I am almost at 4 months already....WHAT!??

Hello my beautiful family (and friends)!

So my companion thinks I´m a little bit crazy because I didn´t die the first
week we got here. And now that I have talked to some more people about it, I
think I am a bit abnormal. Don´t get me wrong, I for sure had moments when
I thought ´how in the world am I going to do this for the next 15 months´
and ´i just don't want to walk ever again!´ But they were fleeting and I just
went forward. I was really tired, but I wasn´t dead exhausted like most
other people describe themselves being during the first weeks. I can only
guess that its because you guys pray so much for me, or because I
internalize too much and will have a break down in a few weeks or
months....I´m going to hope for the first one!

So yeah. I´m doing good! I haven´t gotten too discouraged even though I know
I have LOTS (aka TONS & TONS) of things to learn. That's what the journey is
for, right?

Anyway, this email is going to be a bit more about cool and different things
in Brazil than the work, but I wanted to give you some interesting facts!

1. Ants here are amazing! Maybe this happens in the US too but I´ve never
seen it before! The ants here carry HUGE objects with them back to their
hills! Big leaves and sticks! Things more than 25 times their size....is
that not amazing or what?! I´m going to take a picture next time I see it
because the first time I didn´t have my camera with me and I was in awe.
Seriously...super ants!

2. Oranges here aren´t orange. They have a little orange but are mostly
green. Its very different but they still taste good!

3. For lots of inexpensive delicious fruit, Sao Paulo is NOT the place to
go. This made me very very sad! We do get delicious papaya and mangos, but
the North and the South have the fruit that is just growing on trees as you
walk by and can just grab them off and eat them. Not the case here. The
fruit is a little expensive here and they don´t have all the yummy exotic
types for me to eat. I really want to travel all around Brazil after the
mission and have all the fruit!

4. Weather: So the first day I got here was deathly hot. I thought I might
die and I got a pretty bad sunburn. I just assumed that was how Sorocaba
was since I heard it was hotter in the interior than the city. Sister
Winters didn´t know either since we were both new to the area so we weren´t
too excited about the heat! LUCKILY, we found out that that first weekend
was record breaking abnormal heat for the area! THANK GOODNESS!! Then we
were blessed with the past week which has been sooooooooo beautiful! It has
been cloudy and breezy and cool! So perfect for the work. We´ve gotten some
beautiful rain too. It has been amazing. I hope it stays this way! Its
gorgeous! Oh and I learned that I have to be a little bit careful telling
people a LOVE rain storms because they are really dangerous here. Since the
houses in the city are built one on top of another in very in stable ways,
there are lots of slides when it rains and a lot of times houses fall and
people die when it rains hard...so most people here are very afraid of big
rain storms. Crazy, eh?

Anyway, thats some interesting facts for you.

Other small world info: One of my zone leaders is Elder Gratil. He is from
Gilbert and graduated a year after me from Gilbert High! His best friend is
Tanner Dahl who I was friends with and took to Morp when we had the cowboy
theme! So funny! Elder Gratil and I like to reminisce about the amazing
restaurants we miss and especially the Mexican food!

I love the food here though. Its delicious! We always have beans and rice
at lunch, and then usually fried chicken, or stroganoff, or a lasagna or
pasta thing. Oh and salads here are just lettuce and tomatoes usually.
Different but still good! Its yummy. I love it! Our ward is really great to
us! I love them all!

Oh and last thing: We finally met with our Ward Mission Leader and the
counselor in the bishopric that is over the ward mission plan and they are
awesome! The leader was just called last Sunday but they both have great
ideas and plans and really want to work. I´m so excited to work with them!

Alright, times up but I love you all SOOOOOOOO much!!

Sister Knudsen