Culture shock! Elder Henry is home!!!

Elder Henry has actually had a pretty good time adjusting back to normal life, but I was typing some of the funny things he said when we first got him back from Brasil. Oh and btw, the family from last week did get baptized, yay Facebook for keeping in touch with members from your mission.  Enjoy!

THERE HE IS!!!!!!!!

Ahhh!!!!!!!!!

The Mom hug!!!

Family hug!

Tori taking a photo with her "new" phone (aka Sherry's old phone)

I couldn't stop hugging him or smiling!

WHOA this phone is like a computer!!!

He looks great!

Good old American Root Beer.

Tori also inherited Sherry's guitar

Elder Henry and Sister Henry in the MTC!  I LOVE THIS PHOTO!!!!!

Seeing Sherry at the MTC

Reunited with Gran Gran

Sherry's good friend Andrew served in the mission next to Michaels so I made them wear their matching soccer jerseys for  a photo to send her!

Michael's initial reactions to the USA:

These cars are so big!

I love carpet!

The highway is so big!

Tina is so fat!

Is the cell phone 3g or 4g?

What can you all do on the cell phones?

Oh look its the carpet in our house (Tori showing him a photo of the cats)!!!

Every single house has 4 or 5 dogs and there are lots of street dogs they are nasty they bite they have Sarna a black skin disease you can get from them they are all deformed. Terrible smell.

The cats take care of themselves

Telling us about how the Brazilians thought mild mexican food was so spicy

BAH is an expression of surprise or excitement

Uhhu means yes or uh huh

MOM! I want to do all the laundry when I get home! I can't wait to use a dryer instead of hanging everything! And I want do all the dishes!!!

Where are the dirt roads?

Wait we have unlimited minutes?!!! In Brazil I had 100 minutes a month! The United States is great!

I'm cracking myself up with my own accent! English is weird!

SCREENS ON THE WINDOWS!!!!!!!!!!

I LOVE AMERICA!!!!!

The first time he ate tacos, without hot sauce, he thought they were spicy.  hahaha!

Leaving his "son" with 4 pending baptisms, Elder Henry heads home.

Dear Dad,
     You hit the nail on the head.  I simply feel super surreal, I feel like a deer staring into the headlights waiting for the car to hit me lol.  At least -I- remembered Spencer's birthday.  Of course, a lot of good that does him, seeing as I'm still here in Brasil LOL.
     I'm pretty confident that my greenie will be able to make it here no problems.  Unfortunately for me, we have 4 more baptisms lined up for next week that the next missionary will be able to inherit. (Michael trained his current companion, so he is his "son" in mission tradition).
     I'm pretty excited about our mountain climb.  You know I've never hiked to the Y before?  I would love to go with you guys.
Love you Dad, until Thursday!
Love,
Elder Henry

Yeah, I'm pretty anxious to see you guys again.  Man it really doesn't feel like the end of the mission.  I feel like there's still another year or so left for me, now I understand why everyone says, the mission is so short.  When you are in the mission it feels like it will never end, but now that I'm here, it all seems surreal.

Also I'm planning on leaving most of my Shirts/Pants, my trench coat, a pair of shoes, and the camera here with some members and recent converts.  Paula, the bishop's wife has needing a camera for a long time, and with your permission I'd like to give it to her as a parting gift.  It probably isn't worth that much in the states, but a new camera here is out of reason for a Brasilian.  They are super expensive for what they make in a month. 

I have flip-flops and tennies, as well as tee-shirts.  Cargo shorts would be good, but I also have a pair of gym shorts (only problem is they are pretty raggy already).

I love you all, until Thursday!

Love,
Elder Henry

Spencer's birthday and Sister Sherry Henry's blog info

Sherry's mission blog is at:  http://SisterHenry.blogspot.com, her mailing addresses are available there.

Today is Spencer's 17th birthday!  He started his first job yesterday working at a furniture store.  He got a 4.0 GPA at Clark College this quarter! We are so proud of him!

 And Sherry was set apart as a missionary this morning!  Happy happy day! 

A few photos from Sherry's farewell

With Grandpa and Grandma Henry

 Last family most of the family photo

Spencer's birthday

Sister Sherry Henry - Missionary Photos by Heather Gibert Photography

Having your closest Aunt (who used to take care of her when she was a baby) take your mission photos is just so wonderful! If you'd like to book Heather for missionary or senior photos, leave a comment and I will get you her contact info.

 

 

 

Last baptism of his mission! And 4 Elders in the ward now!

Last baptism of the mission!  In beautiful Mathias Velho.

Dear Mom,

Of course I'll write next week. It will probably be super short. But for sure I'll send at least a "I'm alive!".

     Well we had yet another baptism this week, but beyond that we don't have any perspectives for this week in baptisms. We had a super productive week administratively as we received two new missionaries in Mathias Velho. I feel pretty good about that, as I took a ward that was baptising 3 per year, to a ward that needs to have 4 missionaries because of all the work here. Of course not everything is perfect, and our apartment is SUPER cramped (its basically a studio apartment, with one tiny little bedroom. The poor other pair of missionaries are sleeping on the floor because they don't have beds, and not even space to put two more beds). We hammered out a ward mission plan, and for the first time since I got here, the bishop actually seems excited to work. Yeah, I feel pretty satisfied with what I have done here in Mathias. Now I just have to find something productive to do this week as we have hardly any investigators >.>.

     Yup. I'm pretty excited to come home next week, but its super surreal. I feel like just like I felt like before the mission. "I'm actually going home? I'm actually going to live in a different country here in a week? What's it going to be like?" <- Pretty much the thoughts passing through my head. The new companionship here are Elder F. Oliveira and Elder Luz, both are from São Paulo. They are both 4 months into the mission, so we've got 3 greenies all in one house with me lol. Well I guess I'll attach a photo of the baptism before I go.

     Love you Mom!

Love,

Elder Henry

Looks like they were having a good time with some of the new converts and YSA's.

Strong to the finish.

I can't remember if this has been on the blog already--reliving his childhood by playing in the ball pit with children in Mathias Velho.

 

 

Dear Dad,
     I wanted to let you know, because of our conversation a couple weeks ago of how we had baptised yet another mom (without the father) into the church, that miracles still happen. Heavenly Father was able to help their marriage, and here we have the last member of the family being baptised into the church. L, the father.
     Ah man, how I am dying for some fresh home baked chocolate chip cookies!!!
Love you dad,
Love,
Elder Henry

 

Dear Mom,
Sherry is completely right. Absolutely ridiculous 35$ for a piece of paper that says "I've never done nothing wrong here in Clark County". (Sherry had to pay for her police letter and her Apostille this week and was none to happy with the fee system).
     Yup we watched the missionary broadcast on Sunday, it passed here at 7 o'clock, so I'm pretty sure they taped it and showed to us afterwards.  How crazy is that! Missionaries will be able to use facebook and blogs now to proselyte! Of course it will probably take a while to hit here in Brasil, where we still don't have cars, or cell phones that can text :P. Fortunately for Sherry she'll probably be able to use Facebook on her mission (lucky!).
    This week we finally finished off I's family. Her husband was baptised into the church. I really hope things continue to go well for this family and that they will stay strong in the church. I've done my part, now its up to the ward and them to make the right choices. They are going to have a rough road ahead of them, but I believe that they can make it to the temple one day. Oh man, I hope that here in a year I see a picture of them sealed in the temple :).     

     Speaking of temple, we are going to the temple today with President Wright. My last time going through the temple here in Brasil for probably a long time.
     I forgot to tell you, we are 100% safe down here, I don't know if there's been anything on the news about it in the states, but there are a ton of Protests going on here. Nothing super serious, and there is some violence but much less than the TV shows. Also everything is happening in like São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. There are protests happening here in Porto Alegre and there was one yesterday in Canoas, but we are so far from the center of the city that I didn't hear or see anything.
     Love you Mom, can't wait to see you in a couple more weeks.
Love,
Elder Henry

Going strong to the end.

Dear Dad,

That's awesome that the truck is up and running once again!
The travel plans aren't too bad for me. I don't really mind a road trip, but I will be released for the trip right? Because I do -not- want to spend 14 hours in a car without music or movies to watch. Heck, I'll be able to use that time to catch up on Dr. Who with the whole gang ;). Also after visiting Sherry in the MTC I was planning on heading up to the Provo Temple, and meet up with some of my friends for a little while to chat and say Hi. Nothing that will take the whole afternoon, but something like 30 minutes to see everyone before heading back to Washington.

Well I better go e-mail Mom before I run out of time. Love you Dad!

Love,
Elder Henry

 

Dear Mom,

Well life is pretty normal here in Mathias Velho. We didn't really get a whole lot accomplished last week. It was one of those weeks where you pass by your investigators and they aren't home all week long. Like it was a conspiracy against the missionaries. A.L. was confirmed yesterday which was good. L went to church, and has a baptismal date for next Sunday, and most of our recent converts were at church as well. So yeah everything yesterday was pretty pleasant.

Its a misty gray Washington kinda day, which is pretty awesome, and we are gonna spend most of our P-day today with Vitor and Ederson. Mmm, I do miss your pork chops and applesauce.

Yeah pretty lame e-mail. but hey that's life right?

Love you Mom,

Love,

Elder Henry