Choo-Choo!!!

This week was awesome!!!!

So basically, I was just traveling the whole week. We had only two Zone Conferences this week but lots of other stuff to do away from BH.

The first stop was in Sete Lagoas!!! It was awesome to pass by there again and see old familiar places. That place is really beautiful. Going there and back, we just rode with the President. We talked about a lot of things during the trip. We talked first about the mission, then missionaries, then future leadership callings, then somehow we got on the subject about marriage. WEEIIRD, It’s kind of weird to think that now after the mission, any kind of dating situation could have an eternal consequence, unlike before the mission when I knew that whatever kind of relationship I had would have to end at some point.

I am super glad to have served a mission because it has helped incredibly with my ability to just TALK; talk to any kind of person and start up a friendship. My mannerisms towards people have really changed. I will still have some situations where I know that people will be like, "Man, that is one weird dude." But it will be a lot less often than it was before the mission.

After our first Zone Conference, we got back at night, packed our things up and then got a midnight bus headed to Ipatinga, a city about four hours away by bus. Got there, got to our room, slept for about an hour, and then went off to do our second Zone Conference. It was pretty hard to stay awake the whole time, even harder to look excited. But it went really well. After the conference, the president told us that at the chapel that they have in the center of Ipatinga, there would be a special open house the next day for all of the major politicians of the city. The mayor-council,  the commission, the public relations committee, health care committee; all the big dogs with the money. The President said that originally he was going to have the Zone Leaders head up the open house, but then he felt that we needed to do it. So we cancelled our trip going back home that night, got everything prepared the next day and met with the City politicians and leaders. It was really cool. The church hired a company to make appetizers and drinks and have someone in a tuxedo bring it around to everybody on a silver dish. Unfortunately I didn’t have my camera so I don’t have any pics, but it might be in the Ensign or in the paper and I'll snatch it. After the open house we did a 24 hour division with the Zone leaders until Thursday night, slept in our room, and bought a bunch of junk food.

The next day we worked for a few more hours to kill time until three o'clock, because we found out that there was a train line from Ipatinga to BH, and come on, like I’m gonna pass up on an opportunity like that! So we worked until our departure time and then took the train home. We got back here at about 9 o'clock last night. The train was awesome!!! You could go between the two cars and just look out the half door. I felt like I was in the time of the Great Depression, train jumping to get places. I felt like a kid again.

This was the fastest week ever! Its weird to think that after this letter, there will only be two left that I will write.

Love and miss you all!!

Elder Smidt X

Zone Conferences...

Family and Friends,

This week my companion and I had our first Zone Conferences. My focus for these conferences is to teach the missionaries how to work with leadership in the ward and stake and to encourage and liven up the missionaries. My parts have been about 50 minutes long during the conferences because we are given a specific amount of time to teach. The Assistants, the President and Sister Fortunato both talk, both the secretaries speak for about 15 minutes each. Then we have lunch and then we just do practices.

It's really interesting to me how much easier public speaking has become to me. I remember before the mission I was asked to teach one Sunday in Elders Quorum. What a mess. I didn’t even know how to TEACH! That is the biggest thing that I have learned on the mission, how to teach, not just talk. I remember that Sunday I finished my lesson with 15 minutes left to go in the meeting. So I just told them, "Well that’s it, I don’t know what to do now." So they all just talked about sports for the last ten minutes. But man, how things have changed dramatically. There should be some pictures on the Misson Facebook by now of the conferences, but I haven’t been able to take any new pictures recently. 

We moved to our new apartment this last week and it is awesome!! Other than that, nothing new has happened this week. 

Hope you guys have a lot of fun in Chicago and eat a lot of Chicago dogs for me. Send Aunt Lori and Uncle Scott a big hug for me.

Love and miss you all!!

God Speed,

Elder Smidt X

Elder Smidt...

*From the Mission President's Wife*

Dear Michelle and Mark Smidt

We are so excited to meet you. Thank you so much to send us your plans to flight. We will pick up you at the airport. 

We would like to invite you to have a dinner or a lunch in our home. We will talk with Elder Smidt about that. 

We love your son. As Assistent of Mission President, we can see his trainings with other missionaries. He is humble, powerfull, like a perfect leader. He knows perfectly how to teach, and I love hear his teachings.

Congratulations to have a wonderfull son as a missionary here in Brazil. We are gratefull to serve with him.

With love

Sister Fortunato

Craziest Week EVAH!!!

Family and Friends,

Mom- First off, we do have Google maps on our cell phones, only the staff does. We have an unlimited plan but the rest of the mission only has 100 minutes to talk and that’s it. I made a picture yesterday of the Staff during my spare time. I was waiting for a meeting with the President and I had nothing to do, so I made this picture. It’s all of our faces except for the girl, she still has the same face. 

I got the package!!! Thank you so much for it. I loved every bit of it, except I still haven't opened the Cereal yet. I'm going to try to save it for later. I love the Old Spice. Did they stop making the Fiji Old spice with the white stick? That one is by far my favorite. If possible, I would like some of that ready for me when I get home……and Axe hair puttyJ

So this week was by far the craziest week ever! It’s a blessing to have all the new missionaries coming out, but it is also a challenge when they all come in. I won’t even be able to explain it fully, you just had to be here to see it. We start our Conferences next week, but this week was transfers. NUTZ. So, Tuesday morning we had a small meeting with the President and we talked about transfers. The President had already decided on where he wanted the missionaries, but we still discussed what would be good and bad and made some changes. Then we had 15 new missionaries come in. 13 in the morning and another 2 at 1:30 in the afternoon. Elder Schendroski and I went to the airport with the President and Sister Fortunato in the morning to pick up the Elders and 3 sisters at the airport. We got there about 11:30 am. It’s about a 1 ½  hour trip. Right when we got there, the sisters got in the president’s car and headed to the office, but Elder Schendroski and I took all the Elders, their suit cases, and the sisters suit cases and took a bus back to the city. Right when we got there we left all the missionaries with the two Secretaries and Elder Schendroski to do a new missionary training while I left and went with the President again to pick up the other two missionaries. The President wanted me there to translate because they were both Americans. So I was the translator during that car ride back, but going there the President and I had some good one on one time. We talked about some things we can do in São Paulo when you get here.

After we got back, we went straight to the Mission home to eat lunch. Elder Schendroski was in charge of bringing all the other missionaries from the office to the mission home, but apparently they all left and locked the office without knowing that there was an Elder in the Bathroom. When he came out there was nobody left in the office and the door was locked. He got scared, grabbed the office phone which happened to have the President’s number next to it, called it and was just like, "Uh President, I went to use the bathroom but when I came out everybody was gone. What do I do?" So Elder Schendroski had to go back. We got him, ate lunch, bore testimonies, everybody was crying (I think more out of fear than anything) but joined in one cause; to serve the Lord. Then they stayed at the office while we finished up planning the transfers. The office isn't that big, so 20 people in total is a lot. They were all really loud and hyper waiting there, playing stupid games that were just irritating. Then the transfers were finally released, all of forty of them, which meant calling 80 missionaries. A HUGE transfer, and it was already 8:30 pm and we had to still wait a little longer for the President to call the new leaders. He likes to call them personally and tell them about their new calling, and then we call them afterwards confirming their calling and their new areas. So we just started calling the missionaries that were being transferred without new callings. I accidentally called one Elder that was being called as Zone Leader before the President called him. Right after I told him, I realized what I was doing so I was just like "Uh, just kidding, I read the wrong thing! You're staying exactly where you are. BYE!" And hung up.

Then we took them all to the Secretaries house which is where we were temporarily, but they took up all the beds, so we went with the sisters to the Hotel to sleep. It was already like 11:30. We checked into our rooms and tanked out, but it was pretty cool, my first hotel stay in Brazil. The next day was crazy! All the new trainers arrived at the office at the same time. Now about 40 missionaries stuffed in the office, with ALL of their bags. I was hurdling over things for 5 hours trying to help everybody. It was a mess. We had to get their phones organized, get DVD players to them with the training DVD's, give out their blankets and pillows, and help them locate their houses. It was just a mess, a lot of impatient missionaries, a lot of lost people, and I was getting super impatient because I was being asked a lot of stupidly ridiculous questions. Finally I just yelled out loud, "Whoever is able to leave, can leave now!" They all got nervous and started trying to leave, but there was only one working elevator on the tenth floor that holds only one companionship at a time with all their luggage, so that took another hour or so. Then we had to rush to lunch at the Mission Home with all the missionaries going home. We ate quickly, came back, went to the airport with three of them, checked them in at 9:00 pm, came home, got our stuff, got to the apartment at about 12:30, changed, went to bed, woke up at 3:30 am to bring the rest of the missionaries to the airport, got them shipped off, came back, and I was just dead. Right about now I'm recovering from the transfer. It was just a pure headache that lasted for about three days straight. But it’s all part of the job, Workin hard or hardly workin, eh Mack? 

The leadership experiences that I’ve had in the office are teaching me a lot, but apparently I have a lot left to learn.

ONE MONTH!!

God Speed,

Elder Smidt X

Conference...

Family And Friends,

Today will be excellent. I am super excited to hear the conferences today. Too bad I wont be able to eat pizza with you guys. But we got something fun planned today. We will be watching conference today in the office. Since it’s our P-Day, so we will hook up the projector and watch it here and we will also be eating waffles with maple syrup. Then afterwards in between the two sessions, we have the office Olympics planned. I made an invite for the office today. You should read it and see if you agree. 

Anyway, my new companion is from São Paulo. His name is Elder Schendroski. His name comes from Prussia. He is a really cool guy. I will be happy to end my mission with him. 

Next week I will do my first complete transfer. I will have to get the greenies from the airport and call in all the transfers the night before. It should be good. 

We are getting a lot of new missionaries in this week, this month in total there is an estimated 20 missionaries that we will be getting. Just waiting on some Visas still. But during transfers, it’s just crazy!

So in preparation for all of this there is a huge need for more houses on the mission. My companion and I just went traveling this whole week, doing a lot of house looking, picking the best quality houses, best locations, for the cheapest prices. We found a bunch of really good houses for cheap. It took a little bit of searching, but it will all work out. I just wish that the missionaries had done that before I got on the mission because when I got here, the houses were horrible! But slowly we have been trading out the houses for good ones.

After next week we will start the Zone Conferences. I'm kind of nervous but I'm sure it will be fine. Elder Bond told me that during Zone Conferences the time just flies by because EVERY day you are traveling to a different zone. And this is my last month so the end may come sooner than I will realize.

Love and Miss  you all!

Elder Smidt X

I didnt win the Chubby Bunny Contest. I'm just a cotton headed ninny muggins!!

Elder Smidt X