I'm No longer being trained, so it's a BIG STEP!!!

February 13, 2012
Dear Family,
Wow, this week was crazy! Well, not too crazy, but it seemed jammed packed with things to do.
So, Tonight we find outabout the transfers, so I still don´t know. But what´s probably going to happen is Elder Brino will probably leave the area, and I´ll stay. It´ll be really strange without Elder Brino, and hard too, because I’ll have to do a lot of the work on my own now, but I’m really excited to see what will happen. As of today, I’m no longer being trained, too, so it´s a big step!! haha.
Wow, Elder Scott is getting transferred? How crazy. But it´s good, too. 7 and a half months is a
looooong time for a missionary in one place. Elder Brino has only been here in Bairro Novo for about 4 months and he´s ready to leave. haha.
I explained a little bit in the letter I’m going to send, but with Silvane and her family, things
got a bit complicated. Silvane moved to another area with her boyfriend :( So now it´s looking like she won´t get baptized. At least not with us. And Patrique is not super interested in the church, and doesn´t want to get married. We´re still working with them, but it´ll be really hard. But we have faith! However, the Silvane´s nephew, Luis, is amazing! We’ve been teaching him too, and he´s already ready, it´s amazing. We´re preparing him for baptism this week. Haha, me and Elder Brino are both kind of anxious with this transfer, because we both are soooo excited for Luis, and want to baptize him. But, one of us will be transferred before the baptism, so..... haha, we´ll see. But it was awesome, we asked Luis the other day if he felt ready for baptism, and he got quiet for a moment, started to think, and then said ´Well, I’m keeping all of the commandments, and I’m reading the book of Mormon every day... So I think I’m ready.´ lol whaaaaaat!
My goodness, it´s cool when they understand principles, and they understand what it takes to be baptized!
Wo, the 5 week thing is kind of crazy. I don´t know if it would work for everyone, but I think it would have been a lot better for me. You learn waaaay faster and waaay more in the field. But it´s important to learn the basics at the MTC. it´ll be interesting to see how this pans out.
Here, with Carnival, it´s pretty peaceful. We just keep working straight through the Holiday.
However, this Missionary that just returned in the ward here, he was serving in the Northern Part of Brazil (Baiana) and he said that the whole mission shut down for two weeks. I asked him why they did that, what do the people do during this holiday, and he said ´It´s just apostasy. Complete apostasy´ LOL, I didn´t ask more after that.
Ok, I’ve got to go, my times up! I´m writing you guys a letter today, so be waiting for it! I´ve been
getting your letters, but still haven´t gotten the Valentines package. I probably will this week.
Tchau!
Elder Twitchell