News!

Well this week has been very long and very short at the same time! Crazy stuff's happened right here! I guess y'all know I'm still in the office cuz my Pday is still on Friday! Well Elder Hicks came in on Sunday night, and he let me know that Presidente Amorim has changed his plans for the office, and he wants to return to 4 missionaries, and that I am the new executive secretary! How crazy is that?! I'm still kind of shocked about it! So it's now gonna be my responsibility to make sure missionaries are legal, plan Presidente's travel, prep documents and all jazz! :) 

It's been crazy so far this week. We had to take care of transfers, missionaries coming off Madeira, missionaries going to Madeira, lots of missionaries passing through the office. We had to make sure the HUGE group of missionaries that left this transfer were all ready to go, making sure bags were underweight. Then I had to prep the changes that Presidente had made to the orientation manual for the new missionaries and have it ready by 10am, in the chapel next to the office. Then we had to make sure everyone made the train or bus or whatever to get home after the meeting. So that was fun! Lets just say this week has been a lot of running around, giving rides, work and craziness! So that's been fun so far! But I am more that a little tired haha :) Better get used to it, I'm pretty sure I'll be here a while.

We're planning a big, multi-zone event here in the next couple of weeks, It'll be a Chirstmas/New Years event, probably a little after the new year. We designed an invite yesterday and it looks really good and oh my goodness we are going to hand out so many!!!

Since Elder LeBaron went home, Elder McGhie is lonemanning it. He seems pretty tired lately, he has to do the job of two, don't envy him...

Elder Hicks is my new companion! He's training me as a secretary this transfer and then he's out of here. He's actually very ready to go. The office takes a toll after too long, and this is his 5th transfer here, but he's still doing good. His sister's went home on Monday, he can't even believe that. Our car that we're gonna have here in a week or so is stick, and he's help me get better at driving it. He's learned out here too, so it'll be either A) good or B) blind leading the blind, so we'll see :)

Elder Orozco peaced Porto out, he went down to the Coimbra Zone in Aveiro. I really liked the kid! A little sad to see him go. Can't remember a transfer I've laughed so much. But he's gonna have fun down there.

Today's been pretty good, we went around, stopped at McDonalds and had lunch with some really cool investigators. So that was fun. Then we stopped by one of the malls, Parque Nascente and went around (Happy Black Friday anybody?) and looked at a couple stores. Lemme say, Black Friday is nothing outside of the states. And I LIKE IT. It's great. Everybody's crazy back home. Here its just they've got most of the store's who are just like, "stuffs marked down a bit!" But they do have a lack of thanksgiving here.

Thanksgiving was just a normal day, but it was nice anyway :) Hope y'all had a good turkey day back home! Can't believe its the Christmas season again already! I can't believe I hit my "Year till I go home mark" on Wednesday....crazy. It's amazing how fast this year has passed and how much I 've changed. It's incredible! I love my mission so much :) I don't want to think about going home yet, because I still have a year! IT's so cool and so scary at the same time!

Have a great rest of the week! Happy Shopping!

Abraço,

Elder Buchanan