New Area, New Comp, New Transfer

Hey hey hey! Who has two thumbs and is finally out of the mission office? THIS GUY!

I've been sent an hour north (by Metro still haha we're at the end of the red line) to Póvoa de Varzim! I'm now in the Porto North Zone. I'm back to being a regular old district leader, which is nice I guess. I haven't had a meeting yet and won't this week because of zone meeting on Thursday. But on the plus side, there are only a pair of sisters in our district, so no divisions haha! Póvoa is a really cool place...I like it here, very tranquil. It sits right next to the ocean. My comp says the beachside on sunny days is great for contacts. Oh my goodness, yesterday we walked down a road alongside the beach and I saw the waves and the wind was howling and it was cold but sunny and I loved it :)

My Companion is Elder Gomes. He's from Lisbon and is a native Portuguese. He was born here and so were his parents, his grandparents moved here from cape verde. He's a cool kid. Only member of his family who's a member, and got himself on a mission against everything that could've stopped him. Very inspiring.

We have two big cities we work in, Póvoa de Varzim and Vila de Conde. We live at the bottom of Póvoa close to Vila. We walk back and forth. I'd forgotten how much walking you do without a car haha. It's been a while. But I think I've lost those couple of pounds this week that I gained in the office haha :) It's a good kinda sore that you feel at the end of the day. very satisfying. You feel like it was a hard day of work. We do a lot of contacts, especially close to the beach.

We've got a special ward activity at the end of march for Easter of 4 days that we're starting to pass out invites this week. It's awesome. Elder Gomes always thinks big and then acts accordingly. I really like that.

I really like this ward. They're all so nice and excited to work with the missionaries. Our ward mission leader is young and got back from his mission in Sep, so that's cool : )Quite a few old ladies, two or three families. Only 2 young women for the youth, but we're working on making it 3!

They had been teaching a young woman named Inês before I got here. Our only problem is that her mother will let her be taught but keeps giving excuses to not let her be baptized.  It's very sad to see. So we're still trying to help her and teach Inês.

Well there's my update for y'all :) Have a great week!

Abraço,

Elder Buchanan

Representative of Christ

Hey all :)

Well, we're coming towards the end of a transfer here in the Portugal Porto Mission. That means change. It's funny how when change used to be such a bad thing, you come to love the opportunity it gives you to grow as a missionary. It's an opportunity to get a fresh start. That's something I took away from our mission tour that we had with Elder Kearon yesterday. That I have the opportunity of a fresh start each and every day. It's incredible!

Whole Mission

And that's the beauty of the sacrifice of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Because of what he did, we can have a fresh start, as many times as we fall we can get back up! Through being baptized and then participating in the sacrament (or the remembrance of Christ) each Sunday, we can begin anew. And that is what I'm here to spread. That news. That truth. That we can be redeemed by and through Jesus Christ and His restored church.

I am a representative of Christ. I tell the world that every day I put on my nametag.

I want to make sure that all of you know, that I know that Jesus Christ Lives. That He is our Savior. And that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is His complete church on the earth.

Have a great week! :) 

Abraço,

Elder Buchanan

Short, but Sweet!

Hello! 

This'll be a short one, I don't have much to report on! Just a regular old week...

We have a huge mission conference coming up this week, which is going to be awesome! The entire mission except for Maderia (the island) will be there! 120 something missionaries! haha :) President plans on being very strict on time and dress standards as an area 70 is coming! He's going to give a training, which will be very cool.

It's amazing how the weeks blur together, especially when I just sit at the computer all day, trying to write a manual to help future secretaries know how to perform tasks!

Elders Eldredge, Joao, Buchanan, and Humphrey

Dinner at the Ashby's

We have a cool event for Valentines Day coming up this weekend! I'll let you know how it goes! 

Have a great week!

Abraço,

Elder Buchanan

Sometimes you feel like a nut, Sometimes you don't!

Almond Joy's got nuts, Mounds don't. :D

This week was highlighted by our trip into Porto to go to a restaurant called NUT which serves food revolving around nutella. The crepe with ice cream was pretty darn good actually. We went with our investigator José!

Interesting news about José! I don't think I've ever told y'all about him. He was found by or rather he found them) Elder Hicks(my comp from last transfer) back at the beginning of his mission when he served in Porto 1st. Well he wasn't able to get baptized because of special circumstances. SO he's been "investigating" the church for over a year! But President knew that he wanted to serve a mission and if he waits too much long, he'll become too old. So he's been trying to get approval for José to be baptized earlier and he just told us that it's almost for certain José can get baptized at the end of February! He also gave us a large order about José's baptism -- there must be 100 investigators there. WHOA!

So we've got some large plans to involve missionaries all over the Porto area, everyone José knows, and we're gonna do everything we can to not only have 100 investigators there, but to make it as special and spiritual of an experience as possible!

In other news, President has decided to change the make up of the office and dissolve my position and have it absorbed by a new position of an Administrative Assistant to the President. So I'm going to be spending the rest of the transfer here training Elder McColley on how to do stuff, and also writing (or rather finish writing) an executive secretary manual. So that'll be nice to finally be relived when this transfer gets over. I get to go to a new area and just be a normal missionary again, walk, not have to eat fast food due to lack of time...Maybe I'll lose some weight again...haha :) cuz unfortunately...I've gained some back. :'(

I don't really have any other news than that! So I hope y'all have a great week! I miss ya! I think of ya! 

Abraço,

Elder Buchanan