Letter dated 11 Sep 2013--Tropical storm/Hurricane Humberto, Manuella and Music

Oi Familia e Amigos!

 

Well, sorry for the tardiness of this email but don't think that I have forgotten you people there in the States. If you have checked the Weather Channel, you would know that we have been encompassed by the beginnings of a tropical storm (which I would assume is heading for Florida. Your welcome!) and becasue of that we lost power, internet, and cell phone service. Also, we got trapped in another area and so we had to stay with another companionship for the night (the road had trees covering it and also there had been a landslide). We ended up having to go all the way around the other side of the island to get back to our area. It worked out in the end but we are tired.

 

MIAMI — Humberto strengthened to a Category 1 hurricane far out in the Atlantic early Wednesday, becoming the first hurricane of the Atlantic season.
Humberto was centered about 310 miles west-northwest of the southernmost Cape Verde Islands and is moving north-northwest about 8 mph.

  

 

 

                 

 

• What's this?

Well it sounds like you had a good birthday, Mom. I am glad to hear that. I also have some news to go along with that. We had another baptism this week and her name is Manuella. Manuella is like your Cape Verdean twin, Mom. Like as we were teaching her she just reminded me of you so much. She was a referral of one of the members here and we started teaching her and her biggest worry about joining the Church was that she was afraid that she wouldn't stay active after she was baptized. But we started teaching her, and her kids (who will be hopefully be baptized in the weeks to come), and her faith just grew so much. She is so nice and she just realizes how the Gospel can and will bless her life. Her baptism, I think, was the first baptism that didn't have anything go wrong so that was awesome too.

 

Baptism of Manuella (with her daugther Gamalise and Edy who was baptized)

 

Então muitas pessoas perguntaram-mim "como está a lingua". Eu acho que eu posso falar mais melhor mas eu tenho mais aprender. Creole é mal mas eu posso falar e entender um pouco. Eu não quero aprender Creole até eu posso falar em Português com mais confiencia. Mas com mais tempo, eu vou falar em ambas linguas sem problemas. (So many people asked me "How is the language?" I think that I can speak better but I have more to learn. Creole is evil but I can speak and understand a little bit. I don't want to learn Creole until I can speak Portuguese with more confidence. But with more time, I will speak in both languages without problems.) :)

 

Cachupa (my first real Cabo Verdean food.)

 

So you would be surprised to know that although I am on my mission, I have found a way to use my music skills again. I've picked up piano again. The other day we had to wait to fill up the baptismal font and so for 2 hours I practiced from the simplified hymns book. I can play a lot of the songs in there. Also, I worked on my scales (you know those fun things that are just so awful but so helpful). I hope that I can be able to get good enough to feel confident in playing during sacrament meeting. At this point, nobody in our area can play or really sing... so we will be working on that a bit. We have one Elder that can play piano and he has been playing for the whole transfer but I kind of want to try once too.

 

It's great to hear about how Jordan's talk and Court of Honor went. I bet that was a fun weekend for him. Congrats Jordan! I got an email from Elder Bowen and it sounds like he is doing well. I got a lot of emails this week from family which was a great surprise. Cami, those pictures of Beckham are so cute. Man, I want to see that kid in real life... but pictures with have to due for now. Just make sure he knows that Uncle Brent will be his favorite uncle. Evaly, good to hear that your doing good with the pregnancy. I loved those pictures too that you sent. I definitely have some that I need to save and print out eventually from both of you. Uncle M, I heard about everything that's going on. I hope that you getting feeling better and that the doctors there can help you do that. That is one great blessing about living in the states: good medical attention is available. I loved hearing about the BYU vs. Texas game. It blew many minds over here that they won. I had no doubt that they would win. Man, you people at BYU are so lucky. If someone wants to be awesome, you can send me a chocolate or cookies & cream milk from there. :)

Dream on Elder!!

 

Well I am going to go. It was great to hear from all you and I love you all sooooooooooooooooooo much!

 

Tchão!

Elder Dorff :)