Week 29 Suncoast Enclosures for the WIN

Week 29 

July 9, 2018 

Hey everyone! I feel like I’m at a point where it’s weird to start writing in english hahah! It was a crazy week, in a sense that I was outside of Carregado a lot!! At this point I have also basically seen every part of the main town Carregado!  It is pretty cool here though! I am starting to become friends with all the randoms on the street as well! Especially the young African boys, we have our own handshake hahah. 

3 de Julho, So the night before we headed off to another city Coimbra and stayed the night with two other Elders but the morning of July 3rd we went to our first Zone Conference with our new Mission President, Presidente Fillmore! He’s actually so cool! He had some great stories, taught really well, and his Portuguese is amazing! (He served a mission in Brazil.) But yeah, overall it was a great conference! After that we headed back to the city Santarem because we were doing a companion exchange with the Zone Leaders. Which means I got to serve with Elder Seegmiller! He’s a super great and spiritual guy! 


4th of July! Happy 4th of July to my American friends! Hahah Elder Seegmiller was happy to be with me this day because his companion is Brazilian.... so even though I  am Canadian it was close enough for him! Anyways, we started the day by doing "Banner" in the downtown. That means we set up a banner and then tried to talk to anyone passing, there was 6 of us doing this! Four Elders, and two Sisters! After that we went to some appointments. Following that we went and got Burgers for the 4th of July! We got the burger called "The American" classic hahah. After that we went around working and even met a guy who said he was a missionary in New York back in the day. He asked us how our "Deep Doctrine" was... then went on to tell us that he didnºt wanna talk about deep doctrine because he is responsible for his damnation alone... was kinda strange but that’s life ahah. After that Elder Fajardo and I headed back to Carregado! Once we got home we walked by the church and saw the windows with cracks and big holes in them. It’s a small town so the word gets around fast. We asked what happened and it turned out this crazy guy (that we talk to like every day on the street) was drunk and just started going ham with rocks. He got sent to prison so who knows what’s next for him ahah.

5 de Julho, funny thing is we went home just to go back to Santarem first thing in the morning. We had a district meeting there in Santarem that we did not know about. Sooo we went to Santarem for our district meeting and then once again back to Carregado! sheesh. Once we got back some members had the new windows for the church and the funny thing was is that they had me kinda take charge of a certain area! Now I want to give thanks to my job before the mission at "Suncoast Enclosures". I was able to help out because of Suncoast. At Suncoast we work with a material called "Spline" what it is is a sealer for the screenrooms there and it needs to be put in the right way at the right length. And these windows had the same thing just a bit bigger! So I already knew how to put it in and which way to put it in! There was no debate on it! Crazy to think I used some Suncoast skills here in Portugal! That was basically the day!

6 de Julho, kinda a weird day... not much happened. We tried to contact lots of people on the streets but not much luck. Ya know, just another day in the office.

7 de Julho, Hahah funny way to start the day. So today was the day of the English lesson.. We sent out a mass text and forgot to leave off one member from another ward (who’s job is being an English teacher) and he was mad. He sent us a text freaking out swearing at us, and saying some pretty bad stuff about our religion as well. It was very unexpected but that’s life at its finest! The funny part was I could have corrected his grammer in the text he sent, but I just decided to respond "Desculpa" which means sorry in Portuguese. I didn’t feel like any beef because what’s the point of that. Anyways, the lesson came and 8 people showed up! It was super strange teaching people English. I honestly don’t think I ever saw myself doing this in my life hahah! But it went great, everyone was really thankful and told me they will return next week!! That was awesome! Then no more luck knocking doors in the night aha.

8 de Julho, started with church in the morning, then Irma Luisa’s house for lunch with the members as usually. Something crazy always happens there. This time they had "How to Train Your Dragon" on the TV in Portuguese, so that was kinda cool to hear and actually understand it! After that we walked up a big hill to see if anyone on the outskirts of Carregado needed some spiritual sugar in their life, but naww nobody was interested in our message! We knocked one house and a girl came out in her underwear and told us how it was her 18th birthday and she wanted some ideas how to celebrate it. We made up some excuse and said we had to go. Solid day overall.

Solid week as well. Only one more week until transfer week as well! Who knows what will happen with that!! But yeah time has felt super quick these last two transfers and now I'm already looking back and wondering where the time has went! I has felt both long and short. But all in all, a great decision. I am so glad I’m out here. Although there are people I miss, or stuff I miss, I know I will see them again and I know I can do things I liked before my mission after my mission as well. That’s why while I’m here, I feel I can give my best with service and sharing the true message of the restoration of the gospel. It has blessed my life, I owe it to God to do my part and bless others lives through his power and spirit.

Cool story from this week, is that I can actually understand and even express myself to others in Portuguese and I can easily read stuff as well! Also I make milkshakes and smoothies basically every meal so that's the best.

My scripture of the week is Mormon Ch9 V9

Mormon 9:9 “For do we not read that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and in him there is no variableness neither shadow of changing?”

It talks about God being never changing. I love and believe this fully. I know any promise we read about in the Bible or Book of Mormon is the same for us nowadays if we act in faith, and follow his commandments to stay worthy!

My challenge this week is to compliment 3 different people every day... on something. But it has to be legit from the heart and not just flattery. Flattery is telling someone what they wanna hear, for your own gain. A compliment is saying something from the heart, to express your care.

Anyways this email is basically done. But I just cannot believe Boogie Cousins. Sheesh smh. (NBA Stuff)

Elder out

Mamba out

parks.layton@myldsmail.net

Elder Parks Stewart Layton
Missão Portugal Lisboa
Rua Jorge Barradas Nº 14-C
1500-370 Lisboa Portugal


President and Sister Fillmore (And me) 

Matching ties - Elder Seegmiller 

One of the cracked windows

What a great book

Bussin'

Santarem

"The American"

IDK
A field

Black Roses

Another B.O.M. pic


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