And it came to pass...

And it came to pass that in the 4 week of the reign of Elder Cluff over the people of Brazil, that he had his second baptism!! woot woot!
so the first picture is something funny, im serving in a desert, thats what the area is, but there is this creek going through the middle with soooo much green!! on the right on the picture is what the are looks like, a desert, but the left, looks like a jungle!! i thought it was a funny contrast. you cant get in any of the water here, they have bugs that will swim up your... ya.. so im not getting in the water. lots of nasty things in the water here
the next picture, and the last, (im not sure why they are in the order they are in) is of a baptisim we had last week. the mom is a member of the church but no longer attends, well, not very often, and she had an 8 yr. old son who was not baptised. so we started teaching the family and got them to start attending church again, and then we got to baptise the oldest son. after we baptised him we found out that, for the mission they cant count it, because he is eight years old, the age you are supposed to get baptised. but its ok, numbers are just numbers, we are here to bring people to Christ through baptism, so if they are 8 or over they need to be baptised. you get it. 
the second to last picture is of the 3 other elders in my apartment, the one in front is my companion, the one in the middle is a Brazilian who goes home in two weeks and who is very (trunky) and the one in back is his companion, a elder who talks non stop about video games haha i took the picture on a bridge in our area, i thought it looked cool.
well i have to get off like right now, so i dont have much time to write.
my comp. and i worked really hard this week and found a new group of people to teach, we had the baptism and 3 investigators at church. it was really cool. so it was my second baptism. also the 19 yr. old who we are encouraging to go on a mission went back to church this week and had a really good time. also, i fogot to tell this to weston, a 19 yr. old in the ward here got his mission call this Sunday, to a state in the south of Brazil. the cool thing is he reports to the MTC in Brazil the day after Weston!! so cool! he and i are really good friends, so he will get to know Weston and me. so cool.
well i have to go, we are working hard and getting more blisters. i hope everyone is doing good back in the states.
Com Amo
Elder Cluff

Tudo Bem

what a week!!

so ill start off explaining the pictures.
I got a Hammock!!! o my goodness im so exited!! i have slept in it the last three nights :) i love it. its like a forest green, like Brazil. (well not my current area, im in a desert), idk i love it. the other picture of it is my companion and I. it cost R$40, so like 25 to 30  US dollars. not bad right? it rock. by the way, every house i have been to in Brazil has hooks in the walls of at least 1 room for a hammock. everyone has one. but mine is the coolest!
the next pic is a Cockroach. they are so big!! nasty hu? never really know what food of yours he has gotten to. the next is a Gecko in my room. on the ceiling. cool hu? there are lots of them, these are white. i tried to catch it but only caught the tail.... they fall off easy.. who knew? but they grow back. nasty.
the last pic is something i have never seen and neither has my comp. Escolar means school. its a School Boat... weird hu? not sure why they have them. but i thought it was cool. the school buses here are different too, there is a few different types and the have the most annoying horns! they pull up to your house and honk so you can come out and catch the bus. but the horns are... terrible. haha
well thats it for the pictures this week. i got my hammock at a "feira" its Portuguese for market, or something like that. they have clothes, food... everything. also, no one cares about copy right here so they have all the new movies and music. a dvd cost R$2  so like $1.50 soooo cheep. they have all the newest movies, Captain America, Transformers, Harry Potter everything! things that are not out yet. and u can get them in English too. guess who cant watch them? so close, yet so far. haha no big deal. but im debating weather i want to get all the new ones so i have them when i get home. haha by then no one will use dvds.   next thing on my shopping list is a big machete!! super cool. lots of places have them too.
So some things that happened this week.
last night my comp and i went to a members house to talk with a 19 year old about serving a mission. trying to encourage him. while we were there he had us go out back to pick some Coconuts off their short palm tree, there ended up being lots of ants guarding their sacred coconuts and we got bit pretty bad. they were tiny but it stung so bad. but we didnt give up! we are missionaries!! we got our coconuts. haha but truthfully i dont even like coconut water. the Brazilians do. im getting to like it more and more. then it was like 8:30 pm and the mom decided to feed us, she gave us each the biggest plate of rice and beans i have ever seen!! in brazil they eat rice and beans with every lunch and dinner. but their meals are different, they eat a tiny breakfast and dinner and a big lunch. so for the last 2 months i havent eaten a lot, no one eats a lot. so she gave us that for dinner, there was no possible way we could finish it. i felt so bad. but i couldn't do it! my comp too. kind of embarrassing but what could we do? they were really poor too. normally they give the leftovers to the kids and they finish it. hope so..
also, when i left the mtc they made a big deal about the water, they gave us a water bottle with a filter in it and said to just use that. well, i used it once... it tasted gross and i couldn't get it to taste better so i just put it in my bag. the water here really isnt that good, but... you have to drink. so i just dont think about it. but sometimes, (two days ago) you go to a members house to ask for some water and they give you water out of old 2 litter soda bottle, i think its not polite to give people water out of the tap because it could have stuff in it. but they just fill the bottles with the tap, anyway, a couple days ago, the water in the bottle was nasty! i could see like dust in it.. gross. but its so hot! and we walked sooooooooo much! that what the water looks like isn't such a big deal. haha
This last Tuesday something crazy happened. i was at the computer house "Lan House" where we do E-mail, and i had my card in the comp to in port pictures, then i left and went to the apartment just down the street, then i remembered my card! i went back and it was gone! the owner of the place said she would look on the camera and we said we would be back in an hour. when i got back to the apartment i prayed hard, cuz all my mission pictures are on that card!!! so i said, i know you can do anything lord, through you i can make miracles happen. so when i go back to the lan house, i want my card to be there. i know that through my faith it is possible. so i went back. with complete confidence it would be there, and it was!! the owner looked on the cameras and saw who it was. then 20 mins letter the person came back! and the owner said give me the card or i'll call the police, because the person denied having it. then he handed it over. :) cool eh?
well, thats all i got this week i think. so be sure to send me more pictures! im putting together a cool album. thanks 

i hope everyone is doing good!
Com Amo
Elder Cluff  (the Brazilians say, Cloofy) hehe

A Letter From His FIrst Week!

Note: This was one of the first letters that Dallas sent from the field...it's a letter from BEFORE the previously posted letters. :)

hey!! so much has happened. im in the field. its my second day, i didn't get to e mail yesterday so im doing it today, my p day is still Tuesday. idk when ill normally be on. not really at this time, idk. so i met the pres yesterday and we had luch and stuff, he liked me a lot, he is way cool, so he sent me to a city called Petrolina. it is 8 hours from Salvador and in a different state! just north or Bahia. but this are has a nic name, "the land of baptisms" it is the highest baptising area in the mission, and its my first area. crazy! hopefully i can learn Portuguese fast. my new comp is cool! his name is Elder Hammon. he is a triplet! he has a sis and bro, so crazy. hes from bountiful Utah. Salvador is hot, but Petrolina is even hotter. its sosososososo hot. its crazy. im exited. idk its way sweet too, i cant wait to get to work, i hope i learn to speak fast so i can teach well. so yesterday i left the presidents house a like 6 pm, waited at the bus station untill 10 pm and got on my bus with my comp and got to my area at 6 am. so long, but i slept a lot.

that's pretty much all i have that's new. about mail, the letters go to the mission office and then i get them like every transfer or something, so lame. so im gonna e mail lots, we get 1 hour and we can e mail like whoever. i can send pics on here too. so ill do that more. well i hope all is good, im doin great. tell me whats goin on at home.

my new apartment is... humble i guess, cold showers, tiny kitchen, just poor i guess. but its cool lol ill send some pics. i love u all, i hope all is well!

Elder Cluff

Twin and Triplet!

hey everyone!

so this week i dont have much time to e mail, but i thought i woud let you know whats goin on. 

no baptism this week but we have two scheduled and coming up. :) this week we walked a toon because we are in Petronia west and we are teaching some one in Pedra Linda, a neighborhood about 2 miles aways, walking through a desert haha my comp and i gave two blessing this week. one to someone we were trying to teach and one to a 97 year old man who looked in pretty bad shape. its a funny storie though, we clapped at someones gate, (you clap here, because there is nothing to knock on) a lady let us in and we were teaching here. she was sitting on here chair and there was a live chicken sitting on the top of her chair, so nasty. it looked like a crow. she was crazy!! and she had a huge wort on her chin with big black hairs sticking out!!! so, mole, says weird things. has a creepy chicken lurking on her chair that looks like a crow.... she was a witch. i know it haha  then the next day she caught us and took us into her neighbors home and there was a really old man laying on the bed, he had recently had a stroke and didnt look to good. so she was like, i brought these boys to pray over you! so we gave him a blessing and she rubbed some weird smelling potion on him.  it was pretty wird.

so the pictures, the first is of the road to that place i talked about earlier, thats is really far. its hard to see the end when your walking on it and we have to walk down it haha and its always the hottest day every when we do.

the second is my arm, i counted over 100 mosquito bites from my elbow to my wrist., just on my right arm. the left had like none because that is the side the fan is on. the attack me in my sleep. so i finally decided to use my repent and guess what? there almost all gone! haha i have like 100% deed stuff. it works good haha

the last pic is the tan line from my watch. haha its getting worse everyday i swear.

im getting better at soccer, we play every Tuesday for a few hours

my Portuguese is coming along. i have gained a lot of confidence this week in speaking and sharing my testimony that this church is true. my vocab is stilll small but gaining.

if you didnt already know my comp is also a twin. well, he is a triplet. its pretty cool. our goal is top baptize a pair of twins. we have already taught one set but they werent to interested so we´re looking for more haha that would be so cool. brazil has quite a few twins it seems like.

well thats mostly it. im working hard and trying to get better everyday.

i hope everyone is doing well! keep my posted

p.s. every brazilian home i go into asks to see my pictures and they are confused when i tell them i have none. so it would be helpful if your could e mail me a family photo or just one of you (for those who are not married) so i have some pictures of home and family and friends :)

Com Amor

Elder Cluff

First Sunday in the Field!

hey everyone!!!

so the first day in the field we walked a full hour just to get to our lunch appointment! them walked around the rest of the day. (i also got pooped on by a donkey. they call donkeys boho, it means stupid. haha they have lots of carts being pulled but donkeys and i sat on one and it pooped and when got on my shoes and pants. haha) then the next day we found Bruno. he had been to church for a month and wanted to be baptised. my comp and i taught him and my first Sunday in the field i baptized him. he is 12. i guess they dont call this area the land of baptisms for nothing. so the pic of the needle in my foot with the thread, thats what they told us to do in the mtc, its supposed to let the liquid out and keep bad stuff out too. i thought it was weird so i took the tread out right after i put it in, but i had lots of blisters. their still really sore but i think my feet are getting used to it. i would add more pics but it takes forever for them to load! the first one just finished! so im just sending these.

im learning tons of Portuguese! we teach like 5 lessons a day and my comp has me teach a lot, although my Portuguese is still very bad. im learning fast though!! the area im in is very poor, lots of mud huts and everyone has concrete floors, but their all so happy and so friendly! i love them tons.

my apartment is... like the rest of my area, we run out of water every day. its weird to take 2 or 3 minute showers with the water on as little as possible, but im getting used to it. also the showers are cold, there is no hot water here. its ok, u get used to it. :) the fruit is so big and very cheep. i eat so many bananas haha i did laundry for the first time in the field yesterday, we have a washer but it doesn't work very well and it uses to much water, so i did it all by hand. by the end of 2 years my arms will be huge just from doing laundry! haha and we use dry lines, it drys your clothes as fast as a dryer because its so hot! haha most of the roads are dirt and u wouldn't believe how many dogs there are in Brazil. i dont think i have slept on night since i arrived in Brazil without being woken up by a dog. that reminds me, i saw a cock fight yesterday. o and my comp and i were walking back to out apartment and a huge turtle started charging us!! in the middle of a dirt field!! it was so funny!! i picked it up and wanted to take it home but my comp said not. apparently they are very territorial and like to bite. haha there are also cockroaches and lizards on the walls! we play soccer with the cockroaches haha today is p day and i played soccer for a few hours. it was way fun but it was also embarrassing because the Brazilians and so much better than me. soccer is a way of life down here. everyone plays and watches it.

well im not sure how this letter got so long, im still waiting for the pictures to load so i have time to write. also, i only get letters every 6 weeks, so im never expecting them, so just e mail me whenever you want. because we only get letters every 6 weeks we can e mail for a long time and whoever.

the memers here are so cool! we went and viseted some yesterday, they liked me so they gave me a huge bag of bananas and a pineapple and some guava fruit. they think im funny because i try to talk a lot with them but i speak so little Portuguese haha im getting better though.

well the last picture is done, i hope you like them, i hope your not grossed out by my feet, they will be better soon haha im loving the mission and im working hard. i hope all i well with you all. write me back soon and give me an update on whats going on. you can e mail me pictures too and i can print them out, that would be nice because the Brazilians love love love seeing pictures of the elders families and the u.s. and things. well write back soon! i miss you all!!!

Com Amor

Elder Cluff