Happy Thanksgiving!

Dear Family,

I can't believe that it is already Thanksgiving week!  Where has the time gone?  This year I've been a little more homesick now that the holidays are coming on.  I guess that I just have to push forward and be very grateful for FaceTime!  I hope that all of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving this week.  The missionaries will be getting together for our dinner on Thurs. afternoon.  I'm sure glad that we have a good group here.  It would be hard to be all alone and we know that there are some American senior missionaries in other parts of the country who will be alone.  I am thankful that we are in Sao Paulo and we have friends here.

Yesterday we had a wonderful experience.  We went to see My Fair Lady with a group of missionaries.  I'm sorry that they all didn't go.  We had a wonderful time.  There were seven of us who went.  The theatre was wonderful and it is in an area of the city that is very ritzy to say the least!  The stores in the mall next door were of this caliber...Gucci, Channel, Louie Vuitton, etc., etc!  We saw a necklace in a window that was only selling for only $30,000!   Most of the stores were ones I've never heard of before, probably because I've never been to Paris or New York!  It was elite.  There are several malls like that here in Brazil.  In fact, there are more Tiffany stores in Sao Paulo than there are in New York City!

Back to the play.  In case you are wondering, yes it was in Portuguese!  Also if you are wondering how they translated "The rain in Spain...", it went like this, "As tropas atras do trem trotando."  Which translates to......"The troops behind the train are trotting!"    It was a very good production even if I didn't understand every single word.  The set was wonderful as were the costumes, wigs, etc.  They had a screen or panel or something of a newspaper that they would lower and the action would continue in front and the set would be changed behind so that there wasn't any downtime for set changes.  What's more is that they did it in complete silence!  I am really glad that we went.  I decided to splurge and pay a little more and get good seats so we were on row 5 in the middle.  It was fantastic!

Another thing that happened this week is that we got set apart to become ordinance workers in the Sao Paulo Temple!  We will be working on Friday mornings and we start this week.  I have taken sisters through the veil in Portuguese in Rexburg several times!  I can almost make it clear through myself in Portuguese.  This will help my Portuguese.  I'm excited.  At first I didn't really want to do it but Dad talked me into it.  I guess that I was a bit nervous having to do it all in Portuguese.  Dad wanted to work in the temple because we just don't have enough to do during the week and it makes the time move rather slowly.

I drove to Ibiuna today for our church.  Dad will be gone up to Petrolina next Sunday and I still need to go to church out there so I drove today for practice.  The traffic isn't too bad on Sundays, thank goodness.  Sister Cox is going to go with me next Sunday as I can't go alone.  I started song practice today for a Christmas number.  Also today it was the Primary program.  I think that there are 8 children in the Primary and the three oldest boys did all of the speaking parts.  One other reason that I need to go out there next week is that we pick up three people to take them to church and I don't want to let them down.

I hope that you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving.  I will be missing all of my family this week.  That goes for all our our extended family as well.  It is hard to be so far away from all of you but I am thankful for this opportunity to serve the Lord even if it hasn't quite been what we had thought it would be like.  I love all of you very much.  Tell your families hi from us.  Our time is going by quickly.  We'll be home before you know i!

Love,

Mom/Paula

1.  The group.  Harrises, Burkes, Sister Cox and Dad  

2.  no explanation needed  :)

3.  The stage front 

4.  The theatre

5.  The Burkes, Sister Cox and us.  Our other friends were sitting up in a box on the side.

  

1.  Some of the buildings near the J.K. Iguatemi Mall

2.  More of the area.  I think that at least one of those buildings has a heliport on the top.  A whole lot of the wealthy people go to and from work in helicopters down here.  The apartments around this area sell for over $2 million apiece, not the buildings, the individual apartments! 

3.  With the high end shopping around this display, it could easily be made of gold!