Excerpt from Whitney’s third letter Feb 27, 2008

So... I may have a semi-amusing anecdote... stress on the may. I have several anecdotes... maybe one is amusing.

1. In class were learning our plurals and our animals, so we had to play charades. I had to act out an alligator. Easy. Someone had a pig. Also easy. Sister Tittelfitz (pronounced as Chee-chel-fee-chee by those of us who think pretending to say it in Português is funny...) got a dragon... How might you act out a dragon, you might ask? Apparently you blow air out of your mouth... in a kind of hiss... and when everyone just guesses tiger and lion... then you try to flap your wings. and your wings are your arms. and they kind of just convulse up by your head. no one guessed dragon, but several people nearly lost control of their bladders from all the giggling. The lizard by Elder Thompson was almost as amusing. Aparently a lizard splays itself against a wall and wiggles. And the parrot by Elder Evans was cool too. He put his hands in his armpits and bit on his lower lip and sqwauked occasionally. He was quite persistent about it. Awesome game.

2. Me and my compy's were walking around the track after lunch... or maybe it was dinner... when a wine cork came flying over the wall and landed on the track. I now have a wine cork. It smells of wine. Red wine.

3. I now know how to sing "who stole the cookie from the cookie jar" in portuguese. It goes like this:

--(insert name here) roubo o pão da casa de joão.
--Quem, eu?
--Você!
--Então quem foi?
--Foi (insert name of person you´re qccusing of stealing bread from john's house.
(repeat with new name.)

The best part is if somebody doesn´t say their part right, you get to interupt them with a new song, to the tune of "it´s raining, it´s pouring", you sing "não sabe, não sabe, você têm que aprender. orelhas de burro, cabeça de e.t." Which means "you don´t know, you don´t know, you have to learn. ears of a donkey, and head of ET." ET as in the Extra Terrestrial.

I'm going trackting on Friday! I expect some prayers. I'm a bit nervous. And a bit excited. The girls that went last friday said they had an amazing time and they really felt the spirit and knew what to talk about when they talked to some people... like they were directed in their messages. That's the part that I don't know if I can do... say the right thing to the right person. But I guess I'll give it a try. I've got a couple of street contacts prepared. And we'll be passing out pass-along cards and books of mormon. If any of you feel like you should start contacting people on the street, you should know that one of the things that it's recommended that you discuss is the restoration. The best way to do this is say something like the following, in the language of the country you're in, of course:

"Good morning, I have a wonderful message that will bless you and your family. God is our loving heavenly father. He shows his love for us by calling prophets to teach us the gospel. But a lot of times people reject the prophets. But after this happens, god will always call a new prophet because he loves his children in every age. So I know that God called a prophet in our time--Joseph Smith. And through Joseph Smith he restored the fulness of his gospel and gave us the book of mormon, which is a proof that this message is true. I have this card for you. If you call this number you will receive a book of mormon--for free! I know that if you read it and pray to know it's true, God will answer your prayer through the Holy Ghost and this answer will bless your family."

Or you could teach about the Plan of Salvation (that's the second discussion):

"I have a wonderful message that will bless your life. God is our father in heaven and he loves us so much that he created a plan so that each one of us can return to him. As part of this plan, God sent his son, Jesus Christ to suffer for our sins. I know that if we accept Christ as our Savior and repent of our sins we will be able to return to live with God with our families after this life. I'd like to teach you more about this message, could I come by your house sometime?"

And yes, I can say that in português. Boo yeah.