September 4th letter

Hello,

SORRY for not letting you guys know that I would have preparation day today instead of Monday - I need to be better about that. We have a leadership meeting every first Monday of the month.

Elder Riquerme and AJ

Wow, I had forgotten that it was just last week that we had area transfers! I was only reminded when you guys asked about my new missionary companion. He is Elder Riquerme, and he was born in Santa Catarina here in Brasil, but for the past 4 years he has been living in Ponta Grossa, Paraná. He arrived in the mission field the same day as Elder Zacheu [a previous companion], so he's got 6 months on the mission. He's a really cool guy - he likes to joke around, talk about stuff, and he laughs at my jokes, so that's cool. He didn't know that he was going to be a zone leader, so that really took him by surprise. In fact, he wasn't supposed to be my companion...I think next week the Elder chosen by our Mission Presidente will trade places with him. There has been a delay because the other Elder got chicken pox and is still recovering. I was disappointed when I heard that Elder Riquerme would only be temporary because I like the guy a lot.

To respond to your question, yes I was zone leader and the junior companion. All of the zones except for the zone that Elder César [most recent companion] is leading has a companionship of two zone leaders. I'm training Elder Riquerme to be a zone leader, so technically I'm zone leader and senior companion now.

Nothing super cool happened this week. Well, on Sunday a new Ward Mission Leader was called and he is on fire! He is the best Ward Mission Leader I've had on the mission and I've only been with him for 3 days! We sat down on Sunday and for 2 hours made plans to get our ward in gear with missionary work. I'm excited. As a missionary you work with all types of members and all types of ward mission leaders, some do nothing, some give rides to places, some support your ideas, but others create ideas and get the ward moving! So I'm really thankful to have this guy working by our side.

As I mentioned, we had our zone meeting on Monday and it was the first time that I had control (and responsibility) of a zone meeting. I was a little nervous and we did some training and things that were a little different, but it ended up going well. After that I did an exchange with one of the mission president's assistants and he gave me some pointers about how the meeting could be even better and stuff. I'm glad that even though I've been out almost a year and 6 months I'm still learning a lot - it means I'm doing something right.

LOVE YOU ALL!
Elder Bradford

Picture of zone at this week's zone conference