A Typical Day

Bob's father, Joseph Reese Baird, wrote a journal while on his mission in Mexico in 1919, and many of the entries said, "a typical day," or "did the same things today." "Weather the same." WHAT! What was a typical day? This is a kind of typical day for us.

Missionaries are supposed to get up at 6:30 a.m. Senior missionaries are not required to keep the same schedule as young missionaries, so of course Bob's alarm goes off at 6:20. He gets up and showers, I either stay in bed until he's done, or sometimes I get up and exercise--move around to some music like Roger Miller's Walking in the Sunshine, or Paul Simon on the ipod. Then I get in the shower, and Bob does calisthenics, the Royal Canadian exercises he has done for years. He shaves while I squeegee the shower so we don't get mold in this humid climate. We get dressed and put on our missionary nametags and eat breakfast. As it gets hotter, we are more often having cold cereal with nuts and raisins and cinnamon in it for breakfast. We pray, usually in Portuguese, kneeling on our couch pillows, bear our testimonies to one another in Portuguese, , give each other a nice hug, and head to the mission office, usually between 8:00 and 8:30 a.m.

Bob always takes the stairs in our apartment building. Sometimes I take the stairs, sometimes the elevators, depending how how much my knees hurt. The office is about 1 and 1/2 blocks away. We dodge cars amd buses going pretty fast as we cross our little street, and say "Bom dia!" to people we pass on the sidewalk. We pick up litter that has appeared overnight from the sidewalks around the mission office. We unlock the gates and get to work.

We arrive at the office, and the elders are usually still studying and it is very quiet. We studyscriptures, Preach My Gospel, and Portuguese. I have a computer program for Portuguese that I use often. I also keep something in the bathroom at home, like Portuguese for Dummies, or Portuguese in Ten Minutes a Day, so I get some study every day. At the office we work on various projects for the mission. Some of the projects have included making a housing log for the mission president's wife to use when she talks with the missionaries about their apartments. They had some papers here, a notebook there, but I transcribed the various papers from the last year and put it in a running log, so she could see that for example, the missionaries in Canoas just got a new fan in August, why do they need another one now.

We've also worked to get the missionaries to give us emergency contact names and telephone numbers and put them all together. We wrote a paper about how to prevent and get rid of rats, mice, fleas, cockroches, etc. We wrote a history of the mission for the year 2007. It was a lot of work.

We usually take a lunch of ham sandwiches to the office. But once or twice a week, we go out to lunch. They have a lot of buffet lunch places here, and the food is great. If I thought I would lose weight down here, I was wrong. The place we usually go for lunch is pretty close to the office, and costs $R6,90, or about $4 American for all you can eat. Buffet livre it's called.

On Monday afternoons, we have district meetings at the ward meetinghouse, one mile away. We walk. Our whole zone (about 20 missionaries) comes together, meets together for a while. Together, we recite (in Portuguese),"Nosso proposito--Our Purpose" from Preach My Gospel, and D&C 4. The missionaries recite this very fast and with energy and conviction! They have both things memorized. Dad has "our purpose" memorized. I have them typed out on small piece of paper and glued into my missionary planner. I read it and I can't talk fast enough to keep up with the missionaries. I cannot read the Portuguese words silently as fast as they can say them. Then we split into districts. (About 6-8 of us) We have a lesson from our 20 year old district leader, about teaching the gospel, which I have to admit, I usually zone out on. It's hot, it's after lunch, it's in Portuguese, and I struggle to stay awake. I'm old.

Tuesdays are P-days. Preparation days. We get up and clean our apartment, we shop for groceries, we do laundry, I cut Bob's hair with clippers we bought here, or get my hair cut. Once I had a pedicure. We run errands. We come into the office to write e-mails and write a report to the mission president about our week.

Wednesday, and Thursdays we work in the office. Friday we help at the institute next door doing whatever they need help with. On Saturdays we take the bus to the temple around 8 a.m. We get on the bus right across the street. It costs R$2 (about $1) to ride the bus. In about 10 minutes we get off the bus and walk about a half mile up hill from the bus stop to the temple. In the hot sun. We work most of the time in the office at the temple. We work hard, get exhausted and haven't burned a calorie.

In the evenings, we stay at the office until 6:30, 7:00, 7:30--until I am starving. Sometimes I walk home early and make supper. Sometimes I stop at the corner grocery and buy something to eat or to cook. Sometimes Bob walks to the corner Churracaria (a store that barbeques meat over an open fire) for some delicious meat already cooked. They cook chicken better than I can--I don't think I will cook chicken the whole time I am here. It is pretty inexpensive--$1 for a cooked chicken thigh or leg for instance.

When the missionaries have an uneven number, and more then one visit scheduled, Dad goes out on appointments with the elders. The young missionaries aren't supposed to teach single women alone in their apartments. If Bob, or Bob and I go, no problem. I don't say much, but Dad does a good job, and I am very proud of how well he speaks Portuguese, and how well he explains the gospel. (Bob says: "Vonnie is learning quickly and speaks very clearly in well pronounced Portuguese.") I am learning a little more, though it seems slow.

Today, Bob and I made a second visit to a family. Diogo is the twenty-something married son, who lives with his parents and grandparents. Diogo and his wife Cheila, are members of the church. Diogo and Cheila asked us to come to teach their grandparents, who they said were depressed and felt like life was over. We taught Diogo's grandparents and parents a lesson about the restoration of the gospel sometime before Christmas. When we went back today, we took them some genealogy papers, and helped them fill out their pedigree charts. They were very interested, and very kind. They said that my Portuguese was getting better, and I think I could tell today that it was.

On Sundays, our ward, the Porto Alegre 4th ward, Ala Quatro, meets at 8:30 am. Supposedly. Sometimes none of the Primary staff get there until 8:50. I go to Primary, and play the piano and sit and learn like the Primary children. Primary is a lot easier to understand than Relief Society! I am memorizing the Articles of Faith in Portuguese. I go to Gospel Essentials class during the Sunday School hour which is for people who are investigating the gospel, and for newly baptised members, and for missionaries. Last we have Sacrament meeting. Again, I struggle to stay awake, but hey, I had that problem at home. At least here I can blame it on the language.

Typically, things don't start on time here. We were asked to be greeters at the ward Christmas dinner, which was announced as starting at 7:30. We got there at 7:00. People trickled in and about 8:35 we had an opening prayer. then we had a program. Finally we started eating about 9:00!

We usually head home by 9:00, but sometimes it's later, 10:00 or so. The elders are supposed to be home by then, at the latest, and we try to keep the same rule, and get to sleep by 10:30.

Bob writes in his journal and I read and after prayers, we go to sleep listening to quiet music on the ipod.

So that's a typical day. Long blog, I know. But our days are long. As the song says, Grace shall be as your day. We are so blessed.