Another Picture!

Thanks to Elder Alec Matthews, I got another picture of Elder Bergquist! This was taken while Elder Bergquist was still serving in the Billings Montana Mission. This is a picture of the Wyoming North Zone...

Elder Bergquist is the 2nd from the right on the back row!

A couple of baptisms and his ID card...

Dallin's email to his dad...

Thanks pops. I always enjoy your letters. ha and yeah, the weather feels pretty similar to the weather at home right now. its like pretty warm in the day but not hot, but then cools down a lot at night. i wear a sweater in the morning and the evening pretty much every day. but it is more humid so even though its about the same temp it feels cooler at night. and i dont have a blanket because they said to only bring sheets, but luckily they had a couple here, so im not dying, but it is cold. i sleep with my sweatshirt and sweats haha. and thats good you still have time to play a little golf. i better be getting a letter from layton soon. and thats cool pres sent me a letter. (his mission Pres. from Montana wrote him) i'll see what i can do about writing him. i probably will at some point. but thanks for the letter dad. Love you! até mais!
Elder Bergquist

And his email to me...

?olá gente! como tá?
I came today to BH to do the stuff at the police station, so im at the mission office and everyone is waiting for me to go eat because nobody has eaten yet, so i kinda have to hurry. sorry! and i dont have my camera, but we'll get on those pics, so for the perguntas:

Have you gone to the police dept to get your ID? it was today, they called me last night at like 6 and we left at midnight, it was kinda crazy.

Did you end up having baptisms this weekend? we had aparecida and sandra. aparecida wore a temple dress haha it was kinda funny, but i baptized her and my comp baptized sandra

How is the teaching coming along? How many are progressing? pretty good, we're working on finding a lot because we found hardly any last week. but we found a family, well a mom and her two sons thats seem pretty firme. she had 7 boxes of cigarros, like i think 2000 and her son hid them in his room haha when we taught the word of wisdom. her mom is gonna live it too even though shes not gonna be baptized.

How is Roberta doing?? shes doing well but she works bastante and so she doesnt want to be baptized this weekend because we havent taught her everything yet

What was your most spiritual experience this week? probably with that lesson on the word of wisdom. it went really well

How is the language coming along? (I love that you use a little Portuguese when emailing us!) its coming, slowly but surely

Do you use your George Foreman? yeah pretty much everyday

Are you drinking bottled water? yes

Do you like the rice and beans? love em! haha but not just that. i like the other stuff too, those dont last haha

but i gotta go! love you all! tchau!
Elder Bergquist

At the Miami Airport..

Thanks to a friend (Cami Snyder), that I met on the missionary mom's email list, I got this picture of the boys today! They were all friends in the MTC. Elder Walker, Elder Snyder and Elder Pierson all went to Alabama to serve while waiting for their visas. This was in the Miami Airport before they all flew to Brasil. They were actually on a different flight than Elder Bergquist... Elder Walker, Elder Snyder and Elder Pierson all flew to Rio while Elder Bergquist flew to Belo Horizonte.

Elder Bergquist, Elder Walker, Elder Snyder, and Elder Pierson.

5/18/11 2nd baptism!

Here is Elder Bergquist's email to his father...
Dad, pops, pai, ha
thanks for the letter. Thanks for the pic haha. but mostly thanks for all the lessons you teach me. we truly are blessed above what i ever realized. and i am thankful for that. its amazing how much i took it for granted in my childhood. not only the material things and opportunities we have there in the states, but with my family too. with a mom and dad that are so loving and great and that raised me in the gospel. so thanks to you to for all my blessings. and thanks for the updates ha. the heatles, thats funny, good old jim rome. and im glad the bulls are winning. brother oliver back in wyoming is probably really happy haha. anyway thanks dad. i dont have much more time and i gotta write mom still . I love you pops. soon to be bubs the second haha. A grandpa. how do you feel: haha até a próxima semana! te amo! tchau!
um abraço!
Elder Bergquist

and his email to me...

Ola todo mundo!
tudo bom lá?! perguntas primera.
How are you? Ótimo! bom demais! loving it here!

How is the language coming along? its coming haha, slowly but surely, everyday im understanding more. and teaching isnt too hard, just like conversational stuff haha when it comes to the gospel i seem to understand much better haha

Have you had any pao de queijo? Did you like it? pão de queijo? have i had any? serio? claro! and of course i liked it! haha whats not to like?! its bread with cheese haha. we have it at least once a week haha. and our branch president told me how its made, its really really easy haha

Do you know Sis. Dunlop or Sis. Corbin or Elder McKell yet? (their moms are on the missionary mom's email group) nope. never heard of any of them haha. oh wait maybe elder mckell. not sure.

What do you eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner? breakfast: a glass of toddy (chocolate milk, like nesquick ha) and some bread or little like cookie/crackers or sometimes misto quench (grilled cheese haha) lunch: BEANS AND RICE! and usually some kind of meat, sometimes some pasta, salad, or like fruit salad stuff. dinner: nothing haha we dont have dinner here. usually when we get home at night at 9 well eat something a misto quench or once in a while we´ll order pizza, or just like a regular sandwich idk

How are things going with the family of 7??!!! I pray for them every day! well. they dropped like a week ago. ha. so not so good. but we´re always finding novos. dont worry

Did Adryenne get baptized? Did you do it? yes she did:) no her dad came down from...not sure haha but her whole family came and it was a really cool spiritual baptism. he did baptized her so like....fatherly haha he like hugged her and lowered her under the water haha it was cool, then her family sang a song for her. it was really good. and we had 3 investigators there:) so thats a plus.

Did any of your investigators come to church? yes! we had sandra, a like 30 year old woman, and aparecida, like in her 50s and her 12 year old neta. and some random guy showed up too. i think it might have been sandra bf. but im not sure haha. and adreyenne of course ha

Are you still living with the Branch Pres? yes we are

Do you take the bus a lot? yeah kinda. at least once a day to get home at night. most days twice. because were working on the opposite side of town from where we live ha

Do you have enough $ for food? no not really haha ive taken a lot out of my personal account because we have to get buses to BH every once in a while: like 80 reais and to varginha: like 30 reais. then we get reimbursed but usually not for a couple weeks so idk haha

Can you email a couple of pics each week? yeah i could, but then it would be useless to send my card home. i´ve taken like 6 pictures since ive been here and like 4 are from the baptisms haha but i´ll send those for sure

How far away is the place that you email from your house where you live? like 4 blocks. not too bad.

How much does it cost you to email? its like 2 reais per hour i think

That is the coolest story about your dream of the guy you are teaching! Are you still teaching him? Is he progressing? ha no! its sad :/ but thats alright haha

How many people are you teaching? ha its hard to say, it changes like every day, but today we have 4 people scheduled to go see.

What was the most spiritual thing that happened this week? probably the baptizm. it was really cool. actually, maybe the lesson we had yesterday with sandra. we had a member there. and it was really spiritual. she has had a lot of trouble stopping drinking coffee ( she drinks like 2 liters a day) haha but we just talked about the importance of obeying 100 percent to show our faith and she picked out a scripture she liked when nefi was bound and he had faith and prayed that he could burst the bands. so i compared that to what shes going through. she has a lot of faith and really wants to do whats right, but she hasnt received a response about the book of mormon yet. she has faith and desire, but she need to show that faith through her actions and live the commandments in order to receive the blessings and certeza that she is looking for.

Is your comp fun? haha... do you ever have a good laugh? he´s a really hard worker haha. its kinda hard to be a whole lot of fun when were so focused on the work haha and when we have the whole language slash culture barrier thing haha. but he´s fun, just doesnt joke around a whole lot. ha

but anyway, this was a great week. we have 4 baptismal dates set. two for this week and three for next. (dont ask me, that doesn't add up... haha) and we found this girl, roberta. wow, she´s definitely one of the elect. no doubt about it. she has been looking and investigating different churches and has really strong faith. we challenged her to pray about our first visit and what we taught and have a conversation with pai celestial. and when we walked in for the second lesson, she was like a completely different person. it was crazy. she did and she said at work some girl asked what happened to her or what was different. she said two angels came to visit her and teach her the truth. man does the spirit guide us to those that are waiting, i wonder sometimes if the spirit is just reminding us of plans we made with each other in the pre earth life to find each other and share the gospel. sei lá. interesting to think about. anyway. i love you all! tchau!
Um abraço pra todo mundo!
Elder Bergquist!

5/11/11 I had a Dream about it!

Here is Elder Bergquist's email to his father this morning...

thanks for the letter and the encouragement dad. It was good talking to you guys too. its crazy with the language because i feel like some days it goes really well and i understand and can say what i need to and others i feel like its my first day here again. its also hard because pres only gives us a half hour, the first half of our mission for language study. and thats if we both want to do it. and my comp just wants to work, which is great but i dont get any time for language study, but i do it on the bus or during my personal study sometimes. anyway i guess president knows what hes doing and if i follow the mission rules the Lord will help me. that is weird that the lakers are out already, at least i wont miss another championship and i dont have to deal with everyones crap hahah. but too bad they didnt three-peat again. sounds like an exciting sacrament meeting haha. wish i could have been there. anyway. thanks pops. i love you. until next week. tchau!
Elder Bergquist

And here is mine...

olá gente!! (Hello people)
How is everybody?? well i kinda just talked to you Sunday so theres not much to tell, but we did find a couple of FAMILIES! which my comp said he has never baptized any. hopefully these will be them! but i´ll answer your questions now

Do you know how long your MP has been out? (Will you get a new MP while you are out?) he goes home the june or july before i do, so yeah i will get a new one but not for long.

Did you find out what area of Sao Paulo your comp is from? vila nova cachoeirinha, ala parada pinto estaca, são paulo norte, também foi da estaca perdizes

So, how did you end up speaking in Sac. Mtg. your very 1st week there? Did you Branch Pres ask you to or did the speaker not show up or what? yeah he asked me, he said he always has them, usually on the third week, but then he called us saturday morning and i guess needed another speaker or something so told my comp i was speaking, then he didnt tell me till that afternoon, so it was exciting haha

Is there much Priesthood in the branch? uhh...yeah i guess...i dont know how many are strong members and like temple worthy or whatever but last week in priesthood there was like 25....thats all of priesthood...

So tell us about the people you are teaching that are progressing. well its hard to tell for sure, but we have adryenne who we set up a time for interview on saturday for her baptism sunday and then yesterday and the day before we found a few novos. umm one was a family of 7! and they seemed pretty firm after the first vision we invited them to be baptized and they all accepted. but we went back last night and only like the mom and two kids were home and they were leaving, so we're going to try again tonight i think. and we found a couple others too, but they seem less firm...but we have invited a lot to SM(Sacrament Meeting) and it sounds like a lot will come, we'll be running around all over sunday morning

Have you guys been looking for another place to live? not really. if we pass a place we'll write down the number ha and it sounds like theyve got something going on in the office....idk

What does your Branch Pres. do for a living? sei lá! ha i asked and he said "a lot of stuff" haha

Do you guys teach the Sunday School class, Gospel Principles? no we dont, i dont know if they even have one, we went to the other one last week, but we didnt have any pesquisadores....so idk

Did you say that you 2 are the only missionaries in Alfenas? yes ma'am

How many are in your district? zone? district is 8: 6 elders and 2 sisters, one sister from the states and one other elder from the states

How far away are they? i dont know, where we go for district meeting is about an hour and a half away on bus

How often do you meet with them? once a week, or if we have to go for entrevistas or something

Are you taking pictures? nope haha. we're only allowed to on pday and at baptisms. and on pday we only leave the house to come here and to go shopping ha. so theres not much to pictures of on pday. sorry! i wish i could take more

What did you do for Pday? so far, we have studied and walked here haha. we're gonna go shopping and then eat and i might cut my comps hair, and he has an ingrown toenail so we're gonna go to he doctor i think.

other than that not much has happened except one guy we taught, it was the weirdest thing, i had a dream about it, i dont remember when or much of the dream, but it was like deja vu. and i was thinking, i hope i can get more in tune with the spirit so i can recognize those kind of things in my dreams like nephi and lehi did. i dont know what it means that i dreamed about it, but i remember being in his house and us teaching then him talking, and i remember in my dream not being able to understand, i think it was before i came out on the mish. idk ha anyway just a little interesting tid bit. i love you all. até a próxima semana! tchau!
Elder Bergquist!

Mother's Day!!!

When you have a son or a daughter out serving a mission... the best 2 days are... MOTHER'S DAY and CHRISTMAS!!! They get to call home!!! °Ü°

Actually, in our case we got to call him! In our email we got from Elder Bergquist on Pday (Wed.) he told us what time to call him (10:30 our time) and the phone number to call.

So... at 10:15ish we got his phone number out... and the calling card... and proceeded with THE call.

We called Elder Bergquist and then called Derek, Derek then called Devin who called Brittany (she is in CO for a baby shower right now!!!) and Brittany called Blake! Once we were all on the line we got to chat!!!

Here are some of the things he told us... (now keep in mind he arrived in Brasil 9 days ago!)

*He gave a talk in church today! Yep, you read that right! haha... he said he is not sure if they could understand him! I asked him what he talked about and he said, "Well, since my language is so limited I basically gave the first discussion hahaha!" He said he doubted that they understood him because he could only understood about 10% of anything he hears! They speak too fast and only say about 1/2 of each word.

Funny story: He said that they were teaching this past week and he asked the lady "What are some things you have been blessed with in your life?" And she said, "huh?" So, he repeated his question and she again said "huh?" hahaha... he said he asked her 3 or 4 times and finally his companion asked her... Poor guy! haha... but, he said he can tell he is learning more and more each day. He said that even when he was in the MTC and was used to praying only in Portuguese every day (for 9 weeks) he got used to that and when he went to Powell and had to speak and pray in English he had to stop and think how... Brad told him that after about 3 weeks it will be much better. He was VERY positive and said he knows it will come! Another cute story he told us: (His companion sounds great! A hard worker!) He and his companion were at a bus stop and his companion said, okay, teach me all you can in Portuguese about prayer. He told him, "talk fast and act like your Brasilian". Dallin said he started talking as fast as he could and it was pretty much nonsense and they both just started to laugh!

*He said that teaching in Belo Horizonte is soooooo different than teaching in Powell. Example: They get in a lot of homes. They give about 5 1st discussions every day... AND, they ask them at the end of the lesson IF they would like to be baptized. IF they say yes, then they set up another appointment to come teach them again but IF they say no then they drop them. He said that is very much unlike how they would do in Powell, they might be "teaching" them and working with them for 9 or 10 years! (I think he was stretching it a bit there)

*He said they have about 3-4 people that is "progressing" right now!

*The baptism that he had the second day after he got there was a 12 year old girl. Her mother (or sister, he didn't seem to know and yes they have been by there about 3 times since haha) has been inactive and she came to them and said she wanted to get active so his companion and his former companion (before Dallin) had been teaching her! She came to church today and was confirmed. (He also said that some of the time that never happens... sad).

*We called them at the "church" which is actually a warehouse of sorts. They are in a branch and there is about 75 there each week. He said that if they get it up to 85 constantly then they can send the paperwork into Salt Lake to have a chapel built!!!

*He and his companion just opened up this area. They are currently sleeping at the Branch Presidents house. It has 1 bedroom, kitchen, and living room. He said that they pull out 2 mattresses and put them on the floor in the entry way each night to sleep. They are looking for an apt to rent. The house that they are currently living in is on a main street and when cars go by it is very loud. ;)

*He said there is a lot of hills and it is really pretty, but that the city is pretty dirty. He said it has only been in the 70's but it is humid and they run everywhere they go! He said it has only rained once since he has been there and that was only for about 1/2 an hour.

*Old news... but he told us that he gave a sister a blessing in the MTC the day before the left!

*He said his Mission President is really strict, he won't allow ANY sports or hiking on Pday. In fact he said that one of the elders asked him what he considered "sports", like... "Can we play ping pong?" and he said, "no." But he said he REALLY REALLY likes him! He said that he speaks English really well and doesn't really have an accent. He studied at BYU and is a head hunter.

It was wonderful to hear his voice! He sounded great!!! VERY happy and VERY positive!!! I did ask him to bear his testimony in Portuguese but he didn't want to (I think because Derek speaks Portuguese and he didn't want him to laugh) SO, Brad told him he could do that on our Christmas call! I am looking forward to THAT!!!

Alfenas Brasil!

Oi gente!!
tudo bom? well yes i am here in brasil...haha and its been great so far, but before i forget, first of all, i cant get or send emails from anyone but family, so i guess let elder brambila and marchetti and everyone know ha. and second, the call, we have to do it before 4 i think and thats noon your time i think. i hope i have that right ha. and you get out of church at 2:30 right? i hope i have all of this right in my head ha. so you need to call me...at 2:30 my time. im like 99 percent sure thats 10:30 your time. the number is: xxx xx xxx xxxx xxxx
alright so now to answer your questions.

How many missionaries were on the flight from Miami to Belo with you? just one other. elder topou'ata from northern california. hes a pretty cool guy, but we didnt sit next to each other or anything ha

Did your luggage make it? yes it did! que bênção!! president parrella says that all the time haha

Who picked you up at the airport? the assistants got there like 30 minutes after we got through customs and whatnot. haha and then we waited there with them for president to get there then waited with them til the next plane got there like an hour and a half after ours.

How was your interview with the Pres? really good. i like him a lot

Can he speak English? yes, he speaks probably better english than i do haha i guess he went to BYU? not sure though haha

Who is your new companion? his name is elder vasquez. he's from são paulo. I guess in dereks mission ha idk. and he speaks really good english too

Is he a native? yes haha

How long has he been out? this is his last transfer!! he goes home at the beginning of july.

Is he a hard worker? yes very! and i love that. I'm really excited to be his companion and i guess he just opened this area a couple weeks before i got here. they have had a lot of them closed because of lack of missionaries, but we got like 21 new ones the day i got here. so now theres like 125 or so...so thats good

What town are you guys serving in? its called alfenas. and i guess its closer to são paulo than it is to BH hahah. I google mapped it and it is 4 hours and 14 minutes from Belo Horizonte and 5 hours and 27 minutes from Rio DE Janeiro and 3 hours and 57 minutes from Sao Paulo °Ü°

Do you have anyone you are teaching? haha, yes, we teach a lot. right now, i think we have like 4 progressing...idk

How is the language? Can you understand anything that is going on? haha.. hahahahha....welll....about that...no yeah, i'm starting to understand a lot better. we had district conference on sunday and i understood very little of that hah, but then we had a meeting yesterday with president and i understood almost all of that. it makes a difference though i think when i'm talking to other missionaries and pres, i think their accent isnt as hard to understand. but yeah, i'm definitely getting there.

How is the food? its good! its not that different haha idk i like it.

Weather? its really good. i guess its cold? but after being in wyoming i dont think so haha. its probably in the 60s or 70s idk

How is the ward? good. really nice. like i said we didnt have regular church sunday so i dont know a whole lot about the branch here or how many or anything but from the ones i know they are really nice.

Are you LOVING it??!!! yes!!! que bênção! amo o Brasil!

HOW do we do the Mother's Day call??? Can you buy a calling card there or do you just give us a number to call you? i'll give you my calling card stuff if you want 1800 xxxx xxxx card number: xxxx-xxxx-xxxx i dont know how much is left on it though. and i dont know if you guys want to like 3 way or whatever idk you can figure that stuff out haha.

anyway.
So the first day was pretty chill we were at the mission home/office most of the day because president had like 25 interviews to do ha it took a while then we stayed in a hotel and then took a bus out here to alfenas the next day, dropped off my stuff and got to work! haha anway i love it here. i love you guys! and i am excited to talk to you! ha but we did just talk, i'd kinda rather space them out but thats okay. até mais! tchau!
Elder Bergquist
p.s. we had a baptism sunday too :) it was really cool. and my comp let me do it :) good guy. love you all! tchau!

Just a little info on Alfenas that I googled: Thank you Wikipedia

Alfenas is a city and municipality in the southern part of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais state. In 2007 its population was 71,628 and the area of the municipality is 849 km2. The elevation is 888m. It is served by highways MG 179, BR 491 and BR 369. The distance to the state capital of Belo Horizonte is 335 km and the distance to São Paulo is 300 km. The slogan for the city is "Alfenas, the gateway to the sea of Minas", in reference to nearby Lake Furnas.

The main economic activity is the growing of coffee, with a planted area of 16,000 ha. Alfenas is the headquarters of the Brazil Specialty Coffee Association. After coffee other crops are corn, with 6,000 ha., potatoes, beans, tomatoes, and vegetables. Bananas and citrus fruits are also grown.

Alfenas is an important university town and is well known around the country for its courses in agronomy and dentistry.

Unifenas (Universide José do Rosario Velano). This private school had 18 undergraduate courses and an enrollment of 4,549 in 2005. There are graduate courses in animal science and health.
There were courses in medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, and nursing among others.

Unifal (Universidade Federal de Alfenas). This public school had 15 undergraduate courses in dentistry, nursing, and pharmacy among others. Enrollment was 1,320 students in 2005. There are graduate courses in chemistry and pharmacy.

One of Brazil's largest artificial lakes, Furnas is located scant kilometres away to the north. It bathes 34 municipalities. Its waters are used for boating, jet-ski, swimming, and fishing. The lake attracts a great number of tourists to the region and the city is well served by hotels. In 2006 there were 18 hotels with approximately 1,200 rooms.

The SD card arrived!

When Dallin flew to Brasil he sent home his big heavy coat and a few other things... including his SD card!!!

WARNING!!!

There are LOTS of pictures! and in no certain order... AND, as you can tell they are young silly boys! (I wish he would have taken pictures of the people they were teaching!) Most of them were obviously taken on PDay when they were out playing... hiking or bowling... So, please don't judge! haha...

















A poster they put in an investigators home...


















I almost didn't post these last 2 pictures...