Monday, March 28, 2016

Braga's Semana Santa and 87253987 processions later

WHAT UP FAM TUDO BEM TUDO BEM. Hope everything is tudo na boa and everyone is feeling fine and that PÁSCOA PÁSCOA PÁSCOA was a BLAST for tudo mundo!! Yayyyyyyy Easter

Speaking of Easter, we just so happened to be in the absolute best place in all of Portugal to celebrate the holy day. But really though, they call Braga the Rome of Portugal because everyone and their dog is Catholic so they put on a huge, HUGE FESTA for Easter and theres a billion tourists and churros on churros and CRAZY PROCESSIONS all day, everyday. I felt culturally enriched out of my mind all week!!! And also fat because you know, churros.

Soooooooooo for the week:
   - we took another surprise visit down to P-town Porto (why do these keep happening) and ended up having a bunch of extra time before our train left so we were like AMERICAN sTORE??? And mosied our way down (and by mosey I mean run. Run for the mac and cheese) and WENT SO HARD YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE. Pretty sure I spilt a tear or two in the Dr Pepper aisle. As Sister Runyan pointed out, we've been in Portugal long enough that we get excited about a little taste of home now instead of Portugese food. Maybe that explains the daily McDonalds cravings??
   - so ABOUT THESE PROCESSIONS. YOU GUYS. Wednesday night there was one that went through the full Bible, from Abraham to Christ and everything in between, feat. a wooden Mary being guided on a donkey through the streets. Thursday they had the "ferricocos", which are guys dressed head-to-toe in black (literally, with eye holes cut out of their black sheets) carrying fire and noise makers and calling people to repentance. And Friday had Christ on the cross (again, literally, a literal person being carried through the streets on a cross) and Saturday was THE BURNING OF JUDAS AT THE STAKE. What did I tell you fam THEY DONT MESS AROUND WITH EASTER HERE. It was the biggest party in the world and I think I will come here for Semana Santa every year
   - Also for Easter nobody was at church so bispo came in clutch and cancelled the last hour of church. Hahahahahahahhaah THE IRONY. And no one actually invited us to eat with them for Easter so we had a huge district Easter party!!!!! Problem is, we are at the end of the month and none of us have any money.... or food.... so we pooled ALL of our resources at the capela and ended up making mashed potatoes, some kind of feijoada-thing, and french toast. The greatest Easter lunch ever???? Possibly. You decide.
   - Friday we had a ward activity and it was a blast. Actually it was great because normally nobody shows up for missionary activities here and we managed to get like 8 pesquisadores there!!! We couldnt get the church website videos to work so we ended up having to pull up the second stringer "To This End Was I Born" which is a TINY bit intense and kinda dropped the cheery mood by like 400% but what can ya do. We pulled it back with a bazillion cookies and lemon bars and goofy games and everybody really loved it!!! Success squad
 
And on the realz I hope everyone had a fabulous Easter!! We really focused this week on Luke 24:5-6 and 1 Corinthians 15:22 together, and how since Christ resurrected all of us will resurrect. Thats the miracle of Easter, folks!! Christ LIVES and because of that, we will all live again. And I am so blessed and grateful to know all that and to get to share it!!

Wait, me saying spiritual things??? What happened??

Hahahahahaha alrighty thats all I got for the week fam but I LOVE YOU ALL TONS AND TONS.

BOA SEMANA GENTEEEEEEE

much love from the Portuguese Rome

xoxoxoxox bjnhs Sis P

P.S. sorry I suck and I didnt actually take any pics of anything this week but yall can probably mooch off my comp or something??? Whoops MY BAD

(Carly forwared the following picture from her comp)


And as suggested... stolen from the companion!




















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