Let's do it again!

Hello everybody! I am starting this back up to let everyone know what is currently going on with my journey to Portugal! 

I have been in the application process for about a year. The first 7 months I spent in the reapplication process with GEM but unfortunately that did not work out. I spent most of the 7 months trying to track down my advisor and figure out information and what the next steps would be for me. After the 7 months of me chasing down people, GEM decided not to accept me as a full-time missionary because of my student debt and told me that I needed to pay off about half of my debt in a year or find a rich person to pay off my debt for me. Since I knew that neither of these choices were actually an option, I decided that I would find a new organization. I immediately called TEAM and have had an advisor that has been so incredibly supportive, just like the rest of the organization. I believe that my difficulty with GEM was God closing the door on that opportunity and opening a door to a better opportunity.

There are many reasons why I like TEAM and am excited to serve under them. One of the main reasons that I am excited to work under team is that they have many active missionaries (3 couples) currently serving in northern Portugal. I am excited about this because it means that there are people who are currently working in the Porto region and they know what is going on. The team just finished a church plant in a town called Guimarães, and as they make their departure from the church they will begin searching for a new village to work in and begin a new church plant. 

In October I will be heading to Porto on a vision trip and the missionaries and the group I will be with will be looking at a few different villages to do the next church plant. Basically, I will be helping find the village I will be working at when I arrive in Portugal long-term. During the trip we will be visiting about three different villages and other sites. This trip will help me in the long run because I will have more details to share with you and my other future supporters. As of today I have 100 days until I board a plane for Porto! I seriously can't wait!!! One side of me can't believe that I am returning to Portugal and the other side of me believes that I should be boarding the plane tomorrow! Hopefully soon I will be able to grasp the concept of when I am returning to Portugal. The trip is only for 10 days so it will have a quick turn around but it will be amazing!

That's about it! I will write a post soon about how God has blessed me in regards to my future trip!

revisiting the top 10 list

A couple weeks before I left for Portugal I compiled a list of my top desires and fears. I thought now, since my time is coming to an end, I should revisit that list.....

Top 10 Desires

1. Working with youth cross culturally
1. Although, I haven’t been able to work with youth as much as I would desire, I have  been able to work with them and last week I was given the opportunity to speak to them. It was a real blessing to be able to share with them and also to grow closer to the youth in northern Portugal.
2. Living with nationals
1. When I first arrived in Portugal I was living at the Portuguese Bible Institute. It is a great place to stay for someone who is coming with a team to study a language but for me I wanted to be with Portuguese people. At the institute I wasn’t able to get the kind of close relationship that I wanted with Portuguese people but then it all changed. For the past 2 months I have been able to live with the most amazing Portuguese grandmother, my avó. Through living with her I have had to really push myself to pick up the Portuguese language and now I can understand quite a bit more then I can speak. 
3. Traveling!
1. I haven’t done alot of traveling but I have been able to go into Lisboa tons of times on my own and I did just get back from a week long trip to the northern part of Portugal, which is the most beautiful place I have seen! I can’t wait to move to Portugal and work permanently in the north! 
4. Delicious Coffee
1. I dearly miss my quad 24 oz white americano on the rox but I have been able to find somewhat of a replacement. May I introduce the galão escuro. It is basically a bica, or shot, mixed with warm milk and then steamed together. the “escuro” means dark so mine has a little more coffee and a little less milk.
5. Fado house
1. The fado house was amazing! The atmosphere was perfect! The singing was amazing! It was everything I ever hoped for in a fado house. My mental picture came together perfectly!
6. Seeing old world architecture
1. When I initially thought about this desire I was thinking maybe some old buildings that were a couple hundred years old and had great character to them, never in my wildest dreams did I think that this would include ancient Roman ruins! The contrast of old and new can be seen in so many ways throughout Portugal, especially in the big cities like Lisboa and Porto. Both of these cities have tiny little streets that one car could barely drive up and that is where the old trolleys come in. My first experience with trolleys were in San Francisco where you pay some crazy amount of money to ride the tourist trap through different areas, however, in Lisboa the trolleys are used seriously as a mode of transportation. You could be riding a trolley with elementary school students coming home from school and women with groceries.
7. Learning Portuguese
1. Have I learned Portuguese? Pois....which means sure.....I have been able to learn some Portuguese. I can ride the bus really well and order a galão escuro like a pro! Really though, I have been able to get some Portuguese down pretty well. I can understand alot more Portuguese then I can actually speak. The most important thing is that even when I fail at saying something I don’t quit trying to communicate. Just about every time I try and communicate something to my avó, she replies with, “Não compreendo,” but then I just start from the beginning and try and say it again...she probably thinks I sound like a really bad broken record but I am learning!
8. Eating Portuguese food other then Linguiça and sweet bread
1. Thanks to a cute little cafe at the bottom of my apartment complex I have been able to try lots of different everyday Portuguese meals. The cafe has some sort of lunch that they serve everyday and I usually try and go once a week to have lunch with them there. I have also been able to try many different types of fish dishes, which has been interesting because I am not a huge fish fan but this fish is so fresh it is amazingly delicious!
9. seeing the other Golden Gate Bridge
1. I have seen the bridge and I have even driven across the bridge but, unlike the bridge in San Francisco, you cannot walk across it. 
10. I will finally be in a country that pronounces my name correctly all the time and spells it correctly!!!
1. I thought before that I knew how to pronounce my last name correctly but it turns out that I didn’t know. I actually have become reluctant in telling people what my last name is because then they automatically know that I am Portuguese and then they usually look at me like why the heck don’t you speak Portuguese! I have even have people tell me that it is a disgrace and horrible that I don’t know Portuguese. Oh well! You can’t please them all and atleast I am trying to learn the language!

Top 10 Fears:

1. Doing youth ministry full time cross culturally
1. I think the more fearful and stressful thing is starting a youth ministry from nothing!  If I had known this before then that would have been here. Trying to help start something when I don’t even really have a grasp of the language is the most difficult thing to do. Even with these difficulties, I have been given different opportunities to speak with and help out youth in Portugal, which was super exciting for me.
2. Not fully knowing the language.
1. Legitimate fear! When you get stuck in some random village and you don’t have enough money to get back on the bus.....that is the moment that you feel extremely abandoned and alone mainly because you can’t communicate your problem. In the States if you get lost, and are a girl, then you are able to go up to anybody and ask for help because the majority of the time the person will understand you. The good thing in getting lost and not knowing the language is that you quickly learn the words you need to know like, “Passa por Vialonga?”
3. Living in a house with a pet snake or spider
1. God must really like me because I haven’t even seen any snakes anywhere and I have maybe seen two spiders that were way to small to actually do anything! No giant spiders here that like to jump on your back and hold on for dear life as you are screaming and freaking out!
4. Cultural differneces
1. The other day I was getting a loaf of bread from the bakery and I wanted it sliced but I didn’t know the word for cut, cortado, so instead I stuck out my left hand flat and took my right hand perpendicular and made an up and down cutting motion....unfortunately in Portuguese culture this means you are going to get a whooping....so basically I was telling the guy I want some bread and I am going to give you a whooping....my bad!
5. Not speaking up when I need to....
1. Yep....failed at this one! I am 100% a non confrontational person....unless I am pushed way to far and then I am very vocal about my discomforts or if you are not the person that is bothering me. 
6. Not being able to pronounce my own last name
1. More importantly not being able to speak the language that my last name and heritage is from!
7. Nobody getting my humor.....
1. I really don’t think anybody has really fully seen the real Diane, I mean the crazy, wild, and loves to laugh Diane. They might have seen momentary laps but almost all of the time they get the very quite and reserved Diane that many of you either have not seen or don’t remember seeing.
8. Being overseas on my own and not really knowing anybody that well
1. This has been a real difficulty for me because I am the type of person that functions with a very close group of friends that know me and can call me out on anything and to not have that close relationship except for an occasional skype conversation has been really depressing for me. It has also showed me that I really want to be married before I come back to Portugal.

My personal ad would look something like:

Single 25 yr old female missionary looking for older and taller missionary man who has a heart for Portugal and youth. Portuguese citizenship is a bonus!

I want to be married so that I know that I will have that close relationship that I so strongly miss. Now, I know that marriage is not always a beautiful thing but really no relationship is always a beautiful thing but it comes down to what you do during those times that can bring you closer or tear you apart. I want a partner in ministry that I can rely on and can bounce ideas off of. Also, if I marry a Portuguese man then I don’t have to worry about visas and all that annoying stuff! 

1. Not having netflix/not being able to take all of my movies
1. I love movies! I often watch a movie when I need to relax or need alone time. Unfortunately I brought about 10 movies with me and only two movies were movies that I actually watch frequently. I have a large movie collection of about 300, so to be cut back to only 10 movies was really super duper difficult for me!
2. My living situation
1. This is one area that I probably didn’t need to worry about at all! I LOVE living with my avó!!!! The other night she noticed that I was kind of cold so she took the heater and fully pointed it at me so she wasn’t getting any heat...I quickly changed it so we could both get heat. She has also surprised me and made me lunch or dinner. She makes sure that I watch Dr. Oz with her almost every night! Seriously, I have the most amazing avó ever!!! I am for sure going to miss her so much when I leave Portugal!

No Proposal

Back in 2006, I went with Len Renfer and a group of about 25 other people to India. We were up in the northeast corner, Nagaland, in a village that I am sure has a name but I can’t remember it. While there we did medical and children outreaches in surrounding villages and at the place we were staying we had a college age conference. On one day during the conference about half of the team took a hike up a mountain to visit a church plant and also do some medical outreach but I decided to stay back and ended up helping with the conference. After lunch the university students would usually play some sort of game or activity but since Joe, who was in charge of this time, had gone on the hike they asked me if I would share my testimony and then have a Q&A time. I of course said yes and so that afternoon I shared my testimony with a bunch of Indian students who I am not completely understood what I was saying. During the Q&A time students were allowed to write out their questions on a piece of paper and hand them in. I started out with getting really good questions like, “What is it like being a Christian in the States?” and, “What is it like being the only Christian in your family?” but then......I got a couple of questions that I really didn’t want to answer but was told I needed to by the Kim Renfer, they were, “ If God gave you a Nepali man as your life partner, would you be ok with that?” and then a few questions after that I got, “How are you attracted to guys?”  I answered these questions in the best most sweetest way I could possibly think of... “If that is what God has for me then I am ok with that but I am not looking for a husband right now,” and, “Most importantly the guy would need to be a Christian.” So, for the rest of the time there all the girls on the team were trying to figure out who this mystery guy was...and then we found out...atleast we think it was him because he was the only guy to ask to take a picture with just me while I was standing with the group of other American girls. 

Last week while I was in Porto I was asked to share my testimony with the youth and of course said yes. Now, you need to remember that youth in Portugal is a very broad term, you can be 50 and still considered a youth if you are single. You also need to remember that even though you are asked to do something sometimes it is forgotten and you end up not doing what you were requested to do. So, when I started preparing for my testimony I had this horrible feeling that at the very last minute I was not going to be speaking to the youth and I had suffered through the anxiety of preparing to speak for nothing, luckily it did happen. The youth event was a new tradition that they were starting where they would have a Thanksgiving meal, except no turkey because they took to long to cook, but instead chicken. Many of the youth at this church were very talkative and very welcoming and were willing to speak English with me. The pastor’s two sons that I met were also very amazing boys. The oldest of the two actually got the grand opportunity of translating for me as I spoke. Now I don’t know how many of you have spoke while being translated but it is super duper difficult. You can only say one maybe two sentences at a time before you have to stop to allow the person to speak the translated version. All the pauses also give you just the right amount of time to forget your train of thought or your next point, so notes are heavily needed. The talk ended up going really well even though after every time João translated something I would look at him and say, “Sim” and then would wait for him to say something more and he would look at me to continue. The leader said that she enjoyed my talk and thought that I brought a good message to the youth about us depending on God because he knows who we are and what we are to become. I might have taken the verse and the idea from one of my professors at Multnomah but isn’t that why they are teaching us?

 Anyways, the night was really awesome and just helped me continue in my falling in love of the area. The only thing I didn’t like about the area was the 5 degree weather, ok so that is in celsius but it is only 5 degrees away from freezing! Plus, I didn’t bring any cold weather clothes to Portugal so I only have two sweaters to wear and that is only because I have bought them since the temperature has dropped. It really sucks because I have warm coats and tons of cute sweaters but since I was told that the weather would be warm and beautiful I didn’t pack any of them! Oh well! Sad/happy news....I have less then two weeks left in Portugal!

Peace out!

meu amor, o norte

Before I headed to Portugal I had a mental picture of what Portugal would look like. I pictured myself waking up in the morning looking out my window and seeing grapevine covered hills and trees in foreground. Unfortunately when I got to Lisboa I saw none of this, I was kind of sad that my mental picture didn't come true because it was so beautiful. However, my mental picture was a picture of where I wanted to be in the first place, the north. Before I headed up to the north I was told that the north is very closed off to Christians. However, within the church they are the most welcoming and amazing people.

On Saturday I caught a train from Lisboa to Porto and then headed from the train station to the home of Nancy. Nancy is a GEM missionary who has been working in the north for about  25 years and lives right outside of Porto. We relaxed at her home for a couple hours and then we headed to an English bazaar. There is a nice group of English in the north and they have a club house where they were having a huge bazaar with tons of different things ranging from English specialties to Portuguese items. There were two little kids that were trying to sell little gold star stickers for .50 euros each. They were super cute and would not take no for an answer so eventually we just had to ignore them and walk away. After the bazaar we headed to a church in the area for a chestnut celebration. The pastor of the church is Samuel Paulo and he is good friends with the Wootens, who are retired missionaries and I met at Multnomah, and has also recently spoken at Multnomah. It was really great to meet him because I had heard so much about him from the Wootens and friends from school.

Also, at the church there was a large group of older youth who were very welcoming and open. I was very grateful that they were all willing to speak English with me. I would every once in a while try and say something in Portuguese and they would say, "See! She does know Portuguese!" One of the girls, Rita,  shared her testimony with me and then invited me into the kitchen where a group of youth were playing guitars and singing Fado songs. I, of course, quickly followed her into the kitchen because I LOVE fado!!! Rita's boyfriend was one of the guys playing and so when ever they were talking between songs she would tell him to speak English so that I could understand, she was very sweet! I also met at the church the main youth leader who invited me to their youth event on Friday and then asked me to share my testimony which I agreed to. So, now I will be sharing my testimony in front of a group of youth... I am just slightly nervous!

On Sunday we headed into the hills to visit a couple churches and some friends in the area. First we went to a church in Motim that is connected with an English school. The pastor of the church is Brazilian and his wife is English and I met their daughter when I went on the youth retreat a couple weeks ago. After being introduced to the entire congregation the pastor asked if I had anything I wanted to share with the congregation. Dr. Kopp, my fav prof at Multnomah, always told us in our intercultural studies class to always be prepared to share something when you are visiting a church especially in a cross cultural situation.....unfortunately I guess I didn't listen that well because when I was asked if I had anything I wanted to share I became very wide eyed and respectfully declined to speak at the church. I know I should have come up with something but I was so caught off guard by the invitation but I did spend the rest of the time at the church thinking about what I could have said and what I should have said.

 We were invited over to the pastor's home for lunch, which the wife made a huge feast for us. Roast pork with chestnuts and tons of side dishes. Following lunch we then had to have dessert and after that in traditional Portuguese fashion we had a cup of coffee. We talked about many different things such as my education, what I like about Portugal, and what I miss about the States. I couldn't really say that I missed too much about the states because my mom has sent me chocolate chips and peanut butter, but I guess the one thing that I am missing is my 24 oz. quad white americano on the rox from the cherrybean in Salinas. They were very shocked when I said that I drank something with so much caffeine in it but then when I told them that I would normally have two a day they were even more shocked! We talked about the youth in the area and how it can be quite difficult to get youth sometimes but then I told them that I was use to the idea of searching out youth because that was the same thing that happens in the Lisboa area.

After lunch and the great conversation we headed to a second church near Fafe and again I was welcomed very warmly. After the service was over many women came up to talk to me but most of them didn't know very much English so they would go search out a younger person to come and translate for us. Nancy had a very close friend at the church that she calls her adopted daughter, Lily, and she kept going around to all of the youth in the church and told them to go talk to me because they knew English. I got to talk to some of the youth students and when I told them that I wanted to work with youth in the north they were all very quick in inviting me to come work with youth in their church. So, I guess I have a job once I get back to Portugal.

From the church visit we headed to dinner at Lily's mother's house and we got to eat dinner with Lily, her husband, and two super adorable children. We had another big meal of trying to get people to eat more and more food and try interesting little German treats. After dinner we headed to the castle of the first king of Portugal, Afonso I. We walked around the castle and the duke's palace, which Afonso actually built for one of his lovers. The grounds were pretty cool and the surrounding neighbor hood was also really pretty. There is an old Catholic church near the castle but they couldn't pay their taxes so it got turned into a hospital.

 This is a statue of Afonso and the Duke's Palace in the background.

This is the Castle with one of the entrances by the tree. 

This is the old Catholic church that is now a hospital.

After our walk in freezing cold weather we decided we needed to go warm up so we had a cup of tea at Lily's house. Her daughter, Sarai, who is about 4 or 5 wanted to talk to me all night and kept telling me something about painting so I watched her color a little picture from a McDonald's happy meal or something. Then she brought me a book to read and sat in on my lap and opened it up to the first page and then looked at me like ok you can read to me now. Her mom stepped in and told her that I didn't speak Portuguese but I don't think Sarai understood that someone wouldn't know how to speak Portuguese, so after a couple more times of trying to get me to read the book she then "read" the book to me.

All in all it was an eventful first day and a half and now I have 6 more days of exploring and sharing.

Peace out!

Adventures and mishaps....

Well, I have had many great adventures since my last posting. I have been to the aquarium, to a fado house, and now I am off to Porto. The aquarium was pretty awesome, although, it is quite a bit smaller then the Monterey Bay Aquarium. The aquarium was arranged by the different oceans and, kind of like Ikea, there were arrows on the ground and a certain pathway you are supposed to take. The aquarium was super dark also, so I barely got any pictures. For some reason they don’t allow you to use the flash...I don’t think they understand that if we can’t use flash then we need more light. However, I was able to find Nemo and Dori! I also got a some cool pictures of them both. One cool thing about the aquarium is that many of the tanks have tons of different fish in them. So they had a huge tropical reef tank with puffer fish and tons of other bright colored beautiful fish. 

We also had a youth event last weekend and we took the youth to Ikea for breakfast. We had four youth this time but it allowed us to have some really good conversations. The oldest Fairbanks’ daughter, Hannah, will be graduating from high school this Spring and is now having to go through the very challenging job of picking a university or atleast figure out what she wants to do. She is currently wanting to do a discipleship program with YWAM in New Zealand but is also contemplating what college she wants to go to. She has the option of choosing to either go to a university in Canada or Europe because she has dual Canadian and Portuguese citizenship. Dan, the main youth guy, and I had an awesome talk with her about seeking God’s guidance. I think we helped her in one sense but she still has a very hard decision ahead of her. After the conversation we then took a tour of Ikea, in which everybody had to test run every bed, faucet, and toilet.

A couple days ago, I had a girls outing with two girls that I use to live with when I was at PBI, Jordan and Regina. We went into one of the larger fado areas and found an awesome fado house! This place had the exact atmosphere that I had pictured for a fado house. It was dark inside with the only light coming from candles. The food was delicious and the  company even greater. After we started eating the fado singers started performing and it started with a young woman, who was probably around my age, and she had an amazing voice. The second performer was an older woman, probably in her 40s, and she also sang beautifully. She sang a song when translated says something like, “If you concentrate on your love to much you will forget about God. I did not forget about God.” I really liked the message this line was portraying because I think many times we can focus so much on finding love or the love that we have found that we forget about the most important thing to life. The third singer was a 70 year old man, who was also our waiter, He had black rimmed rectangular glasses and always had a shot of some sort of dark alcohol with him when he sang. These three singers would sing 3 songs and then they would switch. Once a full rotation happened they would take about a 15 minute break and then they would start again. They did the rotation about 3 times before we had to leave to catch the metro and a bus back home. The night was super perfect and was everything I dreamed of! The great thing about fado is that so much emotion is portrayed through the singing and instruments that it doesn’t really matter if you can understand them or not. I definitely believe that I need another dose of fado before I head back to the states and I for sure think that I need to see Manuel again, the 70 year old fado singer. 

Currently I am on a train heading to Porto. I bought my ticket ahead of time and was quite relaxed once I got to the train station this morning. Unfortunately, I can’t do anything without a slight failure involved....so.....I might have accidently bought my train ticket for the wrong day.....fortunately for me the guys working on the train were super phenomanazing and called the main office or something and got my ticket changed so that I could head to Porto today. So, here I am, riding on a train through the country side of Portugal and it is amazingly beautiful.

Well that is it for now!

Peace Out!

Minha Avó

I thought I would write a little blog about the sweetest little Portuguese lady I know, my adopted Portuguese grandmother. Every evening we watch a couple shows together. It usually starts with watching Cozinha de Nigella, which is an amazing little cooking show with this English woman who lives in the States but makes amazing food. I usually end up wanting to cook after I watch the show but I usually have eaten by the time the show starts because it is on at 8pm. We then flip through the channels and sometimes I will leave and go to my room or sometimes I will continue watching tv with her. Usually we will end the night watching Dr. Oz and Oprah. Tonight I decided that I would stop watching tv after the cooking show so I made myself a cup of tea and went to my room. Soon I heard Dona Merces calling for me, "Diana....Diana....Dr. Oz!" I thought it was so cute and so sweet that she wanted me to come watch tv with her.

Dona Merces is a talker during tv shows and she will make little comments through out the show and I try and figure out what she is saying it is a great adventure sometimes. If I am feeling really brave I try and say something to her about what we are watching but she usually ends up saying, "não compreendo," and I usually try again and again to get my sentence across to her. It also happens the other way because I will get caught up on one word she says and then I get all confused and I usually nod my head in understanding but she calls me out on it.  I love living with her because if I want to say anything to her then I have to stumble through Portuguese. The best way to learn Portuguese is when you are forced right?

A little random fact about the words for grandparents are extremely similar. A grandpa is called, avô, and a grandma is called, avó. So to keep my self from getting confused by these I would much rather stick with avozinho and avozinha. I would much rather use the endearing versions of the word then have to struggle through the complex normal words.

Well that is all I've got about minha avó.

Peace out!

Amazingness on top of Amazingness!

This past week has been full of many awesome adventures and experiences! I was able to help put on a baby shower for my friend Rebecca, who is due with her second child in the next couple weeks. I was able to plan the games for the shower, which was totally awesome because I had like 80 year old women eating candy out of diapers trying to guess the what the mashed up candy was inside! The more amazing part was that some of the women said that they really had an awesome time taking part in the games! I guess you are never to old to eat strange looking things in strange situations!


At the baby shower I was talking with my friend, Sofia, and we were talking about the fact that through her husbands work she always gets free tickets to concerts but can never go because she has a young baby so she ends up giving the tickets away. She started naming off the tickets that she had given away.... Shakira, Lady Gaga, and other people that I didn't really care about but then she said....Michael Buble!! I quickly replied with, "Why did you give those away!?! We could have gone to the concert together!!" I was completely joking when I said this but a couple days later I got a phone call from her saying that her most amazing husband, Sam, had gotten two more tickets to Buble and wanted to know if I still wanted to go! Of course, I quickly said yes!!!! So we were off to see the most Beautiful Canadian then next day!!! Here is the deal...Michael Buble might be amazing on CD but times that by a million trillion and that isn't close to his amazingness in concert!


During the concert Michael told us about his new found love for Portugal and it was especially cool because we were attending his final concert on his tour! It was also very emotional for one of his band members who is Portuguese and still has family here in Portugal, it was like a homecoming for the musician and he was very emotional when the crowd erupted knowing that there was a Portuguese man on stage!


The next day, I decided that I would finally go get my bus pass. So, I fixed my hair put on an extra cute outfit and headed to Campo Grande to get my bus pass. I got there filled out the paperwork, took the ID picture and went and to turn in my paper work but, first, I was at the wrong station to get a fast tracked pass and second, I forgot my passport!! I seriously never forget my passport but I had been switching between bags so much this past week that I simply forgot my passport in one of them. I was so frustrated with myself but decided to continue into Lisbon anyways.


I finally got to go to the Fado museum! Which was super amazing! I got to learn about where Fado started and how it has transformed to what it is today. There was also a station where you could read bios of Fado greats and listen to some of their recorded music. You could also watch recorded performances of Fado singers. I went a little crazy in the gift shop and ended up buying three books. The first is called, The Soul of Fado and is about the history of Fado and it is in Portuguese and English, so I justified it by saying that it would help me with the language and the culture! The second, Fadária, is a book with many different Fado lyrics in it and a recording of some of the songs. The last book, Roteiro de Fado de Lisboa, is a book that gives a little info about Fado in Lisbon and also current locations of Fado houses and a price range for how much it is to eat at the houses.


My week was capped off with an amazing weekend at a retreat, Encontro de Jovens com Cristo, which simply translates into Youth Encounter. Basically all I can say was that the weekend was amazing and was a great evangelical tool to allow non-Christians to come into a non-threatening environment and learn about Jesus. I can't tell you what exactly happened during the weekend because if I did...I would have to kill you. Seriously, though, they do ask that we do not talk about what exactly happened during the weekend so to respect that I will not share anything with you even if you asked me in person...desculpe, sorry. I really want to try and do a youth encounter in the states but to do it I would have to have  a bunch of Portuguese people to come to the states to help put it on because, see, you can only help put it on if you have participated in it.


Tomorrow I am hopefully going to finally get my bus pass and hopefully go into Lisboa to the aquarium!


That is all I have for you now....
Peace out!