Still raining . . . and another P Day. The agenda for the day was for Merl and David to go to the house of Wilson, a 16 year old “abandoned” member of the ward. The Branch Presidente asked the Elders Quorum (David is the president) to go to Wilson's home and rebuild it so he can live there. All the other family members have run off with their 'interests' and left Wilson to fend for himself. Having seen it from the outside, I would question if it is salvageable.
(Merl): While the girls were off getting nails done, or whatever, David and I walked all the way up to the Bazar place so David could purchase a couple of items for Ann for Christmas. I looked at a few things but didn’t buy. I told him Kathlyn’s present was home rolled up (rug from Turkey).Then we went down to Wilson’s place to help clean it up. He was with us while cleaning. The place would make a nice chicken house, but to live here would be a humbling experience. It may keep most of the rain off, but not the wind and certainly not the cold in the winter. It is a small structure (home) built on stilts with the underneath mostly enclosed. There was a very unstable staircase up to the living portion. There is one “bedroom” on the ground floor about 5’ x 8’ at most which had clothes and debris covering the floor. There was one chair and a small shelf and another makeshift shelf. This was his bedroom. He must have slept in the chair. There was a square hole in the wall for a window and a door that I’m not sure would close all the way or not. We removed all the clothes and debris from this room and from the dirt ground just outside this room. The bathroom was also on the ground floor, but was not attached to the house. It was attached to the neighbor’s house but the door was on this property. There was a 3’ wide walkway between the bathroom and Wilson’s house. Everything was wet because it had been raining, but it wasn’t raining while we were there, thank goodness for small favors. The construction would be adequate for a chicken house, but it wouldn’t pass any construction standards that I am aware of. A heavy snow, I think, would collapse this place. It’s a good thing it doesn’t snow here. I guess if you are abandoned, this could be a protected place to live until better accommodations could be found. After cleaning that one area we needed to leave.
Ann wanted to have her nails done at a little home nail shop home. She lives some distance away – over by the lake. We walked in a drizzly rain, and walked, and
walked. . . couldn’t find the
place. I would rather walk in the rain
than the hot sun, so it was all good, and I saw another part of town. 
We passed the home of Janice - beautiful vegetable garden in the front. We stopped at a bonecaria (manufacturer of dolls) that makes the Christmas boneca sold all over the area. We were allowed to take a few pictures with one of the men who helps construct the characters. We passed the lake on our way back home, couldn't see any water as the lake was filled/covered by a thick, green vegetation. Some men were working there raking the lake and tossing the greenery over the fence.
After walking around for some time, we decided to head back home. We stopped to purchase some things at the
grocery store on our way home as we were having the four missionaries over for lunch. (One interesting difference in grocery shopping here is that you have to lock up your previous shopping bags/large purses, etc. in a locker before doing your shopping.) Good thing we picked up some more things as
they ate everything we could find to put on the table. I had forgotten how much growing ‘boys’ eat! The two sets of missionaries live together in
one apartment; one set had to get ready for their trip to Porto Alegre on
Tuesday, so they went home to get ready. The other set, Elder Piccini and
Elder Vargas, stayed and played games for a couple of hours. I brought ‘Spot It’ with us, and it was a big
hit. We forgot to give them our gifts
for the day, so Ann and I walked to their apartment to give the bag to
them. One day Elder Piccini expressed how
much fun they were having with the gifts.
He said, “I have never had so many gifts before. . . never. . . I feel so loved.” At that point, he had only received a bar of
soap, a package of seasoning mix, and a candy bar. It’s a different world here. 
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