Portugal, EU

Samuel & Elizabeth Simonyi-Gindelle

It is hard to believe that it is almost three months ago that we arrived in Portugal. Perhaps the time has passed quickly because the days have been so full. We started language lessons shortly after arrival, with a Christian Portuguese lady. We feel very privileged to have Eunice Carapeto as our teacher. She has been teaching missionaries her native tongue for about twenty-five years and has over five-hundred former students scattered around the world. Because we are also schooling our children presently, Elizabeth and I see Eunice separately for our lessons. I go in the morning for two hours and Elizabeth in the afternoon for the same amount of time. Then we have a few hours of written homework in the evenings, besides repeatedly practicing verb conjugations and such things as sounds, conversations, and scripture readings which we have as sound files on the computer. We are about four kilometres from her school so we either walk or bike to our sessions. We are not sure if this is what they call intensive language study, but so far we have not been bored!

There is a small assembly some distance away that we are able to meet with on Sundays. There are only about five believers, meeting in the front of a small drapery shop, but the fellowship is warm though no one speaks any English. This has proven to be a help for us in practicing Portuguese. It has been a comfortable place to start taking part in prayer briefly at the Lord's Supper and the opportunity to visit in the saints homes on two occasions has been helpful. We are looking forward to a brief visit to the U.K. to have our EU visas renewed. It will be delightful to be in an English-speaking assembly.