Monday, May 11, 2015

Hogwarts, Conference, and Skype. Oh my!

Manahoana dahalo e!! Just wanna say it was so great to see all of you yesterday at the Skype. But I think I'm in agreement with you all that I'm glad it was the last Skype call. Nothing beats the real deal. 2 and a half months... So weird to think. I'm so excited!! I'm a little nervous. I'm a little sad I don't have much more time here. Just so many emotions! But mostly I'm just so excited :)

So this week was pretty eventful. Lots of stuff going on. I'll start with what happened Tuesday. So we were getting dogged a lot and riding around on our bikes trying to figure out what to do. Then our member help suggests that we should go visit a less active who lives kinda far away. So we ended up taking the Berlingo and headed off. We just weren't prepared for how far away this place was... We ended up driving for almost an hour to get to this place. And the road was getting so bad that we eventually had to bike another 20 minutes from the car. That place was literally like Hogwarts, as Elder Mack called it. So far out there. And we get to the guy's house and guess what! He wasn't there. And the neighbors informed us that he had moved to Tana, never to be seen again. So that was good! And quite a bit of time gone down the drain. We were on our way back to the main area in Andranomanelatra and I was driving. And we were on that really bad road again and we ended up getting stuck! I was trying to get out of the mud but the tires were just spinning. So we used our ingenuity and grabbed some branches and whatever else we could find to help get more traction in front of the tires. We got out thankfully! And that was one of the most stressful things I've been through. Haha! But it was good experience :)

Another thing we got to do this week was a service project at the church. We got to clean it up for the District Conference we would be having on Saturday. Since I was tall, I got the job of a window cleaner. It was a lot of work, you could tell the place hadn't been cleaned in 1+ years. But all of us together were able to get the job done. And the District Conference went really well. We had a leadership training meeting from 2-4 with us and all the leadership of the branches. They talked a lot about money and welfare stuff, something that really needs to be addressed here. After that there was a meeting for everyone from 4-6 and I got a lot of drawing done! Haha. I'm bad. I should've been paying more attention, but you know me. If I have paper, a pen, and in a meeting it just kinda happens. So yeah, the whole schedule of the conference kinda put our schedule out of whack. Since it takes 30 minutes to get to our area and 30 back it takes a lot of time out and we didn't have a whole lot of time to teach. But I guess it is what it is. Then yesterday we had the big District Conference where all the members came. I got to sing in the choir! So that was exciting. And I don't know why, but the malagasies sure love their french hymns, so those are what we sang. After the conference I got to see some returned missionaries who I served with. I got to see Johnny (Brother Randrianantenaina) as well as Dimby(who I lived with in Tamatave). It was so good to see them and catch up. Dimby is already married and has a little girl! Funny how fast that happens. And then we had interviews with President Adams, probably my last one with him. That man has such wisdom and he knows what he's doing. It's going to weird seeing him leave and another come in. It's been such a privilege to get to know him and work with him. After the interview we got to Skype! And you all know how that went. Definitely the highlight of my week :) So yeah, that's pretty much the story of what happened this week.

So one of my goals before the end of my mission is to finish the Book of Mormon in Malagasy. This week I finished up Alma, reading about Helaman and his 2000 strippling warriors. Helaman was trying to rally up his troops to reclaim their cities and without hesitation the young men responded that they would go, and they never doubted the power and strength of the Lord because their mothers knew it and taught them. Thought that was kindof convenient that I read that the week of mothers day! I've seen in my mission all those challenges a missionary faces, but I've been able to face those with courage knowing that the Lord would be there by my side. I know I wouldn't be where I am had I not been taught that by my faithful mother. I love you Mommy! Happy Mother's Day again!!

Anyways, I'm still loving it out here. I'll try to get more specifics about people we teach and all the Jazz by next week. For now though, I'm signing off. Have a great week everyone!! Tiako ianareo indrindra!

Mumf






Hay!


Hogwarts














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