Monday, February 27, 2012

We've been eating lots of pasta with beans in it lately :) it's delicious. Tons of super sick stuff happened this week. I have trouble remembering what happened when though so sorry if I tell stories that have already been told. Thursday we did pretty much an entire day of service for two of our Ami's and a recent convert. The first was for Daisy (divorced 45 year old lady) and it was just usual yard work but while we were working she stopped and started to tell us how unusual it is to have complete strangers come to her house and work for her just to help her. Super cool. We went to Emanuel's (rasta blackjack guy) apartment and helped him paint his apartment. He had his TV on a music video channel and I'm all caught up on all the nasty music I've missed. T-Pain and Rhianna are dirty sinners ha. Anyways, we were painting and Emanuel was being his usual goofy self speaking with his french/creole/jamaican accent and then out of no where he was like, "Jeff, am I dreaming?" I didn't have a clue what he meant so I said, "ha... What?" He starting saying the same things Daisy said and it was awesome. When we got to his house that day he had a friend there who was just chillin but split when we started working. Emanuel said, "I've known you guys for like 3 weeks and you're there for me more than my friends who I've known for years." It was nuts seeing these people get emotional and just being able to see that what we were doing was blessing their lives. Now just get baptized you fools! Really though, those moments were some of the most fulfilling experiences I've had out here. The feelings of love that I get for these people are overwhelming. It's nuts. We went to Patrick's house last and helped him clean and get his apartment ready for a bed that one of the other members was giving him. Holy moly ha hair, grease, and spider webs galore! It was pretty rough work. I was trying not to gag half the time. He is a pretty simple guy and just does what you tell him to do, for example - Come to our church and get baptized - haha He's super cool though and we were able to help him which is all that matters. Later that night we drove down to St. Paul and I left Elder Chong-Mook there and brought Elder Twitchell back up to St. Denis for an exchange. It was super nice to be back with Elder Twitchell and just run around with our heads on fire. The Tahitian elders don't have quite the same intensity. We worked all day and found new people and taught lessons! YES!!! One girl we met was named Annaelle who is 18 and lives alone in a tiny studio. She has had a super rough childhood and she is dirt poor. She dropped out of school and left home when she was 15 because her dad was dumb and there were tons of problems there. We were able to teach her about the Book of Mormon and explain what we do and she was pumped. Another awesome experience that can't be described with words. This last week there has been some civil unrest as well. Mobs gather at night and there are riots like crazy over how expensive everything is here. People have been destroying stores, looting, burning down buildings and blowing up cars in the streets and it's just crazy. We have to be in our apartments every night at 6 and we sit and listen to the cars explode and tear gas bombs go off all night. The police and gendarmes here don't do squat and people just run wild. It seriously is crazy how mobs of like 200 people can go into Jumbo (Wal-Mart) and just wreak havoc and do whatever they want. The police show up and don't do anything! We have been asking people about it and they tell us, "Yeah, there is nothing we can do. We don't have the right to really fight back or do anything." It sure isn't like America here, these poor people who own little stores in strip malls or gas stations have to just sit back while punk criminals come in and steal and break everything they have. Houses get hit up too and the cars that are being burned are just random peoples cars. It's weird to think that no one has guns ha I could only imagine if we went around and gave all these store owners shot guns and let them do work. I guarantee after one of these little creole guys got his legs blown off no one would go back to rob that store. Sorry that was a bit graphic. But yep, it's nuts here! We have had problems with creepy guys messing with the Soeurs at their apartments as well and it's just... crazy ha. People are just going nuts but we're safe :) It's not as bad as it sounds, it's just somewhat exciting and for the most part it is a few angry/crazy people and then the rest are just scumbags that are taking advantage of the situation and getting free stuff and lighting stuff on fire. Well that's all for me. I'll send loads of pics next week because it's been a while. Have a good week :)

Jeff      

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Hi

It's humid and sticky and sweaty and just my favorite time of the year :) I was complaining before, but this is just ridiculous. It never stops ha. Members tell us that around the end of March it will stop getting hotter and will start to cool down. Hallelujah! Well this last week was pretty sweet. We didn't get to work as much as the week before but we did some cool stuff. Wednesday we picked up sister Kenny at the airport. She came back from Mada to go home from RĂ©union. President made us throw her a little party, so we went to a church and played a game and had a testimony meeting and then we all ate lunch at a restaurant. She stayed one night here with the soeurs in St. Denis but the Soeurs from St. Pierre wanted to drive all the way up to St. Denis as well and spend the night and party. No. Are you dumb? Stay in your area and work, we're having a party with the entire zone isn't that enough? They were upset. So we had the party thursday morning and were finished and gone by noon. At about 6:30 P.M. we went to pick soeur Kenny up to go to the airport the St. Pierre soeurs decided to come up and play all day. When we showed up and they saw us they were all on edge because I have a reputation for... putting people in line. I didn't say anything because they were soeurs. One of them was like, "...Are you mad that we're here...?" I just smiled and didn't say anything. I don't know how to react to people in a positive manner. I just want to tear into people when they do dumb stuff, but I refrain. We got soeur Kenny sent off and it was not a pleasant experience for me ha. Going home looks like the most bittersweet experience in the world. Yowza, I'm not looking forward to that feeling. Can't wait to come home and see ya but leaving is going to be tough. Well back to the real mission stuff. We had this really awesome Ami named Marie Claude. She was GOLDEN and we had taught her twice but yesterday morning we got a call :( She told us to come get our book from her. We passed by and she came out of her apartment and told us that she didn't want anymore. So we talked and she looked at me and said, "I prayed like you told me too. Do you remember telling me to pray? Well I did and I did it sincerely and I went to bed. In the middle of the night something was outside of my door snarling, howling, and banging against the door." At first I was like what? And then I wanted to say, "Don't give me that garbage." And then I realized that she was the first person to ever tell me that she had gone and done what I asked her to do. Granted, people have kept commitments and stuff but Marie Claude was by far the most golden Ami I've had. We tried to get another time to meet but she wasn't having it and she made us take the book. HEART BREAKER. What next... uhhh oh yeah crazy time. We were porting in some gross apartments and an old lady answered her door without a top on and jumped back when she saw us and said, "Oh! Get in here!" haha So I peeked in and saw this young chinese looking guy and we went in. The lady was plastered. It was disgusting. The kid was from Vietnam and he knew a bit about Mormons so we had an interesting discussion with him. He wasn't drunk but super weird and his teeth were all rotted out. He was probably about 27 and the lady, I'd say... 60 ish. They were lovers :) There ain't no age when it comes to love baby. The lady kept touching me and being gross and she would go through phases of anger, singing, and straight comedy. Holy hannah it might have been the craziest thing that has happened. I got some pretty sweet videos of her being nuts. She would stand next to her boyfriend and look over at me and say, " Oh. Tu es beau. :)" and then , "Mmm. Je t'aime. :)" The videos will help you enjoy this story more than me just telling it. Yep time to go. See ya :)

Jeff         

Monday, February 13, 2012

This last week went by pretty quick. We had some awesome lessons and found a pretty golden family. It's the Marie Claude lady I told you about earlier and we taught her and it was awesome. We will fix a bap date this week with her. Our other investigator named Nicole came to church again and this time he stayed for all three hours and he loved it. He was making me tear pages out of my planner so he could take notes during priesthood. He kept raising his eyebrows and looking at me and saying, "This is good stuff man." haha the guy cracks me up. We taught a TON of lessons this week. We actually have a pool of investigators now and life is great. On Friday I had to do a baptismal interview for an old guy from Le Port. It was great... He was ready and we gave him the thumbs up. Yikes haha There was a hurricane that slid on by this weekend too. It barely touched us so that was a real let down. It's super windy though and the humidity is unbearable. I think this is the hottest it has been. It's not even sunny, it's just the humidity that kills me. there is lots going on at the moment. We had a branch activity on Friday night and it was alright. I really have nothing to talk about, sorry. I gave myself a pretty good haircut this morning :) Uhhh.... yep it was a good week. Oh yeah! Elder Chong Mook and I had an encounter with a giant spider in the basement of this nasty apartment building. It was just chillin on the wall staring me in the face. It was beefy and black and just creepy as can be, so I poked it with my pencil and it attacked us. Holy Hannah those things are fast. Don't worry it didn't get me. We stopped by Emanuel's house on Saturday and he was blazin' it up with his homies. He was getting ready to give a tattoo to the girl and she was sweating bullets while he was cleaning all his little needles and tools. His apartment is the grungiest place on the planet and I can only imagine the infections people get when he gives them tattoos. His Indian looking friend was there again and they were happy to see us. We didn't get to stick around long enough to see the tattoo happen which was a bummer, but the visit was entertaining enough. He's a sweet investigator when he isn't partying. We helped another one of our investigators clean her house and get ready for some inspection thing that she was having. We pulled weeds out in the yard too and I loved it. I miss yard work. While I was working in one of the flower beds I managed to rub up all over this little cactus and that was the worst. I had little needles everywhere in my right arm and leg. Yeah, that's about it for this past week. The work is going great. This little kid sitting on his mom's lap right next to me just ripped a loud fart and laughed and then said, "Pardon" hahaha Yes! Time to go. See ya later 

Love Jeff 

Monday, February 6, 2012

Hi

Great week. Time is back up to warp speed and it feels like yesterday I was sitting here typing. We had some success with a couple of Ami's and fixed one bap date. Hes an old guy named Nicole and he lives alone in an apartment. We had planned to teach the plan of salvation but when we sat down the spirit took over and I started talking about the third lesson (gospel of J.C.) and it was crazy powerful. Normally people can't grasp anything that we teach and it's just a struggle but this time Nicole was keeping right up with it and actually answering questions. It was one of the most powerful and perfect lessons that I've been a part of and at the end we committed him to be baptized and he accepted. Earlier in the week I had been studying in P.M.G. about teaching for understanding and it was just crazy how I was able to apply exactly what I had been studying and see the miracle that came from it. If only it was like that all the time haha. Man I can't even describe the feeling I had that day. Another thing that was amazing was how quickly I started to think to myself, "Hey... You're getting pretty good at this teaching gig" NOOOO!!! Haha luckily I caught myself and repented quickly. It's so easy to give yourself the credit and forget that you had been guided and prepared all week and in the lesson by the spirit. I'm so humble :) We taught some other pretty sweet lessons and the area is picking up. Nicole ended up coming to church as well and also three of the less actives that we had taught came back. Oh.. the joy that filled my soul.. haha. We had a few soirees with members this last week and I have been eating sooooooo much. I'm dying. I've noticed however, that I can't put food down like I used to. Before I left I was eating half or three quarters of the pan of every meal Mom cooked and now one rather small plate puts me past my limit. I don't drink very much either, the portions are so tiny! I can't believe how much I have changed. This morning we went down to St. Pierre with the St.Paul elders and the soeurs from St. Pierre to see some of the sights down there in the south. An old couple from the St. Pierre branch showed us around and we took a ton of pics. We played around on the lava flows and went to a few different beaches and waterfalls as well. I'll attach some pics for ya. They took us out to lunch afterwards to a really expensive buffet. It was heaven. The members are too nice and I feel bad but they are always trying to feed us and take us out. It wasn't like that in St.Marie but now in St. Denis and in St. Paul I might not look like I'm a 12 year old wearing my dad's suit. This week coming up is looking like it will be full of fun administrative stuff as we have a new sister arriving, a giant zone conference with a G.A. to organize, new cars to buy, and a visa to prepare for Mauritius. I miss being able to work in my area and that's it :( Now it's big stuff that involves everyone and the pressure to perform and organize awesome conferences and activities is kind of stressful. I can't wait to get home and have a family and career and school to worry about. I'm going to go crazy. Oh I forgot to mention that today We ran into some Americans and it was the weirdest thing that happened this week. They were from New Mexico and one of them was a member. I am so used to the culture here that seeing Americans gave me a taste of culture shock. Coming home is going to be quite an adjustment. Well, picture time! Love ya

Jeff