August 21 - warm showers in a bucket

Last goodbye to Faainu

This week nothing special happened. We did two lessons with L. We have to push his baptismal date back to the 3rd of September because the 27th they have a village meeting and he's a Matai (chief).  He is progressing really well. He either has bad eyes or can't really read so we've been reading togethter. He was at church yesterday and loves it. He comes every Sunday. 

I had some revelation the other day. Instead of taking cool showers, why not use the water heater thing and then pour it into a bucket?!  I've started doing that and it is so much better.

We went to Apia this morning to fill up the car and we got some McDonalds. Pretty good!  Transfers will happen in the middle of the week and we are waiting to get the phone calls to see if I get transferred to another area.  I feel like I might, so it's just wait and see.

We splurged and bought some bacon and it was a bomb Sunday breakfast before church. I'm getting fat...

August 15th - why I'm in Fagaloa

 The photo is with Fa'ainu, the kid we do splits with.  He leaves for the MTC next week

Oh, and I made the can of refried beans you sent. So good!!!   I think Heavenly Father was watching out for me when he called me here to Samoa and not somewhere in Mexico because I would be so fat! :0

Taaaalofa

We got a baptismal date! His name is Luama'a (two rocks) and he's from Uafato. He's probably over 50 years old but so ready to be baptized. We taught him lesson one about the restoration. It was a weird lesson. Before we started the lesson I asked him if he had any questions. He didn't have any but as we started he stopped us a lot to ask questions about stuff. So it didn't flow very well but it was good that he asked us his questions. He wants to get baptized quickly so this week we're going to focus on the importance of baptism. It's not just a one time thing but a life-long covenant. 

The whole time I've been in Fagaloa I've kinda wondered why I'm here. It's an area with not a whole lot of people to teach, the church is really strong, and the few people who aren't baptized REALLY don't want to listen to what we have to say. I've been thinking we're gonna find this big family and baptize them or something major like that. But I've come to the realization that that's not what's going to happen. This week we had a cool little experience with a less-active member of the church. 

My comp and I have been wanting to visit a specific house for a while now and we finally had an opportunity to do so. We sat down and started talking with the woman. Then my comp said in Samoan, "Sorry my Samoan is so bad" and then she responded in perfect English, "don't worry about it".   She went on to tell us (all in English) that she is half Tongan and was born in Tutuila (American Samoa). She was baptized in Tutuila with her husband then they moved here 5 years ago. She speaks English, Tongan, Samoan, and Spanish fluently. She was a really interesting lady. She talked a lot about her family. She said she plans on going back to Tutuila at the end of the month.  At the end, I attempted to testify to her in English about eternal families and it felt flippin' weird trying to communicate in English!

I asked her in the beginning if missionaries had visited her since she's been here and she said no. Not a single time in 5 years. And Fagaloa is very small with hardly any people. After we left my comp and I were still kinda in shock about how the visit went. I thought about it later that day as a reason that I was transfered here. I have faith that the little visit we had resparked her faith and maybe when she goes back to Tutuila she'll go back to church. 

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August 7th & a beautiful sunrise

Sunday afternoon read

sunrise

This week was good! My companion's leg is a lot better. We didn't get any lessons with investigators but a lot with less actives and members. We went on a split with a kid in Uafato who is going to serve in New Zealand. He went through the temple this last week and I could just tell he was spiritually pumped up. He's a super cool kid and we're definitely gonna go on more splits with him this week. We did get a referral about a guy in Uafato who is probably around 50. I've never really taught someone this old, but from what people have said about him, he sounds pretty promising. We were gonna go contact him but we didn't have enough gas so we're gonna go this week. We also got other referrals about some kids who go to church. Hopefully we get an investigator from that.

On Friday we had our district meeting and we did a scripture search game and I destroyed everyone. If I had done that before my mission, I would've failed. It was just kinda cool to see how much I've learned since being on my mission.

This week should be fun! Hopefully we get to set a baptismal date!

Ou te alofa ia te outou uma lava. Fa'amanuia le Atua ia te outou. Maua le fiafia ma oli'oli taimi uma. Manuia tele lava lenei vaiaso!

July 30th...Don't be cheeky

This week we just stayed at home cause of my comp's leg. It's a lot better now so were gonna get to work this week. We baptized our one investigator Faleiva. He lives in Uafato the village with the chapel that's just a roof on polls. There isn't a font so we did the baptism in the river right behind the chapel. My comp was gonna get a picture of me before we did the baptism, but he had to be a witness so he only got the after shot.  That's the first picture above.

We went to Apia this morning to fill up the car and we stopped by one of the elders houses to get a haircut. Elder Powelson is his companion so we got to talk a with him a little bit. Elder Powelson was my trainer and he goes home in two weeks. 

My comp and I thought this was pretty funny...

Don't be cheeky... translated: "aua te tautalalaitiiti"