A Spread of Rampant Green

To whom it will concern. 

Welcome to the email list. For those of you just joining us, I regret to inform you that I've already sent all the good emails, and all these other emails that shall follow, which pertain to my mission, are but appendages to them. 

There are greenies everywhere. You can't take 10 steps in the New Zealand Aukland Mission without tripping over a new missionary that's being trained. Currently half the companionships in the mission are training (which, for those of you who're good at math, means a quarter of the missionaries are new.) Not to mention my mission president is new. There's a general attitude of "whhhhhhhhhat is GOING ON??" in the mission right now, which I would be concerned about if the guy who's actually in charge of this whole operation didn't know all the things that have, are, and will ever "go on." (Cause He's God.) I can tell that He knows these things, due to some subtle clues He's been leaving me that He knows the circumstances of my life.

Subtle clue #1

This week I said to my companion "None of our referrals even want to learn about the Gospel!" That is something I said because it was true. I also wanted to stop teaching all the people we're teaching cause they don't want to come to church. 

My companion nodded sympathetically but encouraged me not to drop everyone without trying a little harder. I think Elder Haffner is a Lord of the Vineyard in training, the way he tells me to "labor a little longer that perhaps we might preserve a little of the fruit." (See Jacob 5 if you don't know what I'm yapping about. Honestly if everyone who listened to me talk went and read the scriptures when they were confused about what I'm saying, the world would be a better place. Because of how frequently everyone around me would ve reading the scriptures.)

So anyway there was this one guy who responded to our ad, but we were not sure if he even existed, because every time we came over or called or texted he wasn't there. People in his house always told us "he's at work, come back later today." We'd attempted to contact him so many times (generally we drop people after attempting to reach them in three ways three times each way.) We tried this guy like 6 times in person and 3 times over text and call. so we could've stopped trying then, but for some reason we both felt like we should try one more time that evening. Then when we came in the evening we were told "he works the night shift, come tomorrow morning!" And for some reason we felt like we should try one more time. And then we came tomorrow morning and his wife told us "he juuuuuuust left, I don't know how you missed him!" But then to our surprise she invited us in to wait for him. And wait we did. Then moments later (as if deliberately trying to teach me a lesson about humility and/or patience) he showed up, (!!!!) and was super keen to learn! (All those exclamation marks are representative of the sheer shock felt by my companion and I upon learning this guy existed.) Our new friend is awesome! Teaching him is difficult because of a pretty big language barrier, but I love showing him the pictures in the Book of Mormon, and I showed him how to get the Book of Mormon app in his native language. 

Subtle clue #2

This week I said to my companion "trying to find people in public never works!" This is something I said cause I was annoyed about how nobody would talk to me or give me resturaunt recommendations. My companion nodded sympathetically but we put some time for it on our calendar anyway. Then, the first person we talked to at the park wanted to learn more about the church, and asked us to come back to teach a lesson. God helped us find this guy, just to teach me that street contacting is a way of finding people. (God's a great teacher.)

Subtle Clue #3

This week I said to my companion "door knocking is so ineffective, it never works!" I said this because objectively speaking door knocking is the least effective way to find interested people. My companion nodded sympathetically, but we went to go knock on doors anyway cause we had nothing better to do, and we're trying to be consecrated, full-time missionaries. We decided for no specific reason to start at the oposite side of the street and come back. And the first door we knocked on was a guy who needed some help. So, at his request we called him an ambulance, and stayed with him until the paramedics arrived. He was having trouble breathing or speaking at all, but we were able to get the necessary information to the paramedics. They didn't seem to think whatever was happening to him was life-threatening so hopefully he'll be okay. They took him off to the hospital, and sent us away (understandably) but pray for Tony that he can get the medical help he needs.

If we'd been knocking on doors any later in the day, or started at the other side of the street, things could have gone differently.  Anyway, we have a loving heavinly father and we are his children.

♡♡

New Zealand is beautiful, and I love it. We went to the beach on Pday and the beaches here are black and rainy and cold and sometimes there's pengins at them. (I haven't seen any yet, but I hear they hang out here. People explain thier absence by telling me they're endangered, but that just seems like excuses.) Defintely I'll send at least one picture and if you want more you'll have to find other means of obtaining them. There are actually a lot of endangered birds here and all I'm saying is for one species of birds to become endangered is a tragedy... for 170 species of birds to become endangered looks like carelessness. 

Bashers are actually built different in New Zealand and I kinda love it. I hear all these terrible stories from all y'all in California and Texas and such about the bashers who hate us missionaries and yell at you or threaten to call the police on you or other mean things. Bashers here just air thier grievances then give us Kiwis and tell us to have a blessed day. We met a guy who told us our church was full of embezelors and racists and such, and that he'd heard (from his mormon friend) that we don't let sinners into the church. I told him that we actually loved sinners especially those that are trying to change, but he wasn't convinced. He then proceeded to rant about how evil the government was, and how our church was equally corrupt, and just run like a buisness. He also told us he was probably gonna kill the whole government with the jawbone of a donkey. He didn't like our religion at all which made me want to challenge him to a "which one of us is happier" competition to see if I could prove him wrong, but I decided against it. Instead I deployed a neat trick that I've been learning from my companion where I just smile and nod sympathetically. Then he gave us some golden Kiwis that I'm SOOOOO excited to try!!! It was the best! Also, fun fact, did you know you can eat Kiwis with the skin on? I discovered this the other day when I was experimenting with my freewill. (They're delicious.) 

We almost got kidnapped:

As we were walking to church in the rain, an old lady pulled up and said "Elders! Are you going to the chappel?" We said yes, and so she told us to get in the car. We looked at each other questioningly, shrugged and decided it was probably fine. Her car smelled like smoke and it had a big wooden chair in it, and generally chairs make sitting easier, but that chair made sitting in the back seat much harder. She's not a member but she was very concerned that nobody was giving us rides to church, and even more concerned that we weren't being fed enough. She kept saying our mom's would be worrying about us, and we needed to eat more. (Surely the truth.) She kept telling us "tell the bishop to give you a ride. Tell your bishop to make people feed you." We asked for her name, but she just told us ominously "you'll find out who I am." 

We later found out from other missionaries that she was our Bishop's mom.

Grumpy Lady:

I MET A NEW GRUMPY PERSON!! She has a sign by her sink that says "If you don't wash your dishes I will punch you in the face" and another sign on her door that says "a kind man and a grumpy old lady live here" and it's all true. She has lots of cats that she doesn't like and a parrot which she always gets mad at. To be fair it's kind of a bad parrot. Her (future hopefully) daughter in law who lives with her is very sweet though and they have a fun dynamic when they're together. The grumpy lady says grumpy stuff and the daughter says happy stuff and it's fun for everyone. (Except the cats.) Thier names are Willow and Socks! (The cats that is.)

Complaining: 

Please skip this if you don't like that my emails aren't focused enough on "actual missionary work." This section is essential to write though, as I aspire to one day audition to join the grumpy people I so enjoy being around on my mission.

 

- Daylight savings time happened and it was terrible. We went to church, and none of the speakers came so guess who they asked to speak. (I hate giving talks with no preparation because I just know if I prepared I would be able to give a GOOD talk, and without preparation I kinda just say stuff. Which you guys would be used to cause of my emails, but the ward was a little perturbed.) 5 minutes before church only the bishop was there, and that's when we knew that we were gonna do eveything. Luckily we didn't have to teach Elders Corum but we were the only guys there so we had to pARtIcaPaTe. (I hope you can hear the disgust with which I say that.)

- I hate my phone cause I'm always accidentally hitting the "close all tabs" button which reminds me of my first camera that for some reason had a "delete all photos button." Moment of silence for all the photos I took of German castles. I also hate my phone cause it's always telling me my face doesn't match and my fingerprint doesn't match even though my face is my face. 

Unrelated to all that, my phone also already has a bunch of cracks on the screen protector, and I don't really know why.

FAQ:

Question: "Do you have any parrots?"

Answer: Unfortunatly I've not yet invested.

Question: "Parrots would make good missionaries."

Answer: You're truly a genuis.

Stats:

Miles Run: 106

Pushups: 9,965

Embark Level: 9

Emergency Transfers: 2

Times I missed Taco Bell: 1

Times I ate Taco Bell: 1

Money I have to spend on food: Infinite. (Credit cards are amazing.)

Credits:

Credit to my Editor, Elder Haffner, who told me how to spell "species." If I'd had it my way you would have thought I was talking about the aromic parts of a plant that you use in tiny amounts to add flavor, color, or scent to food.

Pictures:

———

Additional Photos:

Thunderspeaker

As promised two weeks prior (or was it two years?), I will now educate you in the ways people speak here, be defining important terms. This will hopefully help you avoid confusion the next time you're a missionary in NZ. (This fun list will be especially helpful for those of you who love fun lists.)

1. "As..." This slang is used because Kiwis are bad at metaphor, and means something like "really" or "very." When something is really cool they'll say it's "cool as" or if it's really tuff they'll say "tuff as." When prompted to reveal "cool as what?" NZ natives will be unable to provide an answer. This seems to me like the equivalent of telling someone "his eyes were like," or "the hair of his head like." This slang gets 3 language stars for its efficiency I guess.

2. "Yous." This word is the plural (or sometimes singular) form of "you," much the same way "brethren" is the plural (but sometimes singular) form of brother. This makes it infinitely better than its counterpart "y'all" which can't ever be used as a singular "you."

3. "Congegate." This word isn't specifically NZ slang, but even in all my years of living I've never been able to decern its meaning. (Some of you may see this and feel a desire to to rectify this deficiency, but please try and refrain. I remain ignorant by choice.)

4. "What are we doing." Best I can tell this phrase actually means "what are you doing right now Malachi, stop this instant" but I appreciate my companion's willingness to share the blame. 

5. "That's us." Used as a way to end meetings, agree with someone, or signal that its time to go get lunch at a restaurant we're passing.

6. "Rock up." This one just means "go to." Like we "Rock up to that appointment unannounced."

7. "Whau." As in "Whau River,1" which is my new area. This word is used to talk about said area. "Wh" make a "f" sound here, and "au" make an "Ahhh" sound. 

8. "Luverkin special." This isn't NZ slang, just something my DL says a lot. Basically it's what he calls all the crazy U turns and only-legal-with-a-really-good-lawyer maneuvers while we're driving. Use this when you're bad at driving and want to blame it on your hometown. 

In my many days of reading missionary emails, I've discovered that nobody reading these emails is quite as excited for transfer news as the missionary writing them. The missionaries pull out titles like "CRAAAAAAAZY NEWS THIS WEEK" and then the news is "I'm going to <insert random place none of you know>! And I'm going to be with Elder <unfamiliar name such as witchurch>!!!" And they're always so excited about it, but thier excitement is never enough to justify the extravagant titles they label the emails with, and the exuberant (and eroneous) exclamations they bandy about. Sometimes the missionaries close family understands a little better why certian news is exciting, but to the leyman, those emails come off as self indulgent. But worry not dear readers, with a title as weighty as "Thunderspeaker" I won't waste any time telling about the things that won't interest you, like how I'm training a new missionary on my second transfer before my training is complete. (His name is Elder Hafner, and I had a premonition that this was coming and included a picture of him in my last email. ♡) 

Instead I'll tell you about my late companion's thunderspeaker. It was big, and loud, and I named it based on it being about the size of Thor's fists (He's the god of thunder.) My companion used it to sing careoke with the ward, and that was as painful as careoke always is. I don't actually hate singing, when it's not purposefully intended to be loud, uncomfortable, and out of tune. Its a funny coincidence, cause as of just barely speakers larger than the size of your fist are banned. (It works cause Thor's not in this mission.) 

Dom de Línguas

Speaking of the speaking of speaking, eu disse línguas. That means I speak Portuguese. The reason why is because I discovered a histórias do lívero de mórmon in my flat. (A book of Mormon story book. In Portuguese!!!!) I'm not really sure why it was there because nobody here knows Portuguese and there are no Brazilian missionaries in the mission, so I concluded that God was trying to hand deliver it to me. So I downloaded embark which is an app like duolingo in that they stole the duolingo sound effects. (It's like duolingo in no other ways.) A few days later I found a Portuguese book of mormon, that I'm certian just appeared there. 

I don't speak any Thai which is okay most days except one time when my old companion Elder Na Nongkai (remember with the space jacket?) taught a full lesson in Thai while I just sat there and nodded. The woman he was teaching worked at a Thai massage place, so as we walked up to it he told me we were going to get a massage. I fully belived him of course, and took imediate decisive action. (Namely, to laugh nervously.) It ended up being a fun lesson though, and we got some free ginger tea out of it. 

Craaaaaaazy people:

I loooooove my new companion. (Elder Haffner)

I didn't know this crazy people section of my email would become a reoccurring thing, but it surely might need to be because there are crazy people hiding in every corner. On Saturday we rocked up to visit an inactive member, and we're greeted by a pile of signs obscuring an abandoned looking shack thing. Every sign had a message, ranging from "Jesus is king" to "up against 100 years of NZ police regulations" (whatever that means.) Unfortunately the lady we were looking for didn't live in the shack thing, she lived next door. Fortunately, the crazy guy came stumbling out of his shack to intercept us right after we found the woman we were looking for!

Now I want to clarify, that the reason I love Elder Haffner is not because he's a crazy person, even though that would be awesome. But as we were flanked on all sides, (by the woman we were looking for in the south and the crazy guy in the east) our companionship division of labor became instantly clear. He talked to the woman who really needed a kind, calm, man to listen to her and empathize with her struggles. I distracted the crazy drunk guy who told me all about the "injections" he'd gotten in his legs as a child, that had made him immune to the effects of dugs (?) and also about all the (somewhat vulger) things he said to a policeman who'd been trying to arrest him once. (I think?) He also told me that ---though he'd never read it--- he knew the Bible very well from the mudic he listened to. I invited him to church, but he said unless we played death metal there he'd be sleeping instead. 

Elder Haffner somehow thought he got the better end of that deal, which is why my companion and I are such a dream team. 

NZ Signs I want to complain about:

I'm making this a full email section cause there are somehow multiple signs I want to complain about. That feels surprising to me but maybe yous are less surprised than I am.

- One real estate agent's slogan is "your property is my priority" which is a terrible slogan because the first 3 times I saw the sign I thought it said "your property is myproperty" and simply thought 

"What in the communism?" 

- At a park I saw a sign that said "1 small hot dog = 40 minutes of intense excersize" which is good to know. Since these two things are basically the same, I've substituted by normal 40 minutes of morning exercise for just eating an extra hot dog. Much easier.

- at the train station there's a sign that says "WATCH OUT FOR TRAINS BE SAFE" and besides its lack of punctuation, I take great issue with society (or some random trian station) thinking they have a stake in my safety as an individual. I'll do what I want.

Shout out to Utah's 0 casualties program whose acceptable casualty count is far above 0.

The Lord Will Provide:

This week the lord provided one (1) kiwi, one (1) old sweater that smelled like drugs, two (2) tasty ribs, ten (10) crispy pancake balls, and one (1) companion that cooked me chicken. 

I found the Kiwi on the road at one of the houses we knocked on. (With no answer.) I picked up the kiwi, put it in my pocket, and forgot about it. 3 days later I found the road-kiwi in my pocket, and ate it. It was the best kiwi I've ever had. (It tasted like the Lord's mercy.)

The Jacket came from an old guy who started ripping off his sweater as we walked by him, and at first I was confused but then he pressed the sweater into my hands and said "God bless" and then disappeared down the street before I could give so much as a verbal quibble. I was left standing there flabbergasted, on the cold street, holding an old and somewhat suspicious (but lovingly bestowed) sweater. It smelled vaguely like drugs so I didn't feel like I could wear it, and also I wasn't at all cold despite my short sleeves so I don't know why everyone was assuming I was. I don't get cold. But still I hope that man is forever blessed for his selfless act of giving his sweater to a missionary. May you all be a little more like him.

The tasty ribs were given to us at an Islander shop for free, cause a member owned it. They were the best ribs I've ever had, and I'm a little sad they gave them for free because I want to go back but if I do they'll think I'm just trying to aquire more free food. They also gave us these really crispy pancake balls which were so amazing. Maybe they'll let us pay if we go back? Who knows.

That's all for today, lovely people. Remember: sing your little heart out.

FAQ:

Question: "Help! I've started speaking like your emails, and I sound like you when I write! What do?"

Answer: Unfortunately these effects are both unavoidable and irreversible. 

Question: "Why are you learning Portuguese?"

Answer: It's because Bronson knows Portuguese and I want to be able to talk to him, so I can tell him to read his scriptures.

Stats:

Miles: 88

Pushups: 9125

Spirit Island Games: 7

Embark Level: 7

Dog Attacks: 1

You know who you are:

Ler as escrituras, sua grande vaca.

Pictures:

*Me with my dinosaur magnet collection

*Crazy Guy's shack 

*My arm, post dog-attack. If you zoom in you can see all the manly scratches from when I valiently battled the dogs. You don't have to zoom in to see my forearm mucles though.

*Raiiiinbow!!

*A map of the world, where New Zealand has an overinflated ego and thinks its the size of South America.

———

Additional Photos: