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:
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Additional Photos:
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