Week 21 on the Island of Eua

Hey All,

Good to hear that mom and dad had a good anniversary. La Cantina
sounds mexican, not fair.  

Hopefully you guys have a good day out on the slopes and can have some
videos for me of Luke next week. That would be cool.

I was really glad to hear that you all went up to Princeton to surprise Natalie at her game. I'm sure that meant a lot to her, thanks.

Elder Tafoya is improving ever so slightly, it's slow, but he is improving. We get along really well. I'm dang jealous of X. He gets so many nice conveniences. He gets a flat with four elders to share it.

Thats got to be so much fun, and stores where he can buy real food, probably a dishwasher and laundromat to use. He's got it so good. They probably even have their own desks to study on, that's lucky.

I'm doing well. Lots of work, we have 7 new investigators. I'm very tired, but happy to be busy.

Hope you guys are doing well.

Love ya, Tay

Bits from his Journal-

I decided to print out a new, bigger and better map from google earth. Also printed a map of Houma and Tufu too. This  maps going to be huge, it's going to be way nice. I'm pretty excited aout it actually it will help us track all of our work and make our travel a bit easier. 

2/22/16 We then headed to the store to pick up some supplies. After we ate lunch we headed to our appointment with Sione They didn't really know how to run a family home evening, so I helped them out a little bit. We taught about the Book of Mormon with them. Afterwards we headed back to President Havea's to get our laundry. Sister Havea is so awesome and helpful. We showed up and all of our clothes were folded on the table in their living room and she was knitting a ta'ovala. She is so great, I apologized for all of the work she did, I didnt expect her to fold them or even hang them up to dry. She was happy to do it though and was all smiles, some people are just awesome. On the way back to our MQ the worst possible thing happened, I caught my flop on a rock and it snapped. There's no way I'm changing flops, I'' just have to tape it or super glue it or something. These flops are going to last me the whole mission whether they're held together with duct tape or other flops glued to the bottom or whatever.

2/26/16 Day 184 - 6 Months Out
I'm officially a whole fourth of the way through my mission today. Six months, I have been out longer than a whole year of school days. Crazy. 

2/27/16
We went to market as we were told that the markets usually sold some American goods, occasionally deodorant. So we went and checked for that and found none, then we did find some Tongan-Chinese deodorant circle tube brand stuff. So that might have to do in while. Butttt... We discovered an ice cream cone stand at the market at the DVD store. Ice cream ki ai!!! There's an ice cream shop in Ohonua! How awesome is that, flipping awesome. We are planning on saving 16 Pa'anga a month for ice cream twice a week. Its good New Zealand ice cream too, no restrictions on the amount of cream included. Delicious.

Then we walked to Tufu while eating our ice cream. On the way we saw Samiu and his kids soaking wet from fishing in the ocean. Samiu went snorkeling for crabs and got a big one. The beach on the way to Tufu and the road to Tufu looks like paradise. Sometimes it's hard to believe I'm serving a mission here, I'm pretty lucky. We got a ride from Sione Lonitenisi on our walk to Mele's. Sat on the front of his tractor hitch and held onto the edges. Haha along the way we passed some kids walking, and he slowed down just enough for them to run and jump onto the back of the trailer. No stopping haha. This is how we do it in Tonga.

2/28/16

We got picked up by Alisona to go to the Houma branch today for church. We jumped in the back of the truck, it was raining outside so our ride was a little refreshing. Our hair was soaked when we got the the branch but not much else because the truck was going fast. We met the Pisope for the first time there and he immediately asked us to speak in sacrament meeting in two weeks from now on missionary work. The second counselor asked us to bare our testimonies, so we did that. After sacrament Pisope had us teach an investigator with her fakafeohi and Alisona in the office. It went really well, it wasn't her first lesson. She then wanted to set a baptism date with us for Mar. 19th. This little church here in Houma gets it done. They set up a little pavilion tent thing outside after sacrament each week for Sunday school to meet in. The room used for sacrament was where the primary met and then I think the families garage is where they hold young men's and what not. We had elders quorum in the grass under the tent thing. After church Pisope and Alisona and us had a missionary coordination meeting in the office. Houma is going to be fun. Two new investigators there already. We got a ride back to Ohonua in the back of Alisona's truck. Traveling by truck bed is great!