Monday, November 14, 2016

Week 58 in Tonga


Elder Mahe, Elder DeSpain, Elder Leka, and Elder Ofa

Hey Everybody,

This weeks been pretty crazy. Especially the transfer. But I'll get to that later. 

Monday- Enos and Harmon and I split off from the zone pday and went to play pool at a members house. That was fun. Afterwards we went to the blow holes in houma. Oh yeah, I saw Pahulu, my first AP when I came in, at the zone p-day. Been about a year now since he finished. We were all supposed to eat dog at the pday, but it wasnt ready... Then when we were sleeping monday night, around 11:30 our phone started going off. We kept ignoring it until we got a text from Lisa in Utulau "ko maua eni ha'u moe kuli" haha then we answered the phone right away. Lisa is the best. The dog was ready at like 11 pm, and they decided to drive all the way over to fahefa to give us some dog to eat... Hahaha so we ate dog at like 12 that night. Delicious. 

Tuesday- We took Enos and Fakahu'a to the resort restaurant to celebrate the end of Fakahu'a's training. Love those guys. I also accidentally reversed over their stake presidents dog that day... it crawled under the car. Its alright though, its still alive. I started my vilo hoa that night with Elder Toutai too. 

Wednesday- Dreamt that I didnt have enough money for Ritas water ice. Sad dream. Taught the peace corp named Nick. He's really cool. Good lesson. Love teaching in english, even though I forget a lot of words. Toutai climbed some coconut trees for us and got us some coconuts to drink. Taught investigator named Pela, and then afterwards went to fafanga at Vaikonas. They fed us Ota Ika!!!! Delicious. With hot manioke too, and we heard all about the election and the results, crazy!



Thursday- Interviewed one of Houmas investigators for baptism, and found out that she was the older sister of one of the girls that Tafoya and I tried to teach forever in Tufuvai. That was cool, Ofeina Topu' is older sister. Good talk about that with her. 

Friday- Friday was crazy. I found out my transfer from Gardner at the office. We went over there to drop our car off to be serviced, and ended up hanging out there with the APs and office elders from 11 until 4. The finishing missionaries showed up and we got to talk to them, and then after they left I talked to Tua'one for a while. He just came back from Nomuka in Ha'apai and is having something done to fix his teeth. He's temporarily comps with Gardner... Then he told me my Transfer. Tua'one is coming to Hihifo and being the zone here with Elder Ieni... and I.... I am going to Nomuka and training a tongan.... Then Gardner later confirmed it. And then... They told me all about Nomuka....

NOMUKA- Nomuka is the most remote island in the Ha'apai island group. Its about a six hour boat ride from Tonga, and likewise, around the same from ha'apai. You can only get to it by boat, and ill be so far away from any other missionaries that I wont go to district meetings. I am basically going to Niua, except its not as hot in Nomuka. There's no internet, and there's only a tiny branch on the island. I cover two other tiny islands there as well, but will only go if one of the members say they have an investigator. The island has a fresh water lake in the center of it. Pretty cool. My prayers and letters to president about how badly I want to go back to the islands have been answered, except this is another level. 

So I'm pretty excited about all of that, and the opportunity to train again. Training is fun. 

Nomuka has been shut down to missionaries for years, and the missionaries that did cover the island before, lived on a different island.  (Mom don't freak out I'll be fine). Elder Tua'one just came from there, he just reopened the island last transfer and he was giving me a lots of information that will be really helpful, so thats good.  

So yeah... pretty excited, pretty sketched out, training, no internet, one of the supposed prettiest islands in the world... Should be interesting. Definitely going to be a once in a lifetime experience. Elder Gardner is going to be my new ZL in Ha'apai too, which will be pretty cool. I only go in to the main Ha'apai islands for zone conference, and maybe I'll get to net there. Tua'one told me some of the members on the island have cell phones that I could net from, but I dont know how expensive that'd be or not, so I dont know when I'll be emailing again. And I dont know about Skype for christmas either. Sorry Mom. But I'm going to try, and Elder Enos told me I could call him and he'd read me emails from my account from tonga over the phone to me and respond if I wanted haha. So thats an option. Should be fun. 

Saturday- We baptised our investigator named Pela.

Sunday- Confirmed Pela, packed all day long. Going to try and store my other luggage at my stake presidents house until I finish. Mahe gave me money to buy cards to skype home for christmas with a members phone or something in Nomuka if thats an option. Hes the man. Oh yeah and Otukolo gave me his really nice electric phillips razor to use there because he knows I wont be able to buy razors. Tons of other stuff happened this week that was awesome. But thats the wrap up.

 Love you guys. If I dont talk to you guys again for a while, you'll know why. Could be 4-6 months, but I think I'll be able to email at zone conferences, and there are rumors internet is coming to Nomuka but who knows. Hopefully I'll be able to skype for Christmas. I"m sure Prez will let us do something. Going to be fun. I'll keep you all in my prayers. 

Until Next Time, Ofa Atu, Tay


                         My ward mission leader -Sitaleki

Some P-day beach time






2 comments:

  1. Cannot tell you how much I LOVE reading your blogs...fun,fun fun!It is wonderful to read how you adapt to each situation and find the good in everything that you experience. You are in our daily prayers...always!!! Love Sister Jones Morton

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh Taylor!! I'm so excited for this new experience!! I know you will be a great missionary where they are sending you. I will continue to pray for your success and your safety! Love you tons!! Grama Polly

    ReplyDelete