Merry Christmas! Happy New Years!

Hey everyone! I hope you all had a Merry Christmas! I most definitely did! It was wonderful being able to skype and see most everyone. I couldn't ask for a better gift.

 

Although it was Christmas week Elder Mello and I got a lot done. I think I taught more lessons this week then any other week in my mission. I don't know how! Haha. But we met some great people including a family that we can work with. I have been wanting to work with a family for forever! So we expected a lot of people at church but things didn't go as expected. We waited outside the apartment for people to show up and we had an unexpected visitor. His name is Casm. We met him while we were caroling and we taught him once. When we taught him it was mostly his son asking all kinds of questions and he was mostly listening. But out of all the great lessons we had with all our investigators he was the only one to show up! He had a great experience at church. I gave a talk in both branches on Eternal Perspectives. A couple hours after church we went to teach Casm and his wife Abbey. We taught them the Restoration and used the Prophet of the Restoration movie to show the first vision. We invited Casm to pray about it to get an answer but he said he already has received an answer. He said "The first time you guys came over I knew God sent you" Haha. But he went on to explain that he has felt the spirit very strong in our lessons and at church. It was very nice to finally have someone come to church and already have a testimony. We should have a good week with all the new people to work with.

 

Happy New Years!

 

Love, Elder Hale

Surprises

Acclima

Hello friends and fam! So this week was full of surprises. Elder Hartshorn was transferred to Tobago. I am staying with the zone leaders in San Fernando right now til my companion gets here. He won't be here til Thursday or later. His name is Elder Mello and he is on Grenada right now.

This week was the first week we had church for the Penal members in our apartment. So Elder Hartshorn and I had to speak, sing, bless and pass the sacrament, and teach gospel principles in two branches! And they told us on Friday. But everything went really well. I spoke on the birth and life of Jesus. I told the story of the homeless man that came and gave Dad money after the Suns game. It's a great Christmas story!

We went to Acclima's and we helped her clean her house. Then we helped her son David walk to go sing Christmas carols to her father. Her Dad has cancer and he just stays in bed so he really enjoyed it. He actually belted out all the hymns with us! It was super funny. But it really brought in the Christmas spirit.

Also I had a really gnarly bike crash. A car got close to me and went off the road down a hill into a ditch. It must have been a pretty funny sight. I was fine cause I had a helmet on but it was crazy!

I hope you all have a wonderful week. I enjoyed mine(:

With love,

 

Elder Hale

This is called an Aloo pie! They are sold everywhere!

We sang Christmas hymns for Acclima, her son David (in the picture), and her father.

So this is church in our apartment! Hopefully it grows!

Elder Hartshorn's departure. This our farewell w/ Elder Webb in the back being creepy.

Ramdeo

Carlos and fam

Hello friends we had a good week again. We found a cool Hindu guy named Ramdeo who is actually a Christian that doesn't know it. Haha. There is lots of those here. He is an alcoholic and we had a very good lesson with him where he ended up opening up to us. He really wants help and that is what I like in investigators. 

After we taught him we went down the road and a lady called out to us from her balcony and said "Hey I'm from Canada!" "It's so nice to see white people!" Haha. Her name is Acclima and she left Trinidad when she was 16 and married an Englishman. She said she was sitting there reading her Bible and she was just praying that something good would happen. She looked up and saw two white boys on bikes. haha. She has been going crazy because she is taking care of her Dad. Feeding him, washing him, and everything else. She also has a handicapped son named David who needed some company. We had a nice discussion with her I think there can be something that will come out of it before she goes back to Canada in January. 

Next week we are also have a sacrament meeting in our apartment for those who live in Penal. That way they don't have to travel all the way to Siparia. It should be interesting. Also we are singing for many more activities coming up!

I love you all have a wonderful week! 

Love, Elder Hale

This is my buddy Andrew Baptiste. But you say it like buh-teese(:

Rasta dog!

This is my little Hindu friend Anton at Divali.

Roller Coaster Week

Well Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! This week was a roller coaster ride. Let me tell you about it!

Elder Hartshorn and I sang "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" in our Sacrament meeting. We practiced all week so it went really good. Also President and Sister Mehr visited our Sacrament meeting. Sister Mehr kept complimenting our song which meant a lot cause she sang in the Mo tab. They blow my mind every time they speak. In the 3rd hour President gathered the whole branch and rallied the troops. He told them the whole situation of the West Indies Mission right now and explained how they could help. We have 60 missionaries coming in and not a place to put them. All visas are to their max. He asked for the faith and prayers of the branch to bring about a miracle. He says he is still waiting on Guyana to let him know if they will let more missionaries in. At most they will let 40 in. But he said "I want you all to watch what happens." "Watch the hand of the Lord in His work." "I don't know how he will do it." "But I know he will.." Everyone in the Branch was super excited and ready to do missionary work.

President also announced we will be starting a group in Penal. Which is where our apartment is. It's about 15 minutes from Siparia. And we will be holding Sacrament meeting possibly in our apartment and in Siparia. Yea it's crazy.

After church President took us to see a less active in our area. There had been a really big incident that offended her and stopped her going to church. I won't get into it but this women is very contentious. She started to tell President everything that's wrong with everyone. He politely stopped her and that caused an outrage! She screamed at him with tears in her eyes "Your nothing compared to President Gamiette!" (The last mission president) He just kept saying sorry and we eventually just had to leave because it was so bad.

In the car President did not say one thing bad about this lady. He is so humble. He just felt sorry he couldn't help. I really learned a lot from that experience. Tolerance! Man I love my President.

I love you guys too! Have an awesome week!


Love, Elder Hale

Divali

Well this week was pretty good! We found a couple more promising people to work with. The problem with people lately is committment. They don't want to do anything. It is like pulling teeth to try to get someone to come to church. And everyone uses the exuse that the Sabbath day is on Saturday so they don't really feel obligated to come to church on a Sunday. So the search with go on and we will seperate the wheat from the tares.

 

Divali was pretty fun. Lots and lots of food and fireworks. We took some food home with us and we ate it three days later. Big mistake.. I'm still recovering from it. Never eat leftover indian food!

 

Something kinda funny happened this week with a less active. She told us she is planning to come back to church next year so we taught her not to procrastinate the day of her repentence.  Elder Hartshorn brought up how we don't know when we will die. He said "What happens if you get in a car accident tommorrow?" She said "Oh please, I have plenty days left." So she pretty much shot down his point. But the interesting thing that happened is that this lady went on a trip on Saturday to maracas beach with some of her friends. On the way they were driving on a thin road and they dodged a oncoming and their car went off the road and rolled down a hill. Her friend died from the crash and she was pretty beat. So she is in shock right now.

 

On Sunday I gave my talk and everything went well. After church we had a fireside on Family Home Evening. It was really fun and we had a bunch of refreshments after.

 

There are lots of missionaries coming in the field in March and it looks like President Mehr might have worked his magic with the Minister of Culture in Guyana. They should be allowing us to send more missionaries there. It is pretty likely I could go there to train a new missionary. It will be like starting the mission over. Guyana is a whole new world.

 

Anyways I love you guys and hope you have a Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Love, Elder Hale

Hindu Christmas

Hello friends! This week went pretty good. We had some good days where we had lots to do and other days we stuck to finding. We really only have one serious investigator named Mia. She is 16 and she has a great testimony. She has been taught everything. The problem is her Grandma (Who is a member) won't let her be baptized because she says she isn't ready. So we are running out of ideas with her quick.

At church this week the Branch President and 1st counselor didn't even show up. The second counselor came at 9:15! It was the Primary program too. It was really funny there were only 5 kids. There was one little kid that held a microphone in the middle of them when they sang. It was like the Jackson 5! Anyways so this Branch has a lot of fixing up to do. Especially the part where we don't get fed after church. Haha just kidding! So our focus this transfer is more member work then finding new investigators. Although there is plenty time for both.

I have been assigned to give a talk next week in sacrament on "Being Positive" I don't know if I have heard anyone give a talk on this but whatever! Well I am excited for Holli and her upcoming baby! And Happy Birthday to Dad! Tomorrow is the Divali (say it like Di-wall-ee) celebration so it's gonna be exciting here. It's like the Hindu Christmas! Love you guys have an awesome week!

Love, Elder Hale

Siparia

Hello everyone! I have limited time today but let me do my best to recap this week.

So Siparia is a cool area. The missionary work however is struggling because of the lack of effort from past elders. These past couple days we have had a hard time finding anything to do besides finding! I got to ride bikes for the first time which was sweet! We rode up and down hills for three hours finding nothing but Hindus (which I love). After we were completely exhausted, I asked Elder Hartshorne where we could go and he really couldn't think of one thing. It was a little discouraging. But we had a heart to "Hart" and he really wants to work hard this transfer. He has gotten into some lazy habits so he wants me to wear him out. So we got a game plan now for this transfer and we are real excited.

We also had another amazing zone conference where President Anderson from the Seventy came and spoke to us. He was inspiring! President Mehr never seizes to amaze me either!