December 14, 2009

Hey there!Well it’s been an interesting week with transfers and all. Mkhize and I had planned out what might happen to the two of us…we assumed because he had been there in Ilinge before me that he would be the one that was going to be transferred. We waited patiently on Tuesday for transfer news but nothing came. Not until the next morning. And it was a bit of a surprise. Instead of Mkhize leaving and me staying, it was the other way around. Mkhize would stay and get a new companion, and I would leave to go to East London 1st Ward. East London is about a 2 hour drive towards the coast, quite a big city. So that news came Wednesday morning and I left Thursday morning for East London. A nice long drive in the morning…then finally arrived and got my companion. Elder Turner is his name, from South Africa, Jo-burg. The area in which we work is COMPLETELY different from what I was previously working, which means that it’s going to take a while to adjust. I’m still a district leader of 4. The are is predominately white rich people. It’s a beautiful area as I’ve been able to work and go around the past few days. The area is called Beacon Bay, also work Gonubie, and even way north is called Sunrise on Sea. It’s a large area, and the work is a little slow. It’s completely different when you go from township missionary work, to white area missionary work, you cannot do the same things in the two. And I’ve hardly been in white area my whole mission, so I was kinda stressing about it at first. Mostly we’ve just been trying to visit the members and get to know them better. Our teaching pool is small…and as for the work it can be a little slow as I said…we struggle to get people coming out to teach with us…struggle finding new investigators…basically we could knock all day and no one would want to let us in…plus it’s holiday so it’s even worse. I’m not a big knockin on door fan anyway…so we’ll be working in a different way this transfer to try to increase our teaching pool.
Let me try to let you get a picture of what the area is like. Yes, it’s huge. We’re driving…of course. But parts of it are just beautiful…right on the beach…we take a daily drive on a road for about 10 minutes right along the coastline that looks at the ocean. We’ve gone on the rocks and found some seashells and relaxed a bit to figure things out. I love the smell of the ocean. So it is a beautiful area…which is a blessing…but it’s a difficult one…probably one of the hardest in the whole mission when it comes to success.
Elder Turner has already been here for 3 months. He’s a good guy. We’re getting along just fine. Saturday we had the ward Christmas party up at Bishop’s farm, which is far north in our area. I got to meet most everybody, had a nice braai…people were swimming…playing pool…just hanging out. So it was really nice and a way fun party. Church on Sunday was nice. The chapel is a very nice building and the members are great as well. Oh and the bonus of the rich areas to serve…is that we get fed all the time. That really is a change from my last area…so that is a blessing…if I don’t get too fat! Haha. Other than that idunno…just things are fine. There’s really not too much to tell…I’ve just been trying hard to learn the area…and know the members. There’s really not much else I can report on. Hope this is good enough of an update…Thanks!
Elder Devenney