August 23, 2010

Well, there has been a bit of a change again in my location of the mission, as well as my assignment of responsibilities. No big deal tho. What has happened is that I'm no longer a Zl, but training instead. Which is exactly what i wanted to do before i left this mission. I'm no longer in Port Elizabeth, but headed back to East London, just a different area and different ward. So i used to be in EL 1st ward, but now i'm in EL 3rd ward...which is just a bit different. What's nice about it tho is that since i was here 6 months ago, i already know some of the members in this ward, and i basically know my way around the city, so that's a huge blessing in itself. I'll tell you more about it just now... Elder Moorcroft and i were definitely bummed to say goodbye to eachother, but it had to happen i guess. Yo we had a blast together..probably one of my top favorite companions for sure! I've been so blessed in that area of my mission. I just hope my comps feel the same about me...Anyway, we got a call wednesday morning that i'd be transfered and that i'd be training. I said some good byes to a few peeps and then hopped on a bus that next morning at 6:30 AM! where we travelled to EL. It's about a 4 hour trip. We were thankfully on a nice bus over, they had tv screens and they played some funny jet li movie and then some movie with John Cena in it. We got to EL about mid afternoon, then i got my companion soon after that. His name is Elder Naylor. He's from Centerville, and looks like any greenie would look. A bit awkward, out of place, all that good stuff. I've been trying to make him feel as welcomed as possible so he's not homesick or anything. He's a pretty chill guy tho for sure. He graduated in 2009 and yeah, seems like we'll get a long just fine together. The ward used to have 4 elders in it, then about 6 months ago, because of the shortage of missionaries, they had to take two out. So the ward has only had 2 missionaries in it for that last 6 months. So with my comp and i, we were put back in, and now the ward again has 4 elders. We're basically working an area that has had hardly any work done to it in 6 months. I really dont think we have too many progressing investigators, just a couple Recent Converts, but that's about it. So my comp and i have our hands full to get this area back on it's feet. From our first couple of days in the area tho, we've found that it has a lot of potential. It's a bit of a distance from the chapel tho so that's a bit of a bummer. Well really not too bad, only like a 10 min drive i'd say. But not everyone has cars...It's a bit of a lower class area for the most part. Well not all of it, we have variety to work with so it should be alright. On saturday, it was the Mormon Helping Hands, and there were over 100 peeps that showed up from the ward to go to these two different childrens homes and fix them up, we made a garden, that sort of stuff. It was really nice. And Elder Schamel is now back in EL1st ward, (where i used to be) and so we were together again for this Helping Hands. We were companions during last years helping hands in Namibia so that was pretty sweet to see him again. It's been about 7 1/2 months since i've seen him. Shortly after that, which took most of the morning, we started just knockin around in our area doing some finding. Surprisingly enough, we had tons of success. We taught 2 lessons and got a few good solid return appointments. During this time Elder Naylor turns to me and is like, "do people always want us back this easy" i told him no, so don't get used to it. But truly we've already found some good success and prospective people to work with. We're very grateful about that. Also, this area feeds missionaries a ton! My last area we hardly ever got fed but guess what, the ward has it set up that we have 1 DA every day! that's so sweet! I might just get fat in this area before i come home! haha. K maybe not, but we'll see what happens. On sunday, the church is very nice. It's a different style building. The sacrament room was packed, so that was nice to see. We have an awesome bishop, who i've met before when i used to be here...we actually are living in the back of his house. He's bishop Van Heerden, he's like 28 or something. Very cool guy. After church we took this guy, Andisiwe, who was a little strange, but got to show us around for a little bit. We taught 3 powerful lessons, of which were basically my comps first real lessons being taught. One of which we gave out the BOM and he's like, "technically that was my first BOM placed." He's a goon. He's still learning a lot and has definite room to improve...at one point in the lesson he was teaching about the Apostasy, then stopped, looked at me with a horrid look and had to ask what was next. I kinda just smiled and told him what to say. He's doing really well tho. I'm proud of my boy! And i think he really enjoyed the tracting...probably because we actually found success. O and he even had his first door slammed in his face by this Afrikaaner who i started talking to about Cape Town, specifically Bellville, and i said it was a nice place, and he said "you obviously dont know sh*t" and slammed the door. I told him that one was worth a journal entry! haha. Overall, we have a lot of work to do this coming 6 weeks. I'm excited for the new challenge of training and i think Elder Naylor and i will definitely be doing some good work here. I hope you enjoy the week and i hope this gives a good idea of where i'm at! O yeah, and on last monday we went to Kragga Kamma game park, you'll see a pic or so, and then also we checked out the nelson Mandela Bay soccer stadium in PE. We toured it and it was cool! The pics are me and moorcroft. I'll send others next time.