January 25, 2010 E-mail - A New Transfer!

Well this week has been crazy. I found out that I am being transferred to Kadavu and Elder Zeyer is my new companion. It will be awesome! I am so excited. Bad thing is though, no email and mail only goes every three months.

First we had another awesome lesson with Meli and Milika. We talked about spirit prison and the kingdoms and again he loved it. He was fascinated and so excited about Baptism for the Dead and the fair judgments of God and the equal opportunity that our heavenly father gives to us. At the end of the lesson, I asked him to pray to know if the things we shared are true and he immediately responded and said, "I don't need to; I already know it's true."

So I asked him how he knew, and he said that he already prayed about all the other things I taught him and he now knows they are true. He said he also knows now that everything I am going to teach him is true. I just told him to pray again. Ha ha they are so awesome and I challenged him to pray about being baptized and he replied, "I will pray if I have to, but I already know the answer."

They are awesome! It is too bad I won't get to see him baptized. Petaia and Olimiva were baptized Saturday, however I was not there for it. I have faith it was good.

So Wednesday, I mostly just went and said goodbye to all the people from Tamavua who I am close too. Then Thursday, we had a really good combined mission zone conference. We talked about how a mission is hard but that is what makes it so awesome. If it was easy, it wouldn't be worth the time. We also talked about helping out with ward and branches.

Then on Friday, we had one heck of a line up: Elder D. Todd Christofferson, Elder Jensen, President of the first quorum of the seventy, Elder Hamulo from the area presidency, and Elder Wakolo from the seventy, all in one meeting speaking to us for two hours. It was amazing.

Elder Jensen said that a great work must be afoot in this land and work in order to prompt so many apostles and prophets to come visit us, so we should work hard to keep it going. Elder Christofferson is hilarious and cracked jokes the entire time, which was weird because during his conference talks he seemed more uptight. It was amazing and we learned and talked a lot about pressing forward with this important work.

One thing that hit me hard that he said, was that sometimes we limit the blessings we receive by our faith. If we believe he can give us huge miraculous blessings, then he can, but if we don't, he can't. A lot of times we pray and ask for a little help when really if we have faith, we can ask for miracles and receive them. It was great.

Right after the meeting, the Zone Leaders- Elder Alba and Logsdon, took me and Elder Zeyer to the airport and we jumped on the airplane and flew to Kadavu. It was a tiny little plane with eight passengers, but it was a surprisingly smooth flight and absolutely beautiful; we could see all the coral and bright blue water. It was great. As we landed, I just saw white sandy beaches and the prettiest bluest water in the world.

The landing strip is on a skinny part of the island and goes fifty feet from the edge of the water on one side to fifty feet from the edge of the water on the other. It was kinda sketchy- looked like we were gonna land on water, then slowed down right before the water hit again. It is a very very beautiful place though with a tiny little one room airport. We are only allowed one bag that weighs 15 KG, mine was 30 but it was only ten dollars for the overage fee so I just paid. Little did I know that extra 15 KG was gonna come bite me in the butt.

We got off and luckily the one police car on the entire island gave us a ride about half way to our house. This is the part when my 30 kg bag killed me. I had to pack the stupid sucker ten miles up and down the hugest hills, across two ravines, and climb a half a mile up a huge hill with dirt stairs shoveled into it. Not to mention the fact that it is a thousand degrees blazing hot sun and one hundred percent humidity. By the time I got to the top, I was wishing I would have just left my bag and used the same clothes everyday. I think I am going to leave at least half my stuff here when I get transferred again.

Our house is awesome. It is like living in a log cabin. It is all wood. Actually I feel like I have been camping the past week. We have a small one burner kerosene stove to cook on. I have to sleep in a mosquito net on a small pad. We only have electricity three times a day for a few hours when the generator for our village turns on. The view is amazing; we live right on the ocean side on top of a huge hill overlooking the bay. It is so beautiful. Plus there is a constant sea breeze to keep us cool. It is so nice. We have no neighbors even anywhere close to us so it is so much like camping. I love it and I am so excited to be serving with Zeyer; he is an awesome missionary and we get along great. We have always talked about being companions and it finally happened. I am in the coolest area with the coolest companion in the whole mission. I am so excited! We are literally starting the church here. There have only been missionaries here since October and we are not even a branch, not even a unit, we are an annex which I didn't even know existed but it is the smallest unit of the church. We have some awesome members so far and things are going awesome so hopefully we will be growing soon.

I brought some referrals from people in Tamavua whose family is here and they all seem awesome. No one knows anything about the church here and we are brand new, so people are always approaching us and asking about us and the church it is so cool. I am so excited to be here it is great. Me and Zeyer are gonna work hard do good things and have a great time. I really think I am possibly the luckiest missionary in the entire world right now.

Twice a week, we take a small boat and go to a different part of the island and go to different villages, and every six weeks we take a little boat all the way around the island and go to the other side where there is another small unit ran by a member man who joined the church in Suva I think.

It is amazingly beautiful here and it is going to be awesome. We walked tons up and down hills (consistent with the majority of my mission) and there is not a lot of food so I am going to lose weight. I am so excited. Well that is about it for now. Love you all and see you soon. Thanks for all you do.

Loloma Levu,

Elda Lalaga



P.S. Just Kidding, we have email. We go to the weather man for the island and he has Internet to send weather info. We just have to use it around his schedule and to the power schedule. Mail probably takes for ever though. We will see how that goes.