Monday, December 22, 2014

Christmas is coming!

Bonjour la famille!

So this week was great!  Things moved slowly but surely along, I had 2 exchanges that I did this week one right after the other on Thursday then Friday.  The first day I brought Elder Lever down with me in Basse-Terre.  It was a great learning experience.  He has been having a great mission and has learned a bunch.  So I just sat back and tried to learn all I could.  At the end of the day we went to go get some bokits at the boardwalk along the beach.  Elder Lever showed me how it was done contacting people.  He is very comfortable talking with everyone.  I am going to try to apply some things I learned from him and hopefully some miracles come out of it.  I tried applying some stuff the very next day with Elder Johnston (not Stewart-Johnson it was another exchange)  We once again went down to the boardwalk (all the other missionaries are dying to have the bokits from Basse-Terre for some reason) but as we were sitting down and eating, Elder Johnston and I were having a deep, reflecting conversation about the mission and I leaned over and just started talking to a man sitting on the bench next to us.  I simply said "Hi, how are you?"  He replied simply and we both went back to eating then he turned to me and asked, "What does God think about father's who don't like their children and abandon them?"  It was one of those great questions of the soul that us missionaries are just praying to hear.  I had a prompting to turn the conversation a little away from the depressing thought and more to the importance and blessings of families.  We had a great conversation and I gave him a Book of Mormon with a Christmas card talking about the "He is the Gift" video of the church. A while later his friend came and kind of turned us down and took a lot away from the spirit, which is why we weren't able to get a return appointment or a way to contact him. but afterwards I felt great.  I felt like I did what the Lord had sent me there to do and it was very satisfying.

Then in church there were 30 people that came to the group!  I was so happy!  We even had a young couple show up that I had invited form our English class, who are married, actually married!  And they were incredibly accepted and integrated by the members.  Their daughter had a great time and didn't want to leave! haha  It was the best!  But not only that, The Pommier family came as well, and the Duflo family! During the Sunday School lesson they were the ones who participated the most!  At the end of the day I was just filled with love for these amazing people as well as gratitude to the Lord for having heard my prayers and fasts.

Today we all are going to watch the movie Frozen at 4:00 and then have dinner at a member's house at 6:00. All the new missionaries that have seen it aren't too excited for the movie, but the rest of us are super pumped to see it.  We've heard a lot about it.

I can't wait to talk to you all on Wednesday, have a great couple days!
I love you lots!!
avec amour,
Elder Call




Fr. Potan and me with his Christmas lights




The decorations we have in our car

Monday, December 15, 2014

Exciting news from the Mission President!


Bonjour Ma Famille!

So big news first, no, not the tooth, I'll get to that later. But President Mehr just announced, if you havent heard already:

"I have been authorized to announce by the First Presidency that as of July 1, 2015 the West Indies Mission will be split. The new missions will be named Trinidad Port of Spain Mission and the Barbados Bridgetown Mission. 

The Trinidad Mission will consist of Trinidad, Suriname, Guyana and the ABC islands off the coast of Venezuela.

The Barbados Mission will consist of the Islands north of Trinidad already in the mission including French Guiana that is part of the Guadeloupe District."

So that's pretty big. Too bad I won't be seeing it. They will split the mission the day I leave. So instead of 1 new mission president coming in, we'll get 2. As for me, I'll just fly home on the same plane as President Mehr, which should be fun!

Well zone conference was great. I got to see everybody, Elder Miyasaki was there, Elder Fraley, Elder Lewis,  it was great. I also had to be the translator for the second half of the zone conference. Not much else happended during the week. We had to stay up with the Capesterre Elders in order to get to Zone conference, then District Conference the next day Saturday and then Sunday.

The tooth that's loose is one of the ones that have no permanent teeth behind it.  So much for making it through the mission with them right?  But it's not right in the front so if it falls out I won't look too much like a hillbilly.  Since the dentist says it won't be a problem I'll wait until I get home to fix it.  Don't really want holes being drilled into my head here in Guadeloupe!

You aren't going to like it but I am out of time, I took all my time trying to send those pictures. I could probably Skype at 5 o'clock my time which would be 2 o'clock your time in Utah. I'll keep watching the tooth and update you!

Love you lots!
A bientot!





Me and Elder Stewart-Johnson




I got to translate for the 2nd half of zone conference.  It was a bit tough, but really fun!




My original district and MTC room mates reunited!  The other guy is Jonathan Bonbon, my Branch President's son who came for the zone conference. He is preparing to leave on a mission. We invited him to jump in with us.




We took a picture of the "Miyasaki Family" all the people he trained were all together and then of course Elder Stewart-Johnson who I'm training.  So good seeing Elder M again!





Great seeing Elder Fraley again too!






Thursday, December 11, 2014

New Companion

Bonjour ma famille!

Well I guess I'll get to the questions off the bat.

My new companion's name is Elder Stewart-Johnson, he's great!  I like him a lot!  Yes, I misspelled his name last week, actually I didn't know half of it...  He's from Arlington Texas.  We are going to have a good time together, I feel like he's already trained haha, all I have to do is help him with his French!

They did open the package, they opened the wrapped socks then re-taped it up, not sure what they were taking out of the socks but it had a note  in there about something glass. But all the others were still wrapped up.

So first off I am District Leader, and well, not too much has changed with that other than I have to call in at nights to see how everyone is doing.  I won't be teaching any district meetings until next week so its not really too different so far.  Training is great.  It's different being the older compainon, I've only had companions that have been out longer than I have so its been easy for me if I ever have questions about anything, now its me that needs to answer all the questions.  Definitely a change of roles.  But its great.  Elder Stewart-Johnson is a great guy and full of energy haha!  He's ready to conquer the world and I think its a great thing.  He's ready to talk to everyone and is not afraid at all that he doesn't know French!  I think I'll be learning a lot from him.

The Pommiers are doing alright.  They were going to come to church this week but I'm not sure what happened yet.  Church was at Capesterre so it was a ways to go.  I'm still working on translating and haven't gotten the letter to her yet.

We saw a pretty cool miracle this week.  As I took Elder Stewart-Johnson to go get his first bokit on Guadeloupe, one of our really cool contacts happened to be working at the stall that sold it.  I was going to take him to a different place because I had gone to this particular stall a couple times but he told me, "nah lets just go here because you know its good."  So we did and it happened to be her first day on the job.  We contacted her (Tisha) a while back and couldn't get a hold of her.  So we were able to fix a rendezvous and we taught her the next day about the Book of Mormon and she really understood it and is going to pray about it!  Elder Stewart-Johnson has been making deals with everyone that he'll teach them English if they teach him French and we have been getting some good teaching opportunities from that!

Well I hope all is well on the mainland!  Hope you get some snow and save some for me, and tell Brianna not to forget to shave that beard, its getting pretty long ;)

je vous aime tous!
avec amour,
Elder Call

Monday, December 1, 2014

Trainer and District Leader

Bonjour Maman/ ma famille

Well first things first, we got our transfer calls and there is going to be quite a bit that is changing...  No I'm not moving so don't worry abut that.  BUT Elder Drennan will be going up to Baie-Mahault to be with Elder Broadbent while Elder Santos goes home (*sad sniffle)  Elder Glover is going to be coming back up to Guadeloupe and is opening a new area in Petit Bourg with Elder Ehlert.  Elder Lever is coming up form Guyane to Capesterre to replace him.  The district is getting split into two, north and south.  As for me, I got called to be the district leader in the south district and I will also be training, my new companion will be Elder Johnson who is probably just getting into Trinidad at the mission home.  Its going to be a pretty crazy transfer to say the least!

Also I got the birthday packages!  Thanks everyone!  It was awesome!  I have so much cake I don't know what to do with it!  Also I got your letter for Sr. Pommier, I am working on translating it, the Google translation you sent was a bit interesting haha!

This week however was a good one.  Our numbers hadn't been the greatest recently, just trying to get a hold of people and finding people.  But this week we had a lot of exchanges because we had to make them up for the whole transfer.  But all the time that we had in the area we got to work.  Mostly we knocked doors, but we found some petty good people and yesterday at church a new member showed up that has two kids. One boy about to turn 12 this month, which means we'll have a deacon!  Woot!  The branch is really starting to progress and I am very excited.  I am also loving having Fr. Duflo as the Branch mission leader, its going to be fun!

I had a great party thanks to all of you and the birthday stuff, funny thing is, you sent me so many scripture marking supplies, but none of it was actually purple.... There was a purple pencil, but it just had normal pencil lead in it... haha!  I think its hilarious!  But don't worry, if I find time this week or the next I'm just going to go buy one thanks to the money I was given by Chris and Grandmère K! Thanks!

I would have loved to send you the picture of all the cakes that I have, but the pictures are being weird, hopefully you got that one you were wanting for the card I also hope it was what you were looking, it was the best I could do with the time I had.

I can't wait to talk to you all for Christmas!!
avec amour,
Elder Call