Monday, April 20, 2015

Happy to be back in Guyane!

Bonjour!

Well well, I imagine your just dying to know how things are going down here!  And the answer is: AWESOME!  haha  I love being back here its so much fun!  The first couple days we went around seeing members and I got to catch up with them all!  Most of them actually remembered me!  Everyone  that remembered me said the exact same thing, "Elder Cool!"  (because they just can't figure out how to pronounce my name so I had to always introduced myself as that a year and ten months ago)  "You're back! and you've lost weight too!"  hahahaha!  Man its funny, I thought I was gaining weight on the islands, guess not!  Sr. D'Abreu took a picture and posted it on Facebook and everyone saw it and it spoiled the surprise for a lot of people, but it was still great seeing everyone!  The branch has grown incredibly since I left!  There were 27 baptisms since then and a bunch of people that came back.

My new companion is Elder Smith.  He's from South Jordan and came out one transfer after me.  As Zone Leaders, things are SUPER busy, because we aren't just Zone Leaders but we are also filling the role as the Senior Couple.  We are in the middle of switching out the cars, so we've been car shopping and picking people up from the airport and on and on.  But its been great, no time to think about how soon I'm going home, couldn't be better!  We actually just learned that we are going to have a Leadership Conference in Trinidad next week.  Better yet is that we will be going through Suriname!  One last canoe ride!  We need to get all the visa stuff figured out, which takes time, but its going to be the last time that missionaries EVER make the trip by canoe to Suriname.  Since the mission is splitting, Suriname will no longer be a part of our mission, therefore, Elder Smith and I will be the last ones to ride the Maroni River to Suriname, needless to say, I'm pumped...

The work is going great!  We're teaching a lot of Brazilians (I need to start learning Portuguese, surprisingly I can understand quite a bit already!)  My first day we met a guy who has a HUGE house that invited us in, he is so prepared, he accepted to be baptized the first lesson and has been reading the Book of Mormon almost everyday!  We just need to get him to come to church!

Well I have bunch of other things going on, but all in all, I am happy and busy and couldnt be happier!

I love you all bunches!

Have a great week!

avec amour,
Elder Call



Saying goodbye in Guadeloupe






 

Wise words from Guyane

























Crazy fruit grown here called a  ronbouton.  Its delicious! Its kind of like a grape on the inside









My new apartment



Playing football





Monday, April 13, 2015

You call this a letter?

Hey sorry, you're not going to be happy but I have no time this week!!   Power outage and I have to go to a lesson. I'm here and I'm safe and I'm having a blast!   I'll talk to you more next week!! 

Je vous aime beaucoup!!

avec amour, 
Elder Call

Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Goodbye Gwada!

Bonjour! ma famille

What a day it has been today! Packing, saying goodbye, learning I'm going to have a SISTER-IN-LAW!!! Oh man!  This is awesome congrats you two!  Can't wait till I actually get to meet her!

So I imagine you've already heard everything that's going on from other missionaries, crazy isn't it!!?  I never would have thought!  Everything is going to be so different!  We all got our transfer calls on Saturday as we were up at Abimes waiting for conference to start, so everybody was going crazy!  I had to say goodbye to everyone, we took pictures I only cried once when I said goodbye to the Duflos.  OK and of course when I said goodbye to the Hucs.  It was tough...  But now I've only got 16 hours until I fly out to go back to the land of my first inheritance, Guyane I'm comin' home!  Yep I'm going back down to Guyane Française to be zone leader with Elder Smith.  I don't know what to think, its not at all going to be the same!  They have had so much success down there I probably won't know half of the members down there!

Conference was great!  Did anybody else catch on to the marriage theme?  I know Jordan did!  WOOT!! haha!  Follow the Prophet!  Speaking of which, was Thomas S. Monson looking a lot thinner to you?  Also, he stepped out early and didn't give his closing address.  I hope everything is OK for him and many prayers are going out to him from the Caribbean.  I listened to the whole conference in French, realizing that this may be the last time I get the chance or have the desire to do so.  Did Joe listen in Spanish?  I was so very hoping that Gérald Caussé was going to speak in French, but he did do his own translation.  He recorded his voice beforehand and then played it for the translation as he spoke in English which was pretty cool.

I didn't get the chance to say goodbye to the Pommier family....  When I went by they weren't home and they didn't make it all the way up to Abimes....  I'm just going to have Elder Stew-J take them the package. I got the photo for David and Cindy, they loved it and already have it up at their house.  We stopped by on Monday for family home evening, we couldn't make it to Pointe de Chateau, but we watched The Testaments and they loved it!  It was so sad saying goodbye, especially to Mindiya.  They asked for your address to send a thank you package, so that should be coming.  I also am sending one, sorry, its mostly filled with letters and old study material that's too heavy to take with me, but there is some stuff I got for you all, so keep your eyes open for those.

Well, time is coming to an end and I feel like I'm flying to my death, I'm going to die in the wilderness... (mission death) I couldn't be happier, nor could I be sadder.  I'm not quite sure how I feel right now, but things are good no worries!

I love you all so much!  Family and soon-to-be family ;)

avec amour,
Elder Call




Saying goodbye to the best district in the world!





















Goodbye Gwada!

Saturday, April 4, 2015

Favorite Sunday on my mission!

Bonjour! 

Well sadly, my email didn't work until I had just about 15 minutes left so I'm going to do my best to get as much of your beloved info in here. 

Zone conference was last Sunday and we had our interviews this Tuesday. It was nice, nothing to exciting but I felt good talking to the president, he told me that he's going to move me this transfer which will be next week. He also told me about the deal with getting home. I'll be going home the same day as Elder Fraley. They are cutting my last transfer a week short so that the new presidents don't come in on a weird mid transfer thing. So I'm getting shorted a week...

Yesterday was an awesome Sunday, one of my favorites on the mission. It was a fast and testimony meeting and everybody had a chance to share. The spirit was so strong, especially when David got up and bore a testimony about trials of faith that he had and how he was thankful that they brought him closer to God. Afterwards everybody talked about trials. It was very powerful. Then he helped me teach the gospel principles class and bore an awesome testimony on baptism. It was really cool. I felt very thankful to be a part of this branch, and with general conference next week, it may have been the last Sunday I get to see everybody.

Sr. Duflo got called to be the Sunday School teacher, the Pommiers are going through interviews with the Branch President and should be getting callings soon as well. Its just great. I love these people! We went to the Duflo's house last night and sang some hymns. Sr. Duflo wanted to come with us to help teach some people. Its most definitly one of the places that I want to come back and visit after the mission. Its going ot be very hard to say goodbye. David and Cindy keep asking if I can get permission to spend a whole day with them haha, we are going to try to drive to Pointe de Chateau next P-day (which is actually going to be on Tuesday next week so don't freak out, because of the holiday everything will be closed and we won't be able to email until Tuesday)

I love you all so very much! Tell dad I'm sorry I could shoot him an email today but I'll get back to him, I love reading his emails haha! I love yours too, don't get me wrong, I love all emails!
I love you all!

avec amour,
Elder Call