Enjoying raclettes

Bonjour Maman!

This week was pretty good as usual.  The World Cup has really gotten started, and no I did not watch it, but I know everything that's going on because there's not a person on this island that isn't watching it.  So no matter where I go I can hear it blaring, its very tempting haha.  I was in a lesson and someone was watching a game in the other room.  Oh man, it was hard to stay focused... haha.  I heard that Spain got beat 5 to 1 par Pays-Bas (Netherlands) what?! haha  And also if there is France playing, absolutely everyone is watching the game and will not give us the time of day, especially when its Fathers Day haha!

Not too much else special happened this week.  Edwin came to church again which was really exciting, what twelve year old boy likes to go to church, let alone when he's the only one in his family going?  I'm not complaining!  We have been trying and trying to get a hold of his Mom and brother but apparently his mom is assisting a lady deal with rehab to drugs and spends a lot of her time with her to watch her.  His brother is just never around, unless we play soccer.

We saw Claudia again this week and she is doing really well.  She has been reading from the Book of Mormon very regularly and almost memorizes and recites everything she reads to us when we come by.  She says she's been thinking about baptism but is worried about her family.  Also she doesn't have a way to get to church...

You didn't tell me about dad getting a call in the high council, is it a student ward again, or what?

I love the talks you send me and I hope you keep doing it.  Also I suggest you listen to some talks on byu.edu.  There are some really amazing talks in there.  I download them and we listen to them in the car, which is nice.

This week for PMG I finished lesson 2 the Plan of Salvation.  I didn't get any new ideas this time around but I was thinking a lot about the spirit world after our death and what it would really be like.  I can't really explain my thoughts, especially when I don't have a lot of time, maybe I'll write a letter about some of the stuff I am learning.

The best thing of the week is Jean-Claude!  Remember the story about the guy that ran after us into the building by the Chinese restaurant that sold dim sum!?  He finally got baptized and is preparing for a mission!!!

Elder Miyasaki isn't in French Guiana anymore.  He is one of 4 zone leaders on Guadaloupe right now, I'm going to see him again in July for zone conference!

We had a fast with Fr. Renard and Sr. Telcide to help the missionary work and to help them share their baptism with their family and friends, it was really good, and we ate... can't get much better;)  That's what some of the pictures are.

Transfers are this week and I'm staying.  Elder Drennan is going to Guadeloupe, Elder Ardeche is going to English Guiana, Elder Lewis is coming to be with Elder Bodily, Elder Dayton is the new zone leader with Elder Jex, and Elder Russel is coming back from English Guiana to be with Elder Fraley.

I love you all!  Have a great week!
avec amour,
Elder Call

Fr. Renard and Sr. Telcide

We're eating Raclettes, its a type of cheese that you melt and pour on top of cold cuts of meat and potatoes, its delicious.  I've come to love cheese, I had no choice, after all...this is France!

Hiking Mt. Pelee again.  I'm getting good at it!

Bonjour de Martinique!

Bonjour Tout le monde, plutôt, Maman ;)

This week was good, not the best. We only had Edwin come to church which was really cool and he really liked it, but Dana couldn't make it. She went with her family on a little outing for the holiday weekend (pentecôte) But it sounds like you all had a good time in Florida! Can't believe you could go without me!

Things are going well with Elder Glover and I, sometimes he makes me slow down and not get too stressed out trying to get everything done which is good. We are having a lot of fun together and I feel comfortable with him. So thats nice.

One good experience we had this week was with a lady named Claudia, who Elder Johnston and I met one of my first weeks on Martinique. We had lost contact with her after seeing her once but she called us a while ago and asked us to pray for her friend in the hospital out of the blue.  After that we couldn't find her again. Last week she called again to see "how things were doing" she even remembered my name, apparently she has an amazing memory.  Finally this week we were able to teach her again. she was able to recite back to me quote of the first vision, sadly when I had recited it to her, I stumbled on my words or something because she had thought I had said "un Colombe (dove) de lumière" instead of "Colonne de lumière" So she thought that God and Jesus Christ appeared on a dove of light to Joseph Smith.... Lucky that's all squared away now.

I did get the package.  And I didn't know it had been opened!  I guess you won't be able to send mousse any more.  Unfortunately they don't have any of that here that I've been able to find.  We just watched the DVD 17 Miracles for Sr. Geurnsy's Birthday that you sent.  Thank you, it was great!  Also thanks for those pictures!  They were awesome!  I would have liked some of the MTC because I don't have any to look at...

We played soccer with Andy and Edwin again this week which was really fun! And yes, there was another gas strike.  They have so many I don't even seem to notice anymore!

Have a great week!

avec amour,
Elder Call

My investigator came to church!

Bonjour!

Sorry for last week it was a bit crazy and I didn't have much time to write!

Again this week I don't have too much time, there is way too much I have to do in one hour!  So I will do my best!

But this week was great! We finally had an investigator come to church! That's my first one since I've been on Martinique!  Dana came to church and she had an amazingly spiritual experience!  We had started a fast with her right before she came to church for her to receive a response to whether she should be baptized on the 21 of June and that she could have help on her driving exam.  During church I noticed that she often had tears in her eyes.  Afterward we had a quick lesson with her that was one of the most spiritual ones ever. We had her pray right on the spot to ask if she should be baptized because we could feel the spirit so strong. She gave an incredibly sincere and powerful prayer, and I am not kidding when I tell you that I could feel the spirit buzzing all around.  Afterwards, we sat there and pondered a little bit, she looked up at us with tears in her eyes and I asked her if she would be baptized on the 21 of June.  Slowly she nodded her head and then quickly and with a big smile on her face, she said "Yes!"  It was amazing. I am so excited for her and so grateful to have had that experience with her.

So that was basically the greatest thing ever, especially this week. Please keep her in your prayers!

I will get to your questions now so that you don't get on me for missing them....

It was a great week, we met three really nice FAMILIES that are interested this week. We have only taught them each once so we'll see how it goes but they ALL have cars and they all seem interested. It should be a good follow up week.

I'm glad you saw the pictures of Sister  Pedale.  She is a very active member.  I have talked about her before, she invites us every other week to eat at her house because she loves the missionaries.  She is the mother of the choir director who's husband is the (greffier, I forgot the English word sorry...) and her grandson is the only deacon we've got!  The funny thing is that she feeds us the same thing every time. Ancras de Morue (salt cod fritters) on bread.

Tell Jordan that my garments are indeed still white...I always make sure to wash them with bleach!

Today was good, we made some pork chops with mashed potatoes.   Monday meals are basically the equivalent of Sunday dinners for missionaries because we've got time!

Transfers will be in 2 weeks and Zone Conference is the next transfer, every other.

I like it here, I wouldn't have any problems staying or going, but I will probably stay since its still the first transfer with Elder Glover.

So I was wondering if the flood of missionary farewells has started yet, I'm getting pretty excited to see the next wave of blues and to see how many we get coming our way.  If we get a lot, odds are a lot of us will be training like when I came in, every companionship was training.

And to some important business... Jordan and Shelby, how are things going?  Its a big deal to me ;) je suis fière do mon frère :) I don't know who this lady is so your going to need to fill me in a little bit. I was very surprised when I heard he stopped by after dropping Brianna off, I won't be able to recognize my ladies-man of a brother when I get home! haha! So what is she like?  I have only seen the picture of them flying together.

My studies this week were good. I didn't notice TOO many things this week.  Most importantly I got some ideas for studying, I am going to try to keep a topic study journal that I can refer to with answers to questions and my own definitions. So if you have any questions or topics you'd like me to study, I would enjoy to get some ideas!

I love you all so very much!
Soyez prudents!
avec amour,
Elder Call


On Thursday the priesthood members of the branch went on a 5k run, it wasn't really 5 kilometers but it felt like it haha! I called it the tunnel run.

These pics are of Elder Glover and I on our hike today.  We were down at the bottom west part of the island near Rocher du Diamant. 

Baptism in Trinite

Bonjour ma famille!

Hello!! So apparently the cyber base is closing in 5 minutes so I don't know if I will be able to get a full letter off in time I am so sorry!!  This week was a little slow, we couldn't find too much time to get to people.  We had a long ways to drive and there were a lot of lessons that fell through as soon as we got to the place we were supposed to go to.  But there were a lot of fun things that happened this week.  First of all was the baptism on Saturday and then that night we had the Celebration 2015 at the church.  Honestly the preparation wasn't the greatest, but they ended up having some pretty fun stuff.  The best were the Créole dances with President Occulier, his wife, Sr. Jean-de-Dieu, and some other guy they got to join the dance. He was really funny.  He was kind of a party crasher and when there was some technical difficulties he grabbed the microphone and just started talking, nobody knew who he was haha.

So I'm sorry I don't have a lot of time, but with the PMG study I think we are going to have to change it to 1 chapter a week and I am starting ch.2 this week.

Things are going FINE mom... Things are tough sure, they'll always be tough but I am doing fine, I am studying a lot about hope and faith and there are some really cool talks by Uchtdorf about that.  I haven't seen to much success from my own work but I have come to know the Lord and I am learning so much about how the gospel works.  I wouldn't trade it for anything.

I love you all sorry!!!!!

Oh and I got your letter!!! Thanks!!!

Love,
Elder Call

Short letter, no pictures

Bonjour tout le monde!

This past week was a little tough on the numbers and we werent able to get more than one lesson with a member and 2 lessons with a recent convert or less active. We had quite a bit of other lessons which is fine, but I would rather the others.  Fr. Coiné left for France for a month and Sr. Martial's phone stopped working at her house which took out most if not all of our regular membership work. We finally were able to stop by at a time where Sr. Martial was at home Saturday.  I had been a little worried that we hadn't seen her for some time but all is well.  She was really excited to see us and she even got up the courage, on her own, to call her friend Betty that she had been telling us about for a long time.  I am really excited to see Betty.  I am praying very hard to be able to see her and teach her.  Apparently she has asked Sr. Martial if she could come to church and meet the missionaries.  ALSO she has a 7 seater van that could very well be the answer to many prayers and fasts of finding a way to get people to church!   Sr. Martial should be seeing her today and inviting her to talk with us throughout the week as well as to church and also the celebration 2015 AND a primary activity that will be going on soon with her kids. This can go so well and I pray it does. First is to make contact though.

We still havent gotten contact with Ricardo, Dana was not able to come to church because her kids had something going on, and René was supposed to come to church but there was a problem with our member and picking him up, if I understand correctly. He is hard to understand on the phone. I'm going to talk to the Fr. Occulier to find out what really happend.

This week had been really good for my studies. I may have to bump up the PMG reading a little faster or it could take a while to finish it. Anywho some things I learned going through ch.1 is that most of the chapter is just a quick description of most all the other chapters. Our objective is explained and defined throughout all of PMG.  Most of the first chapter is referring to later chapters.  Another thing is a good scripture I found in Alma 62:45 if I sited that correctly it should talk about having power and authority in teaching (I read it in French so I can't make a good English translation) It said he talk with "a great power and authority, to the point of converting many" or along those lines.  How I understood it was that we HAVE to teach with authority but the comma gives me the idea that the conversion of many was just an added bonus, not and actual effect or reaction to how he taught.  With no authority, there is no conversion. But no conversion does not mean there is no authority.

No time to write more!

I love you all so much! à la semaine prochaine!
avec amour,
Elder Call

Mother's Day

Bonjour!

Wow that was so fast yesterday!  I can't believe we actually skyped, I can't believe we spent most of the time talking about cheese either. haha Oh well, it was enough to see all your faces and hear your voices again!  Sadly I really can't think of what to talk about now after we skyped! 

This week was a little rough, I had to take over the area with Elder Glover coming in with no idea what's going on in the area. Its tough having to take over the planning all by yourself.  That's probably one of the toughest things for me, I have a hard time thinking of what to do throughout each day. Usually I try to make appointments a couple days in advance so that when we get to the nightly planning session I have a full day ahead of me with maybe a couple hours to fill up. But every so often I get those days where the page is blank and I have no idea what to do during the entire day. I would love to fill in time by seeing members and trying to help them with their lives or missionary work, but most of them live really far away. 

I am really excited to do this PME (prêchez mon évangile) with you.  I think it will help me focus a lot more in my studies and to help me reflect and think about what I have read when I write to you.  I would also like to get your thoughts and ideas from a different point of view.  So thanks for being willing to help me out!  I am planning on starting on page one tomorrow for personal study!

My new companion is Elder Glover... I like him, we have been getting along really well.  He is from New Mexico.  Everyone thinks he is actually from Mexico so he has to explain that its a state a lot. So I like to bug him about that haha. He went to BYU for a year before he left on his mission and when he gets home he wants to study to be a neuro surgeon. 

One thing that I would really like is if you could print off the pictures that I have sent you through email and send them to me.  I like to look at my pictures but its really hard to find all of them, I bought a USB card and I have all of them on there but I can only see them if I go on a computer, I also am storing my new ones on it so I don't have any more trouble with lost photos....

The most important thing I have learned on my mission is agency and consequences. That's a little deep I know haha.  But just thinking about it I have realized that there are good choices and bad choices, and then there are good choices and better choices.  All of them have their consequence whether good, better or bad. I have seen people I teach making bad decisions and not realizing that there are bad consequences coming because of their actions. They tell me that they don't understand why bad things happen to them and that they should be able to decide what consequences come with what choice, but they can't. Then we have missionary work, and hopefully we are not deciding between good and bad, but good and better. We could go knock doors and find a really cool person that wants to be baptized, or we could talk with the members and have them invite their entire family, who invites their finds and their friends.  Every choice has a consequence, hopefully I can learn to find all the greatest choices that bring the greatest blessings.

Well that went a lot longer than I had thought, but I want you to know that I still love all of you so much! It was great to see you!  Have a great week!

avec amour,

Elder Call


Here are some pictures from our p-day adventure last week.  We toured the island and saw some waterfalls, Mt. Pele, some rubber trees and even toured a Rum Factory!  I learned lots about making rum.  Just what every missionary needs to know!  No rum was consumed, although a lot was offered.

Elder Johnson's last day

Transfers and p-day fun

Bonjour tout le monde!

SO... this week we changed P-day to Tuesday so that we could go with the Sillon family on an adventure, they've been trying to get us to do it for a while now and Tuesday is their only free day.  So this week we're doing it and they said its going to take a long time so we had to get up really early to come and do our emails before we leave.  I'm finally going to see some waterfalls!  Its about time!  Other than that they say its a surprise, I should have some good photos for next week! And lots to talk about on Sunday!

We got our transfer calls this week, Elder Johnston is going to be leaving to Guadeloupe on Wednesday. He's been here for almost 10 months now... It's about time he gets to move around.  I'm glad I didn't get stuck too long in Guyane.  I do miss it a lot but I don't think that I could last that long in one place.  Elder Glover is going to be coming down to be with me.  I met him during zone conference, I didn't get too much time to talk to him but I think I'm going to like him, he plays soccer, it should be fun.

It was a good week, I don't think we got too many new investigators.  We had one day up in les Desmariniers when we walked into a little neighborhood and were talking to one guy, then everybody started coming outside and talking with us.  We met about 10 people in a good 15 minute span.  When we gave the first guy a brochure someone else called out, "Hey can I have one too?"  and so on and so on.  We are going back on Wednesday and Elder Glover will be with me

I did get the package.  Thank you for the tie from New Zealand!  The tie with the All Blacks team is really cool!

On Sunday we are going to be Skyping at the church.  I'm getting on at 7:00 (19:00) and that should be 5:00 for you but I expect you to know the math better than I do... haha I'm so excited!!!!

We taught Dana this week and we shared a mormon message about coming to church and the spirit was so strong.  Sr. Martial who was there with us then shared an incredible story about a miracle of finding money to go to the temple.  She said that she was about to leave and she had no money but a member came up to her and said that she had set aside money for her, though she wasn't sure why she did it.

I love you all!
TALK TO YOU ON SUNDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

avec amour,
 Elder Call

Watch out for men riding cows!

Pot luck dinner after church 

Teaching this boy to tie a tie

Visit to rocher du diamant last p-day