Bonjour mes amis!
After much toil under the
Tahiti sun, things are lookin up!
Elder Martinson and I were able
to fill our schedule up this week with some inactive lessons and good service
projects. The inactive lesson were pretty awesome, a lot of these people have
been inactive for a super long time and had forgotten most of the Gospel, so we
got to testify of the restoration and the Book of Mormon quite a bunch, which
is absolutely my favorite thing to teach! The Spirit was strong many a time,
and it was awesome to see their face light up as they remembered why they were
a member to begin with.
We had a couple of service
projects this week, and they were both helping the cement walls of a house. Not
easy work, especially when the cement mixer breaks and we gotta do i manually
with a shovel! It was super funny though, because at one point Elder Martinson
and I put all the water, gravel and cement into the mixer, and we thought we
locked it into place (because it pivots from side to side)... but I guess it
slipped or something. So I was just about ready to head over and eat a bit when
I felt cement all over my foot... and I looked and the cement mixer had tipped
over and spilled the cement all over the ground. Elder Martinson looked at me
and said "what did you do?!" and I said back "no, what did YOU
do?!" We had to hurry and shovel it all back into the mixer before it
dried right there on the ground. All the other guys were teasing us, saying
"you white boys..." yeah, pretty funny story.
All in all, these inactive lessons
and service projects got us in contact with some potential investigators. We've
talked to them a little about our message, and they were pretty interested. So
we've planted the seed, no we just gotta water it and make it grow, we got hopes
for next week! Also another great milestone: Ruta came to church yesterday! we
were stoked beyond all belief, and she really loved it. We're gonna try to fix a
date for baptism this next week. Things are looking good for her despite
opposition from her Grandpa.
Aside from the work, its
starting to gradually get more and more hot, and more and more humid at that...
Its making biking up all the hills a little more difficult! On Saturday, it was
super humid, more humid than usual. Those are the perfect conditions for these
flying bugs called manumanu to come out and start mating I guess. So that
night, these bugs were swarming all over the place; the air was literally
thick with them. We were riding our bikes, and I'm pretty sure I opened my mouth
for one second and like 5 bugs flew into my mouth. When we got back to the
house, there were bugs crawling all up in our shirts and our pockets. It was
gnarly, and it'll probably happen again.
The work is slowly starting to
pick up, it looks like. The members are getting a little more motivated to do
missionary work. The bishop has been really emphasizing it lately, so that's
great for us. The DMP has been sick for the last two weeks though, so we haven't
had a whole lot of help from him unfortunately.
A Tahitian saying that has
helped me chill out a little and not stress is "haere maru, haere
papu." It means go slowly, go surely, in other words chill out. Its like
it says Mosiah 4:27, "And see that all these things are done in wisdom and
aorder; for it is not requisite that a man should run bfaster
than he has strength. And again, it is expedient that he should be diligent,
that thereby he might win the prize; therefore, all things must be done in
order." Its still possible to be smart and take it easy a little as to not
burn out, but still be diligent. Something good to think about.
That's about it for the week. I love you all, I will do all
that I can to bring good news next week!
Ua here au ia outou,
Elder Ball
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