Sunday, September 16, 2012

Papitaiso e loma ni waitui (baptism in the ocean!)

Me'u ba bula re na oku ma'avuvale

Well the first part of this last week was officially my one year mark of actually being in Fiji! Pretty crazy. I can't believe that I am almost down to single digits on how many months I have left. Time goes by WAY too fast. I got a letter from Brother Reeves a week or 2 ago and I wrote him back today. I wrote him some stuff to tell to the priest quorum too so that should be good ha It is so funny how I remember hearing the letters and stuff from people that were on their missions and now I am the one writing the letters. That is so crazy that Parker got his permit to drive! Can he drive stick shift yet? I love sitting on the right side of the car here and being able to shift with my left hand and steer with my right. It is way better. I want to try to get an imported car that is like that when I get home. haha

So this week we were hardly even in our area at all. Last Monday we went over to Taveuni and we were there until Thursday morning when we rode the boat back. When we were riding the little ferry boat back it started pouring rain and the sea was pretty rough but I thought it was way cool haha I don't get sea sick or anything at all. Taveuni was really awesome. It is a beautiful place. It was really good too to be able to be over there with those elders and to help them. There are only 4 Elders on that island and 2 of the Elders are still being trained so it was good for us to go and help them out some more. I really like being able to help other missionaries because I remember when I was new and how much I always looked up to the zone leaders. Hopefully people will look up to me in the same way. In Taveuni there is a senior couple, Elder and Sister Sherry. They are way awesome people. They are hilarious. There house is SO gorgeous. I will try to send some pictures of the view they have. They live in this super nice house up on the side of a big mountain and they have a beautiful view of the ocean and some other islands and there are like not any other houses close and stuff so it is really quiet. It is amazing. I am for sure going to have to come back to Fiji to serve with my wife haha there is actually a senior couple here in Savusavu, The Muirs, and he actually was one of the first missionaries to ever come to Fiji. When he came Fiji was part of the Tonga mission and there was only 4 missionaries assigned to cover all of Fiji and he was one of them. They just had their 48th wedding anniversary yesterday and we got to go eat lasagna at their house which was amazing. haha

I wish that the subject of my email was actually one of our baptisms but it isn't. There is a lady from Australia that lives on one of the resorts here because her husband is like the manager of it and she is a member and one of their daughters got baptized this week and they did it on this way nice beach on the resort and we got to go. It was way awesome haha we are actually having three baptisms this weekend though so that will be awesome. There are 3 adults and 3 kids out in a village called Vunivesi where we have a unit and they are all going to get baptized but we are baptizing the kids first this weekend and then in a couple more weeks after we teach the adults some more they will be getting baptized too. They are all such awesome people. We were teaching the adults this week and all 3 of them bore such strong testimonies about how they know Joseph Smith is a prophet and that this is the true church and how they have already been receiving blessings in their lives because of it. Way awesome. We are going to get to baptize all of them in this sweet river too so that will be awesome. I usually always try to make it so that a member baptizes the investigators so that they can have the experience too but this time I do hope that one of the kids picks me because I want to do a baptism in a river. haha

Transfers came in this week and my son Elder Tamuera will be coming to our zone. He is reopening an island called Rabi. It is an island where they are all people from Kiribati where he is from so they speak his language. I think he will do way good work out there. It will be awesome. We lost one of the other 2 Elders that stays in our flat with us sometimes, Elder Haimin. He is the one that went to South Hills Junior High the year I went there too. He is the man. We will miss him.

Well all is well in paradise. Still livin' the dream just like my whole life! Thanks for being such an amazing family!! Au lomani Kemudou vakalevu!!


Loloma, Elder Hawk

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