Far Over The Misty Mountains Cold: "He Told Them Tales of Bees and Flowers, the Ways of Trees, and the Strange Creatures of the Forest, About the Evil Things and the Good things, Things Friendly and Things Unfriendly, Cruel things and Kind Things, and Secrets Hidden Under Brambles"

Not too much new happened this week. Mostly just continuing to visit the members. Gaining the trust of the members is probably one of the things missionaries in the past haven't done as much, and working with the members is the BEST way to do missionary work, cause they will know the area and people much better than we ever will, so a lot of what we have been doing is just getting to know them.

But we still have done things. Last Monday we went on a hike! We went up a mountain called The Needle. It is pretty much the middle of the island. It was awesome. But we got a bit lost. Because The Needle is on a trail called the cross-island trail, which is pretty much what it sounds like. A trail that goes across the island.... and there is a waterfall towards the end. So we were looking for it, but there were a few trails, and our "tour guide", the one who just got baptized and married the Saturday before, hadn't gone from that side, so we got lost. But oh well, it was still awesome!! It was WAY muddy, and I did it in my sandals, cause one of the other elders has my other shoes, and he forgot to bring them. But it was all good and I got some good pictures.

On Tuesday we had our district meeting. Here it is basically just a meeting for us, the other elders, and the senior missionary couple, just so we can keep the work going strong.

So there are 3 branches (or groups) on this Island. One, called Arorangi, the other elders cover. The other two, Avarua and Takitumu, we cover. Now we mostly stay in Avarua, but we need to do more work in Takitumu, so we decided we are going to go there every Wednesday, stay the night, and come back Thursday night. So we did that for our first time this past week. It is a bit of a bike ride. About 45 minutes to an hour, depending on where you start and stop. (It would be nice to drive on the motorbikes or motorscooters especially that everyone else here drives, but we can't, so oh well!) And the flat there is a bit dodgy. It would be really nice, if we stayed there all the time. But the fridge doesn't work, the stuff is all old, there is no hot water, and per the norm there are many bugs. Not as many roaches (though there still are a few), mostly ants and heaps of dead or dying millipedes. There is also the occasional centipede. And not the little ones. Big ones. I only saw one the night we stayed there, but it was about 5 inches long. I tried to get a picture, but man that thing was FAST, so I will try to get a better one later.

Oh, and by the way, all the chapels here are more of complexes, with there still being buildings, but you have to go outside to get to the other little buildings, but anyway, all of them have a missionary flat built in, so that is where we stay.

So when we woke up Thursday morning in Takitumu, we got a call asking if we could come back to Avarua to give a blessing. So, (since we had to go past the chapels) we biked about an hour a half to go and give it, and then an hour and a half back, past the chapel, to go mow a lawn. Which, by the way, was on a ride on mower, so it wasn't as hard, but still hot, and lots of fun. But anyway that was tiring. After that we had lunch with a man named [Timothy], who is our most recent convert. He is originally Cantonese (from Hong Kong) but he was adopted as a baby by English parents, and has lived everywhere, namely Scotland and England.

The rest of our days were mostly, like I said, getting to know members. Teaching them. Haha, on Saturday we had a funny moment though. We were walking our bikes from a house (who, by the way, we had just set for baptism!!! Though apparently she keeps agreeing to when her husband moves out, but when he moves in a week later, she changes it, but hopefully this time!!) to another house, when a pretty drunk guy stopped us. From what I could understand of his thick accent and drunken tones, he was less active. So he was telling us about that. As we were there though, one of our YSA pulled up and started talking when the drunk man left. After that it was just a chain of members. When one left and we started to leave, another pulled up. And we had several just drive by and wave or shout hi while we were talking to the others. It all culminated with the other elders coming in the car of one of their members and saying hi. So when we finally got out of that, we go to the appointment, and the investigator was asleep. So instead we just gave a little member lesson to the two YSA (young single adults) that had come over cause they were friends with the said sleeping investigator. (Funnily enough, they are actually in the other elders ward, which is probably the strongest ward when it comes to amount of YSA. Our ward [usually if I say something like "our ward" it means the one in Avarua] has 3 I think, and 2 of them are leaving.)

So yes! All good, all fun, all in the service of the Lord!!

Stay awesome y'all!!

-Elder Clayton-