24 Jan. 2016

Things have been pretty hectic around here, too. We spent a whole lot of the week trying to get the apartment repaired, which it finally is! We were having some big problems with the water, but it's all cleared up now, thank goodness. On the other hand, we've been having some nice, hot, humid weather here. It probably sounds nice when there's snow out, but it's not quite as nice when you haven't felt cold in a year...literally. In related news, I hit my year mark last week. That was fun, although I didn't really do anything for it. Oddly enough, there's no snow here.

That's too bad about the van, though. It worked for the last what, 15 years? That's not bad. Also, I can't believe that Payne is going to Vegas! Although, that's more because I'm surprised there's a mission there than anything. Speaking of missions, when is Sam putting in his papers? The time for that is coming up... David wants to move to Arizona? What for? I think I might live in Alaska the rest of my life, after being here. 

The biggest news for the week was zone conference. It was supposed to happen on Friday, but got pushed back because Pres. Berret's flight got delayed. So, on Saturday, we learned all about using time wisely, and how to have effective planning. It was pretty powerful, and made me look back on how we use time. He asked us to track how we used our time for a couple of days, and then had us add it all up. As it turns out, the zone as a whole spent twice as much time travelling every day than we did teaching. Our areas are huge, by the way. It can take up to an hour to get to some of the places. In the last area I served in, we lived at the absolute edge of it, so we never really made it up to the top. I think it would take about three hours or more, judging by how long it took to get to other areas. 

I still have some candy left from the last package you sent! Not much, but there's still a little. Speaking of that, we got some news at zone conference. American elders are now strongly discouraged from getting packages from home. Apparently, they've been causing the office missionaries no end of headaches from all the customs regulations and requirements. However, if you want to send me something, you can just go to the site amazon.in, and it'll be sent in-country, avoiding customs. We got express mission authorization to do that, and even to have them sent straight to our apartments, if we want. Feel free to do that! I remember when you said the package arrived, some things had broken. Did any of the carved wooden elephants break? 

Well, our teaching pool is a little small right now. But, we do have some very interesting investigators. One of them, Samuel, is very old, and his family really does not like him coming to our church. He is very set on some gospel topics, such as God showing himself to people, and takes a while to change his mind on those things. However, he is starting to feel the truth of the gospel, and is on date to be baptized! We also have Preetha, whose husband is completely indifferent about her religion. She is a 7th-day adventist, and has some real trouble seeing why we have church on Sunday.. We've explained it to her a million times, but she still can't quite wrap her mind around it. Fortunately for our scheduling, if not for her, she broke her arm recently, and so stays at home a lot, and lives right across the street from a fun member family. So, we go there at least once or twice a week to visit one or another. Our BML recently gave us four referalls! The problem is just that none of the will meet with us. We also found one guy while looking for someone else, Sujit. His grandpa is a less active who lives in Ooty, 2 hours away. I'm still not sure why the elders from a while back baptized him here... Anyway, Sujit is pretty awesome. He has no particular religion, just believing that God is some sort of power out there, but likes to have us over, and is coming around. 

That was basically our week, have fun in Indiana! And possibly Arizona soon!