28 September 2015

Last night, we got transfer calls- which was really surprising, because normally they come on Wednesday. As it turns out, I'm staying in Rajamundry 2nd branch, Elder Patten is going to Bangalore, Elder Braganza is going back to Kakinada with the soon-to-arrive visa waiter, Elder Whaley, who was my companion in the MTC. Also, my new companion will be Elder Jollagum (I'm guessing on the spelling), who is a southern India native. That'll be exciting.

Also, the Ganesh festival ended with a huge bang. All of yesterday and the day before, big tractors hauled Ganesh statues all over Rajamundry, with music blaring and people dancing everywhere. There weren't even any close calls with partiers, but there were plenty of fireworks going off. 

Funny story- we went to an Americanish restaurant a few days back called Eat n Play. Apparently, it used to have a bowling alley and other fun stuff to play with, but it was all closed down. So now it's really just Eat. The food it serves (mostly ripoffs of American foods), with a few exceptions, gives everyone food poisoning, so it has collected a few funny names- Eat n Spray, Eat n Slay, or Eat n Pray. Anyway, while we were there, we talked to a whole lot of people. That ended up working out really well, because 3 of them showed up at church today, along with 2 others we talked to on the street. 5 investigators at church is almost unheard of here! It was a really good week. 

Today was Deep Cleaning Day, by presidential decree, and so we spent 4 hours scrubbing our apartment. The sad truth is that it still is not very clean. A few months back, some elders trashed it to an unbelievable extent (garbage piles in every room and stacked waist-high on the balcony), and the apartment is still recovering. We've put loads of work in, and it's starting to pay off! The bathroom floor is almost white for the first time in at least a year, for example. We are trying to get it to look good, because very soon we all are going to be transferred out, the way things are going. Almost everyone who was there just 3 months ago in Rajamundry is either going or gone. Actually, I'm the only one staying! That's weird to think that I'll be the longest-stayed elder in Rajamundry in under a week. Half of the elders there when I came in will be out of the country at the end of the transfer, too. Wow! 

The work in our branch is going really well, too. We have one investigator on date to be baptized, a recent convert's sister is taking the lessons, and we now have 5 new investigators to teach. Even with having only three days in Rajamundry last week, we still taught a huge number of lessons and did a lot of work. Also, a load of less-actives showed up at church, which is a really good sign. They, plus recent converts, give almost all the referrals. Thatt reminds me- everyone who reads this, please think of a friend that you could refer to your local missionaries this week, then do it!  

That's been all of the major events that have happened this week. It's been fun, and will soon get even better! Send lots of pictures!

21 September 2015

This week has been pretty nuts. We've spent half of it in Kakinada, half of it in Rajamundry, and the other half on the bus between the two. It's been pretty long. On the other hand, neither area has entirely fallen apart or blown up, so we've been at least a little successful. We just got the news a few days back: we'll be continuing with this until the end of the transfer, on October 5th. Also, all of the visa waiters in the US just got two year visas, and are leaving for India on the 6th, which means they'll probably be in Rajamundry on the 9th: two day's travel, and one while waiting in Bangalore. I really hope I train!

In unrelated news, we now have senior missionaries in Rajamundry, too! The Newtons, from Utah, arrived this week, and are humanitarian service missionaries. Their biggest problem right now is that they have no service to do until things get figured out. But they are a lot of fun. (This picture was copied from the mission email; I didn't take it.)

Other than that, not too much happened this week, apart from a few moments of excitement. Yesterday, we were in an auto with a member, and we got pulled over by the police. After checking the driver's license, they fined him 100 rupees for letting Elder Patten sit up front instead of in the back. Also, it's the Ganesh Festival here right now, so there are big Ganesh statues everywhere, and every odd night, we have to be in our apartments by 6:00. The statues are a little funny- they are 7-10 feet tall, have their own little booth, and have speakers blaring Telegu music next to them. One investigator explained the story of Ganesh to us too, and it seems pretty random. That's been it for the week.

14 September 2015

Well, this week has been really short, and what's more, so is my email time. That's due to a long story, which will be told in the email to come.

We had a lot of exchanges this week. On Tuesday, we had Elder Cluff, an Assistant to the President, drop by for the day to go on exchanges and check up on us. We had a really fun day, and did a lot of work. On Wednesday, we had Elders Dias and Braganza drop in, for an entirely different reason. Elder Dias applied for a visa extension three months ago, which was finally and spectacularly turned down. He had under a week to leave the country. So, Elder Braganza is staying with us until he gets a new companion. That could take quite a while, including up to the end of the transfer. He's going to be staying with us at least until next week, which means that tomorrow, we're going over to his area, Kakinada, to do some work there so it's not completely left missionariless for a month. It's a two hour bus ride there, which is always exciting. We will be doing work in both areas for a while. On the plus side, they have the new type of cycles there, which are way better than the cycles we're using in Rajamundry. Speaking of cycles, those have also been very exciting. All three of the ones we are using have been in for multiple overhauls, and are still constantly in need of repair. Most of the time, the repairs are pretty minor, but there have been some thrilling ones...

This morning was the highlight of the week: waterfalls. We woke up early and headed out as a zone to the Rampos Waterfalls, which are only two hours away by auto. We went out, and eventually arrived. There, we started hiking, and hiking, and hiking some more. I was with a few other elders in a group that was way ahead of the main group, and so when we came  to one point, we did the exciting thing: climbed the waterfalls themselves. But, fifteen minutes of near-rock climbing later, we learned that there was a much easier way to the top: a trail. It was very well hidden, difficult to climb, and loads of fun. It took us over half an hour to reach the top, which was very exciting.

There was a pool there that some people were fishing in, including the guy who showed us the way to the top.

We had to do it in full proselyting clothes, including ties. That was kind of an odd experience, going hiking and scrambling over boulders in dress shoes and slacks. But, we made it, and had lots of fun.

7 September 2015

Well, this week was really eventful. A lot of things happened, including my birthday. That went pretty well. We went to Dolphin's, the nicest restaurant in Rajamundry for that, and I tried something new: special chicken fried rice and curry. It was good! That was about it for anything too crazy. Nothing too exciting happened during the rest of the week, either, though. Tuesday, we didn't have district meeting, because we had zone training on Friday. So, we mostly just visited around the less actives in the branch. On Wednesday, we spent most of our time looking around the branch list, trying to visit everyone on it. Thursday, we had weekly planning, then a lesson with Rakesh, our recent convert, and Divya, his sister, who we are hoping will be our next recent convert. It went really well! On Friday, we had an interesting day. We started out with zone training, which took the whole morning, then had lunch with a few other missionaries, then helped the district leader find some stuff around Rajamundry. After that, it was already pretty late, but we managed to still visit a couple more less actives. Something we learned in zone training: The Ganesh Festival is going to go on from the 17th to the 27th, and we'll have to be in our apartments before 6 every other day during it. On the plus side, we'll really get a lot of cleaning done. Our apartment still needs a lot of work. Finally, on Sunday we did a lot of visiting around to invite people to church, then church, where Rakesh was confirmed! Our branch president confirmed him, with his counselors and the missionaries standing in the circle. After church, we did some more visiting, and that was our week.

31 August 2015

First off, I didn't know that Aunt Krysta was expecting. When did that happen? Also, Ben has been off his mission for not even three months, and is already planning his engagement! He does know that it's occasionally okay just to wait for a bit, right? :)

We had a bit of a crazy week. We did a whole lot of going around, but the usual problems struck us: heat, and missing investigators. On Wednesday, we met with one of our investigators for the first time in a long while. Kumar was on date for baptism before we left for Hyderabad, and disappeared since. But we finally got to meet with him! And...he dropped us. This was just about the only too-crazy thing that happened then. 

On Thursday, we decided to clean our apartment some. That turned into a scrubbing festival, because the room we decided to clean was dirtier every time we looked at it. There was dust piled high on top of everything, and the walls were covered in...stuff. Apparently, some elder had hung a whole bunch of things up, then took them all down. That left innumerable tape marks all over the walls, that bugs got stuck in. We also had to clean the mosquito mesh on the windows, the window bars (all the windows have mesh and bars), the floor, the beds, the cupboards, and just about everything else in that room. That took just a little bit. As in, two hours. All we cleaned was the floor, the ceiling, and everything in between. But, that room is now the cleanest in the entire apartment! Halfway through, we made a terrible mistake: we ordered pot biryani. It's a great concept! You make one phone call, and soon afterward, a guy holding a terra cotta pot of chicken biryani shows up at your doorstep and asks for 130 rupees. In reality, it usually takes a dozen more calls and another two hours for him to show up. Needless to say, that was the last time we ordered from him. After lunch, we then went to our BML's house to ask for help with the baptism we were having on Sunday. He agreed, and started thinking about who he'd assign for what. Then, we went to Rakesh, the guy being baptized, and started teaching. We had a dinner break, then he came to the church to be interviewed for baptism. He passed! Finally, we went to a bakery to celebrate (corner bakeries are cheap, everywhere, and have really good food).

Friday was a long day. We had studies in the morning, then district meeting, then lunch. So instead, we went to the church to try to get a film to show for the baptism. But, the internet was down, so we called all of our PIs. For years, elders had been talking to people on the street, getting their numbers, and putting them in the phone, before forgetting about them forever. We changed that. We probably called over a hundred people, and made appointments with 7 of them. That took quite a while. Then, we visited a few more families before calling it a night. 

Saturday was the longest day on record. We called all 7 of the people we'd made appointments with to confirm in the morning, and all of them said that they would meet us. Then one after one, they all didn't show up. We did teach a few lessons to members, but that was it all day besides that. Then, at night, we visited one of them, who gave us a referral! Unfortunately, both live in another elder's area, so we'll be passing them over. 

Sunday was a very exciting day: Rakesh's baptism! Funny story- three weeks ago, we'd been asked to prepare 20 minute talks then, so we did. But during the meeting, right after the sacrament was passed, the district president leaned over and told us we only had to take 8 minutes. That was a huge load off my shoulders. After church, we had a baptismal service, then walked outside (into the rain), and Rakesh was baptized! After that, we had dinner, then visited one family. And, that was our week.

25 August 2015

Well, this whole week has been pretty crazy; not much went as planned. But, it was still pretty good. We had transfer calls, and, while every other companionship in the zone is getting moved around, Elder Patten and I are staying together in Rajamundry 2nd branch. On Tuesday, things were a little interesting. Elder Poleboina, our district leader, came down from Kakinada to stay with us because his companion left for the Phillipines, so in the morning we had to go and print off the district meeting outline that he'd left in Kakinada. After the meeting, we had a quick lunch, which brought back memories. We went to the first restaurant that I'd eaten at in India. Later, we went out visiting, without much luck. In the afternoon during the rainy season here, it is hot. Very hot. And so most people either stay inside and sleep, or go out to some place with air conditioning. That makes missionary work a little harder in the afternoons, because on top of that, schools and colleges aren't out yet, so we have trouble finding people who are home/awake. But, as Preach My Gospel says, our success is determined by our commitment to find and teach, not necessarily our actual finding and teaching. That's good, because we spent the whole week really trying to find and teach, without much finding and teaching. Anyway, Rakesh, one of our investigators, is still on date for baptism, which is coming up really fast- August 30th. We're working with him a lot, because he still has some ground to cover before then. Also, we met a really interesting guy- Mohan. He caught us as we were coming down the street and more or less asked to be taught. He taught himself English by taking a beginners English course then downloading an English bible on his phone and reading it. He is more optimistic than anyone else I've met ever, and figured out a visualization method from Jesus' teachings in the New Testament. He's pretty awesome!

Wednesday was just amazing. We finally got our BML, Auto Raju, to come with us for a while, which made for a really welcome change. In the morning, him and Elder Poleboina came with us (Elder Poleboina's new companion not having arrived yet), and we tried clearing out the phone with his help. Then, Auto had to take off, but he said he'd come back later. We tried visiting around for just about ever, but no one was home. We planned out about 20 people to visit, but they just weren't there. Then, as we were cycling down a road, we saw a car stuck in a sewer. After helping to pull it out, we still had a bunch of time until school let out, so we went to a member who's stuck at home. That night, we had a few more lessons with members, too.  

Thursday was fun. We had weekly planning, and it was Elder Poleboina's birthday. He went with the zone leaders right after planning, and we did a bunch of calling around to get appointments. Later, we got my bike fixed up and printed off the branch list, but then my bike started acting up in a new way. The tire just started leaking like crazy. It would go flat in under an hour, but because there are cycle shops everywhere and people started going back to their houses, we just kept filling it and moving on, trying to make up lost ground. We had a great lesson with Mohan that Auto Raju came to,, and then went to Rakesh. Both of them are excited about learning more! Then, we visited a different Mohan, and talked about him going on a mission. 

On Friday we ended up being a little late getting out of the apartment because we ate lunch inside, and were punished for that with an endless round of missed appointments. All day, we had a really hard time finding anyone who was home or had time. But, we did get my cycle fixed up. The most notable thing that happened was a lesson with the Vakapalli family, about trials. Last time we visited them, they asked about why we get them, so we prepared a pretty good lesson out of the scriptures. After that, we learned something crazy from one of the district presidency: Rajamundry is getting some senior missionaries!

Saturday was pretty weird. In the morning, we got called by a member who asked us to visit her in the hospital because her father was sick. It sounded grim, because her father is the oldest convert in Rajamundry. So, we went over quickly, but had a real adventure finding his room. Apparently, the hospital he was in couldn't help us, because we didn't know his name. We lucked out, and by asking for the "old guy with a big white beard", we were able to find him. He was in the ICU, but he wasn't really sick. He just had some minor thing going on, but was totally fine. After we got out of their, we tried to find a new place to eat, but instead ended up getting massively lost. Eventually we found our way back, but it took nearly half an hour. Then, we headed out visiting, and met up with Vasu, the YSA representative for the branch. We may be having some big "activate the YSA activity" soon, because almost none of them are active. 

On Sunday, we headed out early to visit a bunch of people. We dropped off a shirt for Rakesh, who needed one, asked Venkatesh to come to church, and visited all of our investigators to invite them to church. Unfortunately, most of them still didn't come, but we did have three unexpected people drop in! Two of them, Mohan and VJ, had never been to church before- we'd just talked to them on the street at one point, and they thought they should come! We invite everyone we talk to to church, but these people were the first to actually come, so we were pretty excited. We had a great lesson in Gospel Principles class, largely because Rakesh answered half of their questions and bore his testimony to them. It's always thrilling when you learn how much your investigators feel about the gospel. Finally, that night was kind of slow. Elder Larson, one of our zone leaders, was really sick, but had a few appointments they needed to get to, so I ended up staying with him so his companion could go out with Elder Patten. On the other hand, I definitely got a whole lot farther into the scriptures that night. 

Monday was transfers, so pday got shifted to today. We had all of the usual trouble finding people, but did have some exciting moments. For example, one of the members we are working with met with us, after a long train of unavailability! Also, we found a former investigator's house, after a few adventures. I saw a sign at one point that was really...interesting: Our Slum is Child-Labor Free! Later, we went back to the hospital to visit the same member, who is doing fine. In the evening, we had a really interesting appointment: soccer. There, we found two people who both asked a lot of questions, and wanted to learn more. Then, finally, we taught Rakesh again.

17 August 2015

Well, this week has been pretty exciting. On Tuesday, we didn't have district meeting, because the elders from Kakinada couldn't get here, because of the strike. Apparently, that day was set aside as a Bundt (strike) to try and get Hyderabad (a big city) to become part of Andhra Pradesh (its original state) instead of remaining in Telangana (the state that split off of Andhra Pradesh and now owns Hyderabad's tax rights). So, lots of things were closed. We dropped by the other district's district meeting near the end to try to pick up some meds from the zone leaders, but they didn't have them. Then, we went out to lunch together. The original thought was Dominos, the only American restaurant here, but it looked closed. One of the elders called, and what would you know? Despite having big metal things pulled over all the windows and covering the door, they were actually open, and let us in through the back.

That furry looking thing in the bottom left is Elder Thompson's head, by the way. After we got done there, we went out visiting. Unfortunately, not many people were home. As in, basically no one. Partly because of the strike, everything was closed and everyone was gone. It wasn't violent, though. All that was different was that 3/4 of the businesses were closed. However, we found three new potential investigators, with a bit of a funny story behind that. We showed up to a less-active family's house, and taught them a quick lesson. Then, they gave us a referral! That was the first time I've gotten one since arriving in India. We go to the referral's house, and learn their story. One of them, Pradeep, is a bodybuilder who met an LDS Mexican woman online. She only spoke Spanish, so he learned it to talk to her, and now they are going to get married. However, she insists on him being baptized before marriage, so he agreed to meet with us. We are going to have to be very sure that he is getting baptized for the right reasons, but right now that isn't a problem because he is avoiding us. He also has two sisters who seem very interested, and sincere! As we were heading home that night, we saw a whole bunch of Hindu decorations set up, and people dancing around with music blasting. As we tried to bypass them, we were all but literally dragged into the mosh pit, with people asking us to dance. We got out safely, but it was an exciting moment. 

On Wednesday, we had district meeting in the morning, then left for a lunch appointment. Unfortunately, we got a call cancelling it. The same family who gave us the referral also invited us to one of their friends/relative's weddings, but right before the ceremony the couple started arguing, and it was called off. After that, we went out to go to all of our investigators. The high point of the day was teaching Rakesh, our most solid investigator. He just showed up in church one day, and agreed to let us teach him! He is on date for baptism, but is having some trouble with really believing he can be ready by then. After that, we went to another member's house for a dinner appointment, which are deceptively rare here. One of the sisters cooked us an amazing beef curry! One of the different things about India is simply that the people here don't experiment much with food. Even most of the Christians and Muslims here don't eat beef, mostly because they've never had it. Also, no one eats pork. I have no idea why. As we were going home for the night, Elder Patten took a crash in a very interesting way. He was just biking down one of the alleys when his wheel caught in a crack, and he fell over. He's fine, though. 

Thursday, we had some very exciting weekly planning. Then, we went out to a new restaurant, where I got to try uttapom for the first time. It's good! After lunch, we tried to track down a few families that the branch president had asked us to visit. Eventually, we found them all, but it took quite a while. We set up appointments with them and a bunch of other people, but didn't get to teach many lessons. A lot of people were busy then. 

On Friday, we had an eventful day. Bro. Raju, our BML, had said that he would come with us all day to help us find places, which we were really looking forward to, but he got sick. So instead, we went to the Bordu family, then to the hospital. Elder Patten has been having an earache for a while, so he called the mission nurse, who told him to go there. We waited after checking in for two hours, then Elder Patten got called in. He said that the doctor was a little different than what you might have expected. He mostly just prescribed a whole load of antibiotics, antifungals, steroids, and painkillers. In India, you can get anything in a medical shop without a prescription, as a side note. That includes crazy painkillers, antibiotics, and anything else you feel like. After the hospital, we were short on time. We started heading out, but then it started raining, which trashed our plans. Some of the people we meet with are single sisters, which means we have to talk outside, which they don't want to do in the rain. However, we still had a pretty successful night, and shared a bunch of messages.

Saturday was Independence Day for India. We had a crazy good day, and met with 8 families. That is almost unheard of here, largely because most people aren't home very often. However, on holidays we can meet with anyone because they are all home. We had a long list of people we could visit, and a member who came with us for part of it. That too is very rare here. We dropped by the Godavri river at one point, and noticed something: the river water is just about completely opaque. We couldn't see the steps that were less than an inch under the surface. Anyway, we tried visiting two families in a row that weren't home, but as we swung by later, they were! Then, we visited some more less active families, and called it a day. 

Sunday was one of the best days of the week. We headed out a little early to invite some investigators to church again, then had a lunch appointment with the Katiki's, who also have a son on a mission, and are amazing cooks. They made the best mutton biryani that I have ever had. At church, almost none of our investigators showed up, including Rakesh. But, we had two of the inactive families that we had visited show up! Because the one investigator who had came to church ducked out right after sacrament meeting, we had BMCM instead of Gospel Principles class. After church, we had a hard time finding anyone who was home, until we ran into Mohan. We had an amazing lesson with him, and he really seemed excited to come back to church!

Earlier today, we had an interesting experience. We went to a Hindu temple, after getting authorization, and got to climb the 600 steps to the top of the hill it was built on, in bare feet. There were monkeys everywhere, and some really good scenery. 

Are you still working at the hospital, as well as teaching? What is Ben doing? And if you want some ideas on what to cook, try chicken biryani. That is one of the most popular and common foods around here. Finally, my companion has a funny story. He asked his mom for a lantern, and she ordered one and sent it to him through Amazon India. Unfortunately, he just wanted a small one to keep in his bag, and this one is massive. Would it be okay if I pulled money off my card before my birthday to buy it from him? Transfer calls are today!