Filoha Foote is Adala Be with Transfers

(so apparently I can't type so the letter got sent twice before it was all of the way finished)

Hello everyone that reads this little blog letter thing here this week was good, weird, and anything else that would make it out of the ordinary.

Like the title says transfers were this week and Filoha (president) Foote just blew everything out of the water. From what I can tell like half of the mission is getting white washed (old elders leave and two new elders come into the area) and that is what I am doing. I will be white washing Ambohipo with and elder named Elder Pinson and what I have heard of him is just awesome, I think that we will have a great time together. Also Ampefiloha is getting white washed so new elders are coming in and Elder Tshuma is moving to Itaosy, I think that he will have a great time.

But here is how the rest of the week went,

Monday we had a little family home evening with our DMP aka Nambinana where Fr. Nambinana gave a great lesson on the 10 Commandments. After that we got some great food and conversation, so no complaints there.

Tuesday we had a lot of our times fall through so we spent a good amount of time contacting but we did have a good lesson with a less active named Lanto. We have been trying to get him to come back to church for quite a while but has not yet come but they are still happy to invite us into their home.

Really pretty much of our week was looking for people to teach and trying to get members to find referrals for us so our program is sorta empty right now, its a little sad that it is that way but that is just what happens sometimes.

But on Friday we actually had a really good lesson with Olivier. It was just him that day, Rosa was out shopping I believe, but we thought that we would just teach him any way. We had a plan of giving him and Rosa a baptismal date. As we brought up the subject he told us that he had already been baptized Catholic  which just led us into a giant discussion about the Restoration, authority, and the Apostasy. As we were having that discussion Olivier just sorta sat up straighter and I think for the first time in (I think) our entire time together he was actually listening and paying attention. At the end he did not take the baptismal date but said that he would think about it after he read and prayed about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith.

Then Saturday and Sunday were our out of the ordinary days as we had a Stake Conference, attended by a visiting 70 named Elder Cook, and the missionaries of the stake were invited to attend all of the sessions. We attended and were spiritually uplifted as we received talks about the importance of families and counsels. Then that Sunday night, in order to prepare for Zone Conference on Monday (today) we were moved to an other house that was very close to the church.

Funny thing is that when we got there the other missionaries were not home so Elder Tangarasi, from our house, climbs over the gate (crazy guy but I love him to bits) and opened the gate for us. Then that night I got a call from Elder Anderson (my old companion from Tamatave) and we chatted for a while. His area is being closed (which he is a little upset about) and he will be going to the office as an office elder so I will get to see him when ever I got to the office, so I am totally looking forward to that.

I think that is about it for this week, I will write more about the zone conference next week but I will say that it was amazing and spiritually uplifting. Have a great week everyone!

Elder Nelson

Elder Nelson's Mom here: The following pictures were sent to me by Elder Snell's mom.  He's the Elder in the front left (wearing a dark sweater) of the bottom picture.  So nice to see Elder Nelson since he didn't send any pictures this week.

They did it! And Elder Tshuma had a birthday!

Monday we had a little soiree/ family home evening with some less actives named Lova and Mamy. They are super awesome people and so fun to meet with but the reason that Mamy cannot come to church is because of his work and he apparently can't quit because he has a contract but on the good news his wife Lova has started to come back to church so that is something. But during that little soiree we got some super good food; Elder Tshuma brought some bap (South African food) and I made Peanut Butter cups, super good. Then that night  it just so happend to be Elder Tshumas birthday so needless to say he was destined to get an egg and flour on his head. Oh he tried to avoid it but we got him.

Then for a good portion of this week our times dropped us so instead of going tracting as we normally would we decided to go and begin visiting members and getting them looking for people for us to teach. In my opinion this method is way better than tracting (we still tract but visiting members breaks it up). What we usually do go in and really try to get to know them and build up a great relationship.

On Wednesday we got to go on a suprise split with our wonderful APs, Elder Rigby and ELder Morley. We got to go work with Elder Rigby and is was just such a blast, we taught, Elder Rigby told us some cool stories, and we learned great deal about planning and preparing for lessons along with things to do in the lesson, it was super fun. That night we get home and it turns out that our gas was out so we go out to eat with the Itaosy elders and Elder Morley. Lets just say that we were all dying from laughter near the end.

Thursday was year mark! Woh, were did the time go!

Then Friday I got to go on a split with Elder Evans from my MTC group so he could show me where more of the members and less actives in our area were because he started in Ampefiloha. OMG it was so fun. Elder Evans is just a baller and a great missionary and we had so much fun through out the day. The best was ending the day with a soiree with some members that Elder Evans really bonded with during his time here; we talked, taught a great lesson together on the fly (high five), ate some great food, and played some super fun games.

Saturday Rasolo and Colette got baptized! They had our DMP Nambinana baptize them which is fine but this one was so great because I had found these people and I was able to see them progress until baptism.

After her baptism Colette shared a great testimony about  things that I was not aware of until that point. Apparently their oldest son had recently passed away and she said that is was a very hard time for them. But she says that son after her sons death did the missionaries knock on their door aka Elder Nelson and Elder Munanira. Colette said that she feels so grateful to know that God cares enough about her to send the missionaries at that time, she truly feels that the missionaries were sent from God at that point in time. Lets just say that I was a bit stunned and humbled to know that at that time that through us God was able to comfort one of his daughters, a very amazing experience.

I think that is about it for this week, have a great one everybody!

Elder Nelson

Elder Nelson's Mom here: He sent home a BUNCH of pictures and 2 video clips today.  I was going to sort through them and pick just a few then decided to just post them all.  I think some of the later ones correspond to some of the events in his letter above.  The only other commentary he sent was:

"I forgot to write in the big letter but we also did some Mormon Helping Hands by cleaning up part of the zoo called Tsimbazaza, super fun."

I assume that's what all the pictures in the yellow vests are from.  Enjoy!

This shows the aftermath of the eggs and flour celebrations.  Happy Birthday, Elder Tshuma!