English Fast 2/23/2015

Dear Everyone,

Surprise. This transfer everything is staying the same. Haha well really not a surprise. I'm happy though, it'll be great! We still have a lot of work to do but the miracles will come. Sister Johnson and I are obedient so we see blessings but we've been told to be exactly obedient to see miracles. I know that sounds super cheesy but we are gonna give it a shot! 

We had a good week! Nothing too out of the ordinary happened. On Friday we went and shadowed our district leader in Kwareson. It's a smaller town. It was really fun! We went to the branch president's

house out there. He has this HUGE dog. I attached a picture (I apologize for not standing up straight in advance). It's always a good time shadowing. It's a lot of biking cause we have to go far to get to their area. I love meeting other members and people though. 

This week we tried our first English fast. IT WAS VERY HARD. My sentences were terrible but it kinda worked. By night time we started speaking English again but still, we're trying! 

Let's see, investigator wise. We still haven't been able to see the Sabayo family this past week. It's kinda terrible. I hope they still want to progress. We are seeing them on Wednesday hopefully!! 

Ernesto. AHHH. He's frustrating. We always have these great lessons. He promised promised promised he would be at church but was still a no show. He wants to be baptized but he's gotta come to church or there is no way he'll stay active...obviously.

Rita is such a talker. We are slowly making progress. However we have taught her so many times and we still haven't finished teaching the restoration. She came to church again yesterday! 

We have a couple new investigators. One seems promising for sure! Her name is Sister Yosefsoon. She's an older lady that seems very nice and receptive.

There are so many different religions here. There are a ton of Hindu's and Pentecostal type churches. But really, everything else too. It makes things more difficult to do missionary work here. In St.Vincent everyone was just Christian and didn't go to church so it made life easier and everyone was nice a receptive there. Definitely different. 

We don't have a senior couple in Suriname. But the senior couple in St. Vincent did make lots of cookies you are right! They did cleaning checks, went to district meetings, bought us anything we needed like supply wise and just gave us lots of love!

Sister King promised to send the info this week or to have her mom send it to you. From what i've heard this package service is very reliable. Sam could you fill my ipod up with good hymns and stick it in the package? That would be awesome. I promise you don't have to send a package the rest of my mission!!

Enjoy Puerto Rico!! That's awesome! You're not too far from me! I loved all the pictures and videos. I can't believe how big everyone is getting. WOW! Too cuute! 

Other pictures are of some members here and my zone in our matching soccer uniforms...I know...and then of sisters here. We got another sister a couple weeks ago and now Sister King is going to St. Martin for a couple of transfers. We will miss her!

Love you all!!! I'm very grateful for the wonderful life I've been given. It's crazy how stressed and happy you can be at the same time! Missions are wild. 

Love,

Elizabeth

I'm Really Bad at Coming Up With Subject Lines 2/16/2015

Dear Family,

Well nothing tooooo exciting happened this week! The weather was nice! Not too rainy and not too hot. Suriname is pretty awesome. I'm learning to love it here. 

On Saturday we did service for a member doing some painting so that was fun! We usually have a service project every Saturday to do. I love them. 

As for investigators:

Ernesto, that little bum, didn't come to church! We walked a far way to get him and then took a bus, but we got there and he said he had to clean his room...I wasn't happy. But sometimes I have to remember he's 15. But still. He's a super great kid though. He'll get there. He obviously needs more converting, but he also needs to come to church to get that converting to the gospel. We are pushing his baptismal date...again. Haha it's all good!

Rita is a great lady. She talks a lot though so it's very hard to teach her. She comes to church though which is great! She likes church a lot. 

Mohan is doing good. He came to church this week! Mohan's wife is interested. She sits in on every lesson. We can't speak her language but she seems to understand most English pretty well. I don't know what will happen with her. 

We didn't see Sabayo's this week at all. I still haven't figured out how to get them to church. There are a good number of members with cars but not a ton. And yeah it makes things hard when they are a family of 8. Faizel, I think we are dropping. He told us he doesn't want to get baptized anymore. He started going to another church. We tried helping him in all ways. Maybe it's just not his time. 

Biking is still awesome! It's really fun and I get some nice tan lines. My current fav is my bag strap line against my chest and back...nice. Yeah there's not a great veggie selection but it's not terrible. There are definitely some great fruits here. I've tried so many fruits I've never eaten before my mission. I couldn't even tell you what they are. I think we are starting to get into mango season cause I've had 6 mangos given to me just yesterday. FINALLY! I've been waiting for mango season. I hope you can try Sour Sap in the Philippines. 

Loved the pictures from this week. Sounds like you are all doing great! 

Missions are pretty wild, I have to say. Each time I go to bed I can't believe another day is gone. You learn so much in such a concentrated amount of time. I feel different, but at the same time I don't. It's weird. 

Dutch is coming slowly but surely as usual. I really am beginning to  understand. I'm putting together more sentences and it's really cool when I say something and they understand. On Sunday I said the closing prayer in RS. After all the women started cheering. Haha they all thought I was gonna pray in English. They were very proud of me! 

But anyways,  all is well. This is already the last week of the transfer. I don't expect anything to change this week but you never know! 

Love,

Elizabeth

Picture 1: An article from Guyana news so it's in really bad English. It's so funny. 

Picture 2: Sister Johnson and I. 

Baptisms are Coming... 2/9/2015

Dear Family,

No baptisms are happening here in Suriname yet, but I got some exciting news from St. Vincent! Two Saturday's ago Sasha was baptized and this past Saturday Ryno was baptized!!!!! WOW! Isn't that so cool?! I have to say I was sad to not have been there but it feels good to have been a part of it. I can't believe I found Ryno and now he's a member. Nick is getting baptized this coming Saturday too. It makes me so happy. I wish I could have been there. Sister Sommer wrote me and told me that a couple weeks ago Nick had a dream and saw Sister Sommer and me coming towards him with a message. I'm glad to know that I'll always be a part of their lives now.

Now, Suriname on the other hand...no baptisms yet! Ernesto was all ready to go for this Satuday but he didn't come to church on Sunday so we are pushing his baptism until February the 21st. He's a really good kid! He's a little lazy and loves football- haha, but what are you gonna do. I'm excited for him! 

Sad news with Faizel. We had a lesson with him and he basically said he doesn't want to get baptized anymore becuase of the tea and coffee thing. WOW! He was so open and was coming to church every week and then bam--up goes the wall. He said he gave the Word of Wisdom pamphlet to a Fullness of the Gospel church lady and that she was going to pick him up for church. I feel like we did our complete best with him and had 4 SUPER spiritual lessons all about tea and coffee. But the spirit can only carry it to the heart--not into the heart. He's just too closed right now. Maybe it's not the right time! 

Mohan...I don't really know how to describe him honestly. He's a good man. I'm gonna keep teaching him until I feel otherwise. He always studies what we leave him. He loves everything we teach him. He didn't come to church yesterday though so we've gotta get him to come. 

The Sabayo family are doing well! It's hard to tell how much they are really being converted. We only had one lesson with them this week and it wasn't very spirit filled. I hope we can help them. We have to do a lot more finding this week. I want to find those that are prepared! We still have a pretty small teaching pool but yes, it is increasing. I remember the first week I got here we had like 7 lessons in one week...that is not good. Now we have about 14. Still not the best but definitely getting better. In St. Vincent we would get like 25 lessons easy. But they are two complete different places. In St. Vincent everyone was Christian. Everyone was soo nice and open. I'm sure it helped that I spoke English. Here there are a lot of Hindi people and some other different religions. It's just different. I really do love Suriname though. 

I love the church members here. They are awesome! So nice and strong in the church. There are a lot more families here than there were in St. Vincent. I'm growing closer to the members and building relationships. Yesterday in church we taught YW's and Sunday School. We prepared for YW's so that went well, but Sunday school for the Youth, we were asked on the spot so it didn't go so well. This is only because I didn't have my Dutch sentences or scriptures prepared. 

I speak something called Nader-Engeles which is like a mix between English and Dutch- haha. I still am having a very hard time forming sentences and knowing which conjugation to use, but it's coming little by little. I have such a long way to go. That's when I'm grateful that I still have like a year to learn! One thing I love about staying in Suriname my whole mission is that I get to stay with the same members the whole time. By the end they will see how much I have learned...hopefully. The scary thing is that I'm bound to one day train someone else in this language. 

I can't believe the weather in Utah! WOW! That's crazy. Almost as hot here :) I think that it is so cool mom and dad, that you are learning Tagalog. Keep up the good work! It'll be interesting if you will understand anything once you get there. That is going to be so cool! 

Congrats Jacob! I totally broke the mission law and had to watch the Woodies video. SO COOL! Tell me more about your life and business please!

Leona is adorable!! I can't believe how big she is already. I hope you are showing her pictures of me every day and reading my letters aloud to her. 

Glad to hear everyone is doing well!! Love you all and keep being awesome! I miss you all.

Love,

Elizabeth

Washed Out Week 2/2/2015

Dear Family,

Well, we had a great week! I say washed out because this week there was a lot of rain. Haha, I really don't mind the rain though it just makes my clothes smell by the end of the day. We are in the short rainy season right now apparently. I'm not quite sure how the seasons work yet...

Faizel wasn't baptized this week. We taught him the Word of Wisdom and he was very upset over the idea of tea and coffee. You just feel like that is so dumb as a missionary. You're going to ignore the entire testimony you feel over tea and coffee?? But anyhow, we explained all the reasons and testified but he still was not having it. It wasn't that he couldn't stop, it was that he didn't want to. The next day we went back with a member and they explained it again. I thought he got it. But as we were leaving I heard him talking to his neighbors about it and obviously they're saying wow, that's stupid. So we went the NEXT day with the elders because they were shadowing us. We had another really good spiritual lesson about it. He committed to try going a week without it. We are seeing him tomorrow so we will see how it's going. This is the only thing holding him back. He knows it's all true. Hopefully he'll open his heart and be willing to give it a try. He's a really good kid. 

Ernesto is 15. He is our branch mission leaders nephew. He's been taught by the missionaries for a while now. He's pretty lazy- haha, but he really is smart and loves the gospel. We finished teaching him all the lessons this week and he's like yeah, I'm ready to get baptized! We are planning on his baptism for this weekend. This week we are just gonna work on solidifying his testimony. 

Mohan...well, he's still kind of a challenge, however he is progressing so I don't really know what to do. He loves everything we teach him. He reads everything we leave him. I'm just never sure if he really gets it. He lives with his wife and son. They are so nice. His wife only speaks Sranamtango which is the language the slaves made up way back in the day. Everyone speaks it here and some only speak it which makes life hard. I'm here learning Dutch and trying to speak it and they don't understand me cause they don't even know Dutch. Hopefully I can pick up on that one after I get a little more Dutch down. 

We are teaching another Guyanese lady named Rita. She is so sweet and very spiritual. She's also a talker but she definitely has potential. She is the ultimate Christian, just wanting to do whatever God asks of her. We had Area Conference broadcast yesterday and she came. I think she liked it!

We are also teaching a family of 8! All of them have a baptismal date except for the two youngest. They are a great family. The only problem is getting them to church. The Dad was in the Army and only has one leg. They don't have a car and the Dad doesn't want any of the family to go to church without him. We are working on finding some sort of ride. 

I've been working on setting up appointments to go visit members. It's been really nice to get to know them more. I still have lots more to meet! Remembering names is hard here because I can't say most of them...

Dutch Dutch Dutch. I feel like i'm learning so slowly! I can't believe I've been here for 4 weeks. I can read really well and my word recognition is getting better. I can understand most of what people say. However speaking is still a challenge. I will learn how to say something and then forget it fast. I'm constantly asking how to say certain words or phrases in Dutch--they tell me--then I say it--then I lose it! I have to say something over and over and over till it gets in my mind. I'm really good at saying hi, how are you, how was your day. I know how to say other things but forming sentences is difficult. In Dutch they have things called kickers. It causes sentences to be backwards basically. Which makes it almost impossible to translate from English to Dutch in your mind. I'm hoping I wake up one morning speaking Dutch magically. Elder Prosman teaches all the missionaries in my zone so I can't say it's the basics but it's useful info I can use later I guess.

I can teach a few things in Dutch. My goal is to be able to teach the first lesson in Dutch by the end of the transfer. 

In my package I just got the two story books. I love them though. I got a Dutch one too, so I have been going through and translating the Dutch one and then checking myself in the English one. It's been pretty fun doing that. I'm so mad I didn't get the chapstick or chocolate though :(

Biking is probably one of my favorite parts of the mission. I'm getting really tan biking. I've fallen over a couple times but just because I got caught on my skirt trying to get on. Nothing like a wipe out. 

I like the food here! It's better than in St. Vincent. They have great Indian food and Roti. Lots of rice and chicken though like anywhere. I had really good BBQ last week. The fresh juice here is so good. Just all the fruit in general is so good. 

I'm sending some pictures of me with Lucien's monkey, My branch mission leader's daughter and me, and then some pictures of where we did service for a sister in the branch. She lives kind of on a farm. It was beautiful. 

Keep going Mom and Dad!! I'm sure it's hard! It'll be cool to pick up on some language. I'm so excited for you both. Thanks for the letters everyone. I think I have the best looking nieces and nephew in the world!! Send me more pictures! 

Love,

Zuster Elizabeth