Nausori - Week 12

Wananavu

Ni bula kece 

It's been another great week down in Nausori!  This past week we had a lot of meetings and an exchange but still managed to get some good work in our area.  Transfers are this week, and I can't believe how fast this last transfer has been!  Tomorrow we'll see if things will change up or stay the same.

We had two meetings this week with President and Sister Layton.  The first was in Nausori for all the district leaders and zone leaders in the two zones here.  We basically learned how to be leaders which was awesome coming from President and Sister Layton!  They taught us a ton about how to lead and do all the things we have to do in this position.  The second meeting was MLC which was with missionaries from all around the mission in which we learned a lot as well from the Laytons and the Assistants!  I always feel really blessed to learn from them!

We've been working really hard with all of our investigators and have seen a bit more success.  Luisa and her friend Liti are doing good and are still excited to work towards baptism.  The problem we're facing is getting them to quit smoking which has been hard.  Even though they're pretty young it's already become an addiction.  But we have faith that they can stop through the powers of the Atonement.  Evia, the old lady who is confined to a wheelchair, is loving our lessons and says she knows they are true, so we got permission to bring church to her (because our chapel is the second story in a two-story building) excluding the sacrament while she decides whether she will want to be baptized.  Unfortunately we've been losing some contact with Bulou because she started taking night-classes at the university.  They may be moving pretty soon as well, but hopefully she'll keep reading and praying and continue her lessons at some future date.

That's pretty much it for this week, but thanks for all the support and have a great week!

Love,

Elder Harris

Me and the Bius

Nausori - Week 11

Bula everyone!

It has been one of those weeks where it went by so fast because we were way busy, so hopefully I can remember everything.

Last week for PDay our zone went up to some caves in Nasautoka where we got to go in and take a tour.  They were pretty intense: the tour guide (an old Fijian lady) was telling us all the things they used to do in the cave.  There were lots of stories about the old Fijian culture of cannibalism and old marriage ceremonies which were fun to hear about, although I'm not sure if they were all 100% true or if she was just trying to make my ten bucks worth it.  But at the end it was this big huge cave and there were tons of bats and things.  Pretty cool and everyone liked it.

Another cool thing we did this week was go to Levuka!  Ovalau is a small island off of Viti Levu and has one set of elders out there.  We got to go and visit Elder Jonutz and Elder Bond and go work with them.  The city of Levuka was the old capital of Fiji when the British first arrived, so it is a pretty nice developed place that has an old town type of feel.  But now it is famous for its tuna factory and subsequent fishy smell.  We had to take a bus that boarded a boat and then unboarded the boat and then drove around the island to reach the city.  We went there on Thursday and then came back on Saturday.  We got a lot of work done and had a great time out there!

All of our investigators are doing really well.  Bulou is still reading the Book of Mormon and is on chapter 11 now.  She likes it, but unfortunately they have been really busy so we've only had time to talk on the phone.  Luisa is another investigator that is doing super good and getting ready to be baptized next month.  She lives with a member family and has come to church a few times and wants to change her life and be baptized, so we are excited to work with her!

This week I've been learning a lot about improvement.  Sometimes I feel really discouraged that I'm not improving as fast as I would like to, but I learned that the Lord is more concerned about what direction we are going in rather than how fast we are going.  I'm grateful that an understanding Heavenly Father helps us to improve "grace by grace" or one step at a time.

Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Harris

The Gang inside the Cannibal Caves

They said they used to kill people here with big clubs

Elder Lautogia and I on our way to Levuka

Where the bus gets of the boat in Levuka

A dead bat someone was preparing to eat

Levuka from the Elder's Flat

Boat leaving Levuka at 5 in the morning.  Nice Sunrise.

Nausori - Week 10

lai lotu mada

Bula!

Sorry not much time today cuz we're going to go see some caves up by Nasautoka today with our zone.

It's been a good week!  It was great to see everyone last week and catch up, even if it wasn't for very long!  I think next skype I'll only have a week left on my mission, so that kind of woke me up a bit.  But I was glad to see everyone.

This week we have been just working as hard as we can trying to see a lot of people.  The past two weeks have been hard because we've had to drop a lot of people who we thought were getting baptized this month because they either moved or just lost interest.  It was really hard to see that, but we have just been working really hard on finding new people to teach so we can find more people that want to get baptized.  

Despite the rough fall-throughs, our one glimmer of hope is Bulou!   A few weeks ago we thought we could never get her to read the Book of Mormon, but just recently she made the commitment to really read and pray about the Book of Mormon, which is way exciting!  She has lots of questions still, but it's fun working with her and her husband John (who is our ward mission leader as well).  We had her committed to come to church as well, but John fell off a ladder on Saturday and hurt his back pretty bad so that didn't happen!  But we're really happy with her progression.

Another investigator we have been teaching is named Ivia.  She is a really old lady from Kadavu, and she lives in Nausori with her mentally handicapped nephew Paula.  She really has been reading the Book of Mormon and has a testimony of the Restoration.  It's been fun teaching her.  Her only problem is she is confined to a wheelchair so we're trying to get help from the ward for her to come to church, because she really wants to.  But hopefully we can get that done this next week.

But yeah everything is going really well and I am having fun with Elder Lautogia!

Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Harris

This is a whale back bone just randomly at someone's house

We love getting our truck fixed

A nice horse on a Fiji hill  (I got his good side)

Nausori - Week 9

We were able to skype with Elder Harris today!  It was so great to see him and hear his voice.

Nausori - Week 8

Wananavu

Well another week has gone by with a lot of work.  We had a lot of busy work this week but were also able to have a lot of success in our area, so Elder Lautogia and I were pretty excited about that!

So on Wednesday we had another meeting with President and Sister Layton and the Assistants.   It was really good and we learned a lot about keeping our individual areas productive by planning right and working smart.  It was really good insights and we tried to apply it all this week and it worked!  Always good to hear from our leaders.  Plus one of the senior couple sisters made chicken pot pie for lunch which was to die for!  Always a good time at the mission office.  Right after that we had exchanges with the Assistants.  I took Elder Johnson to my area which was way fun because I remember reading his blog before I came out.  We had a good day and taught quite a few people.

Thursday was really fun as well because we had the opportunity to take Sister Layton and Sister Martin (whom I already know because she and her husband visited us up in Tuvalu) and go and check all the elders flats in our zone.  Because we're so spread out in our zone we had a lot of driving to do which was pretty entertaining because those two are hilarious!  Sister Layton is a pretty big football fan so she was catching me up on all the news about BYU and such.  Plus they brought cookies:)

And Friday we had exchanges again and I took around Elder Stevens from the state of Washington.  He is a pretty funny elder, and we had a great time.  He is pretty young in the mission but has way bomb Fijian already!  It was really good to get to know him.  We saw a family who is struggling right now to come to church because they can't afford it.  It was really hard to hear that from them and to see how much they wanted to come to church.  While we were sharing I felt impressed to tell them that if they sacrificed the money that they had to come to church, the Lord would take care of everything else.  The mother thought about it for a second and said, "Okay, we'll see you on Sunday."  Well the whole family came to church and it was awesome to see them show so much faith!

We are also teaching Sister Dalawa's daughter-in-law who loves church and taking the lessons.  The only problem is that she actually isn't Sister Dalawa's daughter-in-law yet so we're working with them on a wedding date as well as a baptismal date.  But hopefully it will be this month!  Another investigator, this one a bit older, named Lusiana has such a desire to be baptized but her husband isn't very happy about it so we're trying to meet with him to see if he will give his permission.   And lastly we finally saw Bulou again last night with her husband (who is our ward mission leader).  She is still worried about reading the Book of Mormon, but Elder Lautogia and I just showed her that there is nothing inside but the teachings of Jesus Christ.  One thing I like that Elder Lautogia does is he tells them to flip to a random page in the book and look for the word Lord, God, Christ, or Holy Ghost.  He does that about 3 times and they can never find one without those words.  She said she would read it!

It's been really fun with Elder Lautogia.  He's been giving me some mean workouts to do in the morning!  And he's probably gonna teach me UFC fighting pretty time soon.  We'll see how that goes.

Have a great week!

Loloma levulevu,

Elder Harris

Nausori Flat