A Ringworm Christmas

Christmas was awesome, and it was so good talking to my family! I have had ringworm for the past couple weeks but have just kept it on the DL, but then I was going to video call home and my family was all going to see it, so now its public. It started on my back and this past week it has grown to about half my back, both armpits, all over my neck, and now its on my face. So ya life is great. Ringworm is not at all what anyone wants. The nurse at the office isn't really helping much and the anti fungal cream isn't doing much either. Hopefully it goes away soon. Other than that this past week has been awesome!

Christmas in Samoa is definitely a lot different than America, but it's really fun. Also, our Zone Leaders clutched up and bought me and my companion McDonalds twice! They have something called a McAiga here (Aiga means family), and it is amazing. We got two of them for the 4 of us, probably the best present ever. We had 8 drinks, 8 fries, 4 Big Macs, 4 McChickens, and 20 Nuggetts. Me and my companion did yarnballs on Christmas eve, Shoutout to Sister Heindel, and then Christmas morning we opened our packages we got. We spent most of Christmas at our Bishops house because I had a really bad fever, but they have a room that has Air Conditioning so that was super nice.

The member we stay with knows how to firedance. He did it for us on Christmas and it was sooo cool. I had never seen a firedance before but it was awesome, I'm gonna try and learn how to do it haha. This week was awesome, and I am so thankful for Christmas time. I hope everyone had an awesome Christmas! 

Elder Roberts

Yarn ball

McAiga 

 Temple

 Presents

Jaka's Firedance

My shot of being on Live TV from last week

Merry Christmas!

This last week was awesome. Junior got baptized, I am super excited for him. He is cousins with Penny who we baptized last month, we are going to try and bring both of them to the temple next week.

So on Monday all the missionaries on this island sang at this huge concert in Apia. It got televised to all of Samoa and everybody has been watching it. So we are practicing the day of and President called me and my companion over and 2 other elders and told us we were going to do the Nativity Scene. So it's basically this huge festival and we were going to dress up and stand in this nativity scene. I was pretty hyped actually because we were still going to sing. We sang in our costumes in the very middle and we stood out so much. I was on national TV here in Samoa, our bishop recorded it and I got a 5 second shot of just me singing. So I am basically famous here in Samoa. For our costumes we had to have fake beards so they put butter all over our face and then coffee grinds on top of that. It felt so disgusting. It was a fun time, the pictures are below.

I ate some really bad tuna a couple days ago and yesterday I felt horrible, I threw up at our district meeting so that was fun. I feel better now though I just needed to get it all out of the system. Also, we got a new companion, so we are now a trio. He is from here is Samoa and doesn't know English so that is really good for me and learning this language. He is just waiting for his visa so he can go to the Philippines. He is a really cool dude.

I am so excited for Christmas! I love Christmas time and the opportunity we have to remember the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. Not only to remember his birth, but his life. I am so grateful for what he has done for us. I know it is only through Jesus Christ that we can return to live with our Heavenly Father. I know Jesus is the Savior and Redeemer of the World. I hope everyone takes the opportunity this season to remember him and to serve others. I hope everyone has an awesome Christmas!

Elder Roberts

I am a Wiseman

Nativity Scene.  I am on the right.

 Me just chilling with a bunch of Goats.

 Elder Liana, Elder Hugo...  Me and Elder Pu'Efua

Elder Pu'Efua, Risati, Junior, Me

Samoan Kitchen

We took Steve's Family to the Visitors Center 

This week was awesome

This week was awesome, my companion and I really worked hard to find new people. We found a lot of great people that look really promising. We even got a baptism set up for this Friday. His name is Junior and I know the Lord had him prepared for us. We talked to the bishop with him about when the baptism would be and he just kept talking about how he wants to be clean and wants to repent. He talked about how some other churches don't grow up their kids with good standards. He is only 16. It is so rewarding to see an investigator talk like that. I am so excited for his baptism this weekend.

The Visitor's Center has been doing a Christmas Concert every night where the missionaries would sing songs and stuff and tons of people show up and we bring investigators. It's money for investigators because its short, and they like hearing the missionaries sing, and there is food after. Our zone had our turn of singing this past week, and we have another turn next week I think. We practiced for like 2 hours before, then right when it starts it just started pouring rain. It was raining so hard and our papers got destroyed and most of the songs were in Samoan, so I had no idea what to do. It was fun though.

On Monday I had one of the best days of my mission. We had a zone conference and went to the hospital to sing songs for the patients. The hospital has been packed recently especially with Dengue Fever patients. Elder Pu'efua and I got assigned to the kids area! I was soooo hyped. So we and a sister companionship sang songs to these little kids who were sooo sick. It was honestly one of the saddest but most spiritual experiences I have had. It was really cool because afterwords the parents would ask us if we could bless their kids, so we had great teaching opportunities teaching about the priesthood and blessings. It was just so special being able to sing to these kids and perform priesthood blessings for them. Truly one of the most humbling experiences I have had. Also, after President Hannemann took us to this super nice Chinese restaurant in town. They brought out so much food for us I was soo happy. Probably the best meal I have had here.

This week was good though, unfortunately I let a kid in my ward look at all of the pictures on my camera and he pressed the delete all button. So I no longer have any pictures from my mission. I am using some of my companions pictures from this week though.

Elder Roberts

 Us with Junior at the Visitors Center

 Me, Saili, Gordon, and Xavier

 Chinese Restuarant

Our Zone with President

Purcell Family we took to the Visitors Center

At the Visitors Center.  I am third from right on back row.  Pesega zone

Elder Cardon

Elder Cardon of the Seventy came yesterday to talk to our mission. It was soooo good, he is a really good speaker. He basically slammed us with a ton of doctrine and it was really interesting. We talked a lot about the Abrahamic Covenant and the Oath and Covenant of the Priesthood. It was good seeing all the other missionaries also, and this time we actually got to talk with everybody. It was kind of funny to see how different President is when there is a General Authority there. President did share with us about how he got called to be a mission president and was to start in the field 14 days later, I can't even imagine. 

The visitor's center here has been doing the Christmas program every night for the 25 days of Christmas, it is really cool. There are a ton of lights set up and some missionaries do this program. It is a really good thing to bring investigators too. Also, we aren't allowed to go unless we bring an investigator. Elder Cardon bore a really powerful testimony the night that I went though, it was really cool.

Not a whole lot else has been going on, me and my companion are trying to just find new people. We got a lot of insight yesterday at the conference so hopefully something works out. I am really excited for the Christmas season, the best time of the year.

I heard the playoffs for College Football, hopefully Bama gets wrecked.

Elder Roberts

Big Family we teach 

We got them all CTR rings 

Happy Thanksgiving

 Ace's Baptism

YSA in Lotopa Ward 

Fun trail 

At Visitors Center