Week 14-December 27, 2015--Christmas and Dead Indian Men

This letter has been edited to include a few short explanations and stories that we enjoyed during our Skype on Christmas Eve, which was absolutely a delight.  I am happy to report that his irreverent sense of humor and contagious laugh are ever present and thriving!

Yadra Vinaka,

Man this week did NOT go by fast. At all. It was all good though because I had my boys down from RakiRaki keeping us company. (Elder Ogden, his dear friend from the MTC and his barber!)

Before

After

Answers to Mom's endless questions:

I'm all good on shirts. Some new ties would be sick, and also a new pair of glasses, or maybe contacts (*gasp* yes he said it). A watch would be cool too. I haven't had a watch since the MTC.

No Nativities in the mail yet, but I'm still looking. 

We are going to the funeral today for Papa.

(Papa is the grandfather of a family that the Elders have been working with.  He was "ancient" and Elder Dawson  personally changed his diapers and carried him to the shower.  Papa loved the missionaries and they loved him.  A few weeks ago the family called the Elders for emotional support due to a death in the family.  The Elders assumed that Papa had passed away.  When the Elders arrived at the family home to offer support and love they found Papa alive and well.  The family's dog had died.  In their laments, the family asked God why it had to be the dog to go and not Papa.  The missionaries were a little taken back by this but recognized that each grieve in their own way.  The Elders helped the family bury the dog in the yard and prayed for them.  On Christmas morning, the family called again to let the Elders know that Papa had also passed away and wondered if they could stop by to help with the shovels.)

 I'll let you know if we actually bury him or not. His son was way mad at all the Elders for not dropping everything (on Christmas) and going to console him and his wife right away. He acted the same way with his dog though, so...

The main industry in Ba is sugar cane.  There is a huge sugar mill.  Most of the Fijians either work in the sugar mill or have sold land to the sugar mill and live off of the proceeds.  The Indians own and run all of the other businesses in town.

For Christmas dinner Elder Ogden and I went home and made some sick fried chicken and mashed potatoes and listened to High School Musical music. It was way turnt.

The area of Fiji that Elder Dawson is serving is called The Burning West. The area has gone without rain for the last 9 months.  For the last week or two they have gotten a lot of rain.  He and his companion walk all over the town in the rain. He said it's not that bad and the more mud he walks through, the prettier his wife will be.  Sacrifice=Blessings.

So, yesterday (Sunday), I got to participate in the baptismal service of an entire family that we've been teaching since I've been in Fiji. It was so great. They were all smiling and happy. Sister Buna bore her testimony after her baptism and it was so special. I'll never forget it.  (One of the daughters of this family needed to marry her live-in boyfriend or break up with him in order for her to be baptized.  They chose to be married and Elder Dawson met them at the court house and was one of their witnesses!)

Not much else happened. I got to Skype home which was the bomb diggity.  Seeing everyone was awesome.   But other than that it was a way normal week.

Man, sorry, this week's letter kinda stinks. Noqu ca. Well, I love you guys lots! Like a lot, a lot. I'll write a lot more next week!

Much Love,

Elder Dawson 

-

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 13-December 20, 2015

Bula Vinaka!

So straight up, this week like zipped past. I feel like I was just emailing you. Crazy! Anyways, it's been a pretty rad week. 

So my answers for this week. 

The women in Ba really dig na kei valagi (I like the white guy). Especially when they learn I can speak Fijian. I've had a few date invitations, and I accidentally accepted one once.  She was way disappointed when I showed up with my companion and a member present. 

Speaking of women, thanks for the picture of Sister Smith. Oh, *chuckles and leans over super sly like* I remember her. *flicks nose-winks* She was really nice and I remember thinking, I wonder if she will be serving in my family's area. It's obviously meant to be.

Elder Ogden cuts my hair because he's a stud.

The Elders here get transferred when President Layton feels inspired I guess. From what I've heard and seen, President likes to leave people in their areas for a long time. (I'm also crying about Sister Smith's transfer. #emailmelol) 

In Fiji Star Wars is just as big as anywhere else. Which low key stinks because I won’t be seeing it until I get home.

There aren't too many animals here that we don't have in America. Except maybe Mongooses. Are there Mongooses (mongeese??) in America?

I am picking up little things in Hindi. I try not to learn too much because I feel like President would call me to an all Hindi speaking area and I’m working really hard on Fijian, which is coming along. I read from the Fijian Book of Mormon at least once a day. 

Fijians love Christmas, but they don't like visitors on Christmas. Yay...

I am indeed getting Dad's emails. I love them! 

I do get to Skype, if I can get a camera. But Elder Ogden and I are looking way hard. We'll Skype you guys on the 25^th here. So Christmas Eve for you guys. So we'll probably call at like 3 your time. I'll email you an hour in advance for all the nitty gritty details, so make sure you check your phone.

So this week seemed way short. We had transfers and Elder Kumar died (which means he went home, don’t panic) and the two sisters in Tavua both got transferred to the North. So, Elder McLeod and his trainee Elder Akaiti are up in Tavua now, and they took the car from the Hindi Elders. Dang no more rides.

This week we've been focused a lot on Sister Lusi and her family. I love this family so much. Sister Lusi is basically my mom here in Ba. If I have a problem, I call her. They are scheduled for baptism on this coming Sunday and I couldn't be more stoked. We just need her oldest daughter to get married or leave her boyfriend, but we are working with them. 

So, when we aren't out teaching, we do a lot of studying. Recently, Elda Visawaqa has really been in to role playing scenarios. They suck. He will talk as fast as he can and come up with the most ridiculous questions. My Fijian has improved though, so I guess it's working.

Yesterday the RakiRaki Elders came down so we started a fire outside and roasted two whole chickens. Yeah, it was the white guy’s idea. That's right, we're straight savage. It was way good. I'll have to do it for you guys when I get home. 

Before I end I just want to say a quick thing about this season. I used to love Christmas, because of good food, presents, family, presents, friends, eggnog, presents and all sorts of stuff. Lately though, I've been feeling discouraged, homesick, and honestly angry at times because things won’t be the same for Christmas this year for me. But as I turn my heart to the true meaning of Christmas and think of that mild and meek child, wrapped in swaddling clothes, everything gets a little easier because I know that because he was born, there is always hope. Because of Jesus Christ we can live with our families forever. Because of Jesus Christ we have an advocate for the final Judgement. Because of Jesus Christ, we can live again. For that I am eternally Grateful. I love my Savior, and that's why I'm in Fiji. That's why what I'm doing is important to me. I hope you all take a few moments this Christmas to really remember our Savior. I love you and I miss you.

Check out this awesome Christmas video.  It's only 2 minutes but it will get you in the feels!  Merry Christmas!

A Savior Is Born

Much Love 

Elder Dawson

-- 

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 12-Cakacaka Mana!! (Working miracles)-December 13, 2015

Bula Vinaka!

So in response to your questions:

I'm good with food. They don't utilize the churches welfare programs the same here, it's to isolated. I'm just going to have to learn to say no.  And, no, I haven't gotten desperate enough to eat a rat...even though they are big enough that I could probably eat for a week.

I won't be getting onto Facebook anytime soon.  I am weak but I want to be focused.

I received a way sick package.  All the candy and that sweet scripture Christmas tree advent calendar thing is way sweet.  Thank you!

Also, Sister Smith, is she cute?  If she's cute, I want her to be there when I Skype home so she can see how manly and dark I am. LOL

My week, has been full of miracles. Like jam packed with miracles! So we had this sweet Zone Training Meeting and in it, our Zone Leaders, Elder Johnson and Elder Thomas, told us to look for miracles. 

Chocolate Chip Cookies and Coke

So that night we had an appointment with one of our investigators Weni. She was scheduled for baptism that Sunday so we needed to go finish the lessons, and most importantly, go ask her non-member dad if she could be baptized because she is under 18.
The lesson went perfectly, the Spirit was there and we knew this girl was ready for baptism. Then her dad came into the room, we greeted each other and Elder Visawaqa, being way sav, just went for it and asked if Weni could be baptized. Then he kicked it up a notch and asked if Brother Josua would come to the baptism with his family. He got way quiet for a while until finally he said, "Yeah". We were stoked!  So after talking through some details and what not we left. 

Now Weni lives at the very edge of our area in a place called Vaqia and there were no more buses coming so we were going to have to walk back to our flat at 7 at night. We also had a dinner appointment with one of my favorite families, the Tamanis. We were both bummed because we were going to have to cancel the dinner because there was no way we would be back into town in time.  When we got to the top of Weni's hill, there was this Indian man just standing in the road with his car. He saw us and said, "Hey Brother's do you want a ride?" We told him thanks but we couldn't afford a taxi because we had no money. He told us that he was just going to work and he was headed to town. He gave us a ride all the way to FSC and we were able to make it to the Tamanis' house!  

Looking manly and dark...kinda!

Then on Sunday we had a baptism service for Weni and a girl name Abishna that the Ba Hindi Elders had been teaching. It was so special. I've never felt the Spirit so strongly. I felt like all the stresses of life just vanished. 

We had the busiest day after the baptism, but it didn't bother me at all. When I pulled Weni out of the water, I realized why I'm here. It's not to learn Fijian. It's not to live in a "Tropical Paradise". It's to bring my Father's children back to him.  I feel like I'm on fire here in the Burning West. I love Ba and all of it's African like qualities. I love my Father who lives in Heaven. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ. I love my companion. I love my family.  I love this Gospel and the hope it brings to this word. I bear testimony that the message I'm carrying and that all the set apart missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints carry forth is the true word of God. 

Cherish it.

Much Love,

Elder Dawson

--

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 11-December 5, 2015

Bula Vinaka!

Answers to Mom's crazy questions this week:

*I sleep on a bed, the floor, the couch, my chair. Just whatever I'm feeling that night.

*Elder Visawaqa just hit his 9 months mark, he's going to start dying soon.   That means that he will be on the down hill slope of 24 months.

*Diwali, is the Festival of Lights and the Indian people love making sweets.  That's as much as I know.

*Sulus are worn as more of a respect thing, so for like schooling or church. Business people, they wear sulus. But then there are the nightwear sulus, which are way sick. I have two. The women though, always wear sulus around Elders, as a sign of respect.

*I remember Sister Smith in the MTC (but not her face :/ so definitely send pictures). So does Elder Ogden, we are laughing about it.  It's funny that a girl I met and talked with is now serving her mission there in San Clemente, having dinner with my family.  Small world.

*It's great to hear about Ashley's mission call to Hong Kong. Tell her that I wish her luck and that she needs to write me while she's gone.  She will be my wife, after all!

*Our flat is so gross. We have rats the size of small dogs, spiders the size of large rats, and roaches everywhere.

*We've been paying for people to take carriers and buses, and we buy people groceries, so I don't have hardly any money, and we have nothing but flour, rice, and breakfast crackers at our flat. Lately, all of our dinner appointments have been canceling so we haven't been eating much. We shared a bad mango that I found on the road, and it was the best.

Pork and Bean Sandwich...yum!

Oh man this past week has been way sweet! So we've been having a lot of meetings in Lautoka for our zone, which means on Monday's we do Zone P-day. We crush some rugby! I love it. 

I experienced my first mission tour and our general authority was Elder Grifford Neilsen. He gave such awesome instruction. He spoke about the importance of the Sacrament, which really hit me hard, because in our little ward, we don't have high sacrament meeting attendance.  Oh, something way cool, I got to see ELDER GREEN!!!! He came to our zone's Mission tour. Oh it was a joyous reunion!

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday just seemed to fly by. Sorry this week there isn't a lot of way cool stuff. I did however come across a way cool chapter in the Book of Mormon that I really dug into this week. 

 2 Nephi 31

This chapter is extremely close to when Nephi dies so it's almost like his last testimony. Man, it is a way cool chapter. Read it and really think about what Nephi is saying in each verse, especially about Heavenly Father and The Savior.

If you don't have a Book of Mormon, you can order a free one on line on lds.org, or on the same website you can use the online Book of Mormon. And while you're there, check out the Christmas message, it's beautiful. Anyway, I love you and miss you a ton!

www.lds.org

Much Love 

Elder Dawson

-- 

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 10-November 29, 2015

Bula Vinaka,

Phew, what a week. 

SO this week seemed to drag on forever.  I had a lot of fun down in Lautoka, we had Zone Qito and we played Rugby and Ultimate Frisbee in the rain which was way sweet.  I think I'm getting pretty good at Rugby. I think I would be a little better if I could just have people try and tackle me instead of tag me, but I think I'm getting pretty good.

We stayed down in Nadi, the city with the airport that we flew into, for Zone conference on Tuesday. Zone Conference was pretty cool.  I got to see my "Grandpa" Elder Lemalu. I love that guy. Seeing guys from the MTC is always good.  This past week has been way awesome! 

Zone Conference

We got to go on splits with some of the Elders down in Nadi. I went with Elders Van and Carter. We met with some super old guy who was way cool. His Fijian was hard to understand but he kept saying "vinaka vinaka" whenever we said anything about Jesus Christ, so basically the whole lesson.

On the way back to Ba we stopped at McDonalds. When we were at McDonalds I met Bu Kini. She's super famous in Fiji, She's Fiji Rugby's biggest fan. She was way bomb and no Mom, I am not checking out hotties in McDonalds. She’s not what you think!

Bu Kini

On Wednesday, we just had a super weird day. It started raining way hard, which was a miracle to the people of Ba. It stayed way hot, but it was raining. Most of the roads in Ba are dirt, which quickly turned to mud. Yes, we were walking. We received a referral to a family who lived on top of this hill, and on the way up we were slipping and sliding all over the place. When I got to the top I was covered in mud and soaking wet. The husband was outside sitting on the porch and when I saw him I said the only thing I knew how to say in that situation. "Au via wasea na itukutuku baleti Jisu Karisito." I'm sure that freaked him out a little. Just some white guy covered in mud, saying he wanted to share a message about Jesus Christ. He told us they were busy, but we are going to go see them on Wednesday. 

So, Thanksgiving is actually just as big here as it is in America. Which is cool, but at the same time sucks because it makes me miss home. We had a super rad dinner appointment set up for Thanksgiving.  They said they would make a whole chicken for each of us and they said they would make potatoes and curry and rice and roti and all other sorts of good stuff. Well we had had a really long day of canceled appointments and we had walked like 15 miles in around 39 C. So we were way stoked for this rad dinner. We got halfway up the hill that this family lives on, and they called us and told us that they were in Suva for Thanksgiving and they had to cancel. Well, what could I do?   I just sat down and adjusted my sandals for the 45 minute walk back to town and started for home. When we got back to our flat, my companion just went right to bed. I said to myself, I want something for Thanksgiving dinner. So I used what we had, and had a dope PB&J sandwich and some Mango Tang. (And I might have listened to Sia, Ed Sheeran, T Swift, and Iggy Azalea, but the world will never know.) 

On Friday we taught some awesome lessons to our investigators. One is named Akosita. She's way awesome and progressing really well. We committed her to the Word of Wisdom and she said she loved Tea and Tobacco, but we said we would help her by praying for her.

On Saturday I went on exchanges with my District Leader Elder Kumar. His half of the area speaks Hindi so I had no clue what was going on but they really loved the white guy. I'm actually kinda famous in Ba. I'm one of the four white people who lives here, and I'm the only American. I'll go into someone's home and people will say things like "I’ve heard about you, but I didn't know it was true."  

On Sunday as a ward we all went down to the stakes seminary graduation. We got to see some new faces, some familiar, and Elder Visawaqa even saw his Girlfriend, who was on holiday, oops. This week has been way bomb. Like way bomb. I love Ba, even though it's like 39 degrees here every day. I love the Fijian people. I love my Savior and my Heavenly Father. I love you and I miss you a lot. 

Much Love,

Elder Dawson   

Oh, I just realized I didn't answer any of your questions:

To convert Celsius to Farenheit just double the number and add 30.  So, for example, 39 degrees Celsius is 108 degrees Farenheit!  It’s freaking hot, dude.

We use Fijian money. Like ever 50 cents in  America is 1 dollar here. But everything here is basically just like home only twice as expensive. We live on basically $80 every two weeks.

Some food pics:

In my flat it's just Elder Visawaga and I. We often stay the night with Elders Kumar and Fitisemanu though. They have air conditioning. 

Our Ward breaks up into all the auxiliaries. All 40 of us. 

We drink milk all the time. There isn't a lot of cheese. Oh and get this, I eat ice cream now, like a crap ton. Miracles for missionaries.  (Please send me some Lactaid pills!)

I haven't bought a machete, because a young man in my ward is going to teach me to make one. 

The dogs are way mean. I've kicked two. They don't have homes, they're just chillin on 'da streets.

People laugh at me a lot when I try to speak and when I don't understand something. It bothers me sometimes, but for the most part, everyone is always way nice.  

I killed my first rat this week. It was the size of a Chihuahua. I went to go get my camera but before I could two spiders, the size of normal rats in New York, dragged it way.  I feel safe here.

Anyways, I love you guys and I miss you way a lot.

Elder Dawson

-- 

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 9-November 22, 2015

Bula Vinaka

This week was awesome!  I got food poisoning, which stunk, but all is well in the world. 

We got have three new investigators this week, which was under our goal, but it's still pretty good. Introducing myself is so funny. Dawson, for whatever reason, is SUPER hard for Fijians to read and say. Like super hard. So I spend like 2 minutes just trying to teach them my name. They end up just calling me Elder, or Elda. Elder Visawaqa said that there is a way to spell it so it would be way easier and I'm going to try to get my tag changed. Well see.  The spelling is Tosana.

I'm pretty happy it's P-day today. On P-day we do the same things we did in the MTC; email, laundry, shop, play sports, that sort of stuff. It's just more refreshing and relaxing when you're actually in the field. Having P-day in Ba is way sweet. 

Ba is pretty big, it's like if Suva is Denver, and Lautoka (my zone headquarters) is Boulder, than Ba would be Longmont. It's not big but it's not small. There are lots of shopping markets, restaurants, and stuff like that. Shopping is an experience here. 

There are a lot of different foods here.  Not very many different fruits and veggies. Lots of mangoes. There are mango trees literally everywhere. They eat a lot of kesava and rourou which are both pretty good. Kesava is a root and it's kind of like a crappy potato but it's good. Rourou is dalo leaves that are boiled and it's basically just eating boiled spinach.

I really like the food here. I can't really say what my favorite food here is, but I can tell you what my least favorite is. There is this small fresh water clam that they call nakai. I don't really know why, but I am just not a fan. All the other food here is really really good though. I think if I had to pick a favorite it would be Dal and rice. Dal is this like yellow mushy soup stuff, I'm not sure what it is but it's way good. 

Another thing they love here is Giblets. Giblets, for those who don't know, are the insides of animals.  So we got takeaway from a members house and we were sitting down to eat. After the prayer we all just started to dig into this food.  I thought to myself "this is like the grainiest chicken I've ever eaten." And Elder Visawaqa looks at me and says, "You know what that is right? It's Giblets." Than I here Elder Ogden form across the table, "This is straight up a kidney." This wonderful sister, had made us chicken kidney curry. We all kind of lost our appetite for curry that night. We all ate it, but none of us went back for seconds. So we went and put it in our fridge.  

Elder Ogden said he was still hungry so we decided to make French toast, because they made some that morning and I didn't get any because I was like way sick. So we beat some eggs, added cinnamon, some milk powder and water, and some vanilla extract. We were stoked.  It was going to taste way good. I had accidentally grabbed the wrong loaf of bread though and when I pulled out the first piece I quickly became aware of the ants that had colonized the half loaf of bread. My heart broke. I wasn't going to get French toast. I told Elder Ogden about the ants and after a pause he looked at me and said "I WILL get my French Toast." We reasoned that the ants would just be added protein and we cooked up the whole loaf. It was the best French toast I have ever eaten! My time with Elder Ogden was basically that. Just try our hardest to make American food that we miss. We made No-Bake Cookies, twice, and they were the bomb. 

We get fed here a lot. Like sometimes two or three times a night. The Ward is way awesome. My area, all of Ba, only has one ward. The ward is small but the members are the best.  My Bishop is so cool. He's an older Fijian man and he is covered in tattoos. He's way cool. 

So something I've learned this week, is that in Fiji there are not gangsters. Only dogs. At night we will see packs of dogs just chilling in the road, or fighting other dogs, like it's the Wild West here in Fiji if you're a dog. 

I love Fiji and I love Ba. I love being in the Lords service. He is truly always with me and I can see His hand in my life. I'm so grateful for my loving Heavenly Father and His Son. I'm thankful for the Atonement and the ability that we have to be forgiven of our shortcomings. I'm grateful for the Book of Mormon and the truthfulness of it's words. I highly recommend reading it. I'm grateful for my wonderful family, and all the support that I receive from them. I love this Gospel and I love my Heavenly Father.  I love you and I miss you so much. 

Much Love 

Elder Dawson

And this is a note that my Mission President asked me to send out!  I would add that I miss American chocolate and Swedish Fish.

Mail

·  Ask family and friends to follow the guidelines below and to address your mail and packages to:

Your Name (Example: Sister J Jones)
Fiji Suva Mission Office
GPO Box 215
Suva, Fiji

This will prevent getting mail lost when you are transferred. Mail will be delivered to you by other missionaries traveling to your area.

·  The package label should be a general description, such as “missionary supplies”, “confections,” or “missionary gifts.”

·  Packages are opened at the time of arrival by Fijian Customs Officers for inspection and a fee charged based on the contents. If you receive package in the mail, you will be assessed $5 per package if Customs processes your package. This will be done in $10 increments taken out of your support money. (i.e. 2nd package at no additional charge)

· If you are sent packages less than 4 pounds and a very minimal price declared ($10-50) they generally do not go through Customs. They are delivered directly to the office with no fee charged to claim the package.

· You should not be sent packages valued at $100 USD or more because Fiji may charge an additional $100 or more (the value of the package plus shipping) that you will need to pay to claim the package.

· Inform family and friends to not send any of the following products because they will be confiscated and you will be charged a fee:

·         Any meat products, including jerky, noodles, ramen

·         Any dairy products, including noodles and macaroni with milk and cheese products

P.S.  My spider-bit foot.  It's totally fine now!

-- 

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 8-November 15, 2015

Bula Vinaka! This week...this week has been something. I'll start with answering some of Mom's questions first.

My flat is way nice. Like indoor plumbing nice.  All the water is hot, but I'm not complaining. Three bedrooms and one bathroom. It's pretty rad.

The walking every where  isn't that bad. It's all just really far, but not to hilly or anything.

In Ba it's a pretty solid split between the amount of native Fijians and the amount of Indians. But both are the nicest people, especially to the Elders.

Rugby is a huge deal in Fiji. I see at least 60 All Blacks shirts daily (All Blacks is a very popular team). I have had the opportunity to play rugby with the Elders in my zone, and it is way fun.

Ba is an awesome area. The people here are SUPER humble and they are so kind and charitable.

Elder Visawaqa is actually learning English, but he's dang good at it. He's such a great guy and an even better trainer.

I didn't get to see Elder Ogden until today, but man it's been great. We are staying the night in his area and then he is coming down to my area tomorrow.

I miss home but I love it here.

I haven't seen to many tourists, like maybe five total.

I've had a lot of curry and Indian sweets, because of Diwali, so I'm kind of curryed out.

So this week has been rather difficult. I started to feel homesick for the first time this week. Like, actually homesick. It was rough just thinking about certain things that I wouldn't be able to do for two years. I tried hard to shrug it off but I just couldn't. 

We've had a lot of appointments fall through this week. Like a lot! We have an investigator named, Usaia. He's 15 and before I got here he was progressing really well and he had a baptismal date set last week. Recently though, he's stopped coming to church and he never wants to meet with us. This seems to be the case with most of our investigators. They were all progressing and then when I got here they all seemed to just stop.  This whole week I've thought, "This is my fault. I'm the reason they won't come to church and they don't want to meet with us." I've just been beating myself up. 

So today for P-Day, we went to an area called RakiRaki and we decided we would hike a mountain. I didn't think to much of it, but then when we started our guide (a 16 year old girl) took us straight up the side of the mountain. It stunk. Like it was just super hard. All the miles I had walked all seemed to catch up with me and I started falling behind. I kept thinking to myself "I can't do this, I'm not strong enough."  Everyone just kept telling me to push on so I kept going. There came a very large rock that stood between me and the rest of the trail. It was massive and it was not going to be easy to get over. I thought to myself "I can't do this, There is no way I can do this." And then as sure as the sun shines, I heard a voice say " You can do this!  You can do anything, for I am with you." I made it over the rock and up to the top of the mountain.  

As I looked out over the ocean I realized, that the experience I had wasn't just for my hike. I know that my Heavenly Father gave me reassurance that no matter how hard my mission gets, or how dark the world might seem, that we can accomplish great things because he is with us. I know that my Father in Heaven lives, and I know he is with each and everyone of us. I love you and I miss you.

Luke 12:32

"Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom."

And from one of my favorite hymns, Be Still, My Soul:

"Be still, my soul: The Lord is on thy side; 

With patience bear thy cross of grief or pain. 

Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In ev’ry change he faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: Thy best, thy heav’nly Friend 

Thru thorny ways leads to a joyful end."

Much Love,
Elder Dawson

--

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 7-November 8, 2015

Bula Vinaka! So I made it! I finally made it. The flight from LAX to Nadi felt like a lifetime...14 hours I think. When we arrived we were greeted by four Elders; Elders Johnson, Tomasi, Childers, and Robinson. They welcomed us to Fiji and then we embarked on a five hour bus ride to Suva, which also felt like a lifetime.

View from the bus!  Photo cred: Elder Forbush

Sticking with the smile!  Photo cred: Elder Forbush

Cramped much?  Photo cred: Elder Van Roosendaal

Honestly, the time I spent in Suva and at the Mission home feels like a blur. I know we ate Chinese takeout, bought some sulus, ate more food, had a lot of orientation presentations, and met President Layton, Sister Layton, and the Assistants to the President (APs).

The Newest Fijians

President and Sister Layton

On Wednesday we got our first assignment. I was called to serve in the Ba Area in the Lautoka Zone, and my trainer is Elder Visawaqa who is from Savusavu, Fiji. Ba is on the west side of Vitilevu (Fiji's main island). The best way to describe Ba is with one word. Africa. Ba is exactly what one would imagine Africa to look like. Super hot and dry. It's easily one of the prettiest places I've ever been though. There are huge trees everywhere full of fruits and flowers. Ba Area is huge in comparison to others. It takes like an hour bus ride to get from one side to the other, and the best part, we are a walking area! Oh yeah, all the flights of stairs in the MTC weren't to make my legs huge, they were preparing me for Ba.

Elder Visawaqa and Mari, one of our investigators!  She's 10.

My flat is pretty sweet, its in the same grounds as a cute little Hindu temple which is cool, because this Wednesday is Diwali, which means lots of sweets for the Elders. It does have indoor plumbing but zero air conditioning. The food in Ba is so dope! It's a sweet mixture of Fijian food and Indian food.  I had some Chicken and Pumpkin curry the other day.  Wow, it blew my mind!

The church building.

The sweet little Hindu temple that is right outside my front door!

Now, to answer some of your questions Mom:

The only way I can describe the smell of Fiji is with the smell of Seaworld in San Diego. Like, that's the only real way to describe it, wet, green and kinda fishy. Also hot, it smells hot. 

I love my sulus! They are a billiion times better than pants. 

The language is coming along slowly. Sometimes when I'm trying to think of what to say, I can hear Sister Trammell singing one of her songs. I thought they were weird and pointless.  Not so pointless after all. Elder Visawaqa has been very patient with me. I'm sure teaching me is similar to teaching a child. 

The bugs here are nasty. I spray myself with bug spray and they just find the one place I missed and swarm. The spiders here are way big, but they aren't to bad. I've already been bitten by one on the foot. 

The people in Ba are some of the nicest people I've ever met in my life. Everyone is so friendly and happy. 

Yesterday was my first day at church in the Ba ward, and I got here just in time for their Primary Presentation. It was way awesome. They made everyone a sick lunch after church too. So cool. 

After church, Elder Visawaqa and I taught three investigators that were brought to church. Then we took three prospective Elders out with us and proselyted for like 7 hours. The guys we had with us were way awesome. There was Junior, Temesi, and Joeli. They were way sweet. We taught five more lessons that night. Eight lessons, in one day. Elder Kumar (our District Leader)) said that that is the most he thinks he has ever heard in the Zone. Yeah, the Fijian Ba Elders rock!

Junior, Temesi, and Joeli

Tracting? Eh?

I thought that once I left the MTC I wouldn't feel the Spirit as strongly as I did while I was there. I was wrong. The Spirit is so strong with the Elders in Ba. I'm so grateful to my Lord for giving me this opportunity to come to Fiji and serve these wonderful people. I'm so happy I get to share his message of happiness with these people. I'm happy I get to teach these wonderful families that they can be together forever! In the MTC we were told:

 "A missionary leaves his family for two years, 

so others can be with their's for eternity." 

Man I'm so happy to be out here. I miss you guys so much and I love you tons. 

Much Love,

Elder Dawson
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Peace Be Still

Keep it Real