Week 27-March 27, 2016

Last week was uneventful and I honestly intended on sending lots of pictures instead of words.  This would have been a less awkward situation if my card reader wasn't being all weird.  Anyway, still no pictures this week but hopefully soon.

Matavuvale,

Okay so I have recently received some great advice, you know who you are, that I am going to take to heart. This week has been way rad.

On Wednesday evening I went on my first exchange as the District Leader's companion. I was with Elder Hogge, a trainee. So I was the senior companion. It was way fun. We went to one of the Koros in Lokia and I gave him a good taste of Fiji. Elder Hogge is a Hindi trainee so I really wanted him to get the real Fiji experience.  We had awesome coconut and did a lot of walking which was new for him, because he has a truck. It was lots of fun!

The rest of the week was just normal. We had some weird random earthquakes and power black outs but they weren't that bad.

So, when I was with Hogge I noticed a small sore on my leg, and through the week it got bigger and more painful. Then I realized what it was. It was a boil. Red and angry. It hurt like a mother! So with boils you have to let them basically pop by themselves, so today while Elda Tera was getting his haircut I was just sitting there and I ran my hand over the boil and I looked at my hand and it was covered in blood. So I ran to the bathroom and cleaned it up with some tissue paper. I was pretty sick of this thing though, so I gave it a little squeeze. I'll save the gruesome details for another day, but if you have ever seen a movie where someone pulls a bullet out of themselves, that's similar to what it was like. Boils have a thing called an eye and it is this large ball of hardened infection and white blood cells...that can sometimes be the size of a bullet. It sucked. But I'm doing way better now.

Anyways, not to much to talk about, except Happy Easter!  Please watch this amazing video:

#Hallelujah

I love you.

Elda Dawson

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Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 25-March 13, 2016

Yadra Vina'a Matavuvale,

Boy, I can't believe I've made it this far, nearly 1/4 of my mission complete! I just can't believe it's happened this fast. It's kinda cool knowing I've been out this long. Suck it Nay-Sayers.

So, transfers were pretty eventful for us here in Nausori South. Elda Tera and I staying.  He was made District Leader, which means we get to go on tons of exchanges. Partymada! 

Elda Fitisemanu is training now so we got new blood in the District, and Elda Ransom's new companion is Elda Van from my intake at the MTC. It's way awesome to have him here. Elda Johnson became AP, which is cool, but I'll miss him. Elda Noble got sent to Rotuma, lucky punk! Elda Ogden is still in Rakiraki...poor guy.

Elda Tera and I are both feeling much better. 

So, super cool experience this past week. On Vutia, an island in my area, the Turanga ni koro (chief of the village) has wanted to meet with us.  Actually, he's practically been begging to meet with us. So this week we were finally able to get over there. He told us that he was taken to the Suva Temple open house and when he found out about performing baptisms for the dead, ordinances performed by proxy for those who have died, that's all he's been wanting to do. We told him before he could, he had to be baptized. He looked at us and just said, "Tell me what I need to do." So we went back to visit him again on Sunday and took him an English and Fijian Book of Mormon. He told us he was going to be in the hospital for two weeks and he asked us to pray for him.  We said we would and asked if he would read the Book of Mormon.  He said yes. 

Then later that day we met with a woman that has been coming to church, who Elda Tera and I both assumed was a member.  Nope. Turns out, she's a way old investigator from like 5 companionships ago. So we talked with her and all she wanted was to be baptized. It was crazy. Vutia is really exploding with love for the gospel. Hopefully we can get the same kind of success in the main part of our area. I know it will come.

Also, I fixed my shoes. Super glue is truly amazing. 

Yo, Papa, thanks for the package. It was amazing. Momma, let's go you're slipping. Lol.

Well, I love you guys a ton. I miss you! 

Tell Spencer Happy Birthday. Freak that kid is old.

Elda Dawson 👔

P.S. So I want questions, from like everyone. Post on FB that I want questions. Any and all. Naka. 

--

Peace Be Still

Keep it Real

Week 24-March 6, 2016

Yadra Vinaka Matavuvale. 

So this week has been an improvement on the last couple. We finally got power back to our flat on Thursday. Our water pressure is still crazy low, but we make it work. Things are sort of drying out I guess, I had to get rid of a bunch of paper and books due to mold and other gross things. 

Answers to your questions:

Toga got really lucky. The storm was originally supposed to hit right on Toga, but instead it went over us and hit the West. There are some people here without homes and such, but all are getting by right now. The Fijian people are so willing to help they just take in those who don't have. 

Fishing has gone down since the cyclone, probably because all of the fish are dead because they got washed up into town. 

We help clean out compounds and flats on service days, but mostly whenever we offer to help the people just tell us not to worry. There are always people helping each other. It's awesome. 

The West got hit way harder than us, so we're lucky, I guess.  I have had very little contact with the Eldas from the West. I worry because it is my last area and I love the people there.  I am sure they are taking care of each other.  

Elda Tera got worse this week. He actually was bedridden for most of it, so our proselyting was low. I have no information about Elda Datoon, but I was told there were Emergency Transfers in his area, which freaks me out a little. (Elda Datoon and Jasen were in the Mission Training Center together.  Elder Datoon's mother passed away last week.  He traveled home for the funeral and returned to the mission today.)  This week I've been on exchanges for four of the seven days. My district leaders split me and Tera up so he could rest and I could work, but I think it's just because the leaders wanted to take turns having a do-nothing-day. Lol.

We will probably get transfer calls tomorrow. I say probably, because I don't know how it will all go down with so many knee deep in hard work.

 I'm doing well. My feet are fine, my shoes are getting kinda messed up though, I'll just have to look around for shoe glue. I've felt sick a little this week, but I'm fine now. Yes a lot of my clothes are dirty, and yes, I'm wearing them.

This whole experience has been really weird. Almost surreal at times. It's weird how I'm coping with the things that I've seen and things that I'm still seeing. Human nature truly is beautiful. Well Fijian Nature is. Nature itself though, not so pretty. 

 I went out to Toga with Elda Fitisemanu on Thursday and we cleaned out our flat pretty good. It was way terrible. We had to clean out our full fridge that has been off for the past two weeks. It was so gross. Maggots and ants everywhere. We got it all clean though, it still smells not so great. Any ideas? 

I'm excited for today. You'll have to wait to find out until next week though. ;)

I love you guys. I miss you all. Tell Spencer I love him and I wish I could be there for his birthday!   

Elda Dawson

P.S. My companion got older this last week. 

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Peace Be Still

Keep it Real