Finally robotic beings rule the world

I'm going to have to make this a quickThis week we had Zone Conference and Mission Conference with Elder Quentin L. Cook!

At Zone Conference we talked a lot about how we can be better teachers and to help our investigators feel the spirit. We received some really good trainings from our Mission Presidents and from the AP's and I felt like I came out of it with a better understanding of the doctrines of the Kingdom. 

Mission Conference was awesome and I have a notebook full of stuff that I need to go over again throughout this week but one of the things that I felt was so important for me was at Zone Conference, President Rudd asked Thomas S. Monson (who just happens to be best friends with his dad, Glen L. Rudd) for a personalized message and his response was "Tell your missionaries to be a good companion!" I have been working really hard at that this past transfer but it has been very tough because my companion doesn't speak much English. Elder Cook said a similar thing as well in his address so it must be something important.

I can't attach pictures from my camera this week but I caught a hedgehog on Thursday and named it Rocky but I let it go last night because he was too much to take care of. 

Until next time!!!!

Elder Mitchell

"It's a cold night, under the street light"

This week I lost my companion!!!

While we were biking to one of our appointments I turned around to see if Elder Rochefort was following me still but when I turned around he was gone. I looked around for a couple minutes before calling President Rudd but still he was nowhere to be seen. After arranging a search party with one of our office couples and several of the other missionaries in our District we went out and after an hour of being lost we found him about 2K from our flat on one of the main roads. I guess he turned one way thinking it was a shortcut and ended up getting lost and going to our chapel because that's where he thought we were headed. We didn't get back to our flat till around 9:45 but I spent the next hour fixing his bike because he said that the reason he missed the turn was because his seat was bugging him.

We also went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders and Elder Rochefort went to Pukete and Elder Rasband came over to Rototuna to be with me. I found out that Elder Rasband is Kyle Johnson's 1st cousin which was so cool. We had a really good discussion about missionary life and I shared with him some of the problems that I have been facing as an Elder and he gave me some tips to deal with some of the stress I have been having over the past couple of months and weeks. I think the exchange went pretty well but it also taught me that I have a lot of work to do if I want to be the best missionary I can be. 

That'll have to be all for this week!!

Elder Mitchell

Why do I get double-stuffed!!!

Pretty good week here in Rototuna and we got quite a bit done!! Over the past 2 weeks I have been trying to teach Elder Rochefort English but I have had no clue what I was doing or really what I need to teach to him. One of the members from Nawton Ward came over on Friday and we set up a plan for him to learn English and how we will accomplish some of our goals. We have started to go through some of the missionary lessons and I have had him teach me the lessons to help him to better understand the doctrines and stuff like that. He seems to be improving and later tonight we have an appointment with one of our Recent Converts to go over Lesson 5 in PMG because the Elders that baptized them never went over it. 

I got called to be the District Leader over the Pukete, Chartwell, and Rototuna wards so I have been getting calls every other day to give permission for things that I never knew we needed permission for! We have been going for runs almost every morning the past couple of days but since it is winter here, it rains a lot so we usually just do core and push-ups because it gets pretty bad and I don't want Elder Rochefort to get sick. I am really starting to learn the area pretty well and I feel like I am not just shooting in the dark but I also know I have a lot of work I need to do to get this area back to mission standards.

Not much else is going on here but I attached a picture of some of the money here in New Zealand.

Elder Mitchell

"Wear the eye patch Bret"

We have transfers coming up this week and we had a baptism on Sunday which was really cool to see because both of his parents are inactive so it was completely his choice and he choose to get baptized so hopefully that is a wake-up call to his parents.The zone leaders keep hinting that we are getting double shifted but I have no idea but that would be pretty weird as I have only been here for 1 transfer. We didn't really get to do much in the way of teaching since we spent most of our time finding new people to teach because all but 3 of our investigators have dropped us or we can never find time to go see them.

I really don't have much to say other than it has been really rainy here but we keep moving forward regardless.

Elder Mitchell

Having a snack.

My companion and a ward member.

Hedgehog we saw on the side of the road.

My comp with the changing trees.

"Ain't no party like my Nana's tea party"

April 27, 2015

We killed it this week!!!

After our exchange with the District Leaders this week we set out to meet our standards of excellence that our Mission President set earlier this year so we worked really hard to hit them and for the first time since the Standards of Excellence were introduced we made all of the goals!! We hadn't made any of them the last couple of weeks because everyone was on holiday but I guess people just wanted to talk with us this week. I am pretty optimistic for the upcoming weeks although the transfer ends next week so I might be getting a new companion. 

I fell on my bike earlier this week and cut up my hands and forearms but I'm all fine cuz one of the members came and helped me to clean myself up. The members are pretty onto it here in Hamilton and they have helped me stitch up my pants and one is even putting a new zipper in my pants. They are very diligent with our missionary trade-off nights but they seem to be struggling with their home teaching so I have been working closely with our Elders Quorum President to see what work needs to be done. 

I'll send pictures next week because I forgot my camera cord.

I hope all is well back in the 801 because its all good here!!!!!

Elder Mitchell 

Got a new companion and a new area

Kia Ora! 

This week has been pretty good but not very productive for missionary work although I think I have come down with a small flu. We have done heaps of service for some of the elderly people like mowing lawns and one of our members Raymond Gallagher who is just returning we helped him put a weather station thingy on his roof and then we had a pretty good lesson with him and his wife who is not a member. Raymond has been to a lot of different churches throughout his life such as Scientology, Catholic, Baptist, Seventh-Day Adventist, and several other different churches but after figuring out that they were all wrong, decided to return to our church. We had a pretty good discussion about some of the other churches and found out some interesting things about them.

On Saturday it rained all day and I'm not even exaggerating, it didn't stop for even 5 minutes the entire day but we didn't end up leaving the flat because I came down with the flu ( I think) which is still bugging me a bit but I think I'll be fine, the members have been taking pretty good care of me.

I forgot to say something about this when we saw it but while we were headed to our bishops house we were hearing a loud speaker saying something that we determined was not English so we followed the sound till we got to this field and found one of the weirdest sports I have ever seen played exclusively by Muslims. Its called Kabaddi. I was going to try and explain the rules but I think it would be better if you guys went to Youtube and tried to figure it out on your own. 

I am going to go play some rugby with our Zone Leaders so that will have to be all for the week!

Love you guys!!!

Elder Mitchell

 

 

This is my companion Elder Maurice Otto from Vanuatu.

 

PS.  My companion is Elder Maurice Otto. He is from Vanuatu and he is so funny. He speaks English pretty well but it is his 5th Language (Bislamic, Ngunesse, Tannesse, French and English) so that's pretty cool. Cyclone Pam just recently hit his hometown but he has gotten in contact with his family and they are alright although one of their houses got destroyed. It is very cold here for him because it doesn't get anywhere near this temperature back home so he sleeps with heaps of blankets and jackets on each night and it has only gotten to 11 C which is only about 51 F. 

Rototuna is a well-to-do suburb of Hamilton that reminds me a lot of Farmington. There is quite a bit of money here and we get fed quite a bit by the members. We are double covering the area with a set of Sisters, Sister Taufa and Sister Kinikini they are both from Tonga. The ward does have a Facebook page but I don't know who runs it. We don't have a car so we have to bike or walk everywhere but whenever it is raining the members come and pick us up for church and other meetings. It rains quite a bit here in Hamilton and for instance on Saturday, it rained all day non-stop which flooded the shortcut we usually take to get to other parts of our area. Not much is happening in our area lately which is different from Tokoroa because we were always getting new people to teach and getting heaps of lessons each day but here we spend most of our time biking from house-to-house to see new people or less-active members.

 

 

"Some people say we are not rappers..."

April 13, 2015

Hey everyone!

 

Was a pretty slow week for us here in Rototuna because of the school holiday but we did have our temple trip and got to see our Prophets and Apostles at General Conference! Since we have the rare opportunity to have a temple in our mission we get to go quite often and the session was very uplifting and we got a feed at the end of it. I really enjoyed the talks given at General Conference and definitely look forward to getting the Ensign next month so I can read them again!

 

We have been pushing really hard to get new people to teach and finding people but it seems like a lot of people just don't want to listen to us here. They are too focused on their money rather then religion.

 

We recently caught 2 praying mantis to put into our flat to catch all the flies but we didn't realize that one of them was a boy and the other a girl so we now have 1 nourished female mantis and 1 egg sack. We had no idea we were starting a mantis "dating service".

 

I need to find my cord for my camera so I can send pictures because I got a few cool ones this week.

 

Elder Mitchell