"Great Week With A Lot Of Contacting"

Good Morning,

We had a pretty normal week.  We got our great companion picture at a member's house.  Elder Garner took the picture right when the parrot we were standing by tried to eat Sister Herrick so she has a great facial expression.  It will go on the fridge with the other companionship pictures.

We had a great week with a lot of contacting.  We have been trying to build the teaching pool so we started using creative ways to start conversations with people.  One day we were walking and a random guy came up and gave us each a banana and left before we could talk to him.  We ate the banana and then asked someone if we could throw our peel away in their rubbish bin and asked if they had ever met with missionaries before.  We ended up having a great plan of salvation lesson and invited her to pray about being baptized.  Effective contacting :).

We had a fun house meeting where we acted out Alma 36.  We had a volunteer (one of the Deonarinesingh boys) take the role of Alma the Younger.  We put salt on his tongue (bitterness), blindfolded him (darkness), tied his hands (couldn't move limbs) and spun him in circles (lost in darkness).  Then we had him sit there while we talked about how Alma felt and why.  Then we took all that stuff off and gave him a cookie to represent joy and invited him to share the rest of the cookies with everyone else.  It was great.  We taught the steps of repentance.

We had a great service project with Brother Patrick.  We are still helping him get his backyard cleaned up.  On Saturday we helped knock down another wall and he is getting ready to put some cement down.  It is coming along great.

Miracle of the Week:  Brother Patrick is almost ready for baptism.  He just needs to come to church three times on his own.  We made him a church chart like a game board where when he comes he gets to move the piece forward a space but when he misses it goes backwards.  He said he would not miss a week.  We got to church and a few minutes later he came.  He is amazing.  He does what he says he will do.

Thanks for everything.

Love,

Sister Shirts

Doo doo mango (left) 10 pound mango (right)

Phlorie (fried yummy stuff)

How did this happen?  Just trying to make popcorn

Dead snake in the road

Is that a safe way to open a bottle of sweet drink?

Great Lessons And Great People

Good Morning,

I had a great transfer week.  It was sad to see Sister Schindler leave, but I am excited to work with Sister Herrick again.  She loves being back in her first area again.

I tried some... interesting food.  I had tomato bhaiggan choka which was delicious.  I also tried manicoo (possum).  A member of the branch shot it Saturday night in his yard and he cooked it for us on Sunday.  It tasted like curry.  I also tried curried rabbit.

Pork, tomato bhaiggan choka, sada roti

We are working with a mother and daughter who are preparing to be baptized.  They are excited to learn about everything and really want to join the church and follow Christ.  They love the Book of Mormon.  Brother Patrick is doing great too.  He is still learning and coming to church.

Favorite lesson of the week:  We had our Friday Book of Mormon house meeting about Abinadi and King Noah.  We told the first part of the story and had everyone draw a picture of King Noah.  Then we taught the 10 commandments using Mosiah 13 with the hand signals and we all wrote down a commandment that is hard for us to keep.  Then we burned the pictures of King Noah.  It was a lot of fun and the spirit was pretty strong during the burning part.  Leaving our past behind to start new.

Miracle of the Week:  Deonarinesingh family.  We had a great lesson on the Priesthood because there are four boys who are priesthood age.  We watched a Mormon Message about how we need young men to fulfill their duty.  Their dad talked about how he wants each of them to serve a mission so they can become the great young men he knows they can be.  The spirit was very strong.  At the end of the lesson the dad pulled out a pack of cigarettes and put them on the ground.  He said that he is done smoking and he never wants to see them again.  We talked about the Anti-Nephi Lehis and how they buried their weapons of rebellion.  He told the boys to dig a hole quick and they did.  He buried his cigarettes and he is going to put the money he would have spent everyday on cigarettes in a temple jar so they can go to the temple.  The spirit was very strong.

Thanks for everything you do out there.  I appreciate all the prayers and words of encouragement.

Love,
Sister Shirts

Fruit loop cake invention by an investigator

Cool caterpillar

Yeah!  New toothbrush

Fixing the Sisters flat tire

Pretty flower

Attending Hindu prayers:

Stirring the big pot

Decorations

Notice there are no forks or spoons?

Staying in Chaguanas

Good Morning,

Transfer Week!!! Surprises this time.  I will be staying in Chaguanas.  Sister Schindler is going to Curepe to serve with Sister Edmonds.  I will be serving with Sister Herrick again.  It will be fun serving with my old companion.  She opened this area for sisters at the beginning of her mission.

I ate chicken gizzard this week.  Sister Deonarinesingh made it for us.  Strangely enough I enjoyed it.  It just tastes like really thick chicken.  I also learned a new word.  They called newspaper "gaza".

We had some great house meetings as usual.  We had a lesson on Nephi building the ship.  We had them bob for apples and make a boat.  Then we watched the "Dare to stand alone" Mormon message and talked about how Nephi had to stand up to his brothers.  We also had a house meeting about charity and love and we watched the Mormon message about bullying.  Then we played if you love me smile.  House meetings are very successful and the spirit is there teaching.  I love Mormon messages.

Nephi apple boats

I noticed that the spirit was very strong in our lessons this week.  We addressed a lot of concerns so we really needed his guidance to discern needs.  It was amazing.

We had a great service project with Brother Patrick.  We helped knock down some old walls in his backyard.  Once we got one down the other tipped right over and almost mashed Brother Patrick.  Surprisingly he has very fast reflexes.  He has gone over 40 days without rum and two weeks without cigarettes.

The Ramsook family is going great.  They love the Book of Mormon.  We left them to read the story of Alma the Younger from Alma 36 and they read three extra chapters.

Miracle of the Week:  We have been trying to have a lesson on temples with the Deonarinesingh family but things keep coming up.  We have been trying to do it this whole transfer.  On Saturday we finally had it and the spirit was very strong.  Brother Deonarinesingh said that nothing is going to stop them from being sealed in the temple.

Thanks for everything you do for me out there.  Love you all a lot.

Love,

Sister Shirts

Bridge to get to an investigators house

Dasheen (like a purple potato)

It is mango season!

These are the flies that come out when it rains

Superman's car?

Rain, (no) Rum and Repentance

Good Morning Everyone,

We had some great house meetings this week.  We had a Liahona obstacle course and a fun lesson on patience.  For the patience one we watched the "continue in patience" Mormon Message and gave everyone a cookie.  They were told they could eat the cookie now or they could wait until the end and eat more.  The kids loved it.  They were tempting each other and teasing each other.  We had a great turnout.

Rainy season has been..rainy.  And hot.  We walked part way to church on Sunday with Brother Patrick and it poured on us.  We ran until we were finally able to catch a taxi.  We were wet and cold at church.  Sister Schindler and I noticed that we have been turning off the air conditioner when it gets down to the 80's.  And usually we turn the heater on if it gets down below 84.  We are Trinis.  I am going to freeze when I go home in December.

Random Vocab:  Crapo (pronounced crap-o) = frog.  At home when it rains the worms come out - here the frogs come out and they get smashed all over the roads.

As always I had some great food this week.  Geera chicken was amazing.  Mangoes are wonderful and are filling our refrigerator with deliciousness.  Brother Patrick loves making us salt fish.  I think it tastes a lot like bacon.  I also finally tried Souse.  Souse is made of chicken foot, pig heel, and other animal parts I didn't recognize.  They put really good seasoning on it.

Souse is mostly skin and fat

Transfers are coming up and I am excited for whatever happens.  It will be great.

Miracle of the Week:  Brother Patrick finished his No Rum chart!!!  He went 30 days without drinking rum.  He is progressing a lot.  Now we are working on no rum and no cigarettes.  He hasn't missed a day yet.  We taught him about faith, repentance, and baptism this week.  He understood well.  He loves object lessons so we taught him about repentance by putting a rock in his shoe and let him walk around.  We told him repentance is like taking the rock out of the shoe.  He is doing great.  At church someone asked him if he know if this was the right church.  He said "I know I am getting baptized into the right church."

Ice cream celebration with Brother Patrick

That is about it for this week.  Thanks for everything.

Love,

Sister Shirts

Hindu flags

Share Mormon Messages

Good Morning,

We had a very full week.  It was wonderful.  It was Indian Arrival Day on Friday so there was a lot of loud music.  Lots of people were home so we met some cool people to start working with.  We also had to get Sister Schindler's physical done for her work permit.  Our week was also packed full of appointments and we had trade offs so I was in Curepe for a day with Sister Edmonds.  I always enjoy serving in my old area with my old companion.  Just like old times :).  Let's just say I am glad it is P day so I can take a nice nap.

Our apartment has been giving us some fun.  The light in the kitchen is out and we can't reach it to change it, the water heater for the shower is out so we have had cold showers for over two weeks now, they are doing construction so the water turns off randomly, and we had an infestation of maggots one day.  I love it.  No sarcasm...I really do enjoy it.  It is fun.

We got fed some really good food this week.  Shrimp chow mien with some other kind of meat, fry roti, curried duck, curried aloo and chana, and rice.  I also learned how to make dhalpori roti.

We found a cool family named the Ramsooks.  They have two sons and they are very interested in the Book of Mormon.  We had a lesson on the Restoration and gave each of them a copy.  They are excited to read it and we will share more with them this week.  They were comparing it with the Bible while we were there and they said so far so good.

Something that we have found helps us a lot as missionaries is using Mormon Messages as we teach.  They love the visual and the spirit is able to testify of truth as they watch.  Sharing Mormon Messages on Facebook is a great way to share the gospel.

Miracle of the Week:  Brother Sankar.  Brother Sankar was baptized almost a year ago but he had some things to work on after.  He has been doing a great job and on Sunday he passed the Sacrament for the first time.  His smile was so big.  He has had a rough life but he has really turned it around.  I love the power of the Atonement and the opportunity men have to use the Priesthood.

Thanks for everything.  Love you all as always.

Love,

Sister Shirts

Todd's Road Hindu Temple