Mini Transfer

Clouds

dirty water

Elder Partridge by beach

Elder Partridge and I have been very busy this week with paperwork.  I finished up the newsletter and got it printed and then worked on the end of month reports.  I send all the baptism reports to all the stake presidents which include all the totals for each month.  I also send them a copy of the newsletter.  I then had lots of position change letters to do because we had transfers.  The position change letters include letters to the missionary and his parents informing them of their responsibilities.  Elder Partridge has been busy working with immigration on getting Visas for the group that will be coming to our mission  the end of January.  He was also busy getting tickets for missionaries traveling to American Samoa and arranging documents for Samoan’s traveling there.

               I was excited to get to work in the temple again this week.  Since Christmas and New Year’s was on Tuesday, I haven’t been able to work for three weeks.  The temple was quiet this week with not many patrons, but it was still nice to be back.

               We went to the baptism of a new convert that we were able to help a bit with.  We talked to her several months ago about the temple and its importance.  She had lots of non members there who even helped her sing a song for part of the program. It was a very nice service and she will be a nice addition to the ward.  The members brought refreshments, so we had a little social afterwards.

               We had two new missionaries come to our mission this week and had a mini transfer.  They are waiting for Visa’s to go to Australia missions.  Elder Partridge and I took a missionary to the airport that was traveling to the New Zealand MTC.  He will be coming back to our mission for awhile until he gets his Visa.  He was a very nice young man with wonderful people skills.  He had lived in Utah, New Mexico and American Samoa.  It will be nice to have him come back to our mission.

               We are experiencing the rainy season in Samoa.  Yesterday it rained so much, that we didn’t want to venture out very much.  This doesn’t stop the Samoan’s.   We had a group of Samoans cleaning President Leota’s roof in the rain.  They were others walking along the streets and playing sports in the rain. One of the results we have found from the cyclone is the water near the beach is often dirty from all the run off.  It is sad seeing so many of the trees destroyed, but it is also wonderful to see people come to Samoa just to help out for a few weeks.  Missionaries who serve here love the people and often come back to help out during trying times.