It's time to...DO WORK YO!!

bula mama!

okay okay first things first......I SAW IKAIA!!! but it was so funny because we awkwardly shook hands and ill tell you i was soooo tempted to hug him, but i didn't! dont worry :) but we had our meeting and then after at lunch we were just talking about BYU days and all that stuff and it was just so good to catch up. he's getting so skinny!! but we were talking like the whole lunch and at one point while we were talking and suddenly everything just got really quiet. we look up and everyone else was staring at us, so we stopped talking and one of the elders was like, oh no please continue your story we want to hear too! they were listening to our conversation for about 5 minutes and we didn't notice, how embarrassing! lol. but we'll take a picture this week at zone conference, dont worry. 

Thank you for that scripture. I've been having a little rough time loving our investigators that don't keep commitments, so i needed to be reminded that i need to love them no matter what. if i dont love them, then they're not gonna care at all about what i say and what i ask them to do. ive noticed the difference in my lessons. when i truly and genuinely love them, i can hear the spirit clearly and im able to say what needs to be said. while if i go into the lesson just irritated because they didnt come to church on sunday, the spirit is not there at all. i literally feel like a sells girl, trying to share the gospel. no one likes to listen to someone who talks about how their church is better, that's not what we do. we just share about the restoration of this true gospel and help them understand and learn about the fulness of the gospel, instead of just a little piece of the big puzzle.

well...this week was better then last week. each week gets better and better. ive been really praying and asking why i dont seem as motivated and excited about the work anymore. i found myself just going through the motions. it's just like volleyball. if you just go through the motions, no one will get anything out of what you're doing. so ive been just taking some time to ponder and think about what i need to do to get back that excitement and drive. i've been on my mission for about 4 months now and i am just getting so use to the missionary life. recently ive been thinking, all we do is eat, sleep, and find new people to teach the gospel. but that's not what this work is! it's so much more than that! missionary work is helping to strengthen the Lord's church and to find His lost children so that we may ALL return to our Father in Heaven. in my journal i recommitted myself to the work. i really thought about why im here, what am i doing, how am i going to improve? im here because i love this gospel with all my heart and it would be selfish of me to not share it with all of God's children, so that we can all return back to Him. what am i doing...i am building the Heavenly Father's kingdom here on earth. how lucky am i to have the trust of my Father in Heaven to teach His children here in Fiji. it's a responsibility that i shouldn't take lightly because i only have 18 months to do it. and im going to improve by "forgetting myself and going to work." immerse myself in this beautiful work. that includes loving ALL those i meet and because i love them so much, learning their language, so that they can hear the fullness of the true gospel in their own tongue. so it's time to...DO WORK YO!!

this week we've really been focusing on strengthening the members. we've been visiting a lot of less actives. many of them that have been less active for a really long time. we actually found two less active families that no one knew where they lived. come to find out...we walk pass their homes like all the time AND they live right next to each other. go figure! so me and sis. ons and 2 sisters from the branch came with us and we visited those 2 families. one of the father's of the home was even a branch president and his wife and mother are actually not members yet, so we're hoping to get some investigators from that visit. the second family, there is 2 sisters that are baptized out of the like 15 people that live in that one house. but they only got baptized about 2 years ago so they still have so much to learn. so we'll be visiting them a lot. none of them came to church yesterday but it doesn't mean that we are giving up. we will visit them every week until they come to church again. along those lines....i want to invite you all to go and visit the less actives! especially the ones that have just fallen away. usually those who recently fell away still a strong testimony, just maybe something happened that you could help with. but also visit the older less actives. something we do here is every saturday night we meet and go on splits with the auxiliary leaders and go and visit different less active members. it's been really successful and most of the families we visit come to church the next day. so that's something you can ask uncle kahele about. it's really helped us to strengthen our branch.

on friday lucy taught me how to make polusami which is like the samoan palusami. the roro (lu'au leaf) with corn beef wrapped in it, cooked in lolo (coconut milk). and guess what...i squeezed the coconut milk. so we're never buying coconut milk again when i come home. we just get some coconuts, scrape it, and i squeeze it and make the coconut milk for you. fresh :)

this week i have also been trying to speak as much fijian as i can. last night in our lesson we taught the plan of salvation and i tried my best to speak fijian. so i pretty much ended up teaching most of the lesson because my companion is not as confident in fijian. but i tried my best, even though at some points i needed to speak english because i couldn't think of how to say it in fijian. but at the end of the lesson we sang "i am a child of God' with our 2 recent converts Meli and Lucy, and our investigator Arieta. she loved the song! then we prayed and after we prayed i told Arieta that i was so sorry for my fijian because im still learning and trying. her face was like so surprised. she told me that she thought that i was already fluent in fijian. i was like whoa! thank you! but i told her i am far from being fluent and i still have so much to learn! but i appreciated that compliment because it just helped me to know that im making progress in my language, one step at a time.

funny story....so thursday night there was a huge thunderstorm! me and sis. ons were sleeping until suddenly..."BOOM!!" a huge thunder shook our house. and the way they build their flats here is like on log stick things. which i never trusted in the first place. so when this huge thunder hit, first of all, im scared of thunderstorms, and second of all, all i was thinking was our flat is just going to fall off those sticks and we're going to like die! i was freaking out! and then as im lying in bed with my blanket over my head covering my ears, i feel something crawling up my arm. A BIG COCKROACH!!! oh my gosh!! i started to cry because i flicked it off my arm and then it started to crawl up my leg and i just jumped out of bed and jumped up and down screaming and shaking my hair out and i had no idea where it went. my companion was just laughing at me! after standing up for about 10 minutes i lied down again and covered my body fully with the blanket and finally fell asleep. it was the worse night of my life!!

well au lomani kemudou sara ga! kalougata tiko!!

loloma levu,
sista chong

Lovin' my Fijian Food!!

First Bible Bash and a Sacrament for 9

bula sia mama!

Anyway, this week was another slow week and we had a lot of fall through appointments. the work is moving slowly. everytime we think things are getting better, it just gets harder. we're still working on finding more investigators but we haven't been very lucky. the hard thing in fiji is everytime you go and knock on someone's door, they invite you in to sit down, have some juice, and talk a little bit. then you start to share about what you do and start talking about the gospel and then they tell you they go to another church, but all of God's word is good. so you pretty much get your hopes built up and then crushed. i sometimes wish that they would just shut the door in my face from the beginning so i dont sit there for like 20 minutes talking to just have them not be interested. another thing that's hard is that fijians are so nice that they dont like to say "no." so when we ask them if we can come back and meet with them they act all happy and excited but when it comes to that day, they start to lie and hide, which just wastes our time and we get so frustrated. i want them to just tell me that they're not interested and not be nice lol. but me and my companion are praying all the time to help us find some new investigators. hopefully we'll get some new investigators this week.

this week i had my first bible bash. me and my companion went into the pharmacy store to buy some face wash (which is $20!!) and while we were looking one of the workers comes up to us and at first asks if we need help. we tell her no we were just looking. then she asked us if we worked anywhere because of our name tags and we told her who we were and what we do. in my mind i was like "yes! this might be our new investigator." well, as soon as i thought that she suddenly said, "do you know what it says in Matthew 6?" where in the world did that come from! before i realized it she started throwing bible verses at us asking us if we knew what that verse said. she told us that we pray to God not Jesus and we told her yes we believe that too. and then she threw another bible verse at us, even though we agreed with what she said. i was so confused to what she was trying to prove! then she said there is one greater then Jesus, and we said Heavenly Father. but they are the same through their works and she said do you know Heavenly Father's name. we were confused by her question and told us, "God's name is Jehovah." she was a Jehovah's witness. I told her that Jehovah is Jesus Christ and that God is Heavenly Father. she just kept throwing bible verses at us with jehovah in it until finally i was like you know what, thank you but we need to go. we're not here to fight about religions. then we walked out. we then went to meet the elders for lunch and we told them and one of the elders was like "let's all 10 of us go back to the store and teach her the gospel." haha but dont worry we didn't. we just forgot about it. but that was my first experience and i hated it. i hated the feeling of not being able to say what i wanted to say because she kept cutting us off but i know that that's not what we do. we dont go around trying to prove someone else's religion wrong. we're just here to share our message and it's their choice to except it. but the Jehovah's witnesses here are really irritating. they go around telling people not to listen to us mormon missionaries because we dont believe in the bible, only the book of mormon. so they just give me more motivation and determination to teach everyone the truth!

This week we had a lesson with our one new investigator, Maca. she goes to seventh day church and she lives by Meli and Lucy and they asked us to come teach her. our lesson was really good and she understand and seemed to believe in the things we were teaching. we taught her about the Restoration of the gospel and we asked her if she had any questions at the end. she sat their quietly and asked, "how do you know which church is the true one? how do you know that your church is true, what about mine?" me and my companion sat there quietly looking at each other like who was going to answer her question. i finally just felt prompted to bare my testimony. i told Maca, "there's no scripture or anything i can show you that will convince you right now that our church is the only true church. but i can bare you my testimony that i know with all my heart that this church is true and that it's the only true church on this earth. i know with no doubt in my body that joseph smith was a prophet called of God and that he restored this gospel, the gospel of Jesus Christ. this isn't joseph smith's church, it is Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ's church that they restored through joseph smith. i testify that joseph smith translated the book of mormon by the power of God. and that by reading it, it's the only way you can know that joseph smith was a true prophet. only if you read and pray about it." i could feel the spirit so strong at that moment. it didn't feel like i was speaking but rather my lips were moving and the spirit was giving me the exact words to say. after, i bore my testimony she didn't say anything. she couldn't argue with me because it was what i believed, but i knew that it impacted her and i could see the spirit working in her. i now can truly testify that there is no way at all you can do missionary work without the Holy Ghost! the Holy Ghost converts, not us.

Lastly, yesterday we went with the elders up to Boca loop which is about a 15 minute drive from town, where we took up sacrament. the elders are starting a unit up there and they invited us up there because technically it's our area it's just that we don't have a transport so it's too far for us walk. but we hold the sacrament meeting at a member's home, outside on her porch. her and her son are members and then only 2 other people came. so we only had 4 people at sacrament, besides us. this experience was so humbling to see the dedication and love these people have for the gospel. me and my companion got to speak to them yesterday and the spirit was so powerful, even with just the 9 of us there. it is an experience i will never forget and we will continue to go up with the elders on sundays and hopefully the unit will grow more and more.

well all is well here. i still love being a missionary and would not change it for the world. me and my companion always talk about the weird things we're going to do when we get home. well, just the fijian things that we'll do at home, which will be weird to you guys lol. it'll be fun!! but au lomani kemudou sara ga!!

loloma levu,
sista chong

Gotta LUV the NIU!

Some RS Sisters in Labasa Branch

Finally Teaching in Fijian

bula mama!

me and my companion were cracking up at all the wedding pictures. but honestly i didnt expect anything different then what i saw lol. the three boys look so cute! my companion was cracking up at their mustaches and bow ties, cutest!  i wish i could've been there. no one printed a poster of me and carried me around!? how rude! hahaha!

here in fiji it was hot like crazy! i swear im getting like 10 shades darker everyday lol nah just joking, i wish. but its been really hot recently and the sun here in labasa is like penetrating my skin. we walk around with umbrellas not just when it's raining, but also when the sun is so hot, cannot handle. we always feel like the jehovah's witness people, but we gotta do what we gotta do.

well something exciting happened this week, actually just yesterday. I TAUGHT MY FIRST LESSON IN FIJIAN! pretty much the whole lesson was in fijian! and let me tell you, i struggled hard, but at the same time i knew enough to get my message across. i felt bad for my investigator because i probably made no sense at all at some points, but she was so nice and tried really hard to understand me lol. we also had a member present with us so wherever i got stuck she would help me or continue what i was trying to say. we taught the plan of salvation. it was so difficult because not only was almost every concept in the plan of salvation new to our investigator, Arieta, but she had to try and understand it with my broken fijian. i was just so grateful that we had our member there because she really helped Arieta to understand what we were trying to say. when we got to the judgement part in the plan of salvation, she told us, "i know im a sinner, so what happens to me? can even i repent of all the bad things i did? or is it too late?" we shared with her the scripture in Doctrine and Covenants that says that when we repent with the fulness of heart, the Lord remembers them not. she started to cry when she heard this because it was a new sense of hope. i told her that she was already on the road of repentance and she was already drawing closer to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. we told her that our Father in Heaven was already happy and rejoicing that she is choosing to change her life and come closer to Him. i reminded her how much our Heavenly Father loves her and wants her to return back and live with Him. i then committed her to baptism and she accepted. she said that she can't wait to be baptized and be reborn. the spirit was so strong in that lesson, even though it was in fijian and i didn't know how to say everything, i knew the spirit was testifying to her of the truth. now i am have a lot more confidence to teach in fijian and i think me and my companion are going to try and teach in fijian more often.

another good thing happened this week...MY COMPANION ISN'T GETTING TRANSFERRED! well atleast not this week. we found out that something happened with the new intakes travel plans. they were suppose to arrive today but something happened so they won't be coming to fiji for another week or so and that's when there will be a big transfer so we'll see if my mom (companion) stays. but when the intake comes i wont be the new missionary anymore! yaaayyy! so now i won't feel like the little, unexperienced missionary anymore. lol

this sunday we had our primary presentation. and it was a success! me and my companion pretty much wrote the program and taught the kids the songs. so we played a big part in getting all the stuff together and we ran the rehearsal the saturday before the presentation. let me just say now, i never want to be a primary president! hahaha! and now that i just said that, im gonna called there. isa! but me and my companion fasted that morning just praying that the program would be successful and everything would be okay. when we went to church we practiced and from the practice i was so unsure and uneasy about the program. but once sacrament meeting started i just knew it would be okay. i was the one that sat on the side of the pulpit in case the kids forgot their lines and they did an awesome job! even all the little ones did their talks and weren't scared. they're singing was so beautiful and touching to many in the congregation. i think it was one of the first primary presentations that they had in the branch and everyone said it was beautiful. when they sang "i am a child of God" at the end, the 2nd counselor in our branch presidency was sobbing. the song touched him so much! after sacrament was done, so many people came up to us and said they really enjoyed the program and to keep up the good work. i thanked my Heavenly Father for helping us get through this and thanked Him for the spirit that was present during the presentation.

there's one sister in our branch who me and my companion have been spending a lot of time with this week. one because she's the primary president so we were helping her a lot, second because she is going through a hard time. so we've been just going over and visiting, taking her out to our lessons, doing service for her, and just trying to give her that extra support. we have grown so close to her and she's amazing! she's so strong in the gospel even though she's been through so much. i can't imagine all the things that she's been through in her life, she deserves so much better, but she continues to have such strong faith and trust in the Lord. she builds my testimony every time we meet with her. she also has a son on his mission in the Philippines and she's borrowing a friends laptop during Christmas week so she can skype him and she offered for us to borrow it too! so i think we might get to skype on Christmas and not just talk on the phone. yaaayyy!! im so excited! but just thought i'd let you know, only one more month :)

well, the work is still amazing! very difficult but the blessings that come from it are indescribable! au lomani kemudou sara ga!

loloma levu,

sista chong

oh my gosh i forgot something to include in the blog letter. I DRANK FRESH COW MILK!  like straight from the utter kine!! and i was looking at the cow the whole time i was drinking it. it was actually okay and tasted pretty good when you put sugar in it. the only thing was that there was like chunks in it and that's when i almost threw up but i didn't. and i drank it all! and i was like yes i did it! then the lady refilled my glass. i almost cried. i prayed and asked heavenly father to give me the strength to drink this second glass and He did. i held my cup the rest of the lesson so she wouldn't refill it. hahahaha!

Young Men from the branch

Chong in the House!!!

excerpt from Keapo's letter from her first week in Fiji about the frogs:

so every night when we come home to our flat there are all these frogs on the grass. they're maybe like the size of golf balls or so but they're gross and there's choke!! i like scream and run through the grass. they like jump and touch my legs and my companion just laughs at me and tells me, "just kick um!" yeah no im not kicking no frogs!! im just gonna run and hope they dont touch me. sometimes i step on them and it makes the grossest sound. so my companion said we're going to try and come home before its dark so i dont have to deal with frogs, eeewwwwww!!!! i swear im going to die!!! but i guess ill get use to it and start kicking frogs like nothing. we'll see. gross!!!

Boat to Suva

bula mama!!

dont worry i didn't forget about you guys but i think you're on a plane but we're emailing on tuesday this week because we had a zone pday yesterday and didn't have time because it was a holiday so everything was closed. but i'll email you my big letter, later on when we drive back to labasa. we're in savusavu right now, about 2 hours away from my area. but i love you guys and i email you more later today. i got some stories! i love the kids costumes!!!!! we dont have halloween here, i miss the candy :( lol love you!!

***Later in the day we received this letter***

bula mama!!

okay so now we're back in labasa town and back to the work. well, after we email lol. but i had a pretty adventurous week. but before i get to that. what happened to your hand!!! you beating people?? lol nah but fo real what happened! why doesn't the doctor give you a brace or something?? i loved the kids halloween costumes this year, so cute! im sure kino loved disneyland so much! did all the kids go on the tower of terror? the picture is small so i cant really see it clearly. if they did, wow! im so proud of them :)

well, last week wednesday we had a sister training in suva. so on tuesday morning me and my companion still didn't know when we were going because the APs (president's assistant) didn't email or call any of our zone leaders or district leader. so we're sitting in our flat on tuesday and doing our normal studies until we get a call from the APs and they say, "sisters did you know that your plane leaves in 3 minutes?" come to find out, they forgot to tell anyone! they just booked our flight but forgot to any of us so we had no idea our flight was that morning. so we ended up having to catch the bus down to savusavu which is about 2-2.5 hours and then we had to catch the BOAT to suva. we are the first sister missionaries to catch a boat in the whole mission. like for so long. the outer islands have to catch a boat but it's only like half an hour. our boat ride was 15 hours long! when we got to the boat we had no idea what to expect. it was a huge boat, more like a ship. downstairs there was like cars and trucks to ship and stuff and then we had to go upstairs. upstairs where we were going to be sitting was surprisingly really nice! it kind of looked like an airplane and everyone pretty much took a row for themselves and lied down to sleep. but me and my companion shared a row, so one of us slept on the chairs while the other slept on the ground. we were okay and really excited to ride the boat until we woke up in the morning and we did not feel good at all! my head was throbbing and i felt like i needed to throw up because we were in this hot room all night. then we went outside to get some fresh air and watch the waves and we felt a little better. the ocean spray felt good and ocean breeze smelt good and i missed it so much!  we left savusavu at 8pm on tuesday night and then we didn't get to suva until 11am wednesday morning and we ended up missing half the training. it went from a fun, simple trip to suva to a crazy, long trip. it was an experience ill never forget!

The Boat Ride

the training itself was actually really awesome. they pretty much talked to us about member present which is so important and the thing we are the weakest at as a mission right now. and then LANGUAGE! we need to learn the fijian language!!! and it was perfect for me because i love the language and i want to learn it but i just want it to come to me already you know? i hate not being able to speak it. i read uncle shons letter like everyday for that extra boost and motivation so im determined! even our zone training last night was about language. isa! i need to do it! there's a scripture they shared with us from D&C that says that every nation should receive the fulness of the gospel in their own tongue. they told us that even though fijians speak english, they would understand so much more if we spoke fijian and they deserved to be taught in fijian, their first language. so im trying hard but now im going to try my hardest ever to learn the language.  fiji has just enhanced my FOBness lol. i love it!!!! i wear my suluvakatoga (lavalava) to sleep every night because it's so hot haha!!! 

Elder Rainston and Sister Bechu

North District

i want to thank each and every one of you for your prayers. this week we were able to find 2 new investigators and i know your prayers played a big part in that. im humbled and overwhelmed with the spirit everytime i think that not only me and my companion pray for our work but our families do too and you guys are so far away. i can feel your love through your prayers and i am seeing the blessings of having a family that is constantly supporting me and encouraging me to do the Lord's work. i dont know if i would be able to do this without you guys. so i just wanted to say VINAKA SARA VALEVU!

one of our new investigators is Arieta. she is from a small group of islands between the main fiji islands and tonga, called Lau. she is leaving next to Meli and Lucy and she is a referral from both them and another member in the branch. her family is catholic but she has never really practiced their religion so she doesn't anything about Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. our first lesson with her was about the Godhead. she expressed her want to change and become closer to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. she says she knows that she's done so many things that she's not proud of and now she's willing to change her life and fix it. i love her for that and i know she can do it, especially with this gospel in her life. When we taught her about the Godhead she understood that they are 3 different people but she asked us about Mary, Jesus' mom, because she said that their church they pray to her. we answered her question by showing her the scripture John 16:23, which is Jesus telling us himself to not ask Him anything but instead ask the Father in His name and we will receive whatever we ask for. she couldn't believe what she had just read. she was like, "why did they tell me to pray to Mary when it says right here in the Bible to pray to Heavenly Father? i've been praying to the wrong person my whole life. no wonder i felt like God never answered or loved me." it was the first time that i've seen a scripture effect a person so much. she could not believe this verse, she read it over and over and couldn't believe how clear it was. so we taught her the 4 steps of prayer and committed her to pray about what we taught her using the 4 steps and she said she would.

we then had a second lesson with her and we taught her about the Restoration. when we taught her that lesson, we had another lady come and sit in the lesson, Maca. she was another referral but she wanted to kind of see what we teach, what we do, and then she would decide if she wants to take lessons. when we taught the Restoration the spirit was so strong. at the end of the lesson she expressed that it all made sense. we committed her to read the introduction of the Book of Mormon and then pray about it. next time we'll show her the Restoration video so she can picture it and see the First Vision. it should be good for her. but we're hoping that she'll be able to change her ways and come more unto Christ. we're meeting with her again tomorrow and i can't wait! we're meeting with Maca tonight for her first lesson on her own. we'll see how it goes.

this past sunday it was that holiday diwali. and on diwali all indian families pop firecrackers, it's crazy! well, not crazy like home on new years eve but there's still kind of a lot. and they also all make food and sweets. their indian sweets are pretty bomb. and they just give it away to everyone who wants, its awesome! so it was kind of like halloween for me haha.

so the work is moving a little more everyday. the sad thing is this next week there'll be transfers and i really think my companion will be getting transferred because she has been in this area for about 6 months. everyone says that im gonna train as soon as my training is done because that's what usually happens in our area. they said the normal time period in our area is about 6-7 months. so i think ill be here for a while but i love this area so it's okay :) i just dont want my companion to leave me, but it's time for her to get transferred because she's been here really long. but it'll hard, but ill be happy for her. she's amazing!

that was pretty much my week. it was pretty adventurous and productive. it was so much fun! but au lomani kemudou sara ga!!

loloma levu,

sista chong

Scenic Point in Savusavu

Elder Schofield - Micah Swain's TWIN!!!!

Wananavu!!!!

  bula mama!!!

THIS WEEK WAS WANANAVU!!!! look it up ;) hahaha!! ill go day by day to show you how wananavu it was :)

moniti:

so on p-day this week we did the usual. we cleaned our flat, emailed, and then we headed to the chapel to play volleyball. well while playing volleyball me and my companion were making a cake because it was meli's (our investigator that just got baptized) birthday. so we thought it would be very special if we made him a birthday cake and then sing to him after we were finished playing volleyball. so we went and bought a white cake mix, some chocolate frosting, and then we went to the market and bought some coconuts to scrape for the top. it's really amazing how much coconuts i buy haha. it's like whenever in doubt, just use a coconut lol. anyway, so we went to the chapel and baked it because our flat doesn't have a oven so we cooked it there. it was an awesome looking cake and it tasted even better!! everyone was asking how i made it and i told them it's a secret family recipe haha! but i told them just buy the mix at the store. but meli's face lit up when we lit the candles and brought it out while they were coming in after volleyball. it was as if he has never had a birthday cake and he's 30 years old! so he was so grateful and loved it so much :)

tusiti:

the sister trainers came to labasa on tuesday afternoon. the sister trainers position was just created since there has been an increase of sisters serving their missions. so what they do is just make sure that all the sister missionaries are doing okay and doing what they're suppose to be doing. so every 6 weeks or so they come on splits with each sister. so this week it was our turn. i got to go with sis. fanene from america samoa, and sis. ongesel went with sis. tugaga from new zealand. i was really nervous to go with sis. fanene because my companion was telling me that she is very straight forward and just talks to everyone and shares the gospel. she finishes her mission in this coming january, so she is very experienced. im still getting used to mission life and im still getting comfortable walking up to random people and sharing with them about the gospel. 

Sister Trainers

so i went with sis. fanene for the day and we had 3 lessons. the first lesson was with sis. vesi and we talked more about the book of mormon because she hasn't been reading it, therefore she doesn't believe that joseph smith was a prophet. so we talked about the bom and then sis. vesi shared with us that she doesn't get that warm feeling inside when she prays to know if what we're saying is true. we then asked her how she prays and she said that in her church (bahai) they read from a prayer book. sis. fanene then told her straight up that she's not getting an answer because she's praying wrong. i was like whoa! that was very straight up! haha but you know what it was true, and so for the first time sis. vesi agreed to try and pray the way we taught her to, to Heavenly Father in the name of Jesus Christ. so im excited to see her again and see if she tried praying the right way. we then had a lesson with 2 recent converts, 2 little boys who's family has gone inactive. so we taught them about obedience and coming to church. we then met lucy and meli and she loved them and wished she could stay for their baptism. we reminded them of the 3 promises we make when we are baptized. after we did the lesson i asked them if they had any questions about their baptism or anything and all meli said was, "I'm ready!" i was so happy to hear that and i knew they were both ready. but throughout the whole day we talked to almost every single person we saw on the street or in homes. she showed me how first and then she made me try. i was freaking out! but then i realized that it wasn't hard at all. people want to hear the gospel and Heavenly Father has provided those people for me. so she taught me so much and she encouraged me to start reading my bom from the beginning again and so that's what i've done this week.

vukelulu:

what was so special about wednesday was me and my companion went and knocked on doors for the first time. we don't usually knock on doors because we're both pretty hesitant when it comes to talking to strangers. but we went to this one apartment complex kind of thing and we knocked on a door. the lady let us in and we just shared with her what we do, who we were, and talked to her a little bit about what we believe in our church. what was amazing was that i dont know how but almost everything i said was in fijian! i was like whoa where'd this come from? my companion started talking first and she spoke in english but when it was my turn and i suddenly started speaking fijian, her whole attitude changed. she suddenly became interested and she asked if i knew fijian and i just told her im still learning. she said that she really appreciated that im learning the language and she so much open to us after that. this really built my testimony of speaking the language!! ive noticed that when i try to speak fijian they really open up to you and want to help you with your fijian! so im motivated!

Sister Sagar (investigator)

lotulevu:

thursday was a normal day lol. the only thing is i almost got hit by a car. im still getting used to the cars driving on the left side of the road compared to the right side. so when i cross the street, which is a lot i always have to remember which way to look. well, i looked the wrong and i was like okay sis. ons it's clear, i step onto the road and i just hear a loud horn, there was a taxi coming flying down the road. so i jumped back on the curb and everyone was like laughing and was like sista where you from? so shame!! hahaha so now i look both ways like 3 times before i cross the road. 

varaubuka:

friday night we had our first branch activity. we as missionaries planned a movie night for the branch members. me and my companion spent pretty much the whole day making popcorn. i have never popped so much popcorn in my life and you know it was the first time that i never wanted to eat another piece of popcorn ever again either lol. amazing aye!? but we watched "prince of egypt" and they loved it! we actually had a really good turn out and some brought friends which is really good. so our activity was a success! the popcorn and juice was a treat to them because they don't really buy stuff like that because they don't have enough money. so i was so happy to see their faces when we told them there was popcorn and drinks. they were so grateful.

varauwai:

BAPTISM DAY!! i couldn't sleep the night before because i was so excited for the baptism. i was so happy and excited to see meli and lucy make that first step into the kingdom of our heavenly father. well, the baptism was at 1pm and everything went smoothly and according to plan. even our branch president came to our baptism, a miracle! the baptism was such a humbling experience and the spirit was overpowering. while, we were helping lucy change i asked her how she felt and she said that she felt so clean and she felt good. i was so happy! after we went back in the chapel and meli, lucy, me and sis. ons sang "if the savior stood beside me." we had sang this song in a lesson to them and they loved it so much they wanted us to sing it with them at their baptism. it was special! then they shared their testimonies. their testimonies sounded as if they had been members for years already. they have such powerful testimonies of this gospel already and they can only improve and grow. when lucy bore her testimony she started to cry before she said anything. the spirit was so overwhelming and she couldn't express how happy she was to be baptized. they both looked directly into our eyes and thanked us for finding them and teaching them about this true gospel. it was at that moment that i knew the reason im on my mission. to see how much the gospel can effect someone's life. to see the joy and happiness the gospel can bring to their lives. i wouldn't want to be anywhere else. it was a perfect day!

Meli and Luci before baptism

After Baptism

Everyone at the baptism

sigatabu:

okay well to start off sunday we were late for church. not because we were just running late but because no one told us they have day light savings here! the elders called and were like sisters you're late for church, i was like no we're not it's 830. well come to find out it was actually 930 because it's day light savings now. so we got to church and everyone was laughing at us lol. now we're sister day light savings, great! haha. but me and sis. ons had to teach the primary their primary songs for their primary presentation. i dont know how in the world we got put in charge but i dont mind because i love primary. anything i can do to help. as a missionary we dont only help investigators but also the members :) then, in sacrament, meli and lucy received the gift of the holy ghost and i just had a feeling of peace and a surety that they will be okay. as a missionary you constantly have this fear if your investigators are ready for baptism and confirmation or not. but at that moment that they both received the holy ghost, i knew they would be okay and they will be strong in this gospel. the next step is the temple. last night, we went to visit them just to see how they feel about baptism and the confirmation. after that, we told them that the next step as a family was the temple. i gave them the challenge to make it to the temple before i finish my mission, which gives them about 15 months. they graciously accepted the challenge and i can't wait to see them go through the temple and be sealed forever. 

did you guess what wananavu is yet?? AWESOME!! haha. this week was a good week and it's because i had the right attitude and i had the spirit with me throughout the whole week. without the spirit, nothing can happen. 

i loved hearing about you and laa's day together. one on one time is very special and that's one of the things i miss! but au lomani kemudou sara ga!!

loloma levu,

sista chong 

Rough Week for Sista Chong and the Cows!

bula mama!!

first of all...i love all the pictures you sent me of sarah!! she looks so happy and her face is just glowing in all her pictures. i wish i was there to watch but im sure there'll be many more to come. i didnt get to watch the videos yet because i dont have ear phones and we dont want all of labasa hearing the video lol. 

but the work here is going. we had a pretty rough week last week. we need new investigators but haven't had any luck in finding anyone. all the people we talk to on the street usually dont call us after that and just fall through. we also have had a lot of fall through appointments with our investigators. it's so hard because you can't force someone to sit down and listen to what you have to say. so im starting to get really frustrated and ive never prayed so hard in my life. each time i get on my knees, whether it be alone or with my companion, i pour my heart out asking Heavenly Father to help us find some new investigators and to help me recognize who He has prepared for me. we are trying to get the members involved with helping us find some new investigators because that's the best way to get investigators, is through members. yesterday in church, we went to each class...relief society, priesthood, young women, and young men and gave them some pamphlets and encouraged them all to give it someone this week. so hopefully we'll get some new investigators from that. but for me, the first person im focusing on strengthening is the branch president. im trying to get him more involved with missionary work! he doesn't even know our names and the names of our investigators. so im going to become his best friend :) 

this past saturday the elders had a baptism. so we brought meli and lucy to come and see what a baptism is like. we went and picked them up about 10 minutes before the service started and they were excited to come and watch what a baptism was like. im sure that they felt the spirit and really enjoyed it. in fact, they asked us if they could do their baptism interviews right after the baptism instead of that night. so we did it and they both did amazing! so im for sure having my first baptism on october 26!!! but when i first started my mission i just had a mind set of "hurry up and get baptized so i can be the first in my intake with a baptism!" but now that's it's actually happening i dont feel that way anymore. now i am so happy that meli and lucy are getting baptized together as a family and that in exactly a year they'll be able to go to the temple and be sealed for time and all eternity. also lucy is having a baby in march so it will be even more special to them to be sealed as a family with their baby. im giving them until the end of my mission, which is 15 months, to get into the temple.

me and my companion started doing something new this week. we have agreed that music creates such a powerful spirit in our lessons. so this week we started to, at the end of every lesson we sing a hymn or primary song that relates to what we taught. and i can feel the difference in our lessons. just yesterday we went to go see one of our investigators whos husband is a less-active. at the end of our lesson i asked him what his favorite primary song was when he was a little kid. he said "army of helaman." so we sang that song together with him and he still remembered the tune and i could just feel the spirit working on him and softening his heart. his mom, who is an active member, came to see who was singing and when she saw her son singing primary songs with us, she had the biggest smile on her face. he even asked if we could sing one more. so we must have sang about 3 or 4 songs last night at the end of the lesson. and after that we bore our testimonies and he even bore his own. it was the first time that his wife has ever heard him bare his testimony. it was simple but powerful. so i have such a strong testimony about music. music brings the spirit! that's my advice this week. if you ever are sitting in a visiting teaching lesson or anything and you feel that the spirit is not there, song a hymn! besides the spirit and your testimony, music is a next most powerful tool.

okay now story time......so at this time of year in fiji there is an indian holiday called diwali and it looks like christmas. they put up lights and decorations all around town and the indian families make their indian sweets and give them to neighbors, so it really does feel like christmas. well, along with all these festivities, something that the muslim religion does is they kill their cows. yes, it sounds weird but seriously, at this time of year they all kill their cows that they've been raising or whatever. i dont know the exact details but all i know is that since all the muslims are killing their cows, everyone is selling it in the market. and in fiji it's a treat to have beef for dinner because usually we just have chicken or fish. whenever we go over for dinner, the families make the best dishes and always more than 1 dish because if there's only 1 it's really embarrassing and shame.so this week we had dinner about every night, which is very rare and we were so excited....until i found out that this was the week that most muslims were killing their cows. so guess what i had for dinner almost every night.....COW!!! every time i came home from the dinner appointment my stomach was just sick. i went from not eating beef for about 4 years, to eating it every single night for a whole week. OH MY GOSH I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO DIE!!! so im hoping that this week there's no cows left to kill. im praying for it lol!!

but it sounds like everything is still going well at home. how's tutu and puna?? what's their emails?? vinaka!! oh also i got a package from aunty lori with a plan of salvation diagram thing in fijian, she's so sweet!! im going to email her but she sent it first class and it only took about 2 weeks. 

loloma levu,
sista chong

Sulu Jaba! I'm officially a Fijian!!

Labasa Branch Relief Society

Sister Singh, me, Sister Nawaqavolau (my Fijian mom)

Peaceful Fijian Keiki. LOL!!

Conference and Spiders

oh my gosh there is so much going on at home!!! new house, volleyball, burnt hands, dancing, soccer, hula, DAD GOING SCHOOL!! makes me miss you guys even more. but dont worry, i never regret coming on my mission, i love it!!! 

we got to watch conference this weekend. it was sad though because only 15 of us came to watch the saturday sessions and then on sunday morning a lot of people from the branch and then on sunday afternoon the same 15 from saturday stayed. on sunday we had no power, like every other sunday, so we had to find a generator. so we hooked it up and it worked but then something happened and it shut off. they went and got it fixed but then it shut off again 5 minutes later because the cord blew up. so they had to go buy another cord. so while the rest of us were waiting we sang hymns for about 30 minutes. it was just really frustrating and hard work just to watch conference. i never had to go through so much just to watch conference. but now im deeply grateful of how fortunate we are at home to be able to just turn on our tv and watch it and also that every sunday we have power in the chapel. counting a lot of my blessings here.

well, the work is moving fast here. there has been so many changes since i got to the area. im not sure if its because im making the changes or what but its a good change lol. we had zone meeting training on thursday and the zone leaders were talking to us about members present at our lessons. we have actually been doing really good in getting members present in our lessons but the mission overall has had decreasing numbers in members present. so as a zone we made a goal of 5 members present a week. that's what we're mainly focusing on now. we're trying to look at our investigators and think of who in our branch would be able to connect with them. this last week we met our goal and we have been taking different people to our lessons, instead of the same 2 or 3. my testimony has been strengthened so much from having the members in our lessons. their testimonies and experiences they share have strengthened me so much. 

we had a lesson with Lucy, who is getting baptized on oct. 26 with her husband Meli, about the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end. we took with us the young women president, Sis. Rakuita. she is just so sweet and she has been through so much. her love for the gospel is immeasurable and her testimony is immovable. while we were teaching Lucy, i couldn't feel the spirit as strong as i usual do and i was getting nervous because i had no idea what to say. so while sis. rakuita was sharing a personal experience i said a prayer in my heart. a short but powerful prayer asking for the spirit to be with me as i taught lucy. the next time i opened my mouth in the lesson, it was filled with exactly what needed to be said. at the end of the lesson we asked Lucy if she had anything to share and she started to bare her testimony. she said it in fijian so i got the main things but i didnt understand everything but i could feel the spirit so strong and she started to cry but i knew it was tears of joy and then i began to cry. so after the lesson we asked sis. rakuita what she was saying. sis. rakuita told us that she is so grateful for us sisters and teaching her the truth. she never knew how much our Heavenly Father loved her until we started teaching her about the gospel. she never knew why our Savior, Jesus Christ, came and died on the cross, until we taught her about the atonement. she never use to wake up in the morning and pray to thank heavenly father for everything she has until she learned about the power of prayer. i began to cry knowing how much this gospel ive known my whole life could change someones life so much. before my mission i always use to take the gospel for granted and i never took the time to share it with anyone because i never thought anyone wanted to know about it. but now i know that there are so many people in this world who are searching for something and that something is the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

this conference they talked a lot about member missionary work. LISTEN TO THIS COUNSEL!! DO MISSIONARY WORK!! as a missionary now i can tell you that it is so hard to do the work without the members of the branch/ward. so my challenge to you all is to help the missionaries. give them referrals, go with them to lessons, feed them, do anything you can to help them. the best way to find new investigators for a missionary is through the members. so i challenge you and want you to be a missionary!! when the member missionaries and the full time missionaries work together the work will go faster and many more people will have the opportunity to receive the gospel.

okay so this week there were a few fun things that happened :) first one i went into the shower and was about to turn on the water when i saw a huge spider the size of my hand right next to the faucet!! i screamed so loud and wrapped my sulu vakatoga (lavalava) around me and ran out so fast. my companion was just laughing at me and i was like stop laughing and get it out haha. so she got it out of the shower and i almost didnt shower that night, i was fine with just putting on my pajamas and going to bed. it was terrifying!! second, we went to our family home evening/dinner appointment on monday night. it was dark and we were walking on the road to their house but there was construction! so while we were walking this huge truck decides he wants to come and drive straight towards us. so we had to like run to the side, in the bushes, to wait for the truck to pass and you know what happens...i didn't see there was a little ditch/hill thing and i slip and fall flat on my back!! this old man was next to us and was just cracking up, laughing so hard. i was so embarrassed!! we got to the house and the kids were like "sista chong why is your skirt and shirt all dirty? did scooby (their dog) jump on you?" i didnt even want to answer i just told them no he didn't and walked to see the parents lol. so shame!! third, there's this road we walk down to this settlement. along the road there's the cows and goats just hanging out, eating grass, and don't usually bother you. well, we were walking on this road and we're walking past one of the cows and then there was a little calf. well me being so smart was like aw what a cute little cow. went a little closer to look at it and the mama cow started to run towards us!! oh my gosh i was scared for my life!! we ran and good thing the cow was tied up so it stopped but it stared at us until we were out of sight. so im scared to go back lol. okay my last story happened on friday night. so some background first. me and ikaia are in the same zone, meaning if we had a zone conference we would see each other. so ive been waiting to see him and our zone conference is going to happen next month so im so excited to see him. well on friday night we were just about to go to bed when our district leader called us to tell us that there were transfers. so he's reading off all the names to us and where they're going, i wasn't really listening until suddenly i hear, "Elda Nawahine." Ikaia was being transferred to Suva!! i almost started to cry because ive been waiting to see ikaia and now when there's only a couple weeks before i can see him, he get transferred to a different zone, a different island!! isa!! 

well that was my week. au lomani kemudou sara ga!! au misitaki kemudou!!! 

loloma levu,
sista chong

Branch Activity - Fiji Day

Branch Activity - FIji Day

Massive Popo (Papaya)

Meli and Luci - Baptism on Oct. 26

Dumb spider!!