Hello,
I am in Tabwakea right now because Elder
Whitehead wants to say goodbye to people and such before he goes home so the
internet here is actually good. Ha, but next week I will be in Banana for P-Day
as usual. I will try to write quite a bit though so you can have your questions
answered and such.
Do you know anything about your new
companion? My new companion Elder Hungai has been here
for 2 months, but on his mission for around 7 months. He
speaks English, but with his accent I can barely understand him. So I think that will give me the opportunity
to speak in Kiribati to him. He is in the picture that you told me about. He is the Elder standing right behind me.
Are you still sick? So, I am doing well. I got over my last sickness, and then just got
sick again yesterday but I am already feeling a little better. I guess honestly
I just need to have my body get used to this area. Which considering I have
only been in Kiribati for a month so that is expected. (note from Jen... please include Scott in your prayers)
Where do you live? What is the area like and the people? People are very friendly to missionaries. I think there are about six thousand people on
the island and a little less than one thousand in my village. There are a few different little villages
before Banana that we go to. There is
one that is completely an outer island (meaning all stick huts with no conveniences). Most islands in Kiribati are thin and long,
but this one (Kirimati) is pretty huge even though most of it is deserted. It is
pretty much all flat though. There are
just random villages along the road. There
are some people that come here to go fishing.
We stay at the hotel in a bungalow.
I can see the ocean from my house, but
that is the only place I can see it from.
We go try and teach the workers at the hotel
and sometimes the white people or Koreans that are here to go fishing as well. There are some cars here, but not many people
have them. There are these trucks that
drive from Banana to the rest of the island and so people just hop on the back
as they drive by. We ride bikes but I already told you
that. In my area there are a ton of
geckos. They are pretty much everywhere
and in everyone’s houses. The other
thing they have here are a TON of are cock roaches. They are also everywhere. The lizards and geckos don’t bother me, but
all the cock roaches in my house aren’t my favorite. I have not seen any WW2 things yet but I am
sure they are somewhere. Many people husk coconuts but I have not
tried it yet. I drink coconut milk quite
often, but it makes me feel really funny so it isn’t my favorite yet. I am learning from Kain Te Aba ( a guy that I
know) about how to cut coreve so that is pretty cool. The sun rises at 6:00am and goes down at
about 7:00pm. So about 7:00pm we head to
dinner.
What is the weather like? It isn’t supposed to rain here much, but for some reason it
has been raining a ton. I have some
pictures of the roads when they are quite flooded. The winds blow here almost every day during the day and that is super nice. It is so hot here that if it wasn’t for the
wind it would probably be unbearable.
Where do you meet for church? We meet in someone’s building that consists of
metal sheeting on 4 walls. They have little
benches that we sit on (as well as palm leaves on the ground) and some little chairs
for the sacrament. For Sunday School and
Priesthood and all the other meetings everyone just goes and finds different
spots of shade under trees to have the meetings. There is a Mwanebwea that is being built
right now and it should be done in a month or two that we will meet in for
church. It will be sweet and I should
still be here so that will be good.
There is a good amount of young single adults and a bunch of little
kids. I don’t get to teach the little
kids, but I have spoken twice already in Sacrament meeting. I am pretty sure no one can understand what I
am saying but it works.
Have you tried eating anything new?
Well, last week was Hermit Crab
which I hope not to eat again anytime soon and this week I ate Sting Ray. It is actually really good!! It is a blue meat that doesn’t have many
bones so that is pretty nice. Pretty
much for me if fish doesn’t have bones then it is a good fish. I don’t have a lot of time to fish even
though I love to fish. I have only
caught tuna. It would be nice to fish
more and such but we are honestly to busy working to go. The
JMB store here sells American food.
There is even some vanilla and triple flavor ice cream. I would say that is the best thing. It does cost about $25 for a gallon
though. Some people have freezers in our
area but not many. Some people sell these
things called “ICE”. Ice is a little
package with something like frozen sugar water in it. They are quite nice!!!
How is it coming to find new
investigators and how is the language? We have found a few new investigators and things are going
good here. No baptisms yesterday but we
are having one tomorrow, we are teaching some Priesthood aged men so that
should be really good. The language is
slowly coming so that is good.
Well that
answers a lot so I will end. There are definitely
many things that are hard on my mission but stuff is hard on any mission. The thing that I try to do every day is to
just keep working and doing good stuff. I
am being obedient and working hard. I
hope life back home is good.
Love, Elder
Dinsdale
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| Missionaries serving on Kirimati. Thanks to MaryClaire for taking and posting this! |
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