Abaiang today, Tabiteuea tomorrow!!

Hello,                                                                

So there is a ton of stuff to write today and unfortunately I am being rushed for time a little bit. I will try and answer all your questions and write what is going on.

So on Wednesday night I was told that I was being transferred.  On Friday morning we left on the speed boat back to Tarawa. A couple people on the boat were fishing while we were heading back so that was pretty fun.  I will miss Elder Musser (my companion) he was great to work with.  The mission is running out of missionaries so they are only having 2 missionaries in Abaiang and I am headed to the Island Tabiteuea.   I am flying to Tabiteuea tomorrow with Elder Carrington! I am very excited!

 Here is a little about Abaiang.  We had our first baptism on Abaiang the Saturday before I left!!! A girl named Otobina. She was way ready and just a super sweet girl. There should be a ton more people baptized down there I bet in the next month as the work was going way good when I left. So the reason that I couldn’t email last week was we were busy getting some people married and that took up most of my P-Day.  And then that night at the school the internet wasn’t working.  But, the wedding was way fun!

They had a pretty big farewell party for me. It was way sweet and I gave all my candy away to everybody.

I got my package and it was awesome!!  The Reese’s Peanut Butter cups were the best ever!! Tell Sarah that I will totally rock the High School Musical shirt!!  The tools will be very useful for our bikes and the new white shirts are perfect.  Thanks so much for everything in the package. The Indiana Jones card was sweet and also tell Sarah thanks for her card it was super funny!

I have a cool story for all you guys to satisfy your want for cool stories. There is a kid named Babakai. He is like 16 or so but he has just been way sweet lately. He was reading in the Book of Mormon and was reading about when God told Nephi if he did what he was supposed to then he would go to the land of promise. He then took out his Plan of Salvation pamphlet and found the question about where you go after this life. He then told us all about this and how the scripture in Nephi answered the question. And he told us if he did what he should then he would be going to the land of promise. It was just way awesome to me on how he completely personalized the scriptures to himself.  We should all read the scriptures and try to apply them to ourselves even if we don't think they would apply. That was my cool story.

I would like to say that I could guarantee that I will Skype on mother’s day but I don't think I will be able to. On Tab (Tabiteuea) South they say there is no internet.  I think we will be able to radio into the Elders on Tab North for contact.  I am thinking that I will be there until July so I can probably Skype in a couple months.  Please keep writing me at the Tarawa address and you can email me but just realize that I might not see them for a while.

Well, I am happy and healthy here and loving my mission.  I just try and remember that this is my time to serve the Lord.  I try to forget everything that goes on outside in the world and I try to just focus on my mission and serving the Lord.

I am having a great time here! :) 

Love,

  Elder Dinsdale

 Here are some pictures from Elder Kitchens mom.  They were taken when Scott was in Tarawa with many of the Elders from the MTC!! 

No email this week only pictures...

Elder Dinsdale didn't email this week.  I am not sure if the internet was down or if he went fishing... 

I thought I would still post a few pictures from his SD card though!

Looking out of the airplane at Christmas Island!

Elder Dinsdale loving every minute with that Colgate smile!!

Baptism on Fanning Island

House in Fanning complete with mosquito nets.

Clam or Octopous anyone?

Hello,

   I have a new companion Elder Musser he is from Vegas and he seems pretty chill.  It is still raining a lot down here. Sometimes it goes a couple days with just heat, which is
nice for the roads. But, as soon as the roads are almost dry it floods the roads again.

We went fishing today but just for an hour and we didn’t get anything.  I did eat Octopus the other day and also had clams. 

Here are a few answers to some of your questions:

Tell us a little about your house:  Where we live we have some solar power but no running water.  We currently do not use mosquito nets. But, we use mosquito coils most nights.  It is not near as busy here as it is in Tarawa. About half of the area in Abaiang is forest and there are animals running around everywhere.   

Do they have big parties in Abaiang?  There are always parties in one of the villages at least a couple times a week. And a ton of people go. Right now there is a party in the KUC church from now and it will end in June. So, parties are a lot different here than in America.

How are your clothes doing?  My clothes are doing pretty good I would have to say. They are getting dirty and some a little rough after hand washing them and such, but I don't have any issues.

This week we have been working hard and I can already see the work improving here in our area. We have a less active member that we have been teaching and we just starting teaching his wife. We had dinner with them and then started our first lesson. After the lesson she opened up to us and told us about how she was super shy but how she was really happy and she felt like it was easy having lessons with us. So that was way sweet.

Well, thanks for all the love and support! I hope you have an amazing week!

Elder Dinsdale

LOVE SELFIES!!

Chilling with the PIGS!!

Double Post Monday!!

                            Here are a few pictures of Elder Dinsdale's SD card!!! ___________________

Teaching is Good!

Hello,

  So, last week the internet was down and this week I don’t have much time to write.

Teaching has been going good. We have been teaching about the Plan of Salvation lately. It is weird to think that I have known about the Plan of Salvation since I was young. These people have no idea what is going to happen when we die. Growing up in the church you just accept some things and don’t even think at all about it.  It is great to teach.

We have a decent amount of people to teach though so things are quite good right now I would have to say.  We taught a kid this week and asked him to pray about the prophet.  A lot of people we ask to pray about things don’t but he did!!!  And he said that he felt the spirit.  The power of prayer is real!!

So General Conference was this weekend I hear.  I didn’t even know it was conference until I started reading emails.  We don’t get to see them or anything like that here.

I have noticed in this world we really need to be thankful for all the things we have.  We have so many things that we don’t understand that are truly blessings.  We just sometimes don’t realize them until we don’t have them anymore. 

Well, I am off for now. I love you all!

I am good here and I hope you are all great!

Elder Dinsdale

Biking in Banana

Riding on the Boat to Abaiang