Letter dated Oct 31, 2009
Family,
Another good week. Well first off, Shea got my email and emailed me so you don't have to worry about the address anymore mom, but thanks! He sounds like he is doing well. Happy Halloween everyone! They don't celebrate it in Jamaica, but if they did celebrate Halloween I would be afraid to go trick or treating haha. I think if you were to show up at someone's door wearing a mask that the entire neighborhood would go into an uproar, everyone would freak out a people would gather on the side of the road and a nearby pastor would begin speaking in tongues and try to cast the evil spirit out of you.
It hasn't particularly been an eventful week but it has been nice. Elder and Sister Cheesman went back to the states for a week (their daughters wedding, and their sons mission homecoming). The office has been moderately less effective without them, but we still got a good amount done. On Monday we drove out to Maypen to move missionaries out of one house into another. It went well. I have never packed a truck as full as we did then! In a small pick up truck we got a washing machine, 2 mattresses, 2 box springs, 2 boxes of Book of Mormon books, 4 pieces of luggage, 5 backpacks, 6 missionaries, 2 fans and some other small things. It was amazing to see how much could fit into a truck. When we showed up at the new house they live on the 2nd story with a balcony. So we lifted everything from the truck up over the balcony so that we didn't have to go up the stairs. The Washing machine was the one exception. We also had to move 4 missionaries into 2 new houses in Portmore. It took a lot of time and was a pain to do it in the hot sun.
I have got a good amount of practice changing tires this week. Sister Graff got a flat tire so we drove up to the mission home, put on the spare, took the flat one to a tire place to get it fixed. The next day we went to put it back on but the man at the tire place suggested that we rotate the tires, so we did. We took off the back tire, put on the fixed tire, moved the other tires around and in the end it was all fixed. The best part was that it was raining during the entire thing so we were covered in dirt and very wet.
At home we have been playing Chess nightly after planning. Before we did nothing, just sat around and ate food. So we do something slightly more productive now. Elder Brown and I have been keeping score. Currently I have won 10 games and he has won 5. A few of our games have been really close. It is a lot of fun to play with someone who is at the same level as myself.
We have this investigator, Sister Brown, but we just call her grandma (she was a referral from her grandchildren, that is how she got the name). Her daughter and her daughter's family are all members of the church but she is part of some other church. We initially met them but Grandma seemed slightly less effective, she was stuck on her old ways and it wasn't really going anywhere. We taught them a few times and figured that it probably wasn't going to go anywhere soon but the family really wanted us to keep trying. So we have been persistent. We found a member about her age who would get along well with her and have been bringing them along to every lesson and that has helped a ton. We committed the entire family to have family scripture study with grandma everyday and from the Book of Mormon. It has made a huge difference. She has become a lot more receptive to what we teach and has even begun considering baptism. Just the small and simple things bring about the greatest changes.
This week I finished the Book of Mormon again! Wahoo! I have since then just started over again. I thought of studying by topic for a while, but in the end I just decided to read It through another time before I change my direction of study. That is nice that most of you got to go and do baptisms. I will be very excited to go to the temple again when I get home. 2 years is a long time to not attend the temple!
I am starting to run short on time. I got Laura's and Dad's emails. With daylight savings time it will make me 2 hours ahead instead of 1. I am sad to hear about Helen's condition. It is to bad that nothing can really be done. At least she has lived a good life and is prepared for the end.
I don't got a picture to attach today, sorry! I will get one for next week. Transfers are coming up, so if you don't hear from me on Saturday it means I got transferred (unlikely, but it is a possibility). I am not horribly excited for transfers, it just means a lot of work is about to come my way and the office will grow very hectic for a few days! Haha
Life goes well, with winter coming the temperature is nice in the mornings, the rest of the day it is still just hot and humid. I hope that school is going great. That is about it for the week! I love you all and hope your week is good.
Elder B. Kent Talbert
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