Pictures 7/27/2014

Fireside(:

The Kumar Family

Transfers

Another week and another change!

BIG NEWS! I am getting transferred! I am going to a place called Lami! It is on the other side on the bay. Not close to the city at all! And so far, what I have heard, IT IS AWESOME and I m so excited! And to make this even better, I am going to be with Sister Tua! We are white washing the area. Which means Both the sisters serving there now, are getting transferred and me and sister Tua are going there, trying to pick up where they left off! But there is better news!!! ITS FIJIAN SPEAKING AREA!!! So I am super excited and ready and nervous, and scared, and happy! Especially for the Fijian food!!!(: I am seriously so excited! When we got the call Saturday night, I didn't sleep.. haha! Sundy I was exhaustesd, This was definitely a exciting transfer and big one!(:
But there is some sad new... Sister Trammell is going to Labasa. Far far FAR away... haha! Actually another island.. But it is ok! We will still write each other. And when we see eachother we will have so much to talk about! We already don't stop talking but it will be worse! haha!
Anyways, other than transfers this week has been full. Not as full as yours! But still full! We were busy preparing our friend Lario for baptism! Which turned out AWESOME! He was so excited! he showed up an hour early! There are always bumps in the rod, but it was awesome! And it was even better because on Sunday, his confirmation was awesome! He cried during it! The spirit was so strong and I am so excited to have been able to be here for all of the baptisms in this area.
On Friday we had this cool fireside. Elder Haleck? (I don't k no whow to spell..) he came to the mission and he is in the area of the 70. He came and spoke to us! It was awesome. Something that I am loving about this quarter, is that they aren't focusing on numbers at all! they are focusing on how we can become better missionaries! How we can be better people. And I am loving it! That is all he spoke on! Is how we can be better, not how we can get the most lessons, or how we can get the most baptisms. But how we can actually HELP people. Which is something that I have learned... We aren't here to get the most lessons or to baptize the most people. But to Help the people recognize how much Heavenly Father loves them. Help them to come closer to our Father in Heaven. And if there is a baptism involved, then YAY! But if there isn't, atleast at one point you helped them feel the spirit and the love. And that is the best part!!!(: But something he said that I loved, was he told us not to look at people as where they are now. Look at them as what they can be! Imagine them dressed in white getting ready for baptism. That just touched me. Because we can do that for all of our brothers and sisters. And then we will have an eternal perspective and we wont give up on them! It was an awesome fireside!
I am still kinda sick.. but hopefully, once it starts warming up again, I will be able to get it ll gone. Evenone keeps telling me this is the coldest ithave ever been in Fiji. Which means it will be another hot summer!! YAY!!!(: You guys better be preparing your sunscreen and bathing suits! Because that will be all you want to do!(: Can you believe I hit my year mark this week! Where did the time go? TOO FAST! But, it was such a good year and a year I will never, EVER forget!(:
I love you guys so much! Know that I am thinking about you guys all week this week! Em's CONGRATS on your baptism! You will never ever regret the decision you are making! It is one of the best! And give my love to baby Matix! I so wish I could be there for all of this, but I am there in spirit! LOVE YOU GUYS! YOU ARE ALL AWESOME! Next week you will be getting a letter from LAMI!(: Love you guys!
Sister Rich

Pictures 7/20/14

So this investigator of the elders made this board.. it is the plan of salvation all in Fijian. but he is AWESOME! He is so smart! I started teaching him and then referred him to the elders because he wanted to go to the Fijian ward.. so we handed him over but we went to visit him and this is what he showed us!!!(: 

 pitas baptism! (can you tell i was sick?) haha

coolest sunset

Mouse trap

The MOUSE is in the house!!

So this week my story isn't about a bee.. it's about a mouse!
But before you read this... you have to know that there are millions of mouse here in Fiji so what we did was not bad.... and it was the most humane thing we could think of! But if you don't want to read it.... skip down to ok so spiritual things.....

Ok so we walk in the house yesterday and standing right in front of us is a MOUSE. a live mouse. It was like petrified or something because it didn't want to move. So sister siale screams and jumps on the counter as i go and grab the 1st thing i can to try and catch it... So i grab our dish rack... haha! Anyways, after we catch it we didn't know what to do.. We calmed down and stopped frekaing out and decide to call the elders.... NO ANSWER... so we call the Zone leaders... Elder Ishi "bula Vinaka oqo Elder Ishibashi"...me "ELDER ISHIBASHI WE CAUGHT A MOUSE AND WE DON"T KNOW WHT TO DO!" *start freaking out again* right away you can hear his companion in the background just laughing and Elder Ishibashi is just dying also! They tell us to catch it on fire because we have to kill it somehow.... Catch it on fire? He's crazy... so he just said be creative but make sure you record it! We want to see it tomorrow.. so me and sister siale debate what we want to do but neither of us want to touch it or do it ourselves. So we call Elder Terry who gave us some mouse poison a few weeks ago because we saw it run across our floor.. but we call him and he just starts laughing and tells us to put on my shoe and step on it.... hahahah yea right Elder terry. So then he says so and get your landlord and make him do it! So... in the mean time our District Leader calls us in the middle of me talking to my landlord and he is laughing at us because all he is hearing is that we have a mouse and we don't want to kill it so can he? and so shania (th daughter) grabs the cat because the dad wasn't home.. we take it up stairs.. and the whole time I am on the phone and recording this.. we put the cat in the bathroom and THE CAT ATE THE MOUSE!!!!! hahaha! I know that is really sad.. but it was humane because now the cat had dinner... food chain!(: The cat was higher(: haha Well there is our exciting news from the week. and there is a video thats is even better than the story!
Ok so spiritual things that happen this week... PITA GOT BAPTIZED!!!
IT WAS AWESOME! He was so nervous! He was probably the most nervous person I have seen before baptism! But he was so cute and so excited! I love seeing people dressed in al white! It is such a tender moment for me right before they go in because they stand there and kinda look at the water and then they go in. Go down and come up brand new! And I just love baptism day! It is so awesome!(: We have another one this week and we are so excited for it!
We also got 2 new investigators this week. Senal who is one hwo we have been going over and seeing kinda and sharing scriptures and we gave her a book of mormon and since then, things have just took off! She is so ready to hear all about the gospel and all about the Book of Mormon. She has been reading non-stop! So she is awesome! Then we have a girl named Praveena she is actually a referral from Sister Limburg. The mission nurse. And she is awesome! We met her yesterday and she is SO interested in the gospel. She has definitely been prepared! GO sister limburg!(:
Other than that, I did get sick this week, so we weren't out a lot because I was sick and then Sister Siale got a root canal. So we had to stay in the house for 2 days staright and I WAS GOING CRAZY! I can't do that ever again! Haha! but I am doing better now and I am looking forward to this week. Hopefully it will go by fast(:
Sounds like you guys are having fun this week! I am so excited to hear all about the fun things you guys do this week! Make sure you take lots of pictures!(: LOVE YOU GUSY SO SO SO MUCH!
Sister rich

It's a Bee's Life

Bula Vianka family!

This week has been so good! We are preparing for some baptisms coming up and we are so excited for them!(: One is on Saturday and the other is next week. But here's the awesome thing about them. They're bestfriends!!!(: They're so funny! They are dating sisters... and they're just awesome! They have both been so prepared. They accepted the gospel right away. Which was surprising because they are 23 and 22. But, that just shows how prepared they were! And in all honesty, I think I learned from them more than they learned from me! haha(: So it has been so much fun teaching them. I am going to miss seeing them 3 times a week! But, it is all worth it!!

We had this AWESOME fireside yesterday! It was a musical fireside. It was kinda like the one we did... I forgot when we did that one with all the youth.... but it was so awesome! I loved it! The theme was Come Unto Christ. And they sang the youth song "come unto Christ" and it was so good. The lyrics to that song is just awesome! I think it is my new favorite song!!!(:

We had a zone conference this week with the new mission president. Things are going to change here really fast. But it is changing in a good way! The mission is getting a face lift! haha! But it is going to look good not like Heidi from The Hills.. haha But he gave awesome insight! And we are so so SO excited for the next transfers, because we think there is going to be big changes!(:

Anyways, so I had this weird/cool dream last night. I was home from my mission because I wasn't wearing a name tag. But, I was talking about missions. I was talking to someone and I don't remember who, but it was someone i knew because I could feel that.. but anyways, let me get to the cool part. So we were talking about my mission and I explained it as a bees' life. (I don't know if i have heard this somewhere but I thought it was awesome! Ok anyways....) So i was telling them, you know how bees' SHORT lives are dedicated to making a honey comb? And they work so hard to finish this little part of it and right after it is finished they die... Well like us as missionaries, we work so hard and so "busily" like a bee for a short amount of time. We are dedicated to what we do. And when it is done we "die" or finish our mission. But the thing that matters most to them is the part that they have finished in the honey comb. They helped build a little piece but that little piece is still a piece. So I think what I am trying to explain in an email is that as long as we are dedicated to what we do and accept who we are for our short "life" as a missionary, we will be able to help build up the "honey comb" or the kingdom here! But, what I got out of it most is that if we aren't focused on the work.. like bees' when they fly around and mess around instead of doing their job they get killed by the big bad guys... haha! It made me think of in the Missionary Handbook Brigham Young says "if we come on a mission expecting to learn whats in the world we will come and go and return in vain" So basically we will get no where in we aren't dedicated to what we do. Even though bees are busy, they are building something that turns out to be their kingdom and they don't return i "vain". I know this is such a weird dream and it might not make sense to you because you know me and my stories.. but, it was kinda cool. It was kinda just telling me something I already knew that I couldn't hear from anyone else. And then today when I got the news that Hayden is home.... I kinda freaked out a little bit. THAT WENT BY SO FAST! So I guess as we stay focused on what we are "called" to do, we will have No regrets. And as a missionary I don't want that at all! Even though I am just building a little piece of the Lords kingdom here, i want to finish my piece I started!

Well I hope my dream made sense. Other than that this week was just full of appointments and working. Nothing really exciting. But I do love you guys so so so so SO much! Thank you for all you guys do! you guys are the BEST! I love you! Have a good week!
Sister Rich

Pictures July 06, 2014

The youth had a dance on the 4th(:

I FORGOT! WE WENT TO A WEDDING(: haha!

Me and Sister Trammell rapping

I know its blurry... but we matched(: 

Us just being us...(: 

Another Week in Paradise

Is this week really over already? I think I say that a lot, but its true. They go by so fast. Everyday seems to just Blur together! haha!(:

This week was so good. Maybe one of the better weeks I have had in a while. Me and Sister SIale had so much fun going out and teaching and it was what consumed most of our time this week. Which is a good thing.

We had some awesome lessons this week!! I will tell you my favorite... But let me give you some background info 1st. So we have our new mission president. And every quarter, the mission has goals that the president has come up with. We have been focusing so much on numbers lately, trying to get 11 baptisms in 1 month. And we achived it in March. But, in June they wanted to beat that. So we have had 2 quarters in a row where we were so focused on numbers. But this month was the start of a new quarter and IT IS AWESOME! We are focusing all on Christlike attributes, and learnign how to teach like him. This month we were to choose a Christ like attribute and work to obtain it. So for me, I chose Patience. Because I have kinda had a problem with that since I got here. But anyways, so we choose an attribute and we were supposed to fast for it yesterday. We went to visit this less active yesterday, and it is a less active I haven't seen in a long time. Just because things have been so crazy here. But, we decided to go and see her yesterday. SO we go up to the house and I yell "Josephine.... Josephine!! Its the sisters!" no one comes out.. "Jospehiiiiine!!!!!!" Then a head pops out the window and she says she is busy and telll us to come back on tuesday.. so we start walking away and then a guy sticks his head out and says "You guys from LDS?" I look at Sister Siale , and I wasn't sure if he was going to tell us to come in or to never come back again... But I am a missionary! So I say YES with a smile.. He looks at us and he says "Come" so we go in and we had such an AWESOME lesson with them. He is muslim.. well now he is muslim. He was a member, but he told us that no one from the church has visited him for over 20 YEARS! So he went to muslim. How sad is that?! But we had an awesome lesson with them and the spirit was so strong. It was definitely one of those moments, where you know that that is why you are here. He did say we could come back on Sundays, and he will maybe be home. It may not be anything, but atleast he will remember the white girl and the Tongan who came from the church!(:

Anyways, that was awesome! Me and Sister Trammell celebrated 4th of July. We both wore red, white, and blue and took pictures. We were tempted to buy some fireworks and light them. But it says in the white handbook not to play with fireworks... so we decided there is probably a reason for that and 2 girls playing with them probably wasn't the greatest idea. But we did come up with our own rap of America the Beautiful... It was a one time thing and only our companions were allowed a front row seat! haha(: But, I did miss 4th of July back home! I am so happy I will be there for the next one!

We have some baptisms coming up of some YSA boys. The 1st older people I have taught and baptized. AND... I just got some awesoem news. One of the part member families I was teachign in Nadi, IS GETTING BAPTIZED THIS MONTH!!!!!!! I AM SO SO SO SO SO Excited! I just got an email from the Sister serving there and she is getting baptized! Missionary work is just so awesome wherever you are in the world. But, being in Fiji just makes things a little bit better(:

You guys are just so awesome! I can't even tell you how much I love you all and miss you guys. But guess what?! I only have 6 months left! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?! So there is this group called HEFY.. (Humanitarian EFY.. its actually kinda cool!) but our ward is hosting them. And the leader just finished her mission in March and we were talking to her and she was telling me about when she got home. She got off the plane and cried when she saw her family. And then when she got in the car to drive home, she started crying again because she wated to go back to her mission. As much as i love you guys, I don't want to leave! haha! But I am lucky to have 6 months left! SO YAY!!!!

Love you guys so much!(:
loloma yani!
Sister Rich