Malo!

Dear Family,

 

Malo! It means thankyou in Tongan. Malo for being the best family :) I appreciate all of your emails and updates.

 

This week I went on back to back exchanges with the Tongan sisters. I first got to go to Castro Valley, where there are so many funerals hapening! Even the morning I was there someone else had already died. It was so strange. And that affects the whole Tongan community. I also ate dinner with a lady who had taken food from the YSA activity haha. She wanted me to eat a hamburger, jumbo hotdog, bbq chicken, marinated chicken, a big salad, corn on the cob, watermelon, juice, soda, and cake. I think I listed it all. I said "sister, I can not eat all of this!" Which I know can be offensive, but so would throwing up I imagine. She was very nice and told me I could take home what I did not eat. She then sent me home with ALL of the leftovers. Then I was SOOOO excited I got to exchange with Sister Fiefia in Union City! I am BEYOND proud of her. She speaks the best Tongan of all the Tongan missionaries, so the members adore her, and she has completely turned around her area and teaches all day long basically. She is doing a great job training too. And both Tongan companions I had made me breakfast loaded with eggs and bread cooked in eggs (like a french toast). I think I ate more protein in the 3 days in the Tongan program than I have in my whole mission combined. Just kidding, but seriously...hopefully I did not come back 5 pounds heavier. But I helped Sister Fiefia teach two hispanic girls who want nothing to do with Spanish anything, they would rather go to the Tongan ward haha. So we extended baptismal dates and they accepted! Sister Fiefia found them in a stairwell and had asked Plan of Salvation questions, "have you ever wondered where you came from or why you are here?" and the girl looked at her in shock and said "Oh my gosh! That is exactly what I have been thinking about lately!" The Lord truly prepares these people!

 

Also, when I was in the middle of exchanges, I walked into the Visitor's Center to end one exchange and wait for the other sisters to get there to do another, and the first person I saw in the VC was RYAN GILLIS! Woah weird! I called his name and he was surprised to see me, he remembered I was serving in California but not sure where. Then he said "so you probably don't know, I am getting married in like an hour." Woah, weird! Then I saw his family outside the Oakland temple! What are the odds he got married in the Oakland temple?! At the very moment I happened to pass through. I gave Alisha and Sister Gillis a hug, but they were running late for the sealing so that was it. That was possibly one of the strangest things that has happened to me on my mission haha. I am getting so absorbed by mission life, I forget about everyone else my age doing those things. I told them all congrats. If any of you see Kami Chamberlain or her family, tell them I said congrats as well. Weird, weird, weird.

 

Well we found some new investigators this week, but they are too young for our ward, so we are passing them off to the YSA elders. They will probably be baptized, they are super cool girls from China! Hopefully we get blessed with investigators we can actually continue teaching. That is two weeks in a row we consistently found 2 new investigators a week, but we cannot teach them. My companion and I almost wonder though if it is our ward not ready yet to receive new members. As wonderful as some of the people are, everything is still new and learning to function. We don't even have some of the key callings called yet. We do have 81 names on record, which is awesome! It grows every week. No one really knows each other too much yet, but its getting better. 

 

Sorry for the ramblings for this week, this transfer is going by fast! I have three more exchanges this week, including going back to Walnut Creek, and the Oakland Samoan program! Oh yeah we had Zone Conference this week. It was really good, we got training on asking inspired questions so we can teach by the spirit and people can recieve by the spirit. It has changed my teaching, and I have seen amazing results! I thought I understood inspired questions before, but this was a very different training, I loved it!

 

LOVE YOU ALL!

Love,

Sistah Mahtini from Texsisi (Tongan name from Texas)