24th WEEK IN TONGA, VAVA'U / LONGOMAPU / TU'ANUKU

FIRST WEEK IN VAVA'U

Guys!  Vava'u is so flippin cool.  When I said I heard there were mountains, that was kind of an understatement.  There are hills everywhere!  So different from Ha'apai which is so flat.

So my first day here,  I find out that we cover another little town called Tu'anuku which is like a hour and a half long walk.  My comp tells me he knows a shortcut lol.  We go down it and end up walking that whole hour and a half in mud up to our ankles. We were feeling a little adventurous.

Longomapu and Tu'anuku are so dang cool!  The people here are awesome and they are all homies. We have a homie in Tu'anuku, his name is Spencer and he's from NZ.  He's the man and gives us fruit everyday.  He lives in his home with his older brother Ngongo, who's like 80 I think. He has a ton of land that he grows fruit on that he doesn't even sell.  He grows it for him and to share with the missionaries.  Such a stud.  He gave us some bananas that he said would cost $50 each in the states because they are organic! Getting organic fruit for free boi!

Had my first warm shower in 5 months.

So everyone here in Longomapu are homies like I said, but pretty much everyone who isn't a member, hate the church.  There's this guy named Felengi(Franky) and he's a teacher at one of the schools.  If he sees any of the kids talking to the missionaries then he will either hit them or not let them come to school.

That ticks me off a little because these kids are the BEST.  My favorite thing to do here is show the kids magic tricks and give them candy.  And for some reason they love my hair.  I don't know how many times I've been told, "Oua, oku tika aupito ho'o ulu masi'i." Translation: Dang, Your hair is way cool man.!

My first Sunday here was good.  Sometimes in Sacrament Meetings here, people will sing a song in there talks, its straight awkward. 

I forgot to mention!  In my last area we met this very old lady.  We were talking with her and find out she's from Niua (an island were Kolipoki served(Other Side of Heaven)) I asked her if she knew him and she did!  She said she was way good friends with him.  What if shes that girl from that one scene in the movie!? 😱

AND My moma told me that I'm related to one of the first three LDS missionaries that came here to Tonga.  What the heck!?  How cool is that!?!  Tongas in my blood!!  Juat know I'm as palangi (white) as they come.

My B-day today was lit as always!  Spent the whole day waiting in our MQ for Pres to come and interview us!  Got ZC tomorow here in Vava'u.

The views here would blow your minds, these pics don't do them justice.  I'll try and take more to send next week when there's more time!

Love everyone so much! Hook me up with the deets on how all your lives are going!

Ofa ATUUU😘

23rd WEEK IN TONGA, HIHIFO

OSI EKU NGAUE 'I HA'APAI

YUPPP I'm getting transferred!  Heading to a whole new island grouping.  VAVA'U here I come!! Apparently where I'm going there is actually mountains!  Not your everyday sight on these islands. I'm serving in a place called Longomapu and I'm going to be comps with Elder Hosea who was the last AP here in Misiona Tonga.  Apparently the fafangas (feedings) in Vava'u are BOMB (aka PUAKA KI AI) so time for me to gain all that weight I lost here in Ha'apai (20 lbs). 

Anyways my last week in Hihifo has been a little uneventful :(

A lot of our appointments this week fell through which is always a big bummer.

BUT we got to teach that one guy that a couple emails back I mentioned and said that me and Despain thought was very prepared!  We taught him about the apostasy and the restoration.  The whole lesson he kept telling us about how much it makes sense and he believes that the church that Christ established was lost and he has been looking for the right one the past while.  GOLDEN.  So we brought him a Book of Mormon and showed him a couple of places to read and he was like, "Ok, I hope that Despain and the next Elder keep working with him because he is the man!

AND we finally got to teach that lady that I mention forever ago that owns the restaurant again.  Such an awesome lesson!  We also taught her the Restoration, and afterwards she explained how she felt so different and warm when we shared the first vision.  The spirit was doing its job!!  Despain was telling me how he's never heard someone here in Tonga explain so clearly that they were feeling the spirit like that.  Probably helps that she speaks English.

Man to bad that I'm going to be leaving these awesome investigators but I've got a new area coming up and I am pumpeed!! 

STAY TUNED NEXT WEEK FOR CRAYZAY PICS OF VAVA'U

Big ofas and 'umas to all you guys!

-Elder 'Nite

22nd WEEK IN TONGA, HIHIFO

Not much to share this week! We got 2 more baptisms on Friday and I baptized a little 8 year old named Tamafua.

We've been blessed these past couple of days to meet a lot of new people and this one little family that we feel are very prepared! We are teaching them on Tuesday.

Lovin the work, hope everyone is lovin life! :)

If you have time, read D&C 136:31. Adversity is a part of life!

Ofa lahi mo'oni ka moutolu

-Elder 'Nite

 One of the fallen trees

 A great Baptism

 Oh no, I'm going down

Beautiful skies

21st WEEK IN TONGA, HIHIFO

John Tonga From Samoa

Hey everyone!  That name up there in the subject is the name of the
kid we baptized this week!  Sione Tonga Meiha'amoa.  This kid is the
man!  My comp first taught him while we were on splits one night, he
set up the baptismal date right then because he was prepared!  He was
telling us before he got baptized about how his friends keep coming
over and trying to get him to smoke again, but he has been strong, and
sees the joy this gospel can bring.  What a stud!

Unfortunately this other mother and son that we had set up to get
baptized with Sione, weren't able to, because her husband said he
didn't want them to.  That was a really big disappointment because we have
been teaching them since we first got here to Hihifo.  We went over one
day to try and talk with her and they weren't home, so we went to her
neighbors, who happened to be her husbands moms house and we got
yelled at pretty good by her.  She told us she hates us and all we do
because they are bad things, and that she is going to call the cops and quote,
"I never want to see you two on this land again!"... That was a little uncalled 

for especially because the ward had spend all morning cutting and cleaning 

their huge yard/field that their house sits on.  But you know what they say, 

kill them with kindness!  From now on we are going to be so dang nice to her 

she cant do anythings about it.

In other news.... there was a pretty crazy storm on Tuesday, knocked
some trees over (Ill include some pics)

We got some free bread this week!!  It only took listening to an old
man for about an hour trying to tell us a whole ton of stories in some
pretty bad English.  Totally worth it.

So last week we heard about how this man that we had had a family home
evening with, had died and was buried, and we were totally shocked and
it was crazy.  BUT THEN.. he showed up to church this Sunday!  We were
like, "what the heck paulu, you died?!"  We still dont know the whole
story, but just so all you at home know,  PAULU LIVES haha

So as of right now we are friends with and have been talking to 5
ministers from other religions.  We were talking with one of them, he
told us how he respects us a ton and asked us if we could meet some
time and if we could share with him ways he could help the youth of
his church make better choices with the Word of Wisdom.  So we met with
him and talked for about a half an hour.  At the end he asked us if we
will speak to all the youth of his church some Sunday. That's gonna be
sicckkk!!

We found out this last week that the Stake President of Ha'apai, who
lives in our ward, told everyone in a Stake meeting that he is going
to call President Tui'one at the end of this transfer and ask him if
we can stay at least another transfer in the area because of the work
he's seen us do in the area so far.  That was so dang cool to hear!

One day while we were out doin our thing, the Stake Pres's wife
invited us in to eat some left over food, so we went on in and were
just talking for a little bit.  After a while she told me about how me
Tongan has gotten a lot better and when we spoke in Sacrament, even
though it wasn't perfect, she could understand the meaning of
everything I was trying to say.  That was really helpful and a huge
Tender Mercy because Ive been a little down on myself the past bit because
of the language and that was a huge reminder to me of who's work this
is, and how I am just a tool in the Lords hands.

Have an awesome week everyonee :)

Ofaas!

-Elder Kalanite

20TH WEEK IN TONGA, HIHIFO

Oatmeal is Ifo

Well there's not a whole ton new this week to be had!  The work is really picking up, but people can only meet at night, so the nights are awesome, but during the day is still so slow because of how small the area is. 

This last week we taught a lesson to a ex-conman from NZ this week.  He has like perfect English and is very deep in religion, the convos get very interesting. 

We met the owner for the bakery in Ha'apai and his English is pretty good too, but he's pretty old and loves to go on and on.  We listened about his days working for the airline, being the Rowing team coach and him going to Utah for like and hour and a half. We tried to leave like 3 times but he doesn't stop.

One day this week while it was raining, we were chilling under a tree,  I saw a coconut and asked my comp if he wanted to drink it.  I guess he didn't because he threw it right at the tree I was sitting right next to. Coconut EVERYWHERE.  It's a miracle my shirt is still white because coconut wrecks clothes.

Yesterday, we ended up speaking in sacrament meeting again. The funny thing was, I could determine how good my Tongan was, all off of the face of one our members.  When he would start looking uncomfortable and confused, I knew it was getting real bad.  But then he would look really interested, and I'd get all confident.. and it'd go down hill again. Oh yeah between, our Stake President is a G and wore a red, green, and blue belt to church yesterday. 

Our members are really happy with the work that is getting done and people they are seeing coming to church, in our meeting yesterday, they were telling us how grateful they were for that, and it was awesome.  Love the people in this area!  We have 3 baptisms set up for this coming Saturday, 3 for the Saturday after that, and we should be getting a couple more after that, before the end of the transfer.  Hopefully they will all go through! 

We were able to set up 2 different appointments this up coming week with ministers for other religions! We'll see how that goes.

If you translate some of the peoples names here, they have some really funky meanings, for example:

Tonga'onevai: Tongan Sand Water

Vaivela: Hot water

Fakalua: To make throw up (lol, this was a little girls name)

and our bishops name translated is, Willy Fishermen

All righty, love all you guys, have an awesome week!

-Eleta Kalanite

NINETEENTH WEEK IN TONGA, HIHIFO

'Oku 'i ai Fakalakalaka

You guys like that word in the subject??  Fakalakalaka.  One of my favs.  It means progress, and we are seeing a lot of that in our area this week!  We went from not having any investigators or anything to go off of in the area to a pretty good sized group of investigators and this week we got 6 baptismal dates set up!  4 just yesterday on Sunday!  Good stuff!!!

This week has felt pretty slow but thinking back we got a lot done.  For one, we figured out that crackers and ranch taste like croutons.  SO GOOD.  Shout out to my big bro for the ranch.  Last Monday I found out that they sell Peanut Butter and Jam at the store in our area and I just about freaked out.  Made some nice PB and J sandwiches.  DELISH.  I hope you all take advantage of whatever food you have access too.  For real, gratitude is key!

This week we finally watched that broadcast about the changes to the missions.  Almost had to watch it all in Tongan, but we worked our way around that.

The wind has been crazy here!  So much wind and rain the past couple of days.  Our ward mission leader was telling us about the hurricane 2 years ago.  He said that it pretty much leveled everything in Ha'apai in like 10 min.  It took the roof off of one of the Siasi Tonga buildings.  Flippin crazy.

Speaking of our ward mission leader, he is pretty much a legend and whenever he speaks in Sacrament Meeting, he gets up and starts yelling at everyone. He's a little enthusiastic about the work. Awesome guy!

Absolutely no change this week on the number of drunk people we run into.  They always love talking to the missionaries and for some reason, once they are drunk, they all of a sudden have like perfect English.  Its incredible. 

Had my first experience this week with one of our investigators deciding to feed her young child right in front of us in the middle of a lesson... yikes.

There's this church not too far from our house, I'm not sure which religion, but I swear, there's always people there singing.  I remember hearing them there at like 10:30 PM and also at 4:00 AM. That's some commitment right there.

Alright to finish this email off, I'm going to share some language mess ups from my comp and one of my zone leaders during lessons:

- "Na'e fai mana a Sisu" - Jesus did magic 

- "Te ke viku taimi katoa pe" - You would pee all the time!

- "Malo ho fakatomala, Palesiteni" - Thank you for your repentance, President. 

Have a great week everybody! Love you all!

-Elder Kalanite

EIGHTEENTH WEEK IN TONGA, HIHIFO

Na'a Mau Kai Pisa

So transfers are in and I'm staying in an area longer than one transfer for the first time in my mission!!  That was good news, I like where I'm at, Hihifo is awesome and investigators keep showing up because these members are awesome and let me tell you, in Tonga, the members are the way you get anything done.  Gotta be in good with the members!  I'm really happy to see how many people we've been able to teach this last transfer and how we have been able to help the work grow here!  We think we will have a good amount of apostle come to Tonga!!  Not just that, a member of the Presidency of the 70, and also the Presiding Bishop of the Church, and the 70 over the South Pacific Area, Elder Hallek AND the area 70 over Tonga, Elder Tukuafu.  SOO, needless to say this meeting is going to be legendary!

Our mission is also making changes to the schedule like everyone else.  Except we didn't watch the broadcast out here in Tonga, we just found out about it from our Zones like 3 days ago.

So, not a whole ton happened this week because my comp has been sick, a ton of rain down here though.  There was supposed to be a Class 2 cyclone I think, a couple of days ago, but nothing happened.  Kinda crazy stuff,  2 years ago the cyclone that hit Ha'apai totally wrecked it and leveled all the houses and trees.  There are still some abandon houses throughout the island that haven't been repaired or anything. 

We were teaching someone this week, he was really awesome and believed in just about everything we shared him.  At the end Despain asked him, if he believes all these things (which contradict the things his current church believes in) and why he is a member of that church. He just said it's because his parents were apart of it, even though his parents have since passed away.  That kind of a Tongan thing that is kind of unfortunate.  A lot of people are apart of their religion only because that's what there parents are or where even if they don't really believe in it.  Our next lesson we are going to introduce him to the Book of Mormon and let that do its job!  Man I love that book, cant get over it.

Got some pizza with the zones this week. Blessings.

Quick shout out to our awesome bishop out here in Hihifo.  This dude is the MAN!  Despain says he's probably the best bishop he's worked with on his mission.  He is always calling us and telling us that he has set up another Fakafamili (Family Home Evening) with someone for us to teach. And then he will feed that family and us and always gives us Otai (Tongan drink) and he told us about how he fasts every week for the missionary work.  Such a stud!

Ran into some more drunk people this week. Ya know, the usual. 

Here's a little Tongan culture for you guys:  Every time you pass someone or say goodbye to someone, you say "Yo" so we say that like a billion times a day. 

Also, every goodbye feels like a competition of who can say the last thing to the other person, it just keeps going on, and then you eventually say "ok!" and that ends the conversation for sure.  I feel like I'm going to be a weirdo in the states, saying "Ok!" to say goodbye to everyone.  Ah well.

All yalls have a good week wherever you are at!  Keep on keepin on!

Ofa atu!

-Yah boi Elder Kalanite