Elise's mission letters

 I will begin this email in the same way that everyone starts their church talks in our ward.  Dear brothers and sisters, friends of the church, and the children:  hello. Anyway, I hope you all had a wonderful week!  Last week We went on a hike in Papenoo valley and it was gorgeous. Sometimes my head can't comprehend how absolutely beautiful it is here. The one downside of the hike is that I had cleaned our car right before we essentially went 4 wheeling in the muddy mountains and rivers of Tahiti.  We had another amazing lesson with our friends Sheeva and Hono! We taught them about the Holy Ghost and how it feels. They immediately replied with "Yeah when you guys left last week you took the Spirit with you." I love how they are so open to the guidance and warmth of God's communication to His children. It takes humility to feel the peace and joy of the gospel. We love Sheeva and Hono!  We also had a fantastic lesson with Manulani and Amulek! And with Tapu! ...

  Iaorana tout le monde! Happy Easter!  However, if you were in the Mahina Ward, you would have never known it was easter. For some reason all the talks were on family history and we did not sing a single easter hymn. We were bitter.  This week was very long but very good!  I will start with the sad news.  Tevainui, our friend we teach in Tahitian, moved back to her island this week. We knew that she lived on another island and was just visiting her aunt, but we assumed it was an island with missionaries.  However, she is from an island so small that government policy prohibits anyone from even visiting unless they are related to a resident. There is also no internet on the island. While it is sad to see that we will have to stop teaching Tevainui because of this, I have hope that someday, somehow, there will be a way for her to receive the strength and peace she has been looking for.  Other events, in no particular order:  We were at a fatam (mem...

  And you lose the trust of our entire teaching pool forever.  It was a slow life-flashing-before-your-eyes fall. Bonjour tout le monde!  This week was not too crazy but know that probably 30% of our time was spent trying to figure out Alexis's baptismal papers. Rip.  My tahiti-related abilities are slowly progressing! My french is getting better, I can understand more Tahitian, and I am way better at killing mosquitos and sweeping cockroaches out of our house. And that is growth.  By rough estimates, we think that we have been given $150 of fresh coconut water in 3 weeks. Take that dehydration.  I went on exchanges in Faaripo with Sister Jorgensen! We were on bikes which was fun and we taught a lot of cool lessons! One of our friends said the following:  "Yooooo my friend i hinaaro un casse crout."  That is indeed a sentence in 3 languages and if anyone can figure out what it means, you win!  I don't have a lot to write about this week. We e...

  Iaorana tout le monde! (This is the part of the email where all of you now say iaorana back.)  Before we get into it, subject headline comes from Friday morning. On thursday night, Sr Paul had put in a contact in our areabook for Friday morning called "faaoni." We woke up and had zéro clue what faaoni meant. After an embarrassing phone call with a member, some google maps searching, a dictionary, and looking at our member records, we were still lost. Did Sr Paul have a fever dream and make up a tahitian word by throwing together a lot of vowels? Possibly.  (But don't worry we eventually figured out that faaoni is a place!)  I hope you all had an amazing conference weekend and a miracle filled week!  Our friend Alexis got baptized friday. It was a very amazing baptism and he was just so happy! The spirit was very strong and we are very proud of Alexis and this step he has made! He is having some struggles in his life right now, so pray for him.  Here are s...