Elise's mission letters

  Iaorana tatou, bonjour tout le monde, et hello Imagine this: you walk into church. As a missionary, you weave through all of the pews, making sure to give every. single. person. a fist bump. It takes 15 minutes.  We give fist bumps, or checks as they are called here, to everyone- when we start and end lessons, at the grocery store, on the street, etc. People love to add a little *~spice*~ to their fist bumps, thus leading to Sr Young and I taking the time to name some of these fist bumps.  We have:  1. The Classic 10/10 2. The Claw: when you go in for a fist bump and then the other person grabs your fist.  7/10 3. The Snap: typically performed by the youth. When you give a fistbump and they snap their fingers at the same time to add some ~pizazz~.   -100/10 4. The Mami: when they go in for a high five so you go in for a high five but then they just press their hand against yours for a couple seconds. 12/10 Some events of this week, in no particular o...

Iaorana tatou  ~~miracle bébé~~ For some context, we go street contacting on this street called Ahonu pretty much every day. Fun fun. A few weeks ago we met Wendy! We taught her à couple times and every time she was holding this one baby. This baby is very cute and as curly Brown hair and he giggles when I make silly faces. 11/10 à good baby.  On Thursday this week, we passed by another house at Ahonu and started teaching this man named Tehaamaru who was taking care of this very same baby. It turns out that Tehaamaru is this baby's dad.  Yesterday, we were doing more street contacting at à différent part of Ahonu and started talking to this couple. They turned around and we realized that they were holding, yet again, the same baby.  The power of this child.  To summarize, this baby has been présent when we have found 3 différent people to teach.  I will keep you all updated on this baby's efforts to convert the entirety of Ahonu.  And now, some thought...

  Americans living in à french-speaking country that is literally named French Polynesia talk with french tourists and realize, for the first time ever, that they don't know how to pronounce the French word for "goodbye."  Nana is way easier than "au revoir" or whatever the word is.  Anyway, this week was a doozy. Very tiring, sometimes frustrating, sometimes exciting.  Here are some ~-Highlights-~ "You see, I'm tahitian but I don't know how to say tahitian names."  -our friend after we asked her what her granddaughter's name was.  "Do you think that jif is jealous of skippy?"  -Sr Young 3 weeks after learning that the tahitian word for peanut butter is skippy. This fact is clearly still bothering her.  We went to the trois cascades  and  the beach last p-day. Very fun. Took lots of good pictures. Jokes, the pictures weren't good. Thank you wind. But it was still fun.  While street contacting, we met this older couple. They we...

  A local icecream company called TipTop is doing this promotional sale where some of the popsicles have sticks that say "bravo, 1 eskimo gagné." If you find such à stick at the end of your popsicle, you can take it in to any store and receive 1 popsicle, free of charge. Tahitians are going absolutely crazy about this Willy Wonka fananza. We have been given so so many popsicles. Help us.  Iaorana tatou! If I remember my Marquesian correctly, kaoha!  This week was rough. I had a cold-not fun at all- but if I am looking on the bright side, I did win 2 free popsicles so life is good. Most of the week was spent taking naps, but even if we didn't get to go out a ton, we still saw a lot of cool miracles!  On Saturday, we found Ishmael! He told us that he would come to church. Normally, when people say this, they are lying and don't come to church. However, Ishmael came! We realized at church yesterday that he comes to church every week, but is not à member! He says that th...

  "Vous avez traverser le déluge, la boue, et les chiens, et pour ça, je vais vous donner 3 minutes."  Iaorana tatou!  This week was, yet again, à wild one.  Voila the events of this week:  1. Hymn no 69 We were teaching Sheeva, who is this absolutely adorable woman. At the end of the lesson we asked her if we could sing and she excitedly said yes! She told us that she had attended church when she was young with her friend and remembered liking one particular hymn. However, she remembered neither the melody nor the words.  Sr Young, inspired by the Spirit: "Hymn number 69?" Sheeva, enthralled: "OUIIII!!!!!!!"  Sheeva, her husband and kids, and their best friend Vai all came to church sunday! It made our hearts happy. I love this family!  2. Transfer news!  Sr Young and I are staying in Mahina! I am really excited to stay. We decided that we will be brave this transfer and go street contacting in the mountains (literally just huge gated mansio...