Joyeus Noel!

Merry Christmas everyone!  It was super fun to see all of you, and I'm so glad that everyone's doing great!  It was nice seeing a little bit of Christmas spirit haha cuz there's like none here.  And dad, don't worry the pinapo is on it's way.

Dylan's baptism was on Saturday, which was super cool.  He was confirmed yesterday, as well as ordained to the office of priest.  He's awesome, and it's really cool to see someone come into the fold.  Two more investigators fixed their baptismal dates this week, which was dope, if you're obedient blessings come.

We did a little bit of a secret santa that I told you all about yesterday, which was also really cool.  The smiles that lit up the people's faces made me so happy.  The people here don't have a lot, and they didn't have any other Christmas gifts for their kids.  Giving is what Christmas is all about, and it was really fun to spread some happiness.

We tried the hike again this morning, but this time we brought our guide, to make sure we didn't get lost.  His name is Teahi, a super funny 11 year old.  He talked nonstop the entire hike haha funny kid.  It was a sweet hike, and the view at the top was way pretty.

I don't have too much else to say this week, so happy new year!

Elder McQuiston

Pictures:  Dylan's baptism, with our branch president, and branch mission leader
some pictures with the kids we gave present to
Some pics from the hike

week: weird Marquisien relationships

Kaoha mes chères amis et ma famille bien-aime haha.

Merry Christmas everyone!  This week was my busiest week on the mission by far... We have a ton of investigators and teach them all like 3 times a week, and they're all progressing fairly quickly for the most part.

Hmm k Tuesday I finally finished the huge French study book they gave us at the MTC, so I've moved on to start studying Marquisien and Tahitian.  We had some solid lessons as well, and met a guy that is the brother of one of our members.  He is all wrapped up and in tons of pain, because  he was climbing some coconut tree and then the bottom of the tree caught on fire, and he caught on fire before jumping off and breaking his wrist and some ribs....Super sad.

Wednesday we couldn't find a ride over to Hooumi, so we had someone take us and our bikes up to the top of the mountain in between Taiohae and Hooumi.  It was a super fun ride down, we were flying...Probably not the safest thing but what can you do.  After our split at Hooumi with a newly reactivated member we headed back chez nous to the chapel.  We had a lesson with Carla, a 16 year old investigator at Ua Huka over Skype.  She's super cool, and had a super cool experience.  She prayed to find out if the Book of Mormon is true, and felt the spirit super strong, even brought her to tears.  She wants to be baptized, the only problem is that she's living with someone...at 16 years old!! That's the first weird relationship.

The other day...Friday I think we were playing soccer in the backyard with a member, just juggling and such.  Then his mom came out and we started chatting with her... which is when we found out the second weird relationship.  When she was 17 her husband had a kid with someone "very close to her", and then he left that person and got married to her.  Then she told us who the first person was...her sister!  What in the world...and turns out her sister is one of our investigators!  The relationships here are so messed up...and the kid is now 16 and is pregnant living with someone who is 21.  Weird stuff.

Well normally we have a baptism this weekend, but he's not sure if he wants to make the decision to follow the parole de sages, so we're hoping all goes well and he'll get baptized Saturday.  But we'll see.  That's pretty much all for this week...I love you all, until next week!

Elder McQuiston

Pic's:  A pic of me from a viewpoint on the way down to Hooumi, I love my helmet...Also if you look really close you can see some houses in the background...yep that's Hooumi.  And you can actually see the house we went to, if I was there I'd probably show you which one,  Hmm what was the third one... A pic of Taiohae I'm guessing?  The fourth was us with one of our dope Marquisien friends.

Beloved loved ones in a far far away land

Bonjour tout le monde!

We had a dope week this semaine, fixed two baptismal dates and almost died on some hike that turns out wasn't a hike and we found ourselves lost in some thick plants that were like head height way in the mountains this morning.

Alright d'abord Tuesday...actually I changed my mind I don't want to do a day by day.  Well sometime during the week we found two of our ancient amis and had a super good lesson with them both.  We talked about their goals, and then talked about what we can do and what they need to do to accomplish those goals, and they both recommitted themselves to keep their commitments and read the book of mormon.

We also did like 10 lessons over Skype this week with our amis on the other island, and we fixed the baptismal date for one of them!  So we're in the process of planning our next trip over there, which we hope will be the 3rd to the 10th of January.

Our other baptismal date was with the older brother of Kua, our recent convert.  He's 16, and was super touched by his sisters baptism.  When we had our first lesson with him, we found out that he had already fixed his baptism date for the 24th, which is tp we didn't have to do like anything, merci Seigneur.

We also did a split with our recently activated member Fr. Ah-Scha at Hooumi, a little valley like 45 minutes away by car.  It went super well, he used to be a ward mission leader a t Tahiti, and knew what he was doing.  He kept going off in Marquisien, and got all the amis we saw to promise they'd read the book or mormon and pray about it.

On Wednesday we found a new investigator names Steven, the nephew of one of the  members, who has 19 years.  He is way cool and our lesson went super well, and he said he already knows that it's true.  But that's just a side note.  The real story is he made us take a bunch of peppers off of their pepper plant.  When we got home I decided to pop one in my mouth, and turns out it's extremely hot and it destroyed my mouth, esophagus, and eventually my stomach.  45 minutes later I was still sweating and in burning pain laying on the tile.  I decided I'm gonna try and build a tolerance for them, eat one every week until they don't effect me anymore.

Sunday I played the piano and got wrecked, Sweet of prayer was my only saving grace.  But all the members were like astonished because nobody plays the piano on like the whole island, and there's like hardly anyone that knows how to read music either.  So yah they're making play every week from now on.

D'accord bon semaine tout le monde, je vous aime!

Elder McQuiston

Pictures:  The first one is probably the weirdest thing I've ever seen, we saw a horse on some shortcut we were on, and it was wearing a flip flop hahaha.  And then some pictures from our hike this morning, and a rock.

Watch out, I gotta deadly weapon!

Alright first of all thanks so much for the Christmas packageQ  That was a super nice surprise on Tuesday, and yep I couldn't wait for Christmas so I opened it a month in advance haha.  Thanks so much for the cards from everyone, and thanks mom and Emerie for the gifts, you guys are the best.  We got the news that me and Elder Isabell will be staying here for the next transfer at least, so I'll be here at Nuku Hiva for Christmas.

This week we put our new plan of really focusing on the members into action, with lots of success!  Already we have a few really solid investigators, and we had a baptism on Saturday!  We also reactivated a few members, and we've started to work with other members.

The baptism was super top, Kua is awesome and I'm impressed with her strength, in a town where she is one of the only members, at 14 years old.  She was confirmed on Sunday by Elder Isabell.  We found out 5 minutes before primary that we were going to be teaching it, which was a big surprise.  The kids are insane, and man do I feel for the primary teachers, I was fearing for my life at the end of church.  After church we had another lesson with Kua, and while we were there our DMB found his pain keyboard and gave it to us, so looks like I'm the new ward pianist, and I'm going to be practicing a ton at the house this week.

Today we had a super crazy day, which is why I don't have a ton of time, sorry everyone.  But I did find a super dope cassette, which I had to buy.  I'll send the pics.  We also gave a benediction to Roland, a man here that is paralyzed from a  car accident, who has a ton of faith and wants to be healed.  We gave him a blessing, which was a super cool experience, and the spirit was super strong.  By the end of the blessing, he began to be abel to move both of his eyes and see close up, and his mouth was working a lot better.   I know that the priesthood is the power of God, and that by our faith we can accomplish miracles.

I love you all, talk to you next week!

Elder McQuiston

This is the cassette I bought (bread-head), probably the dopest thing I've ever seen, and a huge part of the culture here, they were the weapons of the natives.  I had to buy it because it was the best priced cassette I've seen, and it was a pap I know who made it....Anyways yah watch out I got a deadly weapon 

 Pictures from the baptism

 A bellevedaire

Me with some water behind me

Nous sommes arrives de Ua Huka

Bonjour la famille!

Well definitely an insane week for us, with a lot of crazy news and miracles.

Monday we had a family night with 27 people there!  We were really surprised to have so many people there.  We did a few activities and a lesson, and fixed lessons with all of the amis that were there.

On Tuesday we felt the first opposition.  The father in law of Marie came and told us we were going to have to move out of the house we were at, because he was really upset at Marie for getting baptized.  (Ua Huka is 99% Catholic).  We packed up our stuff, not knowing where we were going to go and headed out to teach our lessons.  Our lessons went incredibly well, everyone was super prepared for us, and we found a bunch of new amis that were really interested.  When we returned back to the house, we found out that the husband of Marie went and talked to his parents, and convinced them in tears to let us stay.  He's a super cool guy, and is also making a lot of progression.

On Wednesday we had a lesson with one of our new amis, and then her brother in law came over and started going crazy on questions and stuff, and talked about his beliefs on the purpose of animals and whether or not there will be animals int he celestial kingdom for half an hour straight...Mess haha.  But after that, another ami Marie set her baptismal date!  We were super surprised, and looks like we're going to have to make another trip over to Ua Huka soon.  We talked with President Bize that night, and he said he's strongly considering sending the missionaries to Ua Huka, so there's a chance that there might be a change here this upcoming transfer, we'll find out on Friday.

On Thursday before we left we had a fireside, and watched the Joseph Smith Restoration video.  We had 30 people at that one!  We bore our testimonies afterwards, and told everyone thanks for letting us stay there and stuff, the spirit was super strong and it was super cool.

Friday we headed back to Nuku Hiva, and once again we landed safely.  We tried to go and see a bunch of our amis here, and fixed some lessons with them.

On Saturday we had another baptism, the first baptism so far a Hooumi, another valley on the island.   It went pretty well, except during the confirmation the little girl's dad forgot to confirm her a member of the church, and at the end we reminded him, and there was just this little pause"...ah mess" and we re-did it haha.  The Frere that baptized his daughter was inactive when I first got here, and had a big problem with the parole de sagesse, and so we worked with their family, and now he's worthy and super active and happy, and his wife was called as Relief Society 2nd counselor on Sunday, which was super cool to see.

Yesterday at church we had a ton of amis de l'eglise there, and like everyone was there early and stuff.  The branch has grown a ton since I've been here, which is awesome.  We had a lesson with one of the amis after church, and she said she knows the church is true and wants to be baptized, and she's ready and wants to do it this week.  So looks like we might have another baptism this week too, which is awesome.  We'll see what goes down.

I love you all, thanks for the prayers, the miracles are coming!  Follow the commandments, say your prayers everyday and read your squirters everyday, and you'll have power over the adversary.  Until next week!

Elder McQuiston

 The Airplane we flew over to Ua Huka Island

  

Me and my Comp in Ua Huka 

 Our German Pancakes

Pictures of the Baptisms

Bonjour

Well Bonjour everyone, turns out we got permission to email from a members computer...so everyone thank sr. Ellis haha.  And I'm alive and well, I survived the crazy avion.

Alright well I'll start from the beginning...so last Monday we had a family home everyone with this inactive sister that was quite the character.  She's about fifty years old, and is divorced with three kids.  I went into the evening thinking that we'd do a nice lesson, but turns out she talked straight for abhor after dinner, and then just cut herself off and said, alright it's about time for you to head home!  Super funny haha.

On Thursday, Elder Cardon of the seventy was in our mission and did a mission conference for 8 hours, and all of the elders in the islands were supposed to connect over the computer  Welp our computer definitely didn't work, and we sat at the church for like 3 hours trying to fix it to no avail.  Bummer!

Friday was the big day, we headed out for Ua Huka.  We are accompanied by Sr. Ellis our relief society president and Fr. Butcher our dumb, who are both super awesome.  After the hour car ride to the airport we got the first glimpse of the airplane, and it was the smallest thing I've ever seen!  There were only 18 seats and we were right next to the pilot, super sketchy haha.  It was a crazy plane ride, super bumpy but only like 20 minutes so no problem.  Ua Huka is super pretty, a part of me doesn't want to go back to Nuku Hiva haha there's a ton of potential here.

Saturday was the baptism of Marie.  It went super well, we had like 20 Amis there.  I gave the baptism talk and Sr. Ellis gave the Holy Ghost talk, and then we headed out into the ocean.  Turns out the ocean isn't deep, so they had to go super far out and we had to follow to witness.  I soaked like my only clothes I have here, but hey no worries who doesn't love salty pantalons. 

Yesterday we did a sacrament meeting, thinking hardly anyone would be there because there are only 4 members on the island.  To our surprise there were 23 people there, and everyone was super interested and payed close attention, it was the first time the gospel has really been on this island, and the first baptism here.

Super cool week so far!  I love you all, see ya next week!

Elder McQuiston

Week...month 4 last week of it

Alright well last week started off pretty eventful...On Monday Elder Isabell quickly got wrecked by some illness and started feeling awful while we were at the church doing our emails.  We looked up the symptoms of Chikungunya, and his symptoms lined up almost exactly.  We called up a member that's a nurse, and she diagnosed him over the phone.  Chikungunya is really similar to Dengue fever, usually for a few weeks and is extremely painful.  Elder Isabell could barely walk it was really bad.  So we headed back to the apartment, and I called over a member to help me give him a blessing.  It was a really really cool experience.  E. Isabell asked me to do it, and in English.  The spirit was extremely strong, and after the blessing almost all of his pain went away, and his fever shot down (It was at like 102).  The next day he was almost completely healed, we were able to do all of our lessons and contacting as normal.

Also on Tuesday the boat came, and we finally got our stuff!  Finally some book of Mormons and some teaching materials...I also got my birthday package, which was AMAZING thanks everyone!  The maple syrup especially is killer haha we've been using that baby to it's fullest.

Wednesday was pretty interesting...We kinda had a little bit of an argument int he morning, and we forgot to pray before we left the house.  We had a couple lessons, and they were both super rough.  We didn't really have the spirit with us, and we were both felling pretty down.  We headed back to the house and had a really prayerful companionship study.  After that we headed back out and did a whoppin 10 lessons, all super good lessons with the spirit super strong.  Having the spirit with you makes all the difference.

On Saturday night we had  a fireside led by us, which went super well, we had a ton of the branch there.  Our goal was to unify the branch, so we mostly played a bunch of games.  We played the game where two people sit on either side of a sheet and you drop it and the first one to say the other persons name wins a point, as well as reverse charades.  They were both a huge hit, and we were pretty happy about it.

Well that's just about all for this week, sorry I don't have any pictures this week we forgot our card reader...And I'm guessing I won't be able to send much of an email next week, we'll see.

Love you all, talk to you in 2 weeks! (or next who knows)

Elder McQuiston

Dogs and Rivers...

Well shoot I forgot my journal today...So I'm basically done for haha.  But hey c'est pas grave, who needs that anyways?

Hmm funny stories for this week...I'm not sure if I already mentioned this story, but a few weeks ago we were riding our bikes across this river we have to cross to get to the chapel, and my tires totally slipped out on the slimy bottom, and I fell straight in the river, got completely drenched.

Another one, I got bit by a dog this week.  We were just walking down the road and some dog was asleep in the middle of the road, and right as we past it jumped up and took a chunk outta my leg...It was so unexpected haha I just yelled ow so loud haha but hey no big deal...I'll probably end up eating that dog some day, no joke hahaha.

So it was conference week this week!  We had a couple people come from the district, someone from the mission presidency, and like 10 members from Ua Huka and Ua Pou.  I met Marie Christine for the first time on Wednesday in person, and she's top, no worries about her.  On Thursday we went with the leaders and visited all the inactive members, which went great they were super funny.  The conference that night went great, and we had 64 people there!  That's almost twice as much as we have on a good week, which was incredible.

So Thursday I didn't tell anyone it was my birthday...and it almost worked.  Until some random missionary called the wrong number, and before he said goodbye he asked Elder Isabell to tell me Happy Birthday...and then Elder Isabell told everyone and everyone freaked out haha.  During the conference they mentioned me two times, then right after they made me come up front and sang to me in Marquisien, French and English.  Then they brought out this huge cake... 

Well there's the week as far as I can remember...but no worries if I missed anything I'll just throw it in next week.  Love you all!

Elder McQuiston

Oh and ps our trip is finalized for the 18-25...and I have no idea what we'll do for p-day, so it'll just be a surprise I guess haha

Note from mom:  Here's a story he shared from my email- Cool story from this week is that one day we prayed to know where to go and to lead us to find people like usual, and then we went out and worked for like 4 hours.  And in those four hours we never found anyone that we could have a lesson with.  But there were a ton of "coincidences", and we ran into a ton of people we'd been looking for, and a few people that wanted to schedule a lesson with us.  It was definitely guided by the Holy Ghost, and although we might not always have a ton of "success", the Lord knows what needs to be done and he'll make it happen, if we are being obedient and doing our best.

A pic of us with Yolanda, a Sr. from Ua Huka 

My Birthday Cake 

My birthday party after conference 

A view from an amis house

Happy Halloween!

Kaoha tout le monde! Super good news this week, we finally fixed the baptism of Marie, our ami at Ua Huka! We set it for 19 Nov, and we got the approval of Pres. Bize to go over there for a week, to do the baptism, confirmation, a family night, a saint scene, and some contacting, which I'm super super excited about.  We will probably take a boat over there on the 16ish, and come back on the 2ish.  So my day will probably be messed up there, Idk for sure when it'll be.  Sadly we're going to have to push back Karen's baptism date, we're really hoping we can get it fixed and get here ready.

Wednesday was the day we finally set Marie's date.  We had a lesson with her over Skype, and it turns out she's been reading the book of mormon like crazy, and is already through Alma!  She has no problems with the word of wisdom or law of chastity, which is awesome.

On Saturday we finally got the chance to go to Aakapa, with Coco and Chantal finally getting back.  It was super super cool, a 2 hour drive.  Besides Taiohae and Taipivai, there are only two other valleys that are really inhabited, and that was my first time seeing them.  We have a really cool family over there that are members, and they hooked us up fatty with a bunch of coconut water, which is super good, they call it l'eau de vie, the water of life haha.

Besides that not too much news, other than the fact that we have district conference this week, and there'll probably be some big changes in the branch.  We have 12 members coming for the conference from Ua Pou and Ua Huka, and we're excited to meet all of them, and hopefully plan a trip to Ua Pou for the beginning of December or something.

Thanks for all the emails and prayers, I love you all, have fun trick or treating!

Elder McQuiston

A huge moth thing that was attacking me 

Pictures from our trip to Aakapa