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 

Bonjour tout let monde!

There wasn't a ton that went down this week, so sorry for the kinda short email haha.  For the most part we just do a ton of contacting, and try and reteach as many of the people we contact as we can.  It's hard the work here, but we just do our best.  My least favorite thing that I hear here is Kaikai Meitai! It means bon appetite in Marquesan.  They eat soo much food here...I don't know how in the world they do it haha.  But I swear it's gonna be the death of me.  

On Wednesday we had a family dinner over at Louis' house, after a super busy day.  Elder Isabell was like dead tired after dinner, but he wanted to teach the lesson anyways.  It was super funny, he was dead tired and teaching a message that made no sense, in super bad French.  Louis on the other hand, was gone.  Out cold hahaha.  That left Louis' wife, a super nice mama, with French as her third language, trying her best to make some sort of sense of the lesson.  And then there was me, just cracking up hahaha it was so funny.

On Thursday we ended up teaching 2 teeming Jehovah's, how do you say that...Jehovahs witnesses?  And 4 Adventists...That one I have no idea what the English equivalent is.  But all of the temiogn and adventists are super stubborn, so those lessons were super tough haha.  

Friday was a super cool day.  Except for lunch.  We went over to Sr R's house, because her husband who had been training in France for 6 months just got back.  he made us Fafaru, probably the  most disgusting food on the planet.  They take a rotten fish, and let it sit for a week or so.  Then they take a fresh fish, and pour the juice from the rotten fish on it, and let is soak in for a couple days.  Super super gross, and it smells like straight rotten eggs.  But supposedly it's pretty popular in Tahiti.  After that we had a soiree familial in Taipivai.  Our DMB took us over there, but he took the whole family too, so there wasn't enough room in the truck.  So he threw some seat in the back of the truck, and we rode on that all the way over the mountain haha it was super fun.  The family night also went super good, we had a bunch of amis and inactive that came.  

Church also went super good, we had the primary program.  There were 7 amis there!  After church we had like a huge feast, and someone brought an enormous chocolate cake.  And we completely devoured all of it, all of the food was completely gone haha super funny.

Well I guess it wasn't that short after all hahaha...But I love you all, have a great week!

Elder McQuiston

Raw turtle and centipede's

How's it going everybody?  Everything's still going great here in Nuku Hiva!  We are pretty upset at the assistants tho, they didn't send us any of our stuff on the boat apparently, which means we have to wait like another month to get any of our stuff.. Mais c'est pas grave, we can make our last 3 book of mormons last a month, I guess. haha

On Tuesday we came to the bishopric meeting again, and it was so frustrating haha.  Everyone knows what the problems are and stuff, but no one wants to take the initiative to do like anything haha.  But there's not much we can do about that.  When it comes down to it we can do everything we can, but everyone has their agency, which is the story of the mission.  That night we had a super super good dinner with on of our investigators.  She made us like this three course meal with AMAZING poisson cru, sooo good.  Raw fish might sound gross, but this stuff is so good, even dad would love it.  You'll see when we come back to visit after my mission haha I'll get all of you eating fish.

We had a formation on Saturday that we made on missionary work, because there are a lot of members that want to help, but they don't know how.  So for Friday  we didn't plan any lessons, so we could go around to all the members, active and inactive an get them to our formation.  And it worked! We had a ton of people at the formation, people that we haven't ever seen at church before.  And it went really really well, all the members loved it and they were getting so into it haha.

Saturday morning we were in Taipivai and Hoomi.  And I was so dead haha, Elder Isabell got us three lunches.  I could not eat anything, I was about to explode.  But our third meal was definitely turtle, which actually wasn't too bad.  But it's interdit (not allowed) we found out after the fact, so we probably won't be eating too much of that I'm guessing.  It was pretty gross tho looking at my plate and seeing raw turtle flesh and bones haha.  Anyways.

Yesterday church went great and we had some great lessons and food.  But at our dinner appointment, on of the ladies yelled lift up your feet!  I raised mine up and looked down, and a huge centipede flew under my feet.  Super lucky, because centipedes are like the only dangerous thing here, and they are massive and bite everything.  It's probably inevitable that I'll get bit at some point, because everywhere is super open and we always take our shoes off everywhere, and sleep with our doors open  But anyways no problem!

Until next week!

Elder McQuiston

Kaoha!

The Marquesan is coming, slowly but surely.  Our ami with a baptism date Karen is  still progressing, and we're picking up the work here and getting a lot more amis.  

On Tuesday we did a lot of contacting without a ton of success, and had some lessons as well with our progressing investigators.  We also came to the branch presidency meeting, and we found out that we need our church attendance to be around 80 if we want a real chapel, and it's around 35-40 right now, so we have a lot of work to do for sure, and that's the goal of like all the members here, to get a real chapel.

On Wednesday we had a similar day, just taught a ton of lessons, and we taught english in Taipivai, which we do every Wednesday.  On Thursday we had a bunch of lessons again, but we needed a ride to take us to one of our investigators that lives pretty far away, and nobody could.  We decided to call our inactive dumb (diligent de mission de branche (branch mission leader)), and he got super excited and gave us a ride.  We went over to his house yesterday to talk about him being the dmb, and he got super excited and told us all these stories about when he used to be active as a dumb, and decided he wants to be active again and help us out.  He said he'll give us a whole day every week and drive us to Hatiheu or Aakapa every week, which is super dope we're way excited!

Mais sinon jeudi et vendredi were pretty normal as well, more lessons, contacting, stuff like that.  Except for Friday night, we had a pizza night with a nonmember family, and they taught us how to make pizza, which was way fun.

Saturday we spent most of the day in Taipivai, did some contacting and filled up our water.  We met this inactive member named rocky, and asked him if there was anything we could do for him, and he thought for a second and told us he wants us to teach him and his nonmember family the lessons, and that his brother was a bishop at Moorea.  We're super excited to head back over there and hopefully ca va bien passer.  We also gave Karen a blessing on our return, because she's heading to Tahiti for a little bit for medical reasons, which was a super cool experience.

On Sunday we only had 20 people at church!  Which was understandable because we had 4 families out of town, but still we should've had more than that.  La sainte scene is definitely our area of focus this week.  After church we went to an inactive member Jeff's house for his birthday party, and there were a ton of nonmembers there.  The food was like this grilled chicken and beef, and it was AMAZING, like one of the best meals I've ever had, so good.  We also played werewolf in French with them, which was way fun as well.

Well that's pretty much all for this week, I love you all and talk to you next week!

Elder McQuiston

The Quay of Taiohae bay 

The Petite Quay 

Some wild Horses 

The ceremonial thing in Taipivai where they did their cannibal stuff

Me with my bike as we headed down the mountain into Taiohae 

at an amazing viewpoint ofTaiohae 

A pic of the mountain with Elder Isabell in it haha 

The Taipivai Catholic church 

 The Tapivai Beach

Week 3 in Nuku Hiva

We had a super crazy week this week, tons of ups and downs.  Conference was super super good, definitely a highlight.  It didn't work well at first, it cut a ton, but we ended up getting it to work pretty good.  And one of the members brought their order here, so we got to watch it in English in the brace president's office, super nice haha.

Last day we just kinda relaxed, after emails we just went back to the house and relaxed and did some cleaning and stuff.  I had to make a new planner, which is crazy I'm already on planner 3!  (they last 6 weeks)  But my planner is pretty chill not gonna lie haha.  We have to reinforce them with cardboard and a cool picture from the liana or something and tape or else they get soaked through with sweat, which is pretty gross actually but hey no problem.

On Mardi we had like the worst day ever.  The boat arrived, which is called the Aranui, and it is half cargo and half cruise ship.  It's like the only way for people here to get anything, so like everyone has their family in Tahiti send them stuff on it, and a lot of people work with the tourists or whatever.  But in anywise, every one of our amis and members inactive cancelled their lessons, and nobody was home all day!  So there was basically nothing we could do all day, frustrating haha.  But on the bright side, I finally got my suitcases and my bike, so I actually have my clothes and stuff now!

The next three days went super well after that.  Merced we had a ton of lessons and did some contacting.  And then on Jeudi, we finally broke the streak here in Nuku Hiva!  For the first time in a year here, we have an investigator with a baptismal date set!  Her name is Karen, and although she's got a long way to go, she has the desire and knows that it's true.  We just have to keep her progressing, and make sure that she doesn't cancel.  And also that day, one of our amis that we've been doing lessons with that lives on Ua Huka, another island in our secteur said she wants to be baptized too, she just needs to talk with her mari about a date.  So that means we're gonna be taking a trip to Ua Huka for a week or so sometime next month, which should be super fun.  And then a week after that we'll probably head over to Ua Pou for another week, so Nov/Dec should be crazy.  It's crazy to think that there is only two missionaries, at Hiva Oa, within about 4 hours of flying distance from us.  

Saturday was pretty much all conference, and Sunday after conference we did some contacting and found some really good potential amis.

Pretty solid week, everything's super chill here in the Marquises, the word I have to use more than like anything is Moana, which means I'm full haha because they feed us so much.Anyways love you all, until next week!

Elder McQuiston

Me eating Lobster or something like that 

Me on my bike on our deck with my super funny helmet 

The best juice in the world, I'll never get tired of drinking that stuff 

Me drinking my juice in our house that is way too nice for us haha 

This is the planner I made for the next 6 weeks