Sept 16, 2012

Hey,

I can't believe Riley is in the MTC. That is really weird. He will probably hate it, but he will tell you guys he loves it in the emails.

At least for the first few weeks. Then he might admit how much he wants to get out of there and into the field. He will be going into the field just before Christmas. That is going to be tough.

So yes it is transfer week. Most people will find out Tuesday morning where they are going but Elder White has promised he will tell me tonight. So only a few more hours and we will know what is happening.

He also told me one of us is leaving, which is pretty suspenseful. I have a feeling it is me, but it could be either of us. I just feel like I have done what I have been supposed to do here. 6 more weeks would be alright I guess. Elder Erickson is a great kid but if you met him I think you could see it is tough to live for 12 weeks on an island with just him. He just has no fire in him, no risks taken and always just wanting to be comfortable. He has grown up a lot already in the 3 months though. I don't think he realizes it but he is not quite the same kid he was when he arrived.

The temple work sounds great... I'm impressed you guys are inviting so many people. And I also have some good videos of our fire. I can't wait to see Brad's. That one sounds quite a bit bigger actually.

If you want to send a generic email that is fine with me. Maybe send a generic one with a personal bit each at the end. Riley is going to need some good emails but he probably won't have as much time to reply to them.

The week has been eventful. Lots of knocking. Lots of cool potential investigators who will become investigators this week. We found more potentials in the last 6 days then in the first 30 days of the transfer. So that was cool.

Do you remember this lady named Bernadette we were teaching? We were over there last monday night. We had a really good teach, but then as we were leaving we were just standing in her kitchen chatting. I was a bit bored and so I was lighting this candle on her table. The wick had like burned away, so it would light for 3 or 4 seconds and then burn itself out. So I kept lighting it and it would burn out a few times but then I got bored and we left. She went to work like an hour later.

She called us the next morning in hysterics. She was crying and yelling and just a mess. She is a old crazy portugese lady who speaks very bad english so it was hard to understand. But it in the end, I guess the last time I lit the candle it didn't burn out. And she didnt' notice it burning before she left work. So it sat there burning all night until she got home. The candle burned down a few inches. But before you think I burned the house down, nothing happened. Her main concern was that her cat might have jumped onto the table and caught fire. She said she never wants to see us again and that she can never trust visitors in her house ever again and loads of stuff like that.

We had been seeing her like 2x a week for a couple months, and had become pretty good friends. I thought. Apparently not though. So she is gone. I felt horrible and depressed and beating myself up over it for a couple of days, but I am starting to see now she over-reacted a bit and maybe there was some other concern there that she just didn't tell us (the last teach we had where this all happened was the word of wisdom). So that sucked.

Also, we had a few people come to church with us. One lady Jacky is an active member of the church of scotland. She is really posh and really nice, in her 50's and we volunteer with her at the charity shop we work in every thursday. So she took us on a tour of the island on last monday (and is taking you guys on one as well next summer) and said she would like to come to our church. We said of course. So she came to church. The speakers were Erickson and our first counsellor in the branch presidency, Manuel. Erickson gave a really good talk, but Holly's three kids were running around screaming, just doing there normal thing. And jacky used to be the headmistress of a school, so she is really not used to mis-behaving kids. Erickson's was good, but he can be a bit monotone at times. And then Manuel goes to speak. He apparently forgot he was speaking today. So he stands up and just starts rambling in his broken English. And then opens up to Alma chapter 7 and reads a few verses. And then keeps going. And he reads the entire chapter. It takes at least like 10 mintues. The kids are still running riot. But the worst part. He read it all in Portugese.

He can't read English. It was insane. And then he just rambled a bit more. It was literally the worst talk I have ever heard. And I'm sure Jacky was like what the heck is this. We also had Ursula there. About

6 mintues into his reading, she tapped my arm and said she had to use the toilet and left. She never came back in. She decided she would rather walk for like 2hours home then endure that talk. I was considering following her. So that was pretty discouraging but also I was trying not to laugh at just how absurd it was.

The other cool part of our week was yesterday we picked up a new investigator family. They aren't really golden or anything, we met them two weeks ago knocking and we tried back by and they let us in.

They are active CoE and we got to share a message with them about the BoM and they said we could come back next sunday and teach them the restoration. They are really cool, a husband and wife and their 15 year old daughter. So there are some good things happening here at the same time some of our old people are falling through.

Thanks for the email. Thanks for the great example you have set to both me and Riley. Neither of us would be out here without your help.

And mom's. Have a good week,

Love Elder Steed