Attached to this email are some pictures of my MTC stay and the first few
days of me on my mission. I got here safely and I am officially a missionary
here for 5 days. I have hit quite a couple challenges but I have faith that I
will be good. I am the only white missionary in my zone, the rest of them are
Samoan. On top of that 95% of the people in the ward I am in are Samoan and
lots of them don't know much English. My companions name is Elder Oto he is
Samoan. Most of the people in the ward speak English but are very hard to
understand. So you know when I said that I'm glad I didn't have to learn a
language.. well i guess I got jinxed because my companion is now teaching me
Samoan. He says I will probably be able to speak fluently in 12 weeks. I am
serving in a town called Raceview. If it is not on the map it is by the town
named Ipswitch. The ward is good. The area has not very many progressing
investigators, so basically all I have been doing so far is tracting. We have
run into a few potential investigators, So we are going to be visiting them all
this week. My companion doesn't have a drivers lisence, and we have a car
starting today. So my next
challenge will be driving a car on the left side of the road and sitting on the
right side of the car. So it will be an interesting experience. Not very
missionaries drive right away when the get into the mission. Since I am in an
area near Brisbane, we get to go to the temple later in the month. I will let
you all know of that experience. I haven't had too many experiences yet.
Hopefully we get to teach more this week. The Brisbane mission is one of the
highest baptizing missions in the world. There have already been almost 300
baptisms in the mission so far this year, which is almost unheard of in most
missions. My trainer in his last are has 12 baptisms in 3 months. He is
feeling optimistic about this area and we are hoping to have at least 5-6 in the
next 11 weeks. We haven't taught much. We are going to be teaching more this
week which I am looking forward to. I have a lot to learn in just 11 weeks, but
I have faith that I can do it. So basically I need to learn Samoan, I need to
learn how to drive on the left side of the road. And I have not even seen a
kangaroo yet. They say that is one of the biggest stereotypes ever. Most
missionaries go at least 6-8 months on their mission without seeing a single
kangaroo. So hopefully I will see one soon. I have more trainings this week,
but not much has happened so far. I will hopefully have some better experiences
to talk about next week. The culture is a lot different here. I was told that
I am already starting to lose my American Accent. That will happen when I'm never
surrounded by any other Americans. There are less than 20 American in the whole
mission. They have missionaries here from all over the world. There are about
200 missionaries in the whole mission. I have a lot to learn and I am excited
to do missionary work. My companion says that it is so rewarding to call your
recent converts after 6 months and finding out that they still go to church. I
know that I am going to have some good experiences and I am excited to get
started this week. I keep you all in my prayers and I hope all of you pray
about me. I'm just really nervous about driving on the left side of the road. I
miss you all.
Love,
Elder Kyler PowelsonLove,
