nate morris west indies mission

October 13, 2009

First of all answering some questions:

Dad had some in his email.

About the economy: We do not see the effects of the bad economy in the States because we have an even worse, yet horrible economy here. The average income here is extremely low. Many children don't go to school, and many people can't read. So no we don't see the effects of the US economy here. About doing wash and cooking. We have a washer in the back of the house. Just put in detergent like at home. To fill it up with water you have to fill up buckets and dump it in but it's not bad. Then we hang up the clothes to dry on lines in our apartment. Cooking is like how is was at college. Here, I've been having 2 eggs, toast and sometimes a bowl of cereal for breakfast. For lunch we don't have to much time to cook so usually it's spaghetti, mac and cheese, or sometimes we eat out. There's a local restaurant next to the apartment that has really good bake and salt fish or chicken curry and rice. Pretty delicious! We have pots and pans and a stove at the apartment. No worries there. Haha. Also, fast food: In Berbice it's only Church's chicken which is a huge chain like KFC. In Georgetown there's KFC, Church's, Pizza Hut and Popeye's. Delicious!

Mom!

I love your attitude with all your hard responsiblities in YW. Keep working hard! I love ya. I really liked Elder Scott's talk too. I wrote down a lot of good info from it. I can't wait till we get the Liahona so we can read it. About the [ten missionary] plaques by the bishop's office: Can you take a picture of all of them individually, and then a picture of them all together and send it to me via email? Also, I'd love more pictures from home and with friends and junk for the next package. Also, I need a thing to put consecrated oil in. One of those sweet metal vials at desert book or something. Next package! Haha. I love ya.

So, this past week was a rollercoaster. This week seemed like NOTHING happened. It was rough! I felt like we worked very hard. Elder Daines has the philosophy to just contact on the street those that'd look like they'd take the gospel. I don't like that at all but I just let that happen. Because we've done that, we haven't taught very many people and don't get too much done. Because of that, our numbers the past few weeks have been going down bad. No baptisms scheduled because we're not teaching anyone! We had interviews with President Gamiette Sunday night and he was disappointed with the numbers. He also said someone told him that I don't want to stay in Guyana and train a Guyanese. I don't know where that came from because I would LOVE to do that. I know I can do that. I told him this and he was surprised. He said that originally he had me leaving Guyana because of that next transfer. I told him that I wanted to stay and train someone. He said that if you really want to, there'll be an increase in numbers this week. So, the pressures on. I'm gonna step up and work extra hard this week. Not just so I can stay in Guyana, but because I'm sick of seeing the lack of success in this area. Yes I can blame it on the lack of education in the area and understanding of our messages, but no. It is my fault and I'll just have to do better. I know I can do it. I know how to teach. Heavenly Father will help me. It was a rough interview but I can improve and next interview hopefully he'll be a bit more pleased with me. I could blame it on Elder Daines but I won't. I could have done a lot better. Lessons learned now help me become better in the future.

Zone conference yesterday: It was a GREAT one! It lasted about 4 hours. President taught us so much that we can use. He is a great man, great leader, great teacher. Loved it!! Learned about retention, bringing less actives back, teaching with the Spirit. Learned a lot about how to invite baptism and how to do it when the Spirit in the room is the highest. If we do that, they won't say no. Because they'll feel it is true and something they need to do. There was tons more we learned but I can't write all of it! After he was doing interviews with more people, so we hung out and talked with everybody for another few hours. It was fun catching up with Elder Scott, seeing how my old area is going. ALL of my investigators in Kitty are baptized/being baptized next week. Keysha, Latoya, Mahesh, Pretty. I was very excited about that. Gonna put them in my preach! (First page of Preach my Gospel). I am grateful Elder Moses cleaned up and got them in the water. I loved talking with everybody. I have made tons of good friends here.

Well that's my week. Rough, but lessons learned. I guess my faith just isn't as good as it should be! This next week will be a blast, making up for our past mistakes.

Elder Morris