Hello everyone! It is great to hear from you all and to see that everyone enjoyed their Easter holiday! Sounds like the Easter Bunny found everyone and a couple people really scored! So Easter in South Africa is definitely not the same as small town USA... People have some funny ideas on how to celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Most of which was drinking for like 4 days straight... Funny example/story on Sunday. But this week has been quite hectic and I feel bad because I have not much to tell you sadly.
Monday after emails we went to the Clusters house for lunch. They are a couple from Ogden that is preparing to go home this week. We went over and visited and they made sloppy joes. I have never been so happy for sloppy joes in my life! It was a beautiful thing. After we went to UFS to play sports. Me and Elder H played an intense game of tennis for a couple of hours while the others played basketball. Felt good to play for the first time in months! We went home and because of the distance to the area we can't work on Monday nights so we played a missionary version of beer pong sort of. We placed a tape roll in the middle of the floor, and took turns bouncing a bouncy ball and trying to make it land in the middle. Harder than it sounds!
Tuesday we got a call in the morning that Elder H was finally going to get a companion. So, we traveled to the airport and picked up Elder Ok from Uganda. He is fresh out of the MTC and has the greenest greenie spirit I have ever seen! He is kind of crazy but he tries. He is 25 but acts and looks like he is 12... Elder H is having a hard time... But now they moved into their area and we split again. We went to Malifu (who is our best investigator) and had a lesson on baptism. She said that she really wants to be baptized and she loves the church so much. Her mother hasn't allowed her to come but somehow she told her that she would support her with her decision to be baptized! We set her for 11 May! It really was an answer to so many prayers.
Wednesday we had 0 appointments. With the splitting of the areas I saw just how dead our area is. A grand total of 2 investigators. 1 progressing. We spent the entire day tracting! It was mostly awful but we found a couple of cool people. We meet a girl named Palesa who was taught by missionaries a long time ago so she was very quick to welcome us in. We have meet a few times now and have tried to see what she remembers, honestly nothing. But hopefully she will be able to progress and now will be her time! We also got a referral for a guy named Bongani. We went to his house and he wasn't home but his family was. We had a cool lesson and got to explain about who we were and told them we shared a message about Christ so obviously people accept that at this time of year! Hopefully they will continue to meet with us as well and we can have a cool family to teach!
Thursday somehow we had planned for 8 lessons but only managed 4. Lots more tracting. We went to Mama Mababe for FHE (She is my mother in this area). We had a fun time and were enjoying when we got a call from the Elders in Phuthaditjhaba that they were coming to our boarding to spend the night! We said goodbye and took off to go and find them in Bloemfontein. Well they were lost and had no idea where they were. They were trying to tell us that they were at the petrol station. Good thing there are probably 174 petrol stations in Bloem. We spent prob 2 hours trying to track them down but finally meet up with them. It was fantastic to see Elder Kakaire and Elder Nthengu again! I miss those crazy kids! We grabbed some McDonalds and headed to the boarding. We talked and talked and talked until way late in the night.
Friday. That awkward moment when there are 8 missionaries in one boarding and we leave the keys in the outside of the door... Nice one. But that shows how safe this place is! We got ready and went to our Zone Conference. We meet at the Bloemfontein chapel and had the conference with Bloem zone, Welkom zone, and Lesotho zone. It was awesome as always to see everyone and catch up. For the conference Pres. Z talked about the importance of working hard and using our time wisely. He challenged all of us to get our 40 hours a week and be accountable for them. It was pretty powerful and gave me another boost to try harder to become better.
Saturday made the Zone Conference lesson a complete failure. Pres Z showed up to the boarding to interview Elder Ok and ended up taking all 4 of us to Bloem for breakfast. Well we were suppose to leave after eating to go to the area but Elder Ad had made other plans. We were now going to meet the Carliles for something and had to leave breakfast to go meet them in the mall. Well remember today is a holiday and saturday. It took us 35 mins to get a parking spot in the parking garage. We got in to the Carliles, they thought they were meeting with Elder Ok to buy him clothes. We then spent 20 mins getting out of the parking garage, went back to the hotel, picked up Elders Ok and H, drove back to the mall, spent 40 mins getting a spot, spent 30 mins shopping for his clothes (he told the Carliles he didn't have clothes. Only had his suit pants to wear), got to the check out and he then says, "I will take these 3 and then I will have 6." We all look at him like what??! He has clothes, just thought mission bought him more clothes. Now we are all disappointed and mostly angry. Leave the store, 20 mins out of the parking, an hour into the area. Now the day is gone and we missed our best investigators in the morning. Fantastic. President thinks we are idiots and don't want to work hard and I look like the bad guy because I am the one driving us everywhere! Pretty ticked about this day. Good thing the breakfast was a buffet and I got pancakes and bacon.
Easter Sunday is definitely not Easter Sunday in South Africa. I was way too disappointed. I was really looking forward to Easter on mission but honestly I did not feel what I thought I would. We had a nice church service and the spirit was awesome during sacrament! The Elders were asked to speak on the atonement and it was really good! (Its nice giving talks here because you say the very basics and thats about what people need to hear) We talked about the atonement, the sacrament, and using the atonement to overcome trials. Overall church was pretty swell other than we only had 4 investigators and less actives come... After church we meet with Malifu again. Well her mother changed her mind and now won't let her even meet with us in the house anymore... So we will have to meet at the church or something. I am not quite sure. We talked a lot about what was going on in her family and it is not in her favor. When we went back outside, her mother was outside. She is huge into the Roman Catholic Church and 'very religious' person. Well she came up to us and was drunk bad. She started asking me for money and I said, "Sorry, all I have is the gospel of Jesus Christ." She told me she didn't want Jesus, only money. Welcome to South Africa. Such a wonderful place! I was too disappointed at this point. We tried to go around and meet some people but no one was home, everyone on the street was drunk. There was no work to be found and trust me, I tried.
Really this week has been quite disappointing. It hasn't been bad but I can tell the spirit wasn't with us as strong. There was too much other stuff going on and not enough work. Its funny, as soon as you try and improve, its like I am going backwards. I just have to keep working hard and trusting that it will get better. This area is very very dead and my companion is beyond finished here. Looks like its time to work double hard and get this place jumpstarted! Have a good week everyone and I look forward to hearing from you again!
Love Elder Peterson
