I am going to St. Lucia on Wednesday!

Things are going pretty well. It's been hot in the Caribbean the last week or so. We had 3 days of blistering sunshine and ever since it has been rainy all day and night. I'm getting pretty sick of being wet all of the time!

We pretty much have the same investigators but they have all stalled at the moment. None of them came to church yesterday for a variety of reasons. One of our former investigators, a guy we were teaching about a month ago, saw us and asked us when we were going to come by his house again. We told him that it would be when he came to church. He said he couldn't come this week because he is currently out of "perfume". That is the worst excuse that I have ever heard! (And I've heard some pretty bad ones!)

We have heard all about Haiti. In fact, Elder Damm and I heard about it roughly 5 minutes after the earthquake happened because we were teaching a lesson to some Haitians right when it was happening. All of their friends started calling with the news. We had a tsunami warning at night but they called it off just a few minutes after they released it. I'm glad to hear that Mandy (one of the nurse that went to Guatemala with Jonathan was in Haiti when the earthquake happened) is alive and mostly well. I've heard far too many terrible stories about people who have lost loved ones in awful ways over there this past week. I think it was missed in the US because of the Haiti quake but there was also a 5.6 magnitude earthquake in Venezuela this week as well!

We heard from the Dominican Republic mission president yesterday that all of the Elders are safe there. (One of Jonathan's best friends is a missionary there). Their mission president took his scooter out and rode around until he found all of them! All of their church buildings are standing and pretty much completely fine. Oh when you work for the Lord!

Transfers are thus: I am going to St. Lucia on Wednesday to be in a city on the south coast called Vieux Fort. I am really excited! I was supposed to be the zone leader but President decided to put we with an Elder that has been really struggling. Neither of us wanted me to have to deal with all of it at the same time. That pretty much means that I won't have to be a zone leader! That is fine with me. I know some missionaries really want that job but I don't! I will miss Elder Damm, we had a good time being companions. This is a video of one of the many interesting things that we did together.


Our Conch BBQ!

I'm super glad to hear that the Aggies are starting to look better again. Elder Oliver in Trinidad sends me an e-mail occasionally to let me know what's going on and the last thing I heard was that they were doing terrible. I hope that they keep doing well because I want to hear good news in March!

(We try to keep Jonathan updated on his friends. We tracked down one friend who is now home from his mission and forwarded him an email from another who serving in Guatemala). Thanks for trying to get a hold of my friend for me. I hope that he gets his head on straight and is alright. Breaking the Word of Wisdom is just stupid! I don't understand why anyone, especially a returned missionary, would want to do that! I totally agree with what Rob said in his email about it being easier to talk about following and teaching by the spirit than it actually is. It makes it even harder when everyone you see is breaking a serious commandment like here on St. Maarten!

I'm excited to read the book that I gave Dad for Christmas. Sorry that some of the content was a little questionable. That's really how the Caribbean is. We just have to deal with it and not get sucked in ourselves!

My toe is still doing fine. The shoulder is still tender. I'm trying to rest it but it's not an easy thing to do! I do have a new problem as of this morning though. I have another ingrown toenail on my left foot! It is on my 4th toe on the lateral side of the nail. It is going to be a real pain, literally and figuratively, to get it out because it is ingrown so far down the nail. It's not a very comfortable thing! I did put medicine on it after my first attempt to dig it out this morning. I'll have another go this afternoon. I didn't have any problems for 14 months. Why does this keep happening? Don't worry, I'm fine.

These are pictures from our activity on the beach this morning:



I'm glad that things are going well for everyone doing the D&C countdown. It's hard to believe my mission is coming to a close soon! I am going to ask President Gamiette not to move me again. I am really sick of moving. I only have 18 weeks left so maybe he'll let me "die" in peace!

The scripture of the week is Mosiah 5:13, 15.

He was there yesterday and loved church!

Zone conference on St. Lucia was good. We were supposed to spend from Wednesday until Saturday there, but they managed to find us flights back on Friday afternoon. It was an adventure going and coming back though. We flew from St Maarten to Nevis to Antigua to Barbados to St. Lucia on the way there. On the way back it was St. Lucia to Antigua to Nevis to St. Kitts to St. Maarten! It was a couple of long days to say the least!

The best part of this zone conference was meeting Elder Prince. He played hockey for Murray high school and then last year he played for Weber State. It was fun talking to him about hockey and the people that we both know.

Unfortunately the baptism scheduled for Saturday had to be pushed back at least a week. Wayne was unable to make it to church because of work. Oh well. We'll keep trying and it will work out the way that it is supposed to. We are going to try and get Kevon baptized next week because he was there yesterday and loved church!

This morning we left the apartment at 6 AM to go to the French side for a hike to Picture Paradise. This is the view from the top:


This is on the hike back down. It took us 3 hours to hike the whole thing so my legs are a bit sore.


The toe is doing alright. The hard covering that it developed has started to come off little by little. It was sore when I first came back because of all the walking but it is doing much better now. I still have probably between 2/3 and 3/4 of the medicine left. Hopefully it will last as long as I need it to!

My shoulder has been hurting for the last couple of days and it hasn't been very fun. I don't know what happened to it but it aches dully whenever I bring my arm across my body quickly. So I just avoid doing that motion! Bryan can check me out when I get home if it still hurts. It doesn't effect the work so no worries.

We found and cooked a conch this week. I will try and send the video next week because it's on Elder Damm's camera and he didn't bring it today. We barbecued it and it wasn't too bad at first...

Transfer calls come this week so I'll know what's going on next Monday. You should tell everyone to just send stuff (letters) to the mission office in Trinidad now and that way they will always get to me.

I can't think of any other news. I'm glad you're doing the D&C count down with me. It should be a fun family activity!

The scripture of the week is Ephesians 6:13-19.

We set a baptism date with Wayne!

Elder Damm and I had a good week. We are leading our zone in almost every statistical category which doesn't matter but it feels nice all the same. We set a baptism date with Wayne, an old investigator of mine, for January 16th. I'll keep you updated on his progress.

Our other cool investigator is named Kevon. He has been to the church in St. Vincent a couple of times and was super excited when we gave him a Book of Mormon. He is one of the rare people that we find that asks, when we ask if they have any questions, when we are going to come back. I think that he will go a long way.

Sadly, the whole mission still isn't doing very well with baptisms. There were only 11 people baptized this past weekend total! That is really low.

I guess Elder Damm likes doing e-mails early so mornings will probably be a normal thing from now on. I am glad that you liked the pictures from last week. I got the picture of Mom and Dad on the Buzz Lightyear ride. I can't wait to go and do that again! It's good that Jonathan (Roylance) was able to pass the "Disneyland Challenge". I guess he can be part of the family after all. I still need to make sure that he can survive a good camping or backpacking trip though! That will just have to wait a few more months.

So Michael got asked if he was a pastor huh? Poor kid. Tell him to dress a little more shabby! I know how he feels though. I would bet that at least 4 times a week we get called "father" or pastor. The best is when we are in Philipsburg in the electronics stores and we have people ask us questions about what the store sells. It's usually tourist and we help them out! (Michael was singled out for a carry-on bag search at the Long Beach airport. The TSA agent asked what his scripture case was so he told him it was his scriptures. Then the agent opened the case and thumbed through his quad and asked if he was a pastor!)

We fly to zone conference in St. Lucia on Wednesday with the meeting being Thursday morning. Unfortunately there are some strange decisions being made in the office about travel arrangements so we won't be coming back to St. Maarten until Saturday afternoon! I guess they want us to all travel together. If they would split us into 2 groups, we could all be home by Friday night. Oh well.

That's about all. Sorry I forgot to bring my planner with the scripture of the week. I will try to remember next week.

I taught him a year ago!

Not much has happened here since I talked with you 3 days ago. Just the baptism of Andell Joseph! Here's a picture:


He was baptised in the morning the day after Christmas. It was great to be at his baptism since I taught him a year ago when I was on St. Maarten before!

Thanks again for sending us the movie ("A Christmas Story"). I think that watching it was every one's favorite part of Christmas Day, other than our calls home of course.

The next few pictures are of the festivities on Christmas Day. I sent them so that you can see what we did.

We sang carols at an old folks home. This is the same old guy I talked to last year!


We played games.


The Stevens' made us a great Christmas dinner. The food was really good. Especially the banana cream pie and the cheese cake!


I also included this picture of all the elders that are serving here on the island of Sint Maarten/Saint Martin right now.
Top row - (L to R) Hickenlooper, Hicken, Larson (ME!) and Warhurst
Bottom row - (L to R) Daines, Manwill, Damm (my comp) and Vance


They are a fun group of guys and I have enjoyed being here with them. Hickenlooper is a pretty weird dude though... He and Daines go home at the end of the transfer 3 weeks from now.

Elder Damm and I had 2 investigators as well as 2 less-active members come this week. That's pretty good when you consider that we had to start from scratch when we got here less than 2 wees ago. Elder Damm is a little frustrated right now because he is the zone leader here and he can't help everyone at the same time. He is really stress but I'll help get him through it. Excluding 1 of the 4 companionships on St. Lucia and including the other 2 English speaking companionships here, he and I had more member lessons than the rest of the companionships in the zone combined. We also had half of the zone's referrals and taught about a third of the zone's total lessons. We have been working really hard!

We are teaching a guy named Edwardo who is 28 years old. He can't read English, just Dutch. So Jeffry Gumbo, the member that picked me up from the airport, goes with us to teach him. We are mostly teaching less-actives and about a half a dozen kids ages 10-17 from part member families.

Things are going well here for us but not for the mission in general. There is a goal to baptize 30 people this week but right now it looks like we will probably end up with around 20. Hopefully we'll be able to find some more people that can get baptized soon!

My toe is still red and the skin is peeling off again. We are walking tons so it has been sore. It is also draining a little bit of clear liquid every day. The worst part about that is that it makes the lint from my sock stick to it! I'm only telling you all this cause I know you want to know whats going on, but I'm not worried about it. I'll keep you updated on it's progress.

The new biggest cruise ship, (Royal Caribbean's Oasis of the Seas), was here last week. It's HUGE! They have to back it in to the dock because it won't fit with the front end in. They had to dredge the bay for about 2 weeks to make it deep enough for it to even pull up to the dock. I did take some pictures but didn't have time to send them with all the other pictures I sent today.

Well, I will start doing a scripture of the week again next week. I thought about it this morning and then forgot to write it in my planner so I don't have one. Sorry.

P.S. Happy new year!

Christmas Day Skype Call.

We talked to Jonathan today via skype video. These are a few pictures we took of him and one that he took of us:

There is a baptism on Saturday!

Hey, I made it to St. Maarten safely but I had a series of unfortunate events happen along the way. First, as expected, my big bag got left in Miami. My flight was delayed leaving Dallas so I barely made the flight out of Miami. Then when I got out of the long line at the lost luggage counter in St. Maarten, no one was there to pick me up. I tried calling all of the missionaries and no one would answer! Luckily I knew the number for Jeffrey (one of the members) and he was able to come and get me. We drove to the Dutch side apartment and spent about 30 minutes calling the cell phones, the house phone and just yelling into the open windows and no one woke up! Since Jeffrey was hungry we decided to go and get some food before going to the Stevens house (our senior couple). Luckily we were able to wake the Stevens up so I stayed the first night with them. They knew that I was coming but apparently they were originally told that my flight was supposed to come in on Tuesday. My new companion’s flight got pushed back a day and they assumed that mine did as well. That's where the problem happened. They were very surprised when they came out to the balcony and saw us standing there! I was pretty much in a terrible mood by then.

Things have definitely gotten better since my first day back. My luggage showed up sometime on Friday afternoon so I have everything. I am not with Elder Daines like I thought I was going to be. Instead I am with Elder Damm (pronounced just like your first impression of the word). He is 2 transfers behind me and we are getting along pretty well so far. We spent our first few nights in the French apartment and as of today we are back in the Dutch apartment where I spent 7 months last year. There are 6 missionaries on the Dutch side now, but 2 are going home at the end of this transfer (January 20th). So we'll be back to 4 then. We are getting 2 new apartments over here because the one we are in is getting old and a bit run down. I can't wait!

The other Elders left us no investigators so we have spent a lot of time tracting the last couple of days. We are pretty sick of that! Luckily I know where most of the members in our area live so we have been able to visit them. Some were really surprised when they saw me! It was fun.

Not too much has happened here yet. There is a baptism on Saturday of a guy that I used to teach about a year ago. I am excited for that! Another person to add to my "other fruits" list. He has his interview on Thursday and then he will be ready to go. He's getting baptized on the 26th at like 7 in the morning in Great Bay. I'll take some pictures and send them to you next week.

I found a few remnants of my Christmas packages in the French apartment. I only found 2 boxes though and I think you said that you sent 3. I am hoping that the last one might still be on its way! The package with all of the little gifts already arrived. The missionaries went through everything and ate most of it... what bums! Oh well. I stole back what I could find! I did get all the scripture references but I haven’t had time to go through them yet.

For Christmas we have permission to use skype to call just like we did on Mother’s Day. We have a pretty full morning because we are going to do a service project, then eat lunch and watch A Christmas Story. I don't know who got that approved but I'm excited to watch it. I will have the computer at 7 o’clock our time so I should be able to call you sometime around 4 o'clock your time. Hopefully that works for you. Talk to you on Friday!