Tonga Week 16

Had quite the week. It started off with the normal slow down and then things started really getting weird.

Personal:

I'm pretty good. I've had a cough for going on 6 weeks though and I'm not sure what from. I have been able to work out everyday and get all my studying in which has been good. I found out mosquito coils are bad for your health so now I just tough out the bites. I think my immune system is getting adjusted because now they usually go away in a couple hours. I have started to adjust a little better to the food and the language is coming. Kapou oku mou poto e lea fakatonga te u tohi 'i lea fakatonga, ka oku ou pehe 'e ikai te ke mahino. I under stand most of what people said, and can get my point across, but some words like year (ta'u) I can't ever seem to remember because I mix it up with ta'i (hit) or ta'e (swear word) and then everyone laughs at me. I wish the work would move a little faster but everyone seems very content not to talk to us.

Companionship:
Seems like a solid we work together.  We are doing okay though and I think one of us will transfer at the next one on February 7th.
Parents:

Mom, Dad, there are several things that you both taught me that I have realized are not quite normal for the other Elders. For Example:
-if you get something out put it away
-stick to your task till it sticks to you
-time is money, in this case not money but I got the point
-how to have fun and still work (i think I taught myself this one but I thank Dad for the job that made me figure it out)
-how to keep things clean and properly wash a house
-how to stay up beat and cheerful when nothing goes the way you want and everything breaks (i thank the big house for that)
.
And many others...anyway, thank you very much.

Tonga:
Silosi turns out has been seeing another women, who's another soldiers wife, which is against the law, so we were teaching sini and the cops showed up and so we left. Sini is doing well though but still hasn't made it to church. She isn't smoking though.

Penitani and his wife split up because of some abuse. I think it was for the best.

We are teaching a new lady named Mafile'o. She's very old but is starting to progress.

Vaiola agreed to be baptized.

We were out finding on Saturday and we started teaching a Pentecost Preacher. After that we passed a house and a guy yelled out for us to come back. He sang the whole Hallelujah Chorus to us and it was so funny we tried so hard not to laugh (he was drunk, and his friend was sleeping standing up) and then he brought it in like to hug us and kissed me. I was so weirded out I shoved him away and then he tried to do it to my companion so we ran to our bikes and rode away. Somehow we still managed a return appointment.

I told my 7 year old boy neighbor that I was hungry so he went and killed a chicken for me.

Me and my comp are currently out of money so we have come up with interesting ways to do laundry and make toilet paper.

We tried to make brownies yesterday. We went to the church to use the oven and my companion opened the oven door to find a huge poisonous lizard. I guess we could go to the hospital if it bites so we turned the oven on and cooked it and then fed it to the dogs.

I helped unload a couple cords of wood on Saturday.

Spiritually:
I've been reading a lot about the other missionaries in the scriptures. It's amazing how easily people reject the Book of Mormon as not true when they have never read it for themselves. If you read it you will know it is true. That's the promise the Lord makes.

Love you all tons and talk to you soon! 81 weeks to go! Wouldn't exactly say it's flying by but I am liking it!

Tonga Week 15

Personal:
Week went good! The zones let slip that I might be training next transfer as well as staying in my area but I still don't know if it's true. I'll just wait and see. I have been able to eat a bit more food lately and ate raw shark yesterday. I finished the Book of Mormon again this week and am now working on the Tongan one. I found cinnamon toast crunch this week and it tasted delicious. I didn't like it much back home but out here it tastes wonderful and reminded me a lot of emma! Also got a haircut this week and I think it's my best one yet out here.

Companionship:
Things are going good. Yesterday he couldn't stop laughing for some reason for like 30 minutes over some funny jokes in Tongan our members told us. Our lessons are definitely getting better and better.

Area/Work:
Sione Mohenoa, our Marijuana addict, well his wife got baptized last week and it was quite the miracle. She was so happy and we were too! We are now teaching a 70 year old widow of a minister and her grand kid Sione and Mafile'o. I'll keep you updated.

Tonga:
Hot, slow, and humid. Nothing new here.

Love you all,
Elder Sikoki

Tonga Week 14

Well the highlight of this week was the Hurricane, sounds like most of you know about it already. Since we don't get the news we found out about it when we tried to call the missionaries out in Vava'u and their phones were dead. Later that night it was so windy that the rain was coming in our windows and hitting the wall on the other side. It lasted about 3 days.

Personally I'm doing great. I have some mosquito bites that itch pretty bad on my foot again - can't figure out why they like me so much. I enjoyed this last week and was pretty excited for 2016. I finally found somewhere to buy coconuts. It's this boy in my neighborhood. We got on a regular schedule and he brings me 15 husked coconuts on Thursday nights. I pay him $10 TOP, or the equivalent of $5 US. He gets super excited about it. I did really good on my studying this week and it was nice to feel accomplished. Hope to do even better next week.
Some small things that happened this week:
-Found a leach about 6 inches long attached to my shower last night.
-We don't have a stove so I figured out how to make tortillas and we found cheese so I made quesadilas with the iron.
-After doing laundry for a couple of hours in my sink and bucket I hung my whites outside just to have the hurricane come through with a dirty rain and get all my stuff spotted
-The kids around here walked in our house and stole our mop and then broke it.
-I've been saving my Annies mac and cheese, but the humidity wrecked the noodles and made them all stuck together and squishy.

Companionship:
Companionship is going fine. One of us will most likely get moved on February 9th when the next transfer is. On new years we stayed up till 12 and played Uno, one of Mahe's traditions. I won more matches but he won the last game before 12 so somehow he's convinced he's the uno champion. We had a feast on New Years eve, we both ate to much. I had fresh seaweed bulb. On Saturday our Fafanga just brought us shells of muscles. We are supposed to eat them raw. Took me about 30 minutes to learn how to open them and then decided they weren't worth the time because they taste extremely fishy. We also had sea urchin which took the place of grossest thing I've had here so far.

Tonga:
Nothing really new here other than the hurricane which was pretty cool. Two puppies now live outside our house. Achilles and Alpha. They remind me of izi and hanz and are usually fighting our playing, and then peanut will come over like emma, he's a little bigger now, and tackle them both and they'll run away. I've smashed so many giant spiders I now feel comfortable smashing them with my hand or my bare feet. My comp said that means I'm adjusting well.

Love you all, I know this church is true and hope you all have taken my challenge to read the book of mormon.

Love, Elder Sikoki