The big news this week of course was Elder East picking up his new trainee, Elder Rea. I'll give a bit of a summary of Elder East's week as per usual.
The rest of his previous P-Day (Mon 24th Oct) was spent helping to open up Elder Reeves' new flat. Elder Reeves' area was being split and he was opening the new area with a new trainee as well. Elder East said that he was jealous that the new flat had a barbecue, although it did have a garage only accessible from a laneway, which wasn't so good.
On Tuesday Elders East and Reeves went to the combined Adelaide Zones' Conference. Elder Reeves was providing the music (piano) for the conference so it was otherwise fairly quiet for Elder East. He said it was good with the missionaries doing a breakdown of D&C section 4. He did lament however that conference post-lunch sessions are always hard as they "digest" after lunch.
Elder East said that he caught up with some of his previous companions at the conference - Elder Davey & Evans as well as Elder Stiles - the other missionary from Canberra.
On Wednesday the new trainees arrived during the afternoon. Elder East has been assigned Elder Rea from Mount Marrow, near Ipswich in Queensland. Elder Rea was originally assigned to the Wellington New Zealand Mission but will be serving in the AAM until the respective boundaries open up and missionaries from Australia can travel to New Zealand. Elder Rea is young - only 18 - and is the third of six children. He has two older brothers that are both on missions at the moment as well, and two younger sisters and a younger brother. Prior to coming on his mission Elder Rea was doing a carpentry apprenticeship. When we asked Elder East what type of carpentry he said "furniture, heritage stuff". Elder Rea is very tall - six foot two. Elder East describes Elder Rea as a "real country boy."
After orientation for the trainees on Wednesday afternoon, President Johansson took them all out to dinner at a nearby restaurant. It turned out to be a more expensive restaurant than President Johansson was expecting, but he decided they'd stay and told the missionaries to order what they wanted. Elder East ordered a $65 rack of ribs. He reckoned it was the best meal he's had since Christmas dinner last year.
The Elders all spent the night at Elder Reeves' new flat again before joining in a District Council on Thursday morning. Elders East & Rea then drove up to Port Lincoln and got Elder Rea settled in.
On Friday they went out to several appointments and taught several lessons.
On Saturday they went and provided some service at a member's home doing gardening. The family then gave them lunch and the Elders also taught a lesson. Afterwards, Elder Rea had his first taste of tracting which Elder East said that he enjoyed.
On Sunday after Church, they attended a barbecue that was put on by some of the members.
They have a referral from a Bishop in Melbourne from somebody in one of the country towns who is interested in being taught and getting baptised. They have to try and work out how they can teach them, and how the members can help support them as the person is 3.5 hours away from the missionaries in the Eyre Peninsula and an hour away from the nearest members.
Elder East says that Elder Rea is doing well after his first few days in the mission field.
Other notes from our discussion:
- Elder Rea went to school with one of the missionaries in the AAM.
- Elder Rea reckons that Elder East must be cheating at a card game they've played together :)
- They have four dinners and two lunches scheduled with members for the coming week.
- On Thursday nights they will often get leftover bakery products from one of the sisters from the branch who works in a bakery.
- Elder East has had a quick message from Elder Haycock since he returned home to say that he's doing OK.
- Elder East reckons that he's getting into "Christmas mode" - whatever that may mean :)
- President Johansson is looking at reintroducing some of the rules around when and how missionaries can get together for social gatherings. He'd previously removed the rules in place from President Marquis. I think Elder East is kind of happy to see some of them being reintroduced.
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