Video Call - 16th May 2022 - Elder East's Final Zone Conference

Another rundown of Elder East's week in the mission field. On the evening of the previous P Day, the APs went over to the Travers family in Firle Ward. Whilst there, they were presented with a belated birthday cake for both of them. The Travers were originally going to be providing Elder East a cake on his birthday until the Covid isolation intervened.

Elder East also took a photo of their cat. He's a doppelganger of our cat Matt Matt back home.

On Tuesday they had a Stake Missionary Correlation Meeting as well as spent a lot of time in the Mission Office. They were able to teach a lesson to a man and his children in the afternoon. The same family would end up coming along to Church on Sunday which was a great step for them to take.

On Wednesday they had the Firle District Council. This included some singing practice as the District was going to be providing a musical item at the next Zone Conference. In the late afternoon, the APs were able to go and do a session in the Temple. Whilst in the Temple they happened to run into the Lees from Elder East's home ward. Brother Lee is from Adelaide and was back there visiting family.

On Thursday they met with the Senior Couples in Adelaide to work out the logistics for the following week. There will be 15 missionaries leaving the AAM and going to their original assignments in New Zealand, another 2 missionaries coming in, and 2 missionaries finishing up their missions. Sixteen missionaries all need to be at the Adelaide airport for a 6am flight next Monday (23rd May). They're flying up to Sydney and then on to their various destinations from there. Because most of them are heading internationally, they'll all have to be at the Adelaide airport by 3:30am. Quite a logistical task.

Later in the day, the Ward Mission Leader took them out to Hungry hacks for dinner.

On Friday they had a combined Zone Conference between 9am and 3pm for the two Adelaide zones. As a part of the Zone Conferences, those who are leaving the mission get to give a farewell testimony. With all of the New Zealanders getting ready to leave, they gave testimonies, however, Elder East wasn't asked to, even though it was his last Zone Conference. We figure that President Johansson must have either forgotten or not realised it was Elder East's last conference too. 

Elder Easts ent us through a number of photos of the Zone Conference. First up is a photo of when he was teaching that one of the Sister Missionaries took.

Then there are a couple of group photos. We're assuming that one is of just his Zone, and the other one is both Zones that were in attendance at the Conference.

Then we have some photos from after Conference. The first is with Elder Gard sitting on his knee. The story behind this is that in mission vernacular, a missionary you train is jokingly referred to as your son. Elder East trained Elder Rea, and Elder Rea trained Elder Gard, so this is a "grandfather & grandson" photo - hence the "grandson sitting on the grandfather's knee" pose and expressions.

The final one is a photo of Elder East with two of his previous companions - Elder Rea and Elder Brown.

On Saturday they had breakfast with a Senior Missionary Couple at the Bishop's home. The rest of the day was spent on trade-offs manning a stall at the Marion Stake Family History Day. They helped set up the stall in the morning and then manned it during the afternoon. In the evening they went for dinner at a Sister's home. She had a cat that Elder East made friends with, of course.

On Sunday, they had the family whom they taught on Tuesday come along to Church.

Some other quick notes from our chat:

• Both Elder Rea and Elder Gard are part of the group of missionaries due to depart to missions in New Zealand.
• Elder East has started two modules of his "My Plan" program that helps missionaries prepare for returning home.
• Elder East still hasn't heard anything re his University application.

Video Chat - 5th May 2021 - King Benjamin Is Inspiring

 Not a long chat this week, so only some quick notes:

• We chatted about what inspired Elder East this week, and he talked about Mosiah 3:13 in his cripture study  he feels particularly relevant to the missioanry work that he's doing. 

13 And the Lord God hath sent his holy prophets among all the children of men, to declare these things to every kindred, nation, and tongue, that thereby whosoever should believe that Christ should come, the same might receive remission of their sins, and rejoice with exceedingly great joy, even as though he had already come among them.

It's a quote from King Benjamin, who also happens to eb one of my favoruite prophets from the Book of Mormon. We spen time talking a bit about all of the various things that we find inspiring.

• He's getting on well with his companions, a bit too well he says. They have to make sure that they don't get distracted. Elder East says that he seems to act as the senior companion, tsakaing the elad on most things.
• Elder East says that member work is starting to grow. They do have a regualr meal with a family in the ward every Tuesday evening.
• They have a number of investigators still at the moment - Danielle, Shane and rachael. They taught five enw people last week as well, but even thoguht they're alll interetsed, they haven't been able to follow up with them for follow up treaching appointments yet.
• Elissa had been preparing an escape room activity for one of her upcoming Seminary lessons. It features a time-traveling Elder East. She'd sent a copy of it through to Elder East to read ... but he hadn't looked at it yet ...

• They haven't taken over the Christie's Beach area that was vacated by the Sister Misisoanries as they were expecting to do. President Marquis has advised that there are plans to open the area back up again with Sisters, so it's not worth merging the information for the two araes togetehr to then have to split them again not long afetrwards.
• One of Elder East's old companions Elder Tukukino has gone home early.
• They had District Council the previous day and Elder Stiles from Canberra was responsible for running it as the current District Leader. 
• I told him that I'd receievd permission from his President Marquis to take him and his companion(s) to lunch during my Adelaide stopover on my flight back from Perth. His response was "the adelaide airport's a bit far." [shrug] Hew as also disappointed to hear that President marquis had said that Elder East will still be in Adelaide after the mid-transfer missioanry intake. Elder East doesn't think he'll ever get to serve outside of Adelaide despite the size of the mission.
• This week was a "nice cat week". He got to meet a lot of "Nice cats".

Video Chat - 31st March 2021 - Dreams of Being an Urban Hipster

It was only a quick chat again this P-Day, but Elder East did send through a bunch of photos later in the day. 

They had Zone Conference on the previous Thursday which Elder East said was really good. The fact that he didn't have to run part of it was probably one of the positives. :) He said that there was training from President Marquis and the APs on lots of little things, such as motivation, baptism, driving, and so on. 

He specifically mentioned the driving instruction as several historical incidents were raised in the training, including the missionary car crash in New Caledonia back in 2019 that resulted in a death. We already knew about this accident as we knew the driver - Jacob Hable. The Hable family had lived in Canberra for several years and we keep in touch via social media. Elder Hable was serving in the Vanuatu Port Vila Mission near the end of the mission when the car crash occurred during heavy rain. I've included a couple of photos below that the Hable family shared from the accident.

Elder East also spoke to us about being "Dear Johnned" several weeks ago. Although they were only ever writing as "friends", it was fairly obvious that both Elder East and his friend had emotions for each other, so her advice that she was now dating somebody was hard emotionally for Elder East. Still, he recognises that his focus at the moment is on serving the Lord and being a missionary. 

Below are the photos that he sent us for this week, along with commentary where provided. The first photo from Wed 24th March is "with Nick, Rob, Sophie, and Cruise (the dog) We're teaching the kids. Their family is really big into 8ball and they also have a pet snake."

The second photo is from "Zone Conference [ Thurs 25th March] with Sister Hall and Sister Fakai our old Christies beach sisters".

The third photo [Fri 26th March]  is "at sports night (held every Friday) ft Elder Levi (he is leaving this transfer to his original assignment of Perth) and some members." 

The following picture [Sat 27th March] is with Sis Macdonald, a member. Elder East says that he particularly liked how he looks in this photo.

Next is a photo [Sun 28th March] with some of the Ellis family kids and Wyatt who was recently baptised.

A photo from District Council that was held on Monday 29th March. 

Elder East was happy to get a hold of a cat. [Mon 29th March]

Edler East said that they had a District P-Day activity down at Hallett Cove earlier in the day, and that he went full "Dad mode" at lunchtime - cooking bacon, sausages, eggs and more. He's decided he wants a barbecue at his missionary flat. He reckons that he can then become an urban hipster. [Wed 31st March].

Sunset photo taken on Wed 31st March.

Elder East commented that he's making a lot of friends with missionaries who are from Brisbane, so he's thinking of Brisbane as a possible place to move to for university after his mission, as he now has a number of friends from there. He currently thinks that after returning in June next year that he'll spend the second half of 2022 working before starting university at the start of 2023. 

Maybe he can find a course and becoming a Certified Professional Urban Hipster Tongmaster ...