Video Chat - 21st April 2021 - Post Transfer Update

We got to have a longer chat with Elder East this week, which was good. The big news of course was transfers, with Elder East staying in the area but Elder Beaumont-Tafua being transferred out and Elder Brown being transferred in. 

Elder Brown was actually born in Canberra, but was raised in Brisbane – his family was only in Canberra for a short time. He is the second oldest of six kids. Prior to his mission he was doing professional cleaning. He was called to the AAM and has been out for around 6 months now. He’s a fan of games and brought several small ones out on his mission. Elders East & Brown are joint Zone Leaders over the Zone, although Elder East lamented that with the changes, there are now only 9 missionaries in the zone at the moment.

Elder East was disappointed at some of the other changes at transfers. They lost the Sister missionaries from Christies Beach. Sister Matenga was due to go home, whilst two other Sisters also went home, one unexpectedly. (Sister Hatch injured her knee and only had several months to go on her mission, so was released to recover.) That leaves only two companions of Sister Missionaries in Adelaide. Elder East says that he likes being around Sisters so it’s not as much of a “boys club” as being around Elders all of the time. The Christies Beach Sisters were working well and being productive. Elders East & Brown will now pick up the work being done by the Sisters as well as remotely covering Mount Gambier.

Elder East commented that President Ellis (Marion Stake President)  is trying to get missionaries to Kangaroo Island. There is a couple there who are interested in being baptised, but need to be taught and married first. Elder East says that they may be taking on Kangaroo Island remotely.

There will be a “mid-transfer” mini-transfer on May 12th, as there will be 5 new missionaries coming in then, out of sync to the normal transfer cycle. This means that there could still be a lot more changes in only a couple of weeks. Elder East is actually kind of disappointed that he didn’t get to Darwin as he thinks it will close soon, so he’s unlikely to serve there. He’s ended up enjoying seeing all of the different areas in Adelaide, but would like to see more outside of Adelaide itself.

Some dot point notes from the rest of our discussion:

• Elder East has broken out his big winter jacket to wear – he reckons it’s been cold over the last couple of weeks. He commented that it doesn’t tend to rain heavily in Adelaide though.
• Missionaries in the AAM will soon be allowed to go to the Adelaide temple.
• Elder East has now been companion with 3 of the 5 other Zone Leaders and Elder Kennach, who is the new AP.
• They were having a District P-Day today and were going to be playing some games together.
• With Elder East’s birthday coming up, he was buying up ingredients to try and make the family’s chili recipe.
• We ordered and sent through tickets for he and his companion to attend the local ANZAC Day Dawn Service

Video Chat - 27th January 2021 - Transferred to Onkaparinga Ward With Elder Taua

 We got to speak to Elder East slightly later this P-Day. He had earlier joined in on a district service project in helping to clean a lady’s home. Apparently, it was hard work. We even managed to get some photos of “after” the clean-up.

Elder East had also just called my parents (his paternal grandparents – Nanny and Grandad East) before calling us. They are in their nineties and in poor health and have recently made the decision to move into aged care. Nanny told me later that evening that they’d just found out that they’d received an offer of a place in a home, however, Nanny and Grandad wouldn’t be sharing a room. Nanny had become upset and depressed about this but said that she then received Elder East’s call which had raised her spirits. Elder East will be happy to learn the positive effect a simple thing like his phone call could make – even if Nanny did think that he sounded like he’d gained an American accent. 

Elder East sent us a few additional photos of the past week. The first was from Church last Sunday where a couple of recent converts (Kevin and Nicky) from the Adelaide City branch came to say hi and also had lunch with the Elders at the chapel.

There was a nice farewell photo with Elder Lwin during transfers.

The fire in the Adelaide Hills bordered Elder East's new ward so he was still able to see it on his trip down to his new area. Fortunately, heavy rains would help bring the fire under control the following day. 

Elder East says that his new area, Onkaparinga Ward, is a fairly middle-class area. There are a few “dodgy parts” but not as many as Marion or Prospect Wards. Their missionary flat is a fairly new three bedroom two bathroom, two story home. They share the ward area with the Sister Missionaries from Christie’s Beach. They’ve already met the Bishop, Ward Mission Leader, and Stake President in his first week there. He even had an impromptu dinner appointment with a family they visited who were having a barbecue. They shared a message with the family and were rewarded with the leftovers from the barbecue.

Bishop of Onkaparinga Ward

His companion is Elder Taua (pronounced like Tower) who is from Brisbane and is due to go home in 41 days (and counting :) ). Similar to his time with Elder Lwin, Elder East has been asked to help Elder Taua have a strong end to his mission. Elder East says that Elder Taua happens to know the Punou family that we knew from Tuggeranong Ward.

Elder East has had some positive news with investigators. 

• The Sister Missionaries had a baptism in the ward last Saturday, and Elder Taua got to perform the baptism. 
• An investigator in Morialta Ward that Elder East taught is scheduled to be baptised.
• They were following up with a couple who were investigating the Church. Elder East bore his testimony. He observed that the feeling of the Spirit was strong and the lady from the couple then shared her testimony about the truthfulness of the things they were being taught. 
• Two children that Elder East helped teach in Onkaparinga Ward whilst previously on trade-offs had been baptised.

Some additional dot points from our discussion

• They have started doing street contacting - ie just talking to members of the public to talk about the gospel. This hadn't been allowed during previous pandemic regulations.
• Elder East seems to be enjoying the responsibility of being a Zone Leader. He has Zone Conferences coming up that he has to start preparing some training for.
• It was only a small transfer. Elder Reeves has been transferred up to Darwin and is the Zone Leader up there.
• They are losing some of their senior missionary couples soon who often serve in smaller country branches. With the large decrease in missionaries during the pandemic, several missionary flats in country towns like Alice Springs and Mildura have been sold off. 
• Onkaparinga Ward is one of Dannielle Grant’s old wards from her mission that she enjoyed serving in.

Elder East Becomes a Zone Leader

 We received the following email on Tuesday morning:

Dear Family and friends of Elder East:

It is with great pleasure that I inform you that your missionary, Elder Seth East, has just been called to serve as the Marion Zone Leader of the Australia Adelaide Mission.

This represents a significant accomplishment on his part and I am sure you are as proud of him as I am.  He will fulfill a very important stewardship as he accepts responsibility to lead his zone in this mission.  Future leadership opportunities in family, church and career will be enhanced by this great experience he will have.  

We are most grateful to you for helping to prepare your son to take on this very important responsibility in the Lord’s army.  Please join me in congratulating Elder East and in providing continuing encouragement in the future.  We love him and are blessed by his service in this mission.

With love and appreciation,

President Derek A. Marquis

Australia Adelaide Mission

Transfers, Leadership and Fires

 We received a quick message from Elder East on Sunday evening with two main points:

1. He was being transferred again. Transfers were the following day (Monday) and he'd received the advice that he was being transferred.  He didn't know where or when at that point in time; and
2. Was there a major fire near Adelaide? [with the following photo]

Having lived through the 2019-20 bushfires, Elder East is mindful of the impact that major fires can cause. He had also received the following warning:

At that point, there wasn't anything about the fire on the news, but over the following couple of hours it became apparent that the fire was a concern and there were regular emergency warnings in the media. Fortunately, it wasn't anywhere close to Elder East. We sent him a quick update on the fire.

As the evening progressed, Elder East sent us an update advising that he was being sent to Onkaparinga Ward, that he was going to be the Zone Leader over Marion Zone, and that he would be companions with Elder Taua. We joked that he's served in 6 of Adelaide's wards, his goal should be to serve in the other 7 wards before his mission ends. :)