12/17/2018 I'm a murderer

Yep. I have killed.

Elder Paopao and Elder Perkins are pretty much dead. And I have killed them. They lived good lives, but their two years are up. Time for them to meet the grave. [Mother's note: If you are not familiar with LDS missions, this death is referring to the end of a mission, time for the missionary to go home. The elder who is the companion when a missionary "dies" is referred to as the one who "killed" the elder going home. Gruesome]

Anyways, on the serious note. This week is transfers, and Elder Paopao and Perkins are going home to California and Arizona respectively. Good luck to them in college as they start in January. My companion, who I will receive tomorrow, is Elder Jolie. Elder Jolie is currently my Zone Leader, so I have had many interactions with him. He's short, which is nice. He's just right across the river in West Memphis. The Zone is also being restructured. West Memphis isn't even in the zone now. We have mostly merged with the Millington Zone and lost the Arkansas areas, and have been renamed to Memphis North zone. It's a massive zone, with more than almost 2 hour drive from one end to the other. 

So, this past week has been kind of hard for the work. Because of Christmas parties, musicals, a semi-P-Day, and other things, we didn't have a lot of time to get out, and when we did, we didn't get new interested people. We have continued to invite people to church who have previously been invited and not followed through, and they were again interested in going, but sadly, did not show:( a member did bring the 7 y/o daughter of someone they knew to church though, and we taught the Plan of Salvation to her. She had absolutely no Christian background (did not know who Jesus Christ was), so it was an interesting lesson, especially considering we are in the South. 

So I mentioned the various activities we had, here are they

Mission Christmas Party: the Memphis side of the mission got together and celebrated Christmas with each other. We had activities, like arts & crafts, white elephant gift exchange, minute to win it type games, and a trivia-ish type game. So I must have grown up in an area with odd White Elephant traditions. Where I am from White Elephant gifts are like actual dirt level gifts. Like a singular, wrapped hot dog? Great! a disassembled barbie in a used pizza box? Awesome! Smelly old stuffed animal? It works.

But that's not how it was in other places though I guess. My gift comprised of the following: the old (1974) yearbook we got while cleaning out that building a couple weeks back, the Ringo Starr album from the same building (we don't know if it still works), 15 lbs of weights, and a lint roller. Apparently the sister who got it was not happy. She definitely would not appreciate a Prior Lake/Burnsville ward white elephants. 

Anyways I got some Mexican food in a bag labeled "how to learn Spanish" on it. We also had dinner, watch Mr. Krueger's Christmas, a Bednar devotional, and had a testimony meeting. Was pretty great.

Branch Brunch: we had our Branch Christmas celebration, a brunch, on Saturday. Good food. We song Christmas songs, enjoyed each other's company, and stuff. We invited a less active family to the brunch and was super happy they came. Sadly they didn't make it to church on Sunday, but it was great to see them regardless. They're a nice bunch

Missionary Musical: this Sunday (and next Sunday at the Bartlet Building) we had a choir performance at the Cordova building. We sung Christmas songs and had a good time. I was the shortest Elder in the normal choir. Classic. There was a particular number I liked. The Stake President invited two members up to sing/play Silent Night, and they were fantastic. The piano player slayed it with adding a jazzy/gospel flare to it. It was just superb. Also it was great to see Jenni and Travis again, and also Maddie. Was fun to see them. I was making a real effort to not look at them and make weird faces though. 

How did finals go for all of you college friends/family? 

Pics

1) the Branch Brunch. The woman dancing is Sister Negretti, our RS president. She's really funny. Her conversion story is hilarious too. Her and her husband, when they moved somewhere, just went to the nearest church, which happened to be an LDS one. And that day there were some stake officials that the conductor was recognizing. She misheard and thought they said "state officials," and she assumed they were talking about her and her husband. And later they recognized them as investigators in Sunday school, and she turned to her husband and said "they think we are FBI." 

2) the funeral for Elder Perkins and Paopao. They are wearing popped bike tubes in memory of all the dead tires we've had this transfer. We have productive district councils

3) a Hindi BoM. We met a guy from India who was interested in getting a BoM in Hindi. 

4) us at a service thing. We were making Christmas baskets for people at a senior living home. The employees were super grateful we wanted to help. It was cool

5) cousin Maddie, me, and Elder Paopao after the Music Tribute. 

6) the Mexican food I got in the gift exchange.