Austin's Madagascar Mission: Doing Some Work

So it's crazy how fast time goes here. It's seriously ridiculous. I will be in this country for a month on Saturday. This has gone by way faster than the MTC.

Ok to start off the week we had our usual soiree with Sr Helen and her family. We had the Reunion missionary leadership over here in Mada for a couple days for that thing I talked about and two sisters from Reunion came over. There is only one set of sisters here in Tana (In fact they have half of our area) so they were with them. They came to the soiree with our sisters and it was fun. They were pretty cool but they were way culture shocked haha. They practically live in Europe over there in Reunion and Maritius.

I hit my 2 months on my mission on the 9th, whatever day that was. That's gone way fast. If the whole mission goes this fast I'll be done in non time haha but I don't want to leave; This place is so sweet.

For that same leadership meeting that I was talking about, Elder Rice's old companion came up from Antsirabe because he's a zone leader down there and we had lunch with him in this way rich part of Tana called Ivandry. We went to this mall that was honestly like taking a step back into America. The place had an escalator. A freaking escalator. How freaking cool is that? Moving stairs. I am so grateful for moving stairs. And they had American food and it was so good.... And to top it all off- a Nutella shake. I would think that it was a Larium dream but it tasted so good. I seriously would have been fine to drop dead right there haha. I couldn't have been happier.

The next day though even topped the Nutella shake. We went tracting for 2 hours and had 5 contacts. It was so sweet. We haven't been able to contact them yet for a few reasons such as being in the office, them not being home when we go, and we didn't know exactly how to get back to where we were for a couple days. Anyway, after tracting we had 4 times we needed to go to and they were all there except for one which is like unbelievable for us. We never get that close to 100%. So it was way sweet. And I lead some of the lessons which were way rough actually but it's the only way I'll learn to speak this crazy language that isn't Spanish.

Alright cool story time. SO we have this investigator, Moe, who is the only member in his family who is not baptized. His wife and his daughters are baptized but he isn't. He has problems with drinking and smoking. So we go by to visit him the other day and he is outside his house pulling weeds in his flower pots. We say hi and offer to help and he takes our help. We help him and he lets us come in to share a spiritual thought. Ok this is going to be a little hard to tell because it's a lot of connecting with stuff during the lesson and after. Ok so Elder Rice sits down and feels like he should talk about baptism but he doesn't want to so he turns to me and tells me to give the thought. So I, not knowing anything that has come to the mind of Elder Rice, open my scriptures and think Helaman 5:12 sounds like a good one. We start in on it and all of a sudden I feel like I need to ask him the question of "Why is Jesus important to you?" And he just starts going off about how Jesus has made all the difference in his life and has saved him and all this stuff. At this point Elder RIce was like "Well that lead right back into baptism" because Moe started talking about how he feels the Spirit sometimes but he wants to feel it all the time. So Elder Rice challenged him to be baptized on the 18th of October. He just has to not smoke or drink and come to church every week. He said he really wants to be baptized and he will do his best but he wants our help. He wants us to go by his house every day so that way he'll be too scared to drink or smoke because apparently, when we came by his house the other day and he was about to drink and after we left he was like "What am I doing" and didn't drink at all that day. So that was way sweet! We went by his house the next day twice but he wasn't home either time so we left him a note that said we came by and to be diligent. He didn't come to church on that day either so we were really sad about that. We'll go by his house today and see what was up. I believe he can do this. He came to church the week before so he can make it. He's a way awesome guy he just needs to get it done. I think once he sees that he can do it, he'll be solid. Hopefully that is.

Next up, Tina Mora. We went by her house the day after Moe and she was the first lesson we taught that day. I was again given the job of giving the spiritual thought so I opened my scriptures to Ether 12 so I just went with Ether 12:6 which turned out to be perfect. She read that scripture and then started in telling a story where that has happened in her life. She has a daughter who can't talk very well cause she has something wrong with her throat or something. They were going to have a doctor look at it but he lived a long way away so they saved up money for a long time and prayed that it would be enough. The time came when they were going to go and they got all their money and got on a bus way late at night and got there at like 7 in the morning. The doctor told them their appointment wasn't until 2 so they were a little worried. They didn't want to spend any money because they didn't know how much everything would be and they still had to pay for the ride back. So they bought a little bit of food and tried to spend as little money as possible and continued to pray that they would have enough money for whatever was going to happen. The time for the appointment came and the doctor gave them the news that this was an easy fix and she would just need to take some medication and it would be all better. And the medication was like dirt cheap. Like Malagasy dirt cheap which is way cheaper than our dirt cheap. So they had enough money to make it home and a bunch of money still left over so they were really grateful for that. It was a way awesome story.

Next up, Jean. We started the first lesson with him and I got to take the lead on that. He quite the interesting ideas on the Godhead but we got that all sorted out. He's progressing a little slow but everyone learns at different speeds so it's fine. We will continue with him if he is ever home. And he doesn't come to church. Like none of our investigators go to church. It's way frustrating.

Vololona and fam. We did the whole Plan of Salvation lesson with them the other night and it went way good. They understand it really well even though I taught it. It helped that I had a drawing of it to. I pretty sure that piece of paper taught it better than I did for sure. They are a way sweet family and are progressing really well.

Ok next thing, I might have a baptism on Saturday and it may be moved to next Saturday, I'm not sure yet. It's this lady I taught like one of my first days here and she is a friend of Sr Helen and her family. They are hoping the lessons will be done in time for this Saturday. And they want to get a Skype call to their family member on her mission in SLC which brings me to my next topic.

The next time anyone is at Temple Square, get a picture of the sister from Madagascar because I am with her family every Monday and I'm sure they would love to see a picture of her.

Alright so with the same family, we sang in church yesterday. We sang Secret Prayer in English because that whole family is way mahay (skilled) at English. The one served her mission in Durban so shes super awesome. Yeah but the singing went pretty well even though no one had any idea what we were singing. They knew the tune though because that song exists in French.

Today we just went and explored Tana a little bit. I went and picked up a bunch of books that I had bound and bought a lamboany which is super cool. I can't really describe it so I'll send a picture at some point. I also put in an order for this custom made African shirt that is way sick. I'll send a pic when I get that next P-day.

Sorry for such a long email this week but a lot happened! Hopefully, this much will happen every week!

Elder Coleman

P.S.

We would always like some more food haha. But no were pretty good thus far. I will be in this area for probably at least 2 more transfers. I have one more transfer of training and then I will be here at least one more transfer to show someone the area if they decide to send me somewhere else. So 12 weeks at the minimum and 6 months and the max so it's hard to say. I see guys all the time from the MTC that are in Tana. I pretty much see all of them in the Tana at some point during every week.

We just do whatever the people ask us to do in church. For example, this week we taught the Young Men about modesty because the girls in this ward are pretty bad about that haha. To put it bluntly, some of them look like foza (prostitutes). Yeah I learn the important words in Malagasy. We just stick with the investigators usually.

The stuff was way good in the package. Propel has seriously never tasted so good. I haven't had the Gatorade yet, I want to save that for my month in country mark to celebrate. Elder Rice's year in country mark is two days before mine so we'll have some kind of big celebration or something.

We just have Ramen Noodle like stuff usually but we've had Spaghetti a few times. We eat out a lot because it's not very expensive and it's way good. I think we are going to make crepes tonight.

I heard about the I-15 thing. Sister Cloward pulled up a video on Facebook with that van going over that waterfall or whatever. That's so crazy! I feel like that is going to be everyday here once rainy season hits.

There are only three sets of sisters in Mada and I don't know how many are in R/M. Two sets are in Antsirabe and the other set is with us. 3 of the 6 are natives and i haven't met the 2 but the 1 here that's from America is from Boise. She goes home here pretty soon in November.

Music wise, The playlist on my iPod called Church would be sweet just not the MoTab stuff. Piano Guys would be awesome. The soundtrack for the 3rd Hobbit would also be very nice. And songs that we've sang in Xpress since I was in it would be good too. Have McK ask Mrs. Terry if she has a list of the songs we did the past three years. The African ones would be the best for obvious reasons. Soundtracks in general would just be really good.