This last week we did a whole lot of door knocking. We got something like 177 contacts with people but only a few potential investigators, only one or two of which we actually got to teach a lesson because they were home/ not busy when we went by for our scheduled appointment. There's still a couple other investigators in part member families we're sure can get baptized and a few less actives that are expressing interest in coming back to church so we're really excited for them.
I guess I haven't said too much about my companion, Elder Smith. He's actually our district leader so he's responsible for a lot of things going on. He's from Columbus, Ohio, but he always makes it a point to tell everyone he meets he was born in Dallas, Texas. I suppose he's as good as it gets as far as trainers go. He's really particular about being exactly obedient and he's always looking for opportunities to teach me something. He's got a great knowledge of the doctrine and teaching people even though he's been out about 8 or 9 months. He likes joking around sometimes, but he's generally pretty focused on the work and he's given me a lot of great advice. So yeah generally he's a really obedient and smart missionary who does a great job of keeping us focused.
He does get upset over weird things though. Like when I snack on chips or something he gets all huffy and feels like he has to sweep the entire flat when I spill a crumb. He also gets frustrated with the one less active we visit sometimes because in his advanced age he's become a little gullible when it comes to the internet.
His name is Alf. He lives in a shady trailer park pretty close to one of the part member families we teach. He was sealed to Faye, who lives in the adjacent trailer, but I'm not completely sure of their situation because they still pretty much hang around each other all the time. I think they're a really funny couple just because they've gone just a little bit off the deep end. We had dinner with them a week or so ago, and we just had simple nacho cheese flavoured chips with cheese melted on top of them and some chicken that was actually really good. Anyways, every time we go to visit Alf he's got some new thing that he talks to us about. When I first got here he had just spent hundred of dollars to get his laptop cleaned of a bunch of viruses and hacks because he gave away his information when he saw on the internet that a "long lost relative" had left him a $175 million inheritance. Then he was telling us his old junker of a car was worth millions in "certain circles" on the internet. Most recently, he claimed Michelle Obama had emailed him President Obama's personal telephone number and a scan of his driver's license.
I think it's just those kinds of things where you go "Oh, Alf" and laugh and shake your head, but Elder Smith always has to vent about it when we drive back to our flat or wherever. So that's Elder Smith.
A typical day starts with us waking up and working out in Brother Pereras' garage. Apparently he's a champion ex-MMA fighter. He's the second counsellor in the bishopric and he's this really buff Mauri guy who just beginning to show signs of gray hair. He's really cool though. Everyone calls him Napa, which is short for his first name, Parnapa. Then we come back to the flat, eat breakfast, do studies, and sometimes we do 12 week training in the morning but we mostly do it in the evenings. Then we go out and visit investigators or go finding for a couple hours until we come back for lunch for an hour. After that we head out and visit people, go door knocking, and all that until we go back for dinner. Most of the time the investigators we have scheduled visits with aren't home or are busy, so we plan lots of backups and we can usually get to someone who's open to a lesson.
Unfortunately some of our keenest investigators are baptismal-age kids who have single moms, and we're not allowed to go inside the house without another adult male there. So most of the time we just talk to them at the door, see how they're doing and schedule a return appointment.
One of the hardest things about this area is member missionary work as well. None of the ward missionaries are ever available for when we need them most and most of the other members don't really talk about religion with their friends and families. Religion just isn't a popular thing in Australia so they have a hard time overcoming that status quo. So yeah pretty much all the member present lessons we get are from teaching part member families.
That's one of the reasons why door knocking is really hard too. People are usually not interested in hearing any religion, and they refuse any service we offer to give, or they're deeply entrenched and happy with their religion (usually Christian, but there's a lot of Sikh here as well) and feel like they're faith is all they need. So potentials are rare, but they're usually pretty keen potentials.
By the way, I won't email until Tuesday next week because next Monday is a public holiday and all the libraries are closed. It's called ANZAC day, and I think it stands for Australia/New Zealand Army Corps or something, so it'll just be a regular work day for us. So that's me for the last week. Thanks for all your emails! I'll attach some random pictures of stuff I've taken. I should try taking more but I honestly don't know what to take pictures of, unless it's like houses and trees and stuff.
Elder Cummings
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