29 October 2018

My Week:

For whatever reason this week seemed to be a mix of frustrating and funny. Let me explain:

As a missionary making daily contact with each person being taught is crucial, especially in a place like Tangerang where many people have irregular work schedules. This week there were multiple days that despite our best efforts, daily contact could not be established with the people my companionship is teaching. Resulting was a decreased number in lessons, and poor follow up with people who are in the process of making big changes in their lives.

At one point I was so frustrated that I asked my companion “Why do these people even have phones (plural because in Indonesia it is common for one person to have more than one phone) if they don’t ever answer them?” Elder Suranto and I kept giving our best efforts and making the best of the situation.

Aside from being a bit frustrating, this week has also been funny. At the end of a lesson someone asked to take a photo with me. While Elder Suranto was taking the picture this person kept shouting “You have no skill. The picture doesn’t look good. Take another picture.” Not sure why this guy was so serious about having his picture taken with me, but it was really hard to keep a straight face while he was yelling nonsense.

While teaching English Class, I came to the realization that while most of the students could understand what I was speaking in English, they had no idea how to spell. In the spur of the moment I turned English Class into a spelling bee, grabbed a dictionary, and made the students write down words as I spelled them out.  What happened was a fun game where the word “gravitate” was spelled “jreiteti.”

Yesterday in Sacrament Meeting a new member gave a talk. What was supposed to be a five minute talk turned into a fifteen minute talk as this new member, who is 17 years old, told of how he spent 8 hours in a single day playing a video game and that he promises the ward that he won’t play video games again. Then he started talking about a dream he had, a natural disaster, more about his video games, and on again. A good half of the congregation was keeping down laughter during the talk.

My Week:

It has been a week since General Conference, and I am learning more and more from the messages presented. I invite everyone to continue to study the recent words of the modern prophets and learn from them. I know that God has spoken to us, and that he continues to speak to us through President Nelson.

Elder Allen

22 October 2018

My Week:

Monday

• Spent a lot of time cleaning the house. After getting it really clean, Elder Suranto and I packed up and headed to Bogor for companion exchanges there.

Tuesday

• I went on exchanges with Elder Montoya. He has been in Indonesia for seven weeks now but his Indonesian is already really good. I was impressed with how fast he has been able to learn the language. We worked hard that day.

Wednesday

• Travelled back to Tangerang and had District Council. Prepared some for a meeting on Thursday.
• Taught a member family. Really hoping that as we teach them they will feel the spirit and return to activity within the gospel.

Thursday

• Had a meeting with the President Mackay and the zone leaders from the other zones. We discussed that needs and challenges of the Indonesia Jakarta Mission, and set some good plans to help the work move forward.

Friday

• Worked out at the mission home.
• Had another awesome interview with President Mackay. We talked about the future of the zone. The Lord has some big plans.
• After arriving back in Tangerang, we taught an English class then ate dinner with a member family.

Saturday

• Found time to do some weekly planning. I know that without good planning I cannot do the most good.
• Teaching three lessons took up the rest of the day. Because of how big my area is, three or for lessons is really the most you can fit into one day. Much different than in Solo, where I could teach up to six or seven lessons in a day.
• Today was the most frustrating day of the week. We paid our electricity bill, and it was super expensive. Then one of the people we planned on teaching told us he would be 30 minutes late. That 30 minutes soon turned into 90 minutes. We met with him, but didn’t have time to teach what we had planned.
• There was a decent rain storm going on when we were teaching at our last appointment. We came home to find that a tree had fallen onto the front of our house and the floor was covered in water on the first and second floor. It took a lot of time to clean up but thankfully nothing was damaged.

Sunday

• I was really excited to meet with someone that I had contacted on the train two weeks ago, but at the last minute she cancelled. Disappointing as it was, we were still able to go out and find some cool people.

Questions:

Q: With Elder Suranto, your Indonesian companion, do you speak very much English?

A: Elder Suranto is very good speaking English. We have agreed to speak English on even dates and Indonesian on odd dates. For me, now that I have been in Indonesia for over a year, I feel about as comfortable speaking in Indonesian as I do in English.

Q: How do the members in Indonesia watch General Conference?

A: We watch it in the church building from a projector. It is translated live in Salt Lake City, and we watch it the week after. To be honest, most of the time the live translation isn't the best, although by the time it gets published in the Liahona it is good.

Pretty traditional Indonesian painting that I am standing in front of.

15 October 2018

My Last Two Weeks:

All has been well. Elder Nelson and I finished our time together in Tangerang. He had served here for six months and was a bit sad to leave. I have now been in Tangerang for a month now, but I feel that I don’t know my area all too well. After all, my current area is over ten times larger than the size of my past area in Solo.

My new companion is Elder Suranto, picture located below. He is from Jogja and has been on his mission for nine months. I feel that the two of us could end up spending a good amount of time together, which is something that I am excited for. It has been six months since I have last served with an Indonesian companion.

I won’t try and go into too much detail for these last two weeks. At this point it seems to hard to digest. When each day is filled with so many activities and so many new faces it can be difficult to recall all that has happened. I will say that my last two weeks have included the following: playing basketball on President Mackay’s birthday, exchanges to Bogor and Bandung, the best haircut of my life, teaching English class, sending humanitarian supplies to Palu, the city hit by a severe earthquake, and of course meeting the people God has prepared.

Spiritual Thought:

You reap what you sow.

Is that true? The answer is yes; sometimes. I taught and taught and taught while in my first area, Surabaya, and for all my effort, for all the sweaty days I spent finding, twice I had a people at church. While in Solo I prayed fervently for inspiration and vision on how I could better direct the missionaries serving in the province. The revelation did come, and no sooner did I begin to put it together did I leave Solo to serve in Tangerang.

Did I reap what I had sown? No. But was it sown? Yes. Although I was not there in person when it happened, three of the people that I had taught and found in Surabaya joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints through the ordinance of baptism and confirmation. And although I was not there to personally teach the missionaries in Central Java, the plan that my companion and I had created was taught to the missionaries and proved successful.

From these experience I have learned that it is not always meant for us to personally reap the rewards of everything that we sow. All of us do things in the now, expecting quick results, when we often forget that the thing we hope for will come later. What we need to do is give our best efforts in all things, and trust in the Lord’s promise that all things will work out for our good.

Pictures:

Sowing up bags of supplies to send to Palu.

An English class that I taught while on exchanges in Bogor.

A truck that I buy my fruit from.

Elder Suranto and I.

A common street vendor selling groceries.

Playing basketball

1 October 2018

My Week:

Everything was pretty good this week. I went on exchanges with another missionary  in my zone, Elder Eddington. He is currently serving in Bandung, which is a 5 hour train ride away. To be nice I bought fried rice for him and his companion. He threw up no less than five times. Our exchange still ended up being a success, as we found and taught new people.

Zone Conference was this Friday. It was shortened to one day; we all felt the power of what was being taught. I felt somewhat bad for President Mackay as he had to run in and out of our training to interview missionaries. My interview with him was great. The lessons that I have learned while on my mission are more valuable to me than any worldly possession that could be offered.

Questions:

Q: Do you have any rats in your apartment?

A: NO. Elder Nelson and I keep our apartment clean. No rats.

Q: Are you safe?

A: Yes.