Week 14 - Pastor Senrick Paul

This week has been so wonderful, thanks to a good P-day last week. It was the first P-day we actually were able to take 5 seconds and enjoy ourselves and not be rushed with laundry and buying produce.

We finally cooked the crabs, but because we're white, we didn't really know what to do with them and they tasted Sais, so we just gave them to our land lady. That's what you do in Pohnpei. You just give stuff away. One of the locals told us, 'Pohnpei is freedom'. And It's pretty true. You're hungry, walk 10 feet and grab a banana, coconut, yam, tarro, breadfruit, mango, chicken, dog, crab. It's pretty cool :) And then you just share with everyone. 

 Attempting to cook crabs

Anywho, we also had a giant hunk of fish given to us, which was incredibly tasty. I got to do the job of cutting the meat off of the bones, and it was surprisingly similar to cutting the meat off of an Elk or Deer carcass. Honestly the most delicious thing I've eaten, so crazy good! I swear that fresh fish meat would be like $40 back home. And someone just gave it to us! I love this place :)

Our hunk of blue fish meat

We got the fish from a man named Senrick Paul; Pastor Senrick Paul. He used to be a pastor for the Protestant church, but stopped going a few years ago because he's really old and wanted to truly learn more about God and he wasn't sure if the truth was in the Pros church (people here call it Pros). We found him and started teaching him, and he wasn't reading the Book of Mormon at all and was just telling us we're super holy because we all love and worship God and Jesus. He wasn't getting the 'only true church' thing. But finally, he read the Book of Mormon. He said it didn't make sense that we're not baptized the way Jesus was, with only a sprinkling on a babies head. So we gave him Moroni 8 :) And he read it. And we came back and he said he was sinning as a pastor and he needs to repent of his wrongdoings and join this church of God. Because this Rongamwahu(gospel) is too important! This Gospel is too real!

Usually he just pawns his daughters off to us (20 and 30 somthin' aged adults) to take to church because church is good. And he told us he's going to call his children in the States and tell them to find missionaries and be baptized. So we asked him if he's ready to be baptized and he laughed and said "now hold your horses" (but pohnpeian style. Cuz no horses in pohnpei) I WILL be baptized, but I want all my eggs in one basket. I need to let my children know and then we will all join together.

Haha I couldn't even believe it. :)

With the language barrier and things I get a totally different impression of people than Sister Behling does. I can understand about 70% of gospel conversations, and I usually know what's going on, but I don't know the details. I can usually teach and testify in Pohnpeian pretty well during lessons. I'm getting better :) It's really cool to see the language begin to make sense to me, and now I can understand people too! So that's great :)

A roadside pool table

Love you all! Hope you're having a wonderful week!!

Also.. We have 18 new investigators... haha there's just too many people prepared! It's so crazy. AND we found someone with a phone! Whaatt?! But that's great because now we can call ahead to see if they're home before lessons! It's so strange. I love this beautiful island :)

Love,
Sister Felt

Week 13 - Nobody's who Break into Cars

This week was long, but good :) It's rained a lot this week, so it's been kinda chilly. but all is well :)

In the rain with Sister Behling

On Wednesday, we locked our keys in our car 10 minutes from our home at 9pm. It was great! We spent about 10 minutes trying every door, trying every lock, and searching for a way in. It was our house keys and car keys. So we were definitely stuck, and our phone was about to die. finally, we said a prayer, and then we went back to the Shotgun window which was open a hair. Sister Behling and I pushed with all our might and shoved it down just far enough to get a stick through which we then used to flip the lock by some miracle. So ya. That was great. Made it inside by 9:10. Our water pump still has a leak, so we just turn it on for about an hour every night to take a shower. No biggie. We're pretty blessed.

Our house

Thursday was District meeting. The Elders in our district are great and all. Its a thing to go eat with your district for lunch afterwards, so we went. It was clear the hay out in the world, and at an okay diner buffet thing. We showed up, and not a one aknowledged us. We weren't sure if its not a thing to sit with Elders, so we walked up, and there weren't any chairs for us. and we asked if we should sit at another table and they just said ya probably. So we did. No one talked to us. What a joke. Found out from the other sisters that it's the same for them and Elders are just dumb. Haha whatever though, because today on P-Day, us and a couple of other sisters went out to eat at Ko-Kos and got some oreo milkshakes and burgers and "didn't" watch the ESPN patriots game. In Yo Face Elders!

On Saturday was Kamadipw en Wau. Basically it's like founders day for each village. It was Pehleng's and it's a celebration of the municipalities king coming to the village. They pound Sakau, dance, listen to music, eat pigs, and have a good time sharing food! It was pretty cool.

Here are some pictures of our area

Yesterday was Sunday. Haha our sabbath waaass... haha it's a story. Sacrament meeting usually starts at 9. but it started at 10:15. Sunday was really really rainy and cold, and when it rains, everything just kinda shuts down. 

Our church building

But in the morning, President Route drove out to our area to pick people up (one member and three of our investigators (yay!!)) and he knocked on our door in the morning. I've accepted the fact that everyone knows where we live and culturally people just walk in. So I'm glad he at least knocked. but he went to pick people up, then we went to church. There were three people there. Like in the pictures of the tent and the whole 'chapel'.

Setting up sacrament meeting in the rain

Finally President showed up. He didn't pick up our investigators due to a miscommunication. They were expecting and waiting for Megan to pick them up (Megan is an RM and a soild member. Our solid member present). Megan did drive out to our area, but the car broke down. So president left to go save her and the member she was picking up. By then there was about 10 people at sacrament meeting. No one with church keys or priesthood keys though. 

With kids in the branch

Waiting for sacrament meeting

Finally the 1st counselor showed up, and they started to get the sacrament table out. Anywho, we had sacrament and presdient didn't show up until after it was over. The rain was pounding really hard and no one really heard the speakers well. But it was pretty good. when president showed up he cancelled the rest of church because the 'chapel' was flooded. So ya haha we were kinda glad our investigators never made it with the way things turned out. Also on Sunday we recieved 9 pancakes, a ton of rice and pork, two ramen packages, two eggs, 10 crabs to cook later, and just a bunch of love!

These people are so humble, loving and kind! And they all love Jesus :) 

 With branch members

Love you all! Have a good week! Pet a horse, and read the Book of Mormon!

Love,
Sister Felt

Week 12 - Online Dating

Nicole and I were able to message back and forth for a little while last night while she was emailing and we had a little Q and A. I've copied some of our conversation at the end of this email. 

Sister Felt and Sister Behling

What a week. I was in sick on Tuesday again because I'm a white person with a weak stomach. But our water pump is still broken and our tank ran dry as well. So we really had no water for a while. And our land lady has gone Awol due to a scandal that happened. We don't know. Everyone knows her and knows where we live, but she was gone for a while and then randomly showed up and walked into our house (!!?!) and told us to keep the pump off and only plug it in when we need water. But it has a crack in it so I worry it's on the road to the dumpster. And our land lady is still 'missing'/in exile. I have no idea. Anywho, Wednesday was insane. It was walking Wednesday, so we really got to know our area well. We were trying to find this girl Selly (12 y/o who we met randomly but she said she's been baptized. no record. but it's probably true.), and in our area, there's of course the main road that goes around the whole island (it's like half the size of a real road in Wellsville) and in Pehleng there are little side stores and people usually live deep in the jungle, a little hike off the main road, but hang out by the side stores and pool tables. So we were asking people where Selly lives. The first one sent us south, so we went south and ran into a big group of kids playing marbles. Talked and played with them for a minute and then sent us North east to find Selly. So we went north east. We saw someone and they sent us West to go find Selly. so we went West. They said Selly was north. So we turned to each other and laughed and started to walk north and ran into the kids again. We stopped and almost looked around in circles, laughing, when this woman walks up, and speaks to us in perfect english! (!!?!) What?!?! In the middle of Pehleng, Pohnpei, there's an American woman???? We talked to her, and she had a New York accent (grew up there) was from Ohio, is Puerto Rican/Itialian, and is in Pohnpei because she met a man online over Facebook and she came to marry him in June. What. THAT was crazy, not just her story, but the fact we were talking to another American??? That was SO weird, I don't even know. And THEN! While we're talking to her, this white girl walks up!! Totally American!! Sister Behling and I just like blink and look at her and back and forth and what!?! She was from Peace Corps and was all fancy shmancy formalities hello with us. It was weird. I don't even know. So we said hello to those two (they didn't know each other) then goodbye, and went to go find Selly. On our way to go find her, people were blasting Classical music, which was weird and crazy out of the ordinary.

In front of our house

Oh! Also!! Everyone here really loves classic country music!! :D So I hear Alan Jackson, George Straight, all those goodies a lot. The one song "And we danced.. .out there on that empty hardwood floor" that one is SUPER popular and is played a lot. Also, everyone still chews betel nut here too. But Sakau of Pohnpei is this mud they drink. They get the roots of the Sakau plant and grind them up. Then they soak them in water. Then they squeeze out all the rest and drink it. It's basically root mud and tastes disgusting apparently (the american woman from ohio told us that. also told us never to try it. She was so cute and funny and nice) :) but it dulls all your senses and makes you not like noise, and basically it's a weird form of being drunk. we can't teach people when they're 'pounding sakau' (hitting the roots with rocks on the sakau rock to grind them up) or when they're making it or drinking it.

The next day, we hiked up to the top of the mountain in the middle of the jungle away from any civilization whatsoever to find this woman we met in town ("town" is really just side stores. It's almost like an old west version of towns just instead of dry desert everywhere, it's jungle.). She is perfectly prepared to receive the gospel. Honestly, our work is just weeding out those who are prepared and those who are not, because there's so many prepared people! And EVERYONE is willing to believe what we say. It's just getting them to understand that they need to be baptized again and there is only ONE true church. They nod their heads and agree, but sometimes they don't really take it all in. Also Language is a huge barrier. Haha I'm learning patience for sure :) Sometimes you just wish you could shove all the info into someones head like a computer, but sadly, people don't work that way. I have to learn the language, then take the time to educate, and find those willing to be educated. It's a very lengthy process, this salvation thing.

Washing dishes in the rain

We did the dishes in the rain again, due to our lack of water. But we've been eating coconuts as often as we can! And there are SO many different types of Bananas. Did you know there are rectangle bananas? And coconuts are the best thing ever. We have coconut doughnuts and oh my wow. I love coconut! I love it so much here, it's like a constant battle of emotions between: I never want to leave I could stay here forever! and, I cant wait to go home and ride horses and see my family and not sweat all the time ;) It's fun, I enjoy it.

Well, that's most of it. People are ready, people feel the spirit when we teach and when they read, people are smart, and We're going to get some baptisms! We actually had a miracle of two investigators at our tiny church yesterday :) even though it's a 40 minute drive, and most people don't have cars, and there's three churches a 5 minute walk from their house, they came!

That's all :) Love ya!
-Sister Nicole Felt

How are your shoes working out?
I LOVE and cherish my Keens. In THIS area, my crocs are sometimes a joke. But they're still good. I'll just probably need another pair of Keens in several months.

Where do you do laundry?
We do laundry at the Kolonia sisters house. the church bought them a a washer and dryer. So we take a few hours swithcing the laundry when needed

What are you doing without water in your house? Can you shower?
hahah thats a good question! We take bucket showers and sometimes risk it and turn on the pump and take a low pressure real shower. But we shower in Kolonia when we come into town and fill up on filtered water.

Where do you fill up on water and shower in Kolonia?
At the sisters house. kolonia is pretty modern. doritos and such and clean water. It's the city of the island. Our house has a toilet and shower but its outside..? We have a porch, and we go out the side door and into the bathroom in another room on the other side of the porch.

So you DO have drinking water? That's good!
of course. and magic water bottles the MTC gave us to filter everything. So we're fine

How often do you and your companion teach lessons to investigators?
We teach about 3-6 lessons every day. and contact at least 5 new poeople every day. The trick is catching them and making sure they know when your return appointment is. But they're very beleiving and know we're people of god.

Have you been to any baptisms on Pohnpei yet?
Ya! Saturday actually. It was Sais

Sais??
like size except the z is more like an s. It means "whatever. Fine. Idk. idc. its chill". It's a great word.

How long does it take you to drive from your area to Kolonia?
about 38 minutes obediently

Well, I gotta go! I really loved getting to talk to you though. I just need to get so much work done... But I love you! Have a wonderful week!! Also I keep meaning to say. Yap was like Moana, Pohnpei is like Tarzan. :) Love you!

Week 11 - White Like Paper

Another week of hard work and a Zone Conference to get in the way of our proselyting..Haha just kidding, Zone Conference is great!! I really really loved it. Honestly a spiritual recharge after being in a tiny tiny branch and low active member area for a while. It was Stake Conference yesterday and Zone conference on Thursday. T'was grand. It's way different with so many missionaries here. I think there's 8 sisters and a LOT more Elders.

Pohnpei Zone

My companion Sister Behling is incredible and I love her so much. We have a hard time getting to bed on time because we're always talking and laughing and telling stories and making jokes :)

Sister Felt and Sister Behling

I'm not used to the local food yet. on yap we didn't get fed once. But here, everyone feeds you and you eat it all because it shows your love and appreciation for them. Mostly white rice. Soy sauce. Sometimes chicken. Ramen. Fish. I am not feeling great. Haha but it's fine! Oh! And they have Gosners milk here :) Kinda fun because it says LOGAN UTAH right on it! I love it :)

A taste of home!

I love white washing. It's great. So we've got 14 New investigators this week :) WahooOOO. We were pretty proud to report that. Our district is 6 of us. The Kitti(Kitchey) Elders which one is Elder Yamamoto, and Elder Pilimai (Starting Tight End on the BYU football team, freshman year. Solid guy. I really respect him. Also he knows psych and its the best) Then the Wone (wenna) elders Elder Brown (the elder that used to be in our area. hes our district leader and whitewashing his area with...) Elder Newill. He's brand spankin' new. We reported our 14 new investigators and beat their 11 :) So proud of us, we done did great.

The language is coming so well! I have had zero materials to study, but Sister Behling is incredible and has been writing down things and teaching me the language from scratch. I can understand the general idea and topics of conversation now and pray in Pohnpeian. Sister Behling also knows German, and a variation of chuukese and pingalapese, and morchluckese, and a bit of Kiribeti. Today we sat with a woman from another place that spoke another language. So between the three of us, we had 9, almost 10 languages :) (My Woleaian and the little bit of Yapese I picked up.) Pretty cool! The language of Pohnpeian says their T like ch and they roll their R's. also every B has become a P. Kinda cool :) still a lot of the ng sound too like in outer island.

Even though I can understand the general idea of the conversations now, I don't know everything. And on Wedensday (take into account that by Wednesday I had been meeting and talking to people for about 9 days) Sister Behling goes "Oh, by the way, Johnston said that you're a really good teacher, he just wishes you knew Pohnpeian. Also he said you're white like paper." I laughed and asked her to explain. She then said "oh, i probably should have told you. but every person we meet so far has either said something about you being really white, really skinny, or really beautiful. I just forgot to tell you." Haha she legit did!! But she taught me the words for White, Skinny, Smart and Beautiful so now I can pick those up. And she's right. My appearance is literally all people talk about haha. When school gets out and we're outside, I feel like everyone is whistling and hollering at us. It happens a lot. But then sometimes we're teaching someone and those same boys come home to us teaching their family :) Ha! Kinda funny but also weird. One of our--scratch that--our only member present, Megan, told us her conversion story and said that she started talking to the missionaries because she saw they were white and that was cool to her. She laughed and said "I dunno, by small and simple things I guess!" It's true. People are so intrigued by us and want to be around us, BECAUSE we are white. But guess what :) We turn it into a teaching opportunity :)

So around Wednesday last week, our water pump broke, and we ran out of water. So it has been an adventure trying to get water. On Fridayish (i dunno, days blurr) we were doing comp study and we began to hear rain outside. We quickly jumped up and ran outside and grabbed buckets and began colleting all the water we could. Then we remembered that we had a lot of dirty dishes, so we ran inside and grabbed them all and put them on top of our car (a toyota Yaris) with dish soap in them. It rained SUPER hard and by the time we were done and had washed the dishes in the rain, we literally looked like we had jumped in the ocean, head to toe soaking wet. It was pretty fun :)

We've met a lot of people who are very prepared to hear the gospel. And we've also met a lot of people who are so so about it. We're just trying to weed out the receptive from the nonreceptive so we can find EVERYONE who would be receptive. If that makes any sense.

ANOTHER funny story. We were teaching a lesson once, and it was all spiritual and great. And suddenly. this creature falls and lands on my face. A sticky gecko on my forehead/ eyebrow and hair. I freaked out but calmly brushed it off onto my hand and flicked it to the ground. It freaked out because it was out in the open, and ran underneath my skirt. Great. Haha it ended up okay, but NO ONE SAW. I don't even know. But then, we went out to the car and I backed the car up outside, and then a crab ran at me. Great. Then we go home, and I go to take a shower, and I open the door to the bathroom, and a gecko landed on the top of my head. Are. You. Kidding. Me. It was a night in Micronesia. Anywho, that was my week :) Love ya!

Love, Sister Felt

Pohnpei Sisters with Sister Poston

Week 10

POHNPEI (Panasong Church Building)

Oh my wow. I don't even know where to start. Definitly the best week of my mission so far. My companion is Sister Behling from Payson Utah. She's been out for 13 months and I am her first American companion who speaks English as a first language. She's incredible. Her first companion was Sister Alanzo. She was my "first temporary companion" when I got to Guam off the plane. Sister Alanzo was a native to Pohnpei and served here on the island. She was from Kitti (where I am serving now). 

Meeting Sister Behling

Anywho, So I got here on Monday and emailed and then the next step was for Sister Behling and I to find our area. We literally had nothing. The STL's had all my suitcases and Behling's stuff, and we just had our satchels and water. We had to find the phone for our area, keys to the house and our car, we had to find our car, and then get a hold of the STL's to get our stuff, and then find someone to take us to our area because neither of us knew where it was and there is no such thing as a map in Micronesia. Also we didn't know where our house was. So it was all an adventure! Finally, we found two Elders (Elder Mueller who was one of my companions flying out here and his trainer) who knew where our area was, and they took us there. Our car is sketch. Smells like cat pee and has the check engine and flat tire lights on. But at least we have a car! We got to our house around 6:00. So it was the end of P-day. Sister Behling is, like I've said a billion times, incredible and so she determined that we need to be exactly obedient, but we also need to be logical and take care of ourselves. So we opened the door and got inside. And sure enough, it was an Elders house. So it was pretty nasty. Also, the two Elders that were there previously hadn't gotten all the information in their transfer call. So the one who went to Guam packed all his stuff, but the other thought he was coming back, so he left everything in the house still. We moved everything he left into the closet room and then put our suitcases in the cleanest part of the floor. Then we took the sheets and paw patrol blanket off the elders bed and put our bedding on the beds, kinda made ourselves at home. After we established ourselves somewhat, we tiptoed out of the house through the mess and went out proselyting. Incredibly, After having only like 3 hours of sleep in two days/two nights, I was doing pretty okay. And we met our neighbors and land lady. It was dark though so we didn't go far. (all year round here it gets light at 6am and dark at 7pm. It's pretty reliable, and makes for some killer dinner time sunsets). Because of my lack of sleep, my companion said we're going to bed at 9:00 because I still needed to adjust. Which was true. So I passed out.

The next day we got up and got permission to deep clean the house and really settle in. Holy cow Elders are nasty.. haha not really, but it was pretty gross. Our house is so cute and tiny, no hot water and barely an AC, and in the middle of the jungle. OH! Our AREA. Oh my wow the Lord truly loves me!! Yap was great and jungley and all, and a lot of Pohnpei is pretty cool, but our area is literally jungle. We're in the middle of the forest hiking on trails going miles and miles all day to find peoples houses in the jungle. Have I mentioned we're living in the jungle? No supermarkets, no parking lots, nothing really. Little side stores that somehow get oreos and pretty good homemade doughnuts.

The view from our front porch

So no one here speaks English really, especially in my area. I'm in the oldest part of Ponpeian meaning that it's the most cultural and is the only one that speaks real true pohnpeian. So I'm picking up the language fast. 

But our first night here, we drove around and met this family by accident. (sister behling drove the car off the side of the road like jones did on Yap. but it was fine because we got out easy). The family came and helped us and they spoke really only pohnpeian. but they were on date with the Elders! They don't remember it, but the area book says they're on date for Oct 14th. Anywho, we've been working with them and the woman Alwisia (alweesee-uh) fed us fresh ocean fish and rice for dinner. It was incredible and we ate with our hands. pretty sure that's what made me a little sick but whatever. Im sure I'll get used to it. But I kid you not, we hike through at least a mile of jungle every day going to and from peoples homes. And there's LOTS of pigs here. There are some that people own and have in pens behind our house and so sometimes our water smells like pig and they squeal in the morning when they're being fed. But I like it! It's really fun.

The local pigs outside our house

Sacrament meeting. Oh my goodness. I thought Yap was small. There were about 40 people at church yesterday. and Four of them were preisthood holders. two of those four were missionaries. Elders Pilami and Yamamoto (Elder Pilami was one of my companions getting here too. The guy is amazing). We had to wait to start sacrament meeting-which was held outside under a tent tarp-for the branch president to show up. And then we had the branch president, one of his councilors, and the two missionaires. the missionaries blessed and passed the sacrament and the presidentcy presdied. The rest of the people were woman and children. The big main problem with our area, is that it takes 3 or 4 hours to walk to church from the edge of our area boundaries closest to the branch (the branch is in Kitti which is the Elders area). and no one has a car. So members in Kitti (pronounced Kitchi. the i making an eee sound.) drive out to Pehleng (our area) and pick people up for church. It's so small. Yap was tiny too, but I cant even describe Kitti.

We went to primary this week. And the kids were so cute! some sat by me during sacrament meeting and tried talking to me. I said in broken pohnpeian that I only know a little bit of pohnpeian, I'm learning. So they talked slower and with more emphasis and tried to teach me. It was so cute! After church we all sat down and the little girls braided my hair and put flowers in it just like Rapunzel and they tried to teach me pohnpeian. No one here speaks English, so i'm picking up the language fast!!

Love you all! We gotta go get our money and such and do laundry and everything. Wahoo. P day is great :)

Sister Felt