Baptism!

Another solid week here in Vanuatu. It is incredibly hot here.  More so than New Cal but it's just something that I've accepted now. Last Pday we had a solid "Family house night" (family home evening) with the 1st counselor in the bishopric. A lot of his family speaks french which was nice. I already feel like some French is slipping away from me and I want to practice!

Tuesday we saw all our investigators who got baptized last Saturday. We had to do some interviews with the district leader and what not. All went well! Also, this member family gave us a huge bunch of bananas. Not sure how we are going to eat like 50 bananas but its fine. 

Wednesday we did an exchange with the office elders. They are in a trio so I got to go with the other 2 while the district leader went with Elder LaMont. All 3 of us were all relatively new to Vanuatu. I've been here for a month and Elder Gaulden has too. Elder Kennedy has only been here about 3 so we all got some good experience talking Bislama. I surprised myself how much I could actually say after a month. It's coming WAAAY faster than French that's for sure. Also the weather on Wednesday was torture. We were on foot and it was super hot and raining at the same time which is the worst combo. 

Thursday we had some new arrivers to the mission. We got them out to their areas pretty easily. We also taught our investigator Jerry who was suppose to come to his baptism but couldn't yet cause he, with a bunch of other kids in his village, all got circumcised. We taught him with all his circumcised buds in a tent. The lesson was a little strange cause they all couldn't really move and they were all stuck in bed but a good story to tell haha.  

Friday was super busy. We followed up with a bunch of people that we found when contacting with president. 2 solid investigators came from it. We also met this "chief" dude who runs a little village here on Efate with a ton of families from Tanna (another island). He was super open to talking with us. So far we've only taught his son but we hope to talk with him soon. 

Saturday was Joma and Ivong's baptism! Their recent convert father baptized them which was a cool sight to see! Jerry's baptism is postponed till next week for the moment. When he can walk again is the real factor haha. For the baptism, Elder LaMont and I got asked to do the talks on Baptism and The Holy Ghost on the spot! I fumbled through a talk on baptism in a language I hardly know haha. All was well. 

Sunday was great. The most organized sacrament meeting since I've been here haha. A ton of people from the ward actually came too. We filled the chapel finally. Joma and Ivong got confirmed and we worked some stuff out with Bishop so a couple can get married and baptized soon. 

Bout it for this week!

Love, avec amour, lavem yufala tumas (I change the spelling everytime cause I don't think anyone knows how its actually spelled) ,

Elder Burbank 

Pics:

-Bananas!

-Left to right: Me, Elder LaMont, Joma, Grem (recent convert father), Ivong then another kid who got baptized in the ward by some other missionaries (Elder Gunnel and Elder Ficklin). 

-Tri-lingual