Transfer weeks make plans . . . Fun!

Well transfers came and went and it had been fun but also crazy. We got barely any lessons this week because I had to wait and get my new companion with some other missionaries. We also had Zone Conference with the mission president in St. Lucia so it was fun flying there. I slept in the church so I didn't do much sight seeing but I got to see some good friends. I freaked out earlier this week because I got my plane ticket and it had someone from the MTC to be my companion. Elder Watson was going to be my companion until some last minute change happened. Not sure what it was but I was so excited! We are just hoping now even more than ever that we get to be companions some time. My new companion Elder Bingham has a first name of Courtney and Courtney Eyring sent me a picture of her and her family for Christmas so I showed him the picture acting like I was just "In love" with this girl. I did this prank to him when he just got here. I told him that she has the most beautiful name ever. "Courtney! I think that is just the cutest name ever!" And then he caught on and we had a good laugh about it. We have the same style of comedic teaching that people seem to like and so we get along great! Just before I got him I was eating in a restaurant with my district leader and two men come in and get food and tell us that they have a warrant for our arrest. Then they talked about random scriptures and we found out that they were joking and were members from the next branch. I was super nervous and they acted like we were bad people because people randomly will come and talk to us to insult us from time to time. It was funny though because later missionaries came in that knew him. Also we said goodbye to one of our amazing recent converts. He is working on a cruise ship for the next 8 months. We are going to miss Brother Davis. Zone Conference was amazing. Talking with President Mehr was nice because there has just been a lot going on and it was good to release some pressure. "Big Bayne Theory" for this week: "God created Adam but he made Eve." Not too sure where he was going with that but I laughed pretty good afterwards. I love St. Vincent and can't wait for General Conference! Baptism next week too! Things are going good!

Kereoki

Well this week has been quite a fun one! We had an awesome week of Relief Society celebration. Monday we played musical chairs for the kids and then the adults. Guess who took 3rd place? Yeah that's me. They play it dirty here too. They sit down before the music even ends. I just wish I got a trophy of some sort. One of our investigators has a pretty crazy old old mom who doesn't like us for some reason. When we stepped into the yard she yelled "POLICE POLICE!" So we went and taught on the beach. Cerdia has been talking about moving in with here daughter so that she can keep the law of chastity and not live with her boyfriend. We are hoping that happens. I made a pretty good quote for the week when someone told us they are going on a diet. I told them to always remember "Ice cream is vegetarian." This week has had the interesting things too. Dogs kept barking at me and oh boy I want a dog whistle really bad! Then we taught some random lady while she got her hair done and we were talking about how Christ established his church with Peter and then she pulls out her phone and puts on the radio. No warning or anything. She listened to the lottery numbers and said: "Oh cool I won $75." No excitement or anything. Then she tells us to go on seeming still uninterested. You always gotta teach a person like that. Then we had kereoki (or however you spell it) and I sang 3 Little Birds by Bob Marley and then afterwards we all sang One Love as a Priesthood group. It was really fun and cool! I got my transfer call and I am getting a new companion named Elder Bingham. I will have to tell more about him next week when I have him. He flies in in like 2 days from St. Lucia but he is an American. I have met him once before. Also some girl guessed my first name which I never tell anyone so it was really weird. Also some Rasta man tried to out Bible knowledge me and said David was Solomon's son. I had to tell him that it was actually the other way. Lately I have been studying Old and New Testaments and the Book of Mormon. I love this knowledge! Things have been pretty good lately. Hard but really good. I love you all and will talk to you next week!

-Elder Brown

One Love with my Priesthood brothers

Important entertainment updates from home

Well this week has really flown by. It has seemed like lately that our weeks just fly by. Being on an island makes a day go by fast. Sunday we have church then Monday is P Day. Tuesday we have a district meeting and Wednesday we have a meeting with the branch mission leader to discuss the work we have been doing. Thursday we plan for the upcoming week and then it's the weekend. It is crazy how fast time will fly. We had a good lesson with one of our investigators and she owns a dvd stand. She showed me the cover to this new Liam Neeson movie called "Non Stop". That will have to go on my list of movies to see. We had a pluming problem in our apartment and we had a small flood over night. It stank pretty bad too but we cleaned it up pretty fast. Lately most people we talk to on the street have just been crazy people. We have gotten a few good lessons with people who are normal. We met one lady who was pretty cool. Her name was Angelina and she really seemed to care about what we share. Now we just need to get her to church! We went to a baptism in Caliqua and it was pretty nice. This girl named Makeisha was baptized and was taught by the sisters. We have really cool sisters on the island too. One of them was a Walking Dead fan so her and I talked about the show just before the baptism and she just got out here like a month ago so she updated me on season 4. Overall this was a pretty nice week. In this picture here is one of our buddies named Kenrick who is getting baptized on April 5th! We just hope that he starts up a combo and gets our other baptismal dates excited to be baptized. He is the only one really keeping commitments.
Also one of our members kids put their baby brother on my lap which is against mission rules so I got this awkward picture with him.

An Elderly Elder

Well this week had just seemed to fly by and I am just enjoying P-Day here. Today is 11 months since I have left home and it just feels kinda strange. I feel like such an elderly Elder. We have had some funny people who just want to meet with us so they can bash on America but try to make it look like they are just saying normal things. One lady we finally dropped because she wouldn't let us even share the Restoration with her. She had good questions such as infant baptism but she didn't care at all. We finally got to share about Joesph Smith and then she asks "So the church started in America?" "Yes." "What was the name of the fruit Adam and Eve ate?" I replied "I have no idea. Maybe it was an apple." She tells us so seriously "That's what America wants you to think." I told her about the Book of Mormon and read the last two paragraphs in the intro and just before that she told us we better hook her on it. So after that we told her that she had no interest in learning so we dropped her. People here love crusades though. There is one like every week! I was reading the Book of Mormon and I realized that King Benjamen had a sweet crusade. He was a prophet though so it was cool. This week we got a ride from the sisters just before we had to go in and then we got 3 flat tires so we called the mission president and 4 of us Elders slept in the car down the street from where I live. It was really fun and felt like a camp out! So another think Vincies or Caribbeans in general love to do is Lime. That's where you go to some corner or something and just sit there and hang out. We did that while waiting for a less active to get back home and we just limed into 2 lessons with random people. That's the Caribbean style. One man was there and decided to lime with us and then he said he had a white girlfriend once and she loved KFC and Pizza. She wouldn't eat anything else or cook. Then he showed us a tour of his apartment on his iPhone with pictures of 2 of his girlfriends. My branch mission leader tells me and Elder Dye all about these new Bible movies coming out about Jesus and Noah. I want to see those pretty bad. I wish I had time to study out Genesis alone. 1 hour study is not enough! I have thought about those boring Byu tv lectures and man I wish I had some. It's funny what being a missionary does to you. Suddenly those studies become the most amazing things ever! One of our investigators actually is ready to settle down now too. He is a teenager named Kenrick and he has been meeting with missionaries for forever and then came up to us and set a date for April. He is a boss! Overall not a bad week but there was nothing amazing with explosions or anything.

Spectacular!

As I was talking about last week things had been pretty hard. I have gotten sick too and have a cough that gets kinda bad sometimes. Elder Dye has had it for 7 weeks now and I think the rain and being around him has helped me get it too. One of our lighter skinned Rasta buddies says boiling and drinking the root of marijuana will get rid of my asthma but won't get you high. I guess God does make everything for a use but I am not too sure if I will use that. One of our investigators is really working towards a baptism date but we just need to get her to live the law of chastity. This week we have had people tell us that they want to be baptized. All of the people (minus Jean) who want to be baptized are sisters or the mom of one of our less actives so we are going to be re activating and baptizing! That is such a success! One of our member's sister literally set her own date. Now for some interesting stories of the week. We met this one lady who I think has short turn memory loss. She has 2 names and introduced herself to us by both names 7 times. Christian Alegdlo and Doll Brown. She was really funny. We are trying to commit some of our eternal investigators to baptism. We take our buddy Preston to come teaching with us. He used to be a Rasta but now is a member for about 2 years now and is saving up for the temple. We asked him to bear testimony about how he was still tempted after baptism and he said that he wasn't tempted at all. It was so funny because we did not expect him to say that.  We met a couple who go to a church already and we went over to share the Restoration to them and the man named Cecil started to talk to us all chilled out and told us about Daniel and the Lion's Den. Afterwards he told us about Jonah and the Whale. He didn't really make a point but he sounded like he was going to. People here can be interesting. Sacrament meeting was interesting again. I think fast Sundays are where things happen. Some kid in the back barfed and they took the whole bench out so they could clean it. They moved it fast and quietly. I did not even notice them take the bench away. A baby was getting blessed and the baby had like 4 names: Sheniqua Shequana Shenini Richardson. That was literally almost the name! The mom stood in the circle for the baby blessing too. During all of sacrament meeting too this kid named Michael (Preston's son) leaned his head against my shoulder. He thinks I am super cool and he always pulls my arm hair out. This week we exceeded every goal we set and it was spectacular! Thanks for the moral support last week Bob Marley!

-Elder Brown