a little more time to write today

Hello momma! 

Yes, I have SOOO many pictures to send you. A ridicoulous amount, and I finally have time to do it today. Last week M was baptised! Yep, pretty legit, ill send the pictures. He is doing so awesome. He got the priesthood yesterday, he's a teacher now. It's kinda funny but also awesome- he got a haircut and the guy doin it put steps (lines) in his eyebrows and he didn't want him to, he called us in a panic asking if that was bad. We told him no, lines in your eyebrows is just weird haha He's awesome, when he learned he would be ordained to a teacher he asked if he had to teach a class and was relieved when we told him he didn't. 


Other big news, N, M's friend that we've been teaching, he is actually getting baptised this week and not next! His friend R, who's 11, is getting baptised this Saturday, the sisters have been mainly teaching him, and we thought it would be cool if they did it together. So this Saturday, we are having two baptisms. Those boys get taught so much because R sits in on the lessons with M and N, and N and M sit in on the lessons the Sisters teach to R. The gospel is taking over that yard! R asked me if I would baptize him, and Elder McLeod is baptizing N... All white everything on Saturday! :) N is rock solid, we taught him about tithing and asked if we had to be a member to pay. When we told him no you don't, he's like "Well good, because I'm paying mine Sunday". Sure enough, N is a stud. He and M didn't have white shirts or ties so I gave them two of mine and a couple ties, I hope they wear them. They didn't rock them Sunday, N said it was too big so I told him to buck up and start eating like a man haha He's 15 too, they were talking about when they serve their missions in my yard how I better treat them to some nice food- that would be pretty cool :)

This week was more hectic than usual, we had more branch stuff to take care of than the norm. We had a pretty sweet activity Saturday, had a pretty good turn out. It's a bust sometimes because taxi's don't run late here and most people don't have fare as it is, only for Sunday, and taxi guys don't run on Sunday so most people walk. M and N walk 7 miles to and from every Sunday to be at church. Siblings- remember that when you don't wanna wake up on time to go to church. Thats like walking to the Liberty Lake building for church every Sunday with the lovely Jamaican sun roastin' ya. I love those boys, its like I'm teaching Mac when I'm over there. They are just goofy, hard workin farm boy 15 year olds who love the gospel. Life is good. 

The temple people go to here- they have a couple options. If they don't have a Visa they go to Panama or the DR, and if they do, they go to Miami or Orlando. We are making a big push for the Temple Patron Fund which is SO awesome. It gives no one the excuse of not being able to afford it. Our district is trying to put together a temple trip for August and that would be sooooooo great. A lot of these people are ready, and now with the assistance from the church to get there, they will be able to. 

Yes, baptizing men is difficult. The Jamaican lifestyle doesn't incorporate gospel standards at all. That's a big factor in why Jamaica can't have a Stake as yet, not enough active, worthy priesthood holders, hence why Elder McLeod is the Branch President. He's doing well, we have the hang of things, and our balance between it and missionary work is good. I've got the hang of my clerky duties too, so things are good. We usually have full days of teaching and then we get a call and something comes up. We really do need to start finding more people to teach though. Our teaching pool is going to be baptized this week and next week and then we are back to square one. Finding is pretty easy though here because everyone is pretty friendly. 

That will be weird coming home and Bishop Jamison not being the bishop, I think they will call Mac to be the Bishop- better start reading your scriptures likkle bwoy! haha 

That would be so sweet in Lin and Kacey came to Spokane...Kacey if you're reading this, bro, think of the good times you're missin' on if you go anywhere else! haha Thats so sweet he's getting a job.

Only two more Sundays until Mothers Day! I am so excited to see you! Im glad I got my haircut when I did or you would be makin fun of my cueball hair cut... safe to say that Jamaican barbers, no matter how much they tell you they can, just can't cut a white guy's hair. I got the fade up the sides, lined me up, and right as we was about to line of the top I just had to say "Nah Nah Nah, nah badda wit de front".  haha It's grown back nicely though. 

The H clan is doing well still, awesome as always, were at church again Sunday. We have too much fun with them. Yesterday we went over there and I whipped out my water gun (its how me and Elder McLeod get up in the morning- alarm goes off and BOOM, better get up or you get soaked by the other), and we all ended up a little bit wet. Had a nice talk with Brother Hudson though, we are going to be teaching him by himself. I think that would be best, since the family is all preparing to be baptized next week Saturday, we can go at his pace. He's a great guy, loves his family a lot. 

Well Momma, Ill be sending those pictues in a bit, sorry I haven't been sending them as often as usual. But now you get a whole heap of em :) I love you!!

Elder Romney 

 If he is proposing, things are not going as well as we thought for J.

 The trio: Campbell, Romney and McCleod-the Oreo companionship.

Elders Conder and Romney slayin' the ax.

 Cute little following!

 Cricket anyone?

 Junction is farmland.

 bad haircut and way early in the morning

 Half zone meeting

 A sweet family J and McCleod are teaching.

 The seaside equivalent of Pryors called Jack Sprat.

 The sister missionaries tagged J and McCleod's truck with oreos.

 This was the beginning of a few practical jokes between the two companionships.

 Jackson is always the filling in the oreo.

 Yet again with the sisters-one is samoan and the other is part Jamaican.

 Homemade breakfast by a native Jamaican minus the muffin...Is that a muffin to the right?

 McCleod, Romney and Campbell.   I think they dug that hole for J to stand in.

 Half of the zone got together for p-day.

 Ouch!  He should know better.  Being in a car is making his skin sensitive.

 Romney, M, and McCleod

 J and M

 Goats are everywhere.

 Jessie the donkey.

baptisms and basketball

Hey there momma!

I am currently sitting in Mandeville, same place I emailed last week..
true, Elder McLeod and I decided we were going to have a low key p-day
today and that nothing was going to stop us from just coolin' out...
well we got a phone call at 5:30 this morning asking if we wanted to
go to zone p-day in port mor (the other side of the island) and that
we would be leaving at 8:30. True, we couldnt pass up seeing half the
mission and playing basketball and guitar in the oven of Port Mor, so
we are just getting back! haha It was so much fun, I've lost a lot of
my already non existant basketball skills, but it was nice to run
around and shoot. It was a packed car going back, me, Elder McLeod,
Brockbank, Conder, and Nugent. Totally worth it though.

So! Weekly activities included having an awesome Sunday, an excellent
Saturday, but most importantly.. FRIDAY. M was baptised!! I
didn't bring my camera but im hoping I have time to send pictures when
we get to junction. Yes it was soooo awesome. M is the man. 15,
we have been helping him how to read, he's pretty shy, and I tell you
what, since he's been baptised an confirmed you can't get him to stop
smiling. It is so sweet. We were originally going to do it in the
ocean, Alligator Pond beach, but true we realized the alligator
part.... nah just kidding, our second witness bagged on us so we had a
really hectic morning trying to find M in the town because he
left his phone at home and we didn't have a way to get ahold of him,
but he ended up calling us, didnt leave his phone and we asked him if
he had fare to taxi to Hopeton and he did. We kinda ruined the Hopeton
missionaries day because they had to stick around the whole time, but
we drove them around afterwords to their appointment. The baptism was
so legit, Elder McLeod did it. M is the man. His best friend N
who is 16 is getting baptised May 12 along with the H family!
They are doing awesome too. All 5 were at church on Sunday and loved
it, everything is going pretty smoothly over there. We are trying to
teach poppa H and the oldest brother, so far not so good, but it
soon come. We know it will happen.

We had Zone Conference on Saturday in Sav! That was pretty legit. We
stayed the night in Mandeville and drove them to Sav in the morning as
well, I love road trips haha Just like back home- minus the cheese
strings (true, my stomach isnt my best friend these days). But it was
legit. We discussed things the First Presidency wants to have happen
with missionary work- pretty cool. My favorite parts about it were
when Sister Hendricks talked about not teaching the Law of Tithing
apologetically. It's so true, so many times we teach tithing as "Im
sorry but the Lord wants 10% of everything you earn" when we should be
saying (in the words of President Hendricks) "Hey! The Lord is giving
out $1000 bills for nickels!" I really liked that, I taught Elders
Quorom Sunday and we talked about the Sabbath and what we should and
shouldnt do on it and why... teaching boldy is the way to go. No more
of this nancy business, its the Lord's way or the highway haha Things
are good.

Thats so nuts about how Washington is the 49th state in church
attendance... Jamaica would honestly probably the highest per capita
when it came to church attendance. EVERYONE goes to church, which is
easy because there is litterally a church every 50-100 feet. Pretty
nuts.

Sis. Smith called, eh? She's a nice lady. Her husband Elder Smith was
the Branch President here before Elder McLeod.

Hey guess what? ONLY THREE WEEKS UNTIL WE SKYPE FOR MOTHERS DAY! True
your mothers day package will probably be delated... my bad. But! It
will soon be sent. I don't have all the the shwag as yet, soon come.

Well true, I love you!! everyting criss ere, zene? wi fi jus gwaan so.
:) A little taste of patios :) (Native Jamaican Language)

I love you!!
Elder Romney

time is short

Hey!

Sorry about the lateness of the email today, we had an awesome p-day!
Went to Treasure Beach and enjoyed Jack Sprat- a little food place
right on the ocean. It was sooo good. I got one of their stickers and
slapped it on the back of my guitar. Im fried like a chicken too, no
white man here, all red man. Since we have a car we brought back the
Hopeton and Mandeville missionaries, I don't mind, I remember taxiing
to p-days and its not as fun. We don't have a whole lot of time to
email, but something is better than nothing!

This week was so awesome. It was a little crazy though, had its ups
and downs. Elder Campbell isn't with us anymore. A missionary went
home in Kingston and so Elder Campbell was transfered there
last night, the Assistants came and picked him up. We miss him
already. He's a funny guy, chances are we will still serve together-
the joy of having the 2nd smallest mission in the world! haha So its
just me and Elder McLeod again.

Family update- they were all at church!! It was so sweet, Momma, the
three younger boys,  and the little girl. I love
them so much, they are awesome. We are going there for family home
evening tonight and having smores after words- kinda fun explaining
what smores were because they didn't know :) So yeah they came to
church, but the coolest thing about it is that when I asked their
daughter (who is a member) how they got there (because they dont have
a car and it would be like walking to Liberty Lake from our house) she
said they chartered a taxi, but the money they used was money they had
set asside for food, but Momma  wanted to be at church so bad
and all the kids, they sacrificed eating on Sunday to be there. How
cool is that?? We are extending them a baptism date tonight, they know
the gospel is true, we aren't worried about them accepting or not.
Life is good! We are teaching the 16 year old boy how to read too,
another humbling experience.

We should be having a baptism this week! Yep, M, the 15 year old
who we have been helping to read is getting baptised Friday. It will
be awesome, he's a stud. He knows its true and even though he
struggles reading he tries so hard. When we sing in church i follow
the words with my finger and he's getting better at pronoucing words.

Thats the big news of the week, sorry for the shorty email, we are
crammed for time and gotta get back to Junction because but true, this
blonde missionary is obedient! :)

I LOVE YOU!!
Elder Romney

Easter

Hey!!! Happy Easters! (Nacho Libre voice)

Easter in Jamaica was very interesting to say the least. It is bigger than Christmas here! Stores have pretty much been closed since Thursday because its Holy Thursday, Good Friday, then Saturday, Easter Sunday, AND Easter Monday. And Sunday night there was a huge rave party out in the parking lot of Shoppers Fair... nothing like remembering the resurrection by getting wasted.  Ate lots of Spice bun and cheese- the Easter tradition here. I soon realized how much of a bummer it is being lactose intollorant... I love cheese too much and my body doesn't like that one bit. 

This week we had a pretty crazy schedule. We were supposed to go into Spanish Town Wednesday morning and help deliver the new missionaries to their areas but true, they were stuck in the Dallas airport because of a tornado, so they ended up getting here Saturday. Wednesday night we went into Kingston though and stayed the night at the Zone Leaders house because Thursday morning we got our teeth checked out by the dentist. No cavities for me! Whoo hoo! It was really nice to see other missionaries. Since I got to Sav, I haven't hardly been around other missionaries besides my companions, good thing my comps and I all get along haha I love Kingston so much, driving in it was crazy! I thought traffic backed up down town after a concert was bad... no sir! Try Kingston! Driving stick southpaw is now natural.. which scares me a bit because going home and switching back will be quite the experience. 

Some pretty cool things happened this week. We started teaching a member's family, mom, dad, and the 4 younger brothers and sisters, which is so sweet, I love teaching whole families. When we first started, momma wasn't to keen on us coming over. She has been studying with the JW's for quite a while and had an attitude of not genuinely wanting to learn but rather just being polite by not saying no. Well, that has defintly changed. We met with them 3 times this week, and you can see her desire to know more and really has grown. She even said that she feels like Joseph Smith did, being confused and not knowing which church was really teaching the truth. Last night we had family home evening with them which was the SWEETEST FHE ever. They don't have electricity so we brought a kerosene lamp and lit it underneath their HUGE mango tree where they built a couple little benches and had some chairs. As always, I brought the guitar for some song singing afterwards, but the lessons really hit them. 

It was something the sisters actually showed us, so props to them. Here it is, and try it for yourself because when I did it, I was pretty close to tears, hit me pretty hard. Anyways, you're on an airplane flying somewhere, and you feels some gnarly turbulence. It hits again and all of a sudden, the engine stops and you are going down. The pilot gets on the loudspeaker and says "I'm sorry passengers but we will be crashing in two minutes due to engine failure". Now... you have two minutes to write your dying wish to someone you love. What would you say? What would you write? So I gave them all a piece of paper and they wrote a letter to someone for two minutes. BOOM, you crashed, you're now dead but your letter makes it to that person you wrote to. I took all their letters, and being in the place of the person they wrote their dying wishes to, I rip up all their papers and say "Nah, I don't wanna hear from her, she was nice but whatever". "I don't need to hear this". "I already know what he would say." ... 

This is how Heavenly Father feels when we don't read our scriptures. Prophets from the Bible and the Book of Mormon have sealed their dying wishes about the gospel in these books, and how many times do we leave it sitting on the counter and say "I'll read it later." "I'd rather go listen to music". "I don't need this, this is old stuff". It hit me hard when I first did this because I wrote my letter to Mac and for him to tear it up, tore me up. Anyway, the family really got the understanding from it and momma warmed up to us a lot, from saying she would hide when we came to saying now that she would like us to come over any time we have available. Her daughter says she's been reading a lot and praying about the message, so we will see what happens. It is so cool to see the Spirit work. She even said "It's like you're saying what I need to hear, but you're just a messenger from God". Couldn't help but smile :) 

Yep so life is pretty good here in ol' Junction. I swear, you'd think I was an emotional wreck with the soggy eye syndrome I've had this week. I spoke in church Sunday about sacrifice, and told the story about G-ma and Grandpa from start to finish, getting married, meeting the missionaries, having the family, and then the cancer battle, and focused on the sacrifices G-ma made and is making for grandpa with working so much but still always fulfilling her calling. I think it kinda woke the branch up a bit that we can all do a better job fulfilling our callings in the church and that no sacrifice is too great for us to make because Christ made the ultimate sacrifice. Anything he commands us to sacrifice is just a minor detail in the grand scheme of things. I learned a lot from giving that talk.

In other news... we played basketball in Mandeville yesterday for p-day my goodness... I can't remember the last time I've been this sore. I think I would be less sore if I got hit by a Mack truck! haha It was fun though, seeing brand new missionaries too, they are so white! It was completely overcast and a bit rainy and they still got sunburned.. I remember the days.

 

I love the pictures! Especially the one with Joshy in the front of it because I can see Uncle James knocked out on the couch in the background haha Cracks me up, I'm getting a tiny minuscule glimpse at the life of a church leader and true, sleep is a precious thing haha I love you!!

Elder Romney 

April Fool's

AHHHH!!! HELLO FAMILY!

Dang what is up???/ I really really really am hoping that you are joking about selling the Monster.... really really hoping... I got a feeling you are because the thought of Haley, my sister, in all seriousness... on a scooter?? (We April Fooled Jackson and told him we sold the motorcycle he rides and got Haley a scooter to ride to Eastern) Come on... lets get real here haha Either way, I guess that just means Im gonna have to buy me a nice new shiny bike when I get home. Maybe that Triumph 675 triple, or an Aprilla 1000s... so much for school! haha but seriously though, I was thinking about school the other day and I really don't think I need school as much as everyone says. If I can make good enough money without going into debt for school, why bother? Just my thoughts on it. You always said to work smart, I really know what that means now. (Joke is on us, he was April Fooling us!-Yeah, good one J!) 

This week was so legit! Its so weird I have the hardest time remembering what happened sometimes because everything is happening so fast. We've been getting the hang of handling branch presidency stuff and missionary work and had a really good week balancing both. We got transfer calls this saturday and the Sisters are actually staying another transfer... they had handed over their investigators and stuff to us, and we got a call Saturday morning saying "Give us our people back!!" It was kinda funny. We also are getting an addition to our companionship. Elder Campbell is going to be with me and Elder McLeod. That will be cool, he's a Jamaican who was also trained by Elder Nelson right before I was. Pretty sure I'm going to completely forget how to speak proper English and be an excellent cook by the time im outta this companionship- an honorary Jamaican I will be. 


Speaking of the Sisters, they locked themselves out of their apartment the other morning as we were going to do some service, so guess who climbed up a rickety old ladder and crawl through a window? I did! haha It was kinda funny, my fear of heights is gone, I think roofing with Adam Kremin killed that fear. 

CONFERENCE WAS SO SICK! Oh man, I loved it. It was a bit of a gong show getting there and such- we had to go up to Mandeville because one of our branch members was getting the Melchezidek priesthood, but the branch had voted to stay and watch it on the computer in Junction. So we watched it Saturday in Junction and then for preisthood and Sunday we went up to Mandi. Well the internet didn't work on Sunday in our building so no one got to see conference. Kinda a bust. But conference was sweet. I loved Richard G. Scott's talk on revelation and the vail. How sweet is it that we can build and strengthen our relationships with those who have past, that they can see us, and that revelation comes in so many ways?? I was pretty jelous of the MTC choir... I wish we coulda done that in the MTC. David Archulleta is servin a mission? Where is he going? 

Well something really cool is happening here. In Junction, being the small farm town it is, there is sooo many people that don't know how to read. One of our investigators with a baptism date is one of them. His name is M, he's 15 and he and his family are awesome. The way we thought best to teach him how to read would to read from the Book of Mormon, so we've been going over there twice a day, once in the afternoon when its just him and we read a chapter, or however many verses until we have to go, and then go back in the evening to teach the whole neighborhood family. I wrote out the whole alphabet for him with a couple words that started with each letter, then all the -tion, ch, th, sion, -ing, and words that have those in them. We came back the next day and he said he was havin trouble reading those words- easy words like "Junction, Happening", stuff like that. We said "Thats alright, lets just read a chapter from the Book of Mormon." We say a prayer to start, and then begin reading. The first verse he struggled with, but then slowly, he was sounding out words like September, Disciple, Descending, big words! IT is so LEGIT to see the Spirit help him read. What other explanation is there? He couldn't read the word Junction, but he can sound out descending? So sweet. I love how the Spirit can litterally make known the truth of all things to us.  



Well fam, have a great week! That camping trip sounds like so much fun. I love you! Anything special you want for mothers day from "the rock" (Jamaica) ? I could send you a little baby or something? Or a puppy! Yes! Ill send you a puppy :) I love you!

Elder Romney