I flew in on Monday morning. It was a way long flight, like 10 hours and I only got like 3 or 4 hours of sleep. And when we got here, it was like 6 in the morning so I had to stay awake the rest of the day or I would have been jet lagged so I was way tired when we got here. But the first day, we got our sulu's (man skirts) and they are so nice! It is pretty hot down here so its nice that we don't have to wear slacks.
The area where I'm serving is called Raki Raki. It's on the main island but pretty much at the north-most part of the island. We are in a bicycling area, but 2 of the 3 bikes are broken, so we walk a lot! It's pretty hard though, we have a really big area, sometimes it takes like more than an hour to walk to the house we are going to. It's an area considered "bush" which kind of means there are gravel roads and farms and wooded areas. The town raki raki is really small.
My companion is way awesome! His trainer was Brother Stock, who was one of my teachers at the MTC so its way cool. My companions name is Elder Leota and he is a fantastic missionary. He is teaching me a lot.
My first lesson that I taught was to the chief of the village!! It was kind of nerve racking, it was the very first time my companion talked to him too, so it was really crazy. we are meeting with him today so it should be good. We have like 14 Investigators right now and we are super busy. The big problem here in Raki Raki at the branch is that our branch presidency isn't doing their calling very well.
So there isn't a lot of good leadership. The 2nd counselor does almost everything, and he didn't even show up to sacrament yesterday because he is fed up with the branch president not doing anything. we were supposed to have a baptism yesterday morning, but the branch president cancelled it because he wasn't prepared. It's really sad, because the investigator Paula is doing awesome, his aunt and uncle are members and he lives with them, and they didn't come to church yesterday, but Paula walked all the way! It is a way far walk too, like an hour walk at least. He is 15, but we are going to do the baptism on Saturday, so hopefully everything works out.
We have a couple of other investigators that are doing way good too, we are going to invite one to be baptized sometime in the next couple of weeks tonight after we teach our lesson. But the only problem with teaching is that we have to have permission from their parents if they are under 18 and if they are married, their, spouse. And a lot of the husbands won't let their wife be baptized which is really sad. There is one investigator named Shyal that wants to be baptized, but her husband said he will leave her if she does so its way sad. Anyway, I have to go now. I'll attach some pictures.
Love, Elder Beilman
-Oh and the people here are super poor. It's way sad. Most of their houses are made from cement blocks and metal. It's crazy. And they sit on the floor all the time. It's hard to get used to that, but I'm getting there. Oh! And the food is kind of gross, not going to lie. But I'm praying that I'll start liking it because I don't want to be disrespectful if I don't eat it.
Here are some of my teachers at the MTC and everybody in my intake.
First meal and sunset. Here, they leave the bones in the meat, so when you eat it, you have to pick out the bones as you chew it, it kind of sucks, but oh well.
