So, Carnival was Monday and Tuesday, and we were stuck inside. It's been awesome. Totally. We played cards for two days straight, and I have pictures to prove it. I even played mahjong with cards! We had Sister Hyde and Sister Graziano staying with us, so that was fun. We ate cake and cheese puffs and spaghetti. We watched pretty much every Mormon Message ever published.

The music started Sunday night. I fell asleep listening to it, and when we woke up in the morning it was still going. But don't worry! It stopped during the day, only to start up again that night. So, fun stuff.

I just found out today that Richie, the investigator we were preparing in Barbados, got baptized last week! I am so happy! He's gonna be awesome.

Valentine's Day we ate heart-shaped pancakes. We took the bus to PEC, and on our way back, the driver refused our money and said, "Happy Valentine's Day." Kinda weird, but oh well.

All in all, it's not been the best week for missionary work, but today we will start getting our area back on track and finding those who are prepared. In district meeting today we talked about teaching recent converts and less actives. We concluded that no matter what the missionaries do, if the members aren't involved, nothing happens. One missionary related about how when he stopped coming to church, it took a friend inviting him back and then the bishop coming up to him and telling him he had been missed to get him back into activity; the missionaries didn't have anything to to do with it. So, it's really important that recent converts and less actives have that support system of members. Home and visiting teaching does not really get done here, unfortunately, but I think if they could implement that more it would be a great strength in retaining members. They would have any immediate support system. So, member work is really important.

I hope everyone had a good birthday :)

Much love,

Sister Aida Tibbitts

Transfer #3!

23 February 2015

Transfer calls were on Saturday. We were in a taxi with music blaring, so it was hard to understand, but we managed (loudspeaker is a wonderful thing). The conversation went something like this:

Elder F.: Do you have a concealed weapons permit?

Me: Um . . . no?

Elder F.: You might want to get one, because you're going to be killing Sister Hendricks! Hahahaha!

Me: Ha. Ha. You're hilarious.

Translation: I will be staying in Curepe and "killing" Sister Hendricks (meaning she is going home at the end of this transfer). More good news is that I am no longer a trainee! I have finished the 12-week training program and am now officially a "normal" missionary. Our district leader asked, "On a scale of 1 to 10, how excited are you to be finished with training?" I told him "55." Training was a good learning experience, though. I'm glad they don't just throw us in without any wheels, but now those wheels are coming off :) Should be fun.

The Curepe ward has been trying to get firesides started every month, and the missionaries did the first one. We decided that if we were going to get a lot of baptisms and reactivations this year, we had better deepen the conversion of those already coming to church; so, we gave a fireside on the Book of Mormon. It was a lot of fun. President and Sister Mehr spoke to us and the Bishop told his conversion story. We wanted to make the Book of Mormon come to life, so each companionship chose a story and we acted it out. Sister Hendricks and I chose the tree of life; she had a rebus poem that we read out with visuals. Not very many people came, but it was a very good fireside: it was mentioned in church three or four times to my hearing. We had a few goals in putting on this fireside: we wanted to get the members reading the Book of Mormon, we wanted them to share it with their friends, and we wanted to get referrals from them. Ix-nay on the referrals, but we shall see about the others :)

Have a great week! Much love,

Sister Aida Tibbitts

Addendum to email: I thought I would share Bishop Ramdhanie's story that he told at this fireside, since it was pretty funny. About twenty years ago, his wife started investigating the church, and she invited him to come to Port of Spain for a stake conference. This was around the same time as the Jim Jones incident, where a man in Guyana basically brainwashed his congregation and then fed them poison, so Bishop Ramdhanie was a little skeptical about the whole thing, especially when they started passing the sacrament around. Afterwards, a couple missionaries started talking to him and asked if they could teach him along with his wife; he was absolutely surprised to hear himself say "Yes." He actually looked around to see if someone else had said it. After hearing what they had to say and reading the Book of Mormon, he decided that Mormons weren't as crazy as he had thought, and now he's the bishop in Curepe! -Aida

Wicked King Noah!

Samuel the Lamanite stands firm under opposition.

There is not that much to report this week. We contacted into a woman who is "never, never, never, never, never" (etc., etc.) getting married, a Jehovah's Witness who probably thinks we know absolutely nothing about the Bible (because we know that Jesus is Jehovah, not Heavenly Father), and a Hindu who was very interested to see if we would still be LDS in ten years. Other than that, pretty normal.

So, remember how I would hunt flies in our kitchen at home? Mosquitoes are the  new flies, except we use our hands to kill them. Sister Hendricks smashed a skeeter on the floor the other night, and blood came out (it was her blood). There is a bit of a graveyard around where we do our nightly planning :) It can get frustrating, because they seem to vanish in mid-air after you try and catch them.

 

In our studies, we read the beginning of Mosiah. My district leader in Barbados asked us to read King Benjamin's message and see how he taught towards a commitment, i.e., taking upon them the name of Jesus Christ. He mentions it at the start, and by the end of his speech, the people are the ones who ask if they can make the covenant! King Benjamin is an awesome missionary. I've heard of a few times when people ask to be baptized, but it hasn't happened to me yet.

Carnival is next Monday and Tuesday, so I will probably be emailing on Wednesday or something. Driving is crazy, because there are a lot more cars on the already narrow roads, and there are a lot of fetes (parties). Basically, Carnival has already started, just not the parade :P Wish us luck.

Have a great week, and Happy Valentine's Day!

Love, Sister Aida Tibbitts

Training in Trinidad, + stake conference

This has been an interesting week. Sister Hendricks was sure that by the end of it she would know nothing about our area, because we had two trade-offs this week and she went to other areas. First we traded off with the Arima sisters, because they spent a lot of time in our area last transfer; Sister Feltis was going to show me where a few people lived. She ended up only showing me one person, but that person was a member referral, so hopefully it was time well-spent :) Then, we traded off with our Sister Training Leader, Sister Hyde, and her companion, Sister Graziano. My companion went to Chaguanas with the STL, and Sister Graziano stayed the night and day with me. Apparently she loves weapons and wrestling.

The fun does not stop there, though. Being trained by the leadership happens a lot more in Trinidad because we actually have leadership here to train us. So, on Tuesday, the assistants to the president asked if they could shadow us for the evening. We didn't end up doing much because someone hit our car while it was parked. We spent an hour-and-a-half filling out the accident report. But, we got the number for the guy who bounced us, and his mom's and their neighbors! So, I guess the Lord works in mysterious ways.

We also had President and Sister Mehr visit a less-active with us last night. That was super intimidating. President Mehr started talking about foreordination and the pre-mortal life and stuff like that, and then he asked us if we had any comments. Sister Hendricks went for it and gave a really good thought about Helaman's army, but I basically just sat there the whole time. It's hard to talk when the mission president is sitting right there and you REALLY don't want to look stupid. I guess I probably looked stupid anyway.

Yesterday was kind of stake conference. We received a broadcast from Salt Lake City that was for the whole Caribbean area. Elder Wilford W. Andersen, Sister Bonnie Oscarson, Elder Holland, and President Packer spoke to us. I really liked Elder Andersen's talk; he spoke in Spanish, which was interesting. I think he must have served in the Dominican Republic or something because he said that his heart would always be in the Caribbean. He drew from 1 Nephi 5:4-5, where Lehi says that he knows the Lord is directing them in the wilderness, and when he says, "I have obtained a land of promise," even though he hasn't actually reached the promised land yet. He spoke about making promised futures into present realities by keeping covenants. Elder Andersen said that receiving a land of promise in this life was not about being assured that the Lord would keep His promises, but about us having the realization that we are keeping ours. That part really hit me. After all, "Your calling gives you authority, keeping your covenants gives you power" (Preach My Gospel). Sister Oscarson spoke to the youth about their present and future families; Elder Holland about standing in holy places; President Packer about the family. They were good talks too, but Elder Andersen's, man, that hit the spot.

Scripture of the week: Hebrews 8:10-13.

It's been a weird but good week. I love you all and hope this next week goes well for you.

Love, Sister Aida Tibbitts

This week has been interesting. Blanking an area is pretty hard, but we are meeting a lot of new people. We have been meeting with several less-actives and recent converts, trying to fill up our time. One of them is named Scott; he is both a recent convert and a less-active, but he did come to church yesterday. Our concern is that he is more converted to the sisters than the church and that he is not truly repenting. Since he has finished the new member lessons, we felt free on passing him over to the Elder's Quorum president for home teaching. That will either teach him the true meaning of church or drive him away. Hopefully he will stay and gain a stronger testimony. We also called and met up with a less-active who has not been to church in 7 years. The missionaries have not met with him in over a year, but he said that he had been thinking of going back to church; obviously we were more inspired than we thought :) He just needs to start following the Word of Wisdom and he will be set. He did not come to church yesterday, but we are seeing him tonight, so we'll ask him what's up.

 

Sister Mehr came out with us on Wednesday. She is a really inspired and smart woman. We went contacting and she was a great help and inspiration for us. Since the missionaries are on so many different islands, it is hard for President and Sister Mehr to go out with all of us, so they take the opportunity when they can. We might have President Mehr with us in the next week or two, since he apparently wants to go visit a particular less-active who lives in our area.

 

I got asked what food I have eaten since I came out. You can buy "normal" food here in the groceries, but when we eat at members' houses we get a little more different stuff. I've had macaroni pie, doubles (Bajan and Trini; everyone told me there was this huge difference and that Trini doubles were a lot better, but honestly they tasted exactly the same to me), Jamaican patties, papaya, coocoo, plantains, flying fish, mauby, sorrel, bake n' aloo, and some other stuff. The food here is really good, for the most part, though sometimes it seems like it is aimed to make you fat . . . IDK, I like eating it :)

 

On Saturday we took one of the senior sisters, Sister Miller, with us on our adventures. She has never gone proselyting before, and she said it was a neat experience. She took some pictures and was going to put it on her blog.

 

This morning our zone went up to Maracas Falls in the mountains. It is a very short hike to a very sparse, if tall, waterfall. Besides it were a few random Hindu flags.

 

I hope y'all have a good week :D

 

Love, Sister Aida Tibbitts

At Maracas Waterfall

Out teaching with Sister Miller (senior sister)

Life and Death

by Ernest Howard Crosby

 

So he died for his faith. That is fine ---

    More than most of us do.

But, say, can you add to that line

    That he lived for it, too?

In his death he bore witness at last

    As a martyr to the truth.

Did his life do the same in the past,

    From the days of his youth?

It is easy to die! Men have died

    For a wish or a whim ---

For bravado or passion or pride,

    Was it harder for him?

But to live --- every day to live out

    All the truth that he dreamt

While his friends met his conduct with doubt

    And the world with contempt.

Was it thus that he plodded ahead,

    Never turning aside?

Then we'll talk of the life that he lived.

    Never mind how he died.

Trinidad

Hello from Trinidad! We are in the Curepe area, which is about an hour from Port-of-Spain. There is actually a stake in Trinidad, so we went to a real ward yesterday! It was still not like home, but who even cares. Sister Hendricks and I are "blanking," which means neither of us know anyone. Sister Hendricks has been out for 15 months, though, so she has a lot of experience. We have been talking to a lot of people. So far, we've only had one investigator lesson, and that a short one. But just now we will have a lot of investigators. We just have to find people. There are a few members who are really willing to come out with us, so that's awesome. The sister who came out with us on Saturday is better at contacting than either of us, let me tell you. Sister Hendricks is a lot quieter than Sister Bennion; it's weird for me to be the more passionate one. I'll bet y'all can't even imagine that :)

 

Oh, and we have a car. And guess who is driving? Yeah . . . me. Trinidad won't give Sister Hendricks a license, so I have been doing it because I can drive for 90 days on a US license. Let me tell you, we are lucky we have not died, because it is CRAZY here. The roads are super narrow and everyone drives really fast. And it's on the left-hand side. I've hit the curb a couple of times, but no deaths yet. We have to drive all the way to Arima for church, so that's an adventure. Sister Hendricks is going to show me how to take the bus for missionary coordination and PEC, just so we can save gas and miles. Yeah, it's been an interesting week.

 

Sister Mehr, the mission president's wife, wants to go out with us this week, which is a little intimidating, but she's really nice. We are also coordinating trade-offs with the Sister Training Leader and another sister who can show us where people live in our area. :)

 

Not much else to report. Our ward has the APs and the JCAPs in it, as well as us and another set of elders. Our apartment is two stories (!!!). It's probably twice as big as our Barbados apartment. I've been on my mission for two months (!!!!).

 

Spiritual things . . . well, I have been reading in 1 Thessalonians. In chapters 1 and 2, it basically talks about attributes missionaries need to have, so that was awesome. I made a whole list. It talked about not arguing and not trying to "convince" people. It was just a little gem that I actually understood amidst the complicated wording that Paul has ended up with.

 

Anyway, I love you all. I pray for you every day, and I hope you are doing well.

 

Love, Aida, alias Sister Tibbitts

Me and Sister Hendricks

Our apartment