July 14, 2014, We Can Get a Big Bag of Tuna for 5 Bucks

Greetings,

We had a pretty good week.  It's been raining almost day and so it's been blasted humid.  It's nice when it's cloudy and windy though.  Yesterday was really nice outside.  I like working a whole lot better when we're not dripping with sweat. 

Sister Boutu was sick for a couple of days this week so I got to write letters, make smoothies, and update my journal because I got really behind while I was in Ebeye.  I'm now writing in the journal that you sent me for Christmas, Annie!  thanks. 

I've told you a bit about the Kiribati family we visit a lot.  Well, because one of them married an Indian guy we have the best dinners: dal, sashimi, and rice.  They made lentils a couple times last week and it's surprisingly good with sashimi.  We've also been eating a lot of tuna and rice this week.  We only get the fish from Kiribati people because they really know how to clean fish well.  Marshallese people for the most part aren't very careful with cleaning fish.  Sometimes they just leave all the stomach and innards and cook them whole.  It's gross.  We found we can get a big bag of tuna for about 5 bucks, so we're going to get one and freeze it and pull out fish when we need some.

Sister Boutu has been really good about reading the Book of Mormon in Marshallese.  I think I started it while I was in the MTC but stopped.  Well, I think I want to try to read it but most of the words I'll learn are old Marshallese words that no one uses anymore.  The most annoying thing is that the spelling isn't uniform.  "jerkakpeje" means "resurrection" and on one page I saw it spelled "jerkakbeje" and "jerkabiji."  It's fine because I knew what it was saying, but it sure is confusing when starting to learn Marshallese.  Also, you know when you're looking for a scripture and you know it's at the bottom of the page on the right hand side but you don't know where exactly it is?  The problem is now I know picture them where they are in the Marshallese Book of Mormon but I forget where they are in the English version.  Does that make sense?

One of our progressing investigators has been gone for a couple of weeks.  She was supposed to get interviewed and baptized so she was really close to being ready.  Well, she showed up at church yesterday out of the blue and asked when we could study this week!  So it looks like things are okay!  We're excited because she's really ready to get baptized.

We also found out this week that the elders in Jenrok are both getting transferred away and that they aren't going to send any elders to the area.  So it's going to be just sisters in Jenrok.  The elders told the bishop yesterday and everyone's wondering why we won't have elders in the ward, especially since other wards have two sets of elders. I think it's because jenrok is just a tiny area so it's fine for just one set of missionaries. We'll be getting the elders' investigators this week so we'll probably go with them to their lessons and get to know them to make the transition. It's good for us because we need more people to study with. 

We're getting lunch with all the sisters on the island today, which should be fun.  We've got FHE with the kiribati family tonight and one of our investigators is coming over with her two kids.  One of her kids is named Nipai (as in Nephi).  That's about it.  I didn't take any pictures this week because I kept forgetting to charge my camera.

Tootles.

Sister Ellen