FEBRUARY 11, 2013

well this week has been great. and very busy. monday we played rugby. fun times. good to run around and side step again (im too fat to play this sport anymore) but ill get back and train. tuesday we had our last zone conference of the transfer. it went awesome. i loved my training and the other trainings that were given. the spirit was strong and i learned a lot, even though ive heard it 6 times. haha. wednesday we had our zone training meeting as the warm springs zone and then we met with president to begin transfers. its so awesome to feel the spirit as were trying to see where missionaries can be moved to strengthen one another. the spiirt is very strong. its awesome. i love every minute. thursday was much of the same. we had more time to work in our area then in any other day in the transfer. so thats always nice. friday we planned. and then helped president with transfers again. saturday was the best day ever!!!! in the morning we drove over to a chapel close to sam boyd staidum and president talked to all of us about our conduct and reaching a referral goal. we drove over and watched the byu game and talked to all of the members there. that was fun. then we went into the stadium. it was awesome!!! i loved every minute. i saw paane there also! it was awesome to see that guy. then i bought some stuff, met a couple of members that handed us 20 dollar bills. good times good times. haha. sunday was good too. i let our family ward bishop know that i was leaving and he had me bare my testimony over the pulpit and starting crying and stuff. i was like, oh gosh.... aha. but ive grown to love this ward a lot. this has been my favorite ward on my mission and will probably stay that way. but ill miss everyone here soooooo much. but everything else is good. im not going to east (the hood) with elder tagilala hes fijian and about 6'4". hes awesome!!!! and from redwood city. pretty swwet huh.

love you!!!!!

ELDER NONU

FEBRUARY 4, 2013

this week has been not too exciting. monday we played rugby. it was actually fun. i taught everyone how to play and they actually had a good time. tuesday we had another zone conference that went well. (after 5 youd think i knew what i was doing.) president rebuked my companion for talking so much while conducting. dude does talk your ear off. but its all good. haha. wednesday we had zone leader council which went well also. WAYYY! better then the last one. i was super iritated the first one because our training was horrible. but it got better. i actually spoke this time and we looked like a team. haha. honestly. this week well be looking over the transfer board and seeing who should go where. so im looking forward to seeing where ill be at. until then, ill work my butt off here. thursday we had our 2nd to last zone conference and it went well also. had fun and trainings were great. friday we had exchanges (LAST ONE!!!!) FINALLY! i was with elder gustafson. He's really cool and really quiet. when im with ermakov were always laughing and joking around and stuff and yah.... saturday we exchanged back and had our planning session for the week and then worked for the rest of the day. sunday was great! we went to our family ward and the dennis family came to church together. after bermuda ward block we had a linger longer/ break the fast, which was awesome! our investigators got to talk to a lot of the members of the ward and have some fun and food. after we went to our singles ward and found out that a nonmember showed up while we were gone and we talked and had a quick lesson after church. his name is jason and he has a degree in theology from a catholic university and he denounced everything it taught him and saw that ours was true so we set him for baptism 3 weeks from now. only problem is that hes 34 and too old for the singles ward, so that was lame. but still, the fact that even happened was good enough for me. haha. the dennis family is doing well also, They are fired up to get baptized and even traded shifts sunday so he could come to church. it was sweet! other then that. were still working hard and finding as best we can. this tuesday is our last zone conference in kingman and lake havasu. so im excited about that. the only bad part is that will be our whole day. well drive home get here around 7pm and take dinner until 8pm and then maybe have a lesson and go home. but then the real work begins! >:D

anyways!

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!

ELDER NONU

JANUARY 21, 2013

yo!

so this has been the best week of my mission. tuesday we had zone conference and we had to give trainings on finding people to teach. i talked about working with the members. it went well, but the group i had the second time i gave my training had no enthusiasm. so that was a little annoying. but its all good. wednesday i went on exchanges with elder leidecker in my last area. hes serving in that ward now. it was sooooo fun! we taught 3 lessons together with the same people i was teaching before i left. so that was nice. and i got to see a couple of the members i got close with. elder leidecker is a really good teacher. i remember in the MTC he barely spoke, but now hes a best! thursday i went on another exchange with elder dubois from minnesota. hes the funniest guy ever, so we had so much fun and had 2 awesome lessons with new investigators. it was sweet!!!! at the end of the night we had cold stone. :P friday was great too! we had exchanges with the kingman and lake havasu zone leaders. where my last 2 companions are. i was with elder taetakua and his companion elder marsee in kingman and elder ermakov went with elder moreno and his companion elder shearer to lake havasu. i always love having mini rode trips out there. its so fun. :) we had a blast. we went to a baptism they had for their investigators and then went out to an indian reservation the next morning for a baptismal interview. i saw a member i loved when i was in kingman and they took us out to lunch which was fun. they have a son serving in michigan and he was out for like 4 months when i was there, now hes coming home in 2. what the heck...... crazy stuff. i swear. and of course the best part of the ENTIRE WEEK! maybe my entire mission. yah lets go with that. well, as you know the jackson family was baptized a year ago. elder van bruggen (my trainer) and elder roedel (my 2nd comp) all taught them. well, i saw them on my exchange before when i was in kingman last transfer and they told me they were taking temple prep classes. well saturday night they knelt across the alter in the vegas temple and were sealed for time and eternity. the spirit was so strong and overwhelming in that room. i loved it so much. they looked so happy as a family. best day on my mission by far!!!! but thats not all ladys and gentlemen!!! sunday we had a special stake conference in our stake and Niel L. Andersen of the quorom of the 12 came and spoke to the stake. it was SWEET!!!!!! we brought 6 of our investigators and they got to meet and talk to him indiviually for a moment. it was awesome!!!! so a recap of my week. 3 exchanges, 1 in kingman, the jacksons are sealed, and i touched the hand of an apostle. what a blessing.

thats my week. i love it! :D

LOVE YOU GUYS!!!!!

ELDER NONU

JANUARY 14, 2013

wel thats lame. and you wondered why i rode a bike everywhere. that crap doesnt happen to a bike. haha. and its free to ride. and you get a work out! what a blessing. and i know you said id probably grow out of that, but i still plan on biking again. unless im on a date, then yah thats too much. but yah. just saying. ill have to get a job so i can spend some dough on something nice. anyways!!! i pray that i will end my mission on bike. i love it so much! :D

thats too bad about the car though. subarus are always good. :) dependable, last long, and 4wd. but yah. just saying.

anyways! this week has been nuts. we had 4 exchanges. first we started on tuesday and went with the zone leaders in the paradise zone (middle of the valley) it was great, i went with elder bradford. hes from virginia and in the air force. then wednesday i went with elder fischer from chile and then elder jacobs on thursday from seattle washington and finally with elder solorzano from mexico. fun times. we had good lessons this week. the dennis family are still coming along well, they both got jobs now and are working a lot. were happy for their families. they are still excited to be baptized on the 9th, so were looking forward to that a lot!!!!! last night we had a lesson with our investigator mario torres, hes mexican and has been in jail for the past 2 1/2 years. hes coming along really well and says that hes just counting down the days until he gets baptized. his son in law greg was also there. weve tried teaching him a couple of times and yesterday he came to church for the first time. he loved it. he went to all three hours and said he loved how friendly the ward was and how welcomed he felt. so we set him for baptism on the 16th last night also. so the work is going forward. the singles ward is not as fruitful right now though. but were trying to think of ways we can fix it. elder ermakov and i are getting along great still. were not with each other a full day very often, but it happens. lol. bro tiatia, our ward mission leader, is on fire still. hes always energetic and ready to help us out. along with the bishop and basicaly everyone in the ward.

the other day we brought the elders quorom president to our lesson with mario and mario and his son were both asleep when we showed up. well we waited for about 10 minutes, and the eqp got up, walked into his room and woke up mario and his son and got mario to come out and sit down with us, then he went back for his son. his son doesnt like us and is just a punk. well, he grabs him by the arm and drags him out of his bed and has him sit down on the couch. it was hilarious.

anyways, thats my week. hope yours goes well! :D

LOVE YOU!!!!

ELDER NONU

JANUARY 7, 2012

this week has been eventful to say the least. moday was my last p-day with elder moreno. i love that guy. hes so funny. but its been good. tuesday we had a couple of lessons and said goodbye to a few member families. wednesday we had transfers and got my new companion in the morning. hes a really cool guy. his name is elder ermakov from russia hes a convert of years. and about 6'3". oh and 26. haha. hes the first companion ive had thats bigger and taller then me, so that was a change of pace. in the morning we picked up the new missionaries from the airport. its always funny to see them come down the escalator with that glow. haha. scared and anxious, but ready to work. we drove them all to the mission home and had some breakfast then trained them on the culture here, obedience, and all that good stuff. we had to pick up a missionary that went home for surgery. he had a tumor in his neck, but he was only home for 2 weeks. hes awesome. and lives in modesto, he took out his endowments from the sacramento temple. he told me about how green it is.... -___- lame! after, we had transfers and elder hardy (my past companion) went home. im gonna miss him, but its cool hes going home. and then 2 other missionaries i knew really well went home also. im just another old lame fart of a missionary now. -__- all my buddies are leaving. haha. that night we had no time to work, so we didnt do anything really, but it was still a fun day. thursday we had a new missionary training, so we got to train them and get to know them and hear their experiences and testimonies. it was really cool. i always love those meetings. then we got to work for a few hours. friday we cleaned for a few hours. which was ok, but we plan for our week on fridays, so i wish we would have done that instead, but it still worked out. elder ermakov is a clean freak, so yah. its cleaner. well just say that. haha. then we got some work done. thursday night we actually had gone on splits and while we were waiting for my comp to show up the friend of the guy i was with was waiting outside of his house and i invited him to take the lessons, and now hes set for baptism on the 16th of february. so yah. good times. saturday we had a really good day. in the morning we taught the dennis family about the gospel of jesus christ. they loved it! they understood what the importance of baptism is a lot more and the spirit was very strong. afterward we had a baptism for anna chorney. not sure if i talked about her very much. but shes awesome too. during her interview she told our district leader about how her and her member boyfriend had been living together for 10 years and when we taught her about the law of chastity, she kicked him out, because she "wants to go to heaven". haha! it was SICK!!!! the baptism was awesome too! very powerful and the dennis family was there also. sunday we had church and we bore our testimony in both wards. the spirit of missionary work is very powerful in our family ward, its building up in the singles though. lol. but still good. so its been a good week. this week we have zone leader council and 4 exchanges to go on with zone leaders. so yah.... fun times. love you!!! :D

ELDER NONU

DECEMBER 31, 2012

this week has been good. we started on transfers with president. its been interesting. goes to show how important transfers and getting to know every missionary is. i wish they would have kept me as a zone leader longer in different areas because i only got to know a few missionaries really well, and the other almost 200, not so much. haha. but. We had SWEEEEEET lessons with a new family we started teaching. its the dennis family. a husband wife and daughter. they lived in west virginia their whole lives. he owned a car lot, making over 100,000 a year with a big house and living comfortably. they visited vegas a few times and bro dennis said he was compelled to come here, so 2 years ago, they sold everything, packed up everything else in their car with their cat and drove to vegas. now they live in a weekly suite place on vegas blvd and he works at a sandwich shop flipping a sign and couldnt be happier. he told us, he doent know why hes here, but he thinks it might be the church. we set them for baptism that same lesson for the first week in february. theyre awesome! well, with transfers on wednesday, president is sending elder moreno to lake havasu city and im getting a new companion. his name is elder ermakov originally from russia. moreno was companions with him about 6 months ago. i also found out that the blog yall have for me has been followed by one the missionaries moms before he came into the mission. haha. his parents wrote me and stuff it was so cool. so make sure to give a shout out to sister anderson from troy michigan. haha. :D anyways. all is well. Christmas was fun. we hung out with a couple of families and taught 4 lessons also. it was surprisingly busy. i now have a testimony that people are liklier to let you in on holidays. haha. but. yah. christmas eve we went to the littles, this awesome family in the ward. they had a ping pong tournament and elder moreno won a $25 gift card to subway. haha. it was great. we also had a nativity thing that they did, which was hilarious and fun. so yah. thats my week pretty much. :)

love yall!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ELDER NONU

DECEMBER 17, 2012

anyways. this week has been good. monday we played sports and shopped and stuff. tuesday we went to our zone meeting with the zone leaders and stuff. kind of a boring day though. wednesday we had a leadership meeting for the mission. elders moreno and i had to give trainings. his was on companionship study and mine was on obedience. it went really well. i loved elder morenos. hes a good missionary. after we had a christmas talent show for half of the mission. it was sooooo fuinny. i was dying the whole time. elder vaiaoga and his zone did the haka, but the funny and awkward part was when he got on stage all he was wearing was a lava lava. i guess hes ripped his pants the last 3 times he did it. so he took his pants off, but the whole time you could see his garments. it was wierd. we kept telling the sisters to cover their eyes. then we all laughed at him afterwards. thursday was the same thing excpet for the other half of the mission. it was fun. but this talent show wasnt as fun as the last one. so yah. we had a small meetig after all of that for all of the polynesian missionaries. we got permission from the area 70 to go to the sevens tournament in february. our ward mission leader is going to get us tickets. :D so yah! well be there again. im sooooo excited. friday was a whole lot of nothing. we went on an exchange with the zone leaders up by my old area. it was fun. i was with elder dubois from minnesota. we had a lot of fun. saturday we had 2 baptisms to go to. one was for a little 9 year old girl weve been teaching named natasha. shes so cool and smart. it was a fun baptism. that night we went back for a baptism in central for 3 kids i was teaching before i left and they got baptized saturday. so that was awesome!!!! unfortunately i didnt get a picture of them though because we got there as it was starting. but its ok. im glad i was there. sunday was good too. we went to both wards. the singles ward is awkward. its sooooo friggin awkward in there im super quiet because i dont want to talk to anyone. at least not the girls. theyll say hi and i just smile and wave. but everyone else is cool. weve had a lot of work still going on and a lot of baptisms also. weve had a baptism almost every week ive been here. so were really blessed. our ward mission leader is bro. tiatia. he just recently moved here and he was from the eagle mountain tongan stake that were in. or whatever. he was in the high council. hes so awesome!!!!

anyways. i love you all!!!!

ELDER NONU