8 Months But Whose Counting?

Has it really been quite a few weeks since I've written this blog? The weeks are going by so fast. Less than 8 months to go before we come back to England. But I don't think anyone is counting the weeks!!!!!!

Hamilton Here We Come

On Sunday we went to church before starting our travels home from Gisborne. We pass by Djahni and her family’s home by about half a mile so I asked very nicely if we could just do a quick toilet stop. I had no idea if he would stop or not until we went down their street. I hope they were as pleased to see us as we were to see them. Big Hugs! Plus we did not stay for longer than 10 minutes so that pleased Elder Saunders. When he heads towards home he never wants to stop so I feel as though I have been treated this weekend.   

Eastwood Hill

 

Next we visited the Eastwood Hill Arboretum. We were told this has such pretty gardens but actually it was full of trees. Elder Saunders was not impressed and did not want to go inside but just for me he did. We (I) actually had lots of fun before we went inside. A bird welcomed us and came so close to us I even feed it some apple. I don’t know what kind of bird it is yet but when I get Wi-Fi next I will google it. I think its a male Chaffinch. That was a good start to our adventure. There were different coloured routes and we decided to take the yellow route which may have taken about 45 mins. When we were about half way around there was a bench so Elder Saunders sat for a while, while I went under some trees to find the Tuis. Boy was I in for a treat. I think it may be the mating season as they was a lots of different calls from them and most of them kept flying around in pairs. I took loads of photos and even videos. Again hopefully they are not too long for me to post on the blog and that you can watch them. After that we went for the second half of our walk, or at least that was what we thought. At one point we could not find any yellow markers and double backed on ourselves only to find that we had to go back in that direction again. We seriously did not know what to do and were quite annoyed. So we followed another trail not knowing if we were going away from the exit or not. It turned out as I thought, we were going away from the exit. Rather than turn back we had to go on another 45 minute trail. We were not happy bunnies when we finally found a yellow/purple/red exit trail. After another 15 mins walk we had finished our original 45 minute walk for a 2 hour hike!!!! I seriously did not want to go into the car absolutely hating this place so I suggested we sat down on the benches for a few minutes to calm down. Timely our welcoming committee returned and I was able to take a photo of our bird on the table. Just in case some of you experts want to comment on this we do know it was not the same bird. But it made for a good ending to our story.

What am I trying to take a photo of the Tui of course.

I'm so proud of my Tui photos.

 

      


The beginning of our walk

             the end of our hike!!!!!

Rere Falls/Rockslide

We managed to deliver all the machines yesterday which actually gave us a P-Day. So we decided to go sight-seeing. First we visited the Rere Falls. It may not be as pretty as some of the other falls we have seen but there were no steps to go down or climb up so this was a plus for us. We then visited Rere Rockslide. You must check this out on utube it looks such fun. Obviously Elder Saunders and I will go back when the weather and water is warmer to have our turn on the slide!!!!!!

Thumbs up for our next visit in the summer when we go for a slide!

 

Kapa Haka Treat

This will be one of the highlights of our mission I am sure. I have been looking forward to watching Djahni’s High School Kapa Haka performance all year. I say ‘I’ instead of ‘we’ here because Elder Saunders just forgot all about it, whereas I never could. Those of you who are my facebook friends will know this story already. This is the blog version. Djahni is the daughter of the Branch President of Whakatane and as most of you know we just love this family. We were also hoping that her performance would be on a Saturday so that we could attend but it was scheduled for 9.30 Friday morning. So we said we would do our best to attend. We were blessed that 2 washing machines broke down this last week in Gisborne (poor missionaries). Plus the sisters who we moved a few weeks ago in Gisborne didn’t have a washing machine and that was due to a misunderstanding between the missionaries and Elder Saunders. So we HAD to go to Gisborne this weekend. And to get to Gisborne you have to go through Whakatane. We left after transfers on Thursday and stayed with the new couple in Whakatane, Elder and Sister Clark. We spent a lovely evening with them and in the morning we all went to the performance together.
This was the regional final and to go through to the nationals next year you have to be placed in the top three. Each performance lasts for about 20-30 mins and there are lots of different segments to each performance. The first group were brilliant and not knowing much about what the judges were looking for made me a complete novice. As I have just found out that that group were not in the top 3. Anyway after only a few minutes of Djahni’s group singing I looked at her mum and said that they were lovely and I got quite emotional. The rest of it was so so good. Hark at the expert here! We left after that and never saw the remaining 6 but the prizing giving was at 4pm. We went on our way to Gisborne and delivered the washing machines and had a lovely catch-up with the missionaries. We then had another super FHE outside by the camp fire with the Bellistons and their friends. All the while I kept checking my phone for the results. After we had part of the FHE outside and ate some food we came inside to watch a good video. About half way through the video the results came in. Naturally I looked at the message but didn’t want to detract from the spiritual message so just keep the disappointment or joy to myself. For Half an hour. I was in tears thinking about Djahani, her family and the other performers and families. Was it tears of sadness or joy.  After the closing prayer was said I calmly said do you want to hear the results and just to humour me they said yes, as if they had a choice. They Won. Can you believe it? Well of course you can they were the best but I was overjoyed. Hope you enjoy some of the photos and hopefully can see the video. Now back to missionary work!!!!!

Transfers Week Part 2

Tuesday
Elder Saunders had no part in taking the missionaries to the airport so he caught up on paperwork and looked for more flats online. I was able to complete what I couldn’t do yesterday.
Wednesday
 Our newbies from the MTC arrived in good time in the morning and we whisked through the orientation in a few hours. In the evening we went to Presidents house for dinner followed by testimonies.
Thursday
Not such a big transfer this week. Elder Saunders helped me load my car. The Elders came and helped take some of the bedding for the new missionaries. I gave out my post and bedding. The Newbies met their trainers for the first time there were lots of hugs and smiling faces. We then had a meeting in the chapel where the released and new callings for Sister Trainer Leaders, District Leaders and Zone Leaders were announced. The newbies and their trainers were introduced to everyone. The President and Sister Rudd gave short talks. The Bellistons were there so they were asked to share their testimony. Then after we had our Subway lunch we all went on our separate journeys home.
Now you would think that after being through many transfer weeks that this is all routine, which it is, most of the time the same order happens BUT it is far from the same thing each time. Each transfers is different although missionaries come and go they are all unique. The more transfers we participate in the harder it is saying farewell from the mission field. Welcoming is easy and an absolute joy to meet and greet each missionary. To hear their testimonies on Wednesday night is such a pleasure and treasure. We have made such special friends and I know that our relationships with many of the missionaries will last throughout the eternities. We look forward to hearing from them in the future as they participate on life’s journey. This sounds like we are on our way home or something, not yet, another 9 months before we step on English soil.

July Transfers Week Part 1

Monday
So many lovely missionaries are going home. Most of them came into the office as they arrived by bus. Normally I just plod through the noise and get my work done but this was a different Monday. I don’t know if I have mentioned it before but I am the proctor of the language programme in our mission. Today we had our first test scheduled. I had set up my lap top before and everything worked but today when I set it up I realized that I didn’t have a port open to be able to actually do the test. Sister Witts, bless her heart had popped into the office and tried to help sort it out. She even spoke to the IT person in America but even he couldn’t sort it out. So my problem was flagged up and I’m still waiting a week later for it to be sorted. Anyway if the test had been taken he would have failed!!!!!! Although we used the time we had waiting for reviewing the demo test and listening and talking about different questions that may be asked it was horrid. I don’t mean it was his fault but because these missionaries have been on a mission for 18 month to 2 years and they haven’t been out to the theatre or watching movies or even going to hairdressers. I feel I am going to have to prepare these missionaries for the random questions that will be asked about their hobbies they haven’t been part of for a while. Wow, hope you don’t mind me ranting on about this it just gets my annoyance off my chest, thanks. By the way I was able to cancel the test and this Elder will hopefully be able to take it sometime in the future.
I just could get my head around my work. So only did small task and talked to the outgoing missionaries. Unexpected to me was one very special missionary who was going home came into the office late afternoon. That was a special goodbye but not forever I feel sure.