Sunday, November 17, 2013

Letter from Elder Meyer: Typhoon just took out banana and coconut trees. Ship biscuits (Q15). Finding J*ne. Darkest night ever. More baptisms.


Hello Everyone.

Crazy Week… where to start? Well, I guess with the questions.


Dad

Well, that is crazy. I think that I agree with your seminary students. That would be a pretty nice welcome home gift, and it would encourage me about coming home and not pushing to stay forever. Ha ha. I am not sure how you get all the cool stuff. You have every missionary convinced that you are a spy. It is quite funny. It makes me laugh. A temple… someday in Chico. That would be great.

Question 1: We have all been so very concerned regarding the typhoon. Somewhere around a few thousand people were killed in the Philippines from it.  I wrote a note on my Facebook page expressing a little concern about you.  President Mecham wrote me a note directly saying all was well.  He is a wonderful communicator and must be a spectacular Mission President.  So what happened in regards to the Typhoon?

Answer:  In Yap, not a ton. It generally missed us. It went south of us. So we are fine. President Mecham is a wonderful Mission President.




Question 2: How many lessons did you get to teach this week, and how many with member’s present?

Answer: 21 and 9 with a member present.


Question 3: What do the members get by way of instruction in preparation for the upcoming grand temple visit?

Answer: They go through the temple class like in the states and passports stuff get sorted, and how much they can contribute, interviews are challenging because President Mecham needs to interview them.


Question 4: Were you able to find J*ne?  I’ve been praying for her.

Answer: Yes. I was able to find her. It is quite a story.  I’ll tell you later.


Question 5: If you send a package for Christmas, we promise not to open it until you say it is ok.  Speaking of packages… what can we send to your friends on the island for Christmas?  We’re open to pretty much anything you suggest.

Answer: Things I send home I don't want you to open till I get home. Is that okay? Things you can send. Let me think of what some members need that would be fun for Christmas.


Question 6: Is there anything that happened this past week that helped your faith in Christ grow even stronger?

Answer: Finding Jane. She has had me worried.


Question 7: What do you enjoy most about training again?

Answer: Watching the new missionary adjust to things here and seeing them grow through Christ.


Question 8: Have you ever considered the possibility of a third branch on the island somewhere?

Answer: Right now, no. In the future, yes. The island used to have 3 or 4 small group meetings. Now we have one. All the leaders on Yap left. So that is when Yap's missionary work fell. It is starting to come back up though.


Mom

Congrats on almost finishing your masters. That is awesome. Your interview thing will be fine. You will not have any problem. Don't even worry about it. Sounds like a temple in Chico could happen someday. That would be really awesome. Don’t push too hard until we get one in Micronesia please. We are going to push hard really soon.

Question 9: What effects did the typhoon have on Yap?

Answer: Nothing to bad. Just fallen down banana trees, and some coconut trees. It was not too bad here.


Question 10: Was anyone hurt?

Answer: As far as i know no one was hurt. So that is all good.


Question 11: How did you prepare for the typhoon?

Answer: Us, nothing. We have a cement house, so no big deal. We went and helped members. Tie down houses and cut banana tees down so they don't blow over.


Question 12: How much damage was done on Yap because of the typhoon?

Answer: Down on the southern end, not a ton, but a lot at the same time. It was the roughest there. Some power lines were down and trees were in the road. Coral from the ocean was up on the road. I mean there was 20 foot was crashing down there. But even with that the damage was not too bad.


Question 13: Tell me one miracle that happened this week

Answer: Finding J*ne. More later.


Question 14: Describe church yesterday - how many were there?  What did you do?

Answer: Church was good. We had 24 people in the small northern branch, Thool.  3 investigators. It was really good. I taught the Youth Sunday school class again. So it was fun. It was pretty good Sunday. I really enjoyed it.


Question 15: Any other unique things happen at church (like you conducting, using cookies for sacrament bread)?

Answer: Jim the Facilities Manager for the church here, just changed the lock on the door, and I am now the only one with a key, so I was a little behind because we were running the small group meeting and everyone was outside waiting for me. And this week for sacrament we use ship biscuits.


Question 16: Did you do any service this week?

Answer: Just helping people getting ready for the typhoon.



Staheli - How are you doing? What is the weather like right now in Reno? Anything exciting happening right now?

Reed - Sorry, I think dad should give me the car when I get back. It sounds like I have the support from his seminary class too. Ha ha.

Grandma - Hope you are doing good grandma. I got one of your letters. Thank you so much. I am sorry that I am not good at righting you back. Please forgive me. Things are going great here on Yap. I love this people so so much. There is an old lady here. Her name is Fransica. She is the grandma of two boys that are great. She reminds me of you. She and you are both supper faithful and have wonderful, powerful testimonies. I love you so much.


To Everyone… find J*ne

Well, I am close to time, so here it goes. Finding J*ne was crazy. [Note: J*ne is someone they baptized earlier.]  She’s been missing and we’ve been trying to find her on this island for a long time. Got some info on where she lives. Went there and no one was there. I was really sad. I have been praying to find her and that she would be alright and not hurt. Well, as we were leaving this spot, I felt impressed to walk up the road a bit. We did and there she was. She was with her husband (not very nice) and the mother in law. J*ne pretended not to know who we were, but I did talk to her. She gave me the look of "you don't know me, okay" so I went with it. Started talking to everyone and she seemed okay. She was not bruised at all, which made me relieved. We are going to go and try to teach the husband and her. I think we are going to approach it like she has not been baptized already.  His behavior changes rapidly. So we will see how it all plays out. I was so happy to find her and see that she is still ok.

The Typhoon

When the typhoon was on its way we went to all the member’s houses. We went and checked up on them and see if the needed help. Well, at one house we cut down a ton of trees. Namely banana trees to save them from the typhoon. It was raining super hard and the wind was really strong. I think we saved the trees though. We cut them down so the wind does not blow them over and hurt the people. If they are cut they will grow back. We helped some other members tie down their house with rope. To keep the wind form taking the tin roofs away. So that was good.

After that we went home and waited. We lost power for almost a day. So not too long. It was really dark that night. I have never seen anything that dark before. It was crazy. It was like standing in a sealed room with no light. It was nuts. The next morning, things were alright. Some trees had fallen over in the road, so we went and cleaned that stuff up. We were pretty lucky that nothing really bad happened to us here. The Lord was protecting us, no doubt. The typhoon did hit an outer Island of Palau really hard. They had to evacuate the island. I believe Elder Ramiterre's family, from the Philippians, is okay.

Investigators

Cl*nton and F*ona. They are cousins. They are super great. We have taught them several times. They should be baptized on the 28th.  Thanksgiving day. It should be really great. They are both super kids. Cl*nton is 12 and F*ona is 9. They are really fun to teach. I have really enjoyed them and will continue to enjoy teaching them.

Cl*nton and F*ona live right next to Jim and Mathew and Sylvester, so they have a lot of member support, so that is good. They came to church and really enjoyed it. We talked about the ten commandments and how we don't worship idols.

Well, I think that is it.

I love you all so so so much. You are great.

You are the best family in the world

Love Elder Meyer

I love you all. I just love saying that. You are the best family ever.

Love

Elder Meyer



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