Transfers have arrived!!

Well Transfers happened last night. Last night in our house we built a nice large mattress fort in which to wait for transfer news, and if I can get pics to work today, then there will be pics of the fort as well. And as we waited until long after bed time t get transfer news, it finally came. And guess what?!?!?! I got transferred!! I am really quite sad about it, because I thought I was going to get to stay here in this area for a little longer. Right now I've been going through areas like candy. Until now, I have only worked with one companion in each area. I really love this area, it has been really good to me, and I am sad that I didnt have more time to work here.

But about the transfer, its a little exciting, as I am leaving Antananarivo, and heading out to province. Antsirabe here I come!! Good to know, but the definition of Antsirabe means place of lots of salt. The area I will be working is called Mahazoarivo. My companion is from France, and I dont know how to spell his name right now, so I dont want to butcher it. But I think his name is Connault, but dont quote me on that Ill fix that next week. He is the same group as Elder Bowler, so he is pretty new still. But I am pretty sure that I get a bike in Mahazoarivo, and so that makes me very excited.

But yeah, I think thats about it for the transfer stuff, but this week was a good week. Besides the fact that I was sick a little this week, it was good.

The zone conference with Elder Renlund of the seventy was phenomenol. It was extremely interesting and great. His wife is extremely upbeat and kept the meeting on an edge. We talked about a lot of different things, but the main one was TTIPF, which stands for, Teach, Testify, Invite, Promise Blessings, and Follow up. We also talked a bunch about asking inspired questions. It was great, and then we had a wonderful lunch, and got our Christmas presents from Sis and Pres Adams. It was a CD with the malagasy hymns on it, and also a Snickers bar.

This week will be crazy because of the transfer, but starting next week I will be emailing from Anstirabe!!

That I think will be all for this week!!

Elder Weber

Photos of the Transfer Notice Fort

See the December 9 letter for more information about this Fort.

Even more pictures from Dec 1

It looks like someone had a birthday ...

 One of the older chapels in Madagascar - about 10 years old

Elder Weber Being Strange

Here comes December!!!

It is weird to think that December has already arrived! And with it the holiday cheer! I am gearing up for Christmas and I am so so excited! I have started caroling day and night, and I am excited. It is a little weird it being so warm and being in the Christmas spirit.

This week was a good week. My companion and I worked hard, but the numbers werent quite what we were hoping for. But that is ok, because they were still pretty good. This upcoming week should be an interesting week.

This last week was Thanksgiving, and we had a good time. We wanted to buy a dukatra(I have no clue how that is spelled) but it is a cross between a duck and a chicken. They are really fat and look good to eat. But you couldnt find one to buy, so we settled instead for some really good sinoa food. Sinoa is Chinese, there is a nice expensive restaurant near us that has good sinoa food. It was good. I also bought a little package of deli sliced turkey, which was SO EXPENSIVE, but it was worth it to say that I ate turkey on Thanksgiving! IT WAS SO GOOD!!

We also taught a lot this past week, and did some contacting. Tomorrow we have a great zone conference with Elder Renlund of the seventy who has come to Mada for a mission tour. It should be really good. We are really excited.

We should have some more baptisms coming up this next week, if things go well with the bap interviews this evening. We shall see what happens.

This next week should be good, and we have transfer news coming up this next Sunday. I personally think I will be staying here in Ivandry for a little while longer, but it all according to what the Lord wants for me at this time.

Life is going well, and more details about Christmas and Skyping when we get closer.

Merry Early Christmas!
Elder Weber

More Photos from Dec 1

 Some Madagascar Scenery and Sunsets

Photos from December 1, 2013

This week, I decided to upload the pictures first.  The first are from a baptism last month. Elder Weber baptized the girl while his companion baptized the boy.

The next set of pictures are to show the rainy season.  Some have short descriptions after each picture.

 Elder Bowler in the rain

 This is a path and not a creek or river.

Picture of hail storm that comes along with the rainy season.

Happy Thanksgiving

Letter from 11/25/2013

Happy thanksgiving everyone!!

This past week was a good week, capping it off with two baptisms. My companion and I each did one of the baptisms and it went really well. We are looking forward to hopefully about 7 baptisms here in December, and a few more in January.

Coming up on the 3nd of December, we have a zone conference with Elder Renlund of the 70, who is also the Area President. It should be really good, more on that in two weeks.

This last week we had a zone meeting in which our zone leader recapped the meetings with Elder Cook of the 70 when he was here a few weeks ago. In that recap, we found that Elder Cook would like the missionaries working in a 30 minute radius of the church buildings. Yes that is a walking radius, not a driving. This is so that members live closer and can more easily travel to church each Sunday. They are also starting to work on reorganizing boundaries and stakes to make it more convenient for that 30 minute radius. They are also looking for more buildings to rent and lease in order to accomplish that goal. I believe in the next year they would like to get that all accomplished to better help the work progress.

On that front, we are not currently working in a 30 minute radius. Everyone was counseled to change their programs if they needed in order to accomplish that. We have since talked to the APs, because our entire ward lives more than 30 minutes away. So we are going to continue to teach where our members live, and then let the church buildings and ward boundaries come to us. My ward right now is leading this stake in full tithe paying Melchizedek priesthood holders. My ward is planning on splitting here in the next year, which will help grow the church. My honest belief is that before the end of my mission Mada will have 4 stakes. Three in Tana, and 1 in Antsirabe. Right now we only have two here in Tana.*

We have a lot of investigators right now and the work here is doing really well. We are hoping to have a great week coming up.

So yesterday was our ward primary program, which went really well. The only thing was naturally they asked me on Saturday night to play for them. It went well was really easy, but it was a little bit of a pain. We are also preparing for a concert in December, a combined concert between our two wards that share our building. We are excited for that upcoming concert. It should be a lot of fun!

Well the rainy season has kinda started here, and will continue until April. We have quite a bit of random rains now happening. It rains sometimes in the afternoon, or sometimes in the evenings, sometimes it hails, but I am still trying to figure out how to predict when it all happens. I have some pics of the hail, but I forgot my camera today and so I cant send any of the pics that I wanted to send.

Life is going really well, and I am really really excited for the upcoming holiday season! I love Christmas and I have already well started listening to the Christmas music in my apartment. I am so excited for what the future holds in store.

Until Next week!!

Elder Weber