Wah ya deh pon?

Wah ya deh pon? Well another week is here! This week was good. The week started out with Elder Stewart saying goodbye to people. Then on Wednesday I went to Spanish Town to pick up my new comp! We had a good transfer meeting there, as well as a good trainers meeting. Man it was weird in those meetings, the Elders were the minority since so many sisters came out this transfer. It was weird, never in a million years did I think I would see that happen lol. My new comp is Elder Jackson from Pocatello, Idaho. We are very different but things are working out good. This week has been kind of slow teaching wise. We have been walking mostly so that doesn't allow us to see as many people as usual. We have started working with someone tho, her name is S. She is the mother of the Zone Leaders top investigator.  She was kind of slow to accept things the first couple lessons we had with her, but we taught her the Plan of Salvation last week and ever since then she has just been so interested! She has family in Washington DC that are members and they go and visit them occasionally. They go to church with them while they are there and have visited temple grounds.  That doesn't happen very often here to find people that have visited temple grounds before, especially non members.  She came to church yesterday and had a good time. She doesn't have a baptism date yet but we are working on that.  Well that is about it, still just same old same old going on around here. I am way excited to watch General Conference this week! Love you guys! Happy April fools! Happy 12th birthday Treyson! Love you man! 

Love Elder Colton Harris

Pic 1 New comp on the left, old comp on the right

Pic 2 I ate the whole fish, head, tail, bones and all... I did it, still not my favorite tho

Pic 3 Pineapple tree! :)

 

Keep working hard and give it your all!

Hey everyone.

Pday is back around already! This week was good! We had zone conference on Tuesday so we went to Spanish Town for that! It was really good! It was just what I needed to hear! We went over a lot of material. One thing that an Elder brought up that I thought was kind of cool was how short of time we have to be missionaries. The Missionary Handbook says that our time is extremely short as missionaries. I didn't fully understand how 2 years could be short until then. But after you take out 8 hours a day for sleeping, 1.5 for morning prep, 2 hours for study, 2 hours for lunch and dinner, .5 hours for night planning, 1 hour a day for other meetings throughout the week, another 1 hour a day for pday, 1 hour for travel time, and 1 hour for other things throughout the week and time wasted. All of this is being generous as well. That only leaves 6 hours a day for actual teaching, and proselyting. That is only 6 months out of the 24 that we have to teach. It makes ya want to keep working hard and give it your all!
Well transfer calls were this weekend.  I am staying here in Boulevard and I will be training! That is exciting. I don't know who he is yet, I will on Wednesday tho! Probably going to set up a chicken foot dinner for him lol! :) Jk I can't be that mean.It has been fun serving with Elder Stewart, it has been a really good transfer but time to move on.  Also mom, sisters took over Turks as well this transfer. There are 5 Elder in Freeport now, that is all the Elders have left to rep! :( I am just glad that I got my 6 months in off island when I did! There are 12 sisters coming out in the next 2 transfers and only 1 going home! When I got to the mission 1 year ago there were only 5 or 6 sisters in the entire mission, now there is going to be like over 40 I think after next month with no sign of it slowing down in our mission either. 

We have had a hard time seeing our investigators this week. They have all been so busy, well at least that is what they tell us. I wish that we could just chat with them online and call it a lesson haha. They all promised to show up to church this week as well and no one did. actually one did, hopefully she can progress. Her name is R. Not too much else is going on out here. Have a great week! Love you guys!

One Love

Elder Colton Harris

I didn't bring my cord to send pictures, sorry.

TIme Keeps Marching On!

Dear One and All,

Time keeps marching on! Another week is down for the count! This week we started teaching a new person, his name is A.  He is the fiance to a member from Spanish Town.  The member just moved into our branch and so she had us come and start teaching him! He is really awesome!  He is just the most sincere guy, he is basically a member of the church already and he just doesn't know it yet.  It is good for our little branch tho, they both have a daughter so next month when they get married it will be a new family in our branch.  With small branches, adding or taking away 1 or 2 families can make a huge difference!! 

I went on a trade off this week with the zone leaders. Elder Bateman came into our area with me. We had a really good time! It was fun. He was in my MTC group so it was fun to reminisce on old times.

We have also been working with a lot of less actives lately and our efforts are being paid off. This one old lady hadn't been to church in years.  She says the last time she went to church, relief society was before sacrament, so that shows you how long it has been! It only took a couple visits and now she is on fire! She is loving coming to church and has given us her granddaughter and her husband as a referral and they are also really really cool! She says that she is going to get them into the church before she dies, which could be anytime cuz she is really old lol.

So tomorrow we are having zone conference in Spanish Town. We get to go and be taught from on high! If you can believe it, transfer calls are this week already! Man this transfer has flown by! I have enjoyed serving with Elder Stewart, we get along really really well!! I think that it is going to come to an end tho! He is cool, he is from Texas, and we are basically the same person.  It also has been getting really really hot here! I didn't think it was possible for it to get more hot then it was, but I was wrong! Bring on summer! Well I hope everyone has a great week! Love you all!
Elder Colton Harris

Pic 1 Us cooking chicken Bobby Flay style!

Pic 2 A picture from our hospital room a couple minutes later! JK!!!
Pic 3 don't ask
Pic 4 #mystreet!!

DR Temple, Here the Jamaicans Come!

Alright well it has been another week! This week was good. Last week after emailing we went to the Bob Marely museum. That was pretty cool.  We got some good pictures there! It was pretty fun. We have had a pretty good week teaching wise as well.  We have been able to start teaching a lot of new people so that is good. We are working with a guy named O. He is really cool.  He is educated as well, so that makes it even better!   He should be getting baptized within a month or so. he has been to church twice and fits in really well.  So something that is pretty cool that is going on here, I don't think that I have mentioned this in letters home yet, maybe I did, but the mission (basically the stake part, not the missionaries) has organized a huge temple trip for next month! Last I heard was that there is almost 200 members from all over Jamaica going to the temple for their first time. They are chartering a plane and they are going to the Dominican Republic temple. Members here are really excited for it! They are also using it as a youth trip for them to go and do baptisms for the dead. Because of this trip, the number of endowed members in Jamaica will almost double!! It is going to be such a big boost for Jamaica! There are also going to be a lot of families sealed together as well. Pres Brown is allowing some Elders and Sisters that are serving their missions right now from Jamaica to go with their families on this trip in order to be sealed to them.  It is a cool thing to watch happen! It reminds me of the saints in Navoo trying to get the temple completed before they had to cross the plains because they knew how much strength it would give them! Well this seems like the final push before the stake is created here. Sometime, most likely within 6 weeks after they get back from this trip, is when the stake is supposed to be established! Somehow this trip is costing the members almost nothing to go on it! It costs the youth US $50 and the adults about the same if they can afford it, so it is a huge blessing to a lot of people here. Everyone is really excited for it, and it is cool to be apart of. 

Boulevard is doing well tho.  We did quite a bit of service this week. District meeting was good. The assistants came to it as well and with them there we had like 14 missionaries, with the size of my district it could have been a zone meeting! I went on a trade off to Downtown Kingston's area, that was fun! Man that area is super! I loved it! Most Jamaicans are too scared to even go down there but I thought it was pretty fun.  There is never a dull moment when you are out on the streets in Downtown!

We also have been making a lot of fruit smoothies lately! We have a cherry, banana, mango, and grapefruit tree at our house.  At the sisters house they have a Jamaican apple tree that we steal from, we also have been getting a lot of star fruit, coconuts, limes for homemade limeade, and other stuff that I can't even pronounce.  All of it is free to us too so we have been pounding the fruit lately, and have came up with some good mixes for smoothies as well! 

Well I think that is about it, have a good week! Love you guys!

Love Elder Colton Harris

Pics are of Bob Marley Museum

 

One year down!

Well another week has passed, and with it the first year of my mission!  1 down, I can't believe it! We celebrated pretty good! 4 out of the 5 elders that were in my MTC group are in my district so of course we had to get together.  We all met up at Tracks and Records. I have been there before, it is the Usaine Bolt owned restaurant (hense the awesome name) that is right next to our church here.  It was good to get all together.  We splurged big time.  We all got 2 meals cuz they serve more than just chicken and rice there so we couldn't pass it up!! I got a jerked chicken quesadilla and some southwest pizza somethin and it was glorious! After that we went to this ice cream place me and my comp bought a 3 gallon thing of ice cream.  We don't get dessert out here, like it just doesn't happen so we took matters into our own hands.  Elder Stewart said that it would last us a month, and I thought it would too cuz it was a lot of ice cream, but we bought it on Thursday and it is Monday, and it is almost gone. Whoops. I also burnt a pair of pants for my year mark.  You are supposed to burn a shirt, but true I didn't have a shirt to give up at this time so I burnt some old pants.

Anyways, teaching was really slow at the beginning of the week.  We are trying to find some new people to start working with, but it hasn't been going so well.  But yesterday at church like 3 awesome people showed up.  One was someone that we have been trying to visit but he has been busy a lot, didn't expect him to show up tho.  Another one was invited by missionaries like 6 months ago and promised them he would show up and didn't have time to come until yesterday, and another one came with their friend who is a member. All of them loved church, it was a good day.

So another cool story.  So Elder Stewart when he came out on his mission came out with a brand new pair of Oaklies.  Well they fell out of his bag like 4 months ago and he hasn't seen them since.  So we were sitting this little restaurant after we ordered some food, and Elder Stewart was like remember the glasses that I told you about, those are them. And he points to some guy wearing them.  I was like do you want them back? He is like no.  He said that cuz we aren't allowed to wear sunglasses anymore in our mission. Apparently they make us look like CIA, so they got banned.  And not wearing sunglasses makes us not look like CIA in Jamaicans eyes or something like that.  Anyways I called him over and I was like hey where did you get those? He was like America. I said yeah, or the side of the road? He then yelled AMERICA, give me $2,000 and you can have them!  I said I'll give ya $1,000 for them. He was like ok.  $1,000 is less then US$10.  So I bought $200 glasses for $10, and the guy still thought he made off like a bandit cuz now he can go buy 3 pairs of fake ray-bands with that money! The story was a lot cooler if you were there in person lol. Elder Stewart was amazed cuz he didn't think I could get them so easily, so i gave them back to him, after we disinfected them!
So a cool side note to that story, Elder Wilkerson was telling me something that his friend wrote him. He said that Elder Oaks showed his mission president a powerpoint of all the countries, and dots showed up on most of them. He said those dots are countries that have had missionaries there in person teaching lessons, then he showed a next slide, and all of the countries had dots on them.  He said this is showing how many countries have had missionary lessons taught over the internet, Skype or other social media like Facebook.  The gospel has and is being taught over the internet in ever single country in the world right now.  It brings a new insight into the phrase teaching all nations, kindreds, and tongues.. it is now happening and it is awesome to be apart of it!

Well have a great week! Love you guys! 

Burning pants to commemorate One year mark!

Elder Harris and Elder Stewart

Duck Dynasty Wall

Track and Records Lunch