Sept. 20, 2010

Hello family,

So yes as you know I worked in Wanica this past week. It was cool to work with a native and it helped my Dutch a lot....or maybe it just destroyed it but in a good way to sound more like a Surinamer.

Elder Wehl is a really good missionary. he sleep farts though. I told him it sounded like an elephant was in his bed. he fell on the floor laughing. He laughs a lot .....a lot. He also has an active snese of other emotions. At the end of the week I said the zone leaders called and were going to pick me up to take me back to Koewarasan. he cried and said he was going to miss me. He really seriously cried......After just a week. It was awkward because i thought he was joking at first, but nope. It was for real. I was not ready for that one. I guess i should be appreciative that I was around someone with that kind of charity to love someone so quickly. I do love him, but i was quit ready to shed tears about leaving someone I would be seeing the next week.

The baptism went great. The hardest part was getting the baptism form filled out. Sis. Wijngaarden's family were all yelling at me telling me how to do it because they had taken a year of English in school so they thought they knew what they were doing. WHY WOULDN'T THEY JUST LISTEN TO THE NATIVE SPEAKER! I've spoken Englich(whoops.... IRONY ATTACK) for 19 years! THe service went great though. We had another area baptizing so we had 4 in the same day.

Even with all that I'm happy to be back in Koewarasan with my assigned companion. I'm really hoping that we get to stay together next transfer. We've developed a great friendship. I think that's been the difference in having some successthis transfer. When you have a companion you want to work with it lets you have the Spirit with you and you can do the work of the Lord not just the work of to white guys in a strange land.

We had 5 investigators in church on Sunday. 2 of them have a solid baptismal date for next Saturday. We'll be working with the lady who is afraid of tithing this week to see if we can't strengthen her faith to just get baptized and see what miracles follow. One of the baptisms is that Muslim girl and the other is a Hindu(by race not religion) lady named Zr. Basant. SHe would be getting baptized this saturdya but she had to take to daughter to the hospital because a pepper exploded in her face so she missed chuch.

I also got the letter to Grandma Jean sent off while I was outside of the jungle last week so you can watch out for that letter. It has some new pictures in it.

Hmm what's a random detail....My bike is .........well old. We don't bike as much in this area so I have some fatness accumilating around the mid-section. No strange foods this week.

Oh yeah Br. Salijo said hi to me yesterday. He was impressed with dad's elk.

Well that should be good. I love you all. thank you for everything: your prays, letters and evrything else.

Love,
Hayden

Hello everyone people,

Yes i did get the other e mails. So no need to worry.

I'm glad everyone is doing good. I really happy to hear Jase is almost at eagle status! That's sweet. And yes good luck with the straight a's. Very possible for you Jase. I feel wierd that you're going back to school already. That seems like a short summer compared to my 6 month summer so far.

Wow dad. Going to work huh? Well I'm glad you get a little better everytime i hear from you. And mom good luck with the math. You should be fine. It's jsut elementary math right?

The Dirkmaat's are leaving for home friday so probably dont' send things there. That's nuts.... I thought they would be hear forever when i first got to Suriname. When i heard how long they had way back then i thought they had a long time left but 6 months was like nothing. That makes me think. 6 months went by so fast. why do i stress? A mission isn't that long. It's jsut hard to get it into to your head that 2 years isn't as long as you always thought it was and you don't have a long tie to serve the Lord in this way.

hey guess what GREAT NEWS! We had a last second baptism this week! we just got it approved wednesday. The bad news is my camera got baptized as well. I gues when i talked about how baptism clenses us from sin my camera wanted to be clean too so it hopped in my pocket right before i baptized.....I know i know typical me. The kid's name that was baptized was Anferny. He had a great experience with the baptism. He said , "Ik voelde me zo licht" which being interppruted means " I felt so light." That was cool to hear. Hopefully Elder Bells dad will send the the pics...ha

We have 2 more missionaries leaving Suriname next transfer and their replacements are nowhere in sight so it looks like we will have 11 missionaries in the whole country until someboby gets this visa problem figured out. I remember how i felt when i got delayed and i feel terrible for these others becuase some havn't been here for about 3 months!

Today for p day we played untimate frisbee in the mud and one of our Elders got chipped teeth.....we'll definitly play again next week. My clothing is completely mudded so i hope i can wear them again because some of the clothing was the shirt that Parker made for me and i like that shirt a lot. Thanks Park!

Wow Reading that e mAil of Tanner's just makes me realize more how short a mission is. He has seriously almost been out a year. I've seen a cuople of times that Jase has said that he feels like i've been out forever but i can't belive the trip to New York was over a year ago and the call opening and the fair and ......wow.

SO yes about the card reader ....uh hold off on that i guess. SO do you want me to buy a new camera here or do you want to sned me one? Or do we just not trust me to have one? I might try to get mine fixed so I'll tell you how that works out and then tell me what you would rather have me do.

I sent Grandma Pat a birthday letter with pictures so be on the look out for that. I think it will miss her birthday, but its comin'!

Wow thats sweet that Austin went ot the temple and his dad got to go. Tell them both hello for me.

I love you all. Thank you for letting me know what's going on and that you're all happy.

Love,
Hayden

Hello the family,

1. Yes, always
2. South most area. Not too far from the other area but rediculously
huge. Toit lui fautweg. Number unkown. It's probably the nicest
apartment in Suriname apart from the washer and observation deck
toilet.
3. No package
4. Yes i saw the pic.

Elder Bell's a big guy with blond hair. We are getting along together really good.

We had only one investigator in church this week so this week we will
have to find 2 really cool people who are ready and able to be
baptized in 2 weeks if we want to fill Pres. Gamiette's order of 3
baptisms.

I really like this area so far. The members here are great. It's a
little bigger branch so we have the chance to work with them more.

Sorry I'm writing boring. I've come under yet another sickness. During
the week I only had a headache so i was able to work without much
problem. Now I feel a bit weak and sick and tired so I've lost my
ability to use colorful imaginative words. ....a monkey tried to steal
my fingers this week. It was big.
My pills are working just fine. I'm not having stomach pain much
anymore just ....woooooooooooooozzzyy. It's P-day though so hopefully
taking a nap will be what i need.

SO yes everything is going fine here. New good strong branch and good
apartment so I'm happy.

Elder Bell's dad should be sending you a pic soon so hopefully it will
make up for my boring writing.

I'd glad that surgery isn't necessary dad! Good luck with the arise
performance! I sent a letter telling Jase and dad happy birthday so
hopefully that comes soon. I love you all and am so grateful for your
suppport!

Love'
Hayden

June 21, 2010

Happy Fathers Day!

I'm glad your Fathers day was good dad. Mine was too. The branch has a small little dinner becuase there are only 2 dad's really in the branch they decided to include the Elders in the eating.

We didn't have any ivestigators in church this week except The 2 little Grootfaam girls and it's still a question if they can get baptized alone because dad and mom aren't making a real effort to come to church. We don't know what's going on with Lloyd. If he doesnt come to church next week I don't think we can keep teaching him because it took 2 months of teaching to get him to church once. But if he keeps reading like he usually does hopefully he'll keep that desire to be baptized. We have another ivestigator who is pretty cool. I don't know if I said someting about him alrady but he is 19 and lives in a house owned by another church. I think he really knows this church is Christ's church but he just doesn't know what to do if he leaves his church.

Jase you can tell Sam sorry for me ,but I lost all my adresses so I dont't know how to write her back because I would love to. And tell Grandma J that her letter from June 1 just got here. She wanted to know. And tell her thanks for keeping up so many letters. She's awesome.

Well my language is going good. I get compliments all the time on it. But I still hardly understnad what people are saying. Luckily My companion gets most of what people say.

So by the end of this transfer i will have been in Suriname for 6 months...in the same area! I'm certainly not mad though. It's kind of fun having to get to the area so well. I feel like I'll stay for at least one more transfer so Elder Bytendorp can know the area a little better but who knows what could happen.

We're gettin along just fine. Elder Bytendorp likes to correct me a lot more than Elder Schroth did but when I am humble about it i find its actually a help to me.

I love you all so much. But now I realize I can stand to be away for another 18 months:)..of course not without much help but I know I can do it. Thank you for your support. I hope you all are having a great summer so far !

June 7, 2010

Hello family amily amily(i don't know i just did it)

I'm starting to love to get your letters for a different reason now. I use to think it was a time i didn't have to think about the pressures of missionary work. Now i love them because... well i don't know just because i love you all i guess. It's helps me to think of the big picture i guess. You're all just goin about life and doin the things you do without me. But i'm happy about that.

We've had a lot better week this week. We had a spritual lesson, i called a lady "brother", and i was riding up to contact a guy and he did one of those step for step fart things. SO i jsut thought i'd contact him anyway to see the look on his face when he figured out that some one was right behind him.

The spiritual lesson was great though. It was this family that had been on and off investigators for a few months and we were about to drop them if somehting didn't happen. We shared Moroni 10 3-5 and broke it bown for them and that brought the spirit very strong. Then i decided to ask the dad to have a kneeling prayer and ask if Joseph Smith was a Prophet. Elder Bytendorp said he felt the spirit really strong right when he asked. I didn't really know because i didn't really understand what he said ha ha. But I know i had to be feeling the Spirit to ask him to do a kneeling prayer. They have of few things to take care of before baptism but their daughters come to church quite often so maybe they can be baptized by the end of the month.

Me and Elder Bytendorp have gotten along pretty well. It's still in the awkward stages of things but there's no problems to interfere with us becoming good friends. Except that he has Disney music cd that makes the neighbors question what the heck we are all about. ha ha. But he's pretty good. If i think there's a way we can be more obedient as a companionship he's pretty open to hear about it.

I'm really happy to hear Jase is enjoying his summer so much already. ANd i'm glad to hear there are still very strong friendships within the family. See Dad he doesn't need the bpoat to have fun...but i do so you just get nice and rested for the next 2 summers. And i pray everyday that you wont' need that surgery and can heal properly and get back to beating young black kids at basketball.

Well I could probably think to complain about some pressures and wondering if i'm doing good enough f0or what Heavenly Father wants of me, but that's no fun to hear aobut so I'll just say this. THis is definitley a transfer of learning as i lead the area and try to teach it to some one. I've been able to lead lessons even with the language and had a companion who wants to be obedient too.

I love you all very much.

Love hayden

June 1, 2010

I'm glad to hear that Jase gets a break from the stress of school now...more time to study scriptures??? And that's cool you got to go down and see Elder Schroath. He might have been humoring you when he said i was his favorite companion, but we did have a great last few weeks together.

I'm glad to hear your doing a little better Dad. I hope you don't have to get surgery and you can get back to your life as my hard working example.

Wow my you miss school? You must have had some great kids this year. I hope you have that same luck for next. It's weird to think that summer is going to pass without me there. I know what you mean when you say it feels like I've been gone forever, it's weird though because i feel like it hasn't been that long at all but also very long.

My new companion, ELder Bytendorp, is very different from Elder Schroath. Elder Schroath was just solid and seemed like he new everything that i didn't, but Elder Bytendorp has been in areas of Suriname where they only speak Surinams Or English, So his Dutch is not too much better than mine. He's only 2 transfers ahead of me as well. It's a difficult switch from going from trainee to holding down the area. This week was weird because i had to work in other areas until my compaion got here so it seems like i had already forgotten my area a bit at first but now i'm getting the hang of things again. I've mostly been praying for the Lord to be patiently with me as i try to do these things the right way. I'm grateful that you have faith in me and encourage me to keep going because i need all the strength i can get. I'm still in the stage where i wish this was a lot easier, but then i guess there would be no point in going if i wasn't going to grow. This is the hardest thing on my mission so far because i'm so worried that the area is going to fall apart sometimes, but then i realize it absolutley cannot fall apart. And if the misson President ever pulled missionaries out of the area then that would just be the Lord's will. I wish I could understand the Lord's will better not worry when somebody doesn't come to church and thinks it's my fault. I do everthing i know ow to do. It's not a perfect effort but the Lord knows what i was capable of before i came here so i must do my best and as Henk says " God does the rest".

I love you all very much. Tell Grandpa V happy b day soon.

Love Hayden

That's a happy missionary!