Dec. 19, 2011

hey everyone this week was amazing because we found some new people to work with and they speak creol!!!! this is super awesome cause its been a while since we have taught a lesson in creole and yester we had a member named charles makison who is preparing himself to go on a mission. we spent the whole day with him and taught a guy named alex prophet who we had found earlier this week.

sorry but this email might be kinda short cause ill be talking with everyone next week also can some one tell me what we are doing for my call home?? just email me details or ill just call on christmas to the house. its w/e.

anyway but yeah we found this other man by the name of duguy and he is da guy cause he has a real desire to find the real church of christ and it felt really amazing to promise him blessings and knowledge if he took moronis promise. i think he will continue to meet with us. he has met with other faiths and done alot of researching but i hope he will see us thourgh.

this week at church edward who the sisters taught but now we are teaching came to church. it was good to see that the ward welcomed him and everyone was friendly to him. also we went to a baptism of an 8year old haitian. a ton of people came and there was a big response from the ward. if only we could get a response like that for a convert  baptism.

today for pday we are going to ihop and i kinda left my pday clothes at another pad of some elders when i was going on exchanges. so im wearing some of elder jones' pants, shoes and a huge ghetto coat that i found in the pad. the pictures i sent are some delicioiuds food items that i made this week including the worlds most perfect steak and a hotdog wrapped in ham and then wrapped in bacon. yes it was pure genius if i say so my self.

anyway i have to go but thanks everyone for the chrismas gifts and ill call next week some time around 3-5 ny time. sorry if thats really vague and i cant remember when church is for you guys so yeah have your cell on if you are....

so yeah thanks everyone and have a great week and i cant wait to call on sunday around 3-5!!!!

-elder johnson

Grand Central Station

Jan. 1, 2012

hey everyone its your favorite elder again. this week was very interesting. first off transfers are tomorrow and so elder jones my trainer and my companion for about 4 months now will finally leave me. im getting a companion by the name of elder stori and apparently hes a thug but a gentle giant. he sounds super cool and i think he'll fit right into midwood. so a lot of time this last week was put towards preparing for elder jones leaving. not only that but elder jones has been sick so our schedule has been a little different to accomidate for that. im glad he actually recognizes that he needs to rest cause other elders (and sisters) dont see that they need to stop so they keep going and eventually it all comes crashing down on them. when i was in the mission home for the first day here there was a sister there who was resting cause she did that exact same thing. sister moreno diez in our district as well was almost sedated cause she refused to not go out and work.

this week for church a lot of people came that usually didnt. edward came and is still proparing to be baptized but his baptisimal date will probably be pushed back because the bishop is really concerned about his mental state. as far as the zone leaders saw he understands all the docterines and principles about the gospel but we are all having second thoughts. we all noticced that there just is somthing that isnt right about him. dont get me wrong he is super nice and understands the gospel to its fullest but he may be interested in the gospel for one wrong reason or another.

another haitian investigator also came and his nam ei s deu duguy. we have been meeting with him for about 3 weeks now and im glad that finally someone came to church. we couldnt meet with our other haitian investigator alex prophet because of the holidays so hopefully we can get in this next week. good news too we FINALLY got into this one building that we have been trying to contact a referral and we were finally let in and we left our number with lamartine's room mate and he called us!!! so now we have an appointment this next week with him yay!!

hopefully elder stori will have some patience with the creole program cause i know it will rock his world to be in a lesson where you understand nothing. its ok though cuase the language of the spirit is still present and that is all that we need to be there. so today we took a little detour to manhattan to see the statue of liberty. usually we are not allowed to go to manhattan but we are allowed to see the statue. so we took a ferry that went by it but the line to go on the island was SUPER long so we will go another time.

thanks for the pictures mom, your quilts look awesome. all the elders that see the one you made me are jealous that thier blanket doenst glow in the dark haha. also sophie and emma look just like new yorkers with those ridiculous hats on and i hope they keep you warm :).

well so yeah besides that ill put some pictures of manhattan on this email and a REAL new york pizza that we had at our new years eve party with the very generous sister terry ann williams.

every one have a great week and try to stay warm (i bet its like 60 there... google just confirmed its 50 there.... not as warm as the balming 30 degrees it was this morning, dont worry though im plentty warm)

-elder johnson-

p.s. they say the snow is comming :(

Dec. 26, 2011

hey everyone i know i just talked to you guys but i thought ide talk more about the last week in my life. so yeah yesterday and the day before where just awesome cause of all the christmas festivaties. yesterday the whole mission went to the mission office in queens and we had a christmas devotional and everyone and thier zones sang for the whole mission. our zone leader and the spanish district leader both had really great solos that ended the night in a very special spirit that i will never forget. during the conference we went and ate lunch provided by the mission in the gym and then we all got to see the christmas slide show and all got to sit on santas lap (photo attached) also we went to grand central station which is another picture and the last is elder jones with his new hair cut that makes him look like will smith.

this last week was really shot cause friday we did weekly planning, saturday was the conferance, and yesterday was christmas. i did go on exchanges with elder meyers who i this awsome elder from st. george utah and is going home in like 2 months which is scary. alot of the elders in my zone that i have worked with are going home soon which is scary cause they are really great leaders to us and have been a really greay help to us in this work.

like i said in my phone call home we are getting ready for edward to be baptized on the first of january and we are all hoping that he sticks with it. he siad one of his reasons for joining the church was to get married and he asked if this was a good reason to be pursuing baptism. we then went through the baptisimal questions and found that he understood what it really ment to be baptized and that he was ready to take upon him the name of christ. this is pretty exciting cause the sisters have been working with him for a good 3 transfers now and finally he is ready.

other than that we are working hard with jean mosias but he still says that he doesnt feel ready to become baptized and we found out that he really dosnt remember alot about what we have been talking about which im sure is due to the fact that he juked us for about 2 weeks. i called his dad and asked him about being baptized and it seemed like his father really didnt care or just was not very concerned for the salvation of his son. either way i think thier lives would be very different if they had a parental figure in thier lives. once again when we visited there was a thug looking guy sitting on the couch (there is a different one every time) and he was introduced as brad's friend which is jeans brother.

so yeah this week ive been able to see how much these peoples lives differ than mine and how blessed i am to be raised in a stable home with a stable family and where everything dosnt revolve around money.

christmas here was very different as i saw some people just treat the day as a normal day. people also used the term happy holidays which kinda bugged me cause i felt like it just made the special occasion seem less as important as it really is. and it really didnt help with all the grumpy jewish people that get surprisingly REALLY offended if you say merry christmas to them. so yeah also all the missionaries in our ward sang in sacrament and elder jones and i were treated to a traditional christmas breakfast called "pepper pot and bread" which is ox tail that is really seasoned well and cooked with burt sugar and served with bread. it was a very different christmas for me but ended really good with a call home and then visiting tery williams' house for dinner.

thanks to everyone for the gifts and ill try to get some thankyous sent in the mail... but idk if i can promise anything.

have a great week everyone and a a happy new year!!!!!!!!

-elder johnson

December 12, 2011 email is like half working

so yeah the library has yet to update the internet browsers on thier computers so my email is like half working so sry if this email dosnt get through. so yeah this weekkkkk.... once again not a lot really happened cause we are just tracting every day now (we renamed it "looking up" but its the same deal) so each day we selected a zone in our area and went to a less active members house, former investigator, or a potential investigators house and knocked, then we do 2 doors to the right and left then do 5 across the street and move onto the next adress.

So its been very interesting this week to see who has been accepting to us and who has not. The sisters gave us one of their investigators cause he had some complications with the ward that he is currently attending and the president didnt want the sisters mixed up in the mess and so now we have him. his name is edward and he has a very interesting point of view in life. he has the mindset that everyone has malicious intentions against him and we are trying to figure out how to soften this mans heart so he can let the gospel in. hes not very trusting either which makes me even wonder why he even lets us teach him. like i said a very interesting guy.

we had the ward christmas talent show and elder kiniknini and meyers sang with elder jones and i and we sang angels we have heard on high.

it was really good for how last minute it was and that we only practiced once (lol) but it was a really good party.

last week we also had an oportunity to meet with jamarie who elder jones baptized and i taught a lot. he is having some troubles geting rid of his old life style and way of thinking that he had back in trinidad and starting to learn to become self reliant. we had a lesson on motivation and was very different than any other lesson that i have ever taught before simply cause it had more to do with temporal life than spiritual life. he is awesome and it has been really good for both of us that we have been able to teach him.

jamarie is in a interesting circumsatnce in that his neighbors below him are members (the fackrells who are a really strong family) and above him is his step sister and her family who are starting to come back to church. it is a cool mini culture of mormons in this one building. it also makes it really easy to have lessons cause we just go from one house to the next and we can help them all with something in their lives.

so yeah im out of time but im looking forward to christmas and being able to talk with all of you. mom i think you guys said that you wanted to have a conference call with grandma? can you send me some more info on that??

thanks to everyone for the letters and support. have a great week!!!

-elder johnson-

Dec. 5, 2011

Hey everyone

well this email might be a little short and sorry if i wont be responding to everyones emails this week cause today was a little hecktic. we are having a food cook off this pday with the rest of the zone. i attempted to make cinamon rolls which turned out fine until i let them rise overnight which ended up having them fall and then they were bricks... :( so yeah kinda sad....

but yeah this week has come and gone and elder jones and i are still having some trouble finding investigators to work with. we found another family this week to work with to get them to come back to church and thier name is the rowley family. we are trying to get some of the members involed too which is the main focus of our senior couple as well. we are trying to revive the home teaching program here cause less than 10% of the members do it each month.

the metelus family are doing great and have started to come back on a consistant basis and i think that they will be getting callings soon :) also we are going to visit them tonight and im totally going to give a lesson with a rubiks cube. you would be suprised on how much a like it is compared to faith.

that nasty stomach pain that i had a couple of weeks ago had just magically stopped one day which is like i said REALLY WIERD cause nothing has hurt like that more in my life. i really dont think it was acid reflux or heart burn cause now i can eat anything i want now. when it was hurting i couldnt even swallow my own spit. it was really bad but i will be enjoying all the baked goods that the zone made today.

i did get the package with all the christmas decorations in it and elder jones and i are having a jolly ol time feeling the spirit of christmas. there really isnt much more happening other than the fact that it has been kinda a sad week of being rejected. it is more sad to see that peoples hearts have changed about the chruch and how i know of the blessings that can come to them if they just listen.

also the christmas devotional was BOMB yesterday. if you didnt get to watch it look it up so you can see what im talking about. also there is a new church production out of the life of christ and it looks really well put together. again im sorry for how short this is but everyone has started eating :O

thanks alot and ill try to keep you up to date with everything. thanks!!!!!!

-Elder Johnson-

Nov. 28, 2011

well im not going to lie but i want to rip my stomach out of me. two weeks ago i got a pain in my chest every time i ate and i called the mission nurse who said she cant do anything about it unless the pain lasts for more than a week. well here i am two weeks later and it has started up again and its starting to affect my sleep now. this time around its been hurting for 5 days now and we suspect that its anything from a stomach ulcer to heartburn to indegestion. ive been taking ibeprophan and pepto bismal but then switched to pepto and tylonol. now would be the time to laugh at my rancid spelling hhahaha. but yeah thats the main thing that we have been dealing with cause its killing me to eat and it happened RIGHT after thanskgiving so i think it could be linked to that.... w/e it will end this week

ANYWAY....... the work is....slow. we have been in a rebuilding stage ever since i was companions with elder jones (again) and so last week we gave our investigators one last try but once again none showed up to church even though Marie Nicholas said she was coming and so we have made the unfortunate decision to drop everyone and start anew.

last week we met with the senior couple with the name of the Rhoners and we found out that there is a TON of less active work to do so im glad for the people that we are able to meet with in the ward and help them stay active and for the less actives that actually let us in thier homes. one family in particular is super awesome. the dad is named clark and the mom is evan and they are working on coming back and we are having fhe with them today. they came for the past two weeks and i think they are making it a good habit.

we are keeping one investigator who is named jean mosiahs and we met with him yesterday and he is progressing and coming to church with his brother. we are hoping that his brother remains a positive influence on him cause he has mixed himself up with the wrong crowd it seems like. this "crowd" was over there last night and they were absolutely stunned that a white boy could speak Creole. i asked them "havent you ever seen a white haitian" and they were like no...... ahahah this week i was called "hatian" by one the members named Fre Dolci who i met the first day here and he is super cool and loves it when i speak creole with him.

thanksgiving was great. first we went with some other elders from staton island to play football by prospect park and it was super fun!! after that we realized that we were really sore and that we would be hurting the next day haha and it did...really bad. but that only effected us for like 1 day which was really funny durring our weekly planning. after football we went to sister clarks house who is the primary president and ate...a ton... which i found out later probably triggered this nasty pain that i have in my chest... but it was some really good cookin thats for sure.

a lot of people that were at the dinner were haitian but they didnt speak any creole at all!! that was wierd and also the fact that some one pointed out that i was the only white guy there but i was more haitian than others lol. there also were some interesting black jokes that definately suprised me but im not going to go into that.....hehe...

anyway not much else has happened with elder jones and i. we are trying really hard to find some one to teach but the people we talk to arent very interested. we are branching out this week and trying some new things and goals. ill tell you how they go next week. but yeah the only people we are REALLY working with are jean mosiahs, a lady named nicole thomas who we see like once a week, and clark and evans family.

i hope that everyone enjoys my pictures and i send my card home so there should be tons more coming. thanks a lot and have a great week everyone :) 

-Elder Johnson-

Nov. 21, 2011

Well howdy yall,

this week has been another exciting week in the life of this missionary. the main event of the week was the ward thanksgiving dinner that we had on saturday. it was the most participation that ive seen out of the ward and it turned out great for everyone that came. this week we saw a new family that is less active and that said that they wanted us to come back. they are clarke and evan. evan is the daughter of sister brewster and jamarie is the step son of sister brewster as well. if thats not confusing enough they live right next to each other and a new family named fakrell just moved into the floor below thiers. its super cool that all these lds families live in the same building and that it makes visiting everyone easier.

we also went all the way out to canarsie this week and saw a less active lady who saw the missionaries in manhattan and wanted them to visit her home. canarsie is a good hour away for us on bus and is on the edge of our area. so we have visited her at least two other times that she said was ok and she was busy those times so we were about to drop her if she wasnt there this last time. it was pretty cool though to see how open she was to coming back to church. super cool lady and her family arent members either so we are going to try to work with them next transfer.

I want to explain the pictures that im sending cause i just realized that i dont take a lot of pictures when we are out about in the week but usually on pday so im making a goal this next transfer to take pictures of our investigators and the ward members. the eplanations are as follows:

1) there is a sale at mcdonalds for 2 bigmacs for $5 so of course we had to get 4 of em.

2) we played zombies again in the parkslope building (stake center) and a member let us barrow some sweet nerf guns >:)

3) and the third one is us eating some classic new york chinese takeout. mmm

there is also some more big news in the new york newyork south mission:

elder campbell is going to the outskirts of long island to open up a new creole area

yeah pretty crazy i know right? so my next companion will most likely be just elder jones alone. sorry no crazy quartet companionship or a trio. just elder jones ahah. also im officially done training so im not a trainee anymore. just a junior companion. elder jones and i decided that this area really needs a baptism and that we have set a goal to get 2 baptisms. elder jones also told me that he wants to create a language study plan so he can start learning creole really well. also he said that if we get risk (or borrow it from the zone leaders) he would play with me one day (yesssssssss). he didnt believe me that i once played with my 6 year old sister and that she beat me one time....actually steam rolled me. grats emma

anyway im running out of time for this week. also i might be sending home a list of some chirstmas gift ideas. nothing serious but just some silly stuff (like sending my texas flag which is not so silly btw) so yeah everyone have a great week and hopefully we wil stop by a post office this week so i can send my card for REAL....

until next time my friends,

-Elder Johnson-