My First Week in
Tahiti
Well, not really
Tahiti I was only there for a few days. For my First Zone I was assigned to Uturoa,
Raiatea. (I’m using a member’s compûter so I can’t take too much time). I want
to write about; my first week here so I will summarize arrival. We flew in and stayed
in temple housing then flew out on Wednesday, my companion elder Chailloux was
with me as well. He is the district leader here, and he is from Bora Bora and
doesn’t speak a lick of English, needless to say it’s been fun. We arrived at
our house and there were mosquitoes everywhere! We live near the airport but on
a road that takes out away from, the coast. Luckily, we found the source of the
mosquitoes and took care of it, the previous elders had left a big thing of
standing water Under the sink. Mosquitoes here aren’t like mosquitoes at home,
after a few swats they give up and fly away!
if you want to know
how I am feeling right now, Watch the other side of heaven when he gets off the
boat and introduces himself to the "branch president" that face is
how I’m doing. Who knew French could not sound like French? I mostly follow Elder
C. around on my bike and smile and bear my testimony. Well... maybe its not
that bad, I can understand probably 20% or less of what is being said to me. I
swear they only use half of the entire word to speak. I can’t understand the
bishop for the life of me. Imagine the godfather, but with two more ping pong
balls in his cheeks- and then put it in French/Tahitian and your getting there.
We already had a
baptism for an investigator named Bruno. Names are sooo hard to get in a
conversation. They are all sorts of American/French/Tahitian combinations, and
everyone says their names so fast I cant ever catch them!
I have a few names
memorized but it is still hard!
We have mostly done
lots of porte à porte (door to door). This involves biking up to someone's
house yelling “iaorana”, and waiting to see if they come out. Then I introduce
us, answer the obligatory where are you from and Elder Chailloux saves me
before I get into trouble! We actually find a decent amount of investigators
this way, probably because they are so confused as to why I speak Tahitian. We
tracted into this ancient Tahitian man the other day, whose shirt only went
down to the top of his belly, and he had a cloud of mosquitoes around him. We
talked a while, gave an overview of the restoration, listened to him speak and
then he agreed to let us come back. (didn’t find this out till after we had
finished).
There’s lots of wind
here, so it’s never too hot, and I am always comfortable at night, due to the
fan, and a thin blanket that protects me from the nono's (mosquitoes). I
actually don’t have very many bites, probably due to my frequent and fervent
prayers.
So lots of biking,
lots of swatting, and lots of trying to figure out what’s going on. Ward council
meeting was extra tedious, but it gave me lots of good practice with listening.
There are chickens
everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE! Right now there are two roosters having a
territory war over our yard, accompanied by their gang of hens. They are crazy;
I go and yell at them to be quiet as well as Elder C. a lot.
The people’s houses
are really cool. Pretty much everything is open, but the insides are tiled and
kept really clean. People in the US would probably think its 3rd world living standards
but that’s how you build houses here. Once you go inside, you see appliances
like TV’s, game systems and nice furniture. So it’s rather odd. Some houses are
nicer than others though. There are still some that are living at about 3rd
world level.
We have meals called
faatamaaraa's with members everynight. Last night I was feeling rather overwhelmed;
as we biked to our diner appointment - I was almost dreading it. But it was
with this wonderfully kind Mami (what you call all old Tahitian women). She
talked nice and slow for me, corrected me French/Tahitian, and made sure I knew
what was being discussed. I told her I felt a little trapped in my own head.
She responded with "well of course, it’s not easy to learn 2 new
languages, but you will, it just takes time" I love how Heavenly Father
knows exactly what we need when we need it. That dinner appointment left me
feeling a lot better.
Well that’s about all
I have time for. Things are going well. Couldn’t be happier!
Elder Molinari
