It’s transfer week again—comes around every six weeks. This transfer hits Elder Thompson and I hard because they are moving the missionaries that have been in the office complex for five to six months to different smaller islands. These Elders have been so much fun. There is Elder Olsen from St George. (He's not related to us!) He is the ultimate AP (Assistant to the President).
Elder Olsen is on the left and Elder Jones is on the right.
He’s tough, fair, great on computers, and can mastermind transfers with ease…and he role-plays everything he tells you. So whenever you talk to him, you get to watch a performance…and he is hilarious.
Then there is Elder Jones from California.
He is Mr. All American football player—confident, cute, and cocky. (There are Tongan fathers that are trying to convince him to marry their daughters.) He actually had a scholarship with the University of Utah to play football. But when he pulled out his shoulder, he lost his scholarships, and then he decided to go a mission. He has a habit of saying, “Follow the rules or I’ll kick you in the face!” It’s not the most loving approach, but the missionaries seem to respect him. He loves to talk.
Elder Hikila is leaving too.
He is from Nuku’alofa. He ended up here in the office because of problems he had with his companion on Nomuka. The Elders were helping the ward members get things ready for a ward dinner. At least Hikila was helping, but his companion decided to visit one of the cute girls in the neighborhood. The companion got suspended for a while. (I don’t think they do that in other missions—send missionaries home for a period of time, then bring them back to the same mission.) Hikila is quiet, a hard worker, and all smiles.
Elder Karratti has only been in the office for a little over a week. He is the first elder on the left.
Four of the Tongan Elders on Ha’apai decided to go partying. They didn’t think Elder Karratti, an American, would realize that they were making their own home-made brew of kava which is a traditional drink of Tonga. Kava is a depressant. Some men will drink kava all night with their buddies, then sleep all day. (You cannot drink kava and go to the temple.) These four missionaries had made many other choices that were contrary to Mission Rules, and they were sent home. Karratti is just here until transfers.
Needless to say, we have been surrounded by action. We think the office is going to be way quiet when the four office elders are gone. But they are all excellent missionaries, and they need to be leaders out in the field. Three of them have been assigned to be Zone Leaders, and Elder Karratti will be a senior companion and a District Leader.
Sister Leha’uli is retiring her missionary pin so we’ll be missing her too.
She has been one of our “presiding angel” missionaries. We have taken her and a companion on many exchanges. To make some those exchanges easier for Elder Thompson and myself, we have taken her to the temple several times and even to our seniors’ Family Home Evening a time or two. This allowed us not to back-track around the island so much as we did the missionary exchanges.
We compared Sister Leha’uli with the mechanical woman at the old Fun House at Lagoon. Anybody remember the Laughing Lady? She would start giggling, then chuckling, then laughing, then laughing hysterically. She would make everyone laugh just watching her. That’s the same as our cute Sister. She is always so happy and full of smiles. Whenever we would go to pick the Sisters up, Sister Leha’uli would say, “Sister Thompson, did you miss me?” And then she would proceed to tell us she had been sick. “Sick for one minute!” She had a lot of those one minute sicknesses.
Well, it’s going to be interesting to meet the next set of missionaries. One thing we can always count on is CHANGE. We don’t want things to get boring here! We love the work! ‘Ofa ‘atu, John and Diane
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