Well guess what...they sent me to Taveuni! Things are great here, but before I tell you all about my adventures, I have to tell you how I got here.
We finally left the MTC last Saturday, and it was high time for me to get out of there haha. We landed in Fiji early Monday morning, at like 5:30am. Then we took a 4 hour bus ride from Nadi, where we landed, to Suva where the mission home is. The ride was so beautiful! It's really green here, and there's just TONS of trees and bushes and plants. When we got to the Mission home, we met President and Sister Klingler, the Mission Presidents, and they are AWESOME! That day we did some interviews and orientations with them to kind of know what we are going to do. Then Tuesday we went to the temple. The Fiji Temple is so beautiful! Its on top of a hill, so you can see it as you drive to Suva, and then Tuesday night we had dinner at President's house. OH MAN the food was so good, I think I ate my weight in funeral potatoes and ham that night. Then Wednesday was the day where we found out where we were going to be serving. We had orientation in the morning where President and the APs told us about Fiji and the people and things, so that was good to hear. THEN THEY ASSIGNED ME TO TAVEUNI!!! I feel lucky because it's an area where there haven't been sisters for a really long time, and now they just opened it to sisters. I'm here right now with Sister Aoina, she is my trainer from New Zealand and she is AWESOME! We are assigned to the SomoSomo area, in Taveuni. We stay in Naqara, and the SomoSomo villiage is right next to us.
On Wednesday afternoon, I got in a van with the other missionaries, and we started to drop everyone off at their areas. But my area, is an island, so I had to fly. So on Wednesday night, I stayed in Nasori with some sisters there, and the next morning I had to get on a plane, and, well getting on that plane was difficult because on the ticket it said "Sister Kumar" because they bought the tickets before they knew where everyone was going. So I had to lie...I LIED AS A MISSIONARY....I'm a sinner. The guy at the ticket counter was like "are you sure you're sister Kumar" and I looked at him and said, "yes I'm very sure that I am indeed Sister Kumar." He knew I was lying, but the Lord softened that man's heart and I got on that plane.
Thursday I landed in Labasa, which is where my companion was serving. Thursday night I stayed with her and 2 other sisters, and early Friday morning we woke up, drove an hour and a half to Savusavu with a senior couple, and then another senior couple drove us from Savusavu another hour and a half to the boat that we were going to take, for another hour and a half. So we traveled all day to get to the boat. Oh right I forgot, the ride from Savusavu to the boat was basically the Indiana Jones ride in real life, minus the huge man-eating snake and fire. It was SO BUMPY! Only the first 15 minutes or something was paved, and the rest was under construction, AKA it was dirt and bumpy for like an hour and a half...but still it was beautiful so that was a plus. The boat ride was exciting, it was a little tugboat thing called the Taveuni Princess, and boy was she magical. We rode all the way to Taveuni, and then got off and another senior couple picked us up, The McFaddens. They stay here like 10 miles away from our flat, but we've seen them a few times and they're great!
The rest of Friday, Sister Aoina, my Trainer and I just unpacked a little, we walked through town, which is really really small, but still nice, and then we did our night studies with the light of a candle beacuse guess what the power is off! It's been off a week before we got here, and it's going to be off probably all this week too so that's exciting! We have cold showers, which I actually like because it wakes me up, and yeah candles but we have a little gas stove so we can cook some things! Our flat is nice, it's small but perfect! We live next to a member family, the Fishers, and one of their daughters is preparing to serve a mission in Auckland, New Zealand so we have been taking her and her friend Maria around with us to our appointments.
Saturday was our first real day! We had like 5 appointments, all over town and in the villiages. We walk everywhere, so that's nice because then we can talk to people along the way! We visited a few investigators, and members of the ward so we could get to know lots of people. And Saturday night we had dinner at the Watekini's house, she is this super funny Fijian lady. When we were introducing ourselves, Sister Aoina said she was Samoan, and then I told Sister Watekini I was Samoan too, and she started dying so maybe I'll just keep telling people I'm Samoan and try to lighten the mood since I'm the whitest thing here...there's one other palagi elder in our district, but he's serving in Matei which is far from us, so yeah I'm super white and stick out like no other haha.
Sunday was great! We watched the Broadcast that was a few weeks ago in Provo, and they hadn't seen it so we got to watch that, and then sacrament meeting was nice too. The kids here are so cute, and funny, except I have to have them spell their names for me because I can't pronounce them. Also my Fijian still stinks...but hopefully that changes haha! It will have to in order for me to survive out here! Most everyone speaks Fijian, so that's great! And Sunday after church we went over to a family in the ward for lunch, The Maiwiriwiri's, and that was great.
Anyways, things are great!! Even having no power is fun, as weird as that sounds I still love it! I probly won't be getting letters anytime soon because they all go to Suva, and then we'll get them when someone makes their way out here! But...thanks for the love and support! I miss all of you, and I hope things are going well!
Love,
Sister Trammell
