Week 94: Meeting with Chhaya, mingling with members

Some notes from questions answered:
My branch has about 400 members in the directory and about 60 people come to church.  There are 6 people in one apartment. The new area is about 6 miles away from the one I just left, but by auto it will take me 35 minutes to get there.

My mission has been a roller coaster. I have learned so many things that will help me be active when I go home.

Hi,

This past week was good. We received a great referral from Elder Basil and Elder Drummond. Her name is Chhaya and she came to church yesterday. During 2nd hour she even bore her testimony and said that she wanted to be a member in our church. We have an appointment to teach her tomorrow at 4PM. The Ray family was unable to make it to church. That was a bit of a downer.

Last Saturday the Tamongs took us out to eat and we discussed how we can bridge the gap between missionaries and members. It was a really good discussion. Something that they brought up is that we as missionaries can do a better job with mingling with members. That's something that I will try to do a better job of.

Tomorrow is our missionary broadcast and the entire mission will be gathering for that. I hear that there are some changes that will happen.

I'm healthy and I'm doing well. I miss you ALL!

Elder Dusara

Elder Challa is the new companion

McD's with elder Basil

Week 93: Transferred to Lajpat Nagar, sad farewell to the 3rd branch

Hey Everyone,

The church is in a place called Lajpat Nagar. There's tons of places to go souvenir shopping out here. My apartment is way nice.

I was incredibly sad to find out that I was being transferred out of 3rd branch. I don't think I've ever cried so much in my entire life. I'm going to miss my district mates. Then of course I'll miss the awesome members. This was my favorite branch to serve in. I am now serving in 1st branch.

In my first few days we are struggling because there was some issue with our phone bill not being paid, so we can't make any outgoing calls to anyone but missionaries. We still were able to have three investigators attend church. I still don't know a whole lot about the branch but I'm excited to help out where I can. Also Elder Kadali sent us a nice list of potential investigators from back when he was serving here.There is a lot of work here to be done in re-activation of members.

Last week as a district we had one last hurrah with going to KFC together. Then I treated everyone to Johnny Rockets shakes!

Elder Dusara

Week 92: Visit to the Taj Mahal, room flooded...

Hello,

Last week Ashita was able to confirmed. She was so happy. She even made us a little scrapbook with pictures from her baptism, along with some notes. Her parents also said that they wanted us to teach them as well. We also were able to set Peter on a baptismal date for next month. 

Last Monday I forgot to share that my room flooded. The drain for the washing machine was clogged so all that run off water just flowed into my bedroom and then into our family room. My scriptures got soaked along with my hamper and my backpack. Our family room looked like someone just dumped a couple buckets of water on the floor. I guess it made it a little bit easier to mop lol. 

Okay so traveling to the Taj Mahal was a pain. Our trains left late and they took 3 hours to get there  instead of 2. We went to Agra fort first and took a ton of photos. We all got two cabs to drive us around for the day. We had a really nice lunch at an Indian restaurant. When we went to the Taj Mahal I tried to pass as a Native Indian because the price is 40 rupees (75 Cents) and the foreigner fee is 1000 rupees ($16). When I got to the front of the line they asked me to show my ID. I hid my Washington State drivers license in my pocket and showed them my registration to live here in India. After about 15 minutes of confusion they finally let me in by paying the native Indian price. The Taj Mahal was way cool! We all took photos for an hour before actually going into the Taj. It was definitely an experience that I will never forget, especially since it's one of the 7 wonders of the 

world. Coming home stunk. Our train was one hour late. We didn't reach Delhi until about 11PM. Then we tried to get cabs to pick us up but none of them could find us. So I didn't step into my apartment until about 12:45 AM. That's for sure the latest night that I've had in a long time.

Transfers are this week. Hopefully I will stay here for the rest of my mission.

Elder Dusara

Week 91: Ashita's baptism...visit to Akshardam temple

Hello,

Yesterday was a great day for Ashita David. The water was incredibly cold. She was not a fan of that. It took us two tries to baptize her because her hair was floating above the water during the first try. Afterward we went to her house and her mom said that she wanted to be baptized in March or April. We will try to work on that. Brother Peter comes back into town this week so we can go back to teaching him as well. We've been trying to bring Sahil and Simren out with us to lessons so they can gain more experience. Simren is leaving on her mission next month and Sahil is still waiting on getting his mission call.

Last Friday we visited a temple called Akshardam. It was a massive structure. It looked like a building that was a couple hundred years old but it was only about 12 years old. The entire temple ground was clean and nice. It's very rare to see something like that. There was also a light show and it was awesome. It talked about how its more important to find true happiness than to be prideful.

Also our zone got together for a zone activity. We all played soccer. It was great. I cut my hand while moving some rocks around to clean up space. Then while playing I fell over the ball and scraped a hole in my compression pants. After playing on these dirt pot hole fields I've very grateful to have nice turf and green grass to play on at home.


Go Seahawks,
Elder Dusara

Week 89 & 90: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Dear Everyone,

First off I hope that you all had a great Christmas. Mine was a whole lot better than last year! We struggled a little bit numbers wise but we plan to continue to meet with Ashita this week. Then we were finally able to meet an in-active member named Pintu Singh at church for a lesson. It was his first time coming to the church in about 3 years.

For Christmas we had lunch at Elder and sister Adams home. We had sloppy joes, bacon meatballs, pizza bites, salad, deviled eggs, and deep fried Oreos. It was so awesome. Then as a district we played Secret Santa and I got a baby blue kurta. Then we all went to a dinner appointment at a members home.

I told sister Appusamy and sister Gill that I didn't buy them anything for Christmas. But at night I packed up all their gifts and we ding-dong- and ditched the presents on their doorstep. But I also placed my camera on the stairs and I recorded their reaction. It was absolutely priceless. I packed scarves, chocolates, cereal, and some notes for them.

I love Christmas!


Happy New Year
Elder Dusara

Happy New Year,

Last week was great! We started teaching three new people from English Class. Their names are Vicky, Nahesh, and Savon. Their ages range from 18-21. We are excited to see what happens with them. Ashita and her mom came to church yesterday. Peter Paul FINALLY came! We started teaching him about 6 weeks ago. Then Raja also came. Ashita's interview was supposed to be yesterday but the ZL's forgot, so it got re-scheduled for today at 3PM. Everything is filled out and ready to go for her.

On new years eve we had to be in our apartment at 6PM. Just for our safety. So I went to Dunkin Donuts and bought a dozen donuts for my district. Also for lunch Elder Moffat became The Real MVP and spotted our apartment lunch at Chillis. The food was delicious.

This week we are excited for Ashitas baptism this Sunday.  We are also visiting a big Hindu Temple on Friday so I'll upload photos next week. I hope everyone is making new years resolutions. Here's some of mine.

1) Get Back Into school
2) Find A Good Part-Time Job
3) Start Dating

Elder Dusara