August 24

Life for us this week was really good we didn't have a lot of lessons this week but we were able to do a lot of finding and to set up some good stuff for the coming week, but man did we get wet. It has rained for at least 2 hours every day since Monday but we have been lucky to stay out of most of the worst stuff. We were in the worst storm that was on Sunday night and it was thunder and lightning but it was really far away, it was cool and weird the water was cold but the weather was really warm. It reminded me of the rain that we get back home, down pour then nothing but it was cool, we did get in with a guy to tell him about the church and all he wanted to do was bash with us so we went back out into the rain haha.

On Tuesday we went out to Usk, a part of our area that i am not sure missionaries have been to in over a year and it was quite a trek to get out there but fun. I was just praying that I didn't get a flat tire on the way out there. We planned we would go out there and then the next day it was raining and we were thinking maybe not, then we just went for it and it was fun but really wet, I found out what other missionaries were saying that after about a year a water proof jacket isn't very water proof any more. It's like they design them to fail after a year because the one I have was soaked through. Luckily a had another jacket with me one that another missionary left behind and that saved me but man were we wet. but we got to see some ponies on the side of the road and we fed them apples.

We also got mistaken as police twice this week once when we went to knock on a door and they opened it and asked why we were there what had  they done and we said we are the missionaries and they were like no thanks, another we went up to this old man and he asked are you out on patrol and then he realized we weren't police officers. He was nice but not interested.
Things in the way of investigators should be pretty good this week. Love you guys I cant think of anything else to say right now. I am doing good, I love my mission and I love you guys so much and thanks for all your love and support.
Elder Poll

August 31

This week has been one of those week that you work hard and everything looks good and then no one shows up to anything really, Our zone conference was actually a zone meeting but with president. (zone meeting is usually just the zone with the zone leaders doing the teaching that they heard from president in there meeting) (zone conference is with two or three zones together and president gives the training himself) This was kind of in between, it was good but I was really hoping for zone conference.They are more fun and also more spiritual, but what was cool was they opened it up at the end of the meeting for testimonies. I just felt I had to share mine and I don't really remember what I said but it had to do something along the lines of missions are hard but rewarding. When I said bore my testimony E didn't realize how many new missionaries were there. We had about 6 missionaries that had been out less that 4 weeks. All of them said that it helped them so I guess that was cool this week. I'm glad I made a difference for them because the rest of our week was a bit of a bust. Almost all of our lessons canceled or didn't show up. We did get the chance to do a lot of service this week and that was nice. It is good to finish a day and be physically as tired as you are mentally.  I am almost always tired mentally but physically not as much any more because my body has adjusted to missionary life and biking a lot. That was the big thing in this area that I had to adjust to. Now I have pretty much adjusted and now I just don't get as tired.

Something I learned this week is elder D is really good at making things look perfect. We were laying some stones for a base for a shed this week and they got us a level but elder D hardly needed it he would just scrape the ground flat and pat it and stuff then he would lay the block and it would just be level it was cool and crazy.
Well that's all for this week.
Love you guys.
Elder Poll

No Flat Tires this Week

Things here have been good and interesting at the same time. The work has been going better and the flat tire thing thank heavens is doing better. I haven't had one all week... (cross your fingers it stays like that). I didn't realize why I was getting so many. There is broken glass all over the roads here and I didn't really realize that till I got really vigilant after many flat tires. its EVERYWHERE!!! So I have been really careful the last week. and I was extra careful yesterday because we went on a long bike ride to the edge of our area. If I had gotten a flat then it would have taken me hours to walk back home. It was a 2 hour bike ride so I would guess a 5 hour walk back. Needless to say I was driving miss daisy careful. ( I think that's the right reference anyway not the fast and the furious anyway)

Anyway this week had been good. We were all over. I feel kind of  like a rag doll. We had flat inspection on Tuesday,then we went to Newport to do exchanges On Wednesday we were in Rwibina for zone meeting. The rest of the days we were in Cwmbran except on Saturday and Sunday we were up in the other part of our area. Pontypool in Saturday and Blenavon on Sunday. Pontypool isn't that far away but Blenavon was the 2 hour bike ride there and we did some work there then detoured through some other small towns on the way back stopping by some people. All in all we were on our bikes for probably 4 to 5 hours on Sunday and my muscles feel it. Even the ones I didn't use are still stiff from being on a bike for so long.

Oh we had a fun talk with a lady on Saturday. She told us that every organization is corrupt and that behind all of it is child abuse She basically made the statement that our church was the same. It was weird though because it started out really good, she told us that her brother was a member but that he had died and we thought, or at least I did... golden teach her the plan of salvation and she will be ready. Then it went down hill. She said that her brother was the type to only get involved if he could get some thing out of it and that he probably wasn't truly into it. Then she said that all any church wants to do is control people and take their money and that the money go's to pay for all the crimes they commit or the people at there head commit. We tried to help her seen it a different way but she wouldn't even give us time to speak. Then her husband came out and told us to leave, We thought it probably for the best that we did. We just tried to stay positive and laugh it off, now it is just a funny memory for me. hahaha.

We were able to get lessons with a few of our potentials and that was good, and we committed them to church but none showed up except this one less active, and that went horribly wrong... She got upset within the first few min and left threatening  to burn the church down. She has a child that is really loud and she knows that, but she won't take her out of the meeting when she gets loud and disruptive. One of the members must have mentioned it and she flipped out and was walking out and saying things like I don't even know why we come to church and more. A few of the members that are kind of friends with her had to keep her from coming back in and her telling everyone what she thought of them.  Needless to say we are going to give her some time to cool down.

On a brighter note we also have some really ambitious members and they asked for 6 Book of Mormons and said they were having a challenge with there grand kids in the next ward over so that was cool.  And my recent convert in Worcester wants to go on a mission. He is looking into whether or not he can go because he will turn 26 to early. He is going to see if he can get permission to go anyway.

That's about all for this week. Love you guys.
Elder Poll

More Bike Trouble!!!

So this week we had a good week but I got three flat tires and that was a big bummer and had a bit more bike trouble but I think I got it sorted out now and I realized that patching tires is a pain and is time consuming and difficult with a  racer bike.

 So this week felt like a really good week we were out working hard and the weather was great it was letting us do everything we wanted to be doing with no rain, but when we looked at our numbers it didn't show it.
On the plus side we had a zone conference with Elder Dykes a member of the seventy and he talked to us on Tuesday about how we can be more effective in our efforts and the things that we need to work on. We did a survey about a week before he came and he used the results of the survey to decide what to talk to us about. It was another trip to Riwbina at 7 in the morning, but at least I wasn't still serving in Worcester, they come to the same meeting as us and have to travel a lot further.

How are the missionaries there anyway have you seen them at all lately? After serving in Worcester and the ward mission leader recently returned from serving in Utah I realized how different missionary work in Utah is from where I am.  And I just realized I miss the rain storms in Utah. Here it just rains all the time and the sky just stays dark, like last week i didn't see a blue sky for 4 days but in Utah you can smell the rain coming and then it just hits and hits hard then goes away. Here it just lingers and lingers and lingers some more.

That's about it for the week. Have a great week.
Love Elder Poll

 It's Been a Year!!!

So this Sunday our ward here did the flip flop and now we have sacrament first, it was good I think I made it easier to focus during sacrament. This week had been good. I did it I made it to a year i didn't think this would ever come but it did, and it was fun elder Michelson and I were on exchange that night and we came out together. he is the one that was in my district at the very beginning of my mission that the Johansens know. We burned our white shirts together at our flat because we have a fire pit in our back garden, then we were going to watch meet the Mormons until we had to go to bed but we didn't get the chance because we were in later coming in because we were teaching a lesson but it was still awesome. Most of the rest of this week has been stop by's but not many people were in which was sad. We also got lost in the hills by accident, we thought we would be clever and take a short cut to our next stop by and we saw this path on our map and we took it and it should have intersected with  a rode. We could take that rode to the place we were going, but somehow we had missed the road. All in all a 30 min blunder on our part, but we did talk to a nice lady that gave us directions and we tried to set something up with her but she wasn't having it. We also went to a referrals house this week they were cool but don't want to here the gospel. They claim to be druids and I am not sure what they believe.
We had a good lesson with some less active this week one came to church and the other committed to come next week also an investigator also committed to come so fingers crossed that it all works out. We have a area seventy visiting the mission tomorrow and are excited about that.
Love you guys and will talk to you next week
Elder Poll