Monday, November 30, 2015

Nov 30 sick part twee

Oh man what a crazy week, I guess I'll just try to start off on a
positive note and say that i've done it! I've successfully managed to
contract both of Suriname's indigenous jungle viruses. Denghue Fever
struck me pretty hard this week and I've had it since Wednesday
afternoon. The symptoms were flu like for the most part and left me
mostly too tired to leave my bed. Needless to say it was not the BEST
of weeks out here but I survived and I'm recovering quite well at this
point. Today's the first day that I haven't had a headache and so I'm
feeling substantially better. Luckily I got well enough just in time
to go on one of our cooler pday activities today, which was golf!
Hahah we went to Paramaribo's golf club with all the elders from south
zone and had a great time, It was definitely a good turnaround from
such a tough week. I played surprisingly well for not having held a
club in so long. I could still drive all right but the rest of my game
was out of the question. All of the missionaries there had a sweet
time though and the place was beautiful! That's pretty much all that
happened this week due to me being sick :( But fear not I think that
by tomorrow everything will be business as usual again, we had 3
investigators in church which was awesome! Some of them are
progressing really well and I'm hoping that we can put some of them on
date this week. Love you all and have a great week!
Especially my littlest sister Sydney who is turning 13!! Crazy!!
Elder Carpenter





Monday, November 23, 2015

Nov 23 Thanksgiving came early

Hello and happy thanksgiving! So great to hear from all of you and i'm
glad you're all doing so well. This week has definitely marked the
transition into our rainy season. Me and Elder Van Den Herik got
pretty soaked on a few occasions but it's all good. We had a couple
cool lessons this week, a group of priesthood holders went by one of
the less actives, brother 'A', in our area, and we asked if we
could come along. It was a little like a home teaching visit but with
a lot more people because he thought he needed help. The lesson
actually ended up going great and I could tell the visit from so many
members of the ward really touched him and he expressed a desire to
come back. Lo and behold we saw him in church this sunday for the
first time in forever! I was so glad to see the members in our area
working together like that it was a sight to behold. If members did
something like that every week I have no doubt we'd already have a
temple in this country. We are also involved in an ongoing service
project with our district mission leader to help rebuild his house! We
spent time on the roof this week and it was pretty freaky i'm not
going to lie! I'm learning a lot about construction though and house
building so i think it's pretty sweet. Last but not least we
celebrated thanksgiving at the 'S's' today! Every year this family
feeds the missionaries at thanksgiving even though they don't really
celebrate it here but it is the nicest thing of them to do and they
are always so nice to missionaries. Anyways that's about it from this
guy but I hope you all have a fantastic rest of your week!
Elder Carpenter


Monday, November 16, 2015

Nov 16 Meet Alex

Hey guys I don't have a ton of time this week and so i'm going to have
to keep it a little shorter but we had a really good week! One of our
investigators, M, was in church with her less active husband.
We're trying to help them get married so that they can be baptized and
I think we're beginning to make progress with them! Her husband is
actually a returned missionary, but he went a little astray and now
we're trying to help him get back on track. In other news, we met a
new less active named sister 'mal.' It was a funny visit and the
first thing she told us was that she stopped believing because no one
could explain why we have twelve cows in our baptismal fonts at the
temple... hahah we didn't focus on that though we just shared a
message about the book of mormon and told her we would study about the
oxen and give her a good answer next time. Hopefully we can put her
concerns to rest. Last but not least we saw a spider monkey up close!
I held hands with it and everything it was CRAZY. I'll send some
pictures in a second. But yeah I hope you're all doing awesome and
I'll see you all next week!
Elder Carpenter
Elder Carpenter's new friend Alex
Just chillin' with Alex. Like usual. 
South Zone Conference 




Monday, November 9, 2015

Nov 9

 Hey everyone! I can't believe the first week here in wanica went by so
fast! Me and Elder Van Den Herik have been having a pretty good time
blanking this new area. Luckily the sisters here before us were VERY
descriptive in their teaching records and so we were very thankful to
them for that! It's made our transition quite a bit easier. Other than
that things have been pretty laid back, I found out something cool, in
that our area actually goes all the way to Brazil! :O Hahah but we'd
never bike that far it would take literally all day and half of
tomorrow. The farthest south we ever go or would go is zanderij and
thats a couple hours on the bike so we would only go with VERY good
reason. In other news I'm soaked sitting here at the computer place
which I take as a solid sign that our rainy season is underway. Some
missionaries look forward to it but I just think they're crazy.
Getting drenched can be a pretty big downer some days if you're just
not in the mood for it. What was cool though this week was that I got
to know everyone in the ward really well by a giant service project we
did for a retirement home! It was for the International Day of
Service, not sure if that's sponsored by the church or suriname or
what but it was a great time and the project was definitely a success.
They were all super grateful, although I did witness an argument
between two really old people as one lady was telling me to rake the
garden while an old man said that he was planting flowers. Then the
old lady said he was lying and that he's too lazy to rake it himself
and I quietly slipped away as they continued to babble... I certainly
do love old people however they are super sweet and loved talking to
us. In other news tomorrow is zone conference! We are excited about
that and it should be a great time. I love and miss you all and hope
that you have a great week!
Elder Carpenter
He likes his new camera. The best one he has had. And he has had three!
The fun children of one of the families in their area. 
Elder Carpenter's new apartment and the "iron" he pumps nowadays. 
The International Day of Service in Suriname. 



Monday, November 2, 2015

Nov 2 first a puppy, now a kitten

Crazy news! We received our transfer calls a couple days ago, and I'm
moving again! I'll be headed out of Kwatta and head south into the
area Wanica South! Still an established and somewhat organized branch,
but it will be the smallest one I've served in so far at least. Wanica
South shares some borders with the jungle and is one of the furthest
south areas that we have and so I'm pretty excited to check it out.
The craziest thing though, is that I'll be serving AGAIN with Elder
Van Den Herik! Apparently we just can't get enough of each other. I'm
actually very excited though, me and Elder Van Den Herik had an
awesome transfer together a few months ago and I know we're going to
accomplish some great things in this new area together. Wanica south
was actually just turned into a sisters area a few months ago. But due
to a general feeling that the area was unsafe for the sisters there,
we are being sent instead! Missionaries have been there forever, but
ever since the sisters got sent in they had a couple things that made
them nervous about leaving them there, and so they turned my old area,
kwatta, into a new sister area! It's substantially safer and so they
thought it would be better suited for sisters. In other news, me and
Elder James had a cool experience yesterday while we were contacting.
We were driving looking for a place to park the car and the second we
got out to start talking to people, a lady from 3 streets down started
to wave and shout out to us, turns out she is a long time member who
really wanted to get back in contact with missionaries! We were so
excited and felt really blessed to have run into her the way we did.
We could have contacted or parked anywhere, but we were led to someone
who was specifically trying to find us and I know that we were led
there. Besides that we also had a stray kitten walk in our yard and he
may have imprinted on me because he didn't leave for like 3 days, but
he finally left a couple days ago I'm just hoping he's not dead... We
had a puppy given to us last week and a Kitten this week so at this
rate maybe I'll have pictures of a baby parrot or something next week
I have no clue what's going on. But anyways, have a great week and
I'll let you all know how Wanica is!
Elder Carpenter
His kitten
A cellphone company advertisement 
Most of the missionaries in suriname. All but 4 he thinks. (Elder James is hidden in the shadows under the canopy)