Feb 29

Hey everyone! A quick update this week, we had a really cool

experience with one of our investigators, sister 'D.' We FINALLY got

to sit with her husband, and talked to them both a lot about families

and committed them to get married! They said they would pray about it

and when we came back the next time, they actually had! They said that

they wanted to get married and I was freaking out! They want to meet

the person from our church who has the license in suriname to marry

people but they said after they meet him they want to set up a date!

it's so close and I couldn't be more excited for them. I hope you all

have a great week!

Elder Carpenter

this is a picture i took this week of one of the roads here in
suriname, hahah when you look at this it's almost a wonder i've only
popped 1 tire so far

Feb 22 the Polar Express

Hello everyone! The baptism of 'FD' went through this week
which we were happy about, his older brother 'R,' who is also
preparing for a mission, was able to baptize him and I could tell it
was a really good experience for their whole family. We also held a
contacting activity in Lelydorp, with just the south zone only, and
set up a free lemonade stand! We gave out about 10.5 liters of
lemonade and a whole box full of book of mormons so I'd say it was a
pretty good success! Today for our Pday activity I drove the white van
now nicknamed "The Polar Express" with almost all the missionaries in
Suriname to a place called Overbrug, where we've been once before a
long time ago. It was a great time and the view there is sweet! We
played a lot of volleyball and had lunch up there and it was a great
day. In other news the polar express also got a flat tire a few days
ago and I'm happy to report I replaced it with minimum casualties,
thanks mostly to a wonderfully detailed owner's manual. we met a new
investigator who teaches us srnan tongo as well and so with any luck i
can be a trilingual missionary upon return home! Hahah although there
is no possible way I will ever be able to use this jungle language
again its still cool to have. That's about it but Mi lobi Yu en Mi si
yu backa :)
Elder Carpenter

Feb 15 Alligator!

HELLO FAMILY!! I'm happy to report that my companion, Elder Van Den

Herik, has made a full recovery! Things are finally back to normal

with us and I'm very happy about it. This upcoming week one of sister

'D's' sons will be baptized, unfortunately sister 'D' is still

unmarried and can't be baptized yet but she is an extremely converted

woman. It's really just her uninterested husband who is holding her

back these days. On exchanges this week we got some good contacting in

and met a sweet guy named Leroy. He was blasting music in his house

and I thought there was no way it was going to work out, but sure

enough he walks right out and lets us in before we even introduced

ourselves! hahah he was also excited to take a Book of Mormon and so

I'm really excited about him and if he progresses. Our branch

presidency here in wanica just got switched around, and two people in

our area just got the melchizidek priesthood! This area is really

growing and I feel really proud of the work we've been able to

accomplish here the past little while especially with the members.

They all have very good scripture study habits and I can see that

making a big difference in the branch and the enthusiasm they have to

do missionary work. Last side note: Totally saw a wild Alligator

today! Hahah it was at least 3 feet long, pretty freaky! I hope you

all had a great Valentine's Day!

Elder Carpenter

The alligator in its natural habitat!

Service in the branch

The crazy bat from last weeks email. 

Feb 9 Happy Chinese New Year....year of the bat? :0

Another week come and gone, we had zone conference just a couple days

ago and it was really cool. President Egbert talked about the

atonement and had some really good insights. He broke the Atonement

down into 7 points, every point being something different that the

Atonement can do. I don't remember all 7 off the top of my head but a

couple were forgiveness of sins, healing infirmities, resisting satan,

and etc. We also had district conference this week, (The normal

equivalent of stake conference) A funny story is that during district

conference, a bat flew into the chapel! Hahah it was pretty crazy, it

flew around for a few minutes until it got clipped by a ceiling fan!

In other news my companion Elder Van Den Herik has been pretty sick

recently. He had to get an MRI of his stomach to see what was wrong.

Hoping that he makes a speedy recovery this week. I'm getting used to

driving the humongous white van around, no incidents or fatalities to

report yet thank goodness. Unfortunately I don't have a lot of time

this week but I hope you all have a great week! 

Lobi!

Elder Carpenter

Ps. all the internet places were closed

yesterday due to chinese new year's. and right now is the earliest i

could get on since this is the only working cyber cafe for 8

missionaries to go to and i had to drive everyone. hahah its been a

super hectic day

Regarding the bat:

It was actually dark outside because it was a leadership session of

district conference. and I actually saw it again later because the

next day we played sports by the church! It was still crawling around

outside the church parking lot the next day! It's wing was distorted

so it couldn't fly very far it was crazy

Feb 1 Dirt road to somewhere

Hello Everyone!

It's the week before zone conference here, we are expecting president

and sister egbert on February 5th for zone and district conference so

at the moment we're getting everything ready for that. We have a

baptismal date set this week for one of Sister 'D's' sons

so that's pretty cool, other than that we also got a new member in our

area, his name is Brother 'Z' and he lives all the way in Domburg.

A place that's about an hour bike ride away! We've decided we might

try to go up there once a week and contact to get some more

investigators in the area, hence making the trip a little more

worthwhile. But I'm excited to see brother z, he actually used to

be someone I taught in my old area, Paramaribo south, until he had a

sudden issue and disappeared from the church for awhile. Needless to

say it's cool that I'll get a second chance to teach him and hopefully

help resolve whatever concerns he has so he can come back to church.

Something cool that happened this week was probably when we were

trying to follow up with a referral we got, after an hour of biking we

finally realized we were pretty lost and were about to give up on

finding the person when suddenly, a huge, 4000kg truck pulls over on

the side of the road and starts waving to us! Turns out, the driver,

was someone that I used to teach named Brother 'An!' Hahah and upon

speaking I asked him if he had any knowledge of the road we were

looking for, and sure enough, he pointed us to the right way, a tiny

dirt road I never would have thought of trying if he hadn't told me,

and so in my eyes it was pretty much a miracle! Anyways, I hope that

everyone is well and that you all have a great week!

Elder Carpenter

THE obscure dirt road that they thought led to nowhere

In Domburg