February 5, 2014 'Thoughts'

February 5, 2014

Dear Family,

well we're just one week away from and it feels really weird...

it's really hard to be patient because I want february 13 to come tomorrow. at the same time  feel weird because I've been here for 2 years which is a long time and I've gotten used to being here and being a missionary and have tried really hard to not think about returning home throughout my mission and now that I think about it; I can't believe that the time has officially come. I've been gone so long and I feel that I've changed a lot and that things back home have changed a lot too (mostly the people; everyone is bigger now!)  so i don't really know what to expect when i get home. i think I'm going to have more culture shock returning home than when i got here. It'll be weird.

our lives are awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! our family is amazing. is there a lot of snow back home? (please please please say yes) is it cold?

 

what is our church schedule these days? what is the address to our chapel?

 

January 29, 2014 'Almost There'

January 29, 2014

Dear Family,

T-2 weeks!!

p.s. taft I got the letter. thanks a lot.

 

 

there are no problems with staying warm here. I when I get close to getting on the plane it would be nice to have 50-60 dollars just in case of additional fees and random stuff. I know money is tight. if it helps just transfer the money from my savings to my checking account.

 

January 22, 2014 'What to say, what to say?'

January 22, 2014

Dear Family,

Just so that you are all aware Elder Suarez is okay. He hadn't eaten nor slept in 2 days and was really stressed out and depressed due to all the stuff happening with his companion and his body just gave out. He's in Santiago right now talking with Pres. Douglas and having a couple precautionary studies done in the hospital. When I talked to him he said he still wanted to go home so hopefully talking with President today helped.

There comes a point in time when the mission is just the mission and it doesn't seem like there's anything to tell...

The big Dajabon market that I mentioned a couple weeks ago is really just full of all the humanitarian aid-food, clothing, shoes, hygiene supplies, medicine, etc....-that the united states and other countries send to Haiti. Many Haitians take all they can get and sell it back to the same North Americans (me and all other North American missionaries) that send the goods or to the Dominicans. kinda sad.

unfortunately we haven't had the chance to talk with Crisleidy and Camilla or Gladys and Jenifer...they've been busy or out of town. sometimes it seems like right when you get what you think is a golden investigator they let you down...keep on keepin on! gotta help them the best we can.

my comp is very energetic and helps me stay alive and happy. He's really cool. I'm so glad that I get to finish my mission with him.

We are helping a sister in the branch dig a giant hole for a latrine and the earth is so hard we have to use a pick axe with a homemade, very poorly carved handle. My hands are skinned pretty bad from the pick axe. I've gotten many blisters and hopefully they'll turn into callouses...

a happy missionary

Elder Hunter Allen Robinson

 

P.S. From what I heard when they were arranging my flights home I will be getting home around 2 or 3 in the afternoon on February 13. they didn't give me an itinerary and they probably won't until I'm on my way but I'm sure you'll get one with all the details. 

about "fattening me up"-I like being skinny and hope I can stay skinny...I will need to get into some organized sport of some kind since i won't be walking around all day. 

thanks for everything.

 

January 15, 2014 'Zone Leader Madness'

January 15, 2014

Dear Family,

Since it has been so long since I've written a legitimate email I figure I own one to you all. It has been crazy the last month with baseball games, christmas, new year's, transfers, new area, new comp, new responsibilities and generally a crazy life.

Being Zone leader is not easy. not only do you have to worry about your own area, investigators, and members; you have to worry about 8 other missionaries and their respective areas, investigators, members, challenges and needs. It has been pretty exciting. On Monday we went to Dajabon to participate in their district meeting but their district leader didn't get to the chapel until noon because he was trying to put a mormon.org video on a dvd to use it in the meeting...his companion has kleptomania which means that he cannot resist the urge to steal things and he doesn't even care if someone sees him. it's a sad condition. due to this he has had difficulties with companions, members, investigators, and others. He has stolen many things including a camera from a camera store...he recently stole something from a member and the member called Pres. Douglas so they had to take him out of the area. they took him out on monday and the district leader stayed with a member as a mini missionary. Yesterday the assistants came to dajabon and gave him his new companion-elder arias. this morning the district leader called the other elders that are in dajabon and asked them to go to his house. when they arrived they saw that he had all his suitcases packed and he claimed to have talked with Pres. Douglas to go home. while they were there he passed out and they took him to the hospital. the first diagnosis was that he had taken some pills to try and kill himself. this diagnosis has since been rejected. He is just really sick. the last thing we heard was that he is unconscious and they were trying to stabilize him. Pres. Douglas is currenlty in Dajabon and we hope to get more information soon. things are crazy!!! I hope he gets better and we are able to figure all this out.

I thought that it would be really hard to be in a new area with a new comp for my last transfer and in some ways it has been but it is all getting way better. I love my new comp and we have some golden investigators: Crisleidy and Camilla's uncle and aunt are members and we started teaching them last week. we introduced the restoration and gave them a pamphlet to read and when we came back for the follow up appointment they had both bought notebooks to wrtie notes in as they read, studied, and learned. they wrote questions and basically taught us the whole lesson on the restoration. All we did was back up what they said with scriptures and testimony. it has been so long since I've had an investigator that actually learns for themself. It was a breath of fresh air and we are so pumped to teach them. they came to church on sunday and when we went back to talk to them on monday they had basically memorized the introduction to the book of mormon. Camilla prayed about it and was able to receive an answer through "profound silence and peace." crisleidy forgot to pray but committed to. we invited them to be baptized and camilla said yes and Crisleidy said she would have to think about it. We invited them to continue to pray and as they do so they will have the desire to be baptized. man it is so cool to teach people like that. they are young teenagers but i know that they will be baptized.

We are also teaching Gladys and Jenifer. Jenifer almost always comes to church and last sunday she told us that she wanted us to visit her and her mom. her mom has come to church before and has talked with missionaries as well. We invited them to come to church and they came! there were 130 people in church on sunday!!!

my testimony has grown so much as I have been a missionary and have worked hard to do what i know the Lord expects of me. I have gained a strong testimony of tithing which is a little strange seeing as how I don't pay tithing as a missionary, but I've seen many great examples and have had incredible experiences with the dominican people. I have always paid fast offerings and I know that if he pay fast offereings, and a generous one at that, and tithing we will always have enough for ourselves and our families.

I know that My redeemer lives and that he loves me. I have had profound and powerful experiences everyday of my mission. sometimes it just takes time to step back and ponder to recognize the Lord's hand in our lives.

I'm curious, how has my missionary service blessed each of you, other than being a good example. be specific.

count your many blessings

Elder Hunter A. Robinson

January 8, 2014 'Monte Cristi'

January 8, 2014

Dear Family,

My new area is super close to the ocean. and a lot closer to haiti as you suspected. my new comp is Elder Morales, he is from nicaragua and he was in the D.R. mtc with me so we basically have the same amount of time in the mission. He is extending his mission, i am not. Monte Cristi is really hot and dusty and there is always a pleasant breeze since we're so close to the ocean. if it weren't for the breeze i think I would probably die of the heat. it's a small branch here but even being a branch there are more people that came to church on sunday than those that attend in the ward in Licey. The leaders are strong.

In the past with other mission presidents this zone (dajabon, villa vasquez, monte cristi) was a zone of punishment where they would send disobedient missionaries or just missionaries that didn't want to be here, maybe to coerce them into choosing to go home...it has since changed with president douglas; pres. douglas says that he only sends his best missionaries to this zone. that makes me feel good. 

Being zone leader is so tiring....i'm so tired all the time and never get to bed on time. we work hard in our own area and have to worry about all the other missionaries is the zone (8). at least it's not a huge zone with 30 missionaries.

the baseball game was super fun. I screamed myself hoarse cheering for the aguilas. they won 7-3! it was so fun. what made it really fun was having the members with us. it was a real treat for all of us.

i never did give the kid the other baseball. I gave it to elder anderton. i didn't give it to him because when i gave the first one to the kids everyone in the neighborhood would bother me and ask me for baseballs when we went there so I didn't really make the situation any better, in fact worse...I didn't give him the ball because I didn't want all the people to think that i'm rich and am the santa clause of baseballs...

Life is good and i love Monte Cristi. 

December 26, 2013 'Sorry'

December 26, 2013

Mom,

I am so sorry that we weren´t able to talk much yesterday. I should have called you first instead of Nikelle. I was so glad to talk to Noah and Parker and Alaura and Noah and to see claire for a minute and to have the opportunity to see dad´s pizza  shop.  But I feel  really bad that you and I didn´t get to talk very much at all.....But at the same time maybe it was best that way. We got to see each other and say I love you. You were crying a little which made me want to cry and I didn´t want to cry, if we had kept talking I know I would have cried. But don´t worry, we´re on the home strecth and then we have all the time in the world to talk. I´ll even take you on a date if it´s okay with your boyfriend.

I love you mom

December 18, 2013 'Crazy Day'

December 18, 2013

Dear Family,

I wish I could write a long epistle about how my week went but We gotta run to get to our baseball game!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Go Aguilas!

Life is awesome I love Christmas and mostly Christ.

Elder Robinson

December 10, 2013 'A confirmation and the missionary from La Chiva'

December 10, 2013

Dear Family,

Hector was finally confirmed on sunday and he got to church early to have an interview with the bishop to recieve the priesthood. Unfortunately he had to leave church early to go give his house key to his brother who is moving in. so he'll receive the priesthood next week....he came to church in a shirt and tie and slacks which is quite the transformation for him.

Since his baptism and even before Hector has been giving us a bunch of references of his neighbors, friends and family. we are currenlty teaching one of his neighbors, one of his brothers and his wife and one of his friends and his wife. He has named himself "the missionary from 'la chiva'" He is awesome. and it is fun to see his excitement for the gospel.

Close to Hector's house there is a group of kids that are always playing baseball in the street and one day I stopped and asked them to let me give it a go at hitting. the kid pitched the ball and I promptly smacked it onto a neighboring roof thus losing the ball......I felt very sheepish and bad. I was willing to go ask the owner to go up on the roof to fetch it but Hector told me to forget about it. Well I went and bought a brand new ball and took it yesterday to give to the kids. Ever since I lost the ball the kids have harrassed me as I walk past where they used to play so I just waited until they started harrassing me, then stopped and gave three kids the ball telling them that they had to share it with everyone. Well a few minutes later an older kid came up, whom I immediately recognized as the kid who pitched me the ball, and told me that it was his ball that I had lost and that I should have given the ball to him...so now I have another ball that hopefully I will give to this kid so he'll be happy and they will all quite harrassing me and be my friends.

Hopefully we'll be able to go to Hector's house here in a little bit to have him teach us to weave his fishing nets. I'm always looking for new skills to learn and take home. with tne same netting pattern you can make hammocks or volleyball nets or ping pong nets. a useful skill that takes a long time but it's cool.

Enjoy this Christmas season

Go tell a complete stranger "merry Christmas" brighten someones day!

Elder Hunter Allen Robinson

December 3, 2013 'B-Day'

 December 3, 2013

Dear Family,

Thanksgiving was amazing!!!!! the chicken came out great and everything else just came together well. We ate a bunch and were very happy. We had to go a little hungry for a few days due to the big purchases for the meal but it was worth it. I was very proud of the chicken.

Hector was baptized on Saturday and it was great. the only problem is that he came to church late on sunday and was not able to be confirmed....so he has to wait until this sunday and make sure he comes early.

we´ve found several new investigators some of which are progressing and others that are not. It´s hard to know when to let an investigator go but sometimes it is necessary and then other times they just ask you not to come back like pedro and yajaira did last night. they just told us that they are catholic and aren´t going to change religion and don´t want us to waste our time visiting them. this is a common occurance and is almost a breath of fresh air when it happens because I almost prefer it to be that way than teaching someone for a month and having to drop them for not progressing. it´s much easier if they just say at the beginning ¨i don´t want to progress, bye¨ 

Life is crazy and fun and we are working hard.

We are going to a baseball game on December 12!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The goal now is to help Hector be confirmed, receive the priesthood, participate in blessing the sacrament, prepare his father´s name to take to the temple and go to the temple at the end of the month.

Elder Robinson

p.s. we went fishing today with Hector.and I tried my hand at throwing the net a few times. I actually got a couple good throws and caught 2 fish!!!

Hector is going to teach us how to make his fishing nets and the same pattern can be used to make volleyball nets or even hammocks! I´m gonna learn a new skill!

Thanksgiving - our christmas tree courtesy of the grovecreek 7th ward relief society. thank you so much. we are going to put one ornament on the tree everyday until we get to christmas starting tomorrow!

Mom – Happy Birthday tomorrow!!