Weekly 🤙

Also fun fact real quick 🤙 this doesn't mean hang loose that's just an American apparently according to all my new Poly friends it's called shacka and I don't thing it means anything its just what all the cool kids do so 🤷‍♀️ anyway good morning whanau how are you!? Sorry I didn't send a weekly last week. But these past couple weeks have been really good a little crazy actually. 

So to start Sangeta got baptized wow that was amazing I love her so much she has such a strong desire to draw nearer to her Savior and is really excited to continue down the covenant path she's great. Well her fiance's cousin came to the baptism and he must have felt the spirit very strong because he cried though the whole thing and told his uncle he wants to learn more so we started to teach him! He's so so cool and just really wants to be happy and feel that peace he felt at her baptism again. The only problem is that he only speaks Tongan and well in case you didn't realize I only speak English so we had to have a translator, but it's okay because I'm just grateful he's so patient with us and still wants to continue to take the lessons. 

Last week sister Graham got attacked by a dog but she's good now. Moving on transfer news came both me and sister Graham stayed in Red Hill yay! But one of our bffs elder Demille ditched us to be the the assistant to the president. Rude. But really though I'm so excited for him that just shows how awesome of an elder is. He gave us literally so many referrals... Definitely going to miss him. But it's good we got to keep his companion Elder Moucatel who's super cool he's only on his fourth transfer and he's already been zone leader twice so basically he's gonna be an apostle one day. Love them anyway so BREAKING NEWS....... We got elders in red Hill... That's right you read that right they are making us share Red Hill and its rude. Nah but really Elder Strate and elder Berry are super cool. Elder Berry is fresh out if the mtc and is Canadian so I just want to make fun of him so bad but I'm a missionary and have to be nice but wow some seriously self restraint has been experienced. 

Anyway it's been really good okay actually so story time first time I met them I no joke thought they were about to mug us 😂. So picture this two young cool sister missionaries walking down the sketchy streets of Hunua NZ it was like 8. So the sun was down and out of the corner of my eyes I see two guys following us (so in the white handbook it says to always keep a small amount of cash on you in case you get mugged but I had definitely just spent my mugging money on cool temporary tattoos (for post mish obviously) like three days before so I started panicking) so there I was trying to save my companion from the creepy guys following so so I turn around and start shouting.  I was, I kid you not this is what I said... So embarrassing, "Okay so look I'm a missionary, I really don't have any money but like I have this watch if you want it, but I've definitely broken it twice already but if you duck tape the battery in place it's as good As...Oh..." so they were kind of far away, close enough you can tell there is someone following you but far enough away and dark enough that you couldn't tell who they are so I was like really out trying to bribe these potential muggers with my cheap watch and turns out it was our new elders they laughed really hard it was rude anyway that's how I met my double covers and I just looked at the time and my pday is over so much love be good - sister berrett

Random fb messenger texts and pictures from Sister Berrett, part 1

(my side of the conversation is standard type, Maddie's is italicized. )

Me asking about transfer news - What's the big news? Staying or going?

Don't find out until Tuesday.  But the Zone Leaders know and they think they are hilarious.

What?  How do you pack, prepare, etc?  and Rude.

I KNOW.  WE ARE GOING TO FIGHT THEM.   They said they are staying, but like they keep hinting that one of us is leaving. 

Anyway, Guess what?  I almost Cried.  Guess what?  You're supposed to guess.

Ok.  Ummmm. Someone gave you something that made you miss me.  You got kicked in the shins.

I FOUND MILK DUDS AT THE STORE.

Shut up.

There is no American food anywhere. Ever.

Are they hard and stale? Like they sometimes get at Walmart?

Yup :)  Just like home.  You also wanna hear something weird?

KMART ISN'T DEAD.  IT IS ALIVE AND THRIVING IN NZ.

No Way.

Like it's bigger than any of the other stores.

Do they have blue light specials?

Yes.

Day 95. Dear diary, I think I've forgotten what America looks like...

That's right folks you did read that right. Your favorite missionary the one and only has been out for almost 100 days. Which really isn't actually that long but my comp burned her bra yesterday for her one year mark  and I just want to feel cool like her so any ways 100 DAYS yay *burns... hair tie?*

So life in the good ol' NZHM is peachy keen. Kura and the boys (definitely going to petition for that to be their band name) GOT BAPTISED. Wow it was incredible. Real quick before I tell her whole story I just wanted to shout out any return or current foreign serving missionaries who are about to start quoting the church's national privacy policy yes I got her permission first before I wrote this email again stop with the judging.  So wow the Leka whanau, they are amazing. So Kura said I could say as many or as little details as I wanted but I'll try and keep it to a minimum. 

But miss Kura leka is just the sweetest lady ever. she was actually the first investigator I met in NZ. So my area Red Hills, Papakaura, has been closed for a long long time and the mission has had occasionally elders just covering the area and kind of just keeping tabs to make sure the members where still alright and one day they had this crazy prompting to knock all the doors in this one street I won't say which one because you know privacy but its notoriously known as the street where the main New Zealand gang is staying, and these elders had some serious faith and trust in their Heavenly Father and decided to go tracting down this craz dangerous neighborhood, aka may or may not be my neighborhood, sorry forgot to mention that mom,  promise I'm fine, the gang is cool, don't worry.  Anyway the elders ended up knocking on Kura's door. It turns out that Kura started dating her husband James (who's a member) when they were 13 and six kids one wedding and lots and lots of trials and heart ache later, James ended up going in active and never taught his wife and children about the church and Kura being the awesome person that she is mid crazy hard trial, decided to pray even though that goes against everything she believed and prayed for help, and a few hours later the elders ended up on her door step with a message about how God answers prayers and the rest is history. Sister graham and I got permission to finally reopen Red Hills and met Kura and along side the elders ( love them ) reactivated James and converted the whole family and baptized Kura and her three oldest boys. I might have cried ... alot. Shocker. But this past transfer (6 weeks) has been full of miracle after miracle after miracle. It's been amazing. The Leka whanau was baptized and confirmed the weekend. 

Sangeta our other friend we are teaching is on date, and Maia, one of my closest friends we just put on date for her baptism on the 7th. I have had the privilege to meet SO many amazing humble people who are so full of love and have stolen my heart. These past 5 weeks my testimony has been strengthened immensely and over and over again I have felt God's hand in my life. I love this work SO much. I dont even want to think about how different my life would be if I didn't decide to serve. I have come to a much clearer knowledge of God's individual love for his children and a stronger testimony of the Book of Mormon and how it really is the word of God. Wow this gospel, Christ's gospel, really is so good. I'm just so happy to be a missionary. I'm sorry this weeks emails wasn't as full of dumb stories as the past weeks, but I just really wanted to take the time to tell you all that I really do love this work my Heavenly Father has allowed me to be here and meet so many people that through out heir stories, have helped me draw nearer to my Savior. because of the privacy policy rules for missions outside the us we aren't allowed to state anything other then the names of those we work with without their permission . So its been hard to share the stories of the miracles I do see on a daily basis so my emails usually just do consist of the usually dumb things I end up accidentally doing, but I just want to let you know despite the lack of stories of actual missionary work it's all I really want to talk about.  In preach my gospel it talks abut how the closer you draw to your Savior the more you'll want to share it with others and its so so true. Anyway I'll step off my soap box now but wow I love being a missionary. 

more stories and pictures to come soon, keep on praying, love you all much - Tuahine Berrett

1) good ol sister Graham

2) the Leka whanau, the coolest missionaries ever, and the elders :) 

3) AUCKLAND SOUTH ZONE!!

4) the man. the myth. the legend.

Roast pig luau, DIE for Tonga, an accidental baptism and swimming pool lessons

Kia ora whanau-

Wow where do I even start?  So... so I’m currently serving in good old Papakura, South Auckland so that’s cool. Honestly it’s so wild it rains like probably 89.5 times a day and it’s winter over here (ya weird right apparently it has something to do with weird sciencey stuff and the equator who knows?)

Anyway these past two weeks have been really weird. We were chillin doing our comp study like one does and out of no where, we get a call from our Tongan ward relief society president and she was freaking out and was like “come here now”. So she sent us this address and so we skirted on over and we got there, and in her broken English basically said something along the lines of “okay you eat now” and points to a giant party and then leaves. And we tried to explain to her that we can’t go to parties and Tongans get rEALLy offended if you don't eat their food so long story short we showed up to this giant Tongan luau with the biggest pig I’ve ever seen, roasted whole on a skewer and none of them spoke English and we don’t speak Tongan. So we can’t leave but no one knows why we are there, and long story short the dj stopped playing the screamo music for a couple minutes because they started digging a giant whole in the middle of their lawn, and then everyone started cheering and ya. Then we ate the pig eyes. They made us. It was very sweet, and honesty tasted kind of like sweet shrimp, but I might have thrown up for like three hours after a and had nightmares for two days. So that was cool.   Anyway I love the Tongan ward, they are so so so amazing. Honestly the sweetest, most humble people I have ever been able to meet with. Such love for the missionary work, and an incredible culture. I just wish I could understand what they are saying so we don’t accidently show up to another hole digging party again.

Anyway moving on, what’s next on the list? Oh right so fun story. We got a call from another friend of ours in the Tongan ward (again love them) and basically she goes “hey can you come to the chapel right now?” and since our appointment just got cancelled so we were like, “Eh why the heck not?” so we went over and well our good ol pal Latai was like hey my uncle just decided to get baptized and Bishop says the missionaries have to be here, can you watch?  So uh in case you’re wondering, that’s not how it’s supposed to work. They have to go through all the lessons from the missionaries (aka us) and then have an interview, and then they can be baptized. But again, language barrier.  Yay. So we came mid baptism and he was already in the water, and it would be kind of awkward to like yell at him from the other side of the font and be like “Hey ya you can’t do that”. So we kind of just let it happen, and then decided we would talk to him after. So that was cool. Anyway most awkward conversation ive ever had in my life. anyway.

Moving on, Die for Tonga. So there are SO many Tongans in NZ like a lot - a lot. Anyway they love Tonga. Like I’ve never seen so much patriotism in a group of people ever. Maybe it’s just cause no one really boasts that they are from Arizona cause like Arizona is cool and all, like I love living there, but it’s just a big piece of dirt, so... But here no joke, you know if a family is Tongan because they will have a huge flag in their front yard. anyway i kid you not anytime one of them sees a Tongan flag they literally YELL this thing, “Mate ma’a Tonga” but it basically translates back to DIE for Tonga. So now you know.

And last fun weird story of the week is I have this good ol’ pal Glen. I love Glen. He’s honestly such a great person with such a desire to draw nearer to his Savior but he keeps calling us at the weirdest times. He has a hard time setting an exact time for his return appointment so he usually just calls us whenever he is free. And well good old Glen, got to love him, called us and was like “Yo I’m free right now can you come over?” and we were like, “ya we are on our way. Your house right?” and he goes, “Oh I forgot to tell you, no I’m at the pool.”  So to all you either current or returned missionaries before you start panicking and quoting the white hand book (missionary rule book), no we didnt get in the pool, yes he was wearing normal clothes. Anyway gosh y’all are so judgey. So yes being the good missionaries we are dropped our plans to actually do our weekly planning on time and went to the pool. 5 stars for Gryffindor. Anyway so ya that’s basically the coolest part fo the story we just taught a regular lesson in the waiting area at a public pool, but you know I thought it was cool so thought I’d share. OH also fun fact after serving as a missionary for almost four months seeing people in skin tight wet clothes is scarring. it was hard to make eye contact with Glen because I just wanted to look at the ceiling. DO THESE PEOPLE EVEN RECOGNIZE THAT THEIR CLOTHES ARE TIGHT? AHHHH its okay.  I’m fine.  Also shout out to my mom who said one day I’m going to look back at all those times i decided to wear leggings out in public and question all my life decisions, and you know what mom...as much as it pains my prideful self to say it.. you were right... anyway moving on.

Life is good I hope every one back at home is amazing :) thanks for all your emails they make my day.

Much love, Die for Tonga, -Sister Berrett

Picture 1: my good ol pal Latai she's putting in her papers soon soo exciting!

Picture two: we might really love NZ and Tonga but it's fine it's not excessive I don't know what you’re talking about

Picture three: my sweet friend Kura who's actually getting baptized on the tenth!!!

Pictures four and five: my area ❤️

Malo e lelei

Kia ora whanau:)

Wow it’s been amazing. God has seriously been so good.

So this week was zone conference which was amazing I can’t even describe it. The spirit was definitely present and so so strong. President Erekson is brand new to the mission got here about th same time i did. And he talked about all the spiritual preparation he did before coming out here because he wants to make this mission the best it can be with the Lord’s help. At this point we are having really low numbers about 2-3 baptisms a week mission wide and they said when a new mission president comes it’ll get even lower, so hes been stressing because that’s already really low and hes trying to figure out what he can do and after a lot of sleepless nights and prayer he said he received this promting that soon we are gonna have rates of 500 baptisms a year. And the second he said that the spirit filled the room really quick. And then he basically gave us this giant call to repentance saying hes not looking for missionaries but an army. Like the stripling warriors, and then he gave us this long amazing speech on on accountability, on making and really sticking to goals, on being bold, and seeking out those who are the elite and on obeying with exactness to the mission and church rules. Wow I’ve never been so happy after being so rebuked. it was so cool,  I cant even explain it, it was amazing. And since zone conference its been insane litterally miracle after miracle and miracle have occurred. We have found 10 new people! 10! God has been so good. And we are white washing the area. Which means typically we should have like nothing. And we have 8 more people on the verge of being new people.

It’s been great. I’ve cried so much. Shocker. But I think Sister Graham, my companion, has been a huge part of that. She just pushes us everyday to do a little better to work a little harder and to be more diligent, accountable, and obedient. Her testimony is so sweet too. I can just tell how much she really does love The Lord and wants to do anything he asks. And it’s all I want too. Don’t get me wrong, this past week has been so hard. Really hard. But I’ve never been happier in my life. We are always teaching about, thinking about, and testifying about Christ, always praying and trying to ask the Lord “what lack I yet?” and I’ve never been so filled with joy in my life. This is God’s work and i know it. This is his church there is no doubt in my mind. It’s been testified to me over and over and over through the Holy Ghost my whole mission experience. I’m just so grateful to be here and be a missionary. So thank you to everyone that;s helped me get here.

So side note I just really wanted to apologize to everyone that has written me. I have been having a hard time trying to find time to email but I’m going to  make it a bigger priority because you all mean so much to me and I don’t want to lose contact with, or let down any of you so please keep on writing and I promise I’ll write you too. Anyway keep on praying and being the amazing people I know and love. I’d just like you all to stop sometime this week and pray for missionary opportunities and see how you can better serve and love those around you and I know that as you do so prayerfully and faithfully the lord will put those people into your path. 

Mahalo - Sister Berrett

1) So funny story we thought we didn't have any bikes so we went through this long process and convinced our angels of district leaders to go through alot to try and get us bikes from the mission office and when we finally got them we took the bikes to the back yard to find a place for them only to instead discover a shed that I swear was never there before definitely might have been filled with bikes already.... so we may or may not have 4 bikes now and may or may not have been too embarrassed to tell the district leaders.... oh well.

2) our cute beach :)

3) beach pt 2

4) So story pt 2 so since in good old red hills they haven’t had missionaries here for a LONG time the apartment was completely empty so the same district leaders that definitely may or may not do so much for us all the time. rip. they are awesome,  contacted the mission office and got us like a crazy amount of stuff for our place and got it to us like Jimmy Johns level of freaky fast. So this was basically Christmas it was great.

5) Basically the sweetest family ever. Also side note in New Zealand they are like OBSESSED with KFC. So that’s cool we basically live there like every feed appointment is at KFC. But like it’s actually better here for some reason. Like not good, but definitely better. 

6) So we may or may not have invented a version of volleyball / dodgeball / yoga that we play with badminton rackets. And by yoga I mean the one pose were you lay on the floor and try not to fall asleep. And by playing this "game" I mean we have good intentions but usually sleep through exercise... 

7) :) 

Sorry, it's been a hot sec

 Talofa, malo, alo, bulu good morning and kia ora my whanau :)

Well its been a while sorry about that my dudes, but its been real crazy since I talked last, I don't even know where to start.

So here's a couple main points so I can catch y’all up

1) Well Carol decided she didn’t want to get baptized she left us a voicemail at 1 am the morning of her baptism.  But you know everyone has their agency. 

2) I got my visa... that was hard to hear. Like don’t get me wrong, I was so excited to go the the fetchin bomb mission the NZHM, but the small town of Minot North Dakota really stole my heart. It’s funny when I got my reassignment call I was a little annoyed I was like “Um, I’m pretty sure there isn’t anyone other than buffalo in North Dakota and all my pals were getting cool reassignment calls to like New York City, and the gorgeous state of Washington and crazy Colorado.”

And I was a little annoyed. I think heavenly father new I needed to take my ego down bit, and good thing beccause I’ve never met a kinder people in my life than the humble people of the Minot 4th ward. I honesty cried when I found out I got my visa. It was hard. My mission president and his wife were some of the kindest most inspirational people I’ve ever met, and my companions became my best friends. I honestly just can’t thank my Heavenly Father enough just to allow me to be part of the ND,BM family. Anyway sob story over. But I dipped out of ND and I might have cried but it’s okay no one needs to know. 

3) NEW ZEALAND IS WILD

4) I flew from Minot to Denver to LAX and then to Auckland it was crazy.  And somewhere in the wild mess they lost my luggage,  one of the planes broke down, I was three minutes away from missing a flight, and I got 0 hours of sleep but its was actually a blast 12/10 would do again. 

7) I landed in New Zealand and I’m gonna be honest I might have definitely thought New Zealand was gonna look like Moana with everyone singing and dancing in perfect tropical weather and like dancing palm trees I don’t know. Well turns out its not.... ITS LITERALLY SO MUCH BETTER! So fun fact New Zealand is like the cooler version of London. It literally has everything anyone could love about London, the food, the lack of preservatives, the funny terms, their obsession with having to do everything opposite of America, like driving on the wrong side of the road and using things like kilometers and Celsius,  like gosh who does that? Because obviously we are the best and everyone should be like us. (so that parts a little annoying) and really kind people. And then take all of that but then put it on an island full of Polys and funny Europeans.  It’s amazing. And then give them knock off Australian accents and an obsession with rugby, like four different Polynesian cultures intertwined with the London culture and the BEST FOOD AND dairy in the entire fetchin world!

8) Fun fact there are more sheep than people in New Zealand, also another fun fact there are twice as many cows then sheep and then last fun fact 65% of all dairy world wide comes from New Zealand so basically we are cool and I want to be a Kiwi now, okay moving on.

9) I got the cutest companion in the world Sister Graham from the very small very unheard of state of Utah. Ya I know I’ve never heard of anyone especially missionaries from there either. 

10) I’m actually serving in Auckland which is weird because there are three missions in New Zealand the Hamilton, ( aka the coolest and best one cough cough mine) the Auckland mission and the Wellington mission and I guess my mission president took one look at me and was like “Ya I’m sending her to the other mission”. So rip. But yes I’m still in the Hamilton mission but for some reason part of our mission actually covers Auckland. Ya I  don’t get it either. But that was cool. OH also President and Sister Erekson are amazing and I feel so honored to have them as my mission president and mission mom. 

11) (sorry didn’t mean to write this much) so I’m serving in the Red Hills area, which covers the Princess ward (the Tongan ward)(cool I know, right?)(ya I don't think any of the Tongans like being in a ward called the Princess ward but I think it’s hilarious) and the Red Hills Ward.  And well long story short, the poor members have ahad a really bad experience with the past five or six sets of missionaries who actually all got sent home after serving in the area so it’s been closed for a long time because the people really dont like missionaries, so me and Sister Graham are white washing (opening an area) and just trying to gain the trust of members yet.  And I really appreciate the experience because I don’t think I have ever worked harder in my life and I’ve only been here for a hot second but I’m already so in love with the people and the work and im just so grateful for the opportunity to be a missionary. It’s amazing. 

12) I’m learning Tongan so that's super cool! It’s not my main language it’s just a side language we were asked to start studying so it’ll make the work a bit easier and ya also I started learning Russian and by learning I mean I started it on duolingo and I think its been like two months since I've been on there but basically I’m a pro so. 

13) Sorry for the long email I’ll try and shorten it down next time anyway love y'all so much thanks for the support keep on writing. 

Arohanui,

-sister berrett