Elder Jaren Bryner A LDS Missionary Down Under in Adelaide Australia: Feel the spirit of Christmas

Email #43
Area: Grange area of the Firle Zone
Companion: Elder Touti

Excerpts from Mom's email:

Hey Mom!

Yeah transfers are on the 17th, but even if I am transferred I still have time to email so we could still figure out skyping. Yeah it is hot, but not as bad as I thought it would be. Only had one 40 degree day so not to bad, but supposed to get hotter sometime. Haha yeah time has basically felt the same to me. Has gone fast, but also feels like I have been here my whole life!

Well this past week has been really really good! We have had a lot of exciting activities going on and things like that. First this week we went to an old folks home to sing and play games with them as a zone. That was really cool! It was part of the Light the World initiative that we are participating in. We are still looking for another service project to do on the 26th as well. The elderly there seemed to love it! We have some great singers in our zone, so luckily they could drown out my horrible singing haha. I asked Sister Collins to send you the pictures for that. It doesn't quite feel like Christmas without the snow and everything, but I can feel the spirit of Christmas for sure! We were able to talk to each of them and get to know them. I even beat this one guy at chess and I haven't played that since I was little, so he was pretty impressed with that but didn't like losing haha. There was this other lady who could play piano in a unique way. She plays all by ear and kind of just hits the notes close to the correct keys, but it actually sounded alright. It just was cool, because she had some form of dementia I think.

Saturday night we had our Ward Christmas Party! Now that was pretty cool! Definitely was the best ward activity that they have put on since I have been here and was a pretty good turn out. We had some investigators even show up, so that was pretty cool too! They put us on the spot and asked us to be a part of the young men's skit last minute and even asked us to sing... Luckily with the sisters, but still we only practiced 20 min before we went on haha. Think it went okay though. Santa made an appearance as well and we got to take photos with him, didn't know what to ask for Christmas though haha. Lastly last night we had our Christmas missionary fireside up by the mission office! Was a great turn out to that as well and the spirit was so powerful during it! With all of these Christmas activities, it has really brightened up our week! Looking forward to the rest of this month as well as the spirit of Christmas keeps rolling forth!

Love you Mom!!!!!!!!!!!!

Excerpts from Dad's email:

Hey Dad!

Yeah my week has been awesome! Work has slowed down just a little, but still going well. Found 3 New investigators during tracting. Fun fact, we call it Game Time here haha. Guess just makes us feel for pumped for it:). "What time is it Elder? That's right, it's Game Time!" haha. Pretty funny, but something the mission has done a few months back. Makes a difference believe it or not. Like I said before, we do minimum 3 hours tracting a day so that is a big focus as a mission.

The Christmas season is definitely here even though there is no snow. Everyone here has felt it! Man especially F... holy cow! So at the Christmas party he was the host, even cracked some pretty funny jokes! At the missionary fireside, he gave a talk about how the Gospel has changed his life! That was pretty great to be there for! He has been killing it! Everyone there had great comments about it afterward and even a lot of people told me that by the way he spoke made it seem like he has been a member for years. We went by his place yesterday to have some cake with them for their daughters birthday right before the fireside and he told me that he only had a few points written down so most of it came from the heart. I didn't even see him look down to read anything! We are going by again tonight for dinner with them so that will be good!

So the next few weeks will be pretty cool. Today we are having our district activity having a BBQ and playing sport over by the beach. Then next week we are having our zone activity putting together our Christmas skits that will all be on video haha. Don't know how it goes never been here for that, but they do it every year. Idk what else they do here, but sounds like Christmas here is even great for the missionaries!
Love you!