whats crack a lackin familia
life is....better. not the best, but better. cant ask for to much more. i decided to just change my attitude and things are getting alot better. on the boat ride back to fogo, there was a giant storm, it was raining. crazy stuff. instead of getting scared or annoyed i just decided to have a good time with it because its not every day you get the chance to ride on a little fisher boat in the middle of the ocean during a rain storm. so i stood on the back of the boat and i just sang my heart out. the boat is way loud so i can sing as loud as i want. it helped. i didnt get sick, eventhough the boat was crashing back and forth, forward and backward. it was awesome i sang everything from eminem to i know my redeemer lives. it was a blast. got to fogo soaking wet, but i didnt even care, just laughed at the whole situation. LEGIT. in fogo we did find motion sickness medicine so that helped on the way back to brava too. so things, as i said, are getting better. still not best.
i forgot to tell you last week but i did get all of your letters before a left praia. so that was awesome. THANKS! :) still havent gotten any packages but they will get here. i hope everything is going well over in L Town. i miss that place like crazy. i wouldnt mind giving up right now and coming back, but i wont. i will keep plugging along.
we are knocking ALOT of doors. its all we do. its hard. but just like the boat ride i just try to make it fun. i knock the door and put a giant smile on my face so when they open the door there is a tall white kid smiling at them. its hilarious. and sometimes i dont talk, i just look at my greeny companion waiting for him to talk. ha, but you gotta live life fun, or life aint worth it. i have been trying to remember one thing that my mtc teacher, brother schlappi said to me, "just have fun knocking doors, it is my favorite thing. its like christmas. every door is a surprise" haha i wish i could have that type of enthusiasm.
there aint alot of food here to eat. but i eat what i got. rice. rice. rice. rice. yummm.....so good.
sunday in brava was horrible. the most disappointing, heartbreaking thing i have ever seen in my life. i taught the elders quorom class, said an opening prayer, passed the sacrament and gave a 25 minute talk. the branch president called me 2 hours before church started to tell me to do this stuff cause he was stuck in fogo. it was awesome. psh.. there was a total of 20 people in church. i think like 5 or 6 adults. there is no order. there church building is a mess. there spirit cant dwell there. i am embarrased to invite people to church there. and i know why everyone almost here in brava is inactive. you just dont feel welcome here, and thats not right. thats not the way the Lord wants it. there is alot to do. alot of work. but we are trying our best. its not easy. and its not going to be easy but i am just pressing forward as best as i can. i am doing my best and i know when i do, i will recieve blessings from God. he is watching over me. i know he loves us and that he lives. we need to put our trust in him and then we can have happiness. real happiness. life is hard. but i really dont think he meant it to be easy. we need to learn. we need to grow. we cant grow or learn if everything is easy. i am grateful for all of you and your support in this journey. we still got one more year to go, but we can do it. it wont be easy. but we will grow from it. i know i am. i am a different person. i am being shaped into something....beautiful. and i am not ashamed of it. president faust said "we cannot convert beyond our own conversion" we first need to be converted in our own hearts before we can expect others to change. i love you family. hope all is well. dont got more time but know that i am ok and God is with us all....AMERICA RULES!!!!!!
elder coleman...the one. the only. the wild.
tchau tchau fo now
Monday, August 30, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
Letter from Elder C. 8.23.10
What up
so i dont really have alot of time to write. there isnt really places here in brava to use internet. we found one place but the internet wasnt working. the owner of the place was nice enough to bring us to his house and let us use his laptop. its kinda wierd how generous some people are. he was just like ya sorry the internet is not up but you can come to my house and use mine real quick. so i will just give you the low down.
brava is tight. thats all there is to it. but that doesnt necisarily mean that i like it. its like a whole new Patim again. the boat ride was ridiculous. one straight hour of swaying back and forth. i got really sick. lost my appetite. which still hasnt come back. i have a feeling i will lose some weight on this island. i am really excited to go back out on the boat again tomorrow to go to zone conference in fogo. it will be aight. there are very few people here in brava, like 6000. but there are only like 25 active members half of them are kids under 12. there is seriously alot of work to do here. its gonna be difficult. i say it like patim again because all we do is knock doors. like yessterday in itself we knocked like 50 doors. dont like it. i thought i was gonna get here and since it has been 2 years with out missionaries all the members were gonna give us like hundreds of references. ha what was i thinking. man i was so wrong. the people really arent super interested here. alot of them speak english because they either have been to america or have family there. so i have been practicing up my english too. as far as food goes. there aint nothing to eat here. i will really miss praia because of the good selection of food. rice everyday dont fly with me. the house is alright except the shower sucks and i have to wash my own clothes by hand. thats cool psh....get that corn out of my face.
welp gotta go before this dude gets mad. oh, my companion is from santo antao. well im outta here. until next week. love elder c dizzle
fica no manso manso
so i dont really have alot of time to write. there isnt really places here in brava to use internet. we found one place but the internet wasnt working. the owner of the place was nice enough to bring us to his house and let us use his laptop. its kinda wierd how generous some people are. he was just like ya sorry the internet is not up but you can come to my house and use mine real quick. so i will just give you the low down.
brava is tight. thats all there is to it. but that doesnt necisarily mean that i like it. its like a whole new Patim again. the boat ride was ridiculous. one straight hour of swaying back and forth. i got really sick. lost my appetite. which still hasnt come back. i have a feeling i will lose some weight on this island. i am really excited to go back out on the boat again tomorrow to go to zone conference in fogo. it will be aight. there are very few people here in brava, like 6000. but there are only like 25 active members half of them are kids under 12. there is seriously alot of work to do here. its gonna be difficult. i say it like patim again because all we do is knock doors. like yessterday in itself we knocked like 50 doors. dont like it. i thought i was gonna get here and since it has been 2 years with out missionaries all the members were gonna give us like hundreds of references. ha what was i thinking. man i was so wrong. the people really arent super interested here. alot of them speak english because they either have been to america or have family there. so i have been practicing up my english too. as far as food goes. there aint nothing to eat here. i will really miss praia because of the good selection of food. rice everyday dont fly with me. the house is alright except the shower sucks and i have to wash my own clothes by hand. thats cool psh....get that corn out of my face.
welp gotta go before this dude gets mad. oh, my companion is from santo antao. well im outta here. until next week. love elder c dizzle
fica no manso manso
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Letter from Elder C. 8.13.10
hey fam,
alright before i say anything else, i just want to tell you where my next area is. THE ISLAND OF BRAVA!!!!!!!! heck ya baby! ok so brava is a small island a little ways from fogo. it has flowers, fruits, its green i hear its just beautiful. the thing is that it has been closed to missionary work for over TWO years! the work was hard there and so president took the missionaries out and for other reasons i guess too. but anyways he has been thinking and wanting to send missionaries back there for about 3 or 4 months.
well your son, brother and grandchild will be opening this island back up! that is sooooo legit, i cannot even tell you. oh wait....thats not it. did i tell you i am training too!!! oh ya haha i am going to train a cape verdean. i am soo pumped. its gonna be the best experience in the entire world. i never would have thought that something so amazing would happen to me. that's the new news and i am stoked. my new companion, elder fortes, doesnt get back to cape verde from the mtc in brazil until the 19 august so i will have to wait for him. that day we will fly to fogo and then take a boat over to BRAVA, which means WILD!! its gonna be sooo sweet i seriously cant even explain it.
i have been in the office in praia for the past 4 months and i miss being among the people. yesterday was my last day there. i left with a light back. i felt like all this stress and anxiety was just lifted off of me. its was a great feeling. the office is going down to two elders now. elder sargent and elder shelhamer. it def was a crazy transfer. lots of crazy things happened but the coolest and craziest is that i get to train, reopen and serve in the best island in the country....BRAVA!
well because i found this out on tuesday i have just been wanting to leave praia so bad. i am super pumped to just get out there on my island! haha anyways this is about the only thing cool that happened to me this week. you know just still here in cape verde chillin, preachin, and tryin to do my best. its aight. so i have been packin up my bags today. its a bit stressful that we can only take 40 pounds. but i am trying to work it out so i can make it over there.
about my area. still hard as ever, but its ok. i mean we had one kid come to church on sunday. it was his first time so that was really tight. i hope he comes this week too. we are going to pass by his house again. i get to stay with elder owens monday, tuesday and wednesday. man i love that kid, he is soo funny! so that will be sweet too.
i dont really have any cool experiences from this week, but more exciting news....I FINISHED MY FIRST JOURNAL LAST NIGHT!!! man i didnt think i was ever going to finish it. but i am really trying to write every day. aint easy sometimes but i am trying. i like the mission. i am finding seriously a new love for the scriptures. i LOVE reading the Book of Mormon more than anything. i read it for like 2 straight hours the other day. i feel like when we read the the Book of Mormon it really brings a shield around us. it's like our day to day protection from the world of evil. we read it everyday and we cannot fall. so i was reading in the Preach My Gospel book the other day and i found this quote by Elder Faust "you cannot convert people beyond your own conversion" its like we can't just walk around everyday expecting to convert or help anyone if we ourselves are not first converted. i know this is why President Hinkley "raised the bar." we need to prepare from a very young age to be ready for the great and difficult journey of a mission. every young man should serve a mission. there is no doubt of that. we learn so much out here to prepare us for the storms of life. life is the hardest thing. just living is not easy. but as we look at what we learn and the way we grow day by day by living the gospel, we see that it is all worth it. because in the end, if we do what is right, we get the biggest present in the world....ETERNAL LIFE!
i am happy. life is good. dont worry about me. i made sloppy joes today. they were good. there aint nothing else to say. keep it real.
so since i am out on brava in the next coming week, its gonna start getting harder to get my mail and junk but it will be tight still. zone conference in fogo will just be like christmas i guess!!! haha i will get everything at once. cool beans. well i am out. stay sweet
C LOVIN'
alright before i say anything else, i just want to tell you where my next area is. THE ISLAND OF BRAVA!!!!!!!! heck ya baby! ok so brava is a small island a little ways from fogo. it has flowers, fruits, its green i hear its just beautiful. the thing is that it has been closed to missionary work for over TWO years! the work was hard there and so president took the missionaries out and for other reasons i guess too. but anyways he has been thinking and wanting to send missionaries back there for about 3 or 4 months.
well your son, brother and grandchild will be opening this island back up! that is sooooo legit, i cannot even tell you. oh wait....thats not it. did i tell you i am training too!!! oh ya haha i am going to train a cape verdean. i am soo pumped. its gonna be the best experience in the entire world. i never would have thought that something so amazing would happen to me. that's the new news and i am stoked. my new companion, elder fortes, doesnt get back to cape verde from the mtc in brazil until the 19 august so i will have to wait for him. that day we will fly to fogo and then take a boat over to BRAVA, which means WILD!! its gonna be sooo sweet i seriously cant even explain it.
i have been in the office in praia for the past 4 months and i miss being among the people. yesterday was my last day there. i left with a light back. i felt like all this stress and anxiety was just lifted off of me. its was a great feeling. the office is going down to two elders now. elder sargent and elder shelhamer. it def was a crazy transfer. lots of crazy things happened but the coolest and craziest is that i get to train, reopen and serve in the best island in the country....BRAVA!
well because i found this out on tuesday i have just been wanting to leave praia so bad. i am super pumped to just get out there on my island! haha anyways this is about the only thing cool that happened to me this week. you know just still here in cape verde chillin, preachin, and tryin to do my best. its aight. so i have been packin up my bags today. its a bit stressful that we can only take 40 pounds. but i am trying to work it out so i can make it over there.
about my area. still hard as ever, but its ok. i mean we had one kid come to church on sunday. it was his first time so that was really tight. i hope he comes this week too. we are going to pass by his house again. i get to stay with elder owens monday, tuesday and wednesday. man i love that kid, he is soo funny! so that will be sweet too.
i dont really have any cool experiences from this week, but more exciting news....I FINISHED MY FIRST JOURNAL LAST NIGHT!!! man i didnt think i was ever going to finish it. but i am really trying to write every day. aint easy sometimes but i am trying. i like the mission. i am finding seriously a new love for the scriptures. i LOVE reading the Book of Mormon more than anything. i read it for like 2 straight hours the other day. i feel like when we read the the Book of Mormon it really brings a shield around us. it's like our day to day protection from the world of evil. we read it everyday and we cannot fall. so i was reading in the Preach My Gospel book the other day and i found this quote by Elder Faust "you cannot convert people beyond your own conversion" its like we can't just walk around everyday expecting to convert or help anyone if we ourselves are not first converted. i know this is why President Hinkley "raised the bar." we need to prepare from a very young age to be ready for the great and difficult journey of a mission. every young man should serve a mission. there is no doubt of that. we learn so much out here to prepare us for the storms of life. life is the hardest thing. just living is not easy. but as we look at what we learn and the way we grow day by day by living the gospel, we see that it is all worth it. because in the end, if we do what is right, we get the biggest present in the world....ETERNAL LIFE!
i am happy. life is good. dont worry about me. i made sloppy joes today. they were good. there aint nothing else to say. keep it real.
so since i am out on brava in the next coming week, its gonna start getting harder to get my mail and junk but it will be tight still. zone conference in fogo will just be like christmas i guess!!! haha i will get everything at once. cool beans. well i am out. stay sweet
C LOVIN'
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