Teaching on the beach

How's it going ladies and gents?! It's been another mint week here in the ELM. I taught my first lesson on the beach, chilled in a convertible with my ward mission leader and l found a loophole to play the guitar more.

     

The highlight of this week is defiantly teaching a boy legend named Justin. Justin is an 11 year old boy that we started teaching this week. We are already good friends with his parents and everything is aligned perfectly for us to start teaching him and helping him to be baptized on the 19th of August. His parents told us that they asked him where he wanted the missionaries to teach him and he said, "The beach!" So we walked over and taught him there. So yes, he's the real MVP!

      

Brother Cresnowski, my ward mission leader, took us out for a nice lunch on Tuesday and he drove us around in his convertible. We talked a lot about new ideas that we want to introduce soon to the ward and getting everyone stoked on coconuts about doing missionary work.

     

Elder Anderson and I have been doing a lot of finding lately. This week we really focused on sharpening up our skills and finding more people to teach. And as a result, we got a referral for the Newcastle Elders, found an amazing German lady that we will hopefully be teaching tomorrow and loads of other potential people to teach. Like I said before, people are very friendly here, up north, so most people are willing to talk. August should be another awesome month for the us and for the North Shields district! 

     

It's been a pretty musical week so far as well. On Sunday Elder Anderson, Sisters Rigby and Cook and I sang a musical item on Sunday. We sang "Come Thou Fount" and it was a lot of fun. I never saw myself doing something like that before. On Thursday, I will be featured in another musical item as well. I'm gonna play a hymn on the guitar for a baptism. So I've got a loophole to pick up my guitar again and play.

     

Everyone is pretty excited for Wednesday to listen to Elder M. Russell Ballard. It should be a lot of fun and I really am excited to be inspired by him. Our mission has been having a lot of success with baptisms that President Turvey says the mission hasn't seen in years! That's all that I've to update on, hope all is well cheers!

-Elder Holyoak

Teaching Justin on the beach

Brother Cresnowski taking us for a ride

Movie man and the start of my black year

Hiyuh kids, you alright! This week Elder Anderson and I were film stars, we had interviews with our Mission President, Dave from York emailed me, we went bowling on P Day and we have a special guest coming to speak to the mission in August.

I went to a chippy with Elder Anderson a couple of days ago and something funny happened. When we finished eating and got up to leave a lady asked us, "Can you guys stay there for 5 more minutes? We've been making a film and you've been in the background." So we stayed and now we're in an Independent English short film haha!

     

President and Sister Turvey came up to North Shields for interviews again. They had a really cool announcement for us. Elder M. Russell Ballard is coming to speak to our mission on the 2nd of August! It's crazy because we just had Present Nelson speak to us in December, so we're really excited for that. 

     

This week I was able to go all the way up to Alnwick, the Northernmost part of the mission and go on an exchange. In that village, it has the actual castle used for Hogwarts in Harry Potter! I haven't actually seen it yet, but I definitely will when I go on a P Day. I went on an exchange with the Elder Mills(a former companion). He's still his proper farm boy self, but we had a good day together again. 

     

I don't really have much else to update on, this week went by really quick. My official 1 year mark is in 3 days..... CRAZY! I already burned a shirt with Elder Livingston when I had the chance. 

-Elder Holyoak

1 year "Burning of the Shirt"

Bowling on P-Day

1st week in North Shields

Way Ay, it's been a proper canny week like! How's it going guys? There's a lot new stuff going on here up in North Shields. I was pranked by a member, Geordie Accents galore, American football in England, and I went to Leeds for a district meeting.

     

Hey you alright and everything. On Tuesday I took a train up to Newcastle and waved goodbye to the York Zone. The train ride was beautiful going through Darlington, Durham and Newcastle. Elder Anderson (my new companion) from Farmington, Utah picked me up and we went over to North Shields. He's a good bloke and he's been on his mission 6 weeks less than me and he's super chill. He's served in the Leeds 1 ward and here so far. He's a pretty funny guy. I've never served around someone that's so chill all the time... haha. We get along really well and he's breaking me into the area. There's so much already that I love about North Shields! It's the largest area that I've been in so far. Our main source of transportation is the Metro and buses and people really do get more friendly the more north you go.       

     

Along with the Geordie accent, you know that you've met a proper Geordie when you hear one. There's only been a handful of really broad ones that I've had trouble understanding so far. I'm now in the county of Northumbria. It is the one that touches the Scottish boarder, so the teams in my district are in the Northernmost part of the mission. Since I have a brand new district, I'll introduce everyone to you. So we've got Elder Rodriguez from Barcelona with Elder Mills the same potato lovin' bloke that I served with  up in the Alnwick Branch on the borders. I'll be going on exchange there soon, so I'll let you know how that goes. Then we have Sister Filikitonga from Tonga and Sister Hope from Arizona up in the Ashington Branch. And last but not least, we have the North Shields Sisters, Sister Cook from Garden City, Utah and Sister Rigby Kaysville, Utah.  We've got a proper canny (very good) district over here!

     

On Wednesday we went to Young Men's because we're teaching James who comes. Some of them had never played American Football before, so we taught them which was super cool.

     

On Thursday, I went over to a deaf members home named Sister Thompson for tea for the first time. When I got in the sisters were speaking sign language to her. I was trying my best to communicate to her with my iPad. After a while, Sister Thompson said, "I just can't do this anymore!" She wasn't actually deaf and I was super thrown off and everyone laughed. It was a pretty good prank because Sister Thompson can fluently sign. Haha!

     

I'm really enjoying it over here so far. It's always a weird transition moving to a new area, new missionaries to serve around, and new members but it's good. The work is güd. 

Take care and cheers!

-Elder Holyoak

My new district

Prankster sister missionaries and my new companion Elder Anderson

England Leeds mission District Leaders

Transfers..................

Way Ay Man! This week we taught a bloke that I found in February, I had some American and English pride, an exchange with the traveling assistants again and TRANSFER CALLS AND....... I'M MOVING TO NORTH SHIELDS!

We received transfer calls on Saturday and tomorrow I'll be moving up north to Geordie Land to North Shields! It's a town that's really close to Newcastle. I'm staying as the District Leader up there and I'm proper pumped. Elder Withers is going back home to Idaho, Elder Lewis is going to a small town called Peterlee and Elder Livingston is training. We're also getting two other new missionaries in Brid while I'm gone. President Turvey made a big change to the mission. Over two thirds of the missionaries were moved or changed leadership positions. The funny thing is that I'm going to the area where Elder Lewis just came from and serving with his previous companion, Elder Anderson. I've only heard good things about the area and that the Bishop is super cheeky. I'm excited to let all of you know about my adventures up there!

     

This week was of course the 4th of July. Instead of celebrating for America, I went to something called the Proms night. It's basically just a British pride celebration night where they sing songs and waves flags, no fireworks though so that was kinda lame haha. Another really cool thing that happened this week was that Elder Livingston and I decided to knock on a former investigator that I found way back in February. When he opened the door for us he was super friendly and had us come in and share our message with him. He's a cool guy with electric guitars hanging all over his walls and a really nice wife, with 3 boys a girl. Elder Livingston and his trainee will be seeing them next week.

     

I don't have much else to update on. I'm a bit sick today so I'm gonna go chill while I can. Take care and pray for me that I can understand the Geordies this week haha! 

 Cheers!

-Elder Holyoak

North Shields

Proms Night-British Pride Day on July 4th

Showing American Pride

England Leeds Missionary Assignments and Areas

(You can find Elder Holyoak under the Sunderland Zone)

Happy Treason Day Peasants!

Happy treason day peasants! Tomorrow will be my first 4th of July outside of the promised land, so it's going to be like any other day haha. This week I did some missionary work with a German, we brought a special guest to district meeting, and somebody is preparing for a baptism!

     

So I gotta quick funny story before I jump right in. I was getting a haircut today and the barber asked me, "You want any off the fringe?" I had no idea what he was saying, so I ask him what a fringe is. And it's the bangs of your hair! I thought that I was getting pretty used to what British words mean and everything, but this one caught me off guard. I've heard that around Yorkshire people use different words for things.

     

On Wednesday for district meeting, I invited the legend of the branch Jamie Ackroyd to come and participate with us missionaries. I forgot to take a picture, but it was really fun to have him there. After that, Elder football (Elder Livingston) and I went to Scarborough to go on another exchange. This was my first time going with Elder Kull from Germany. I had only briefly met him in the MTC, but it was ace spending a day with him in rainy Scarborough. 

     

We made some really good progress with Rory this week. We were able to set a goal with him to work towards his baptism!! He got work off for all of his future Sunday's and is getting close to stopping smoking.  During the last lesson we had with him, he sang for us, "Johnny B Good" and that was lit. 

     

Well the time has come again for transfer calls. Everyone is telling me that I'm leaving Brid, which is pretty likely. Also, next week Elder Withers is going home to Idaho. Happy Forf of July everyone, make sure to keep your fringes in line.

Cheers!

-Elder kaoyloH

Elder Kull from Germany

Delectable Week

Wazzup my American peeps! This week I went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders in York, James over in Scarborough got baptized, I hosted my second district meeting and we got the coolest new poster for our flat.

     

It started off a pretty delectable week going on exchange in York with Elder Glenn. The cool things about being around Elder Glenn is that he speaks Chinese. I never realized how many Chinese people live in York until I went on this exchange. We would walk around the streets and he would stop a Chinese person and they would just stare at him and probably think, "This white guy is speaking fluent Chinese to me!" A couple of them said, "Wow! So clear!" We had a lesson with a recent convert named WanTing. We actually met her in one of the public building in the University of York. It was weird walking around the University grounds on my mission for a little haha. 

     

On Saturday, the super star of the district, James, got baptized! I wasn't able to go over to Scarborough to see it, but the other lads said that it went really well. On Sunday he revived the Holy Ghost and was interviewed to receive the Priesthood. Also, he is going to go to Preston to do baptisms for his father soon.

     

I had my second district meeting this week. I'll only be holding 4 more, until we have our next transfers.  It's been a lot of fun planning them and helping missionaries to have fun and be uplifting at the time.

     

One last funny story before I wrap up this email. In England there are bus adverts (advertisements) everywhere. Elder Livingston and I saw a man taking out the old posters and putting in the new ones. So naturally we asked him, "Hey mate can we have one of those posters?" He wrapped it up all nice and gave it to us. So our newest feature to our flat is a massive Transformers poster that we all signed haha. 

     

Overall it was a pretty good week. The work is going güd and the church is true. Hope y'all have a good week, pip pip cheerio!

-Elder HolySmokes

A little Harry Potter reference

Elder Glenn, the Chines speaking Elder

Flat Mates

Transformers, more than meets the eye

Happy Favuhs Dee!

Hello my American peeps. Here is another update from sunny Brid. This week was the hottest week of my mission so far, I interviewed someone for baptism for the first time, Rory came to church and I got to eat out with President and Sister Turvey!

     

Hey up, summer is definitely here in Brid! I bought some aloe vera for the boys in the flat, because we keep getting burnt.... haha. Most days it's been around 27 degrees, which is in the 80s in Fahrenheit. I took some quick slick pics in the sun for all of y'all.

     

On Sunday, I took a train over to Scarborough to interview someone named James for baptism. Elder Kull and Barff have been teaching him for a while and he's the most prepared person that I've ever met. He's been going to institute and has visited the temple grounds with his girlfriend. That was defiantly the spiritual highlight of my week! His baptism will be this Saturday and I'm really hoping that I'll be able to bring someone over from Brid to see it.

     

So, the funny story for this week is about Elder Livingston. During morning exercise we ran to the beach like we normally do and he saw a wooden post to break up the waves poking up out of the water. And he told me, "Dude I gotta take a quick karate kid picture on that!" He goes to jump up onto it and he missed and destroyed his leg. His leg had scrapped up against it and it cut his leg up. He was just laughing at himself and said, "I guess that's what I get for being disobedient and getting close to the water!" Obviously, us 18-20 year old blokes are tempted to get in the water on these hot days, but we are resisting and I learned my lesson without getting hurt.....haha.

     

On Friday, we had interviews. But this time, my mission President came to Bridlington. He and Sister Turvey interview my district and I. After they were finished, they asked us if we could show them around Bridlington because they had never been here before. So we showed them our flat. We rushed in and cleaned a couple things before they came in and then toured a bit around the town. Then they wanted to take us out for a meal. We ate at this restaurant called "Aloha." It had some proper Mexican food, which is really hard to find here in England. It was great getting to know them in a relaxed environment and just hanging out with your mission President and his wife for a little! I talked to President Turvey about music and his band growing up. He was in 4 different bands and mostly played the electric guitar. He told me that his favourite live band that he saw was Led Zeppelin. That's right, he saw them live! That was a really fun night.

     

On Sunday, it was Father's Day of course and I need to say at least something about my dad in this letter. I wouldn't be the person I am today without him. He always makes me feel good about myself and has been a smashing example to me. Love you Money Maker Mike!  During Sacrament the primary sang "I'm so glad when dad and grandad comes home" in their cute British accents and Rory came! Rory has been making a lot of progress getting off cigarettes and coffee. Things are going really well as of late and I'm just gonna keep trucking along. Hope you chaps have a superb week. Cheers!

-Elder Holysmokes

Dinner with Brother and Sister Turvey

Dodgy me in the water

James

UK pride- Yorkshire flag on the left, Union Jack on the right