Saturday, December 26, 2015

Week 76

ITS CHRISTMAS WEEK!!!!!!!!! I am looking forward to a very much needed skype sesh! I cant wait to see all you guys!

This week doesnt have a lot to tell. It is unreal hot here. We walk outside everyday and I just laugh... it really is comical how we live haha. From 2pm to 9pm I am losing on average 6-8 lbs of water weight! I feel like Im doing hot yoga during our lessons.

I got to go on a comp exchange this week. I walked with Elder Watteyne. He is from Logan, but we played against each other in lacrosse my senior year when he was a sophomore. Small world. It was a nice time getting to talk about lax for a little bit, its been quite a while.

As far as the area and the work... well there is work to be done. We are working hard and being obedient, but there is something else we need to be doing because we just arent catching the right breaks these days. None of our families came to church yesterday. We dont know why Magre didnt come, because his wife, Sarifa, was there. We are going over there tonight to see whats up. We are still hoping to open there marriage process this week since last week didnt work out. Hopefully we can get them to understand the commitment they need to put into this.

In all honesty thats all I really got. We get to talk more on Christmas day. My skype time is from 4pm to 440pm on Christmas day! Im super excited! Try not to freeze this week!

Much Love,
Elder Hruby


We got to skype with Elder Hruby on Christmas day and it was so awesome! He is doing well and is the same old Grant we love and miss. Crazy to think that the next time we skype him will be a month before he comes home!




Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Week 75

I'll just start by saying this so I can leave it alone the rest of the email so I dont annoy you guys... IT IS SO HOT! Ive never had a week this hot. Everyone single day, except yesterday was bloody hot. But this week was pretty solid.

As rough as Pday was last week was, we ended it on a good night. We had a family night with a less-active member and his wife who isnt a member (Manuel e Isabel). It was solid and he shows some strong interest to come back and she came to church by herself yesterday cause Manuel had to work! She liked it and a lot of the Relief Society gave her a warm welcome. Progress baby!

The big news this week... Magre e Sarifa are moving on their documents! We taught them about marriage and explained the docs on Tuesday and they accepted in no hesitation. The only dificulty is they are from Quelimane which is further north than Beira, so to get an original copy of their birth certificate is tricky, but God works miracles and they have some family members that were super willing to help out and we should have the docs down here this week. We want to try and open the process by Friday so that they can be married and baptized on January 9th!!! Im stoked for them. They are one of those families that really recognize just how much the gospel is blessing/changing their lives. It is my favorite thing to see too.

We also have another family, Americo e Rosa who had already come to church a few times and accepted baptism, but this week they accepted marriage and they have a super easy doc situation! We will probably go a little slower with them, however, since they need a little more time to understand everything and gain a real testimony, but miracles nonetheless!

Matola has been doing us dirty lately. I feel like Im back in Beira sometimes with the power outages and lack of water, of which we had both this week. We ran out of water for only like 24 hours, but we didnt have that many bottles of water stored in the house, so Wednesday night I set a new personal record showering with about 700ml of water haha! Luckily, the next morning I went out to the water spout and it was flowing so we filled up like 80 bottles of water, just to have the water start pumping through the house again... at least next time we will have bottles! Also, energy went out Saturday night... which was probably the hottest day of the week... joy. Woke up at least a dozen times just soaked in sweat haha. I dont even get mad really anymore I just think its hilarious... Ill go through anything for the story ya know!

Well I think thats all for this week. We will be skyping on Christmas day I believe. Not quite sure on the time yet, though. Im beyond excited! Im trying to think of which stories I want to tell in our limited time... gotta be something good, get you guys rolling on the ground a bit :) Have a great week!

Much Love,
Elder Hruby

Tuesday, December 8, 2015

Week 74

So I will be sprinting to write this email. We have had a rough time finding a place to do internet. Energy is out in most of the zone, and this place we found is only letting us do it for 15min. Gotta love Pdays right?

This week was... well it felt rough. Looking at our week we actually had some good success. 2 families and 8 people at church. Most Elder Ellingson and I have had. I think this week was tough partially because the week before was so good. Also, summer has arrived in full force. Im currently dripping sweat onto the keyboard and my shirt is partially see through from the sweat... gross I know.

Magre e Sarifa are doing super well! We taught them about marriage and they accepted with baptism for January 9th.... thats in 2016! I will be super pumped when we get them in the water. It will be the first family baptism in this area in a long while. We are trying really hard to find other families but our main difficulty isnt sitting with new families, its that the message just doesnt seem to get through. Its in one ear and out the other. This is a God fearing people, but sometimes that plays against them in that they will believe anyone that shows up to their door and say Jesus. kind of frustrating, but we are bound to be lead to some golden families. Well in fact this week we did find one super cool family. Manuel was baptized in 2008 and now is inactive and married (not legally). His wife isnt a member, but is open to us and he really has a desire to return to the Church. Writing this email I dont know why I was pouting about our week so much... it actually was pretty solid. Hindsight is 20-20.

Story time! Me and Elder Ellingson went to the machamba with a Sister member. That is there big garden land thing. Well we went with Irma Lydia. It was the hottest day of the year, 41 or 42 degrees! I burnt bad!!! We went out there with our hoes and started clearing land for her to plant stuff. We worked for about 3 hours and I was so dead and so sweaty afterwards. The rest of the week I was dying too. The best part of the story has to be the transportation to and from. We had to ride in the back of a truck with about no joke 50 other people, standing mind you. It was about a 45min ride, but we only traveled about 8 miles haha. They were harrassing us and making all sorts of jokes because you never see white people doing that, but Lydia defended us. It was so packed tight and everyone was holding onto each other it was ridiculous, you wouldnt have believed it if you saw it. I felt like I was at a high school dance, except the fact that the girl in front of me wasnt my cute date, it was a big ole machamba mama, and the person behind was a shirtless man haha.... oh this place is paradise!

Well time is short, hope life is running well, I love this time of the year! Even in the heat Christmas is still real. Talk to you next week!

Much Love,
Elder Hruby


Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Week 73

This was one of the best weeks of the entire mission! The work, the place, the families, and the mission in general was osum! Elder Ellingson and I finished this transfer with fashion. We had by far our best week of work of the transfer. We hit almost all our goals and we had 2 new families at church! One of them is looking like they could really progress, Magre e Sarifa!

So today was transfers. I now enter into my 12th out of 16! That is crazy! With the divisions of the wards last week and some talking with Pres, me and Elder Ellingson we given the entire ward of Liberdade as our own. We picked up another area since there were elders working there, but we moved them out and now we own it all! Means even more walking, but we should never have a down day because of all the area we have and all the members too! It is a vote of confidence in me and Elder Ellingson but Im stoked. We are getting a family this transfer I can feel it in my bones haha.

So my second Thanksgiving on the mission... has to have been one of my favorite Thanksgiving of my entire life. We went big and bought a real turkey and a bunch of other good stuff and actually put together a meal our moms would have been very proud of! We had turkey, mashed potatoes with gravy, rolls, salad, a fruit jello salad, apple pie, ice cream, lemon bars, bunch of soda, and we found non alcoholic champagne, and PUMPKIN PIE! Elder Holt made the pie from scratch and it was delish! We went out to work on Thursday morning and when we came back for lunch Elder Holt and Sharpe blindfolded us and took us into the house, they had set up a surprise for us. When they brought us back into the living room they unblindfolded us and they had cleaned up and reorganized the room and covered the tables with food and table cloths and drinks and they even had built a tower of coca colas with flaming fireworks coming out the top... ya it was extreme, but I loved it. We then popped the champagne bottles and ejoyed ourselves a lovely little missionary Thanksgiving! Went back out to work and had a successful day, although it was soooo hot. Because of the heat there was a pretty wicked lightning storm that evening, so much lighting that we actually had to go home an hour early! All in all it was a great holiday. Made even better knowing aunt Connie is doing better. I love that lady!

Those are the highlights from my week. I cant believe Im done with my 11th transfer. Time is a trip... I know I say that a lot, but it is so weird here on the mission. The work continues and Im looking forward to this next transfer, and of course the fact that our 3rd skype sesh is less than a month away! I love you guys to the moon and back!

Much Love,
Elder Hruby