What? 1/4 of my mission is already over?

This week has been a great one. Very busy, we taught lots of lessons and ate lots of rice. 

We taught Pak P. almost every night this week because he wanted to get baptized this week. Everything went well with him and he was baptized yesterday in the swimming pool of Hotel Trio! There was only like 1 other person in the swimming pool so it was a lot better and a lot more spiritual. I am so happy to see the gospel bless families. P.s' wife was baptized about a year ago and their kids are age 7 and like 5. I see them being a strong LDS family getting sealed in the temple later... so exciting! 

Something kind of sad happened this week. My back up pair of glasses broke! My newer pair broke a while ago and I can't use them anymore, and now my older pair broke too! They are being held together by some super glue for the time being. I went to the mall a few days ago to order some new glasses. My vision is pretty bad haha it is -7.25, at least I think that is pretty bad. My new glasses should come in a few days. We went to a new members house the day my glasses broke. She is a nice old lady who makes the best soto in the whole world! While we were eating she turned on the tv and we watched some Indonesian tv shows. They are sooo bad hahah the quality is just terrible and it is pretty cheezy haha, but that's what makes them so fun to watch too haha. 

We taught the first lesson to a new investigator this week and it was awesome. He has been coming to chruch for a while with his friend but wasn't ready to take the lessons from the missionaries, but now he wants to learn. He is great and I don't have any doubts he will get baptized soon too. There is a lot of potential in Magelang and the small branch is going to be too big for the building haha. 

Oh yeah and my mission is already 1/4 of the way over! That's a big chunk! I got my mission call almost 1 year ago. Before I know it I am going to be on the long plane ride home. 

Okay have an awesome week!

- Elder Hymas

It is really pretty in Magelang

Happy Chinese New Year!

Some yummy nasi goreng!

Baptism!

Going to the Swimming Pool and Feeding Monkies

Some fun stuff happened this week. We started off the week hunting down a big lizard called a tokek. Elder Zollinger and I caught it in a water bottle and took some pictures with it. Then we let it go freeee.

We also got a call earlier this week from one of our investigators and he told us that we wants to get baptized soon. We were surprised but pretty happy as you can guess. We still have some more to teach him but we have been meeting with him like every day and the plan is for him to get baptized this Saturday! Cool stuff.

The other elders in Magelang had a baptism this week for one of their investigators! Her baptism took place in a local swimming pool because the church here doesn't have a baptismal font yet. It wasn't the most ideal place to have a baptism but as long as it works right?

Today for P-day we climbed up a small mountain. There was a nice path up the mountain and there was also a lot of stairs. We were pretty beat once we got to the top. Once we got up there there was another path going down so we tried it. Once we reached the bottom we found ourselves at what looked like a military academy. There was a nice track and field and life size model tanks. I don't think we were supposed to be there haha so we climbed back up the mountain again and went down the right path. On the way down the mountain for the 2nd time we say a bunch of monkies and I feed them some knock-off M&Ms.

Well that's about it this week!
- Elder Hymas

A stupid cicak found its way into my oreos... :/

Me feeding a monkey

Most of the ward at the baptism

My companion and I

The place where the other elders baptism was at. Unique baptism that one was

A picture of me that a rambunctious primary kid took of me while I was trying to teach him English.

The Rambunctious Primary Kid

The Tokek we caught

White Washin' in Magelang

This week was transfer week! On Tuesday I moved to Magelang. The branch president of Magelang drove to Solo to drop off Elder Litster, so he was able to pick me up and take me back to Magelang with him. It was nice, the branch president likes jazz and Michael Buble. I met my new companion later that night, Elder Widigdo from Bogor. Elder Widigdo is an awesome missionary and a really nice person. We are getting along just fine. Elder Widigdo also just transferred to Magelang with me so that means we are white washing our area. We had a fun time this week figuring out who all the investigators are and where they live and who the members are. It wasn't that bad though, Magelang is probably the smallest area in the mission so it was manageable. This is the 3rd area that Elder Widigdo has white washed haha so he is pretty used to it now. Our house is pretty nice and big. There are 4 elders in Magelang, Elder Hymas, and Elder Widigdo. Elder Zollinger from Idaho and Elder Lie from Semarang.
I really like Magelang so far. Like I have said before it is up in the mountains. So the weather here is a lot colder. I think I might have went a day here without sweating which is weird. It is rainy season here though so it rains every day for a while and it rains hard. We got soaked a few times, but we are hard core missionaries so it didn't phase us. There is a lot less people here in Magelang so it is a lot more quiet and peaceful. The branch here is pretty small here. I think there was about 30 people at chruch yesterday, about 5 of them where investigators. The members here are all really cool and really good friends.
A few days ago we taught an old man who says he is Christian and goes to Church but we found out during the lesson that he doen't beleive in Jesus Christ. Haha I thought that was pretty weird. Nggak pain dia ikut gereja tetapi nggak percaya Yesus Kristus. Sangat aneh dia.
Oh yeah last Monday while I was still in Solo I ate some dog for the first time. It was actually pretty tasty... I wonder what type of dog it was....
Well have an awesome week!
- Elder Hymas

Elder Widigdo and I with some awesome members.

the sketchy place we ate some dog at

Some dog and rice! Yum!

Our English Class

The Church building

It rains a lot here

Last week In Solo

Well my last week in Solo has been pretty good. We were all a bit sick this week though, probably masuk angin, I'll tell you about masuk angin in a bit. I visited some people for the last time kinda sad but it's all okay, the work always move forward and it is just the life of a missionary. I don't know what it is like in other, "normal" missions but here you get transfered like every 6 months, sometimes longer haha. So you spend a lot of time in the same place and with the same people. And then you can get transfered to other city 500 miles away.

Yesterday our new member Brother H passed the sacrament for the first time and then bore his testimony in the meeting. He is awesome and I am going to miss him. We spent some time with him this week teaching him about the priesthood and about the history of the church and Joesph Smith. We watched the Joesph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration movie with him and it really helped his faith grow seeing all the hardship and sacrifices of the saints. I think Bro H is going to do just fine.

So I'll tell you a bit about "Masuk Angin". They believe in a sickness called masuk angin which roughly means enter wind. They believe that if the wind blows on you, especially when it is night/raining/cold that you WILL get sick from the wind entering your body. It is a legit thing and everyone believes in it and takes silly precautions to avoid it haha. The symptoms of masuk angin include coughing, sneezing, sore muscles, fever and headaches. Basically all of the symptoms of a cold or light flu. Didn't show up for work yesterday? "Sorry masuk angin!" Don't feel like getting out of bed in the morning? Masuk angin. I am often in closed rooms and it is hot even by Indonesian standards and they still will never turn on a fan because of their fear of masuk angin. Haha I just tell them that I am immune to it.

Alright well have an awesome week!
- Elder Hymas

Me with my first Durian. It tasted...unique..

Pak Jon and his family. they have the best ayam bakar ever!

A stray dog eating out of the trash, this is sadly a common sight.

Me with some awesome primary kids.