Christmas!

Dear Family,

How are you doing this week?  I cant imagine that things can be that bad, it was just Christmas and the spirit during Christmas is just magical!  I hope that you are all healthy, not to stuffed from all the sweets that come with Christmas time!  I am so so so so grateful that we were able to skype.  I dont know if you could tell how frustrated I was to not be able to skype in the morning, but I am so grateful that it started working in the evening.  I  didnt realize how lucky I was to skype that night until my comp tried like everyday and nothing would work for him.  He finally got things to work this morning.  As I speak, he is skyping his family.  So happy for him!!

So this week... the work was hard.  Malagasies do not exactly spend Christmas the way that we do in America.  The Malagasy way is have some family over and you just enjoy some alcohol and just sit and talk.  Now, I do understand that Americans do that, but its not as bad, trust me!!  So, we tried to do our best with times and teaching.  We taught 27 times this week, I think and only got about 25 hours worked.  Usually we are in the 30s with both of those numbers.  So, my Christmas was so great!! I will tell you about it!  We got up, we had a wonderful breakfast... at least in terms of Malagasy food.  We made pankakes and hash browns with some syrup and ketchup for our hash browns! After that, I cleaned the house.  Just went crazy on the cleaning, we needed it.  We cleaned, prepared food for dinner, for dessert, and got ready to go out to work.  So, we planned on just eating lunch at one of the little hotely's and eating rice like a malagasy... but no one was open.  What is this?  Someone has got to feed the missionaries!! I guaruntee that Brock was fed like for every meal.  The least that Madagascar could do is have an open hotely so we can buy rice and Laoka... hahahaha.  So, yaa we found a stand where they had a cold bottle of juice, so my comp and I shared a cold bottle of fanta for lunch.  Memorable.  Then we went out to work.  So, it being Christmas time and all, it was snowing and just freezing cold... Yaa then I woke up.  So it was probably like solid 90's but 80% humidity... it was death.  Merry Christmas though.  We walked around trying to find people to teach.  We had some times scheduled, but they werent home, and if they were, they were drinking and just havin a jolly ole christmas.  Midway through the day we had planned to go to the local hospital and sing to the sick.  Let me tell you, we did not sound good.  Me and one other elder could hit notes... the other two are tone deaf... they did the best they could to make as little noise as possible while we sang silent night in english and malagasy mixed. Although we were not good at singing, the spirit was so strong!  Even though we were singing to old men with cathiters in their stomach, to naked women, to kids who were sleeping, you would have been amazed at the spirit that was in the room as the parents and family of the sick thanked us for taking the time to visit.  Meant a lot to them.  The rest of the day we were running errands to prepare for the massive dinner we had planned.  We got home after about 2 lessons that day and started getting dinner ready.  One elder was preparing hawaiian haystacks, while the rest of us cleaned up and got ready for our guest.  Yes, I know that guests are not allowed at the missionary home, but our leadership made an acception for the 1st counselor in our branch presidency!  Odilon is the name.  One of the nicest men I have met here in Mada!  He was married about 5 months ago to a very nice woman.  However, about 3 months ago his wife left to another part of Mada for work and still had not returned.  He was going to be alone for Christmas... NOT ON MY WATCH!  I had him over for dinner.  I also took the liberty of getting a small gift for him.  I bought him a nice little button up shirt.  So we enjoyed our meal, talked in Malagasy and English because he can do both and just enjoyed company.  Then he opened his gift.  The light in Odilon's eyes just lit up.  In English, he stated over and over, "thank you thank you" "oh man its wonderful, perfect"  You know that spirit of Christmas that you can feel when you do something for another person, or you walk down the stairs on Christmas morning to the tree... I felt that, when Odilon asked if he could try it on and take a picture.  He looked great in the shirt, perfect fit, great night.  The rest is history.  I hope that you were all able to feel the spirit of Christmas and remember the true meaning.  As the new year roles around, I am reminded of goals that I made in the MTC... time to make some new ones.  I love you all so much and hope that life will continue to be good to you.  HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Elder Herrin