Transfer Week

Dear family,

Today is a great day.  I hope that you have all had the opportunity to take a minute just to think about how great our lives really are.  I sit here tonight on the beach.  Literally, I am in Tamatave with my mission president sitting on the Indian Ocean talking about how great it is to have the gospel in our lives.  I am so grateful for you and your love for me. 

That Being said, this week was WAY hectic.

President was gone most of the week visiting missionaries in fort dauphin.  We did a couple of things to pass the time... Hahaha.  We went on a split with the zone leaders, elder Yeagley and elder Coleman! Two wonderful missionaries.  I went out with elder yeagley and reminisced on old fort dauphin times.  We taught some great lessons and I found out that the woman that I taught and baptized in his area is doing great and has a calling now.  Nothing better for a missionary to hear than that. That was a great day.  After that started the crazy hectickness. 

On Wednesday we went to help move houses for a couple of the elders.  They were moving from one house to the other which meant that three houses were involved because the one that they were moving out of, someone else moved into.  So we started taking things down, and moving things from one house to the other.  Almost an hour into it, the landlord of the new house called and told us that we could not move in... She wanted to the money in her hands before we moved in. We payed it through the bank. Of course.  Soo we moved the elders to.... our house.  This took us allll day long.  Literally we finished up at about 4 o'clock in the afternoon.  By that time we had got stuck in traffic and had a little incident.  Just a really long day for Elder Herrin and Elder Covey.  It seemed like the night was never going to end.  We ended up taking the six elders that were living with us to pick up food because they didnt have any (of course) and then back to our house.  All while trying to keep things up in the office.

The next day was great.  We got up and ran a couple of errands.  We picked up a backpack for an elder, bought a mirror for one that we may or may have knocked off, and then got back to the office for a district meeting.  I am just going to say that district meetings are the best.  Every time I get the chance to attend one it just lifts me.  Elder Morse, one of the district leaders in the South Zone gave a great lesson about goal setting.  He talked about what type of goals we should be making and how we need to be keeping track of them.  As I kind of challenged you all last week to make some goals, this meeting just was a testament to me that I need to make some goals.  We walked downstairs to the office only to find my favorite sister woolley with a black eye.  Turns out, earlier that morning she had her phone stolen by some random guy.  He reached into her pocket as she was walking to her field where she does exercises and thought he was just going to grab an elderly womans phone and leave.  He thought wrong.  As he reached in, so did sister woolley. She didnt let go of the phone.  As he realized that he was going to get a little resistance, he got close to her and shoved her to the ground.  As the two hit the concrete steps, sister woolley did the only thing any good fighter would do. She bit his ear.  "I bit him good" she told us.  Right at the top of the ear, just like our friend Mike Tyson.  Unfortunately, Elder Woolley was a tad too late, but that didnt stop him from trying to get the kid.  Elder Woolley chased him until he too fell.  Both great efforts, but the phone is gone.  Soo later that evening we picked up President... he asked us if we held the fort together...

We kind of spent New Years Eve with he and sister Foote.  It was a nice evening of chatting and talking about how great the mission is.  A day later we took off to Tamatave.

We drove up early Saturday morning and showed up at noon.  President did interviews with the missionaries  the rest of the day.  He is long winded... hahahah.  Church was great the next day.  We were able to attend two branches and then have a great meeting with all the leaders after.  We talked about the growth of Tamatave and how we want it to become a stake.  We talked about numbers and ideas and member work.  I translated for president, not the easiest thing to do.  After the meeting we went to pres. Pauls for dinner.  We got to ear rice and laoka with pres and sis foote.  What a fun night.  For some reason, it seems like the fun always turns to a crazy thing here in Mada.  We got back to our beds that night and got a call from president foote telling us that one of the missionaries needed to go to the hospital.  We threw our clothes back on and got marcellin (the driver) to pick us and the sickly up. Got him to the hospital at 11 oclock and they didnt know anything.  They asked him some questions and suggested some medicines that we pick up...oh malagasys.  I stayed with the sick missionary that night while my comp went to the missionary house.  While on thier way home, they hit a posy posy driver with two people in the posy posy.  The people went flying and the posy posy went to pieces... they spent another hour plus taking people to the hospital (that we just came from) dealing with the drunken police and trying to make a deal with the posy posy driver on how much money we owed him.  What a night. 

The next day we got up and waited for Marcellin to deal with the police before we went up to a place called foul point.  A beatiful beach that has white sand.  We had a zone activity planned.  We played beach volleyball and beach soccer.  Way fun day. 

Tonight, I sat on the beach of the Indian Ocean and talked about what the future holds and how confident my mission president is in my companion and I.  He knows that if we live the gospel, if we continue to make great choices that no matter what we choose to do with our life, we will be successful.  Nice to know that someone has that much confidence in me.  I love being here on the mission.  It is the greatest blessing in my life.  I love being a missionary!

All my love

Elder Herrin

Elder covey and a cute kid

The tamatave zone

Tratra ny Krismasy!

Dear Family,

Merry Christmas, again.  It was so good to be able to talk to you this week. My siblings are all getting to be so big... kinda weird.  Its so funny to see them the way they are going about life now.  Rhet is driving to and from practice, Maci is playing basketball and playing the piano and Ty is doing all his sports while finding a way to keep his little mouth moving.  It amazes me.  Mom and dad, well, I love you.  What a wonderful hour and a half that I had to chat.  Just knowing that the next time I talk to you will be in person... a little weird to be honest.  What are we doing for the new year?  Party at the Browns?  That has seemed to be the usual! 

My week was fantastic.  As I told you when we talked, the office couples decided to get the workers here at the office a gift.  They bought 19 ducks for each of them.  Yes, 19 live ducks.  Elder Covey and I got to help Sis. Woolley put a little tinsel around each of the necks to make them festive.  Then the workers came one by one to pick up their gift.  First come, first got the fattest. 

As for the missionaries, we had a big party.  Elder Covey and I were here at the office early making pancakes and eggs with President and Sister Foote.  We fed the missionaries a mighty breakfast.  After we had finished that, we had a really nice spiritual thought.  We heard from Sis. Rossitter (our mission nurse) and from President and Sister Foote.  Both talked briefly about the true meaning of Christmas.  There was something that President Foote talked about that really hit me.  He was talking about coming to know our Savior better, on a personal level.  He said, "As missionaries, we wear him on our chest every day, but He wears us on his hands and feet."  It was a really powerful statement that hit me.  I have thus started to study more about the Savior.  What a great man he is.  We played a couple of games with both zones and finished the afternoon off by watching "A Christmas Story".  WITH the approval of President Foote of course. 

I spent a lot of time with the Footes as we work closely together.  We got to hear about all of his Christmas traditions and what he did with his family.  I pondered about the wonderful Herrin traditions that we have.  I hope that you all were able to get into your new Christmas pajamas and go look at Christmas lights.  I hope that you were able to all spend the night in the same room to awake to the wonderful feeling of Christmas day.  I hope that dad read from Luke and that you all got to feel of the true meaning of that Christmas day. 

I know that Jesus Christ died for the sins of the world.  For you and me.  I know that through Him, we can be saved and that we can all return to live with our Heavenly Father once again. 

As we prepare for this new year of 2016, I DARE you to make some goals.  Push yourself.  I will do it as well.  Thanks so much for being my support team back home.  I could not do this without you.  I love you so much.  I love being a missionary, too!

All my Love

Elder Herrin

This week's pics

My Journies

Dear Family,

Wow... it seems like it has been a long long time.  Well, it has been.  I apologize if it has taken me too long to write.  I know that there are no excuses, but I have just been traveling and found that there is a lot to do.  With that being said, I know that my family comes first... so starting now until I mess up again, I will keep it that way.  I miss you all so much.  With the holiday season coming up, I think of you often.  I dont feel like its Christmas time, not even a little bit, but I know that this time of year brings great joy to us all.  I hope that you find someone to spread this joy with during the season. 

So its been a couple weeks and boy have I had some crazy adventures.   We have been to Toliara, another beach province on the South East corner of Madagsikara, and we have also been to Tamatave.  I want to share a couple of amazing experiences with you from those two week long trips. 

Our first trip was originally planned for Fianarantsoa.  We went and visited the missionaries down there so that President could do his interviews.  We got down there and President looked to us and said, "We are already half way to Toliara, do you wanna continue on down the road and do interviews down there while we are at it?"  Of course, Elder Covey and I agreed and we took off.  We got in the car the next day and were on the road.  Fun times when you get to talk to your mission President and his wife and learn from their experiences.  We got to the beachy sands of Toliara and started interviews.  That evening, President treated the 4 missionaries and us to dinner on the beach... Just amazing views.  The food was good too.  Then came the excitement. 

The next day we got back on the road to head back to Tana.  It was going to be a two day trip as its a cross country drive.  We had planned to go all the way back to Fianarantsoa on one day and then make the rest of the drive the next day.  The total km's for the first day was 511.  We made it almost 300 when we stopped for lunch in this nice little town.  We took off for the second half of the drive.  When we got to km 500 we saw that cars had started to slow down to a complete stop.  We werent sure what was the matter.  So my companion and I started to ask around.  We found out that there was a bridge that had given way... No one was going through the night.  People had started to "set up camp" in their cars, on the road, wherever they could.  We figured that it would not be a good idea to be there because we were white and we had things that were of value in the car.  So we turned around headed back down the other way not knowing what to do.  We pulled over to pray.  We prayed that we would be able to find gas (something that we were running low on) and we prayed for protection and the reassurance that we would be ok for the night.  We stopped to talk to a road police guy for a little bit after we had finished praying.  He told us that he wasnt sure when the bridge would be fixed.  We asked about gas.  He happily responded that 10 minutes down the road was a gas station that was open 24/7.  That in and of itself is a miracle because many gas stations are not 24/7 so to find one in the middle of no where was amazing.  We got gas and decided that it would be best to meet up with one of the senior couple who was leaving Toliara the same day.  We drove about 200km back towards toliara to the place that we had lunch.  We had the couple get us a room and it all worked out.  I know it may not seem like a whole lot, but to be in a situation like that where you are driving at 11 oclock at night praying that things will work and then to have them work out is just amazing to me.

This last week Elder Covey and I spent working in Tamatave.  We took two other elders with us to go and do splits up there to boost the areas and the work.  Two of us went with one companionship (4 total elders).  One set of elders taught the program that they had scheduled, the other set tracted all day long to look for new investigators to teach.  It is still amazing to me just how receptive people are here to the gospel of Jesus Christ.  I would tract and most times the very first door would let us in to share our message.  One cool thing that I got to be apart of was the District Meeting.  The district leader had asked me to give the lesson.  I had thought that I had a lesson ready and then at the last minuted changed the lesson.  I talked about exact obedience.  I felt that some of the elders really needed it.  We read from the white handbook and then from King Benjamins address in Mosiah.  We talked about that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass.  I have a strong testimony of that.  I know that obedience is the first law of heaven.  I think that its just great that we have been given so much help from our heavenly father to help us here on earth.  I had a couple of elders ask me after the meeting how they can start being exactly obedient.  I thought it was really cool that they wanted to apply something that I taught.  Made me feel like I was making a difference.  I hope that I gave good advice and that I am a good example for them. 

I have sent a couple of pictures home.  I hope that you got them. I played with the lemurs a little, that was fun.  I love you all so much.  Thank you for all your prayers and help.  I love being a missionary. 

All My Love

Elder Herrin

Pictures from Lemur Park

This is me feeding a lemur... on my shoulder.

Then me trying my best to feed a small lemur while not making out with him...

Pictures from Toliara Trip

Picture of Sis. Foote driving and Pres. in the passenger seat.  Long drives... means change of drivers often.

A beautiful picture of a sunset.

Some people that sold us some great fruit along the way.  They were happy to see that we spoke their language

This week's pics

This is a kid that we stopped to help.  His bike was broken so we helped him. As you can tell... I kept good watch over them just in case a big bear was about to attack. 

Love ya