I've had some people ask me about this. The schooling in New Zealand is not too different from our own. They have Primary School (what we would call elementary school), Secondary School or High School (High School), then College (the last part of High School), and then Tertiary School (or maybe that's the same as New Zealand's college. Anyways. What we call college in America, they call University. To Americans, a University is a collection of colleges on a campus, and a college is just a school of a certain profession. Well, University of Uni is what they call it. Also, there is this learning program thingy called course. Course is just like University. It is just like a class on a certain thing. What we would call a vocational college or something.
So! The Christmas lights for the Hamilton temple started on the 8th! However, missionaries don't get to go. Sad. Day. There isn't a need for us to go, but still... Oh well. It won't effect anything. I'll just have to come back to NZ after my mission. :-) So, I gave my camera to a member to take some pictures. I didn't have time yesterday to get it back from him. As a result, there won't be any pictures with this email. Sorry.
We watched the First Presidency Christmas Devotional last night. I know, heaps of you will say, that happened like a week ago! Well... Not in New Zealand. It was Monday then in the afternoon or something. So, we watched it a week late. That's how General Conference will be as well, I'm told. I loved all of the First Presidency's talks. I loved P. Utchdorf's about recieving gifts a lot. It's not often that we hear someone tell us, receive be grateful. I admit that I usually am indifferent about the things I receive, but I will become better at doing that by receiving the many gifts that all of yous will send to me. ;-) Jokes! :-) Anyways, It was a great thing to hear from P. Utchdorf, and I advise you to follow his advice. P. Eyring's talk, to the best of my ability (I had to walk out of the chapel a few times with my companion to make some calls during his talk.), was about giving meaningful gifts. It was good. I thought of many ways I can improve my gift giving. P. Monson's talk was about giving of yourself. "He who gives money, gives much. He who gives time, gives more. But he that gives of himself, gives the greatest of them all" Or something like that. Anyways, P. Monson is the man, and you should all listen to what he has to say.
We have been teaching a lot of new member discussions with the ward missionaries. For everyone that doesn't know (that was me, about 3 months ago), the new member discussions are taught to the Recent Converts shortly after their baptisms. The Ward missionaries are the ones that generally teach those, and the missionaries usually sit back and supervise the teaching. However, they just need to be taught by someone other than us, so, all of yous preparing for missions can go about seeing how you can do that! Because it's great learning experience. Trust me. It will strengthen your confidence, it will strengthen your testimony, it will strengthen those you teach, and it will strengthen your teaching capability. So jump on it. Now. :-) You can talk to the Ward Mission leader about that, because he's the one that knows how to coordinate. So, the first task is finding out who that it. If you are like me before I went on my mission, you don't even know what a ward mission leader is, let alone who he is! Lol... :-) But, he is your go-to-guy for all of that stuff. So, do it! And then reap the blessings.
Anyways, so, we taught something like 13 New-Member discussions last week. Nuts! But it's cool to go back to those people that have already been baptised and to see their testimonies grow again and again when we teach them. :-)
Dear Mother and Father.
I sent a package home with some items in it. I wrote the names of who they go to on the packages (you'll understand what I mean when you open it.) But, you can read the notes on the top, and send those items to others that need to be sent on, and open the boxes and find out what I sent yous on Christmas. Please send the gift(s) on to those people that are not our family with speed so that they get home before Christmas please! :-) Thanks! I selected the gifts and picked them out individually for those I sent them too. No hints! And I made sure they were packed with enough bubble wrap so that you can't possibly tell what is in them. Supposedly, that package will be arriving shortly. I sent it on Tuesday, so it should be there at least by next Monday there (Tuesday here). So, no peeking!
That probably didn't make any sense. It read it over and died a little. So, Mom and Dad, open the package, read the note attached that says Mom and Dad, and follow the instructions for the other gifts. The one for the kids just keep. But you can easily just deliver them to houses, don't worry about mailing them. I neglected to think that those boxes will not fit in a letter, so they will cost money to mail along. So just deliver them.
Hopefully they made it through customs without any problems! :-)
One other thing. I need some recipes to cook Brownies. Just send me heaps of recipes please. I'm bored of eating noodles. So please. read what I just wrote before this. :-) That also goes for everyone. If you have any delicious recipes that are easy to make, send them to my family in email, and they can send them to me! :-)
Nothing else to write. I was kinda hoping to have some emails from family to reply to today, but I have not received any. Sorry there's no pictures today!
With lots of Love,
E. Staheli
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