I am Elder Jake Rose, and I am currently serving in the Tonga Nuka'alofa mission. I left to the MTC January 5, 2011 and will arrive back to my home in Utah in two quick years.
This is my story and the stories of the people of Tonga.





Elder Jacob Aaron Rose

Tonga Nuku'alofa Mission

P.O. Box 58

Nuku'alofa, Tongatapu, Tonga

South Pacific

Monday, April 25, 2011

well it's me again. And I'm freakin happy just so ya know.

Hello everyone!


Another week flown by here in tonga! I swear i just wrote you all yesterday or something but i guess not haha. I loved all your emails this week!Thank you for them all! okay i'll just hop to it! 4/15 We had a big meeting all the missionaries on the main island with the area president. Elder Callister. It was good! We just talked about how the Book of Mormon restores all the plain and simple truths lost in the bible! It's pretty sweet! I didn't bring my notes so i can't tell ya. So i'll just say it was good. Then after that I got mail! Got a tape from mom! So don't loose hope that your mail is lost. It hopefully will eventually get here! Then later that night we went over to the church. The ward chior was practicing cause they were performing at stake conference! Which stake conference goes like this. Preisthood saturday from 2-4 and then the real meeting from 5-7 then on sunday from 10-12. it's crazy! 4/16 made a big realization. came up with a theory and even tested it! So whenever you walk past people, which is alot you just say like alu koe ( go you) or toki ha'u it( just come it is the literal translation but it's like did you just come from there) and people respond by saying yo. well i think people just make noise and people just act like they knew what is being said. So i tested it. Someone walked by and i just made some noise and they responded by saying yo. Point proven. Tongan is just jibberish and acting like ya know what's goin on ;) haha. anyway i helped my comp upload some of his pictures to the computer. Then we went to kolomotu'a for stake conference. it was really good. One of the guys that spoke i could actually make out almost all the words just couldn't make sense of the sentence. but that shows improvement! Then they had a guy from australia! He spoke and after each sentence a guy translated to tongan so i was able to understand! He talked about spiritual crocodiles and how temptations can just come out of nowhere. but we need to be strong. I really felt the spirit there. 4/17 wen't to kolomotu'a for conference again. Again the Auzzy guy talked to us and he talked about the spirit and how it can work through us. i actually talked to the guy after and told him i was from kaysville. He asked if i knew any martineaus I said i did ( nick martineau) He said when he comes to utah he stays with them. I didn't think i'd meet anyone here who knew people i did haha. crazy he was from australia. anywho then we went to our fafanga and ate good. The guy told us about his mission here in tonga. he started crying when he talked about the miracles he saw happen here. It was good. Then we went to a recent converts house and visited the family. They were very thankful we came buy and we looked at alot of like family photos they had. When we got home the ZL's said to pack cause i was bein transfered tomorrow (transfer day) but they didn't know where. So i packed and cleaned and then wrote in fale's rememberance journal and he wrote in mine. Fale was mad when he found out he was stayin in Longolongo. He wanted to move. well 4/18 Transfer day! One transfer already done! only like 16 left! we woke up and got ready and waited around for someone to come get me! I just read the BOM and talked to fale. After a long while fale said we should go call the ZL's to see what was goin on. so we did. This transfer was weird. All that was happening was me and elder unga were switching. I was only moving a town over. So I came to Kolomotu'a and elder Makasini is my new comp. That was unga's trainer and unga went with fale. Kinda weird but i was happy cause i already knew makasini and i liked him. He's funny. I still have P day the same day and will throughout the mission.  He has already helped me more in the language than fale did. He knows what i have to go through cause he didn't really know tongan either so he's helpin me alot! Well after i got to kolomotu'a (means town old) we went to visit some members and talk. then we went to our fafanga and they just took us to get food and so we went to eat with fale and unga. Then us 4 went to that recent converts house again and talked to them and made sure things were good. That night me and makasini talked til 2 am. haha. 4/19 woke up and did the kolipoki thing. English and tongan reading the BOM. Then for comp study we did the same thing and maka was just explainin stuff to me and helpin alot Then we went to district meeting. it was good. 2 of the elders in our district didnt show up but we did it anyway. We finished a little early so me maka fale and unga just did like doctrine questions we had and helped answer them til time was up. Then after that we came back. Maka took a nap and i kolipoki'd again. WHen he woke up we set up the baptismal program for the girl that's bein baptized saturday that him and unga taught. Then we went to our fafanga! It was such a nice house! actually a millionaire. They had carpet! First time i saw that here! The lady grew up in the states and is actually going to her sons wedding in utah next week! She said she'd take a letter for me. so i'll send a little package with my sim cards in it so she can send it from utah to kendra!  Then we came back home and talked with the family who's property our house is on. They have a little kid named george who is so cute! He's so fat! We call him huluka (hulk) He loves to eat haha. Then it started to rain so me and maka went inside and talked til 12 haha. 4/20 i woke up and kolipoki'd again. I found some scriptures and thoughts i'll share now. Helaman 5:12(scripture mastery) 23-24 and then alot of the rest of the chapter. It talks about nephi and lehi being surrounded by a pillar of fire but not being harmed. You guys can read it on your own, the whole chapter to get the details, but my thoughts were just that our hearts take courage when we have the protection of the lord. And things seem easier. I dunno that just stuck out to me and i really liked it. Then later that day i practiced teaching a principle to makasini and we went to teach a girl who was recently was baptized but she wasn't home. She was at sport. HOly cow this is huge in tonga. They have what is called sport which is like a big track event that goes for 3 days from all the schools in tonga and like the whole island goes to watch. it's crazy! then we went to our fafanga. it was cool cause we ate and then the dad came home from working at the temple. He does every wednesday and fasts for his family every wednesday. When he gets home at 8 they all break his fast together and then like have a spiritual something. They all quoted the first 5 articles of faith from memory together. I thought that was cool. Well that's about all! I love and miss you all and am thankful for you! Take care and until next week! 
Love,
Elder Rose!

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