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oihnafcv/loi /'i12ko KJLA;L

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Sorry...mosquito on the keyboard...

Anyway, today is another p-day down in Tarawa. Our president wants to meet with us to discuss setting up a branch in our new area!!! He flew in from Hawaii to talk with us. SO last night at about 8 pm we were running around the village trying to find someone that could take us in their boat.There's this guy named Lotebwa that we've been trying to contact for two months. Every time we go to his house, he's not home. But this time...he was! He was super nice and told us that someone had hired his boat to go to the airport tomorrow, so we could hop on with them. We were so relieved. If we couldn't find a boat, we would have to leave at about midnight (when the tide would go down) and walk for about 3 hours. So we were pretty happy we found a boat.

The work is going really well. We have been sleeping at this guy's house in Kainaba so we don't have to do so much walking, and we can get more time to work there. He's way nice. He lets us use his extra buuia, pillows, mats, gets water for us, cooks for us...pretty much everything. ANd get this...he's not even a member. He's one of our investigators!!

The other day we were studying on our buuia in Nabeina. The mayor for Nabeina walked up and invited us to a village bootaki (party) to celebrate the new maneaba (town meeting house). We thought this might be a good way to open up some new doors in Nabeina (because the work is really slow). WE had a baptism that night, but he told us it would start at 10 and end at 12. WE decided to go. WE showed up at 10 and sat there...until 4. Then it started. It ended at 6:30. It was pretty cool: the dancing, the music, the food, the food, and the food. They asked me to say the closing prayer. That was my first time speaking in front of the entire village! I was a little nervous but it went well. After the bootaki we grabbed our stuff and ran to Kainaba to do the baptism. Literally ran. Ever ran through the jungle at night in your underwear? Check. (brief explanation from Mom: they take off their clothes to cross the water between islands, they then hold up their clothes to keep them dry. Some of the islands are not inhabited so they just wait until they get through all of the water to put clothes back on)

Thank you for the constant prayers. I know they are helping. Yesterday we slept in Kainaba, woke up and did church, and started the journey over to Nabaina. The only problem was, this time of the month is the strongest high tide. The current was so strong we got swept off our feet and started getting pushed out to sea. Luckily we were able to retreat back a bit and get our footing. But we had a problem: the tide wouldn;t recede until 10 pm, and we needed to do church in Nabeina. So we said a prayer. We felt like we should go back to the village and do some teaching. We randomly found this guy who's brother is a member and a teacher at BYU. This guys happens to be the mayor of the village. WE had a really awesome lesson with him and his wife, and he invited us back. After the lesson, we went back to the water. It hadn;t gone down at all. We said another prayer and just went for it. It was so crazy - the current didn;t give us any trouble at all. I'm not even kidding. WE could see it rushing around us, but it was like there wasn't any resistance. The power of prayer is real!!!!

I have so much to write about, but not a lot of time. Just know that the work is going really well. I'm convinced that missionary work is the most rewarding job in the world. There's no salary (we actually pay for it), but seeing peoples' lives change for the better is good enough for me. I've seen people completely turn their lives around, fix their marriages, strengthen their families, and lighten their lives. What more could I ask for?

Until next time,

Elder Barker