Life's Good - January 16, 2017

So as you can guess from the subject, life is good right now. Things are going as well right now as they have been my whole mission. We have people to teach, people coming to church, and people ready to be baptized.

My companionship is great, Elder Agabu and I are getting along great, probably as well as I have gotten along with any companion so far. It's a bummer he goes home at the end of this transfer so I will lose a friend I've made.

The members here are awesome, they are giving us people to teach and love for us to come and visit them. They always are so kind to us and we have a great time with them.

Church attendance is improving, this week we had 47 people there compared to 34 last week. Also we had 8 investigators at church which was super exciting, everyone is being fellow shipped and loves coming each week. We should be having 3 or 4 people getting baptized on February 5th, which is always super exciting.

I want to thank everyone who wrote me letters for my Christmas box, opening and reading them was so special to me, I miss you all and love the kind words you wrote to me.

I love you all and hope you have a great week

Elder K

 

Attached are some of the views here in Molweini.

 

 

Happy New Year - January 2, 2017

Happy New Year everyone! I hope everyone had a great holiday!

So the new area is awesome! I have an awesome comp, an awesome house, and an house branch! I'm super happy right now, I think the happiest I have been for my whole mission right now. Life is just great.

Molweni is an awesome place, its super small but its actually kind of nice. It's not nearly as busy and loud as Umlazi. Its up on top of the huge hills/mountains. Its super beautiful. I have to try to take some pictures of the views.

Molweni is a smaller branch of about 40 people. We meet in a school. It's a great place though an the area is really ready to have some great missionary work done.

I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Elder K

 Me with my new comp - Elder Agabu

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year - December 26, 2016

I hope everyone has a fantastic Christmas, I know I did because I got to FaceTime my family! It was so cool to see them since it has been 8 months since I last called. It's crazy that I am now half way done with my calls home. Next year at this time I will be 21 months and just have a little left.

Christmas here is a lot different, no trees, lights or presents really - just family time and a nice meal. We got 3 huge meals back to back to back. I didn't think i would be able to finish it all but I did, we even had a 4th appt scheduled but we ran out of time, so they packed a container full of food for us.

So tomorrow I will be leaving Umlazi. It's crazy that have been here since the middle of August, I love it so much but it's time for me to head to my new area which is Molweni. It's a township about 45 minutes more inland, so still hot and humid, and I can't see the ocean every single day. That area is a small branch so there is a lot of work to be done there. Our Mission President called me this morning and told me he is putting one of the senior couple missionaries in that area and really wants me to work with them to help get things going there. It will be a challenge for sure but I'm super excited.

I love you all and hope you have a great new years.

Elder K

1 week left - December 19, 2016

It's so crazy that this Sunday is Christmas! It seems like just yesterday I had just gotten my misison call and was just starting to prepare to leave, now I have been out for almost 9 months, my how time flies!

This last week went rather fast, missionary work has been pretty tough lately because December here is the party month, people are always going to the beach or out of town so it has been tough to nail down appointments with people. this week we are changing our tactics and are doing a bunch of service this week, we did some this morning and have more planned for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Hopefully it will help people feel of our and our Saviors love for them.

On Saturday we had our huge mission Christmas party, there was about 50 missionaries there, it was a ton of fun to see some of the friends I have made on mission. because our mission is so big they have to have a second party tomorrow for the rest of the missionaries on the other side of the mission so I didn't get to see some people. If you would like to see pictures you can go to ldssouthafricadurban.blogspot.com , It's blog run by our mission president and his wife and they post pictures there all the time so it makes up for my lack of sending pictures home.

I hope everyone has a great Christmas,

I love you all

Elder Knutsen

The Wedding - December 12, 2016

Hello everyone!

So for those of you asking I'm feeling way better today than I was last week.

So this week was another normal week until Friday, because we had a wedding Saturday! It was super hectic and crazy trying to get everything ready. We borrowed a truck from the mission because in some areas the roads aren't very good so the mission has a bunch of trucks for missionaries to drive instead of cars. It was so nice top drive it for a couple days, it was a big Isuzu kb 250 double cab bakkie (a bakkie is a truck here) the trucks are smaller here than back home but it is still a big truck. We had to use it haul a bunch of chairs and a huge tent. It was super super tiring. Weddings are a lot of work but it was super awesome to see 2 of our investigators getting married so they can be baptized.

Then on Sunday we attended church in a different branch then where we are serving because one of the senior couple missionaries was going home so we went to their last Sunday before they leave SA. It was super crazy because the guys there were only halfway through their mission when I came. I guess it just means I'm starting to get old on mission.

It's crazy that Christmas is just 2 weeks away, I hope every has a great Christmas season and remembers the true meaning of Christmas and remembers the birth of our Savior.
 

I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Elder K

The Flu - December 5, 2016

Hello everyone!

So this week was an interesting one. Things got slightly better this week but I got super sick this weekend. It was probably the sickest I have been in my whole life too, I wont go into detail but lets just say it was not fun.

We taught some good lessons and found some good people this week. December here though is really tough for missionary work because everyone goes out to party and drink and nobody is ever home because everyone gets time off work. Its the start of summer here so the weather is super hot too.

I want to thank everyone for emails this week. I'm super sorry if I forgot to reply to you but I read everything that was sent and loved all of it.

I'm still kind of sick and my brain isn't quite working well, so this email will be kinda short but just know that I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Elder Knutsen

I'm so sorry - November 28, 2016

So first let me apologize for not emailing everyone the past two weeks, things have been kinda crazy lately and I haven't always felt like sending a group email which I am sorry for.

So let's go over the past couple weeks, first we had a baptism 2 Sunday's ago which was super exciting. It was the first person I had found, taught, and baptized, so it was super awesome.

2nd we will be having a wedding for 2 of our investigators on the 10th which I am super excited for, the Sunday after we will have like 3 or 4 baptism so I stoked for that.

Those are kind of the big events that have happened, but we have done fun stuff along the way.  

Today we had like 30 missionaries come and play soccer together which now will be a weekly thing, it was so much fun but it was so HOT!!! It is like 35 today and very very humid so you feel hot all the time. It's nice but sucks at the same time.


Sounds like things are going great back home... here not so much. my new comps name is Elder Thandi from Zimbabwe, and lets just say we aren't getting along very well. I have no idea how I'm going to make it through this transfer, it's been three days but it feels like its been forever, everything he says to me is super negative and it's always his way or the highway, he doesn't negotiate at all. I have also learned that companionship relationships aren't always prefect. I've known that, but this transfer has been really tough so far. It has helped me grow a ton though which I am grateful for.

I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Elder Knutsen