Week 17: A New Year and Suriname

Bonjour,

Had a fun week down here in South America. New Year's Eve we didn't get much sleep because our neighbor really liked loud fireworks that sounded like bombs. We worked hard last week trying to get a lot done before we left for Zone Conference in Suriname.

We left Saturday morning, drove to the border, which takes about three hours, got on a little boat to cross the river and then drove in a taxi for three more hours to get to Parimaribo. We had a great fireside that night. We stayed with Zuster King (our sister training leader) and Zuster Christensen.

Dutch is a weird language. Church on Sunday was all in Dutch other than President and Sisiter Mehrs talks which were translated. They were having their district conference. Listening to Dutch made me feel like it was the first few days of my mission again, when I didn't understand much of what people were saying. There was one guy from Haiti in their branch who only spoke French, so we had fun talking to him.

Sunday night we got to watch "Meet the Mormons!!" It was so good! During the last story about the Mom sending her son on a mission most of the missionaries were crying, including me. It was a great movie and a great explanation of our faith.

We had a great zone conference on Monday. There were a lot of missionaries there. The amount of missionaries in Suriname has almost doubled since last time. In our conference we talked a lot about Mosiah 18:21 and having our hearts knit together with our branch. I learned a lot. I even had the opportunity to be chosen to give a short presentation about a point of doctrine. I was also asked to lead the closing hymn which we sang in Dutch. I don't speak Dutch or sing it, it was an interesting experience.

We were spiritually fed and physically fed very well this weekend. Ate some good Roti and some Surinamese food. We also got to buy some American food! We had a small suitcase packed full of macaroni and cheese, cereal, pancake mix and a lot of other stuff.

We had a good Suriname trip and now we're back working hard for the last week of the transfer. I'll let you know next week what is happening.

Love you,

Soeur Banks