week 47 Pictures

 

 The hang fam and Sister Price 

 

dinner with the Van Vliets

 

Cool missionaries.

FHE with the Cambo branch

Elder McCown eating lunch. We ran out of food, money, and dish soap this last week. got desperate.

 

Buddhist Monk in San Fran we talked to for a while.

They gave us juice.

Lit some popcorn on fire. No reason.

 

Some kids catching turtles in the Oakland 9th at the barbeque today

Week 47

Not getting booted yet. Another transfer in Oaktown

 

So like 10 missionaries at emails today are leaving and I feel Really Trunky today (fun missionary word). luckily I get to go teach a whole bunch of people tonight so it's ok.

I'm safe! All is well! Our Investigators are progressing! 20 missionaries go home this transfer! My friends are all leaving and getting transferred!! Another week in missionary life.

Monday was pretty sweet, we had family home evening and tons of people came and we all went to the visitors center. super cool. Tons of food. Happy happy. 

 

Tuesday was stupid, but Pream is good and dinner with Sally was good (:

Wednesday we had exchanges with Elder McCown and Elder Crump.  Me and Elder Crump had an awesome day, got a couple referrals, taught Ming Savonn (I know I spell her name different everytime...) and ate dinner with the A.P.'s. super good. Elder McCown and Elder Ey got stuck in San Francisco and got home at like 11 it was super funny.

Thursday we went to San Francisco to the Bhuddist temple. That was it. There aren't many Cambodians it turns out.

Friday was weekly planning and Jonathan. Happy day.

Saturday was cool. we had to go clean our apartment cause we found out our manager is going to inspect it Sunday. Pretty lame. Then we went to an emergency dinner with the Spanish zone leaders, it was fun, then we taught Pream 

Sunday we had a practice for sacrament, we were singing with the Oak 9 missionaries. We went to the vistors center, then all of a sudden Linda K. Burton walked in, but we didn't recognize her and walked past after saying hello really quick, then Elder hansen was like "dude that was linda K Burton" and Elder Bybee was like "Who is that?" It was so funny. That night we went to meet people, and we met this Cambodian lady and were trying so hard to teach her, but she just kept saying she was busy, so instead we just started helping her water her plants and telling her jokes, it was super funny, she didn't ever want to learn, but it was still super fun to get to know her and finally do some service! 

I know more happened this week, but I can't remember for the life of me. Life is good, I love being a missionary.  I know some really awesome people here, I am really blessed.  A ton of missionaries I have really come to love are going home on Wednesday, It feels weird seeing so many people head out, but I am so grateful for what I have had the chance to learn from them.  The church is true, our Savior is real. Take the time to know him.

 

Peace.

 

Elder Tolman

Week 46 Pictures

 

baked a cake all by myself.

Elder Ey is a model for the church in case I hadn't talked about that before

 

 

​I saw a draw bridge draw for the first time

visitor's center is neat.

 

our beds stink, so we started sleeping on the floor and it's better.

Week 46

Last week? Probably

Well, The good news is this last week was pretty cool. The bad news is I am probably going to get kicked out of the Cambodian program next week.

Monday was the usual running around, tracting, meet cool black guys with cool insights on God. managed to teach this Old guy we have been working on. He still doesn't like Christ, but it's a step.

Tuesday- Training meeting in Antioch. Reunited with my father for a bit. taught a less active and then went to Preams house, who had some crazy revelation going on in our lesson and said that he felt like God wanted him to prepare to be baptized and that he wanted to know what that meant, so of course we told him, it was so cool. so he is gonna get baptized on the 12th.

Wednesday we taught Saroeuth and went tracting, we found this super sweet place where you can go watch the massive ships come into the docs in alameda while we were eating lunch, it was so cool. We went to lunch with the Van Vliets after that to the famous Barneys burgers. It was delicious, I love it. literally the best hamburger I have ever eaten. Then we went to Soccer night with the Oakland 9th ward! super fun, it was the first time we really got to talk to the members since we only go to one hour of church with them. Then we had correlation.

Thursday we had new missionary follow up training then got asked to go and give a blessing a lady in the Emergency room. It was crazy. there were homeless people and crazy people everywhere outside the hospital, and it smelled like all of them had peed on each other or something. The lady had bad lungs and had a weight disorder and had stopped breathing. It was amazing the faith that her family showed in their heavenly father while we were there. after that we ate dinner and went tracting and found this cool lady name Tyanca and her 8 year old son named adrian, they are super nice and super ready to learn about the Gospel!

Friday was weekly planning for like 5 hours for two areas and then we taught Ming sovann, and we had an awesome lesson on the plan of salvation, and at the end she asked when she was getting baptized, it was awesome. she thought she was getting baptized this sunday, but we told her that she had canceled too many of our appointments and she had to keep learning haha, so now she wants us to come over more!

Saturday nothing really happened except we went to a concert with pream at the visitors center, and it made me miss music a whole bunch, but the spirit was super strong. Neat.

Sunday we had dinner with the Yim family after church and that was pretty much all that happened, except that Elder Ey gave a talk in the Oakland 9th and it was awesome. super fun stuff.

I love being a missionary so much. I don't have a lot of time today, so just remember how much the Lord is focused on guiding us in everything we do. literally everything has his hand in it, and I am recognizing it more and more every day. 

Elder Tolman

Week 45 Pictures

 

​Her Husband caught like 6 of these ridiculous huge fish

 

 

Over at Brother sots





Week 45

When all goes down the Pooper!

The subject line pretty much summarizes every day this last week. Not that it was a bad week, but literally every thing we had planned save it be two appointments with members fell through! Pretty crazy stuff. The devil is workin' hard to keep us from having any success, but in the end we showed him...

Tuesday- Went and taught Pream and a whole lot of unsuccessful tracting and really angry Oaklandians.

Wednesday- We had a lesson scheduled with a less active that we have been working with named Penny, but when we called and talked to him he told us he wanted us to stop coming over, so that kind of sucked. We tracted for about three hours, had a beer can thrown at us, a couple people talked to us so it was a success! We ate dinner with Siphal and Jessica that night, it was awesome. We talked with Siphal about what needs to happen in the branch to help it grow, it was really awesome. Next we went and met with Brother and Sister Lang and their Daughter and Talked about the same thing and shared a message on faith and Miracles! 

Thursday- We got a notice our apartment was being inspected by the complex owner so we had to clean a bunch of stuff they asked us to clean before they got there, so that threw off our whole day. After those activities ended and our studies got all finished up, we went and tried to build some trust with the Oakland 9th members, and got nothing but a rock. Literally someone left a rock on our car, that was the most human interaction we had the rest of the day.

Friday- We did group weekly planning with all the elders in Walnut Creek at the institute, which wasn't the best Idea. We had to go to Antioch that night, but we also had to do weekly planning, so we went to Walnut Creek to save time and not drive in traffic. But that night we went to Brother Sot's house and talked with him about the branch too and got his thoughts on what we need to do, it was great, and they gave us a whole bunch of eggs from their chickens! Then we went to our Zone Leaders apartment for exchanges! We do a new kind of exchanges where all the elders go to the leaders area, so it was a party.

Saturday- crazy. I was with Elder Crump all day, and we did a blitz, which if you aren't a missionary means all the missionaries in a zone go work in each others area for an hour at a time, then switch companions and switch areas, tons of fun. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, nobody got a single lesson, it was rough. We went to eat dinner together after that at this Vietnamese place, unfortunately no Cambodians were present. After that we started a fast for the mission that the missionaries will be able to be more purpose driven and experience miracles. Then Me and Elder Crump went and taught a lesson with one of their recent converts. That was pretty much the end of the day haha.

Sunday- it was super frustrating.  First, that morning I got trapped in our parking spot by a car that parked super close behind us, so I was trying to get out and pulled in to change directions and clipped the concrete pole on one side. Then we went to church. Church was good, they even gave us cookies to eat for when our fast ended! We finished out our meetings, had one investigator show up, that was nice after the week we had. Then we went to get our stuff from the clerks office after the Oakland 9th sacrament, and our cookies were gone!!! Our branch clerk took all the food they gave us!!! I was so mad. Literally the only good thing I new was going to happen the rest of the day was go home and break my fast and eat the stupid cookies. Heartbroken we went back to the car and went home, Broke the fast, and finished our studies. That night we didn't have anyone to take to why I believe, which was a huge bummer, so we decided to go follow up with a referral we got a week or two ago, and we talked to their family for about an hour, and they invited us back and said that they would learn, but they didn't have time to go to church! So basically once they see how incredible this message is they will come to church!! It was awesome! it's this guy and his wife, the guy is a singer in the only Cambodian band in the bay area, so we have a ton of fun talking with him. Good stuff.

Blessings come from faith. God pays attention to everything happening in our lives. Nothing happens that Heavenly Father doesn't know about. Just trust him and stick through whatever bad things happen. Use your faith and invite Christ into your life. It's really cool, because once you have Christ with you in your life, you will see miracles often, because literally the natural result of the presence of the Savior is Miracles, that is all over the scriptures. I love you all! Have a great week!

Love, 

Elder Tolman

Week 44 Pictures

 

​There is this super pretty place called Crockett that we went to, it has this unbelievable bridge and a little mini bay, it's sweet. We got a call about a Cambodian family here, we are going back tonight!

Pream got me a birthday cake haha

​The extent of the birthday festivities

 

How to know your investigator is progressing.

"Thai did you read your scriptures?"

"ya elders course I did"

"Whats in your scriptures?"

"ya know how people listen to music when their high and learn things? The same thing happened when you read the scriptures, but it's cooler."

   *The funny thing is this is a step in the right direction in his case.

 

saw a pretty funny van

 

over at Ming Savann's house

​downtown

 

we teach Cambodian on Saturday's

Week 44

Talkin' with the Fam' on the day celebrating mothers

My heck, every week just seems to get crazier in one way or another. I don't have time to email a lot today, cause temple day is this week!! I have a whole ton of pictures though and will email more tomorrow!! I Got to talk to my family yesterday so that was awesome. I love my family so much.
Shout to all my missionary friends too for keeping me on their mass list. Y'all are the best.

Week 43 pictures

My District

At the market this morning

We had a huge pile of Ensign's so we found all of the pictures of Christ and cut them out and put them on our wall.

week 43

What good things. Good people. Great actually! I love being a missionary!

So, this last Monday was FHE and we got to share a lesson on John the Baptist! It was really random, and everyone got really emotional, it was really roundaboutly spiritual... neat.

On Tuesday we had District meeting. Bad news. As of last week, musical instruments are a no. Literally this was the most frustrating thing that has happened on my mission. Good thing We trust president. After that we went to teach Ming Savorn and then Bunthai, and then we went to Pream's! Woo! Then that night some stuff went down across the street from our house. There was a fight at the liquor store, and this guy got shot, so it was really loud and there were people fighting until like 11, it was awful, but pretty cool to see the natives of the ghetto show themselves.

Wednesday was rough, but we got to see Saruath! 

Thursday was rougher than Wednesday, still good. We met a guy who only wears clothes they have used for costumes at Disneyland, and he was wearing a wilderness survival outfit that day. Cool.

Friday- we got to go do service in Walnut Creek to set up for the service we were going to do on Saturday, then we did weekly planning!

Saturday we did studies, went to service, went to lunch, went to tract for an hour, went to dinner with The Neves, a senior couple in the 9th ward, and then went to teach Pream and Jonathan.

Sunday was good, We went to the Cambodian Branch, then WC for the 9th ward, then back to the Cambodian Branch, then after sacrament went back to the 9th ward! crazy! Then we went to a birthday party for dinner! It was cool, the entire Hang family went to Siphals parents house, so basically all our less actives members where there! Pretty neat! And Bunthai and His mom  came to sacrament meeting! Super cool! 

This week was good.  I really don't have a lot to say, just make sure you make an effort to help the missionaries in your home ward, that is what we are working on with our branch. Missionaries cannot do missionary work without the people that live in the place they are serving! Missionaries leave! Members don't! Do your part and go and share the gospel with them! I love you all, the church is true, Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world! I love being a missionary!

Love, 

Elder Tolman