A new transfer to Crosby.

Hey all you home-skillets! Greetings from Southport...and yes...it will be the last time emailing from this sea-side town! Here's what's happening=

I am moving down the coast...to Crosby! I was initially a bit bummed because that area literally borders mine, but my good friend Elder Tuioti is serving there and has filled me in on a lot of the deets. My new area has some beautiful beaches and nice parts like Formby, but it also has some sketchy areas like Bootle (notorious for throwing things at missionaries). I am pumped though, I have felt like my guard has been down the entire time here in peaceful Southport...so I'm stoked to be and work in some dodgy parts again. Look forward for some stories.

This next transfer will definitely be interesting. First off, I will be a new daddy! I have already follow-up trained Elder Bradley, but I'm stoked to train a brand new missionary of my own. That will be the fun part, but the challenging part....Crosby ward is dying pretty heavily with only 30-40 active members (well...still better than Barrow)....and the rest of my district includes one intense Canadian sister, 2 crazy Tongan sisters, and one super sensitive Lithuanian sister who can still barely speak English. Basically, I have a ticking-lady-time-drama-bomb on my hands. So with all that mixed together....I am up for another adventure.

This week has been pretty sweet. I have spent a lot of time bonding and doing service for the members here, and I will miss so many of them. I also finally got to see Gary again! It was incredible timing, but basically I got to leave him with my testimony and a solid bro hug, and hopefully his door will be opened to future missionaries. Southport has been an incredible experience, full of ups and downs, but amazing friendships.

Well that's about all for now, but I'll fill you in on the new deets from my new home and new companion next week. Till then, I love you all, and peace out!

Elder BA

the Harbon crew

The Grays, aka my southport grandparents. The coolest cats I know

Huge liverpool concert

Roar

Gary the man.

best-southport-friend-Joe

Southport crew

Football and Drunkards.

Hey everyone! First off, happy birthday sister! (more to say later on). Haha seriously, your beach bum adventures are making me day dream super hard right now, and it's super hard to type.

My week has been good though. Here's the quick deets (huge time crunch today):

I had an exchange in Liverpool with Elder Roberts. Liverpool is always an adventure.

Back in Southport, we were walking through Hesketh Park and challenged a whole group of people to football, and Elder Frandsen and I won! Take that you smelly English pig dogs! Anyways, we ended up teaching them, and 4 of them asked really intelligent questions, showed really good interest, and became new investigators! They, along with many other random on-the-spot lessons with good people, are slowly building up our teaching pool, which is what we desperately needed. Not only that, but one of the former investigators here has been coming back to church, and she is showing good progress and is looking good for baptism in the near future! We are taking it slow, but I can totally see it happening. The work is pumping up, and it's awesome.Haha Elder Frandsen took one for the team and got rebuked really hard on the bus by the driver for preaching. Stick it to the man.

This week's theme, drunkards and pot-heads calling us over to "change their lives". Their intentions to bash us reversed though, and every time their hearts were softened and we were actually able to teach and laugh with them. This one man even bought us drinks while we taught him right outside the pub!

Anyways, the truth is unconquerable, the Holy Ghost is real, the gospel brings peace, and people are inherently good, sometimes you just have to dig a little deeper.

I love you all, and I hope you continue to have a chillax radventure by the coast. You are the best family ever. Till next time, peace out.

Elder BA

p.s. transfer calls this Saturday! pretty sure I'm leaving, but who knows, I have been surprised before.

p.s.s. It.is.your.birthday 

New President and adventure.

Hey everyone! I'm going to keep this one short and sweet, cause I want time to write to everyone individually before I head off to our man day in Crosby with the other elders. So here are this week's deets!:

Last p-day, we started a tradition, MAN-DAY-P-DAY! We gathered with some other elders in Crosby, ate manly food, and played chair football for over 3 hours (best game ever, I'll introduce it when I get back)!!!!

Exchange with the new trainee in my district, Elder Lee! He is a super rad, crazy, surf/skate outdoors kid...so needless to say...we had an instant connection. The whole exchange was filled with spontaneous connections made with random people, and service and also...skating with a group of kids by the pier!!! It was so fun, and now I have a testimony that skating can connect people from all over the world, and yes...it can even lead to sharing the gospel.

I finally got to meet Pres. Ulrich at the multi-zone conference! I was a bit sceptical at first, but now I really like him. He is basically a wannabee Bruce R. McConkie, but I love his desire to make us all gospel scholars. He is a good man with a deep knowledge of the gospel, and I believe with his energy, and us getting I-pads in September, this mission is going to explode.

So, this Saturday was absolutely hectic! As you know, I was suppose to go to the temple with Alex. We got a train to Bolton, only to find that our connecting train to Chorley was cancelled. Flip. So we ended up having to get a coach. Funny thing though, it was the most random but funniest coach ride ever! The only people on the huge coach were Elder Frandsen and I, another random kid, the driver, an actress and....yeah...Jack Sparrow. Picture included. He was a professional impersonator, on his way to work a carnival but was totally lost, but remained in character the entire time! Haha so for over an hour, we were talking with this actress and Jack Sparrow, and the driver was just laughing at our conversations the entire time, with people taking pictures of our odd little group. We wrote a mini screen play for "An Actress, Jack Sparrow, Two Mormons, Stuck On A Bus". Look for it in theatres.

So after that adventure, we ended up getting to the temple literally 5 minutes too late for Alex's session. I was destroyed!! Luckily though, we just did a later session, were filled with the spirit juice, and we were then on our way. Super bummer that I missed Alex, but we were able to meet and teach some really good people on the way there and back, so that attempted to make up for it.

Well everyone, I love you all! Stay sweet, don't forget to floss, and peace out!

Elder BA.

p.s. picture proof

Hospital teaching and more kisses from homeless ladies.

Snap, hold on while I try to overcome my beach camping trunkiness...AHHHHHHHHHHHHH....ok I'm done for now. Seriously, I wish I could be there with you all right now! I can't wait for those good times again to enjoy the sun and water and just...be with you. It's crazy to see everyone grow up so much, but it makes me happy to hear that all of you are still adventurous, funny, witty, sarcastic and good friends. Best family ever.

And even before this email, I have been having some wicked daydreams of SUP surfing. It's catching on, even over here in England!

Anyways, drawing my mind away from your beach adventures, here's what happened in my not-nearly-as-epic week:

So the work has been really dead lately, but we have been able to have some really good small moments. For example, we had a little hospital adventure. Alma Perry, a really old, witty, less-active, funny lady who we have been teaching was in the hospital for about 2 weeks before we were actually able to go visit her. When we finally got there, we found that she had totally packed up her bags, ready to go...without the doctors really telling her it was ok to go. Haha so that was pretty funny to see her all ready to escape, and we also got to be there when she was bantering with a lot of the nurses. We were there for quite a while, but the amazing thing was that there were a lot of good people in her hospital ward, and the lady sitting next to Alma began to ask us some really good questions. Long story short...we ended up teaching a lesson to basically everyone who wanted to listen in there, and even one of her nurses joined in! It was a really unique teaching experience, and the spirit was strong. Afterwards, we ended up wheeling Alma out of there, catching a taxi home with her, only to teach the taxi driver on the way. Overall, it was just a really unexpected but good day...especially due to the fact that I hate hospitals.

We got to slack-line at Hesketh Park! We saw some families gathered together trying it out, just like our family has done in the past...so we went over and asked if we could try, and they welcomed us! They were a bit hesitant at first, but I think having the chance to film 2 Elders embarrassing themselves slack-lining softened their hearts a bit. It was fun though, and they were good people. I am totally rusty.

The 4th of July was incredibly lame (except for the food mum, that was lovely. We had a killer BBQ. Thank you!). After singing The Star Spangled Banner in the morning over the phone with the other 'muricans in our district, we basically spent the whole day walking in the rain. I miss freedom

I don't know why, but all the flippin homeless people flock to us! Sure they are good people, but I am getting tired of smelly homeless women kissing me on the cheek in the street. They are pretty funny to teach though, the alcohol asks us some pretty "deep" questions.

The highlight of the week was definitely our Family Fun Day! Basically, we just had a big BBQ and games and junk at our chapel with the whole ward. It was good to see everyone come together. Bragging time= one of the games was a Wellie throwing competition. For you Americans, that's basically a rubber rain boot. The competition was to see you could hurl it the furthest...and I won it for the men's group! My prize was a golden wellie for the trophy, so you'll probably see it when I get home. Win one for 'murica.

Other than that, it's been a pretty boring week. President Ulrich is officially here, so we are starting the transition. We will get to meet him on Thursday, so I hope everything will be cool beans.

Oh yeah, I am going to the temple with Alex this coming Saturday!! I am so stoked to see him again, my welsh brother from another mother.

Well my dirty beach pirate family, I love you all. I can't wait to join you at the beach next year, but until then...just keep on having Brien fill my place. Thanks for looking our for him. Peace out everyone, enjoy your time together!

Elder BA