Letter from August 5th

This is a picture when President Carter came up for zone conference a little while ago.  I can't think of anything else you could tell people besides good maybe great or fantastic. Ha. One of the priesthood holders out in Angkula, named Adrian, wanted me to tell you that Elvis Presley is still alive, he is just hiding. But you can't tell anybody because it is a secret. He is obsessed with Elvis and has heaps of Elvis stuff. He wants you to take a picture of him if you ever see him around. Some of the members from Mulga Bore took a horse to the horse races in Harts Range and they just caught wild horses and took them but we saw them getting them ready to take to Harts Range. It was kind of funny because the horses didn't want to be ridden on but they were supposed to be racing in the next couple of days. I realized what the saying "peeing like a race horse" meant because I saw it, yuck. Like a fire hydrant. Anyways, something cool that happened this week, we had a little family home evening thing with some of the bush saints and we used flour in a cup then tipped it over so that the flour was just standing on its own, and then put a skittle on it. Then with a knife you go around and cut the flour and whoever makes the skittle fall has to eat some plain flour. It was showing that we need to build on Jesus Christ, on solid ground. If we don't then we fall down and have to taste the yuck. Then the kids had a flour war after that and they were all white. ha. Those are some cool things that happened this week. I just learned that I will be staying in town this week with one of the zone leaders because the other one is going to go out bush and see how the work is going out there. Yeah. Everything is still awesome here. I hope your still enjoying life as much as you can. Keep smiling. Love ya.
Love Elder Hyde

Letter from July 22nd and 29th

July 22
-Are there any of the aboriginal communities you visit that have become your favorite? 

 I came in an interesting situation because one of the communities that we visit, all of the people are in town, so I haven't seen them out there, but the times I have stayed in town we visit them at their houses here. I have really grown to love them, they are probably the most progressed in the gospel at this point, they have a few worthy priesthood leaders. Then I also really like the other 2, Engawala has quite a few members so that one is cool to visit. And Harts Range there is not many members but it is still cool there.
-Are there any that don't seem to welcome you as well? 

There are just a couple families in Engawala and Harts Range that don't really like talking to us but they aren't hostile towards us.
-Is it mostly the women that will listen to you? 

Yes. Mostly women and kids but there are a few men that are good.
-Do they have a lot of domestic dogs or are there just dingos that run around? 

They have heaps of domestic dogs butIi don't know if I would call them domestic. They are pretty dingy. Missing fur or skinny. But yeah. There are dingos also but they don't really come into the communities, just if you camp outside them. And that is also why they have dogs to fight off the dingos. Like the community that our shed is in, we can hear dingos but then our dog Mcnight fights them off.
-It seems like I read a story of a baby that got carried away by dingos there. 

That is a true story, I heard there was a big debate whether the mom killed the baby or not, but they finally decided it was a dingo. interesting.
-How is your new President? 

New president is awesome!
-Have you had much chance to spend some time with him? 

We got to have a personal interview with him and that lasted 15 minutes then we had a training the next day for the whole day so we spent some good time with him.
-Are there any of the aboriginal women that like to mother the missionaries (sometimes to the point of spoiling) or do they just think you should be men and take care of yourselves? 

They think we are men and can take care of ourselves and they are right. ha.
-Are you happy with the missionaries you are working with? 

Yes, we all have different backgrounds that help the work a lot, but unfortunately we just found out that my comp Elder Hepworth and Elder Teeples are leaving, me and Yamamoto are staying.

Keep smiling. One of my favorite scriptures- 2 Nephi 2:25 We are here to have joy, keep enjoying life. Love you heaps!

Elder Hyde


July 29
-Tell us about your new comp?

My new comp is Elder Visesio, its a tongue twister. He is fairly new in the mission but is already a great missionary. He is an islander with Samoan blood born in New Zealand but lives in Brisbane. He has 4 siblings and he is the oldest. He is very humble and funny. The other new comp is not a new companion for me. He is Elder Sie. The one I served with in Elisabeth. He is even funnier and more focused then before so he is great. It was sad to see the others go, but we are going to accomplish miracles with these elders.

-Have you had any funny experiences with the aboriginals there?

Um well, one that was kind of weird but funny was Elder Sie got peed on by one of the kids in Engawala. There are heaps of little things that are funny that happen and I tend to notice them more when I am looking for them so I will look for more of them so that I can write you more.

-Do they play rugby or do anything like that you could join in on for P day?

Right now it is their footy season so they play that but their practice isn't on Monday so we can't play with them but we go on the other days and talk with them just to build the relationship, because there are some potentials on the team also.

Thanks for writing. Just thinking, we have this vision that we want some of the aboriginal families to make it to the temple by October because that is when the branch is going down to Adelaide to go. Could you include them in your prayers that this may be possible. Thanks. Love yous heaps.
Love Elder Hyde

Another Week

Elder Hyde skipped out on his weekly the last couple weeks.  He responded to ours but didn't write one of his own so we are going to have to get after him for that.  Here is some of what he had to say:

From July 8:
"This week has been good. This time it was just me and Elder Yamamoto that went out to bush and we were only there for three days, because there was a show her in Alice so all the communities came in for that. So we didn't do church out bush this week.  It was weird going to an actual organized branch for church. I haven't been to one for the past like 8 months, just got to sit back and relax. For church out bush we hurry to all the communities and do sacrament at all of them. We give talks and conduct and preside, so we do the whole lot. Its way fun-you get to learn a lot that way.  We do have something planned for p-day today. .  . . CLEANING! We want everything to look the best for when President Carter comes up. We have interviews with him tomorrow and then training on Wednesday.  We do have some investigators, more of our focus is developing the priesthood so they can run the show, and strengthening the members to do their own missionary work."

From today:
When asked how his week was and how it went meeting his new mission president:
"The week has been good. We didn't go out bush at all we just stayed in town because some of the bush saints were here so we had to stay in and look after them.  The meeting with President Carter was good. He is awesome.  We did get everything clean but he didn't even look at any of it. Ha. They are really going to help us get things moving more quickly here. At the end of the interview it was pretty funny because we were kneeling down to pray, and I got a cramp in my leg because we had done some service for some people and I didn't drink much water during or after it.  So I had to stand up and stretch and then we could say the prayer. Ha."

When asked if they have many investigators in the areas they go to:
"When we are in town we pretty much have to just go finding tracting and stuff all day and then give who we find to the town elders so we meet heaps of people and we have been running into a lot of Americans lately. There is a secret base here that they work at.  We do have investigators, not very many but there are some and a lot of potentials we are trying to start teaching. It is interesting how it works because they have to come to church 2 times before we can count them as new investigators and when we start teaching them."

Here is a part of his letter our dad:
"I can't think of anything that I really need here yet. Transfers is this week and there is a lot of talk in the air so I don't know. It has gone by so quick though. All of the aboriginals in those communities pretty much know us, even if we really don't know them. Actually last time there were some that told us that we need to visit them because they knew us and saw us going around but we never went to their house.
Yeah the whites own the cattle stations, we never see or talk to them although I want to try to hook up with them and see if their wife would cook us food or something. ha. but they aren't really our focus. The aboriginals are our focus. 
Well love you. Stay happy.
Love Elder Hyde"

 

Just Pictures This Week

This week Elder Hyde just sent a few pictures along with some responses to some questions that we asked him.  Here are the pictures:

Elder Hepworth, Elder Hyde

Gate to the Aboriginal community

Here is how Elder Hyde descibed this gate: "There is this gate that we have to go through because there are cattle so we have to get out of the ute and open it up, but directly under the gate there is an ant hill.  But they are not normal ants. They chase you! So you either have to be really fast to open the gate or do a little dance to stay away from them. It is especially hard at night!"

Another side note: "Our new mission president came in last night so we will meet him on July 10th when he comes to Alice."

Great News!

Hey family,
I recieved some great news this week from Tennant Creek. Noeleen the lady that I was working with for the past 4 months to baptize actually got baptized. Flipping exciting. Can't wait to hear how they did it. I don't know how the week could get better after hearing that.
Time flys like crazy here. We get up in the morning get ready pack up the ute, go out and teach til night then we unpack, eat, and sleep. I wish I had more time to explain it also but the time also flys while I am emailing so it is hard to write a whole lot.
Love ya.
Love Elder Hyde

Learning More About the Bush

G'day family,
Great week! Learned more ways about the bush. We went out bush on Wednesday. It ended up being just me and Elder Hepworth because 2 of the communities that we go to, all of the people were in town so 2 missionaries stayed here to look after them. We went to the other 2 communities. It is pretty cold out there. The shed we stay in is tinny, it has a bathroom in it, to have a warm shower when we wake up one person has to start a fire under the water heater thing and it heats up the water. i will send a picture of it.
I could try and describe the bush and the people and how we do the work but it is pretty hard sometimes, and you cant quite get the full picture until you experience it.
We drive quite a bit in the utes between the communities. They love the missionaries out there. The communities are pretty small only like maybe 200 people or less. The main focus is building priesthood leaders because we pretty much run the show for church and stuff, but there are a couple of good men out there that help a lot with the church, soon we will be able to make the switch to them running the programs. We do a lot of activities and movie nights and family home evenings. We collect a lot of fire wood for them so they can keep warm. I love it out there.
Love you all heaps. Keep smiling :)
Love Elder Hyde

The Water Heater

Packing Up!!

Hello family,
I guess I will start out with the information that you will probably really want to know. It was transfers this weekend. We were planning on going up to Elliott for the weekend but when we called to ask permission they told us that we couldn't. That seemed weird. Then we realized it was transfers, so we knew that one of us was gone and that we would have to be in Alice Springs. They later told us that. . . I was packing. :( I wasn't expecting that. But fortunately they didnt say that I was packing 23 kg because that would mean that I was leaving the Alice Springs zone. I got my new companion yesterday. His name is Elder Hepworth from Utah. And my new area is called "Bushland Water". We are basically in a companionship of 4. We travel out to the aboriginal communities around Alice Springs to help bring the gospel to them. We will be leaving tomorrow and coming back in to town on Mondays for pdays then we go back out each week like that. I was pretty sad when I heard that I was leaving a big aboriginal community in Tennant but now I am going to where there will be even more. It is also way colder down here than in Tennant Creek, there is frost on the ground in the morning when we go play soccer. Love you all. Have a great week.
Love Elder Hyde