Zach Fiore Tahiti Mission: Week 24: How to get 30 baptisms in one week

Bonjour,

Figured I'd start one off like a local. Not a Tahitian local though since no one really uses that here.

So this week was fine. A little hard to be honest emotionally, but the work was good, so that balances to fine.

We give many blessngs at the hospital which I love and even brought the sacrament to a few people which was nice. An interesting happening was we got rejected by a member for giving one. We weren't the right mssionaries he said. I guess he figured it was a no risk play. He coud call the missionaries and then just decide if we were fine to do the blessing when he saw us. We also went for another visit and met the patient in the hall, as he was walking back from downstairs. We shook his hand, talked a bit and were about to enter the room with him, until the nurse jumped out and said we can't go in without a suit and gloves. The patient went in and we suited up. I don't know how we were allowed to touch him outside if we had to put gloves to visit him inside. It's a little suss. I washed my hands well.

Mami Anna was mad we visited Mami Mareta and was very passive aggressive and then aggressive aggressive.

My mom sent me 40 hours of General conf videos from the Tahiti distribution centre so I've been ripping those.

Oh and it rained a lot here and we made it to orange for cyclone warning. I really wanted a cyclone (to chill) but then realized that could interfere with calling home, and as I've had a kinda tough week, I couldn't take the risk. So the rain stopped after a few days and I was happy.

To answer the question we've all been reading for. The way to get 30 baptsims, and the way I did it was by going to the temple and doing baptisms for the dead with a new convert! Finally made it inside the tiny Tahiti Papeete temple! I wore crocs due to rain which is kinda bad. I baptized the convert for his grandfather, giving the grandpa the opportunity to truly accept the gospel in the next life, which was such a spiritual experience and definitely the highlight of the visit. Other than that the temple was okay and I got super homesick from it. Not the best temple visit in all to be honest, but I'm happy for the convert and am always happy to do missionary work on the other side of the veil as well. As missionaries we can't go to the temple often which sucks. I urge everyone who can to go more often as it is such an important work and brings so many blessings for you and others. I wish I could go more and I'm hyped to go when I'm back.

Have a good week everyone

Love

Elder Fiore

Mom's note:

I am so happy the General Conference DVDs made it there. I ordered them on Dec 23 from the Tahiti Distribution Centre. Not sure why it took so long?!?! lol I guess the hold up is always inTahiti?!?! His Valentine's Package which I sent right after Christmas has not made it yet, and Rob sent him something in mid Jan from the US thinking it would take less time - but still not there.

Elder Fiore is still hanging in there with the ups and the downs of dealing with anxiety. It really is trying him, but we are so proud of his courage to share how he feels and the effort and faith he is putting in. We had a terrible internet connection this week so it was super hard to see him.

Here are some photos: