August 18, 2015 – My last email as a missionary

Dear Mom, Dad, Lauren, and Ian,

Wow, this is something weird! My very last letter home as a missionary. I'm not sure if I should talk about my last week here or how I feel. How about both?

Well, this past week my companion, Elder Walters and I spent a bit of time learning a few more songs for another choir activity. But I only needed to learn one song so we didn't spend much time working on that :D But the activity was a graduation for a Self-reliance class the church is doing. This class is one of the first in the world and they earned degrees from BYU so this was a pretty big deal! There was a news team from the country covering the graduation. If you look it up you might see me on the piano. ;D Anyway, the activity went great! I played well and everything was all good.  ^_^

Well, after that whole thingy, Elder Walters and I turned our attention to finding those 60 references we have received over some time through the English class we were teaching. We had 30 people come to the class!!! We had the highest number of references received and contacted in the zone. We were happy with that.  :D Unfortunately, not one of them came to church because it stormed and Dominicans are terrified of the rain. But that's ok, because something that would happen the next day would cheer me up.

So, I got a call from my ZL's asking if I could come to the capital and help in translating for some US Navy doctors coming to visit the country. Boy, it was an amazing experience!!! The troops doing this service project were all fantastic! Also, there were different jobs for different translators. Some were translating for the doctors, but I was assigned to translate at triage. Basically, I was the welcoming sign in. So, I got to meet every single person that came in. That day something like 250 or 300 people came in. I had to sign them in and ask what the problem was. Man, I heard some interesting things. Mom, I'm leaving it to you to include what you think should be included with what I heard. XD But it was a great experience! And I will never forget it! (This is Elder Froude’s mom…I decided not to include his stories of his triage experience as most of them were inappropriate for this blog. Funny, but still inappropriate. Just ask him when you see him. J)

So, this one is a little random, but I thought it was really cool! So, Elder Walters and I went to go to a member's house to pick something up. When we got there the member went into his house to get it and Elder Walters and I were joking around and talking, as we usually do, while we waited. When the member came back and saw us, he told us that we didn't look like normal companions. We asked him what he meant, and he said that we look like we don't just bear one another's presence. He said we looked more like great friends that just happened to be companions. I guess he meant that there are two types of companionships, one that just kinda works together and one that are the bestest friends. I thought it was the coolest thing! That not only am I a happy missionary, and Elder Walters too, but other people can see it too. It was a neat little moment!  ^_^

Well, this letter and my mission is coming to an end. It's a very funky feeling. I felt like I have been doing missionary work for as long as I can remember, and loving it, and now it's coming to an end. I'm sure any returned missionary knows how this feels. And I guess now it's my turn. It's been an extraordinary experience. The miracles I have seen, the happiness I have felt, the things I learned from my mistakes, they all have come together to make me a better person than I was before the mission. I'm nowhere near perfect but I think I'm a little closer to it, much more than I would be had I not served. It's weird, I can notice a difference in myself but at the same time I cannot. It's like piling up hay. Each piece of hay is almost weightless and I can carry it like nothing. But with time, the hay piles more and more and before I even notice, I'm 10 pounds heavier without realizing it.

I know I have changed; I'm just not sure how much. What I know for sure is that my testimony has grown and so has my love for the Savior and His work that He has called me to. And I have learned things that I probably would not have learned had I not served a mission. I have loved every moment of being a missionary and I hope to be able to apply what I learned out here in the world so that I can be able to let my light shine before the world, especially with the state the world is in. It will be harder than before but I feel that the mission has prepared me to be the best disciple of Christ that I can be.

Well, that was my little emotional splurge. X) I hope it makes a nice final entry for the blog. It's been a great two years! For the last time, thank you guys so much for being on and chatting with me on my p-days and for all your love and support! I love you all! And God be with you till we meet again!

-Elder Froude

Our apartment is on top of this chicken restaurant. 

You want to buy an ax?

Pres. Corbitt's birthday

Found this cane-brella and just couldn't resist buying it. Cool, right?

August 10, 2015 – Second to last letter home

Dear Mom, Dad, Lauren, and Ian,

Great, you all have me counting now too! X) Anyways, it's weird but I'll only do this long letter one more time and then I'm home... Waaahhhhh! But fortunately, I have quite a bit to write about! I can go about it day by day because we had quite an eventful week. Even though it was eventful, again, we didn't get to go out to teach much :( I'll start from Tuesday since I already wrote about last Monday.

Tuesday was getting ready for moving day which meant spend the day cleaning and packing not only our house but the house we were going to move into as well. So that’s exactly what we did. And since the new house was just down the street, we figured we'd just carry all the little stuff on over so that the people coming to help could just focus on the big stuff. We spent all day doing that, so we didn't have much time for teaching. In fact, we didn't teach at all that day :( Same with the next day, but different story! O:

So Wednesday was our moving day but I didn't get to help move. I was asked to go to a leader's meeting to share my last testimony for all the leaders. President Corbitt does that for any missionary that has been a ZL before in their last transfer. I went with 18 other missionaries. It was awesome! I felt like I was at a high school reunion. I took lots of pics and even some videos! It's always nice to see other missionaries! ^_^ But it took us a while to get back to our apartment though. We arrived at the meeting about 8:30am and we got back to my area about 8:30pm. Again, not able to go out and visit some people.

But not only that, the district of San Pedro asked if I could play the piano for the choir for the District Conference that same weekend. I said sure, and then they picked 4 songs that I didn't know how to play. Great, I thought, I have to take the time to learn these songs. They were “Come Come Ye Saints,” “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” “Peace Be Still,” and another one that Elder Walters ended up learning. I'll get to how I did later.

Thursday was our District meeting, so no teaching that morning. And then we went home and took a little power nap before we went out, but I woke up with a cold! I had felt it the day before, but I didn't think anything of it. Well, it got a little worse and it gave me a bad sore throat and I lost my voice! So, we didn't go out that afternoon but used the down time to continue learning. The process repeated for Friday and Saturday.

Friday though, we were able to go visit a progressing investigator to get at least something. And I was able to talk a little, so we toughed it out for the appointment and then went back home. Well, the investigator wasn't there, but his wife was, who, till that point, had been a little quiet during the lessons. Well, we got to know her and it turns out that she is incredibly smart and so cool! AND she wants an eternal family! We went there planning to talk about the Proclamation and she told us that she said that she had a feeling that when we came over that the family would be discussed. It was INCREDIBLE!! The Spirit was very strong and we could tell that she really did want it. She said that she'd keep the copy and give her husband a stern talking to so that they could get baptized and sealed. Yay!!!! We're going to visit them more often :D

Now comes Sunday, the day we have to play for the choir. I played “Come, Come Ye Saints” and “Battle Hymn of the Republic” just fine. Then I had to play “Peace Be Still.” The first verse went off without a hitch. The second verse, my right arm started to hurt. The third verse, not only does my right arm completely cramp, my fingers lock in place! So, not only am I in a metric ton of pain, I can't play correctly! I just moved my arm up and down trying to hit the right notes and it didn't work too well. XD The fourth verse my arm relaxed and I tried to play something that resembled the hymn. It was so embarrassing! DX But I tried X)

Then today for P-Day, we took a much needed break and just stayed home and played some dominos ^_^ I'm enjoying what I have left of the mission. And at the same time, working hard! It may not be in the missionary work, but it's stuff people needed us to do. And that's what Jesus Christ's ministry was all about, wasn't it? Serving others? I hope that we can keep serving people as much as we can. Hopefully, this week we can balance them both. We'll see what happens! I love you guys! Thanks for being on!!

-Elder Froude

My previous companion, Elder Tillman!

August 3, 2015 – The Not So Long Letter

Dear Mom, Dad, Lauren, and Ian,

Well, this might be a little short seeing as how there won't be much to report on this week, but I have a piece of good news though!

Well, the reason why there isn't much to report is because we haven't gone out a single day this past week. Elder Walters was still recovering from the burn on his leg and when he made some progress, he got sick with a bad cold. So, we were kept in all week last week. We talked a lot about stuff though, being best friends and all.

But on the bright side of things, we had a fruitful fast yesterday!! We knew we were a little low on investigators and had been meaning to look for more but we just haven't been able to. Well, there's this guy in our branch that runs a radio show and he's been inviting people to come to our English class, which has been a little short on students. Well, he's been finding people all week and on Sunday he comes to us with like 31 referrals for us to meet on Saturday when we can get their info!! With that, we'll be busy for the next while. Thanks miracles!!

Well, that's about it unfortunately. But this next week should be much longer! Promise!! Love you guys!!

-Elder Froude