Elder and Sister Condie Mission Blog: January 3, 2015

Happy New Year!! What a wonderful year we have had and looking forward to more great things in the coming year, 2016! Our week started out with our visits with the kids! Love love that! We visited Darshini and the kids at the salon! Have such a great time with them! Ordered a little McDonalds which we loved!! Tuesday began with District meeting with the Bedke's!! It is so fun to have them here! They are willing and anxious to be serving and jumping right in with the mission work in Negombo! They are Humanitarian missionaries for this part of their journey also. We had a great meeting and then took the elders and them with Pres Anton to Dolce Italia! Yum! They came back to the apartment for awhile to visit and to explain to them some things about serving here! They are going to be great! Wish they were staying longer! Their mission will be over in April. Later that night, we went to Inoka's to celebrate Steffaniya's 9th birthday! They had cake and lots of food that Richard (Tania's husband and investigator) made! (Kind of spicy for me)! We rode over with Pres Nishan and his family! Great fun with great people! Wednesday, Steve went with the elders to see Yatika and Nihan...friends of Tania's. (The elders always need another man when they go see a lady investigator). Great visit! Steve came and got me and we went to Franks house to meet his mom! She has been gone for 4 years working in Israel. She is a baptized member but now wants to start her own church here. She was very nice and we enjoyed our visit very much! They fed us a wonderful lunch! It was great to meet Franks "other" mom (besides me!!!) We went home for a half hour and then we were off again to Shanika's. We had a wonderful visit with them. Thursday was New Years Eve. We wanted to give our 4 elders (previous elders) a gift for Christmas and Steve thought it would be fun to take them to the movie! We ordered pizza first and had a great time with these guys! We just love them so much! We then went to "Star Wars"! We had good tickets in the balcony and had a great time! There was so much hype about this movie.....and we all really enjoyed it! They came back to the house where we visited and laughed and enjoyed each other! The branch was having a party at the church for New Years Eve. They served Rosepaan......which is big, giant slices of bread....and then you dip them in different curries. They were going to have a movie night but it got changed or something to a dance party. I think that made some people not come. There wasn't a very big turn out.....so....Pres Nishan, the elders, and other leaders went out on the streets and around the church and invited people over for dinner! There were so many that came and enjoyed the meal and we were able to meet new people! It turned out to be a great service for the community! We were party poopers and left the church about 9:45. We get so tired in the evenings!! But it was a great night with those that were there! The New Year brought more food invitations! We had lunch with Sherine and her family at her Brothers home, Roshan. He is very nice! He has a wife and 3 children. Sherine says he usually won't talk when there are members of the church around....but Steve got him talking quite a bit! Then Sherine's husband took us home.....another guy who does not talk much....but talked to us all the way home! That evening, Sister Primali and Pres Kolitha invited us over for dinner! They live quite far but with the holiday, there wasn't that much traffic and we got there in an hour! And had a fabulous dinner with them. We had a great visit as well! Primali is one of the nicest people I know. I really enjoy her a lot! Great day! We had some sad news this week....that our buddy, Kingsley passed away. It made us very sad! His funeral was Saturday. We went early to the visitation. We saw his 2 children there and that was very nice. I have to say I got pretty teary seeing him. He was so vibrant and happy a few months back....dancing with me, laughing with us, telling great stories....just a wonderful man. But the last time we saw him, he was so thin....with tubes everywhere and not even conscious. So it was a blessing that he didn't have to suffer anymore. He was all dressed in a suit and tie with a red rose on his lapel. It was great seeing him without the hole in his neck and the tube from his nose. We will miss him. We then headed to Chilaw! We picked up the Bedke's on the way so that they could meet the people and be able to start doing the teaching there....since it is quite far for us! It was really great to see Piyumi again! She hadn't come the last few times we were there! We had a great time! We didn't get home too awfully late so that was nice too! Sunday was fast Sunday! We invited Brother Lyle over with Hansani and her family. Her parents don't speak English much so it was nice to have Lyle there to help with the conversation ! They are the nicest people! Hansani is so sweet! Her parents want to get baptized soon and that is exciting! She is so happy with her baptism! Pastor David....the guy Lyle took us to see (and to convert he and his village) came early in the morning and came to church and then to dinner. Bro Lyle is sure they are all going to join the church and that we will have a branch there! It was nice to have them all here. Hansani and I made cookies after dinner to go with the ice cream! She always wants to come to our house and make cookies, so this worked out great! Another big week ahead! Going to Kandy for 8 baptisms this weekend! EIGHT!! And they don't even have missionaries there....just wonderful returned missionaries who are doing wonderful things! It will be a wonderful week I am sure!!!!