Elder Tyler Newbold NY NY North Mission: Week 37

June 22, 2016
Wednesday, Day 253
Day 240 in NY

Pday!
Today I woke up feeling like I was getting sick... My head hurt and I just felt "bleh". But we had plans for the day so I went with it. Our roommates said they had a surprise for us. But wouldn't tell us what it was, so we planned to follow them around all day. During laundry we had an appointment with a member for lunch, so we met with her at Subway and chatted a bit. We ended up having Elder Richards and Burton finish banging out our laundry and taking it to the apartment for us as we made our way home. When we got home they led us to the surprise! It took some walking but we finally got there. When we entered the doors we were still pretty clueless as to where we were. Then my best friend Elder Richards handed Elder Tatafu and I a ticket to the MoMA. (The Museum of Modern Art). Which we kept even until after the museum. We walked in and didn't see anyone asking for or checking tickets so we walked around and found ourselves in the museum and we just kept exploring. When we finished we remembered that we still had our tickets and that they don't expire so we can come back. After the Museum we went for a walk and found some stores, we went to Hollister and Elder Richards and I got matching shirts, they had a sale, 2 for $14 so we just split it. Then we found a Nike store and we just explored around that, I think there were like 3 or 4 floors. I just remember going up so many escalators. After Pday we had a dinner appointment with Ray Smith! So we went over to the East side of Manhattan and met him at his apartment, then we walked to Mole and had some really good Mexican food. I ordered the Burrito (Enchilado style) and that was way good! After a good meal and a good chat with Ray he took us back to his apartment where he needed to grab his stuff to then catch a train upstate. So while in his apartment we shared a message, one that he expressed great appreciation toward and that he enjoyed greatly. Which made us feel great! We have been sharing he same scripture with different people and have been applying it to them all differently as well and we felt that this one definitely was the greatest yet. After a prayer we all walked down to the train station where we caught a train and parted ways a few stops later and made our way home.

June 23, 2016
Thursday, Day 254
Day 241 in NY

Today I woke up feeling much worse then yesterday, my head hurt, my body ached, I got up to take shower and felt lightheaded... After a shower I just got back in bed and slept from 8-12pm my poor companion was probably so bored! I woke up to our roommates coming home for lunch, we asked each other what our schedules were and after talking Elder Richards said that they had a dinner appointment the same time that we did. My plan was to find out their plans, hoping they wouldn't
have a dinner planned so that we could go on a split, one of them to stay home with me, and the other to go out for dinner with our member. But they said they had dinner plans with their Branch President, so we decided to cancel our appointments. After doing so, and a nice long nap, I wake up to our roommates once again returning from their appointments and the first thing from their mouths were "do you still have a dinner tonight?!" Responding with no, they shrunk and encouraged Elder Tatafu to ask the member to see if she was still okay to take us out for dinner. She responded yes, and we conducted a split. Elder Burton went with Elder Tatafu to dinner and that was great because then Elder Tatafu was finally able to get out of the apartment and do something other than be bored. When they returned for the night, I asked if they would give me a blessing. I didn't want to spend another day in the apartment... After the blessing it was a little after 9:30, so we all did our nightly planning. Planning on playing it by ear, we had a set appointment with Mia, a recent convert, at 2:30. I planned on getting up when I had enough rest and was able to go out for the day. After sleeping all day I wasn't tired for bed at 10:30... So around 1AM I ended up in the bathroom looking for NyQuil, after taking a swig I was sound asleep in bed.

June 24, 2016
Friday, Day 255
Day 242 in NY

I slept in his morning, just till about noon. Then slowly but surely I was able to get out of bed and ready for the day. Still not feeling 100% better, but knowing that with out the blessing I was given last night I would not be out of bed, we made our way to meet with Mia. We met at Bryant park cafe, where we ate lunch and we shared a message with her. Not feeling up to eat all day yesterday I ordered a pulled pork sandwich and I was in heaven! Our message was on the sacrament. We asked how she prepares herself for the sacrament and we discussed some more things that she could do even through out the week. She shared some really good things with us about how she knows we need to repent daily even up until we partake of the sacrament. It was really neat to hear that from someone who has only been a member for 6 months!

After meeting with Mia we went to the church and just relaxed... After being in the sun with Mia and walking so much, my body was not functioning. So we sat down at the church, drank our water, and did some planning until we had another appointment at 5pm with Brandon H. He was taking us out to Mighty Quinn's BBQ. He being from Texas and knowing what true BBQ is said that it's not the best but it's good for what's in NY. So we took his word for it and agreed to meet there. (For being sick I was well treated today with food). When we got to Mighty Quinn's I ordered a brisket sandwich, which was pretty good with there Mighty Quinn BBQ sauce. We talked about our mission and how it's going and we talked about his mission in Reno and it was just a good time. He also told us that he would be moving tomorrow, so of course we offered to help him out at 9 am. When we got home from dinner we planned for tomorrow and I laid back in bed and made sure I got the rest my body needed to recover so that we could help Brandon move.

June 25, 2016
Saturday, Day 256
Day 243 in NY

Woke up this morning and got ready like any other day, since we were meeting at Brandon's at 9 we pushed back studies. We got to Brandon's at 9 and helped him pack up his apartment and fill up the
U-Haul. After a couple hours of that we had everything packed up and ready to go... Except his carpet that he wanted to take. It was too long to fit in the truck and he didn't want both of us to carry it 11 blocks to his new apartment and with me still not feeling 100% he told me to ride his bike alongside him and my companion as they walked from his old apartment to his new apartment, while Elliot drove the U-Haul. When we got to his new apartment we started unloading the truck and putting everything inside, by the elevator. As we started unloading the truck they would take things up to the room after filling the whole elevator. After more than a few rides up and down we had the truck unloaded and the apartment filled with his things. We were finished up around 1 o'clock and Brandon felt bad that "he made us work" all day with out feeding us lunch, even though he bought us donuts for breakfast. So as we got ready to leave he gave us a 20 and said go get lunch. He insisted and wouldn't take it back so we held onto it. Not feeling very hungry we decided to keep it till we needed it. After a long morning of hard work we went home to clean up and rest again... I ended up falling asleep again and waking up just in time to go to dinner with a member. We met at her apartment with Brian; it was such a good meal. She made chicken pasta, apricots, and garlic bread. Afterwards we talked with them about any missionary experiences they've had lately, after a moment they both had one and Brian told us that because he's a recent convert he shares with a lot of people he meets about his story and how he found the church and what a great difference it is to him in his life. Kalena works finances for the Broadway industry and she says there's rarely anyone religious in the industry she works in. So she went on to say that since the Book of Mormon play is crude and not friendly she has decided to never watch it, because of that decision she's able to share with her co-workers that she is a member and she's answered some of the questions her co-workers have had about the church. After our visit we hit the pavement, praying for a bus… After about 15 minutes a bus came, we were all the way at the end of our area. We had walked from dinner at 110 st. down to 100 st. and we were saved by a bus. When we got on the bus we took a seat and immediately I was exhausted. Being sick has just drained me. This whole time Elder Tatafu has been telling me to take it slow and just rest my body till I'm better and then we can start going out. That being the best thing to do, I just didn't want to get in a habit of being inside all the time and wanting to do nothing. But we came home and I went to sleep.

June 26, 2016
Sunday, Day 257
Day 244 in NY

Sunday! We went to church and had a great sacrament meeting! Elliot played the violin for a musical number, which I didn't know he could do, so that was awesome to hear. Feeling slow and out of energy we made our way to our classes and after church went home. Then Elder Tatafu made me lay down and rest since I did too much the last couple days. Today we just stayed home and I was able to rest and he did his studies. The Ward had a lunch planned at 2 at the park, which would have been fun, but I fell asleep and didn't wake up for a while, so we missed out on that. I'm feeling better; I'm just out of energy.

June 27, 2016
Monday, Day 258
Day 245 in NY

Woke up this morning and my head was still hurting so I kept trying to keep my self hydrated, when I stood up and walked around I'd feel a little uneasy. We had our studies and I planned out district meeting. We went to the church to have our leadership meeting and the zone leaders came to join us for district meeting. We FaceTimed the other districts in the zone and had our meeting, I think I was nodding off to sleep during it because I don't remember much about it lol. When we finished leadership meeting, I conducted district meeting. I didn't plan on speaking a whole lot because I sound sick and my head hurt. We went around the room and as a group read Alma chapter 18. After reading I asked the question "What were Lamoni’s feelings at the beginning of the story?" As the question was thought about, one by one they began to share thoughts and ideas to this question, which lead to other questions. It was really great! As the comments came to a long pause I'd throw in the next question "How did Lamoni's feelings change?" Again a great discussion continued as they opened up and shared their thoughts. Then we read Alma 34:15–16, and compared it with Lamoni’s story. Then I asked "How does Christ’s Atonement enable us to obtain mercy?" and we talked a little bit about that and how the atonement is the only way that we are able to obtain mercy then I bore my testimony and just expressed my love for them and to them about my love for this work. Preach my gospel is the greatest! Everything we talked about and the questions I asked were all inspired from Preach my gospel.

For lunch, after district meeting Elders Richards and Burton and Tatafu and I went to Chick fil a which was so satisfying! I felt like I hadn't eaten in days, but I had! After we ate we came home and had to do some planning since I was asleep all day Thursday for weekly planning. And that was basically our day. Over the past few weeks, we've lost contact with some of our investigators and found out that one of them is moving so we are down to one progressing investigator, who we are hoping will keep us busy.

June 28, 2016
Tuesday, Day 259
Day 246 in NY

Today we have our interviews with President. So we were supposed to meet with President for our interviews at 10:10 but we got a call from Elder Stevenson last night asking if we could switch times so that they could reserve the time they would have their interviews to help one of the members in their ward move. I agreed and switched with them. At 11 am we went to the church where we had zone study, which is where President takes a break from interviews, and addresses the zone with any remarks and teachings he feels the need to discuss. As planned according to the schedule, we should have been done at 12. He ended up going an hour over time and we finished at 1. So now with all the
interview times unknown and pushed back, we quickly left and grabbed the Cazba, which is just another type of street meat. After grabbing our food we went back to the church and waited for our interviews round 3:20 pm he was finally down to Elder Tatafu's interview and then mine 10 minutes later, by the time I got out it was about 3:50 and we needed to go downtown to 15th street to pick up mail from the Union Square Chapel. I got a package from home with some goodies; a new pair of slacks, new socks, and the best pair of stance socks out there (THANKS DAD!), a sweet tie from Miranda and her sweet family! And my annual Pizza my heart T-shirt that I'm so stoked about! Thanks y'all! I also got a letter from my roommate Elder Richards, which cracked me up! He lives with me and he sent me a letter last week, which I didn't know about. Last week when we picked up mail, Elders Richards and Burton came to help because our district had so much. While we were getting mail, going through the letters, Elder Richards came up to me and said "Dude! Why don't you ever send my a letter?" I told him "because you never asked!" Secretly he wrote me a letter that day and sent it. So, today when we got mail I found this little letter, I checked the sender and it said Elder Richards, he cracks me up! Inside was a 3x5 card and not even a full line was used on it, his card said "Elder Newbold. I asked you why you never send me any letters and you told me that I never ask. So I am hereby asking for a letter. -Elder Richards This dude cracks me up! I'm making so many good, fun memories with many good friends.

Well by the time we got home we had time to get ready and head out as a group to a members apartment for dinner. Will C. invited the 4 of us over for dinner, the weather was unknown, it was saying it was going to rain so he called off our plans to go to pier 45 and check out the sunset. We instead, met at his apartment and he made a sweet summer salad with watermelon and oranges! We ate the salad with some really good sandwiches he bought. It was a great dinner! We then shared a scripture with him and invited him to continue to increase his foundation in the church. He shared some great goals with us and we said a closing prayer, then he offered to take us out to ice cream
and of course we couldn't pass that up. We all left together and on the way to the train he bought us ice cream and we headed to the train as he headed back home. What an awesome guy! There are so many great members here; we are so blessed to serve where we do.

Hope you all enjoy another week! Thanks for all the feedback and compliments about my emails. I'm now considering writing a book when I get home, so stay tuned! Thanks again to all! Love you all!

Patience. Love. Faith

Much love,
Elder Newbold