12/18/17
Hey Fam-

I am pulling the grieving card and not writing a group email this week. I will send pictures, though. Long story short, I miss Sister Talemwa like crazy. Eish. Hardest goodbye I have had in years. 

Sister Diing is my new companion! She is from New Zealand! She seems super chill. I haven't served around her at all, but I am sure we will enjoy!

I am still in Mabvuku, so that is good!

I won't email next week because I will be Skyping home! 

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Love, Sister Lewis

Exchanges

Sunburn

Fam

Conference!

The District!

Drop it!

Olivia and Yolanda

TINY LIZARD!

Twinnies

Jeffries!

Talent

Sunburn

12/11/17

Hey Fam-

Sorry for the scare last week haha.  I will definitely keep sending group emails. I can't promise that it will happen every single week because different things pop up sometimes that will keep me busy, especially this upcoming new year, but I will do my best! 

Monday: After emailing, we went to MLC dinner! MLC stands for Missionary Leadership Council haha I don't think I ever told any of you that. It was a super good dinner! This time I was off the hook for cooking. I just got to enjoy Sister Mkhabela's cooking! It was really fun. All of the people on the council right now are powerful and funny. There is this one elder who just got on the council who reminds me of my best friend, ANDREW HUNT. Hahaha if any of you know Drew, Elder Johnson is like totally his twin! It has been fun getting to be friends with Elder Johnson and all of the other missionaries on the council! MISTAKE #1 this week....All of the sisters on the council (Sister Park, Sister Plothow, Sister Mzunga, and Sister Wells) stayed up until like ONE IN THE MORNING talking nyayas on Monday...oops. Sorry not sorry.

Tuesday: MLC! It was a really powerful MLC this time around. Eish. I liked it a lot. We talked about a lot of the issues that the mission is having and how to solve them. We also set our goal as a mission for the year of 2018. In 2017, there were a little more than 2,000 convert baptisms in Zimbabwe. We set a goal of 2,500 for 2018! I am so pumped to work towards that goal. We had some really good lessons on Tuesday. One of my favorite was with Nigel! We taught him the Restoration with his brother Simba and they really enjoyed it! MISTAKE #2 this week...So Sister Leatu'u and Sister Jeffries came for exchanges this week. They came Tuesday night and we stayed up until twelve thirty in the morning...

Wednesday: Exchanges with Sister Jeffries! It was super fun! We enjoyed way too much ahaha. Sister Jeffries had a raging headache all day, though, which I felt so bad about. She was still so fun and happy to be around, though! We saw a TON of people, too. They slept at our house again that night...MISTAKE #3 this week...we slept at twelve in the morning...

Thursday: GUYS I WAS SO TIRED BY THURSDAY HAHAHAHAHAHA. I was literally dead it was awesome. We did weekly planning and then went out and hit the area! We had a few good lessons, but everyone we taught told us they were going somewhere else for the holidays so that was boring haha. After the area, we got home by like eight or so, closed the day, and then I passed out! #blessed 

Friday: Lessons, lessons, lessons! I haven't yet told you guys about Olivia (10) and Yolanda (14)! We found them through Melody (10) who is friends with them. They were SO PREPARED FOR THE GOSPEL YOH. We don't even teach them, they teach us! We give them a pamphlet and they pretty much have it memorized by the time we get there. We taught them about the Word of Wisdom on Friday and they just got it so much. They are getting baptized this Saturday, and I am so pumped! I will send some more pictures of them this week.

Saturday: MISTAKE #4 THIS WEEK...being white...So I got SUPER sunburnt on Saturday hahaha like maybe the most sunburnt I have ever been on mission. We went contacting with the ward missionaries for our Stake Conference this past weekend. We were walking in the direct sunlight for like 4 hours inviting people to come...and I got fried. In my defense, I totally put sunscreen on that day, too. The sun was just too intense. I had kind of a cool experience while we were doing that, though. There was a homeless guy sitting on the street and he was looking pretty rough. It looked like he hadn't bathed in a few weeks. All of the ward missionaries were just walking by him, even though they had contacted every other person we walked by. I stopped in the street as I watched three little girls walk up to the homeless man. They greeted him very respectively, and then they walked away. The Spirit pricked my heart so badly in that moment! I went to invite the man to our stake conference. I found out his name was Luke. We didn't talk too long, but I invited him to sit by me at our conference. He didn't ask for money or food or anything, we just had a nice pleasant conversation as two grown up adults. It was really nice! I will never forget the feeling I had in my heart as I realized I did something the Savior would have done. I didn't judge that man by his appearance. He didn't come to the conference after all, but I will never forget Luke.

Sunday: STAKE CONFERENCE! Oh my gosh Elder Koch from Brazil from the Seventy came and it was amazing! He talked about humility and I loved it so much! I loved the conference and felt the Spirit so much!

Well ladies and gents, this is Sister Talemwa's last Monday in Zimbabwe. She leaves next week Monday in the morning. I am pretty much going to be an emotional wreck, but it is okay! I am praying that my next companion will be Sister Namugenyi again, but we shall see haha! I want to send her home, too lol. 

I am excited for Christmas coming up so soon! The time is FLYING. I can't even hold onto it at all. 

Have a good week, guys! I recently heard this and I just loved it, "You don't find peace until you love somebody else." CHOKWADI. I think the times I have been happiest in life are the times I have forgotten myself and loved others. Being selfless is the only way to really live, in my opinion.

Sister Lewis

12/4/17

Hey Fam!

What a fabulous week! Eish time is FLYING with Sister Talemwa. We are having way too much fun together hahaha. I can't believe she goes home in two weeks. Pakaipa! 

Monday: We didn't do much after emailing y'all, just shopped for food and taught some lessons! Did you guys know we teach on Mondays? We do! Go us!

Tuesday: Sister Talemwa's last District Meeting! We have MLC and the Christmas Devotional, so this was her last District Meeting! Of course she gave the doctrinal study haha. On Tuesday we helped this Gogo wash her clothes and it was super fun. Sister Talemwa does service like nobody's business. I missed doing it with her! We had some super good lessons on Tuesday, as well. 

Wednesday: Lessons allllll dayy. We taught Shakira and Beyonce all in the same day, so if you don't call that a success, I don't know what to tell you at this point hahaha. Shakira is a recent convert, and Beyonce is getting baptized next month! We also did some service on Wednesday! I played with this HUGE group of kids for a little bit. They taught me some cool songs, and I even learned what the colors on the Zimbabwean flag mean from this little girl. I will try to send the video! 

Thursday: Interviews with President! Which means we spent almost the whole day just sitting at the chapel haha. It was super fun, though, because the whole zone was there and they are all CRAZY. It made me realize how old I am on mission, though...yoh. I was just sitting watching all these new missionaries go crazy and talk to each other and laugh and have fun and Sister Talemwa and I were just kind of sitting there like eish we don't even know half of these people haha. It was really fun, though. I found out WAYYY TOO LATE IN MY MISSION that my camera has a Fish Eye Effect, so I was taking really terrible pictures of everyone and making them look pretty much obese and it was awesome. 

Friday: #LIGHTTHEWORLD "Freely ye have received, freely ye shall give." The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a Christmas initiative where they pretty much just encourage people to do something different every single day to serve someone else. It is super fun! Sister Talemwa and I are super diligent in doing it haha. So for me, I bought some beef jerky at the store (different than American beef jerky) and I gave it to another sister missionary who was really in need of some food, but was nowhere close to getting it.  We had some amazing lessons on Friday, too!

Saturday: #LIGHTTHEWORLD "I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink" I may have carried two twenty liter buckets of drinking water on my head for this lady who was carrying water...it was awesome haha. We had a bunch of fall-through lessons on Saturday, but it was okay because the other days of the week were so powerful. 

Sunday: #LIGHTTHEWORLD "It is lawful to do well on the Sabbath" Sister Talemwa and I washed dishes for two different families! It was super fun. Church was amazing! Fast Sunday is always my favorite! I told the Primary children last week if they all invited a friend to church, I would bake them a cake. THEY TOTALLY DID IT. So now I owe them cake hahah. Kids are too powerful. 

It was a great week! It went by SO fast. Sister Talemwa and I were like, "what the heck. It is Monday already?" So yeah. It is not even fair how fast time is going by. Sorry for the terrible emails, I am so tired of emailing most of the time haha. 14 months is a looonnnnggg time to communicate through email only! I might not do my group emails every week starting next transfer, but I will really try to get the motivation haha. 

I love you all and I hope you have a great week! #lighttheworld

Sister Lewis

Olivia, Yolanda, Kelin

Crazy Braid Hair!

Casual

Rings 4 Days

Swag

 

Sunday Besst

11/27/17

GUYS! I am such a dummy hahahaha I took too much time emailing other people today and forgot about the group email, so let me write you something fasta fasta. 

Monday: I got my hair done! It was awesome. I will send some pictures soon soon!

Tuesday: Happy Birthday Connor! District Meeting was great! We had some super good lessons after DM.

Wednesday: Exchanges with...SISTER CLARK. Literally Lewis and Clark, guys. So exciting haha it was an awesome exchange. She is companions with Sister Tonga, so we all got to hang out with each other and stuff haha. 

Thursday: Weekly Planning! I totally forgot about Thanksgiving haha. We just worked, worked, worked.

Friday: Tons of lessons, baptismal interviews! WE ARE TEACHING SOMEONE LITERALLY NAMED BEYONCE YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW HAPPY I AM ABOUT THAT HAHAHAHA.

Saturday: Baptism! Ancillar, Malcom, and Reuban all got baptized on Saturday! Also this awesome thing happened on Saturday haha. We were helping this guy get water from the borehole and we got caught in the POURING RAIN. We got so soaked it was awesome haha. 

Sunday: Church! We also got to watch the YSA Face to Face and YOH I got so much revelation it was not even funny. 

Love you guys! Sorry I wrote this email in literally two minutes! I am so lazy to email these days hahah #cominghomein4months

LOVE YOU!

Sister Lewis

P.S. Sister Talemwa and I sleep between like 12 and 1 everyday because we literally cannot stop talking to each other haha

Baptism of Ancillar, Malcom, and Rueban

11/20/17 

GUYS!

Calm down, calm down hahahaha. Everyone emailed me this week being like, "I hope you are okay!" I have said it to a bunch of people individually, but I also want to say it in my group email, DON'T WORRY! Honestly, Zimbabwe is such a safe country that even though all of this crazy stuff is happening, I still feel safer here than in some parts of the very country I come from haha. There has not been any violence. We are so safe! They had us stay inside one day when everything was starting and they weren't quite sure what was up, but every single day after that we have been allowed to proselyte with no problem! As missionaries, we are not allowed to give our opinions on the politics and stuff, so I am not going to say much about it, but don't even be worried for me at all. I feel NO fear. I am just enjoying mission! Let me tell you about my week!

Monday: We went to take Sister Park to the doctor's office so they could tell us what was wrong with her, and they just said it was a stomach infection. She has been taking pills for the past week and when I checked up on her today, she is totally fine and doing well! Thank you for all the prayers for her. Sister Plothow is also better from her sickness. Monday was my 14 months on mission mark! Time FLIES. What the heck. I am coming home in four months SOS. 

Tuesday: Since we were in Harare, we went to District Meeting with Sister Talemwa and Sister Plothow, which was like my correct district anyway haha. We got the BEST NEWS EVER on Tuesday that Sister Plothow was going back with Sister Park to Mbizo. I was SUPER HAPPY to be with Sister Park for a week in Mbizo, but the Spirit just kept telling me over and over again while I was there that I was not in the right area with the right companion. It really helped me strengthen my testimony that transfers are SO inspired! As soon as I got in my area and was teaching my own investigators with my own companion, all of the drama that had happened and the stress I was feeling just went away! It was awesome. 

Wednesday: We got a text telling us to just stay home while the mission was trying to figure out how safe it was and stuff like that. Sister Talemwa and I CLEANED our house super nicely, we had a photo shoot just for fun, and we did our weekly planning! Pretty boring day, for the most part. Both of us just wanted to be out in the area teaching lol.

Thursday: Hahahahaha so Sister Talemwa and I did some service on Thursday. We have this recent convert who needed help clearing her field to plant chibage (corn), so we went and did that. CLEARING A FIELD IS TERRIBLE. I was just pulling huge weeds all day with my hands because they only had two hoes and there were four of us. Of course they didn't give me the hoe because I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO USE IT PROPERLY lol.  We also had some great lessons!

Friday: Teach, teach, teach, baptismal interviews, teach! HAPPY ANNIVERSARY JASON AND HEATHER! 10 YEARS WOOT WOOT!

Saturday: Baptism for Patrick and Kundisai! Powerful people with powerful testimonies! Then lessons lessons lessons.

Sunday: THE WARD IS AMAZING. Guys. I have never been in a ward on mission. They are so powerful. I love them. They were super welcoming and excited to have me.

Pretty much I am the happiest person ever! Sending my trainer home in a GREAT area is amazing! I love you all so much. Thank you for all the love and concern and prayers. See you next week!

Love, Sister Lewis

Decorating for Xmas

Part 2

Photoshoot pt 1

Pt 2

Pt 3

Pt 4

Cleaning

Ice from freezer lol

Paper Cranes

Baptisms

Selfie

Kaden

Sass Master

Mad Love

11/13/17

The Adventures of Lewis and Park: THE ENCORE

Guys hahahahaha what even happened this week!? Let me just tell you how my life has been craziness for the past straight 168 hours. Remember how Sister Talemwa was supposed to be my companion? JOKES! 

So after we finished emailing, Sister Talemwa and I went back to the office to pick something up. Our phone had died, so we just weren't even expecting what came next. This transfer, I was supposed to be with Sister Talemwa in Mabvuku, and Sister Plothow was supposed to be with Sister Park in Mbizo, but Sister Plothow got sick. Sister Plothow and I are like best friends so I was so worried about her all week. BUT. We get to the office, and everyone is just looking at me with like anticipation in their eyes. I could tell something weird was up. Sister Plothow pulls me off to the side and was like, "I am sick, so Sister Mkhabela wants me to stay in Harare with Sister Talemwa until I get better. You are going to Mbizo to be with Sister Park." I love Sister Park with all my heart and soul, like honestly we got along so well, but I was freaking out because I was supposed to send my trainer home! So I went and talked to the APs, and they were like, "Yeah, this will just be for the week. We will switch you back when Sister Plothow gets better."

MY TRIP TO KWEKWE!

On Tuesday morning, I got up and went to District Meeting with Sister Talemwa and Sister Plothow. Then, I got on BRAVO! Bravo is not fun haha. It was a three hour bus ride to Kwekwe. What did I do? Missionary work, of course! I sat next to this guy on the bus and we started talking about life in general for the first like twenty minutes, and then we just started talking about religion and I taught him about the Book of Mormon. It was a great conversation. His name was Abraham. He lives in Bulawayo, which was like another 3 hour ride after Kwekwe, so I left him with some things to read. When I got to Mbizo (same thing as Kwekwe), we went to teach some lessons. YOH I missed Sister Park SO BAD! This whole entire week we slept at like 12:30 every night because we were just talking and catching up on life. 

Wednesday was a good day! We had a lot of fall through lessons, but we found a lot of people to teach anyway. I got a break off of driving this week KIND OF (see Sunday for details), which was super nice. 

Thursday we did Weekly Planning and went to the area. Again, some fall through appointments, but we found really great people to teach. Heavenly Father was just trying to make me work realllyy hard in Kwekwe. 

Friday we had baptismal interviews and we worked in the area. Friday night, Sister Park started to feel a bit sick. She woke up with a fever, but she just drank water and went back to sleep.

Saturday Sister Park was feeling WAY WORSE, but we had three baptisms, so she toughed it up and we got to see ONISIMO, PRINCE, AND YASSINE get baptized! I hardly even knew them at all, but it was still so fun to see them get baptized! Cute kids. They are all like 14, 13, and 11 year old boys. Super nice kids. Great future missionaries one day, especially Onisimo! After the baptism, we tried to teach a few more lessons, but then Sister Park decided she needed to call Sister Mkhabela to get permission to go home and sleep. She slept for quite a few hours, so I just packed my stuff nicely, cooked dinner, and read to keep myself busy. She was way worse at night, so on Saturday night, Sister Mkhabela told me that I needed to drive Sister Park to Harare the next morning.

Sunday we did not even go to church at all because church starts at 9:30 in Mbizo and we had to be in Harare by 12:30 for the doctors appointment, which means we were supposed to leave around 9. It was soooooo weird not taking the sacrament. I think that is the first time this whole entire year that I did not take the sacrament. The drive up to Harare was SO beautiful! I had to drive since Sister Park was sick, but I actually really enjoyed it. I miss long car trips. We get to the doctor's office around 12 for our appointment, but he wasn't there yet. HE DID NOT SHOW UP UNTIL LIKE 2. Eish. We sat at the hospital all day and poor Sister Park was just sleeping. She has a stomach infection, so they gave her antibiotics and she should be good to go.

SO today I am emailing you from Harare! Can you even feel how much drama my week had? I didn't even mention all of it haha. We still aren't even sure today who is going to Kwekwe and who is staying behind because Sister Plothow is at the doctor right now getting some results. EISH. Living out of a suitcase is not nice.

Amid all the drama, though, I had a good week. I really enjoyed being with Sister Park again. I hope I get to finish the transfer with my mission mother, though!

Pray for me to just have a normal week, please haha.

LOVE YOU ALL. Have a great week!

Sister Lewis

First picture with new SD card!

Onisimo, Prince, Yassine

Clinic Chillin'

Sleepy Compa

11/6/17

GUYS.

Want to hear the worst news of my life? My SD card broke almost last week. I am going to like copy all the pictures onto a flash before it breaks for sure...BUT I DIDN'T GET TO TAKE ANY PICTURES AT ALL THIS WEEK. Thank the heavens because I had the spirit of prophecy (jokes) and asked my mom to send me a new SD card a few weeks ago...so let me just wait patiently. When a camera is the literal only technology you have in your life as a missionary, and you can't use it, life feels different. Shame, guys. Pray for me. 

KUNZIMA EMLHABENI. (Life is hard) Sister Dyantyisi is going home TOMORROW and I am not okay with it. I literally cried the whole entire day yesterday. She and I got waaayyyy to close and I just feel like she is taking my right arm with her to South Africa. I don't even know how to live. Eish. This is definitely the most painful goodbye I have ever had on mission. Except I am expecting another one that will be terrible next transfer because GUESS WHAT?!

SISTER TALEMWA IS MY NEW COMPANION!!! Can you even believe it?! I am with my trainer again! She is in her last six weeks, so after this transfer together she will go home. She was my first companion, and I will be her last companion! To some of you, it might not seem like a very big deal, but it is actually super rare that two people are companions more than one time. And it is almost NEVER that a person gets to be with their trainer again. Are we lucky or what?!

The only thing that is actually super sad is that I got transferred away from Zengeza. Now I am in Mabvuku, which is still in Harare. I cried when I found out I was being transferred. 12 weeks was not enough! But I am excited for Mabvuku. It will be my first ward on mission! I am too used to surprises now. 

My last week in Zengeza was good! MLC was a huge success, especially the dinner. This time, it was just Sister Dyantyisi, Sister Mkhabela, and I cooking, and it was super fun. We really enjoyed. 

I can't even tell you how many times this happens, but this week while we were teaching this guy, he was like, "Yeah, I am a pastor." I have taught a lot of pastors in my time haha. 9 times out of 10, though, they just want to take our teachings to their church. Shamwari.Prease prease. 

We taught Dixon about the temple this week! It was a cool lesson. He should be getting baptized next week, but we will see. Since both of the sisters who are going to be in Zengeza this transfer are new, it is going to be REALLY HARD for them to balance out trying to learn the area and keep all the investigators we have and stuff like that. Pray for them, please. 

As usual, Robson was just slaying us this week haha. He doesn't swear these days, but he is just such a funny person. I will miss him :(

We had a table contacting activity with the branch this past week. It was cool! We just set up a table outside of a grocery store, threw some bibs on, and put out pamphlets and a whole bunch of people came! We got a lot of new people to teach. 

Okay let me share with you the story of Ranga, since I didn't get to last week. Remember how I said it was super cold for a few days last week? So on Saturday, we had planned to see this guy Lincoln, but he was running a little bit late. We decided to walk around in the street and invite people to church. It started sprinkling a little bit, but we didn't mind. We were walking past this house of guys digging a REALLY DEEP PIT, and I greeted the guys. I asked them if I could come help clear some of the dirt, and they said yes. Everyone, including my companion, thought I was joking. I can't even really explain it properly, but I had to walk around the edge edge of this huge pit. My companion refused to come help because she thought she would fall in hahaha. So then I took a shovel and just started helping them. I think I spent a solid 15 minutes shoveling dirt. While I dug, we talked about why we are here as missionaries, and Ranga invited us to his house to teach him and his family! He said that he doesn't go to church because he can't agree with any of the doctrines, but he wanted us to come and see him. Miracles come by working hard, hey?

So now I am ready for Mabvuku! I think it might be my last area before I go home, but we shall see. Mission has taught me to expect the unexpected. 

Love you guys! I hope you have a great week!

I love you, Dyantyisi! Travel safe, shamwari. 

Sister Lewis

10/30/17

Guyss......I am helping my companion cook for MLC dinner again...so we are leaving super early from emailing...but SO MANY AWESOME THINGS HAPPENED THIS WEEK that I can't even wait to tell you about next week.

IT HAS BEEN SO COLD IN HARARE FOR THE PAST THREE DAYS.. which is amazing because it has been like hot hot hot hot hot.

No car probs this week, no sickness, I am good! Transfers are next week and I am not even ready!

Selfie

My Loves!

Cold

Kelvin!

Good Story....

Good Story...

Exchanges!

PLOWTHOW

Shamwari

Waiting for Sisters...