Sunday, December 28, 2008

hey, just some things about collin :)


hey y'alls

sorry we've been lazy about posting, we've just been.... well lazy.
collin's been doing really well, and we got to talk to him on christmas and all that fun stuff. he's also singing in a choir. here's a quote that we should have posted when it happened

"Hey! What's up? Well I too am in a christmas choir.. We'll be competing against other churches in the area or something. It's actually really good... usually french speaking people sing very badly. like, seriously. But this choir is going well. I'm really excited for it. I'm actually among the best in the tenors, which i think is funny. i kind of lead the section at times. it's really fun singing in french. i love it."
so yeah, that's the skinny on the choir. today we got a picture of him singing in it (up there ^ ^)
there's more stuff that my mom probably wants on here, but i'll let her handle it, because i want to get back to my dinner :)
thanks for not getting after us for our lazyness about posting :D

Sunday, December 14, 2008

here's THIS week's email :)

Oh yes so i didn't give ya'll a rundown of my week. I put my shirt in the washer and it got a little bit messed up. I turned it inside out, didn't use a ton of soap, only washed it with like 2 other things, put it on cold water only, and did a slow cycle. also dryers don't exist in New Caledonia, so i put it out to dry... and the BEHIND part of the shirt is alll messed up. i'm sad. all the pictures are alright for now though. i've stopped wearing it for the time being.

We had a lesson with a lady named Natalie.. I think I may have mentioned her before. We taught her once before, and since then 2 rendezvous with her fell through.. but this one worked out. she actually cancelled things to keep her rendezvous. It was really awesome. We walked in and before we even started the lesson, she said um, can I have a book of mormon? I really want to read it!! And we're like WAWAAATTT?!?!?!? That is the keyword!!!! We had actually that very morning, put our testimonies in a Livre de Mormon just for her, and brought it with us. I got the warm fuzzies handing it to her and we were really really happy. She had read our pamphlet all the way through twice since our last meeting, started reading her bible again, and noticed the Lord has already been blessing her. She only faught twice with her husband this week, which is down from every day. She was smart enough to attribute this to BLESSINGS instead of coincidence. I'm really really happy about it. The only problem is, she says she can't see us until January. Which worries us. she's going to be out of town and stuff. but we're still goign to stop by to make sure seh's allright.

also we met this guy.. he was a reference given to my companion months ago and he was never ever there.. for some reason (the Spirit) he pulled out his old planner from Ducos and decided to call him on Saturday. It turns out his wife was being stalked or somethign wierd so they never answer the phone to numbers they don't recognize. but today he answered. He's golden. He doesn't smoke or drink, and he's already married. Those are the 3 problems we have with every single investigator ever in the history of New Caledonia. He's friends with lots and lots and LOTS of active members. he sees their good examples and wants to see what's up with them. so then we show up.. he told us he asked one of his friends (who is the 1st councillor in the branch in Tontouta- my old branch) to give his little son a blessing, who was really sick. he excercized his faith and his son is healed. he already has a testimony of the Priesthood. Dang. Golden. I'm thinkin we'll baptize him.

We also taught a lady named Marie-Claude, which i think i already told you about.. maybe? i don't know. anyway, (which made me think about Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Enterprise... I actually taught a guy named Jean-Luc in Paita, and met a guy in paita whose last name is Picard. Not the same guy, but both names. awesome, EH??) .. we found her daughter during porte a porte, and kept trying to get a rendezvous but she wasn't really that interested. one day we gave a little kid in the house one of our pamphlet things on the restoration (which means restaurant in french... someone gave a talk about the Joseph Smith Restaurant a couple months ago. i want to eat there! in french it's retablissment.. re-establisment) and left our phone number. ironically, we came by one day and the girl we found originally was not at all interested, but her mom, read the pamphlet twice, loved it. she has already been to church before and saw the missionaries years and years ago and really wanted to get in contact with them again. and then poof we show up at just the right moment. ! We were excited. unfortunately she didn't keep our rendezvous for saturday, which was a shock, but we'll try for the next saturday.

Ummmmmm mhmmmmm... other than that, a giant flying cockroack flew on my head a couple weeks ago at a members house, and i ran out of the house. it was funny. this week we got harrassed by like 10 different drunk guys. once the police actually helped us (usually they do absolutely nothing but give speeding tickets)... but as usual, i'm totally safe. for some reason i'm never scared of these guys, even when they're yelling don't ever come back here again! First and last time in my neighborhood! etc. they're drunk anyway and don't remember ever talking to us. i think it's funny.

Um........ I ate a pizza with potatoes and shrimp on it.. i gave out a book of mormon in vietmamese, i learned some more phrases in tahitan, (including big crap), I got told i speak french really really well, and got told that i don't speak very well but i make do with what i have. :D ha ha. i ate more raw fish, poured coke out the window on a little kid (ha ha, long story) and .... hmm... i found out that the members think i'm cool.

well that's it! ya'll have a great week!

here's from the 7th :)

Hi! I'm gonna give a rundown of what happened this week, in case you're interested. This week monday me and Elder Manarani had adventures in Noumea center. We ran around town looking in souvenir shops for random crap and found some cool junk to send to y'all for christmas. We made it back home by bus, having taken all the right busses all day. Awesome! We had never taken a bus to centre ville and were kind of scared, but we made it there and out alive!

We also bought these glue traps for cockroaches and there's like a million in all of them. i'm really happy to see them suffer. they move their little antennas around for days but can't move. and to taunt them a little bit i put a jelly bean in one of them and they all got really excited and tried to rip off their legs but didn't succeed.

I forgot to tell you last week, i did my first talk in sacrament meeting in FRENCH and it was really scary but went really really well. people still tell me that i did a really good job.. 2 weeks later, that's much beyond the required courtesy "good job" so that must mean i actually did well.

we had Zone Conference with President Ostler and President Baxter (mission president, area president and 70) and their wives and it was really really awesome.

Also French is going really well. However I realized I don't understand when French people talk!!! Like, france french people. It's really sad, but i only understand the island accent and vocabulary. and if i were to speak to a proper french person i would definitely sound like a hillbilly, cuz people use a very different (and very incorrect) grammar here. I'm scared to come back and say that i speak "french" and then people will find out i speak "Francais outre mer" outer sea french. meh, whatev. it's alright. it works alright for me, cuz i have never ever taught a french person. they're all really really really mean and hard headed. island people are amazing.

i've been learning a couple phrases in tahitian lately.. it's really awesome. i accidently mix in english when i speak really fast with my copmanion and don't realize it, and he does exactly the same with tahitian. it's funny, i'll say um, was that french??? and he'll say what?? oops!

we only taught 2 lessons this week, but one of them was really really good!!!! We have 2 new investigators.. Marie-Claude and her daughters, whose names i can't remember. they were really excited when we came to the door, had already read the pamplet we have on the restoration, and were ready with questions. they're pentacostal and don't understand the need for organized religion, but we'll fix that. :D we have another rendezvous on Saturday.

That lady that we found that said she had been praying and then we showed up, we saw her finally for the second time yesterday. her schedule is sporatic but she's really excited for us to teach her. we dont' have an appointment but we'll teach her sooner or later and i have a feeling that she will benefit greatly from our message.

We sang in the choir Sunday, and also sang for this Wallisan guy and his family. His daughter is in our Branch, but most of his family is not members. He has been really sick and they thought he was going to die, but he got a blessing and now is doing much better. They asked us to come sing for him. We found out that the doctor said he needed to start speaking, cuz there is this problem in his throat. he hadn't spoken since he got sick months ago and the very first time he spoke was while we were there!!!!! He really apprecitated it and we were happy to be there. we're going back next week too.

um... yeah, i think that's everything that's happened lately. :)

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

newest email from collin

I had a really good birthday. Elder Manarani took me out for brunch at this "Snack asaitic" that is right by our house. There aren't very many restaurants outside of Noumea Center, but there are these "Snacks" that is just a little restaurant. We ate really really well... I ate a "Steack Frite Salade au Sauce Champinions", which I think I spelled wrong, but it was just steak, french fries, a little salad, and the steak had this really good mushroom sauce on it!! Mmm! Then we went and did service (which we do every Thursday) for this lady who lives in Robinson (a missionary sector not to far from us, where our district leader is) and we cut hedges. It was really fun and I fell in the hedge and thought I was going to die but I'm fine :) It's like a 15 foot tall hedge and I fell all the way to the bottom! Ha ha. I wasn't hurt or anything, but it was really funny. Then they surprised me with some cake, and sang happy birthday. This guy who served a mission in New Caledonia like 40 years ago told us stories.... :) They were way funny. So one of them was he was doing porte-a-porte with his companion. They knocked on this door and this big woman was facing away from the door watching tv. They tried to introduce themselves but she wouldn't listen. Eventually she called her daughter out to tell the missionaries to go away. She said well, I'm sorry, I'd like to talk to you but my mom is catholic and we don't accept missionaries. But the companion wouldn't give up! he kept saying no, it's important for your family! meh meh meh. She kept apologizing, and he kept insisting. Eventually the big lady got out of her chair. She pulled out this cross necklace and a locket thing and said look. We're catholic. This is Mary, this is Jospeh, and this is Jesus. Okay? In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost GET OUT! (Degage!!) SLAM door. Ha ha ha!

Later that day we tried some porte a porte, to no avail as usual. We eventually went home and found that Elder Amundsen and Elder Troutman had paid our apartment a visit.. They switched everything around!! Our desks were switched, they switched our beds, and everything in our closets! It was way funny. Elder Amundsen left me some pictures and wrote me a little card and they brought me a little cake with Matches as Candles. Ha ha! I was really really happy. Elder Amundsen is amazing and I'm really happy to have him as a friend.

Later that night we had this big thing of Letchi
(this little fruit that grows on trees here.. About the size of a plum, it's red, and it has a pointyish skin on it. You have to peel it off and there's this white fruit meat stuff inside, and a big seed. I don't really like them that much, but everyone else loves them and they literally grow on trees so they're in great great GREAT abundance.) and we gave it to our nice neighbors. Turns out it was the dad's birthday and they gave us 3 big slices of cake.. not knowing it was my birthday!

So that brings the cake count up to 3. Then I started making my cheesecake, but didn't have time so I had to put it off. I actually didn't end up eating it until 8-9 pm yesterday. :( Sorry. But I did eat that cake the neighbors gave us on my birthday, along with cake at service. Anyway, it ended up being a really good birthday. Everyone seemed to remember too, and that's all that really matters to me. As long as someone thinks about me or something.

Oh and we got video of unwrapping my awesome presents, and doing the candles with the CD of y'all singing happy birthday. :D:D:D It was almost like you were there!!!

Thanks for everything! I really really like the shirt, and I have fun explaining the people to my companion. I wear it every night. :) Don't worry about me ruining it in the dryer, that is something that simply doesn't exist in New Caledonia!

OH and also.... You were REALLY lucky that package didn't get searched at all!! I found out that they would have had to unwrap every present and look inside, and they probably would have just sent it back!!! But luckily they didn't search it at all! Oh and by the way... Don't ever send raw meat of any kind to me. Um, yeah. Didn't think you would, but just.. yeah. We had trouble with a package someone sent to a missionary here that had meat in it. Weird.

Also, I don't think I'm getting any of the letters people are sending to me these days. I think the post is being super super gay. Could you put a notice on my blog for me? (haha. done and done. :D)
I would like everyone to know, that I ALWAYS reply to every letter I get, and if you don't get a reply within 2 1/2 months, that means I Didn't get it and probably never will. I want people to like photocopy the letters they send, and if I never get them they can resend them, or forget about it. But if someone thinks I'm not sending letters to them anymore, it's not true and it's just because I never got the letter. also, make sure to always remember the CEDEX on the end of the address. (Mom, you forgot this one!! I'm lucky my package got to me.. :O)

Elder Winget
Bureau de la Mission
BP 15154
98804 Noumea Cedex
New Caledonia

The most important parts of the address are 15154 and 98804 so make sure you write these very clearly. Also it might help to have very plain white envelopes, with nothing written on it besides the addresses. I don't know if this is the problem or not, but just an idea.

alright.

Anyway, so I will tell you a short story. I went on an exchange with a missionary who had been here for only about 3-4ish weeks and is really terrible at french. It actually went really well. I was really scared, but it was fine! I got a taste of being a trainer. I felt weird speaking in english all day, and forgot how to say some words! I was not able to pray in English and did it all in French! He asked me lots of questions and I felt really really smart when I was able to answer them! It was really fun and made me feel really good and confident as a missionary and in my French skills.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Here's Collin's birthday present


Tomorrow we're sending out Collin's birthday package. It's cutting it a little close for New Caledonia, but we'll just have to pray it will get there in time. His mail situation has improved a ton, so I'm not too worried.
  So, here's the final product! Channing was kind enough to model it for the blog. On the front of the t-shirt is a copy of his nametag, and on the back are pictures of everyone, or at least all the pictures we could get with the time we had available! If we missed you, I am so sorry... there's always Christmas... The back of the t-shirt says "We're behind you 100%"  ha ha ha...get it? It may be corny, but I know Collin will love it. Thanks so much to everyone who contributed pictures! We know some of you wanted to be on Collin's shirt but didn't get to respond to our email, so we kind of cheated and took some pictures off Facebook :P 
 So Channing and I were at Missionary Mall getting Collin some ties for his birthday today. They are having a huge tie sale, and a bunch of really nice ties are only $1.99! So we had a lot of fun picking out  some ties he would like. If you've ever been there, you've probably seen that they have pictures up on the walls of missionaries all around the world. Well, we brought in that crazy picture of Collin reading Le Liahona and they put it up on the wall right above the drinking fountain. So if you ever go to Missionary Mall and you get thirsty, you will get your chance to see Collin's insane grin!

Monday, November 10, 2008

Mean people and cockroaches

Here's some crazy, typical pictures of Collin -reading "Le Liahona"( hmmm, he must really like that magazine!)
  And another of him  as a half-dressed, proud American (note the tiny American flag in the background)
The third one, the one with a bunch of graffiti around him, prompted me to write "please tell me that's not your apartment!"  Collin says, " About the graffiti... it's everywhere. That wasn't my apartment, but basically anything that doesn't move, anywhere in Noumea, has graffiti even thicker than that. But it's not scary like LA or NYC, people just see graffiti in movies and think that's what you do."
  Here's some more news from yesterday's email:
"I did get transferred to Vallee du Tir, so it was more or less like  starting over completely. We have no car, so we take the bus and walk. It's actually not so bad. And as it turns out, we get to keep all the members, so we still eat chez les membres (at members houses) most every night. And we get to get picked up by the magic Elder Ammundsen (his MTC companion) for church and activities. He's so rad! I see him most every day.
  We started out with NO investigators, no leads, and... nothing. We started going through our Area Book and found some "ancien amis" ...old investigators? and called the promising looking ones.  We have 5 rendezvous for next week! We're very excited!  We're teaching a lady named Madame Tokyo, and she's basically like Isma from " Emperor's New Groove".  She is like a million years old. Except for she is nice and she is black.
 We also did a porte a porte and found a new ami.  AND I had my first experience with getting yelled at by a French person. We went to go knock on this door and this lady looks over at us and yells, "Not this door, not even in your dreams!" i didn't understand exactly what this meant at first, but my comp explained it to me and I was kinda sad. But then right after that we found our new ami (investigator BTW) so all is well!

Our apartment was INFESTED 
with cockroaches at first. It was nasty and dirty and I immediately got to work cleaning. Before I think I wouldn't have cared, but after living in super nice super clean Paita, I about went freakin crazy. So I've cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. Elder Manarani was excited to have a clean freak companion. Also I fixed the ceiling fans, and the cold water in the shower. So our apartment is a million times better. But even though it was much cleaner, we still had a ridiculous number of cockroaches. So this morning I got down and dirty and super cleaned the kitchen. And I found their...NEST.  had a bad feeling about moving the frige, but ever since the first day in there I knew they must be back there. So I moved the frige, and they all started pouring out from behind. Hundreds, I swear! So I got out the poison and started spraying profusely. Those buggers are IMPOSSIBLE to kill. Any other bug dies instantly with that poison, but with them you have to drench them in it and it only slows them down. Nasty! So I swept and mopped everywhere, and killed all the cockroaches, and everything is sparkly clean."
Mom's note: "Eeeeeeeewwwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
(cringe and shudder...)

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Elder Winget's Halloween


Here's Collin with the 2 green pumpkins he and Elder Manarani ( the guy with the gummy tongue and fangs) carved on Halloween.  Even in the South Pacific some people celebrate Halloween, but it's not as widespread as it is here. Collin said some of the other missionaries got trick-or-treaters, but he was disappointed that none came to their apartment. :(
 Collin and Elder Manarani don't have to travel back and forth between 2 apartments anymore. They are in the Vallee du Tir (sp?) apartment now, and Elder Amundsen and his companion are in the Ducos apartment. Collin's excited to have Elder Amundsen close by, since he was his companion in the MTC. 
  Unfortunately, I don't have much news this week.  Collin said he typed a big long email, and just when he was about to send it, the server shut down or something, and he lost the whole thing! He had to start all over and he didn't have much time left! He did manage to email us some great pictures.  I've been having trouble trying to post them all at once for some reason, so I'll send the rest in another post.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Collin likes his new companion and area



We just got a new email from Collin! He sent pictures, too! That's his new companion, and a praying mantis they found in their apartment. Here is an excerpt from his email:
"Alright, alright. I'm sure you have many many questions, and I've read all your emails, and sorry I didn't reply very well last week, so you may have to ask me some of those questions again.
I just sent some pictures of my companion and moi, elder tekurio with his presents, which got there about an hour before he left (he was super super excited.. he's going to make a cake in Fiji. I didn't get to see what was wrapped in the green things though, he had to jet. Also the other picture is a praying mantis (religious mantis in french) that we found in the bathroom.

Anyway, Ducos is NOT by any means tiny or island. It's actually one of the biggest sectors here.. It's part of Noumea. I'm right in the city. Well, kind of the Ghetto of the city. but still city nonetheless. Also I have 2 sectors, Ducos and Valeé du Tir. 2 sectors, 2 appartments. there are only 22 missionaries in NC right now, and that's down from 36 so there are lots of sectors that they can't close, but don't have enough missionaries to cover, so there are 3 sets of missionaries covering 2 areas.But because we have a limited number of kilometres (miles they can travel), we can't be going back and forth between 2 areas all day, so we have another apartment so we can sleep there and work in that sector for a few days, then go back to our other sector and work there... make sense any? hope so.
Elder Manarani is really really really nice and awesome. I spoke almost 0 french with Elder Tekurio, so I think this is a punishment as well as a blessing. :D ha ha. I literally think I've learned more french in the past 4 days then in the past 3 weeks in Paita. Channing mentioned in her email asked me if I have noticed a sudden french improval.... Freak, totally. I have the gift of tongues for sure. I KNOW I do. I have no problems communicating with him and I'm so happy to be with him.

The sisters in Paita are doing really really well as well. I showed them their sector and stuff and I think they'll do tons of great work there. I think the sector and the branch were getting a little dry with Elders there. Everyone was so excited when we told them I was leaving and that sisters were coming. :D I thought that meant that they didn't like me, cuz that's the impression that I got and I was really really sad about it.. but then the sisters tell me everyone talks about me all the time and that they really miss me and stuff. So .. . yeah. Good stuff.

The branch in Ducos is really good and lots better than Tontouta branch. I think we'll do really good work there.

Um.... Let me think. I saw a crazy cat lady, for serious, I had another tim tam slam, Elder Manarani told me he's never had a clean freak companion like me besides Elder Tekurio so that's kind of funny.( Collin a clean freak?!? I think I  might faint! ) WE cleaned Vallee du tir appartment today and it was FILTHY and COCKROACHES EVERYWHERE so I was really glad to clean it. I don't think anyone ever cleaned it. We're generally just in the Ducos appartment though, which is generally fairly clean. We'll clean that more later today. Um.... Yeah. So I'm in Noumea these days and I miss all the stars you could see way out in Paita.. Freakin crazy out there, the amount of stars. so awesome. um... I haven't got your letter yet, that dad mentioned, but I haven't got the mail for 2 weeks cuz of a ridiculous stupid "because I said so" rule that the ZLs made that paita wasn't allowed to go to noumea for any reason, besides to kindof noumea/riverre sallee to do internet. that's why the package was so late. it was at the office sitting there for a whole week plus. anyway. i'm in the city now so no problems there... mail twice a week.

Um... quyestions? comments? I liked the pictures that mom and channing sent.. rad costume! we're going to carve some green pumpkins on saturday and i'll send you a picture! also i loved the talking cd and the package a lot lot lot!!! thanks!!!! also there is a very good chance you will meet Elder Tekurio!!! he's coming to utah for conference in april and i said he HAS to go see you guys and he says he will. he will at very least call the house, but he's going to try to come over! :)"
"I love you so much! See ya next week!"

Check out new video - Read on...





There's a link to a great video about missionary service ( don't click on a picture- they're just visual aids :). I saw this on TV and I got all misty-eyed thinking about Collin and all his friends and cousins who are currently serving missions, and his friend who just got his mission call to Oregon (good luck, Rylan! We're so happy for you!). I hope you enjoy watching this as much as I do :D
I put up the link over in the "Collin's mission-related websites" section. It's the Mormon Tabernacle Choir one, on the top of the list. Check it out - it's great!
Above are pictures of Elder Winget at the MTC, in Georgia, at the mission home with Pres. and Sis. Ostler, and teaching at a home in Paita :) 

Monday, October 20, 2008

Elder Winget's getting transferred!

We got email from Collin yesterday, and he had a pretty eventful week. Here's some of his email:
"Well I'll give you a rundown of my week...    Monday we had a zone p-day kind of thing and played ultimate frisbee on the beach in Noumea... it was so fun! It got CRAZY windy and rainy and impossible to throw the frisbee but it was still so fun. I saw a real life starfish in the wild, and I saw hundreds of tiny tiny crabs!! like...quarter sized! It's a shame I didn't have my camera with me :( Oh well. Tuesday I did an exchange with Elder Payne, who is a newer missionary than I am, and it was scary to be alone with someone who speaks less french than I do!! But we did alright! He thinks he speaks better french than I do, but he really really doesn't.
  BTW random side note .. some weird things I've eaten since I've been here: octopus twice, lobster once, and raw fish many times! Tahitians love this raw fish salad thing and always make it whenever we go anywhere. so yeah. Also people are obsessed with chow mein here. weird. Random NC word: Puree means mashed potatoes but also people use it like a swear like saying holy crap! ha ha! It's because it's kind of close to this other P word that is like an actual swear word. Meh, there's your random fact for the day...
  Saturday was Valerie's baptism, finally... the marriage and baptism went great and perfectly smooth. We had lots of fun at their party thing after the wedding and I got some pretty good pictures. Sunday was Elder Tekurio's last Sunday, so all the missionaries did talks (kinda) Me and Elder Payne just bore our testimonies, but lots of people came up to me and told me my french was perfect so that made me really happy.  French is still ridiculously hard for me but it's getting lots better. On Saturday night we were at the Dinne family house and they speak little little english and usually try to tell me stuff in english, but this time we all talked in french and it worked out really well and they said I'm "beaucoup mieux" than before :D :D :D"
  "OH I JUST GOT TRANSFERS. (like right when he was typing the email) I'm going to Ducos with Elder Manarani, a tahitian who doesn't speak any english at all. OH dear... Ha ha. They're whitewashing Paita and putting in Sisters!!!! Oh my its so scary. We'll I'll tell you how that goes next week!
Love much many moosen,
Elder Winget"

Here's some pics Collin sent us in email. The resolution wasn't very good, so they are small. He didn't have time to describe what's going on in the pictures.  He did say he and Elder Tekurio went to McDonalds for his birthday (Elder Tekurio's), so there he is standing by a McD. sign, but the others I'm not sure of the details.
Well, have a good week everyone!



Thursday, October 16, 2008

Collin really doesn't spend all his time eating...

Okay, after reading that last post I realized you may be getting the impression that Elder Winget spends a great deal of his week  either eating, or planning to eat. Not true. Channing emailed him asking what his weekly schedule is like and when he eats so maybe they could plan to eat a poptart or something at the same time on the same day  :D 
 Just for fun, here's another video:

More about life in Paita, New Caledonia

I decided it's about time I updated the blog. 
  Here's some excerpts from last week's emails Collin sent to our family:
"we're progressing investigators for the Teigmoin Jehovah missionaries... ( that's Jehovah's Witnesses)... Ha ha ha. they come over every Friday, share with us a message, engage us to go to church and read in the bible... it's really funny to us that we're on the receiving end of the missionaries. We haven't yet gotten to the point that we send little kids outside to say "um, they're not home" or hide in the house and hurry and turn off the music and close all the curtains when their car comes around, like our investigators do to us  :D ha ha. "
 "I don't say too many french words forgetting that they're not really english... yet.  The only ones i do say have to do with mission stuff:
sector=area,   dirigent/chef=uh.. boss or leader, teigmoin Jehovah= Jehovah's Witness. and. i say a couple others but i forget. I'm pretty good at still writing in english."
"That's so crazy that it's snowing in Utah. I forget that snow like.. exists.  Its so warm here all the time. The only time I was cold was back in winter/July and last week when I had a fever. Then I was really cold. But for the most part it's hot all the time. And weird thing about european countries is that NOBODY believes in air conditioning. Nobody. Everyone just opens windows and doors and gets a fan. Even at church we just open all the windows and turn on the ceiling fan. Crazy, eh?"
"oh man conference was so amazing yesterday and Saturday. I did watch it all in english, so I actually got something out of it :D ha ha. And I did see Caleb :) crazy! He's leaving the MTC for Korea tomorrow, by the way!" (Caleb is one of Collin's friends who sang in the MTC choir in General Conference)
 "my schedule is pretty much Monday p-day, then dinner at the Aru family house
Tuesday, district meeting and then proselyting, and this week dinner at Soane's house
Wednesday, just port a porte (door to door tracting), and dinner at the Ahuroa family's house
Thursday is service in the morning, then dinner at Li-Khau family's house
Friday is finding (?) in the morning, weekly planning in the afternoon, then dinner at the Toyons house.
Saturday is just... whatever ( nothing is scheduled yet)
Sunday is church at 9, and then ... do whatever. sometimes dinner on those days too. We get fed every night! Basically, we eat lunch between 11:30 and 1 every day, and dinner is at someone's house... pretty much.
Um. Fabulous. I love you heaps and bounds and elephant pounds
love,
Elder Winget"
Here is a little video clip of some more of the "wildlife" in New Caledonia :) Elder Tekurio was lighting the water heater, then - Surprise!

Monday, September 29, 2008

another Picassa album is ready

I added some more pictures to Picassa this morning. A quick way to see them is to go to a link over on the left of any of the other Picassa albums, such as "MTC pictures part deux", click on My Photos, and it should bring you to a menu of all Collin's albums we have up so far. Then just click on the ones you want to see. Collin sent us quite a few little video clips, and I will put one up every now and again. Channing put a few up on Collin's facebook page, so you can see some there also. I'm planning on doing a post that has some quotes from his recent emails and letters, but I don't have time right now, but I hope you enjoy the pictures! Here is Collin doing the "tim tam slam"( more info in the Picassa album)

Sunday, September 28, 2008

New Pictures on Picassa


Hey everyone! Sorry it's taken me so long to put up the Picassa pics, but now they're here! The first installment is ready to view. More will come ASAP. Collin mentioned in today's email that some of you have been asking for pictures :) 
   In today's email,Collin says he will get to watch General Conference, but not until the week after it's broadcast. He is pretty sure he can even watch it in English, because he says if it was all in French he wouldn't understand very much of it yet. They had a baptism scheduled for last week, but it had to be postponed until October.  They have another baptism scheduled soon, but I'm not sure when. Collin is doing well, and loves living in New Caledonia. He misses ranch dressing, Reese's p.b. cups, and starburst, but there's plenty of food to like in New Caledonia as well. Check out the pictures in the new Picassa album - you'll see he gets to eat tim tams, Crax cereal, and hamburgers on french baguettes, among other things. Last week he ate lobster at a member's house, and Soane, a man they just baptized, made them octopus (yikes!) but Collin said it was quite good! There's a picture of Soane, with Elder Winget, Tekurio, and Huuti.
  Well, it's late, and I need to go to bed. I will put up more pictures and maybe some video sometime this week.  Collin wants me to pass on to you all how much he appreciates the letters you send him - letters from home mean a LOT to missionaries! So thanks everyone!!

Saturday, August 30, 2008

the votes are in... lizard tail video wins!

This video was taken in Collin and Elder Tekurio's apartment in Paita. I guess if you grab a lizard by the tail its tail comes off, and keeps on moving. Yikes! If you listen closely, you can hear Collin say "more of it came off" when he tried to grab the lizard again. These lizards live in everyone's houses and eat all the mosquitos. I have to admit, they are pretty cute :)

first pictures from New Caledonia!!



We just got over 300 pictures and video in a package from Collin yesterday! This one is Collin "preaching" in Paita. The other pictures are a family he and Elder Tekurio are teaching, and the chief's hut at that tribe they visited. Fun stuff! I will be putting up some new albums on Picassa as I have time for it. Wow, I'm like a kid in a candy store with all this new stuff!! 
Elder Winget is doing very well, and has been having many fun and interesting adventures. So we chose a good title for this blog after all :)
I'll put a couple more pictures in this post, and I'll have the family vote on which video they want me to put up first, and that will be in the next post. Then the Picassa albums will take a while, but I promise to do it ASAP.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

a little Q and A with Elder Winget

Here's some questions we've asked Collin in emails over the last couple of weeks, and his answers. I decided to just copy and paste this into a post, because it tells some interesting info. about what life is like in Nouvelle Caledonie. i hope this will tide you over until we get some fresh pictures. Here you go:

What is the cost of living like there? Pretty expensive.. From what I hear the Dollar is pretty close to 100 francs, and most stuff is really expensive.. We eat a lot of rice and chicken. My companion is a good cook. We actually have had steak quite a few times, because it's really cheap here compared to a lot of stuff. Fish, interstingly enough, is expensive. No one wants to fish here, it makes them feel poor.

how are you and your comp getting along? Great! We're good friends and we can talk for a long time and make each other laugh. Sometimes just talking about whatever gets in the way of the work, but we work hard too.

how is the language? Kind of hard.. The accent is weird. First few days I didn't understand ANYTHING. but I'm starting to get it. All the little quirks of New Caledonian french are interesting.

Are you teaching anyone? Yes, quite a few people actually! We have 2 really progressing investigators and a few others that aren't really progressing. On the 18th we engaged a guy named Soane to be baptized and he said yes! August 18th.( Yes, he did get baptized - I will post more about that in another blog)

what is the food like? Great. We get fed a lot by members. They're all really poor so we get like rice and whatever meat and vegetables usually, but it's very normal food. Tahitian food is really weird, but pretty good. I hav en't run into anything too gross to eat yet.



do you have or need a bike? nope. We are in a car. There is only one area in NC that have bikes. Mostly cars, a few walking.



do you ever wear your lava lava? Nope, people don't really wear them here. I'm using it to decorate my desk.

Are you healthy? Yeah, I feel really good actually. No specific complaints.

Are you getting sunburned? No, interestingly enough. i haven't even been wearing sunscreen.. :P

how is the weather? Kind of cold actually.. It gets really cold at night. During the day it's pretty hot though.. But I hear int he actual summer time it can get up to 100 degrees though.. :(

do you see any cool animals? Nah, lots of stray dogs. WELL, actually there are tonnnnz of lizards everywhere. They're really nice, they run around people's houses like mice, except for they dont' do anything bad. They eat all the bugs too. TYhey're really fast. I'll have to get some pictures of them.

is the culture real different? YEah, nothing too weird. They keep their doors open all the time. They are mostly really nice. The french is weird and hard to understand. Very Frenchlike in the city, but very 3rdworldish outside the city in some places. But weirdly enough, everyone has a TV. There are 2 channels over the air, but a lot of people have satellites.


If you wanted to do so, would you be allowed to fish? Not sure. A member gave us a bunch of fish and we fried it up yesterday though. Another member gave us a bunch of other food at the same time.. Great way to break our fast.. I was stuffed!

What are your church meetings like? Wierd. The members here are.. interesting. And it's all in french. :P



How big is the branch you are in? Pretty small. I'm not sure how many members. But the chapel meeting room is the size of our elder's quorum room back home. Well.. Maybe two of them.



Are there any wards on New Caledonia? Nope.

How many missionaries are in New Caledonia?. bout 30

What is the average number of Baptisms in New Caledonia per month or year? 30ish. last year 36. to date this year, 18.

Has there been any weird food you had to eat?. Nope, everything is normal so far!

Have you seen any weird bugs or animals? Just the centipede i just told you about!! (a picture will be coming soon)

Do you do much tracting? We tract for about an hour or so on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Wednesday is half day at the kids schools, so the parents have to be home. Other than that, nobody will listen, or it's just moms alone at home, or they're taking a nap, or watching mexican soap operas (serious) and won't do anything else. :) During wednesday and saturday it's fairly effective though.

Do the members help much? ... No. We're really trying to change that though.

How big is your area? Not huge, but big enough that we need a car. Just the city of Paita.

How much time does your comp have left on his mission? 3 months

Are the members as good singers as indicated in the book "other side of heaven?" Nope. French singers suck. Try watching a church movie in french. it's painful.

What kind of building do you meet in for church? it's... like a normal church, except for no halls.. it's not enclosed. all the rooms have outside doors. Kind of hard to explain.. I'll try and get a picture.

Are you still experiencing "america loving" from everyone? yeah, for the most part. :) it's not from everyone, just from a few people. most people just like us though.

BTW with mail, it's not as scary as it sounds.. Usually everything goes through fine, but just sometimes they get stupid and feel like sending stuff back that wasn't perfect. You most likely won't have a problem, but still try to do everyhting right if possible. :)

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Spinning - BAD part 2

 We love this video! Collin has sent us quite a few funny little video clips, so I decided I'm going to make a DVD for him for when he gets back. If you want to see it, come to his welcome home party and we'll play it then  :) Actually, I have been working on his DVD a lot lately, so that's another reason I've been behind on the blog. Well, I hope you like this sample!

Spinning - BAD part 1

Collin made a little video on his last day in Georgia that we thought was pretty funny. Here is part 1 of "Spinning- Bad" Part 2 is in the next post.

finally, a new post!

Hello all you loyal and patient blog readers! I really underestimated how busy I would be doing all the back-to school stuff! Now I have a few minutes to sit down and let you know Elder Winget is indeed alive and well in New Caledonia. The above picture is from when he was in Georgia. We still haven't received any New Caledonia pictures yet, but Collin let us know that his memory card is on its way here, and hopefully we will get it sometime this week. Also, I will put in the very next blog all the interesting FAQ about Collin's life in the islands that our family asked in emails and his answers. He has had a baptism already, and another scheduled for September. He has seen giant bugs, tiny house-lizards, and is slowly adjusting to the unusual Polynesian version of French that is spoken there. I actually need to go now, but will post more later today :D Thanks everyone who reads this and for the gentle reminders that you want more Elder Winget info. That makes us and Elder Winget happy  :)

Sunday, July 27, 2008

Just a little info about emailing...

we would like to tell you that Collin does love getting emails from you all, but that would be cool if you could please keep it short, because he only has one hour total on the computer each week, and when he gets as many emails as he does that isn't very much time, and he's said that he feels bad when he can't get to all of them. it would be a big help if there is some thing that you could say in a letter to send it there, but by all means, keep sending him emails! just maybe shorter ones :) we keep 94 cent stamps at our house, so if you need one, we'll be happy to share!! 
peace out

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Big screen TV in a grass hut? DO READ.

We finally got an email from Collin from new caledonia! Here it is. It's pretty great :)


Hey so I'm in New Caledonia right now.. Cool, eh? It's 10:35 AM and I'm in a very small city named La Foa on exchanges with an Elder named Huuti. He's Tahitian. So my P-Day is on Monday, but there is nowhere that has internet on Mondays so we end P-day an hour earlier and do Email on Tuesdays. And due to weird circumstances I didn't get to do email on Tuesday, so Here I am on Wednesday Morning doing email.

General info: My companion is Elder Tekurio who is from Tahiti, but lived in Florida for 23 years.. So he's American. Pretty much. He's really cool and we get along great. The French is really hard, and I currently don't understand a word anyone says, but everyone understands me. Weird, but whatever. We have taught some great lessons and yesterday with Elder Huuti we went to a Tribe.. With a real Chef (Chief), Kaz (grass huts) and everything! But the bizarre part is one of the families we taught had a big screen tv and a really nice laptop inside their shack. I really don't know what that's all about. Everything here is... weird. Half the stuff is really really third worldish, and then people also have REALLY western everything! Everyone speaks french, and here and there we run across someone who speaks a little English, but everyone seems weirdly obsessed with americans. So they love me. Even though I don't say anything. Ha ha. One of the member families we taught a family home evening lesson with and the fed us were like talking to me in english and they gave me this skirt thing (i'm not sure what it's called here) like a lava lava and they were like obsessed with me. Elder Tekurio said that was the most excited he'd ever seen them. Elder Tekurio is completely fluent in English and French, cuz he lived in America for so long, but also lived in Tahiti for a while, and he only speaks french to people.. So if you ask them, he understands English but doesn't speak any. It's funny.



We don't have any pictures yet, but we hope that soon we'll get one of his little man skirt.  :D

Monday, July 7, 2008

Elder Winget traveled through time!!!



Collin has arrived safely in Fiji, and will be going to New Caledonia on Wednesday morning. Since his flight went out from L.A. at almost midnight, and Fiji/New Caledonia is a day ahead of us timewise, Collin skipped July 6th entirely  and arrived in Fiji 10 hours later on July 7th! Whoa... that's weird to think about. Collin's cousin, Matt, and his wife Deneal, have been living in Fiji while Matt works at the U.S. Embassy there.  They couldn't pass up a once in a lifetime opportunity to meet for a little while at the mission home before Collin leaves for New Caledonia. Lucky for us, they took pictures and video, and emailed them to us! Yay! I hope this link to the video works, but if not, be patient with us and we will figure something out.  BTW, the password to view, if you need it, is "collin"
http://www.vimeo.com/1298591

Alas, it seems that you can't click on this link after all, BUT if you highlight that vimeo address and copy and paste it into the address bar, it works. I will try to put it in the links section maybe tomorrow, and that should be better. Man, modern technology makes it so much easier for a mom to have a missionary half-way around the world  :)

Sunday, July 6, 2008

How to write to Collin

Here's the official word from the Fiji Suva mission office on how to write to Collin:

Dear friends and family of a New Caledonia missionary,
  Our missionaries are thrilled to recieve letters and packages from home. Such signs of love mean a lot to every missionary.  However, please be aware that when you send mail and packages to the mission office in Suva, Fiji, it costs the mission large sums of money and a much longer delivery time to forward your letter or package on to New Caledonia.
  Therefore, please note the following address to which you should send your packages and letters to have them delivered more quickly, and at no extra cost to the mission:

FOR LETTERS:

Elder Collin Winget
Bureau de la Mission
B P 15154
Cedex
98804 Noumea Cedex
NEW CALEDONIA


FOR PACKAGES:
Bureau de la Mission
B P 15154
98804 Noumea
NEW CALEDONIA
ATTN: Elder Collin Winget


Please make sure for packages you have the missionary's name AFTER the address.  The value limit is $2oo.  All receipts must accompany the items. Remove CD's from packaging.  Only send 2 or 3 similar items such as shirts, pants, socks, ties.  They are suspicious of items for resale.  Do not send jerky or medications, they will be destroyed.

Sincerely,
Sister Robbins
Mission secretary
Fiji Suva mission


So, Channing and I were wondering... what have they got against jerky anyway? We were imagining all the possible reasons we could think of for destroying jerky, and Channing illustrated our crazy thought processes.

(not sure if this is clickable, so if it's not, you can just copy and paste it.) 

BTW, it will cost 94 cents to send a letter to New Caledonia, and it should take approx. 6 days.


http://fc03.deviantart.com/fs30/i/2008/170/d/a/jerky__Jerky__JERKY_by_cakeface.jpg

Saturday, July 5, 2008

4th of July surprise!



Our family had a great 4th! It's always great since it's Cameron's birthday that day, but it was extra special this year because we got a phone call from Collin telling us his visa came in and he is headed to Fiji TODAY!! Today is the 5th, BTW. I will put his new address in New Caledonia in the next post. He should be there within the next couple of days!! Yay! Collin said he left some stuff, including a memory card from his camera, with his companion in Georgia, and he will be sending it over to us soon. As soon as it comes in I will post pictures Collin took while in Georgia.  July 4th is one of those kind of days where we miss Collin a lot, due to the fact that he and his cousins and Dad get together and blow stuff up and generally have as much fun as they legally can with the fireworks. I made 2 Elder Winget cardboard cut-outs that I stuck in family photos just for fun and to make it seem ALMOST like he was with us... (I'll put some more up on our Picassa album thingy so you can see what other weird stuff we were up to with our fake Elder Collin :) )
  Collin will get to call us one last time from the L.A. airport tonight, and then he's off for a 10 hour flight to Fiji! The weird thing is, he will arrive there on July 7th. Fiji is 1 day ahead of us, so with the earth turning and Collin flying over several time zones that means... oh well, that makes my brain hurt! You figure it out if you want and explain it to me! It's funny that he gets to Fiji on the 7th, because that was his original departure date before he was told to leave the MTC  2 weeks early, and then go over to Georgia and all. So basically, he is where he's supposed to be, and everything just works out :).

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

It has come to our attention...


we've noticed that a million billion people are reading this blog, but we only get a couple of comments on each post, and a few none at all. I'm SURE that you all want to post, but you just don't have a blog, so it's not letting you. so i changed the settings so everyone can post, so hopefully this makes people more willing to post or whatever. KTHNX THAT'S ALL
heart/Channing.

*EDIT* if you want to post but don't have a blog, click the "NameID" bubble, and you can just type in your name. then it will say stuff like  [yourname] said: "WOW. this blog is amazing. i think i'll go give channing a large sum of money." like that. HAPPY POSTING.

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Stories from the MTC- c'est choc!

I have a little time today, so I'm going to tell you one of Collin's stories... once upon a time, WAY back in the MTC, Collin told us a funny story about this man here - He is in the bishopric in Collin's branch in the MTC. His name is Brother Matage (pronounced ma tong ee, but I don't know if I spelled it right) He is from Samoa. I'll let Collin tell the story in his own words from a letter he wrote us back at the end of May:
 I got a letter from Aaron  and he's doing well.  He's super choc ( the awesomest French Islander way to say cool) So... oh yeah I actually have a story about that word. K so one of the teachers went to New Caledonia and my teacher was telling us about him and he always does the hang loose sign thing and says "c'est choc" all the time and my district decided that was the most awesome thing ever so we do that constantly.  Our branch president's counselor is from Samoa and so he's like super cool and laid back and so we asked him to say "c'est choc" and do that sign and he was like ok... shaka? (choc is pronounced shoc with the o being like chocolate) And he told us the story of the hang loose hand signal...
  In Hawaii there was this fisherman who was attacked by a shark (shaka) and it bit off his 3 middle fingers. So when he waved at the tourists, he waved with only his thumb and pinky, and they'd ask "what does that mean?" And because he didn't know English he'd just say Shaka, which means shark. :) So people started waving like that and stuff. Anyway, it was awesome. It's just a coincidence that choc rhymes w/ shaka, but it was funny anyway.
  When I can, I'll tell some more MTC stories. bye.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

What Collin did after calling us at the airport



Anyway, I'll tell you everything I can think of that has happened thus far. After I hung up with you guys on the phone, I ran up to the gate and was second to the last person to get on the plane, and the lady was really surprised I got there. I run up and they were getting ready to load the next plane, and she's like are you going to Atlanta?? So I said yes, am I too late? And she said No, but we're doing very last call right now so you better hurry. And I said Okay! Thanks! and I hurried down the ramp. Luckily there was still a few people in line to get on the plane still, so I wasn't missing much. The problem was, however, that there was almost no carry-on space! Lots of people apparently had put their personal item in the top racks and I had nowhere to put my little rolling bag. So I sat there in the back of the plane and waited for everyone to sit so I could get to the front of the plane where the only last little bit of space was, and then when I got there it was all full! So I just stood there and I'm like ah, crap. But it wasn't just me, there were about 3 other people with the same problem. The flight attendants announced for anyone who put their lap bags in the overhead space to please take them out so we could put our crap up there and actually leave the gate on time. (it was getting down to 2 minutes before departure) so everybody did that, and I found basically the last remaining space and I took it. Fortunately there ended up being just enough space for everyone, so nobody had to check their carry on bags, and we took off right on time. On the flight I ended up sitting between an RM and Elder Flanagan. He eventually fell asleep and I eventually got to sleep as well. I'm glad I did, I only had between 1 1/2 and 2 hours sleep the night before. Unfortunately though, I didn't get to preach to anyone on the plane, which was something I was looking forward to. When I woke up I messed around a little bit with the screen thing on the back of the headrests, where usually they have movies, tv, and games. I didn't have any headphones so I wasn't too tempted by anything. I watched probably 2 min of CNN without sound, and I read a little bit of the scrolling stuff on the bottom. They also had a section where you can see exactly where the plane was in the states (tracked by GPS), what the speed, temperature, miles travelled/to go, came from time and destination time, and estimated arrival. That was very interesting and I watched that for a few minutes, but after that I made my way to the games section. They had an inflight trivia that you compete against others on the plane, and I decided that was the only thing I could justify within the rules, so I gave it a shot. Some rounds I actually did pretty good, but most of the questions were geared for older people, with like older movies, tv, and sports so I had no idea for a lot of it. However, one game I ended up getting about 3rd place on the high scores list (just for that flight). But that was pure luck. I didn't know any of the answers and just ended up randomly clicking the right ones for a long streak.

I ended up travelling with Elders Flanagan and Haws, and Sister/Hermana Howard. Me and Flan, obviously, are waiting for our New Caledonia visas, Elder Haws is waiting for a Tahiti visa (also through France), and Sister Howard is waiting for a visa from.. Somewhere in South America. I can't remember exactly where. But anyway, we got off the plane smoothly and went towards baggage claim, which was about a half mile walk. They literally had a train that went from one end of the airport to the baggage claim area. But we just walked and took the moving sidewalk things. Our APs for the mission met us there, told us about our companions, and drove us to our destinations. It was about a 45 minute drive from the Airport to my apartment, and that's where I said goodbye to the other elders and the sister. Since it wasn't a normal transfer day, I didn't get to meet the mission president like most new missionaries do. I was the only elder going to that companionship/area/apartment. They were originally a threesome, and I broke it up into two pairs. My companion is Elder Lewis from southern California. Like, really really southern. He says it's 7 miles from the ocean, 7 miles from the border. He's been out 18 months. He's really chill and I get along with him great. The other two elders are Elders Tigges (tigger without the r he says :)) and Allred. Elder Tigges (pronounced tiggis) is from North Carolina and Elder Allred is from Salt Lake. Those two elders get the car, and me and my companion get the bikes. That afternoon I unpacked and took about a half hour nap, went to wal-mart and bought some food (they gave me 160 dollars.. apparently they usually give the visa waiters like 30. awesome!!) and then we went out to visit a family. They are a black family a few miles away from our apartment, comprising of Pearl who just got baptized about a week before I came in, and is divorced. She has a daughter from her ex-husband and two sons. The two sons are 16 and 18 and are named Kaliid and Jabrii. The spelling is a little different, but I can't remember. Her two grandsons who are from her daughter also live there and they're named Ray Ray and Didon. The two older kids are getting ready to be baptized on Friday, so we went and taught them the fourth lesson, or the commandments. They seemed to be a little bit queezy when we taught them about chastity and the word of wisdom, but they seemed to accept it. They are reading and going to church, and haven't had much chance to go to young mens activities, but I think they will start going soonish. The next day they had their baptismal interviews, and it turns out Kaliid (the 16 year old) doesn't feel ready to get baptized on friday, so it will just be Jabrii. They're all really cool and really nice and Pearl works for Great Clips. Ray Ray is super friendly and is always really excited to see us. He is sadly addicted to video games, and has been playing Grand Theft Auto, so he talks a lot about killing cops and running people over, and my companion tells me he can have quite a mouth, but I haven't heard it. We're not sure if he learned it from the video games or other people or both, but GTA is famous for its very very course language so I wouldn't be surprised either way. He is a pretty good kid and Pearl tells us he gets up some days and really wants to go to church, and she has to tell him to wait until Sunday!! He's really cute and I'm excited that he's so excited to go to church and read from the Book of Mormon stories book. I think he isn't allowed to play the violent video games anymore since pearl got baptized, but I don't know how well that is working out so far. He still has a ton of potential though and I'm sure he'll turn out to be a good kid with some help from his family. He likes to pray when we come over and it's so cute. Heavenly Father, thank you for family, help us be good, name of Jesus, amen. :D awesome kid. Didon is 8 and wants to be baptized (grr, i keep typing baptise because of french.. Il veut que se fait baptise. wait, is baptise a word? blah.) and we're waiting on his Mom to receive the lessons, and apparently she's very willing and interested, but the missionaries in her area are slacking. Grr. They're great people though, and I'm happy to teach them. I'm still a quiet shy sidekick missionary right now, but I'm warming up quick.

We also visited Eugene and James King, who are a family that live a little closer to our appartment. Every time we come over they're just chilling out on the porch smoking. I wanted to tell you about them, but interestingly enough, James (I think he's 20) showed up at the library and talked to us for a little while. He's a funny kid.  I like him. I wish he would keep his commitments because I think he would be a good investigator, if he was willing to progress. Eugene is his dad, an older guy who has been a trucker for a while. He has a really thick southern accent and I can't understand half of what he says. But he's interesting. He has a long beard and smokes a lot, but he's still cool. I'm not sure what the deal with the mom is there, I think she lives there but I don't know if they're divorced or what, but I'll find out later with more time. I can't just like go up and ask these things, ya know.

Today we went to a restaurant about 15 miles away from our appartment with a member, who is very interesting. She's a chiropractor from the area and before that she lived in Minnesoda. She says that she knew some Wingets from there who actually pronounced it our way! It was cool to hear that! She said Hi Elder Winget (pronounced right) wait.. is it Wing-it? I was so surprised. It was cool to hear someone pronounce it right the first time!

Right now we are at the University of West Georgia at their library. And this brings us to now. :D I set up my email the way I like it and looked at my Picasa site and posted something on my blog, and now here we are. :D I sent a letter to Aaron and Janae today, and I think I'll send a little snail mail to home, but it will be short since I have sent this ridiculously long email! :) I put my addresses up on my blog, so if y'all wanna send stuff, send it there!

Well I guess this is the end, i hope you have enjoyed this!

Love,
Elder Winget

What a surprise!!




Wow! We actually got a surprise visit from Collin himself! That was unexpected. He emailed us from a library in Georgia, and thanks to his computer skills, posted on this blog! Now I have to put up some decent things here since I know he might check it from time to time.  His p-day is Wednesday, BTW. If you want to leave a comment on this here blog, Collin will probably read it next week.  He says he doesn't know if he will be allowed to do this when he gets over to New Caledonia, so send in your comments, folks, because we don't know how soon his visa will come in and the rules may change.  He sent us a really long email telling us what he's been up to since we talked to him from the airport, so that will be the next post...
(This is Channing) I would like to announce that i am NOT a crazy cat lady, and I usually look normal. This is just soon after I rolled out of bed to talk to Collin. ^^ 
  Our stupid cats wouldn't get out of the way for us to type, so we took a picture to send to Collin since we were discussing this whilst chatting with him. We think Charlie's depressed because he misses Collin, but since he's a stupid cat, we don't know for sure. But he does look depressed, doesn't he?  Okay, next post: news from Collin.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Bwa haha!

Guess what? This is ELDER WINGET typing on my own blog.

I know, it's strange. But you like it.

Anyway, I'm here in Carrollton Georgia right now, just chillin at a public library. Things are great here. It is so green everywhere. We're teaching some awesome people and the work is going great.

I was super bummed when I heard i wasn't going to New Caledonia right away, but I like it here so far, so I couldn't have asked for a better place to stay while I await my visa.

My companion is Elder Lewis from California. We share an apartment with two other Elders named Elder Allred and Elder Tigges. (Sp?) They're cool too. Anyway, I am going to go email some families, but in parting I'd like to tell you my address for the time being. Remember I could be leaving anywhere from a week to 3 months, so if your mail gets returned, it just means I've gone on to Fiji.

Elder Collin Winget
104B Danny Dr.
Carrollton, GA 30017

Monday, June 23, 2008

Crazy changes for Elder Winget AGAIN!

Hey all you loyal Collinheads! The crazy changes just keep happening lately!  I  have just spent the last week running around, getting the last minute things Collin needed to leave the country for Fiji 2 weeks earlier than expected. Just when everything got all put together, with his flight plans finalized and everything, he got another surprise! His visa hasn't come in yet, so today he is off to the Georgia, Atlanta mission until his visa comes in.  Apparently they are pretty picky who they give visas to these days, and France likes to check things out pretty thoroughly before they let people come over to New Caledonia. We have no idea how long  it will be until he leaves for the Pacific Islands, but Collin is ready to go, where ever and whenever he is sent. I think he was going a little stir crazy at the MTC , sitting in classes for 12 hours a day! So he is looking forward to the adventure of teaching the gospel in Atlanta.  We were lucky enough to talk to him twice on the phone in the past 3 days, so he could inform us of all the travel changes and where we could reach him. It was so good to hear his voice!! He sounds wonderful, same Collin as always, but now he has the added bonus feature of being able to speak and  bear his testimony in French! He told us he bought an extra Book of Mormon in english and one in french, just in case he got to talk to anyone on the plane :) 
  We are not sure how to reach him in Atlanta yet, but we did a test letter from the DearElder website and sent it to the Georgia, Atlanta mission. I'll let you know how that worked out.
 I have some interesting stories that Collin has told us during his adventures in the MTC, but since I'm not quite smart enough to figure out how to put multiple pictures on one blog post, I will do them seperately.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Some exciting changes for Collin!

Collin just emailed us on Friday to tell us that he will be leaving for Fiji in a week, instead of July 7th like originally planned.  He will leave on June 23 and fly to L.A. where he will have a 3 hour lay over. He will be allowed to call us from the airport, so we're really excited! Then he will fly straight to Fiji from there. I don't know if he will be staying in Fiji before he goes on to New Caledonia, but he said he would be in New Caledonia by the 28th. He's really excited to go. He's been getting tired of spending 12 hours in class every day, and is ready to go out and teach the gospel.
  So, we all have just one week to send Collin anything at the MTC, and after that, it's going to cost quite a bit more! The DearElder website doesn't deliver to New Caledonia, so we have to use U.S. postal service,I guess.  If you try to send a letter to Collin in New Caledonia via DearElder, it will cost the mission home in Fiji a lot of money to forward it on to New Caledonia, so they have asked us to tell everyone NOT to send mail for Collin to Fiji. Don't worry, I will post the address for the New Caledonia mission home, and the rules for mail there, and the approximate costs of sending stuff there in the next blog entry.
  Collin wants to thank everyone who has written to him so far. It really means a lot to him to get your letters! 

Monday, June 2, 2008

Collin sent new pictures today!

Collin is posing with  Jean-Luc Picard that Channing made for him. ( Will he ever make his bed?  oh well) He is doing great! Take a look at the new pictures he sent us -Channing will post a link to the left called" MTC part deux" Check it out, there's some good ones.
  Here's some quotes from Collin's latest letters:
"MTC is great, but I can't wait to leave!"
"I'm so excited to go to New Caledonia that it's ridiculous.  On Sunday I decided that we are just going now, even though we're by no means ready."
"Thank you for all the prayers. I am getting along great here and I know it's because of your prayers and everyone else's :) Thank You!"  And last but not least, "Oh, and nobody from the ward ever writes me... Why?"
  So, come on everybody, let's all send Collin letters!  Just click on the link to the left - DearElder.com, and you can send him a free letter.  It only takes a few minutes, and the letters get printed up and delivered every weekday at noon. the Elders in the MTC get their DearElder letters delivered to them while they are eating dinner, so it's pretty fun for them.
 Well, enjoy the pictures!

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

IT'S FIXED, GUYZ!

hey so I, in all my fabulousness, fixed the link to the piktchurz of collin. so if you were to click on the link on your left, it would ACTUALLY take you to some pictures. incase you were wondering.


*this blog entry brought to you by channing*

Working on the problem with the photos

For those of you who can't see Collin's pics from this blog, hang in there - We are working on it.  The problem is, some of the info here was set up on Channing's google account, and some of it was set up on mine ( Kristie's). The 2 of us have been so busy that we are never both home at the same time except when we're asleep! We need to be together to figure this mess out.  That will probably not happen until Saturday. Until then, here is another cute picture of Collin :)