Pingelap Songs Video

Kamry's companion is from an outer island of Pohnpei called Pingelap which has a very small population.  This Island of Pingelap has a very rich and interesting history.  Kamry's companion is done with her mission in November.  Kamry is helping her with her English so that she can pass an English test so that she can apply and be accepted to BYU Hawaii.  This will greatly enhance her life and her future.  Kamry has asked us to pray for her companion specifically that she will pass the English test and be accepted to BYU Hawaii.  Kamry really loves Sister James and will miss her when she leaves the mission.

This video is Kamry with Sister James in a member's home singing songs from Pingelap.

HOPE and HAPPINESS

I'm so happy today while writing this email that I can't stop smiling. Nothing major happend this week. We taught a lot of lessons. The assistants came with us and taught. We still had a lot of water problems and people canceled sometimes. So why am I so incredibly happy? Its all because of the spirit! When we actively strive to seek the spirit every single day and really follow the promptings of the spirit, we will be happy! This is truly the secret to real joy and this is why I'm out here on a little island in the middle of the pacific ocean, because I want everyone to feel this JOY! I rejoice in this gospel and in my Savior Jesus Christ who makes it possible for me to one day live in eternal happiness and bliss with all those that I love. Even though everything is not perfect right now, I have so much HOPE.

Here are a few things that give me hope and happiness:

1. There is a new Chapel being built in Uh for our branch. It will be a real chapel and it will be on the main road, not high up in the jungle, which means it will be so much more accessible.

2. The Book of Mormon and all the standard works are currently being translated into Pohnpeian. Right now we have about a third of the Book of Mormon translated. Its a few of the main, spiritually rich chapters, and I'm so grateful for it, but I know the work here on Pohnpei will hasten so much once there is a full, complete, accurate, translation of the Book of Mormon!

3. Our recent convert Macelynn, who I love with my whole heart, got called as a branch missionary! She's been coming with us to help teach and has grown so much. It's so fullfilling seeing her teach others these things that she has come to know are true.

4. I got FIVE packages in the mail this week. (Shout out to all my incredible family, I appreciate the Love and support so much! Also I probably dont need to go grocery shopping for a few weeks!) 

I hope you all will strive to have the spirit with you, so that you can feel the hope and happiness that comes from this Gospel! Appreciate your chapels and the Book of Mormon! Read it EVERY DAY. Everytime things don't go the way we want them to, instead of being upset or discouraged, Sister James and I have begun saying "I have faith in Jesus Christ and the Power of the Book of Mormon." I love you all so much! 

Love,

Sister Milne

P.S. I ate blowfish this week and it was good but super chewy but less flaky than normal fish and more like chicken in a way except the taste was totally fishy....iou dohlul! (delicous totally!) 

pics: Last  monday we went to a place the sticks out in the ocean called Nett Point with the SIsters, also the Senior Couple took us out to dinner at one of the nicer restaurants here and it has an incredible view! 

No general conference yet, but zone conference and stake conference!!

This week felt so long, but I think it's just because we did so much! President and Sister Poston came and we had zone conference and stake conference with them!! They bring the spirit so much, it's incredible! I feel so inspired and motivated:) 

Zone conference was phenomenal as always. My companion, Sister James, gave her departing testimony because this is her last transfer! She did incredible and made most of the sister cry. I love her faith and her sweet spirit so much! 

Stake conference was crazy because it was all the members on Pohnpei. There was decent transportation, so we were able to get 2 investigators there and a ton of less active members! We pretty much spent all week inviting people to come. There was two sessions and in between we all ate lunch with our branches and wards. It was so funny eating rice and curry with my hands while sitting on the floor in a crowded little room full of people I love in the church building. An experience I will never forget:) 

Also I completed my language mastery certification this week, which is good but definitely does not make me a master! It mainly just means I can teach all the lessons super simply and hold a basic conversation. Eri, Mwahu sang sohte! Better than nothing! 

Also, my wonderful companion and my wonderful friend Sister Poll have been teaching me some Pingalap songs which has been so fun! I'm really not a great singer, but these Islanders are and their songs are beautiful!! 

 I love hearing all of your missionary experiences and all the pics I receive! Keep them coming!

Love, 

Sister Milne

Drisela's Baptism!!

This week was really great, it went by so fast! 

The highlight was Drisela being baptized and confirmed. She has been such a blessing in our lives. 

My favorite part was right before she went into the font, she gave Sister James and I the biggest hug and said "Oh I poakpoakeikumwa" ( oh I love you two). My heart was so full of joy, I couldn't stop smiling. It was crazy trying to get the baptism organized, and it definitely didn't go smoothly, but it was PERFECT. 

I had the opportunity to speak about the restoration at the baptismal service, and for the first time I really enjoyed speaking in Pohnpeian and felt pretty confident. Not confident in myself of course, but confident in my Heavenly Father's divine help, which he did in fact give me. 

I love Drisela so much and her baptism brought me such joy, and I know that what I feel is just a fraction of the way Heavenly Father feels about her. 

On a side note, for the first time in 3 months I took a hot shower this week and it was the cleanest I've felt in my entire life:) Also we decided to go out for breakfast this morning and I got blueberry pancakes and it felt so much like home for like 2 seconds I thought I was in America!

Love you all,

Sister Milne

​

There'd Better Be Coconuts in Heaven!

2nd transfer is over and I'm staying here in Uh with Sister James! We were both so excited and relieved. We both feel that this area needs us, or maybe we just need them. 

My favorite part of the week was walking on Wednesday and getting to meet so many cool people! One woman we ran into when going from house to house is a less active member named Marta. She is smart and knows some English and she let us help her shred coconut that she then juiced for the coconut milk and it was SO COOL. I love coconuts and I'm super interested in the different things they do with them, all based off when you pick them and how big they are. It was fascinating. She also let us eat some of the super sweet crunchy fleshy part that is not in coconuts you get in America and she gave us Uhpw which is the coconut water that you drink. It was like a dream come true:) 

My favorite person right now is our 13 year old investigator named Drisela. She's getting baptized this weekend and she is so excited! She told us she wishes this week could just be over so it could be her baptism already. She loves the Book of Mormon and sharing her testimony with us. She is such a blessing from Heavenly Father because she was so prepared and ready, there really hasn't been a single thing getting in the way of her progression. I know it's because she is so close to a strong member family, members are SO IMPORTANT. 

The rest of our week was fillled with lots of hard work and the same old water problems and car problems. Maybe it was because of the looming transfer calls, but I really enjoyed it all so much. I love Pohnpei, I love these people, I love my Heavenly Father and all that he has blessed me with, I love you all, and I really love coconuts.

Sister MIlne

The Power of the Priesthood

This week started off with us going on exchanges, so I got to hang out at the bottom of the Island with Sister Russell and my favorite Tongan, Sister Taunauta! We were actually where my companion, Sister James is from which was super neat! 

Then this week we had a couple of surprises show up on our front porch. The first was my old pair of Nikes that got stolen two months ago....or I guess just borrowed since they were returned? We were out walking for "walking Wednesday" and we came home at 5 pm and they were just sitting there on our porch. Super weird, but cool! Blessings from the Lord, eh? 

The Second thing that ended up on our porch was a cute little kitten! It was scared and alone so I took care of it for a couple of days. We named it Moroni because it wandered alone for a time, just like Moroni did. 

The rest of the week was just us working hard as usual. Saturday I was pretty sick, and all of our appointments fell through which I took as a sign that Heavenly Father just wanted me to rest. So I went home at dinner time and slept for 13 hours. I was feeling much better when I woke up Sunday morning. I know that I can't help others until I help myself first!

My favorite part of the week was Sunday night. We have a great investigator named Merleen. She lived in the US for a time, so she's super great at English which is fun! She has diabetes ( a ton of pohnpeians have diabetes)  and she has a really bad infection in her foot that has made her unable to walk for over a year. We taught her about the priesthood earlier this week and she desired a priesthood blessing. So Sunday we brought the Elders with us to give her a blessing. After they left we asked her how she felt when they blessed her and she said, "Oh yeah, I was going to ask you about that. What was that?! It was like electricity from my head to my feet. And it was really warm and just filled me up." It gave me so much joy to explain to her that it was the Holy Ghost that she had felt. She was so excited when I told her that she could feel it over and over again if she kept working hard to obey the commandments of God and read her Book of Mormon:)

I know this work is the Lords Work and it will continue to move forward despite opposition. I look forward to that day when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ. I love my Savior and I love his Gospel. 

Love,

Sister Milne

I Love Island Life

Last monday, Sister James and I decided to reward ourselves for our hard work by buying local clothes and matching rings! It was super fun:) She bought a dress and I bought a skirt.

Our week went by super fast, we are working really hard to help build up the church here. I wish there were more hours in the day so we could help more people! 

We have a lot of investigators and we are trying to help them overcome all their questions, concerns, and live the commandments of God. I know the most important thing is for them to feel the Holy Ghost by praying, reading the scriptures, and going to church. I love these three things! They are what life is all about! or at least what life should be all about! 

I love these people with my whole heart, it makes me so sad when people have been given so much light and knowledge and they don't take it. Its like being offered hot chocolate lava cake with vanilla ice cream and instead eating beans and spinach. I just want them to eat the cake, but I can't force them, they have to choose for themselves. Except what we are offering is better than hot chocolate lave cake! Its eternal life and peace and joy and happiness with our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and our Families!! I just need to work harder to help them see how important and good this gospel is and that its meant for everyone! 

This morning was super fun, we went to some old ruins at the bottom of the Island called Nan Madol. We asked what the history is behind them, but the man there said that people cant talk about it while at the ruins or they will get sick. (people here are very superstitious about stuff, its really interesting) But it was beautiful, and right at the coast and I just love the ocean and the jungle and exploring old run down places! We went with our zone, except none of the other sisters in our zone went so it was just Sister James and I and the Elders. But it was still fun and incredible. I loved it! 

Thanks for all the prayers!

Sister Milne​

Wearing the skirt with a random t shirt is the pohnpeian style:) ​

Seek Ye First The Kingdom Of God

This week feels like so much happened but also like nothing happened! We finally got our water back Tuesday night, so it wasn't too long without water luckily. It was kinda fun fetching water from the local water hose on the side of the road like the locals do.

We had to drive the sister training leaders to the Airport on tuesday to fly to their Missionary Leadership Council (I think thats what MLC stands for), and then pick them on friday. Plus we had to drive into town Thursday for our District meeting so that took up a lot of our usual proselyting time. It was fun getting to go into town and see other missionaries, but just hard scheduling wise. 

We also just had a lot of appointments fall through again this week.

But what has been cool through all of this is seeing Heavenly Father really guide us to where we need to be and when.

On Wednesday we ended up having an unexpected lesson with two sisters that we have been teaching. Their father, who won't let them come to church, decided to join the lesson, because of his friend that was over who it turns out is a member. This man has had a lot of difficulties and has been somewhat less active, but he helped so much with the lesson. He brought up the scripture in Matthew, "Seek ye first thing kingdom of God" which was so inspired. I know that this man needed to be there in that lesson. I will probably never know why, but I think it strengthened him, helped the girls, softened the heart of the father, and taught me! 

I've realized that I need to seek first the kingdom of God more. Instead of stressing over water, food, of other temporal things I need to focus my whole heart, might, mind, and strength on the Lords work and he will provide. 

He provided us with water when we didn't have any. I got 3 packages in the mail this week, all which contained food. (This is a blessing because the grocery stores haven't gotten a shipment in a while, which means today there wasn't a lot to buy and just the fact that we are on a island means food is pretty expensive.) My Heavenly Father is so aware of me and my needs and I know that he will not let me down.

This Sunday we had the opportunity to fast for the Church on Pohnpei. I really saw that as I put aside the physical, food and water, and focused on the spiritual, going to church and studying the scriptures, I was able to feel the spirit so incredibly strong. I sought the kingdom of God and felt the blessing of doing so. I know this truly is the Lords work and no matter what difficulties come, it will continue to progress forward until that day when our Savior Jesus Christ will come again.

A few fun things with the language:

1. As a child my nickname was kam kam and here there is a word kamakam which means to beat up. Ex. I pahn Kamakam uhk. I am going to beat you up. (Pohnpeians love this word)

2. In most languages the Title "Sister" gets translated on name tags such as "Hermana" in spanish. Here however, there really is no word for sister but rather you just say rei seripein which means my(sibling) girl, so i wouldn't make since to just put essentially My Girl Milne on the name tags. Going by Sister Milne makes it still be a formal tittle. 

3. The word for Dog is Kidi which is pronounced like Kitty. The word for Cat is Kat, except in the Pohnpeian language, T's make a "ch" sound, so it is pronounced "Cach"

Peace, Love, and Blessings!

Sister Milne

Zone Conference!

​This week President and Sister Poston flew to our Island for a zone conference! It was so fun to be with all the other missionaries and to be filled with the spirit. It was the closest I've felt to being in the temple since coming out here. The zone conference really motivated us all to put in even more effort to increase the work here on Pohnpei. There's a lot of things that we cant control, but we dont want to be the limiting factor! We will be having a Pohnpei wide fast this next Sunday to strengthen the members and hasten the missionary work, and I'm very excited for it! I know that uniting together in fasting and prayer is seen throughout the Book of Mormon and I have faith that we will see miracles!

Sister James and I were so excited to get to work after the conference, and then so many of our appointments fell through.....But we aren't discouraged because we know the blessings come after the trial of our faith:)

Sunday we did feel blessed as one of our investigators, a young mom named Ronia, came to church with us! The members just loved her and her baby and I was so grateful to them for being so welcoming. Also, there was finally working water at the church building so we were able to have a full 3 hours of church for the first time in 3 weeks! Now the only water issue is that we woke up this morning with no running water, we went outside to fix the pipe which we have to do every day, but this time there was no water coming through at the break either....Hopefully we will figure that out by tomorrow, but if not I know that this is the Lords work and it will move forward. 

I experienced "muching" for the first time this week when we went and served our investigator named Sehpe. Its essentially just weeding/clearing out all jungle vegetation. Pohnpeians consider anything from nature or the jungle to be samin (dirty).The calmness and the smell of dirt reminded me of weeding our garden back home and it was probably the first time in my life that I enjoyed weeding. Also it changed things up, I love breaking up the normal routine. 

Also we hiked to a waterfall in our area this morning with some missionaries from our zone! It was super nifty. 

A lot of people here believe that as long as they believe in God and are a part of some church, they are doing enough. This week we had to work really hard to help our investigators understand that just like there was one True Church of Christ in the Bible, there is one true Church today and it is the exact same Church that Christ led when he was alive. And just like in the Bible, our words are not enough. We must actually do those things that God has commanded and that Christ taught. My testimony on this grows stronger every time I testify about it.

I ese me mwomwodisohwet mehlel oh I ese me Joseph Smith Wia emen sohkoup en Koht. I ese me kitail koaros serien Samatial Nanleng oh I ese me Sapwellime Poakong emenemen kitail.

I know that this church is true and I know that Joseph Smith was a Prophet of God. I know that we are all Children of Heavenly Father and I know that He loves each and every one of us. 

Sister Milne

Surprise Pics!

I love when I get surprise pics of Kamry on Facebook.  There is a wonderful Missionary couple that serves on the same island as Kamry.  The wonderful Sister Fulton posts pictures from the mission and I love when I get a glimpse of Kamry!

I love the picture below of the boys playing checkers.  Very clever.

The Gospel is Simple

This week I learned a lot about the simplicity of the Gospel. I have a goal to not speak any English during lessons which means right now I can pretty much just bear my testimony on whatever is it Sister James Teaches about. But its really helped me see that what is most important is the spirit. Sometimes I forget that the warm, peaceful, happy feelings of the spirit are something that most people have never felt before. My companion, who is a convert to the church, says that for her it was like coming from darkness into light, as if she had been lost and she didn't even know it until she was found. I love that, and I love the Holy Ghost so much. It fills me up with a calm confidence and assurance that this is the only church with the fullness of Christ's teachings. How blessed I am to have it!

This week an 8 year old boy who comes from a part member family was baptized. We have been teaching him at the request of the Branch President just to make sure he was ready for baptism. He is so cute and it was so fun to hear sister James really break the lessons down for him. It made it even easier to follow along word for word to what was happening! He always gives the best prayers, he prays for his dogs and his mom and school and for his baptism. He was baptized in the ocean off the side of a road that goes out to a little island that is part of our area. It was so pretty! 

A few fun things that happenend this week was: 

1. Waking up to the loudest thunder I've ever heard in my entire life.

2. Teaching a woman that has a legit mustache. Its like the old Chinease man style, long and thick on the sides with some wispies on the chin. 

3. A little boy giving me a surprise haircut in the middle of a lesson (the damage isn't noticeable)

4. Getting soaking wet scrubbing the cement floors of our investigators house.

5. Our water pipe breaking and us having even dirtier water than usual. We had to hike uphill until we found the break and the held the pipes together with a rock. 

6. Giving my first full length talk in pohnpeian in church yesterday. It was also the boldest talk I've ever given. I was so scared and I totally just read off my paper the whole time, but I did it!

This morning a few of us Sisters hiked up to some WW2 ruins and it was awesome! There were some cool stuff to climb in and under and there were some pretty views of the ocean. Every day I love to see what color the ocean is, sometimes its blue or green or gray. I'm truly living in paradise. Except for the mud and germs....but the pretty stuff makes the bad stuff not as bad:) 

Thanks for the prayers! 

Sister Milne