Thursday, April 11, 2024

Thursday, April 11, 2024

• Started exercising again
• Visit with ward member Tasha JnPaul a branch member and super mom
• Sister Sharon and Sam (see real name below) Alleyne
• Our first meeting will Allen Oral Smith. 
• Matthew and Marth Mathurin (he is ward mission leader)

Today was the most interesting day. We visited two families throughout the day and they were members that we have not seen at the church.

This morning first thing I decided that it was time to get exercising again. I have been slacking since we left Provo. It is funny, we don't really feel like we do that much, but we are beat at the end of the day. Of course we usually wake up between 5:30 and 5:45 am which is when Tina's alarm goes off. I don't have the weights that were available in Provo but there are things that I can do. There is a tree that is just the right size and height to do pull up on. I also do push-ups. Also, I did stairs and step-ups on a bench. So I do 3 sets of 10 each, except push up's and I do 3 sets of 20. I hope to increase that over time.

We stopped by Tasha JnPaul's place, she is a member of the branch and lives just kiddy corner from our place. She is the most dedicated person I know. She is like a super mom and member. She knows everyone, she provides food for welfare members, she teaches several classes and more. We stopped to get some addresses of members and where they live. Usually we ask for google pins since addresses are almost non-existent. She gave us two that I will tell about below.

The first visit was Sister Sharon who is a member and her husband Sam Alleyne (his real name is Arthur Gilbert Francis Alleyne). She is originally from the United Kingdom and he was born and raised on Barbados and they are both white, which is a little unusual since most people here are of African decent. A person born on Barbados is called a Bayesian. Sam is not a member, but is supportive of the church. Sister Alleyne has not been to church for some time and she blames it on health. Sister Alleyne has 4 children from a previous marriage, all out of the house. Sam has 3 children from a previous marriage, and they have one together. They are scattered all over the world. They are a very interesting couple and she seems to be one of those over achievers and has done quite a bit. She was telling us that her first husband joined the Church, but she didn't for a long time. I guess she had gone to church a few times but not really interested. Anyway they moved or were visiting Florida and she went with him to church. I guess he husband had previously met with the bishop and made arrangements to interview her for baptism. When they got to church the bishop cam up to her and said, so...you are going to be baptized today huh. She said absolutely not, but the bishop took her into his office anyway and began to ask her the baptismal question. When he got to the end he ask her if she would be baptized and she said "why not" and she was astounded that she said it and she was baptized that day. I don't remember the story, but her first husband was baptized by someone that did not even ask anyone if they could be baptized, and there were two of them, and this guy just took them done to some water and baptized them both. Her husband was active for a long but eventually they fell apart and she said they had an ugly divorce. She later met Sam and he is a really good guy, and supportive of the Church, but I guess has no desire to join. Sam is a sea captain of ships, and has captained all kinds of ships. His real claim to fame is that he was in the first "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie. He is in the first scene where Capitan Jack Sparrow is in a little sinking boat that floats in front of the ship Sam is the captain of. They are on the side of the ship looking busy and Sam is giving orders. It is only for a second or two and Jack Sparrow floats on by. They live in what looked like a really richey house at one time, but it is really run down now. They said they are trying to fix it up. While we were sitting there, wild birds were flying through the house and they had a little bowl of crumbs on the floor and the birds would fly in the house and pick through the crumbs. They are an older couple he is in his 70's, but he says he still captain's ships.

This afternoon we got a frantic call from Noah Avril, a 23 year old young man that is the ward clerk and is preparing to go on a mission. There was another member that had come to the church looking for help from the church. His name is Allen Oral Smith. I am not sure about him. Elder Hall told me about him and I think he has some psychiatric challenges. But he came to the church saying he needed some help. He talks really quietly and was very difficult to understand. I wasn't sure what he really wanted. Noah said he had his phone and it had a suicide video that he had made. Anyway he is a concern and I am going to get him to a doctor tomorrow and ask the doctor what help they have for people like him.

The two sets of Elders in our branch stopped by to return the credit card. They had to get their car serviced, and I guess it took all day. They actually came by this morning to get the mission credit card to pay the bill. They stayed and visited for a bit, but we had to leave to go visit the Mathurin's so they left.

This evening we went and visited (after dark mind you. I try not to drive after dark) Matthew and Martha Mathurin. They are members of the branch and he work's a ton I guess. He is a plumber and works maybe 7 days a week. Matthew is our ward mission leader, but I don't know how much he is functioning with all his work. I am just trying to get a feel of where the branch is at. It seems that we have a bunch of faithful sisters and not so many faithful brothers. Marth works as well so I imagine they do pretty good for themselves. I would like to see a little more activity out of them, but we'll see. Matthew talks the talk, he just needs to walk the walk.