Pukalani Maui -- 1st Area!!

Area:  Pukalani, Maui
Companion:  Elder Niemann

Well this is aloha from the beautiful island of Maui! I’m serving currently in the Pukalani area and Elder Niemann is my companion. We live on the side of mount Haleakala, our pad (living quarters) is the oldest pad in the entire mission. Its right next to the Pulehu chapel, I think it’s the oldest church building in Hawaii (don't quote me on that). They call Maui the valley island because it is. We live up in the place that is called upcountry, because it’s on the side of the mountain and it kinda slants. But there’s mostly just green rolling hills. Just like 10 minutes ago I talked to a crazy homeless guy. I also talked to a crazy homeless guy in Oahu, he was talking nonsense. But yea it’s beautiful here, the islands small enough you can see the ocean on both sides. We were able to go on top of mount Haleakala and watch the sunset this morning. It was pretty sweet, we were there with our district. I don’t know our district here as well as our district at the MTC yet, because our MTC district was pretty close. I actually miss most of them a lot, but Elder Niemann is a GREAT trainer. He's been a missionary for 6 months.

CLICK on Map TO MAKE LARGER!!

 I’m gonna see if I can send some pictures, but if I cant then I’ll mail some home later ok? Make sure Thomas gets this too ok mom? I was over at the Kaimimokus house the other day, and I had the opportunity to have myself some taco poke (octopus) and it was ok, if you like gross cold rubber in your mouth. They also gave me poi, that stuff is a little weird and I had some terra plant or something. People over here think that if they feed the missionaries more that they get more blessings. So they don’t understand when you tell them your full.

I actually lost my wallet, (please don’t get mad at me) and I lost my driver license because it was in it and the cash that was in there. But I must have been really lucky or maybe God was looking out for me because I actually put my debit card in my pocket before I lost it. So were all good I think, except I don’t think I can get off the island without a license. I might have to get a Hawaiian license. If that’s so, I think I need my birth certificate and junk like that right?

 We don’t have any baptisms yet, but I think I might be close??? I don’t know, I’m still just trying to get everyone’s name right. Try giving a blessing when everyone’s name is like a whole sentence. Elder Neimann and I have the pad to ourselves so that’s nice. It’s such a sweet pad, it’s got a lot of history to it. One thing that I also didn’t expect was how cold it could actually get here! On top of Haleakala it was like 30 degrees, and with a boat load of wind.

O yeah, my P-days are Mondays if you haven’t guessed. It sucked because we left for Hawaii on our P-day so wasn’t able to email and all that. The plane ride was really quite long. I was going crazy because I had a window seat and I just stared out in the ocean for the whole time. By the end I was going a little mad. I don’t like how the wings on the plane move up and down that aint cool. But one of the girls from my MTC districts is in the Maui zone so that’s always nice. The Maui zone is comprised of Molokai, Maui and Lanai. Oahu has most of the zones with I think like 7? Elder Niemann keeps on telling me that I got really lucky when I got sent to Pukalani to start, because our pad is really quite at night can barely hear the cars. But there is this friggin’ rooster that always wakes me up, he’s a dumb bird.

It’s pretty scary being a missionary man, because when people see you, your not Tanner Shoemaker anymore. Your Elder Shoemaker - and people expect certain things from Elder Shoemaker that Elder Shoemaker sometimes doesn’t even know if he can do. That’s all I’m really gonna say about that.

We actually have a bunch of banana trees behind our house, with bananas growing on it. Church yesterday was pretty cool. They had me bare my testimony in church, it’s so weird because a lot of the buildings around here are like half built outside. I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to send pictures if I’m going to be writing more cuz I don’t have a lot of time.

We have car which is nice. We don’t do any bike riding. We have been doing a good amount of tracting lately, there was this rude lady that I didn’t really think kind thoughts about. Towards the end of the MTC I really started to love Elder Dzieman too, I actually really miss him.

It’s hard being away from home sometimes, I do miss having a solid support system to just be there for me. I just want to let Mom, Dad, Landon, Josh and Grandpa and Grandma and everyone else know how much I appreciate all that you’re doing for me, and that I love you a lot. You should totally get more people to mail me maybe, and those pictures you sent me Mom are like solid gold.

 Love you, got to go, pictures will probably come in the mail because I wrote such a long email and didn’t have enough time to figure it out. Okay?. So I guess I’ll be seeing ya!

 Elder Shoemaker