Another Week Finished

Wow! It has been a really hectic week and I don't have much to report on considering I wrote just a few days ago. Everything is really good down under. Things are still really busy and I am loving it. Not much has happened in the past few days so I don't have much to report on except life is good and I love it here. My living arrangements have changed a bit. Elder Roessler sadly is going to the city to finish up. He only has two more weeks but he really wants to finish in the city, so that means we needed to get a new assistant. His name is Elder Gee from Sandy, Utah. He has only been out for 11 months and is a stud. He will do really good and I am looking forward to getting to know him better.

But besides that nothing else has changed. The Lumsdens came to church and seemed to enjoy it. We were not really able to talk to them much about what they thought because they left right after but they seemed to enjoy it and we will be going to have dinner with them at Elder Vinson's house this week. That should be good. They asked Elder Vinson to baptise them so that was neat. I can't wait for the fourth of December. I love you all so much. Next week's letter will be better.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Love Elder Brough

Haunted Toilets and December Fourth!

Oh, boy! Oh, boy! Sorry it has taken me so long to actually sit down and email you! I love you so much, please don't forget that but this week has been hectic as! So at the moment Australia is so beautiful. You have my favorite tree at the moment blossoming. They are called jacarandas. It has a purple flower. It is really pretty to look at all the green trees and then every so often seeing a big puff of purple. I love this place. Also, birds are all over the place again. There are some really cool looking birds here. There is this one red bird that hangs out in our backyard every morning. I just love it as well. Personal study is frequently interrupted by the cackling of a kookaburra. Australia is a crazy place!

So to the first part of the subject of my letter. Haunted Toilets. So first off the flat I live in at the moment is, for a lack of a better word, a hole. It is super old and ugly and now we are pretty sure it is haunted. The assistants, Elder Tou and I were relaxing in the lounge when all of a sudden we hear a loud clatter coming from the laundry room/toilet room. So being the curious people we are we went to investigate and to our horror, the only toilet in our flat had fallen over. Now we have no idea how this happened and there are many that do not believe my story but OUR TOILET JUST FELL OVER!!!! I know it does not make sense but it is a true story and was a big inconvenience! We had to make a few runs up to the office through out the week but as of late we have a toilet again but it was not a fun experience.

So last week we were busy cleaning and closing a flat. The first one we had to clean up was for a senior couple that was coming in. So Elder Tou and I were busy cleaning the flat up and throwing out a lot of the clutter missionaries aquire. I made my first trip to the tip! Tip is Australian for dump and surprisingly dumps still smell in the southern hemisphere. Beats me. But all last week we were getting that flat ready for Elder and Sister Lambarth from St. George. We also had to paint the flat with Elder Taylor. Elder Taylor is a service missionary. And he does not like fleet. Elder Taylor was part of the North Mission doing what fleet does and he doesn't like to have 20 year old kids intrude on his work. I am just going to leave it at that. I just love the office.

So I went finding in the city for the first time! Man was it intense! So like I said we have a teaching center in our mission and apparently there are only three teaching centers in the world and Sydney has one of them. Basically the church owns two floors of a high rise. One floor is a chapel and the other is a family history center and a bunch of rooms where they teach people. The atmosphere there is incredible and the missionaries there are always teaching and baptising there. I just love it, it is in down town Sydney right across from Hyde Park which I would say is the equivalent of Central Park in New York and there are just hundreds and hundreds of people passing you by. I have always been intimidated by this and the other day Elder Tou decided we would man up and give it a shot. So we talked to the missionaries there about what the best thing to do was and they said just walk down the street and hand out these flyers. They handed us a little flyer that said "Free English Class". So we hit the streets and anyone who was not white we talked to. It was fun because it was very fast pace. I actually ended up losing Elder Tou for a good 45 minutes but luckily we found each other and it is all good now. I love the city and I really hope I get to serve there at some point.

So enough rambling. Missionary work is going very very well! Since the last time I emailed you we have taught Peter and Nikki Lumsden twice and both times it has gone very very well. We were able to set a baptismal date with them for December fourth and they are both excited about it! I believe they are referred to as the elect in the scriptures. It has been a truly humbling experience and I am so happy I have had a chance to teach them and to be at the right place at the right time to be a part of their conversion! They are such a wonderful family! We taught them the "make or break" commandments the other night and everything went really well! I am excited to continue to work with them!

Peter and Nikki own a health product company called Lumsden Health Products. They just recently came out with a weight loss product called The Latin Seed and basically it is a seed that you drink with warm water and it helps you lose weight. Don't worry it is all organic. So Nikki and Peter hooked us up with a free sample. Basically it is a cleansing thing and it is suppose to just clean your body out. And I can testify that only being on it for two days, it CLEARS you out! But I am down to lose some weight. So we will see how that goes!

Anywho, I love you all so much. Congrats Jordan on the engagement. I am excited to be able to get to know another sister in law! I love you all heaps!

Elder Landon Brough

The "haunted" toiletWith Elder Taylor, a service missionary, and Elder Tou at the Chatswood flat With my zone, the Greenwich Zone

Tender Mercies Part 2

So another terrific week! One of the best weeks in the office. I just love being here. So this past week we had transfers so it was so hectic moving people around and helping them all get settled and what not. So I am glad that is all over. Through it all, however, we ended up getting another companion temporarily. His name is Elder Hansen from Cedar City, Utah/ San Diego, depending on who you are talking to and he is so cool. He was way sick for a day or two with something that nobody really knows but he is good and we are just waiting on the new arrivals to come in so we can throw him out into the field. He is a really good guy and I am so happy I have got to serve around him this past week.

So the referral we received from Elder Vinson was so incredible. We were told to meet at the Dural McDonalds parking lot at a quarter to six. Elder Tou and I were very very very nervous because he is a General Authority. We rocked up to Mackers a few minutes late and we saw him standing next to his car. We approached him and he ended up being a very very funny guy and very relaxed. What can you expect he is an Aussie. So we show up at the referral's house a little after seven with a family from a neighboring ward that works with him. Their names were Peter and Nikki. Peter is from Australia and Nikki is from Chile. They are married and have two kids who are three and five. And they are searching and they talked about baptism. It was an incredible lesson. We taught the restoration and Peter knelt in prayer at the end of the lesson. It was such a wonderful experience and I look forward to teaching them the Plan of Salvation tomorrow.

So I had a wonderful experience yesterday on Sunday. Every fast Sunday we have a recent convert fireside where recent converts speak and investigators come. It is always a spirit filled fireside and a lot of baptismal dates have been set at them including Brendan Burke's. So on Thursday Elder Roessler, who is one of the assistants, called me and asked me to invite someone to speak at the fireside so instantly Robert Murphy's name popped in my head so I called the Cessnock missionaries, got Robert's mobile and called him up and he gladly accepted the invitation to speak. So he and the Cessnock missionaries drove down for the fireside. They showed up an hour early so I showed Robert around the temple, mission office and mission home and we even sat in the living room of the mission home and talked with President and then at the fireside Robert did an immaculate job and I felt the spirit so strong. I just love being a missionary and the things I get to see and be a part of and I am looking forward to the rest that the Lord has in store for me here in this sun burnt country!

Love Elder Brough

With Robert and Elder Hill in front of the templeWith Robert and Elder ChanWith Robert and Elders Hill and Chan

Tender Mercies

So this past week has been crazy! So many things are going on. We have been so swamped with silly office things and zone conferences. We had the last two this week. So it was nice to finally get those all done. I must say I love missionaries but I really love the Great Australia Sydney Missionaries. They are so incredible and I am so thankful for this opportunity to serve with all two hundred of them! I seriously just love it! But with the end of one crazy hectic week comes another crazy hectic week. So we got all the zone conferences done and then right on to transfers and there was so much to be done! It is crazy and oh man it was just crazy yesterday and I am glad it is over! But it is the good kind of busy.

So I have been thinking that I have not really told you the set up of the Sydney Mission. So let me explain. In the Australia Sydney Mission we have 12 zones. The old North mission consisted of Coffs Harbour Zone, New Castle Zone, Greenwich Zone, Penrith Zone, Parramatta Zone and Hebersham Zone. All of them are stakes except Coffs Harbour which is a district and half of the Penrith Zone is a District called the Orange District. The former South mission consisted of Mortdale Zone, Hyde Park Zone, Liverpool Zone, Campbelltown Zone (Which is Macarthur Stake), Canberra Zone and South Coast Zone. All of these are stakes as well except South Coast. Wollongong is part of the Macarthur Stake and the rest is the Nowra District. The church is really well established here. I think it is funny I could tell you the name of every ward and branch in the whole of New South Wales. I am such a nerd!

So in the midst of the chaotic pace of the office the Lord still sees fit to find ways to let us know He is there. So Elder Tou and I, as well as Elder Cummings, were pulling into the car park of the Normanhurst Chapel for church and I see a strangely familiar souped up Subaru. I just stare at it thinking where have I seen that before? I was stumped and it was bugging me. So I hopped out of the mini van I get to drive around, opened the sliding door, grabbed my suit coat and throw it on and started to walk to the chapel. When I turned around it all clicks to where I had seen that Subaru before! It is then I see Melissa Hale and Brendan Burke walking into the chapel. So I double take and say, "Wow, I baptized that guy!" So I ran in to see what's up and they came to see me. It was so cool!!!! It was so good to see them, especially Brendan. I remember when he first started coming to church he always wore a black shirt and a red tie. It was good, I personally didn't mind. I was just glad to see him at church. But there he was with a white shirt and a suit. It made me so happy. I was gutted because I didn't have my camera but it was so good to see them! I was talking to them and dropping hints left and right to see if they are getting engaged anytime soon and they are not but they are going to some resort up in Queensland soon so I am hoping it is then. I will keep my fingers crossed! It will be so cool to see them sealed! Also, Brendan told me he gave his first talk and I thought that was way cool. He even gave me a copy of it. It is flipping hilarious and way good. I love how the Lord shows his love to his children!

So that is what is going on with little old Elder Brough down under. We recieved a member referral from Elder Vinson of the area seventy. Talk about presure. It is a family who has some friends who are members so it should be intense. Elder Tou and I joke about hopefully if we end up doing a horrible job we won't end up being mentioned in General Conference. We will see what goes on. Love you heaps and hope to hear from you soon.

Love Elder Brough

With Elder Tematafaarere from Tahiti whose heart is proportionate to his size!With Elder Puentes from Chile, who has a really good sense of humor.With Elder Jest from England. All I can say is that I love this kid!With Elder Ding from Mainland China. He is the one who did not even know about Joseph Smith until he came on his mission.With my former companion, Elder Chan from Hong Kong and Elder Gee who is from Utah (aka "The Factory").

Music!

This is a post from Nancy. I finally figured out how to put this music playlist on Landon's blog. At first I was just going to put on some of his favorite hymns but since he is not allowed to look at his blog (and claims that he has never looked at it) I thought I would take the liberty to also include some Australian standards as well as music by Australian artists. I was hoping that I could just get my songs from my iTunes account but unfortunately Apple doesn't have a playlist feature for blogs. With playlist.com it is all free and therefore the selections are not near as numerous and I can't totally customize the playlist as I would like to. If you want to turn down the volume, listen to a different song or turn the player off altogether just scroll down to the bottom and click on the appropriate button.