Iaorana tatou,

E Ua = 'it's raining'. A sort of tahitian greeting when it rains.

This week it rained. A lot. It rained the hardest Saturday night, with lots of flooding, especially downtown and in the valleys, where the rivers overflowed. Church on most of the island was cancelled actually so that everyone could help the families whose houses were flooded or even destroyed. I spent the morning driving around helping the Relief Society prepare food for the families and the ward members who helped with the cleaning. And the afternoon we helped clean a house that was flooded. But all is well now, at least for us. Our yard and the houses around us were flooded but our house was fine! I saw pictures of downtown though - like a tunnel that passes under one of the roads was filled with water like a pool.

The rest of the week wasn't too interesting. Just rain. Reminds me of when I got to Tahiti and there was a hurricane in Fiji and we hardly saw the sun for three weeks. It was harder to work through the rain, people weren't too interested to come out and talk to us. But we persevered and had some great lessons that were worth the wetness and Saturday was sunnier and that saved our week, we were able to teach a lot more lessons.

I encourage each of you to faaitoito, persevere whatever your rainstorms may be! Blue skies await you on the morrow, just like this morning. We often shared this week my favorite story from the life of Jesus Christ - when he calmed the tempest. Whether our storms and trials are physical or spiritual, Christ can bring us peace if we are not of little faith. He is our Older Brother and He loves us! We do not need to be afraid.

I love you!
Soeur Ladd