Happy Pongal

Happy Pongal/Sankranti/Kite Festival (depending on what locality you're from and what faith you belong to), everyone!  The kite festival was AWESOME here in Hyderabad.  Seriously, thousands of kites were in the sky yesterday and Saturday. Everywhere you went you would hear the victorious shouts of children after they'd cut down a rival kite (kite festival really means kite fighting here, it's pretty cool).  I am so sad to say that I didn't get any pictures as my camera battery was dead all this past week.  We had helped some investigator kids fly a kite on the top of their apartment building--which just happens to be one of the tallest apartment buildings in the area, that was a lot of fun.

This week flew by, I was in a different area/ward nearly every day this past week.  I started in A.S. Rao Nagar then made my way across the city from there.  It was a lot of fun working with these elders and, what more, the Lord led us to at least one new family to teach in each area, how incredible is that?  

I had a cool experience this past week while I was serving in the West Marredpally 2nd ward area.  It is important to know that in the earlier part of last year, I served in the West Marredpally 1st ward area.  I struggled quite a bit in that area because I felt like the work was not progressing very well, despite the hard work my companion and I were putting in.  We talked to hundreds of people, most of which seemed relatively disinterested in our message.  So that brings us to now.  Prior to my arrival in Hyderabad, a certain investigator in the 2nd ward area, Swamy, had been looking for me.  He had been asking all the elders in Hyderabad when Elder Tuscano would be coming.  Naturally, the elders asked Swamy why he wanted to know and he told them that Elder Tuscano was one of the missionaries who introduced him to the church.  When I got to the 2nd ward area, the elders asked me if I knew Swamy.  The name sounded familiar, though I had no recollection of any specific Swamy in Hyderabad that I knew of (you talk to a lot of Swamys in India haha).  Anyway, the elders told me that he'd been dying to meet me and they'd scheduled an appointment to meet with him.  While walking down the alleyway to his apartment, Swamy saw me from the end of the corridor and ran up to me and gave me a huge hug.  As soon as I saw him, I recognized him!!  He was one of the few people I'd spoken with last year that had actually been interested in learning more about the gospel--my companion and I had talked with him while waiting for a bus to come in the 1st ward area.  And now brother Swamy is making rapid strides toward baptism.  It was an amazing reunion.  This experience was a testimony to me that, truly, NO effort is wasted.  Whether planting seeds or gathering the harvest, we are but instruments in His hands.  I will forward some pictures we took with Swamy on his phone haha.

I hope everyone has a week as exciting as this festival was here in Hyderabad.

Keep the faith,

Elder Tuscano    

Hello from our Hyberdaddy trip

Hello from Hyberdaddy, everyone!

It's been a while since I've been in this city, it's good to be back, even if it's for a brief time.  The food is still as good as ever and chaala spicy, might I add ("chaala" means "very" in Telugu).  It's been fun serving in the A.S. Rao Nagar ward with Elder Shuman, from Preston, Idaho, these past few days.

One interesting change, however, is that of the climate: it is SO cold in the mornings and evenings here!  Some of you may be thinking, "Elder Tuscano, you're in the heart of southern India, there is no way it can be that cold."  I beg to differ haha.  We've been going to this park in the mornings to exercise and you can see your breath, I kid you not.  Some of you may refute that thinking, "Elder Tuscano, that may just be the exhalation of the abundance of pollution in the city of Hyderabad, is it not?"  That may be partially true, but I think the main reason is because it's so cold haha.

Elder Shuman and I witnessed a cool miracle this week.  One night we had a fairly busy evening planned; but, lo and behold, all the appointments we had planned for fell through.  So we went to a quiet place and said a prayer together that we would be led to a family looking for the gospel.  After saying Amen, we asked an elderly Hindu man if there were any Christian homes nearby.  He led us right to the home of Prabhudas and his family.  No less than five minutes later, the Lord led us to a wonderful family, prepared by the Lord to receive His gospel.  Prabhudas is the friend of a member who had met with missionaries a few years ago but stopped, and had recently been hoping to meet with missionaries again.  Interestingly enough, Prabhudas is the very same man whom Elder Shuman had been trying to contact by phone for just under a month now but he'd never actually talked to, seen, or met with him.  As we met with Prabhudas, his brother walked in.  Then his mother.  Then his other brother.  It was amazing.  They were all so happy to see missionaries again.  How grateful I am that the day of miracles has not ceased.  God lives and He is a God of miracles.

I hope everyone has a great week and stays nice and warm.  I will do my best to do the same haha.

Keep the faith,

Elder Tuscano 

P.S.  I am so sad because my camera battery died shortly after I arrived in Hyderabad so I was unable to take many pictures ):  But I will send the one I did have enough battery to take haha.  The picture I am sending is with a cute family we taught this past week.

Advance Happy New Year; enter 2017!

 early morning view from bangalore apartment

jackfruit tree

an area where we found a new family to teach

"Advance Happy New Year!" is the phrase you would have heard had you been in India on New Years Eve, I thought that was pretty funny haha.

This week was good here in Bangalore, little slow though.  A lot of people had a lot of things goin' on but, despite all the hustle and bustle, we still found a couple new families to teach!  We are excited about that.

It's crazy to think that 2017 is already here.  Our ward tried to have a New Years' Party at 8:00PM on Saturday but, unfortunately, it didn't start on time haha, we missed out on those festivities.  On New Years' Day, however, we had so many new people walk into church that we weren't able to teach them all!  We did teach quite a few of them though and, along with other people and families we met with this past week, a common resolution for the new year was to have God be a bigger part of their lives, or to follow Jesus Christ a little more closely.  I just think that's awesome, I adopted the resolution!  We can always have a great year or month or week or day when we choose to follow the Savior.  It's been a privilege to serve the Lord full-time for the entire year of 2016 and I look forward to the time I have in 2017 to do the same.  

In other news, I will be in Hyderabad this coming week and possibly next week on special assignment!  I'm excited for that.  Beef biryani, here I come!

Have a great week everyone, and stick to your resolutions until they stick to you!!

Keep the faith.

Elder Tuscano

Hare Krishna (Merry Christmas)!

 skype with the family on Christmas morning

  skype with the family on Christmas morning

  skype with the family on Christmas morning

 Madame Nazarena and her class of schoolchildren with whom we shared the Light the World

three cute kids we showed the Light the World video this past week!

 this is a bunch of tractors in our area, it reminded me of Staheli Farm in Washington haha.

a typical scene in our area.  This specific area is where we found a new family to teach!

Merry day after Christmas everyone!  I think just generally speaking, the day after Christmas is usually pretty anticlimactic, or maybe that's just me haha.  Anyway.

This week was pretty jam-packed with Christmas festivities and activities and lighting the world and whatnot.  There were quite a few highlights, I will just mention a few:

In the month of December in India, Christian families will hang a colorful, lighted, paper star outside their home in anticipation for Christmas.  Elder Poleboina and I took advantage of this and used it as a finding opportunity.  So on Thursday night, we went to an area, knocked on people's doors, and asked them if we could share a short Christmas message.  In a space of 2 hours or so, we found four new families to teach.  Almost everyone we spoke to invited us in and absolutely everyone loved the Light the World video.  That was an unforgettable experience.

On Christmas Eve, in the afternoon, the missionaries in the Bangalore zone got together and had our Christmas devotional.  We watched part of the First Presidency Christmas devotional, had a small testimony meeting, exchanged white elephant gifts, and had homemade chocolate chip cookies and ice cream afterwards, it felt like a little slice of home.

Later that evening, we had our ward Christmas party--it was a crack-up.  The party was supposed to start at 6:00PM but as things go in India, it started at 8:00PM.  Ten minutes or so before the party started, the Relief Society president approached me and my companion and asked us to be in the Nativity play.  She asked yours truly to be Samuel the Lamanite.  Hahaha.  It was awesome, I got to stand on a chair and hold my hands above my head and read the prophecies of Christ's birth in a loud voice.  Everyone got a kick out of that.  My costume consisted of a baptism jumpsuit with the Relief Society president's shawl wrapped around me like a toga.  It was so funny.  I wish I'd taken pictures, I will have to find some and send them.  My companion was the angel Gabriel.

Sacrament meeting on Sunday was great.  Our ward had a special Christmas program where each quorum or auxiliary (i.e. Primary, Relief Society, Young Men, etc.) would sing a song, then the leader would speak.  Unfortunately, the Young Men AND the Elders' quorum had designated a chorister beforehand and, in the middle of the meeting, asked me to come be the chorister.  It was awesome, I loved everything about this weekend.

Important Christmas side notes:

• Our Christmas dinner consisted of green chicken biryani and dhal, it was delicious.
• Our mission had twenty-four baptisms on Christmas Sunday!!!

I hope everyone had an exciting, spiritual Christmas.  My prayer is that we will all Light the World in 365 ways over 365 days not only in this coming year but every year that follows.

Keep the faith,

Elder Tuscano  

wHO, wHO, wHO is that in the Santa suit and other holiday treats!

 The look that this kid is giving me is exactly how I felt to be Santa Claus

 Eggnog

 sharing the Light the World message with everyone!

 Sister Bhargavi's baptism!

 Elder Poleboina and I with Brother Davidson at lunch!

young kids playing cricket.  We shared the Light the World message with them after the match!

 service project with elders' quorum

"Merry merry Christmas, happy happy Christmas!" everyone!  That is the chant you will hear as the members here go caroling, it's pretty funny.  And cool.  Fun traditions.

A lot of stuff happened this week and it went by pretty quickly.  There are a few highlights I will address just briefly so that this won't turn into a novel haha.

On Friday night, Elder Poleboina and I went on splits in an effort to share the Light the World message with as many people as we can.  I went with a young man who is preparing to go to the India New Delhi mission later this month, his name is Karthik.  We had a wonderful evening planned, but unfortunately, everything we had planned for fell through.  Even our back up for our back up for our back up plans.  We didn't know what to do.  By chance, we ran into some members who were doing a service project at a sister's home nearby.  We followed them and when we arrived there were quite a few people doing quite a few things and we thought, "Oh there's no way we'll be able to share the message with all of these people."  But we asked the leader of the project if we could share a quick message with everyone and within two minutes or so we had everyone gathered together in one home and shared the Light the World video and message and they loved it!  It also just so happened that a bunch of small children came to hear the message.  Afterwards, we asked one of the cute kids, Wilson, where his home was and he said, "Come!  I'll show you!"  Then he led us right to his home and his family with whom we then shared the same message and they loved it!  They invited us to come back and teach them again this week.  I will send pictures from the experience.

Bhargavi's baptism was yesterday and that was seriously awesome.  She loves Jesus so much and is just ecstatic about following Him.  I will send photos.

The other highlights may not be as exciting but they are still fun.  For example, on Saturday, we went to lunch at the Marriott with Brother Davidson, a good family friend here in India.  He is an amazing person and also a pioneer here in India!  It was so cool to chat with him about his experience of seeing how the Church has grown since he joined.

Also, this is interesting, in the middle of our elders' quorum class yesterday, the Young Women's president called me out and asked me to be Santa Claus for a gift giving activity they were doing as a last part of their class, so that was pretty funny.  I will send a funny picture.

Lastly, I made eggnog this week!  Miraculously, we found all the necessary ingredients to make eggnog so it's been nice to have a little piece of home.  Unfortunately we couldn't find nutmeg, but we did, however, find nutmeg in it's true nut form; so we had to grind it into our own powder haha, that was cool.  I will send pictures.  Lot of pictures from this week.

But I hope everyone has a very merry Christmas and finds time to reflect on the true reason for this wonderful season.  Christ truly is the Light of the World, how blessed we are to know that.  I know that He lives and I can't express how privileged I feel to bear witness of His divine reality to the beautiful people of India.

Happy Holi-days (get it?  Because Holi is the festival of colors?).  Keep the faith.

Elder Tuscano

sweet (and busy) is the work...

 Us, the wonderful schoolchildrens, and a new missionary that came on exchange with us.

 This is the sister whose home we helped paint!  She is awesome and speaks Tamil only.

Elder Poleboina, myself, and our boy Elder Navaneethan!

He just came back from the MTC, we went to pick him up at the airport!

 

Vannakam, everybody, what is up?

This week flew by, there was a lot going on this week: missionaries departing, new missionaries arriving, ward festivities, etc.  But this week was a good one.

The highlight of this week happened on Thursday we went to a recent convert's home, Sister Babitha.  Sister Babitha teaches a nightly homework-help class for children ages four to fourteen or so; there are about twenty or so children in her class.  So on Thursday evening we went to her class and showed all the kids the Light the World video and they LOVED it.  They asked us to show it again so we did haha.  But the discussion afterward was probably one of the coolest experiences on my mission so far.  We asked them simple questions like, "Who has the light within them?  Who wants to have more light?  Who likes serving their friends and family?  Who wants to be like Jesus?" and they would all respond in unison with hands raised high and loud voices, "MEEEEEE!"  It was incredible.  I guess what made it so incredible for me was that a room full of children from diverse religious backgrounds--Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians--all made a commitment to be like the Savior and serve others as He did.  Many of them didn't know much about Jesus before, but as they watched scenes from His life they saw the light in Him, they recognized the light within themselves and wanted to be like Him.  That's how powerful and loving the Savior is.  I can't express how blessed I feel to be in His service.  I took some pictures of us with these incredible schoolchildren so I will send them your way.

Also, this past week, one of the Light the World days was "Jesus Visited the Lonely and So Can You." So, our elders quorum did just that by visiting with and re-painting the home of an elderly widowed sister who hadn't been to church in some time.  She just has a small home but was IMMENSELY grateful for the service and even came to church on Sunday.  I got a picture with her as well, so that's comin' your way!

Here are a couple of classic, one-liners from our favorite north Indian, Sunil:

• Once a week, we play badminton or volleyball with Sunil because he loves sports.  After we finished our match this past week, E. Poleboina was, naturally, sweating profusely.  Sunil came up to him and said, "You look so sweet."  We later came to know that what he meant to say was, "You're so sweaty!"
• Sunil was helping me teach a new investigator we found this week.  At one point in the lesson, Sunil said, "The Bible says there should be no terrorists."  I had to try as hard as I could to hold in my laughter.

I hope everyone has an awesome week and keep lighting the world!

Keep the faith.

Elder Tuscano

rainy, biryani and light the world

 Madinaguda chapel in Hyderabad.

this is me with a good family friend of ours, Brother Davidson!  His home ward is

Whitefield Road.  He is the one in the beige vest.  On the far left is a recent convert Raj Kumar,

and in the center is Brother Fisher, a counselor in our bishopric.

Hello hello, everyone!  How goes it?

It goes well out here in Bengaluru.  It was pretty overcast and rainy all week which is interesting because monsoon season is supposed to have left with the month of November.  It's been nice though, the rain has made it even cooler than it has been lately.  Bangalore's climate is pretty awesome, it gets down into the 60s (I believe in the evenings).  At night we don't sleep with the fan or the A/C we just open the windows.

This week started with an exchange to Hyderabad.  Hyderabad is also Elder Poleboina's hometown.  When Indian missionaries go on exchange to their "native place," which is rare, they are not allowed to visit with family.  Fortunately, however, the zone leaders serve in Elder Poleboina's home ward and were able to coordinate with his mother so that we could eat the food she'd prepared!  It was delicious.  I also had some of the most incredible beef biryani while there haha.

Speaking of biryani, for the Church's worldwide day of service this past Thursday, our ward got together and made a TON of biryani for a local orphanage here in Bangalore.  It was awesome, seriously such a sweet experience.  The children were adorable and so appreciative.  I'm working on getting pictures from the event, unfortunately my camera is having trouble focusing again so I did not take any photos.

A cool spiritual experience: we are teaching a sister named Bhargavi, she's cool.  This past week we were teaching her about the plan of salvation and God's purpose for her: to live with Him forever with her family.  As soon as we said that she teared up and expressed how wonderful that would be.  That was such a powerful experience, I hope that we all appreciate God's purpose and plan for us as much as Bhargavi does.

Sunil experience of the week: we were about to start teaching him when he stood up, extended his pinky finger from his hand, and said, "I have to sing the song." He then left the room and came back a couple minutes later, we asked where he went, he said he went to the bathroom.  It seems that, for Sunil, singing the song is code word for going to the bathroom.  We thought that was pretty funny haha.

Hope everyone has a great week!  Don't forget to light the world this week!

Elder Tuscano