Monday, August 11, 2014

He bit me!

This was an awesome week! We had a lot of cool experiences and a lot of cool people that we are working with. We met an awesome family that is from Kinshasa. He spoke Kikongo so it was fun to speak Kikongo with him for a little bit. But their entire family is really interested in the church. They were a referral from someone that just got baptized on Saturday. They are all faithful people but hadn’t been able to decide on a church yet. So we basically said “We can help you with that!” haha Anyway we also got another referral for a girl named Flore. Her husband just died in December. But she met the missionaries for the first time three years ago but wasn’t really stable where she was living so it didn’t ever really progress. But her mom and brother are both members. So we went and saw her and she has already read the entire Book of Mormon, has a strong testimony of the Restoration, has studied all the missionary brochures, reads every Liahona, and wants to be baptized. I was at a loss of words. That was pretty incredible.
Anyway, we also had a lesson with Nana who has been progressing really well. He owns a bar but had agreed to live the Word of Wisdom and came to the decision that he needed to change his work. However, this week we taught the Law of Chastity. He was asking a lot of questions about polygamy and their situation before God. Then he said, “Let me tell you how I became a polygamist…” Yep. It turns out he was married legally to his first wife, then she just left him. So he went and remarried culturally. Then his first wife came back. So he just kept both of them. So that makes it difficult if he wants to be baptized. I guess we’ll see how that goes.
Sunday we had an awesome day at church. It has been incredible to see the progression of our sector. Our first week we had 5 investigators at church. This Sunday, we had 18 investigators at church! It was so cool! The second counselor in the district presidency came up to us afterwards and said congratulations because their branch had never been like that before. Our entire zone is exploding. It has really taught me a lot about obedience. As a zone (5 companionships) we had 60 investigators at church and 43 baptismal dates are set. That is incredible. Anyway, the work here is going incredibly. We have been working hard and we have done a lot of walking, but the work is worth it. The blessings are pouring out on our zone.
Also, funny story. After church, we were talking to members and investigators when I felt a sharp pain from behind. I looked behind me, and it was a child biting me! That was kind of weird. He’s a crazy kid and has way too much energy. And our entire zone is going to their family’s house for FHE tonight because he is in the district presidency. So I’ll let you know next week how that goes haha.
As far as ebola goes, everything will be fine. This last week our mission president told us all to be aware of it. We are forbidden to eat pork, goat, anything weird, and especially NOT MONKEY as Sister Monga said haha. We might be getting a large group of missionaries from those missions so that they can flee the virus. We’ll see how that goes. And Cameroon is being very cautious about letting people in. So we’ll be ok. Here, there are a lot of people that always claim to be sick. So we never know. I have had a nagging cough for the last couple weeks but it’s going away. I think that was because of the change in climate. It’s cold here!

Shoes are very important to missionaries haha. Even my hiking boots (as I call them) are getting pretty worn. I will be taking them in to get sewed up pretty soon. But many missionaries really like Keen’s sandals. They are lightweight, comfortable, and most of all, expensive. But 1 pair could probably last your entire mission. I would still take one pair of regular shoes to wear to church and other meetings, but for proselyting, sandals would be good. Here the problem is mud and dust. I don’t know how it is there, but it will probably be fine. One of the elders told me that he has seen contact solution here, but they must have been out last time. I will continue to look. I am being very judicious with how much I use…  Yaoundé is a much richer city. I will try to get some good pictures of the city this week when we are at church, but if not you should look up pictures of the city. There are a lot of big buildings. Buildings that are bigger than back home! It’s crazy! We do a lot of walking. Depending on the day, we can take quite a few taxis too. But we mostly just walk a lot because taxis only follow the main road.
Public toilet situation huh? Well… This will be fun. So there isn’t really such thing as public toilets. At church they have normal toilets. And at our apartment. But if you have to use the bathroom in public, that gets interesting. The public at large just go on the side of the road, but as missionaries that isn’t really kosher. So you have to ask people to use their bathroom. The bathroom is usually just a hole in the ground. Usually it is really gross. So we usually try not to do that. Luckily, we have regulated our bodies to the situation so we don’t have to use the bathroom in public very often.

Anyway, the work is going really well here. There is so much to do! We have so many people to see I don’t even know if we can see everyone. And they are all incredible people.  I love this branch. And I love our investigators. 

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