Oh, and they sell on the side of the street so food is very accessible and it's super delicious. I had my first FM (free meal) from an investigator on Friday night and it was delicious! They call it "fry stew" its deep-fried fish with a groundnut (unsugared peanut butter) sauce and Pepe, which is a pepper that is the size of an almond but its as spicy as 5 jalapenos all mixed together and put over..... guess what they put it on... RICE. everything here goes on rice. it was so delicious!
So i also can't send pictures yet because the computers here have tons of viruses so it will ruin my camera. So i'll have to try and send them from the church computer next Monday. sorry.
We ride taxi all the time and we are always walking uphill. its a three-mile walk up the mountain to the very back of our area and we have 35 investigators so yes there are people up there that we teach! i'm definitely going to be in shape when i get home! Of our 35 investigators, 21 of them have baptismal dates!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
we had one Saturday but it got canceled. His name is Peter Kamara and he is such a friendly happy guy! He was so stoked for his baptism and the night before it he calls us and tells us that he told his Aunt about his baptism the next day and she said that if he goes through with it that she'll kick him out of her house which is where he lives. So he canceled. She's a pastor at a 'Born Again' church........... Anyways we ran into him last night on our way home and he is house hunting so that he will not have to listen to her opinion anymore so that he can make his own decisions! AWESOME! So we said "Peter we'd like to talk with your aunt and see if we can commit her to baptism. He laughed but agreed.
So now i should probably tell you about my companion! His name is Elder Sumrak from the good ol USA!!!!! He is super awesome and super spiritual and super funny! And he's from Chesapeake Virginia! So, Jess, you'll probably have to find his family for him and tell him they say hi. But he is super awesome. He's been out 16 months! Also one of the AP's here is Elder Wooten. We went to Junior High school together! In the MTC i ran into Elder Quinlinn who is from the 27th ward in the Clinton Utah stake! I'm running into tons of people that i know from a long time ago!
One last story! So we went to teach this recent convert Ishmael on Saturday afternoon and when we get there he's holding his book of Mormon and another book called "a struggle for peace". we start reading it and we see that it was written by a 6th generation Mormon couple and its a whole book of different compilations of apostasy material that tries to prove all of the church's doctrines wrong. Ishmael being the amazing guy he is told us that when his uncle gave it to him to read and whenever he would read it he felt sick and unhappy so he would just start reading his book of Mormon AWESOME! there are some super-spiritual people up here it's awesome! So we asked him if we could take the book and he said yes so we took it and after we closed for the day we went outside and lit it up!! had a nice bonfire in the middle of the street! It was a blast and i have pictures of it that i will try and send!
So now i must tell you about the kids here... they are the cutest but can be super annoying! When we get up into our area you can tell because you start hearing all of these little kids yelling "white man white man white man!" They do love to touch you which can be really annoying! They also yell 'Ompatu!' which is Krio for white man! The kids are super adorable tho!
so for my last thing i'll tell you about the rain miracle on my first day. So Elder Sumrak and i go up to the very top of our area to teach a man named Abubuhkar and his family and when we get there it's raining and we are soaking wet from the rain and it's like a three-mile hike so we're soaked with sweat too! Near the end of the lesson, the rain picks up to hurricane status. Strong winds and the rain is huge and the front porch which is what we're sitting under is steel so the rain is pounding it and making a super loud noise so we can't even hear anyone talking so Elder Sumrak yells to Abubuhkar 'alright let's have a closing prayer so we can go! And during the prayer maybe i'll ask for the rain to stop!" so he starts to pray. Right in the middle of the prayer the rain and wind INSTANTLY(<--EXTREME EMPHASIS) stops. He hadn't even asked for it!!! We both look up at each other through squinted eyes and then he quickly closes the prayer and then we walk back to the apartment. Right when we reach the front steps of the apartment the rain and wind starts again INSTANTLY! Heavenly Father definitely watches over his missionaries. I cannot believe how much one week has made my spiritual side grow. I love this place more and more every day! It's disgustingly beautiful. more on the disgusting side for sure. There are wild dogs running everywhere chasing lizards and there are chickens everywhere too and the pigs hang out in the rivers and streams which are used as a garbage dump here. They dump a whole bunch of garbage in the river and burn it so that it'll float downstream. So the smell is pretty rank sometimes. But so far I've been bitten by 6 mosquitoes a gigantic spider... and i'm not even kidding, the fang marks are at least a 1/4th of an inch apart. which is huge! And when i went into clean my ears the other night before i went to bed... there was a 4-foot long snake just chillin' next to the toilet... i almost stepped on it and it scared the crap out of me.. funnier thing is that Elder Sumrak had just got done sitting on the toilet right next to it. I'll put more details in the letter i'll send to you guys. Which don't plan on a ton of them because i am absolutely super, super busy!
I Love you all so much! please write handwritten and use dear elder please!!
With love from Africa,
'Ompatu' Elda Rogaz
P.S. I use my lantern all the time! its awesome! its what saved me from walking into that snake which is evil looking.. just wait till you see the picture. electricity... it goes out quite often so you have to fall asleep while your fan is working and then you pray you don't wake up when you get too hot. and yes i am getting used to it fast. but when we're walking i sweat 100% of the time. also showers............. involve a bucket, a cap full of 'this stuff kills everything so don't get it in your eyes', cold water, and a cup
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| The King Harmon living quarters |
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| Elder Eshun |
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| Strawberry, banana pancakes. We make them for dinner every Sunday. |
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