5th post

Cher tout le monde,
It’s been an interesting week, like all of them before! I have all
these notes taken from Tuesday, and it turns out they’re all jokes
that I was writing down throughout the day.  Elder Morin, who replaced
Elder Lafleur, made these gangster jokes in the MTC that go something
like this: What did the gangster say when he saw everyone saluting the
flag? Disrespect! As in, this is respect. If you didn’t get it.
Anyway, I was coming up with these lame but amusing jokes while we
were in taxis and stuff (obviously I wasn’t thinking of them during
lessons………..), and I started changing it up a little.  What did the
Alaskan gangster say when he came to Africa? Snowhite! Like, there’s
no white…anyway. Go back a few weeks and you’ll read about how your
sense of humor changes on your mission.  We die here coming up with
these jokes.
On Wednesday we had a zone conference with the mission president,
President Jameson, and his wife.  All the elders from Bonabéri came
over to the couple missionaries’ (the Gaeley’s) house to meet us,
where we had this incredible meeting about what’s going on in the
mission, what’s to come, etc.  We talked about Gabon opening up after
the new couple gets here in May, and how only 4 missionaries will be
sent there, for the first time! I think it’d be so awesome to get sent
there, and I think it may happen before the end of my mission, but I
doubt I’ll be the first.  There’s others who’ve been here much longer
who will most likely be sent ahead of me.  I’m way excited for them,
whoever they are! Then President was talking about the mission being
split in the future!  We’ll be split down the Congo River, and will
turn into the Brazaaville and Kinshasa.  Since the North American
missionaries can’t go into the DRC anyway, it will make things much
easier for the presidents of the missions to manage everyone.  Since
President is being released in July, we’ll have a new mission
president, President Cook.  If the mission gets split after he gets
here, I’ll have a third president sometime down the road.  Things are
going to get super interesting here really soon.
President Jameson is an amazing person.  I had such a blast meeting
with him and talking about the work here and everything.  He’s very
inspiring, and it’s clear that he’s a man of God.  I could probably
talk with him all day.  And he’s hilarious, which makes him even more
incredible.  Anyway, we just had a great time together.  I only get to
meet with him two more times before he’s released, which is
unfortunate, but I’ll cherish each meeting.
That same day, I came down with some weird African cold.  I woke up,
went running, and was sneezing the whole time.  We came back, I kept
sneezing, my nose started running like a broken sprinkler (which
happened today actually), and my sinuses started going crazy. It
lasted all day.  I must’ve sneezed…200 times.  Maybe.
I realized that the Douala language sounds very similar to what the
Ewoks sound like in Star Wars.  For example, “have a good evening!” in
Douala is “ebyam yabwam!” and if you say that with an Ewok accent
(whatever that is) it sounds so funny.
I also learned that people here wear cologne not to attract the
opposite sex but to smell good for themselves.  It’s kindof funny.
Some of our investigators have started doing missionary work on their
own, and they ask us for more brochures and Books of Mormon to give
away.  It’s awesome.  They’re so excited about the Gospel, and they’ve
started sharing it with all their neighbors.  The only unfortunate
thing about it is that we just straight don’t have the time to teach
as many people as are interested.  Especially now. We have a chunk of
baptisms coming up, and we  really need to focus on those who are
preparing themselves for that commitment.
On Friday we went to teach an anglophone and his friend who are living
at a member’s house.  His wife fed us fufu, but this time it was made
with corn, so it was much more solid.  And they gave us a fork, which
made it much easier to eat.  It was called “fufu jammajamma,” and it
came with some sort of vegetable side.  But it was way good! The
member is a doctor with his own practice, and on the way back down to
catch a taxi home he asked us to give blessings to some of his
patients.  We went and met this older woman and her daughter, who were
both sick with something that I’ve never seen before.  The daughter’s
mouth was either really dry or white from the sickness, and the
maman’s right side of her body had started becoming paralyzed.  At
their request, we gave them a blessing, and when I opened my mouth to
start speaking English, French came out and it didn’t stop.  So I just
went with it and like always the Spirit guided my words without really
any thoughts on my part.  It’s such an incredible experience, giving a
blessing.  After the maman we were going to leave, but there was a
woman there who was a friend of the daughter, and she asked us on our
way out if we would give her a blessing of comfort.  So Elder Zurcher
gives me this big ol’ smile which apparently meant that I was supposed
to do it.  Again, just an amazing feeling came over me and I just
spoke whatever came through me by the Spirit.  The woman, after we
were done, just kept looking down and started shaking her head and
said, in French, “it’s like there’s something…” and brought her hands
up to her head, and she looked back up and thanked us a ton, and then
put her head back down and put her hands over her eyes as we were
walking out.  I wanted to stay and talk to her about what she was
feeling, but we really had to go.  I’m sure she’ll have her
opportunity to hear the Gospel soon, at least, I hope so!
Cameroonians always say “nous sommes (or ‘on est’) ensemble,” which
means, “we are together,” which I never heard in France, but I love
saying it, and love hearing it.
Oh man.  When I was sick, one of our investigators, Soeur Marlyse (the
one who got me the sanja), gave me a bottle with real honey in it.  It
was interesting tasting to say the least, but I mixed it with hot
water and it made my throat feel better.  But our member friend
Jeaques came over to help us teach one day, and he opened it to smell
it, and apparently didn’t close it all the way, because when we came
back from teaching there was about 50,000 ants marching from my desk,
down the leg, across the floor, and across the whole apartment to this
hole in the wall where they must live.  It was incredible.  I took a
video of them before we ended their crazy spree with permetherin.  The
pile they created after we swept them up was impressive.  It was
probably a good cup of dead, dry ants.  They harmless, but annoying.
Church was awesome this week.  We have an awesome member who is a
return missionary who just threw down on everyone about having phones
in church.  But he was so loving about it, I don’t even know how to
explain.  It was just an awesome talk, I was taking notes.
If there’s anything I’ve learned here, it’s that if you want something
to start at 6:00 here, you tell everyone to be there at 4:30.  It
takes so long for things to get started.  No one is ever on time, and
I’ve never seen anyone come early to anything.  It’s just the culture
here, so please be patient with me when I come back.  It’s very
possible that that rubs off on me…
There’s just so much happening here.  I believe it’s already been a
week, but I will always be amazed at how fast it’s going by.  I can’t
wait to write next week, I miss you all and think and pray about you
all the time.  Please keep in touch!
Boonya bwabwam (have a good day), je vous aime tellement (I love you
all so much) !
Elder Garland