February 3

Soooo I forgot my planner again DANGIT. There's a ton of stuff that
happened this week and my poor little memory slot is always
overflowing, so all the things that happened in the beginning of the
week basically don't exist in my head anymore.  It makes reading my
journal really exciting though, haha.

ANYway, I'll do my best.

Wow, I really don't remember anything haha.  I take so many notes on
my planner which requires me to remember nothing.  I know that on
Tuesday we had a really full day.

Ok little things I remembered.

One time, the day after it rained a ton, we were walking down the
flooded street and these guys had made a bridge of bricks, which we
didn't have money to give them to cross.  One guy waved us over
anyway, but his friend apparently didn't get the message, because when
he saw we weren't gonna pay he jumped on the bricks in front of us and
stood there, shaking his butt and acting like a child.  Well someone
eventually came from the other side and wanted to cross, so the guy
had to come back to us anyway, so I'm pretty sure he felt like an
idiot.

We had the longest day ever on Thursday because we got ratéd a ton,
and everyone else we wanted to see wasn't there.  On our way to see
one of the people who ended up not being there this 16 or 17 year old
kid started walking next to us and asked about Joseph Smith.  We were
really excited and were talking about it as we were walking, but when
he asked what the fruits of Joseph Smith were we thought it would be a
great idea to stop and give him the Book of Mormon.  Unfortunately, we
stopped in the middle of a giant courtyard of a high school.  Well the
kid started arguing with us about prophets and whatnot, and a little
crowd started gathering.  The little crowd turned into well over a
hundred students, so I profited by telling everyone in Munikituba that
no, we weren't Jehovah's Witnesses, and no, we weren't Chinese, which
made them all die laughing.  Anyway, a supervisor came over and asked
us to keep moving along because if we didn't the whole school would be
there before long, so we kindly took our leave.  It was awesome.  I
wish I could've just preached to everyone while they were there...the
Dan Jones soap box approach could be SO effective here!!!

With all the time we had I decided to go contacting for the very first
time in my mission, if you can believe it.  There's this really nice
house that I've always wanted to contact, but we've never had time
until last Thursday, so we took advantage of it and knocked on their
door!  The mom who came out was really nice, and we even set a return
appointment for next week.  We're really excited.  Later that day we
had another experience where we were walking passed this other nice
house and I stopped, looked at Elder Hatch, he nodded, and we walked
back and contacted them too.  Turns out that the lady we ended up
talking to works for the branch president! It was so cool!  We're
gonna try to see her next week too.

Anyway we walked probably 20 miles that day and it was really hot, but
the good news is that VanAusdal made us barbecue chicken pineapple so
it was all ok in the end.

Friday was really short because we went to a marriage in the boonies
for this really old couple that the other elders have been teaching.
It was adorable.  Well, kindof.  He's 15 years older than she is, but
you'd never guess because once an African mama or papa hits 50 they
all look the same haha.  It went super smooth though.  I loved it.

The next day that couple and one of their kids was baptized (one is
already baptized, and there's two more who are going to be baptized
within a month), so it was awesome.  After the baptism the Baileys
asked us to help them with passport pictures but ended up feeding us
spaghetti instead.  They are so awesome, I love them to bits already.
Going to their house is like a little slice of America.  They don't
speak French but they try their darndest with the guards that watch
over their house.  It's adorable.

Sundays are getting really stressful because there's all these new
people coming and they ALL want to talk to you after church and so do
ALL the members and ALL the kids.  We gave two blessings, so that was
really great, as it always is.

THIS WORK IS SO AWESOME!  I can't even begin to describe all the crazy
things that happen and all the incredible stories we hear.  Some day
I'll have time to just sit down and talk about all the bad stuff too,
because Lord knows I have to censor these emails.  The great news is
that the good ALWAYS outweighs the bad!  The just and righteous will
ALWAYS win because God will ALWAYS be behind them and God ALWAYS
wins!!!

I love you all and I'm sorry for this short, lame letter, but I hope
you will read it anyway.  Maybe I'll include some more details next
week.  Time is passing so fast.  Yikes.  In two days I will officially
have been in Africa for one year.  I'll probably have to eat some ice
cream to celebrate.

Byooooooooo!!!!!!!

Elder Garland