My companion and I are both wiping our noses and sniffling as the beginning of the incredibly hot, rainy season starts here in Pointe-Noire. In exactly one month I will have been here for a year. Crazy. We've both had a cold for the last couple days, but it's getting better. We just push and power through it, and the Baileys have been nice enough to provide us with some glophenicine and benydryl. Who knows if I spelled those right...
Anyway, what an incredible week. We kicked it off last P-Day at the beach! We played some volleyball, went down and set up some wood and started a fire and got out the hotdog roasters and cooked FIFTY, brought them back up to the little restaurant/dock where we sat around munching on Sister Bailey's homemade hotdog buns and banana bread/cake and no-bake cookies and dying of delicious. We got to run around on the beach for a while, which is always a blast. Elder Sperry and I got a nice picture of us jumping off a small sand cliff holding hands, which we are mighty proud of. What no one was proud of was the animosity we felt towards this pack of kids that followed us around on the beach and hung around our fire while we were cooking hotdogs. Everyone was feeling like our privacy was being invaded. Everyone except Sister Bailey, who just wanted to give all of them hugs and give them a half a hotdog. It wasn't until afterwards, when we were home reflecting on the day that we started feeling really bad. So we repented in sackcloth and ashes and told Sister Bailey she was right and we'd work on being less annoyed by the kids who aren't actually trying to annoy us. It was a great day for learning.
Otherwise, we had a pretty busy Tuesday. We learned that our recent convert Mirian (a.k.a. God-Thanks) was moving away to Sibiti, and that our golden investigator Wisdom (Sagesse) was moving back home out of our sector for the school year. That was sad, but we picked up some new investigators at the same time, which was awesome. God always has someone for us to teach, no matter who is coming or going in the sector. It gives me hope that the sector will hold its own even if it gets white washed. The members bring so many people to church anyway, missionaries could work on that alone, not including recent converts and less-actives.
We took the world's longest detour to get one of the places we were going to on Tuesday, and I realized that I don't think I've ever talked about that. The taxi drivers are so funny. They will go off road, deep into the quartier, take turns and corners and come up about 100 feet later on the same busy road in hopes of moving up a few cars. I literally watched as the car in front of us drove passed as we were waiting to get back in line on the same road we left 30 minutes earlier. No one seems to realize how big of a waste of time and gas it is to get out of line - only to get back in line in the same spot, if not further back.
Anyway, we had another experience helping an ancient maman walking through the quartier carrying a huge bag of stuff on her back, tied up to her forehead. I stopped and pulled the bag off her back and was surprised at how heavy it really was. She starts laughing through the 4 or 5 teeth she had left and is calling us "ba banna ya munu" (my children) and clapping her hands, praising Nzambi and Yeezu (God and Jesus). She was the cutest little dinosaur of a woman you've never met. We had a great chat in Munukutuba as we walked her to her parcelle, and as we approached, her grandkids (or great grandkids, I don't know) were outside and went running back in yelling about the mundele helping mémé, it was so funny.
On Wednesday we decided that on Sunday we were going to fast for Bintu, so she could get out of this house she's living in and get baptized. We also met a bunch of new people to teach and that's always great. In one of the quartiers we had to walk into the sticks, and you could tell that the people there probably hadn't ever seen a white person in real life, judging by the looks on their faces. We walked into the parcelle of a new friend of ours and had a similar reaction as to when we were helping that old maman. Kids screaming, older kids laughing, adultes cheering; it was great. That's my every day though, so forgive my lack of enthousiasme haha.
In another parcelle down the road we were teaching the nephew of a member who was baptized in France forever ago, and his grandma with no teeth came to pray with us, and as we were leaving gave us a big bag of beignets and peanuts. So nice, and so good. The old people love us haha.
We had a going away party/devotional for Elder Masse on Thursday evening. We gathered around to eat lasagne and cheese cake topped with raspberries, and then we shared our testimonies. It was really special, and I didn't even cry. I think it's because I'll actually see Masse in the next couple months (at least on Skype), which is nutso. He shared a sincere testimony about being truly converted to the Gospel, which I am a witness after having worked with him a year into his mission and again at the end of his mission. He left a great legacy in the mission, and he'll be missed dearly!
The party didn't end there. On Friday, after having a rare James Nehemiah sighting on Pemba whilst walking towards the church (he pulled over the taxi he was in so he could get out and say hi - it had been literally 6 months since I'd seen him), we came back and were about to start weekly planning when we were invited to share a parting dinner with Elder Massé and the Baileys at the restaurant in front of the airport. It was my...4th or 5th time there haha, it's super delicious. I got chawarmas because hey, I don't know if I'll ever head back up to Cameroun. We sent off a sad Massé with all his bags packed and his tie perfectly tied, shirt perfectly ironed, and hair perfectly coiffed. He looked like a missionary, true to the blue! I was proud to have been with him one last time.
We had some sad news on Saturday morning - the Kizimbou family's papa passed away after struggling through medication and eventually giving it up. Alain bore his testimony on Sunday and said he was there when he died, but that it was in his sleep and it was peaceful, which was a happy ending. We went by the house anyway to give them our condolences, and we ended up grabbing a torn up couch seat to help them scrub down the outside paint job from the last several years' worth of dust and dirt. It was a small geste, but they really appreciated it and brought us out a table with raw peanuts and nkaba, which is basically casava roots. Delicious. And I got all the peanuts because my companion is allergic :)
We didn't have a baptism ourselves this weekend, but the Mpaka elders did, so we supported them in their success and got to wish a sweet, young woman congratulations on her decision. Afterwards, I taught English class and then we headed back home. Drained from having woken up sick and spent the whole day sniffling, we weren't very motivated to make anything fancy for dinner, but we ended up going out anyway to get bread so we could make egg salad sandwiches, which ended up very tasty, if I do say so myself.
A million people came to church on fast Sunday, despite the pitter patter of rain. So it begins...in the next month we will have torrential downpours. I can't wait. Loic, our friend in the sticks, brought his family to church, and some more people came for the first time. 22 in all were there as non-members. It was nearly a quarter of the entire congregation, if not more. I can't get enough of it. I just wish the same people would come back week after week. We had some great testimonies, and then we had to go back so I could start doing personal interviews with the elders. Elder Sperry gave me this great idea during one of our companionship inventories, and I decided that I could try to pull it off without it being super awkward, especially since this weekend we'll be having zone conference, and I wanted to have something to teach that was applicable to our zone, instead of just going over the things that we'll be learning during mission counsel on Thursday. It actually went really well! I finished them this morning, but there seemed to be a theme of things that all the elders think we can work on, so that will be great. I'm really excited to be able to do something more as a zone leader than just sending in numbers to the assistants haha.
Anyway, we tried watching the Priesthood Session of General Conference with the elders at the Baileys, after enjoying a most divine corn chowder and Texas sheet cake, but it was glitchy and we only got through Elder Cook's talk and then Elder Christensen, before we cut it. They were both super good though. I'm excited to get the Liahona and pour through them for real.
I've been LOVING Spencer W. Kimball's Miracle of Forgiveness. Only a prophet could bring out so much from one word. I would sincerely suggest that you all read it. It makes you feel worthless at first, but then a million bucks by the end. And I'm not even at the end haha. Seriously though, the Atonement is real!!! Try it out. Ask for forgiveness - but don't just do it haphazardly. Put some thought into it. Abandon your sins. Turn your life around!!! There were so many quotes that I've written down already. but one of my favorites has been "following the path of least resistance makes both rivers and men crooked." Struggle goes with strength!!!! By our trials we can overcome and BEcome strong!!!
I love you. Have a great week :)Elder Garland
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