Hey Everyone!
Hope everything went well this week and hoped that conference was good! I've heard some good things so I'm downloading some of the talks now so I can listen to them later.
My first week in Batsonaa has been really good! The first couple of days were really hot and I was sweating like crazy. I've been used to A/C so much that I haven't had to worry about the heat to much. It kind of sucks because our room has no airflow so it's always hot and the fans that my companion and I have both suck really bad, you can't feel anything. I've had to wash my sheets a couple of times since I sweat at night pretty bad, but thats just something I'll have to live with. Some sad news is that my camera is dead now. It won't work at all and I'm deeming it useless. I've asked some senior couples to keep their eye out for me so hopefully soon I can get one.
This week was really nice to just go out and teach people without having to worry about problems throughout the mission. Although I did receive a lot of calls throughout the week from my replacement Elder Falk on how to do some things and Also from other missionaries calling to make sure of some things. We were able to have about 30 lessons this week which is pretty good and we also had 8 member present lessons which is really good as well. We're planning on baptizing 2 people. We've taught them a couple of times and they're both really cool. It's a married couple and their names are Emmanuel and Jennifer. We are trying to get some more serious people to teach but a lot of them seem to just like our company and don't have much interest in coming to church. Elder Eli relates really well with the people and I can see him learning and applying the scriptures more and more each lesson. As of now I don't really feel like the senior companion because he has such a desire to lead, I give him council at times, but he's been leading out most of the lesson's and is trying to get me to know the area as soon as possible. The ward was really cool and Saturday we went to a woman's house that is very wealthy. It was her birthday and I guess she's the wife of an old mission president in Nigeria. Walking to her house I really felt like I was in America. It was a gated community and there were no open gutters and all the houses had yards and lawns, it was quite a sight!
Elder Eli is still doing good! To give more information on him, He is an awesome cook. He doesn't really know how to make american or european food very well but the African food he makes is freaking amazing. We've kind of made it a tradition in our apartment for all of us to pitch in to buy food and then have Eli cook it all for us. It's going pretty good so far! He's also phenomenal at Soccer. He was playing for a local team back home but had to stop because of a shoulder injury. We played today in Klagon with some other elders and he was dominating everyone. I'm not bad compared to most of the Americans but I suck compared to the Africans.
To answer some questions: Mondays will continue to be P-Day for me, I'm able to talk to all immediate family members for mothers day so I'll call all of you! I'm not sure if I'll be able to skype yet but I wouldn't count on it. The people I teach aren't very educated. I'm used to it so I don't see them as uneducated as much but for you guys to picture it better then yes they are very uneducated. We don't really teach anyone wealthy. It happens every once in a while but it's rare. I haven't been sick yet either.
We haven't had light off this week! [They haven't lost electricity] This is normal though ever since Christmas because of the election this year. The president is hoping to get reelected and he wants the people happy so lights off has become rare ever since christmas time.
Thats all for this week!
Love you guys!
Elder Smith
Hope everything went well this week and hoped that conference was good! I've heard some good things so I'm downloading some of the talks now so I can listen to them later.
My first week in Batsonaa has been really good! The first couple of days were really hot and I was sweating like crazy. I've been used to A/C so much that I haven't had to worry about the heat to much. It kind of sucks because our room has no airflow so it's always hot and the fans that my companion and I have both suck really bad, you can't feel anything. I've had to wash my sheets a couple of times since I sweat at night pretty bad, but thats just something I'll have to live with. Some sad news is that my camera is dead now. It won't work at all and I'm deeming it useless. I've asked some senior couples to keep their eye out for me so hopefully soon I can get one.
This week was really nice to just go out and teach people without having to worry about problems throughout the mission. Although I did receive a lot of calls throughout the week from my replacement Elder Falk on how to do some things and Also from other missionaries calling to make sure of some things. We were able to have about 30 lessons this week which is pretty good and we also had 8 member present lessons which is really good as well. We're planning on baptizing 2 people. We've taught them a couple of times and they're both really cool. It's a married couple and their names are Emmanuel and Jennifer. We are trying to get some more serious people to teach but a lot of them seem to just like our company and don't have much interest in coming to church. Elder Eli relates really well with the people and I can see him learning and applying the scriptures more and more each lesson. As of now I don't really feel like the senior companion because he has such a desire to lead, I give him council at times, but he's been leading out most of the lesson's and is trying to get me to know the area as soon as possible. The ward was really cool and Saturday we went to a woman's house that is very wealthy. It was her birthday and I guess she's the wife of an old mission president in Nigeria. Walking to her house I really felt like I was in America. It was a gated community and there were no open gutters and all the houses had yards and lawns, it was quite a sight!
Elder Eli is still doing good! To give more information on him, He is an awesome cook. He doesn't really know how to make american or european food very well but the African food he makes is freaking amazing. We've kind of made it a tradition in our apartment for all of us to pitch in to buy food and then have Eli cook it all for us. It's going pretty good so far! He's also phenomenal at Soccer. He was playing for a local team back home but had to stop because of a shoulder injury. We played today in Klagon with some other elders and he was dominating everyone. I'm not bad compared to most of the Americans but I suck compared to the Africans.
To answer some questions: Mondays will continue to be P-Day for me, I'm able to talk to all immediate family members for mothers day so I'll call all of you! I'm not sure if I'll be able to skype yet but I wouldn't count on it. The people I teach aren't very educated. I'm used to it so I don't see them as uneducated as much but for you guys to picture it better then yes they are very uneducated. We don't really teach anyone wealthy. It happens every once in a while but it's rare. I haven't been sick yet either.
We haven't had light off this week! [They haven't lost electricity] This is normal though ever since Christmas because of the election this year. The president is hoping to get reelected and he wants the people happy so lights off has become rare ever since christmas time.
Thats all for this week!
Love you guys!
Elder Smith