Well good morning! Hope all is well in Texas again and that last week was as sweet as ever. We just got done playing some football (just with our own zone on a short pitch, 7 on 7). I tried my hand at keeper today, it was pretty fun and I did ok, but midfield is where I belong :) Keeper is just too stressful! I didn't give up any goals though, so it was all good. Today is transfer news day, so there might be a change coming. There are three guys from our zone going home this week. Elder Hill (Kaysville, UT) who was the AP< id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">Izekor (Benin City, Nigeria). So there will probably be a lot of changes to our zone, we'll see I guess.
So the computer I am on is being crazy, so hopefully I actually get this email sent today, and get to read some of yours! But I guess I just need to count my blessings that I've actually got a computer huh?? Haha. So the week in Moree was sweet again as usual. I don't know if I talked about Elmina Castle in last week's email, but that's what we did last P-Day. Elmina is about 10 minutes west of Cape Coast, and that's where the other castle is. We went there for a zone activity and it was pretty fun. The main reason I wanted to go was to buy some Twi books. That's literally the only place in Cape Coast to buy them! So I bought three books that look like they will be good in helping me to learn it better. In one of out lessons this week I actually noticed myself being able to hear stuff without having to try to listen too hard. It's coming kakrakakra!!!!!!!!! I'll just keep working hard.
Tuesday was good, we had a combined district meeting in Cape Coast so that we could all see the guys going home one more time. It was a good meeting. I was really tight with Elder Hill, so it was weird seeing him for the last time. He was my zone leader for a transfer and then was the AP for three, so I saw a lot of him. After that we had a good day of proselyting. Jacob has started doing some family history stuff, and he's really excited about the temple. He filled out a full 4-generation pedigree chart and a few family group records, pretty serious stuff for Africa. The records are difficult here. Like for his Grandpa, the record was "Kweku, born about 100 years ago". It's good he is working on it! Oh yeah, that reminds me, here's a list of Ghanaian names if you wanted to know:
Day you were born.........Name (Male/Female)
Monday..................(Kojo/can't remember the girls)
Tuesday................(Kobina/Aba) they usually shorten Kobina to Kobe (as in Bryant)
Wednesday.........(Kweku/Ekua)
Thursday......(Yaw/Yaa)
Friday..............(Kofi/Efua)
Saturday.................(Kwamena/Ama) usually shorten Kwamena to Kwame (as in the worst #1 pick ever)
Sunday...........(Kwesi/Esi)
Tuesday night was epic. Elder Saunders told us that when he was on his mission, he would jump rope 1000 times without messing up every night, and when he got home, he could dunk. So Elder Mortensen and I have been jump roping every night to do that, but we've never been able to get to a thousand without messing up. We were starting to think it wasn't possible. But then Elder Mortensen got 1,120! So then I had to beat it, and I got 1,501! It was so sweet, I felt pretty good haha. But then, two nights later, Elder Mortensen broke 2,000! He got 2,166! I went to break it again, got to 2,000 and messed up at 2,024 :( Very sad. So Elder Mortensen is the Yamoransa jump rope king...at least for now. I'm gonna break it tonight!
Wednesday was a solid day again, we had our baptism class at night, not as many people came this time, but it was still a good class. We taught about Faith and Repentance and then we'll teach about Baptism and the Holy Ghost this week. The people that come seem to really like the class, they are always really engaged in the lesson, now we've just go to get 50 people coming a week so we can create a stake in Moree! :) We also taught this guy named Jephther- we had a good lesson- now he's excited about learning. It'll be cool to see where it goes with him. We also taught his mom after, and Jephther told us that he helped her to her reading too. Pretty cool!
Friday was sweet because Andrew went to the temple! We found out Tuesday that the Bakano branch in Cape Coast was going Friday, so we asked Andrew if he wanted to go with them and he said "Heck yeah!" (well not exactly, but basically :) They left early Friday morning and he called us at like 10 saying "guess where I am???" He was so excited. It was awesome to see him getting ready to go. He had the names of all his grandparents to do there, so he was pretty stoked about that. We saw him Sunday and you could just tell had had loved it so much. I let him take my camera and he took some cool pictures. Luckily, my camera didn't get lost in Accra haha. I wish we could have gone with him, that would've been SO tight!!!!!!!
We saw Elder Ahadgi again at the chapel site on Saturday. The chapel is coming along well, they're about to start building the roof. We talked to Elder Ahadgi for awhile, we talked a lot about Sunyani and what he thinks about the work there. He basically said that what is going on in Sunyani right now is going to be the model for the rest of West Africa. I don't know if I explained it very well, but as of two months ago, Sunyani had zero branches and zero members, but it is a city of over 1 million. The mission bought 4 missionary apartments across the city, all with a room big enough to have a small sacrament meeting. The missionaries go and contact and invite people to church at the apartment on Sunday. They are already getting 100 people at Church in Sunyani now. Elder Ahadgi said that at the rate its going there, there should be TWO stakes in Sunyani in 5 years. There's not even a branch right now. It'll be interesting to see.
We went to Yamoransa's baptism Saturday night, it was good. They haven't had a baptism in Yamorans in a while, but Elder Mortensen and Elder Katoa have been working really hard and they're about to baptize a lot of people there! We proselyted with Bismark again on Saturday, that guy is such a stud!!! I can't believe he speaks Twi, Fante, English (fluently) and French (fluently) and he's only like 21. He needs to be a missionary now! Church was sweet on Sunday. Dennis, our convert from a couple of months ago, got to bless the Sacrament. We had a lot of investigators at church, including a sweet family, the Ano's. They've got four kids and are just really humble people who want the best for their family! Sunday night we chilled out by playing Settlers of Catan...man that game is ridiculous! Elder Mortensen got it from Elder Valentine (he was trained by him) and we played it for the first time. Too much fun! And way too frustrating! Haha.
Well that was it for the week. Next transfer is going to be sweet for Moree. We've got 11 people with baptismal dates right now.
A few random things I jotted down to mention:
-Justin's chocolate hazelnut spread is the bomb!! Thanks Amanda :)
-I FORGOT TO SAY HOW CRAZY IT IS THAT SHE HAD THE BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wowzers....I feel tooooooo old!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
-How bout you guys Grandma and Grandpa?!?!?!?!?! Geez louise that's insane. The pictures are ridiculously awesome. Say hello to little Olivia for me!!!! Give her a "wapume" from Africa :)
Well, nothing else I can think of. Send my love to Denton 2nd Ward on Christmas Sunday. Love you guys!
Yebehyia wae
-Elder Brown
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
December 6, 2010
Mema mo akye! I hope the morning is going well so far in Tejas, the day has been good here so far.
This week was sweet! It was probably the fastest week on the mission so far. Our teaching pool is a little smallish right now, but we did a lot of contacting, which I thought would make the week seem longer, but it actually made it go by faster. We met some sweet people that I'll talk about. First off is that I forgot to talk about the Primary program in last week's email! Two Sundays ago we had the Primary program, and it was so tight! All the little kiddos memorized stuff and sang songs and the like, just like in America. It was pretty sweet. One kid was like the MVP, he memorized half the Book of Mormon it seemed like. He had probably four different parts, each were a solid two minutes long, and he didn't mess up once! And it was all in English. Pretty crazy he could do that!
Our FHE went really well at Bro Pratt's Monday night. About 10 recent converts/investigators came, so that made it really good. Bro Pratt taught the lesson (on living the gospel better in our daily lives) and then Elder Adams and I were in charge of the game. We couldn't think of ANY game to do. Elder Adams then had the idea to do a rock, paper, scissors tournament, so that's what we did! It was so fun, we taught it to them, and they loved it. They were getting so in to it. The winner was Vanicia, Belinda's sister. She beat Eric in the finals to take the championship and the coveted reward, an extra delicious FanYogo, which was the snack. It was a great FHE! Plus it made it easy to start teaching Belinda's sister, which we did a few times this week (she committed to baptism the first lesson on Tuesday).
Tuesday we had a good district meeting, and then a good day of proselyting after. We taught Belinda's sister, and then we had our longest time to contact yet. We contacted all evening. We walked down the road from Moree to Moree Junction and contacted along that for a few hours. We passed one of our investigators, Edward, playing football in a grove of coconut trees on the side of the road, so we stopped to play with them for awhile. It was pretty fun. Then we just made our way down the road to Moree Junction. The first people we met were some guys gyming, Seth and Evans. They are pretty cool guys, we have taught them each a few times since Tuesday, and they even brought one of their friends to the second lesson, Christian.
Wednesday we proselyted with a member who had just returned from living two years with his brother in Cote d'Ivoire, Bismark. He's a ward missionary in Moree. He speaks Fante, Twi, English, AND French. We had such a good day because he was with us. We taught tons of lessons, and he showed us a few less-active's to go visit. It was such a solid day. We got a lot of new investigators Wednesday, hopefully some turn out to be serious.
Thursday was pretty solid. The craziest part was that we went to visit a recently returned sister missionary. Sister Eshun, to ask for a referral and talk a little bit. She was telling us about her mission and she started talking about one of her old district leaders, who was named Elder Beeston! She couldn't remember where he was from, but chances are he's related to good ol Elder B somehow. If the former Elder Beeston reads this, let me know if you've got a cousin or something in the Ghana Accra mission! We met with another referral on Thursday, Solomon. He works on the chapel, and wants to learn about the church. The "Doctrine of Christ" teaching curriculum worked again and he committed to baptism as well. He's a really sweet guy, speaks really good English.
Friday was like Christmas for me! I got 7 packages! :D It was so tight! It honestly felt like Christmas morning ripping those things open. Thanks so much to everyone that sent stuff! It sounds like there is more on the way, so I'll be excited for those :) We went on splits with the Zone Leaders on Friday. We went with Elder Jackson (Centerville, UT) to Moree. Elder Jackson is tight, he's super smart, went to BYU. We talked a lot about BYU and stuff (man I miss that place!) and he taught us some cool stuff while we were teaching. We taught Francis again.
The weekend was good. Togbor came proselyting with us on Saturday, helped us to teach a lot of lessons. Frank Jr., the most spiritual guy in all of Moree came with us for a second, and while we were teaching a lesson, he goes and contacts a random guy, sits him down and teaches him. It was so tight haha. He's been off his mission (went to Cote d'Ivoire) for like 5 years, but he's still going strong! He works at the MTC, so he travels to Accra every week, and travels back to fulfill his calling as Stake Sunday School President. Such a stud! At night we met Andrew...his calling changed, he's not going to be the YM prez, instead he's the executive secretary.
Well other than that, nothing else I can think of right now about the week. Everything is normal! I love you guys so much, thanks for everything! I've got Christmas presents under the tree in my room, so life is good :)
Love, Elder Brown
This week was sweet! It was probably the fastest week on the mission so far. Our teaching pool is a little smallish right now, but we did a lot of contacting, which I thought would make the week seem longer, but it actually made it go by faster. We met some sweet people that I'll talk about. First off is that I forgot to talk about the Primary program in last week's email! Two Sundays ago we had the Primary program, and it was so tight! All the little kiddos memorized stuff and sang songs and the like, just like in America. It was pretty sweet. One kid was like the MVP, he memorized half the Book of Mormon it seemed like. He had probably four different parts, each were a solid two minutes long, and he didn't mess up once! And it was all in English. Pretty crazy he could do that!
Our FHE went really well at Bro Pratt's Monday night. About 10 recent converts/investigators came, so that made it really good. Bro Pratt taught the lesson (on living the gospel better in our daily lives) and then Elder Adams and I were in charge of the game. We couldn't think of ANY game to do. Elder Adams then had the idea to do a rock, paper, scissors tournament, so that's what we did! It was so fun, we taught it to them, and they loved it. They were getting so in to it. The winner was Vanicia, Belinda's sister. She beat Eric in the finals to take the championship and the coveted reward, an extra delicious FanYogo, which was the snack. It was a great FHE! Plus it made it easy to start teaching Belinda's sister, which we did a few times this week (she committed to baptism the first lesson on Tuesday).
Tuesday we had a good district meeting, and then a good day of proselyting after. We taught Belinda's sister, and then we had our longest time to contact yet. We contacted all evening. We walked down the road from Moree to Moree Junction and contacted along that for a few hours. We passed one of our investigators, Edward, playing football in a grove of coconut trees on the side of the road, so we stopped to play with them for awhile. It was pretty fun. Then we just made our way down the road to Moree Junction. The first people we met were some guys gyming, Seth and Evans. They are pretty cool guys, we have taught them each a few times since Tuesday, and they even brought one of their friends to the second lesson, Christian.
Wednesday we proselyted with a member who had just returned from living two years with his brother in Cote d'Ivoire, Bismark. He's a ward missionary in Moree. He speaks Fante, Twi, English, AND French. We had such a good day because he was with us. We taught tons of lessons, and he showed us a few less-active's to go visit. It was such a solid day. We got a lot of new investigators Wednesday, hopefully some turn out to be serious.
Thursday was pretty solid. The craziest part was that we went to visit a recently returned sister missionary. Sister Eshun, to ask for a referral and talk a little bit. She was telling us about her mission and she started talking about one of her old district leaders, who was named Elder Beeston! She couldn't remember where he was from, but chances are he's related to good ol Elder B somehow. If the former Elder Beeston reads this, let me know if you've got a cousin or something in the Ghana Accra mission! We met with another referral on Thursday, Solomon. He works on the chapel, and wants to learn about the church. The "Doctrine of Christ" teaching curriculum worked again and he committed to baptism as well. He's a really sweet guy, speaks really good English.
Friday was like Christmas for me! I got 7 packages! :D It was so tight! It honestly felt like Christmas morning ripping those things open. Thanks so much to everyone that sent stuff! It sounds like there is more on the way, so I'll be excited for those :) We went on splits with the Zone Leaders on Friday. We went with Elder Jackson (Centerville, UT) to Moree. Elder Jackson is tight, he's super smart, went to BYU. We talked a lot about BYU and stuff (man I miss that place!) and he taught us some cool stuff while we were teaching. We taught Francis again.
The weekend was good. Togbor came proselyting with us on Saturday, helped us to teach a lot of lessons. Frank Jr., the most spiritual guy in all of Moree came with us for a second, and while we were teaching a lesson, he goes and contacts a random guy, sits him down and teaches him. It was so tight haha. He's been off his mission (went to Cote d'Ivoire) for like 5 years, but he's still going strong! He works at the MTC, so he travels to Accra every week, and travels back to fulfill his calling as Stake Sunday School President. Such a stud! At night we met Andrew...his calling changed, he's not going to be the YM prez, instead he's the executive secretary.
Well other than that, nothing else I can think of right now about the week. Everything is normal! I love you guys so much, thanks for everything! I've got Christmas presents under the tree in my room, so life is good :)
Love, Elder Brown
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
November 29, 2010
Mema wo akye! Hope all is well in Tejas, I haven't read the email to find out the BYU-ewtah game yet, but I'll be hoping for the best!...just read it...oh well, no biggie. It was just the refs, of course :)
I didn't even realize it was Thanksgiving last week until your emails! It's just August all year round here! So Happy belated Thanksgiving! We celebrated with a big plate of fried rice and chicken, it was ok. But I've got a lot to be thankful for, so its no biggie yo!
Well I'll get on with the week now. Tuesday we went on splits with the APs, we went with Elder Akoki (Cote d'Ivoire) out to Moree. He is the new AP and I don't know him very well, so it was cool to get to know him. He taught himself how to lay the piano growing up in Cote d'Ivoire, so we talked a little about that, he's a really cool guy. We made our own fufu and groundnut soup for lunch (groundnut soup is basically super spicy tomato soup with peanut butter in it) after district meeting. It was really good, but...it got to me later in the day. I got sick again in Moree! Not fun! But it was ok, I just came back and went to bed. I felt pretty crappy the rest of the week, but I endured, didn't miss any proselyting.
Wednesday we taught out baptismal prep class again. It went really well, had about 5 investigators, 5 recent converts, and a couple of members there. I was kind of out of it because I was still feeling sick, but it was ok. We taught The Restoration lesson with emphasis on the Restoration of baptism. It was good, I think everybody there came to understand better why baptism into the Church is the only true baptism there is. Ephesians 4:5 baby! Use that scripture pretty much everyday haha.
Thursday I just felt really crappy again, can't really remember what happened. Friday I felt weird still, but it was a really good day. We met with all of the baptismal candidates in the morning, Belinda, Bernard and Kobina. Then we got to play some football in the afternoon! It was sweet, Andrew invited us to come play on the 'Teachers' team for his school's Teachers vs. Students game because there were only 7 teachers playing. So Elder Mortensen and Elder Katoa came out to Moree and we played the most legit football match I've played yet! It was so tight! They had uniforms for us and everything! We looked legit. And there were probably 200 people watching, so we got some time in the limelight :) It was awesome to play with Andrew, he was really good, and it was just sweet because now it feels like we're just best friends rather than missionary and recent convert. The game ended in a draw, 2-2, although the teachers cheated a little bit haha. There was this one teacher who was honestly a pro. We took some sweet pics and I was gonna send home, but this comp doesn't have a usb plug in. But the football was sweet! Since Andrew is a stud RC and we had two investigators on the students' team, we felt ok playing with em :) Later Friday evening, the Saunders (the senior couple in CC) needed Elder Adams to do a baptism interview for them in Abakrampa since they were joining our baptism on Saturday. Abakrampa is a village about 15 minutes past Yamoransa, it was a really cool place. The little side village we went to, New Ebu, is like a little town in central Utah! It is laid out in perfect blocks just like Utah. Moree is like a massive chaotic village, but New Ebu was just perfectly laid out in blocks. It honestly reminded me of Koosharem. They are putting Elders in Abakrampa this coming transfer, it will definitely be a great place to have elders.
Saturday we had the baptism! It was very cool, we combined with Mannkeisim and Abakrampa for it, and it went really well. Dennis got to baptize his friend Kobina. We had made him practice all week haha. I'm glad it was a good experience for him and Kobina. Dennis doesn't smile much, he's a very serious dude, but he was smiling all Saturday night. Even in the picture he's smiling! It was tight. Bernard was baptized by his best friend, as well, Stephen. The baptism went really well.
Sunday was interesting during church. Coolest thing: Andrew was called as the Young Men's President!!!!! And Belinda, before she was even confirmed, was called as the Relief Society secretary! It's so cool to see these "future leaders" turn into "current leaders" right before our eyes. So so cool. We also got a new ward missionary leader, Joseph, and assistant Timothy. We hadn't had a WML in probably two months, so it's good to have one again. We met with both of them after church, and I think they will both work hard. They're both prospective missionaries, so we'll be helping them prepare as well. Joseph is a funny guy, it'll be fun to see him learn how to be a leader like this. After church we just went to all of our recent converts and investigators to invite them to come to a special FHE with the bishopric tonight, hopefully they all come!
Today we played Abura in a highly anticipated football match. Abura had been talking up their team this transfer because they got a couple of guys who were really good. CC had been undefeated in the last 5 months so we were all excited! But alas, we lost 4-2. I scored a sweet goal though! Me and Elder Mortensen had a sweet drive, he received the cross perfect, let it bounce once, put a perfect header right over the defender, landed right where it needed in front of me, and then I did a little hesitation move and rocketed that soccer ball off the keeper straight through the posts. I felt pretty good, me and Elder Mortensen were pretty proud of ourselves haha.
Well that was the week! I'm sending off the Christmas package today, its nothing special, just a little something. A few random things: whenever dad writes "I worked a lot this week" in his emails, I always think it says "I worked OUT a lot this week" haha. Makes me think Dad's hitting the gym ;) Which he needs to! If he wants to go on the Amazing Race with me.
Also there's kid that lives above us that's 11 that's a stud. His name is Bismarck Brown, he's going to be the future Elder Brown in Africa! I let him wear my name tag while we were waiting for the bus for stake conference last week, he thought it was pretty tight :)
Anyway, I love you guys, HAPPY BIRTHDAY THIS WEEK H! Although I'll email him of course :) I just glanced at the email to make sure there are no urgent questions, and it doesn't look like there is. I'm going to read it tonight on the camera! Much love from Ghana land,
-Elder Brown
I didn't even realize it was Thanksgiving last week until your emails! It's just August all year round here! So Happy belated Thanksgiving! We celebrated with a big plate of fried rice and chicken, it was ok. But I've got a lot to be thankful for, so its no biggie yo!
Well I'll get on with the week now. Tuesday we went on splits with the APs, we went with Elder Akoki (Cote d'Ivoire) out to Moree. He is the new AP and I don't know him very well, so it was cool to get to know him. He taught himself how to lay the piano growing up in Cote d'Ivoire, so we talked a little about that, he's a really cool guy. We made our own fufu and groundnut soup for lunch (groundnut soup is basically super spicy tomato soup with peanut butter in it) after district meeting. It was really good, but...it got to me later in the day. I got sick again in Moree! Not fun! But it was ok, I just came back and went to bed. I felt pretty crappy the rest of the week, but I endured, didn't miss any proselyting.
Wednesday we taught out baptismal prep class again. It went really well, had about 5 investigators, 5 recent converts, and a couple of members there. I was kind of out of it because I was still feeling sick, but it was ok. We taught The Restoration lesson with emphasis on the Restoration of baptism. It was good, I think everybody there came to understand better why baptism into the Church is the only true baptism there is. Ephesians 4:5 baby! Use that scripture pretty much everyday haha.
Thursday I just felt really crappy again, can't really remember what happened. Friday I felt weird still, but it was a really good day. We met with all of the baptismal candidates in the morning, Belinda, Bernard and Kobina. Then we got to play some football in the afternoon! It was sweet, Andrew invited us to come play on the 'Teachers' team for his school's Teachers vs. Students game because there were only 7 teachers playing. So Elder Mortensen and Elder Katoa came out to Moree and we played the most legit football match I've played yet! It was so tight! They had uniforms for us and everything! We looked legit. And there were probably 200 people watching, so we got some time in the limelight :) It was awesome to play with Andrew, he was really good, and it was just sweet because now it feels like we're just best friends rather than missionary and recent convert. The game ended in a draw, 2-2, although the teachers cheated a little bit haha. There was this one teacher who was honestly a pro. We took some sweet pics and I was gonna send home, but this comp doesn't have a usb plug in. But the football was sweet! Since Andrew is a stud RC and we had two investigators on the students' team, we felt ok playing with em :) Later Friday evening, the Saunders (the senior couple in CC) needed Elder Adams to do a baptism interview for them in Abakrampa since they were joining our baptism on Saturday. Abakrampa is a village about 15 minutes past Yamoransa, it was a really cool place. The little side village we went to, New Ebu, is like a little town in central Utah! It is laid out in perfect blocks just like Utah. Moree is like a massive chaotic village, but New Ebu was just perfectly laid out in blocks. It honestly reminded me of Koosharem. They are putting Elders in Abakrampa this coming transfer, it will definitely be a great place to have elders.
Saturday we had the baptism! It was very cool, we combined with Mannkeisim and Abakrampa for it, and it went really well. Dennis got to baptize his friend Kobina. We had made him practice all week haha. I'm glad it was a good experience for him and Kobina. Dennis doesn't smile much, he's a very serious dude, but he was smiling all Saturday night. Even in the picture he's smiling! It was tight. Bernard was baptized by his best friend, as well, Stephen. The baptism went really well.
Sunday was interesting during church. Coolest thing: Andrew was called as the Young Men's President!!!!! And Belinda, before she was even confirmed, was called as the Relief Society secretary! It's so cool to see these "future leaders" turn into "current leaders" right before our eyes. So so cool. We also got a new ward missionary leader, Joseph, and assistant Timothy. We hadn't had a WML in probably two months, so it's good to have one again. We met with both of them after church, and I think they will both work hard. They're both prospective missionaries, so we'll be helping them prepare as well. Joseph is a funny guy, it'll be fun to see him learn how to be a leader like this. After church we just went to all of our recent converts and investigators to invite them to come to a special FHE with the bishopric tonight, hopefully they all come!
Today we played Abura in a highly anticipated football match. Abura had been talking up their team this transfer because they got a couple of guys who were really good. CC had been undefeated in the last 5 months so we were all excited! But alas, we lost 4-2. I scored a sweet goal though! Me and Elder Mortensen had a sweet drive, he received the cross perfect, let it bounce once, put a perfect header right over the defender, landed right where it needed in front of me, and then I did a little hesitation move and rocketed that soccer ball off the keeper straight through the posts. I felt pretty good, me and Elder Mortensen were pretty proud of ourselves haha.
Well that was the week! I'm sending off the Christmas package today, its nothing special, just a little something. A few random things: whenever dad writes "I worked a lot this week" in his emails, I always think it says "I worked OUT a lot this week" haha. Makes me think Dad's hitting the gym ;) Which he needs to! If he wants to go on the Amazing Race with me.
Also there's kid that lives above us that's 11 that's a stud. His name is Bismarck Brown, he's going to be the future Elder Brown in Africa! I let him wear my name tag while we were waiting for the bus for stake conference last week, he thought it was pretty tight :)
Anyway, I love you guys, HAPPY BIRTHDAY THIS WEEK H! Although I'll email him of course :) I just glanced at the email to make sure there are no urgent questions, and it doesn't look like there is. I'm going to read it tonight on the camera! Much love from Ghana land,
-Elder Brown
Saturday, November 27, 2010
November 22, 2010
What's up! Very glad to be able to hear from you guys again, as always! Hearing some updates from home always gets me ready to go for the week! I've gotten the first half of the Thanksgiving package (chicken, gravy, soup, potatoes), hopefully the rest of it will come this week! I got a package from Grandma Brown this week too, had some sweet candy and stuff! Anyway besides that, the week was really sweet. We played basketball on a court down by the beach last week, it was fun to be able to ball again. There are some guys that are pretty good in the zone, so it was really fun. I kind of hurt my shoulder playing though, haven't played a sport that involves the use of the arms in a while! That interrupted my morning work-out routine a little, but it wasn't too bad. I've been getting up a little early every day for the past few weeks and working out with the stuff we've got in the apartment. I'm getting totally ripped...haha. Fufu won't do that for ya I think. But I've actually enjoyed getting up at 5:30 and working out for a little while, it's hard, but it gets me ready for the day!
The week of proselyting went really well too. On Tuesday we held our first "Baptism Prep and New Member Class." Elder Adams had the idea to do it last week, so we decided to go ahead and try it. Basically we just want to have another opportunity each week for our investigators and recent converts to get together every week to be able to gain a solid foundation of knowledge concerning what we are teaching them, and then also to be able to become friends with each other and get more comfortable in the church setting. It went really really well. Elder Adams and I taught from 3 Nephi 11 about baptism in general, and it was really good for all who were present. We had a few investigators come, several recent converts, and a few members, so it was a very good mix to have. There is a new teaching curriculum that the missionary department has implemented, and basically our focus in all teaching is supposed to be baptism. We are supposed to talk about baptism in the first lesson with anyone we meet. So every investigator we have, we invite them to come to the baptism prep class, whether they have committed to baptism or not. I think it's going to be a really good way for them to learn better about baptism and about membership in the church in general. We're going to take each missionary lesson and teach at the class, but we're going to make everything stem from baptism. So for this week we are going to teach the Restoration, but we are going to focus on what that means about baptism, and why we need to be baptized into this church. We'll focus on the apostasy and the Restoration and let the Spirit take it from there! It should be sweet, last week's class was awwwwwesome.
Wednesday we had Zone Conference, it was sweet as always. Thursday through Saturday we stayed busy preparing the people who will be baptized this week for baptism. Belinda, Bernard and Kobina are all doing really well, and are just awesome!
We also had some fun messing with tro-tro mates on Thursday. They call the guys who you pay on a tro-tro "mates" and we just had some fun messing around with them while we were driving. I love riding on tro-tros, it's so fun. It's like a mini roller coaster ride everyday.
Jacob, our recent convert, is a barber, so we always go to his place to get our hair cut. He cuts the African way, we're the only oborufo who's hair he has ever cut, so he just does it the way he knows! So yep, my hair looks like P-diddy's or fitty's. No big deal.
We helped Andrew finish his basic family history stuff on Friday. We got all the info into Familysearch for his grandparents who have passed away, and he'll be able to go to the temple next week to do their work, pretty sweet! He got the Melchezidek Priesthood on Sunday at stake conference. He was so excited. So awesome to be able to see that for him. 2 and a half months ago, we didn't even know who he was...Ye da nyame ase. SO AWESOME!!!!!
Saturday I went on splits with Elder Katoa in Moree. It was sweet, we taught a bunch of lessons, and had a lot of fun cruising around Moree all day. Elder Katoa loved Moree. He is so tight too. He's a powerful guy. In physical and spiritual strength! He's one of the reasons I've started working out for an hour every day! Haha.
Sunday was Stake Conference. It was one of those big regional conferences broadcast from Salt Lake, so we got to see Elder Oaks, President Packer, Sister Dibb, and Elder Cristoffel Golden (area presidency, from South Africa) speak. We went to the Abura stake center to watch it. The Stake center was PACKED. Honestly it was pretty ridiculous. They will be splitting the stake here by the end of next year I'm sure. It was sweet to see so many members there together. Elder Oaks spoke a lot about putting off old traditions that aren't in line with the Gospel.
Well that's it for the week. I love you guys, thanks for everything!
Alright well thanks again for everything, I'll be looking forward to the packages :) LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!! and everybody else that reads this too!!!!
Yebehyia,
Elder Brown
The week of proselyting went really well too. On Tuesday we held our first "Baptism Prep and New Member Class." Elder Adams had the idea to do it last week, so we decided to go ahead and try it. Basically we just want to have another opportunity each week for our investigators and recent converts to get together every week to be able to gain a solid foundation of knowledge concerning what we are teaching them, and then also to be able to become friends with each other and get more comfortable in the church setting. It went really really well. Elder Adams and I taught from 3 Nephi 11 about baptism in general, and it was really good for all who were present. We had a few investigators come, several recent converts, and a few members, so it was a very good mix to have. There is a new teaching curriculum that the missionary department has implemented, and basically our focus in all teaching is supposed to be baptism. We are supposed to talk about baptism in the first lesson with anyone we meet. So every investigator we have, we invite them to come to the baptism prep class, whether they have committed to baptism or not. I think it's going to be a really good way for them to learn better about baptism and about membership in the church in general. We're going to take each missionary lesson and teach at the class, but we're going to make everything stem from baptism. So for this week we are going to teach the Restoration, but we are going to focus on what that means about baptism, and why we need to be baptized into this church. We'll focus on the apostasy and the Restoration and let the Spirit take it from there! It should be sweet, last week's class was awwwwwesome.
Wednesday we had Zone Conference, it was sweet as always. Thursday through Saturday we stayed busy preparing the people who will be baptized this week for baptism. Belinda, Bernard and Kobina are all doing really well, and are just awesome!
We also had some fun messing with tro-tro mates on Thursday. They call the guys who you pay on a tro-tro "mates" and we just had some fun messing around with them while we were driving. I love riding on tro-tros, it's so fun. It's like a mini roller coaster ride everyday.
Jacob, our recent convert, is a barber, so we always go to his place to get our hair cut. He cuts the African way, we're the only oborufo who's hair he has ever cut, so he just does it the way he knows! So yep, my hair looks like P-diddy's or fitty's. No big deal.
We helped Andrew finish his basic family history stuff on Friday. We got all the info into Familysearch for his grandparents who have passed away, and he'll be able to go to the temple next week to do their work, pretty sweet! He got the Melchezidek Priesthood on Sunday at stake conference. He was so excited. So awesome to be able to see that for him. 2 and a half months ago, we didn't even know who he was...Ye da nyame ase. SO AWESOME!!!!!
Saturday I went on splits with Elder Katoa in Moree. It was sweet, we taught a bunch of lessons, and had a lot of fun cruising around Moree all day. Elder Katoa loved Moree. He is so tight too. He's a powerful guy. In physical and spiritual strength! He's one of the reasons I've started working out for an hour every day! Haha.
Sunday was Stake Conference. It was one of those big regional conferences broadcast from Salt Lake, so we got to see Elder Oaks, President Packer, Sister Dibb, and Elder Cristoffel Golden (area presidency, from South Africa) speak. We went to the Abura stake center to watch it. The Stake center was PACKED. Honestly it was pretty ridiculous. They will be splitting the stake here by the end of next year I'm sure. It was sweet to see so many members there together. Elder Oaks spoke a lot about putting off old traditions that aren't in line with the Gospel.
Well that's it for the week. I love you guys, thanks for everything!
Alright well thanks again for everything, I'll be looking forward to the packages :) LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!! and everybody else that reads this too!!!!
Yebehyia,
Elder Brown
Saturday, November 20, 2010
November 15, 2010
Ca ya bien!!! Alright, first things, Elder Mortensen got Bacon n' Cheddar easy cheese in a package last week and you HAVE to send it to me!!!!! OK?!?!?! It's amazing!!!!!! So now that that's out of the way, on to the good stuff :)
So this week was so sweet. Probably the sweetest week so far on my mission. It just flew by, and even though it wasn't really anything special finding or teaching wise, it was just awesome. I never really felt worn out during the day (Except for Sunday, which was Fast Sunday...not nice not eating or drinking when its 103!!!!!!!) and the days were all productive. Tuesday I went on splits with Elder Mortensen and Elder Katoa, because Elder Adams went to a special training meeting for DLs and ZLs in Cape Coast. It was really good. The work in Yamoransa is kind of slow right now, but they are working really hard to speed it back up. We contacted for a little while, taught a first lesson to a member referral, and met with a couple of recent converts. They have a sweet recent convert who we taught right before he left for the mission prep class in Ola. He's definitely mission bound next year. Then we taught a recent convert who I had actually taught several times with Elder Chesa, Timothy. He's a really cool guy too, he was the first guy I taught 5+ times who got baptized, so that was especially cool. Wednesday was basically the perfect day of missionary work haha. Absolutely nothing fell through, we taught 12 lessons. It was crazy! We met will all the people we wanted to, contacted a couple guys who seem really cool and are friends with some members, and taught 4 recent converts. It was just awesome! Never had a day like that, hopefully there are some more coming as we work hard though :) Thursday and Friday were normal, met with Belinda a couple times, she committed to baptism! I'm really excited for her.
Saturday was the sweetest. We taught some great lessons in the morning (Belinda), and then we went out with the Young Men's president, Bro. Hawkson. and visited all of our YM-aged recent converts. We met with Isaac and Steven, the two best friends who were baptized a little while ago. It went really well. Bro. Hawkson just taught them about how they need to be reading the scriptures plenty, about how important the Book of Mormon is. That is exactly what we wanted to talk about, so it worked out well! We also met with David, talked about the same stuff.
Saturday night, we roasted a pig for a dinner!!!! It was Elder Mortensen's year mark, and since Elder Katoa knows how to roast a pig, we did it! We bought the pig from bishop and it was huuuuuge. Elder Katoa said it was the biggest pig he has ever killed and cooked. He actually had some trouble killing it, but he eventually got the best of it. Seein him kill the pig was pretty crazy. Then we went back to the apartment, built a fire outside, cleaned the pig, stuck it on a stick and roasted for two hours! I was a little skeptical about how it would taste, just because didn't put any spice, seasoning sauce or anything on it. But oh my word....it was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good. I probably ate more meat Saturday night than I had my whole mission. It was ridiculous, tasted like something straight from Fogo de Chao. No joke. Goodness gracious, that thing was better than just about anything. And the experience of cooking the whole thing, from life to meal was awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We'll have to do it as a family on our next family campout....haha :)
Sunday, it rained superrrrrr hard in the morning. I heard the LOUDEST clap of thunder I have EVER heard, hands down. I was asleep, and it literally made me jump out of bed. Elder Mortensen thought a bomb had gone off and we were under attack for about 5 minutes. It was insane. It shook the house. And then since people think rain will kill them here, no one came to church! I counted at the start of sacrament...there was 19 people there. 19!!!!!! Not to say how awesome we are or anything, but about 8 of those were recent converts or investigators :) Andrew blessed the sacrament again (by memory) and we confirmed Jacob (since last week we watched conference, we didn't do it then). Elder Adams and I bore our testimonies in testimony meeting. Elder Adams threw down some Fante (Minyim de asor no ye nokwar- I know the church is true) and everybody liked that. It was a cool testimony meeting, just because there were so few people there. Andrew bore his testimony, that was sweet. We walked all the way to Abakamoru before church to pick an investigator up to take to church, Edward. We walked in the rain all the way out there, and he came with us. He had a pretty good time. One of his best friends, Enoch, is a member, so hopefully something comes from that. He's a really cool kid.
Something kind of cool-there is an Ethiopian in our zone, Elder Mekonen. I remembered that Pres. and Sis. Andrus are serving there right now, and I asked him if he knew them, and he said he did! He couldn't stop talking about how awesome they are and about how much he loved them. He said he would meet and talk with him all the time, he helped him get out on mission. He even said that last year he went to Thanksgiving dinner at their house! Pretty Sweet! Small world, eh?
So anyway, I can't think of anything else awesome right now. I got your package today, the one with the Christmas tree and stuff in it! Can't wait to set it up and decorate it :D You and Sister Adams must be talking, you guys send me and Elder Adams the same stuff :) He just got a package of the same Tyson's chicken last week, and the same mashed potatoes! Its cool though, bc that stuff is awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just keep sending any cool stuff you can find! Especially easy cheese!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Glad the Wildcats won, hope they crush Cedar Hill this week! The Cougs might have a shot in SLC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!! Thanks for being sooo awesome! Yebehyia!
Love, from Cape Coast, Ghana,
Elder G. Hebertson Brown
So this week was so sweet. Probably the sweetest week so far on my mission. It just flew by, and even though it wasn't really anything special finding or teaching wise, it was just awesome. I never really felt worn out during the day (Except for Sunday, which was Fast Sunday...not nice not eating or drinking when its 103!!!!!!!) and the days were all productive. Tuesday I went on splits with Elder Mortensen and Elder Katoa, because Elder Adams went to a special training meeting for DLs and ZLs in Cape Coast. It was really good. The work in Yamoransa is kind of slow right now, but they are working really hard to speed it back up. We contacted for a little while, taught a first lesson to a member referral, and met with a couple of recent converts. They have a sweet recent convert who we taught right before he left for the mission prep class in Ola. He's definitely mission bound next year. Then we taught a recent convert who I had actually taught several times with Elder Chesa, Timothy. He's a really cool guy too, he was the first guy I taught 5+ times who got baptized, so that was especially cool. Wednesday was basically the perfect day of missionary work haha. Absolutely nothing fell through, we taught 12 lessons. It was crazy! We met will all the people we wanted to, contacted a couple guys who seem really cool and are friends with some members, and taught 4 recent converts. It was just awesome! Never had a day like that, hopefully there are some more coming as we work hard though :) Thursday and Friday were normal, met with Belinda a couple times, she committed to baptism! I'm really excited for her.
Saturday was the sweetest. We taught some great lessons in the morning (Belinda), and then we went out with the Young Men's president, Bro. Hawkson. and visited all of our YM-aged recent converts. We met with Isaac and Steven, the two best friends who were baptized a little while ago. It went really well. Bro. Hawkson just taught them about how they need to be reading the scriptures plenty, about how important the Book of Mormon is. That is exactly what we wanted to talk about, so it worked out well! We also met with David, talked about the same stuff.
Saturday night, we roasted a pig for a dinner!!!! It was Elder Mortensen's year mark, and since Elder Katoa knows how to roast a pig, we did it! We bought the pig from bishop and it was huuuuuge. Elder Katoa said it was the biggest pig he has ever killed and cooked. He actually had some trouble killing it, but he eventually got the best of it. Seein him kill the pig was pretty crazy. Then we went back to the apartment, built a fire outside, cleaned the pig, stuck it on a stick and roasted for two hours! I was a little skeptical about how it would taste, just because didn't put any spice, seasoning sauce or anything on it. But oh my word....it was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good. I probably ate more meat Saturday night than I had my whole mission. It was ridiculous, tasted like something straight from Fogo de Chao. No joke. Goodness gracious, that thing was better than just about anything. And the experience of cooking the whole thing, from life to meal was awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We'll have to do it as a family on our next family campout....haha :)
Sunday, it rained superrrrrr hard in the morning. I heard the LOUDEST clap of thunder I have EVER heard, hands down. I was asleep, and it literally made me jump out of bed. Elder Mortensen thought a bomb had gone off and we were under attack for about 5 minutes. It was insane. It shook the house. And then since people think rain will kill them here, no one came to church! I counted at the start of sacrament...there was 19 people there. 19!!!!!! Not to say how awesome we are or anything, but about 8 of those were recent converts or investigators :) Andrew blessed the sacrament again (by memory) and we confirmed Jacob (since last week we watched conference, we didn't do it then). Elder Adams and I bore our testimonies in testimony meeting. Elder Adams threw down some Fante (Minyim de asor no ye nokwar- I know the church is true) and everybody liked that. It was a cool testimony meeting, just because there were so few people there. Andrew bore his testimony, that was sweet. We walked all the way to Abakamoru before church to pick an investigator up to take to church, Edward. We walked in the rain all the way out there, and he came with us. He had a pretty good time. One of his best friends, Enoch, is a member, so hopefully something comes from that. He's a really cool kid.
Something kind of cool-there is an Ethiopian in our zone, Elder Mekonen. I remembered that Pres. and Sis. Andrus are serving there right now, and I asked him if he knew them, and he said he did! He couldn't stop talking about how awesome they are and about how much he loved them. He said he would meet and talk with him all the time, he helped him get out on mission. He even said that last year he went to Thanksgiving dinner at their house! Pretty Sweet! Small world, eh?
So anyway, I can't think of anything else awesome right now. I got your package today, the one with the Christmas tree and stuff in it! Can't wait to set it up and decorate it :D You and Sister Adams must be talking, you guys send me and Elder Adams the same stuff :) He just got a package of the same Tyson's chicken last week, and the same mashed potatoes! Its cool though, bc that stuff is awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just keep sending any cool stuff you can find! Especially easy cheese!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Glad the Wildcats won, hope they crush Cedar Hill this week! The Cougs might have a shot in SLC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!! Thanks for being sooo awesome! Yebehyia!
Love, from Cape Coast, Ghana,
Elder G. Hebertson Brown
Monday, November 15, 2010
November 8, 2010
Wazzup! Sounds like its been a sweet week in Denton, besides the Rangers losing :( Sorry about that, but oh well, they'll win it in 2012!!!!!!!!!!! Glad to here H was a human highlight reel, wish I coulda been there. And finally BYU! That's just what they needed, a bye week to get regrouped and then pound a terrible team into submission. Sounds like Heaps was pretty efficient. I just hope (but not pray, that's bad) that the Cougs can pull it together for another miracle in Salt Lake in a few weeks. I'm getting a lot of grief from the U fans here and so it'd be nice to have scoreboard for another year. Hopefully the U gets derailed a little bit because of the TCU pounding. Does it look like TCU will have a shot at the National Championship? Hope so. Glad Guyer won, I'm sure the refs were gunning for a Southlake win. Not even kidding, I bet they were.
The work on the chapel is going sweet. Pres. Freeze asked if I was digging a grave in one of the pics, but I was digging a hole for a foundation pole actually! Well I didn't dig all that much, sort of just climbed in for a pic :) It's sweet to see the work going, they put up lights so they can work at night too. And a lot of the people working are members of Moree ward.
So here is the news from the week. First off, we got our water back on (Ye da nyame ase). It would have been sooooo terrible not having it on for a longer period of time. Elder Katoa came on Wednesday, he's so tight! His last two companions were marines, so he's gotten huge. We're all gonna work out a lot this transfer so we can get big like him haha. He played professional rugby in Tonga, so maybe we'll learn a few things about that. He loves to roast pig, so we'll be doing that this weekend for Elder Mortensen's year mark!!!! It's gonna be sweet!!!!!!! He's just a really cool guy.
The rest of the week went really well. We've got a really cool new investigator, Belinda. She came to the church with her uncle a few weeks ago, and she has loved everything we have taught her.
I finished my first journal last week! Pretty crazy....it was the one Grandma H gave me, so now I'm on to a new one. Alright only twelve minutes left, so I'm not stopping to correct anything, if there are errors, kose aye! So the week besides that was cool. We have a phone when we proselyte now since Elder Adams is the DL, so that makes things a little bit easier. Our teaching pool is somewhat small still, but it's growing as we're getting some more referrals and stuff. We met with Francis again finally last week. He's a really really good guy. We met a guy named Akom who is really cool. He's an older guy, maybe late 50's. We go into his room and he's got a Book of Mormon, a Doctrine & Covenants, Pearl of Great Price, and the Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, Heber J. Grant and at least five others!!! Crazy. He said his brother who died recently was a member, and that he just likes to read about anything religious. It will be interesting to see how it goes. He is a Buddhist...and since I think Buddhism is pretty dang sweet, it'll be fun to teach him. I can throw down with some of my knowledge of the Dhammaphada :) Aunt Krissy even wrote a quote from Buddha in my little family book which I love!!!!!! Ps I love that book.
Anyway, four minutes left, gotta wrap up. One thing I can't forget: I want a package of just cheese!!!!!! There is no cheese here!!!!!!!!!!!! EZ Cheese, nacho cheese packets, blocks of cheese, anything!!!! E. Mortensen said he got a package of cheese, and that it was the sweetest package ever. So send me a flat-rate envelop chocked full of cheese :) Tons of EZ Cheese and Cheese Whiz all right?! :D I can already taste the bacon cheddar cheese whiz in my mouth :) Well actually I can't because it's not here!!!!!
I LOVE YOU!!!!!!! A lot
Buh bye,
Elder Brown
The work on the chapel is going sweet. Pres. Freeze asked if I was digging a grave in one of the pics, but I was digging a hole for a foundation pole actually! Well I didn't dig all that much, sort of just climbed in for a pic :) It's sweet to see the work going, they put up lights so they can work at night too. And a lot of the people working are members of Moree ward.
So here is the news from the week. First off, we got our water back on (Ye da nyame ase). It would have been sooooo terrible not having it on for a longer period of time. Elder Katoa came on Wednesday, he's so tight! His last two companions were marines, so he's gotten huge. We're all gonna work out a lot this transfer so we can get big like him haha. He played professional rugby in Tonga, so maybe we'll learn a few things about that. He loves to roast pig, so we'll be doing that this weekend for Elder Mortensen's year mark!!!! It's gonna be sweet!!!!!!! He's just a really cool guy.
The rest of the week went really well. We've got a really cool new investigator, Belinda. She came to the church with her uncle a few weeks ago, and she has loved everything we have taught her.
I finished my first journal last week! Pretty crazy....it was the one Grandma H gave me, so now I'm on to a new one. Alright only twelve minutes left, so I'm not stopping to correct anything, if there are errors, kose aye! So the week besides that was cool. We have a phone when we proselyte now since Elder Adams is the DL, so that makes things a little bit easier. Our teaching pool is somewhat small still, but it's growing as we're getting some more referrals and stuff. We met with Francis again finally last week. He's a really really good guy. We met a guy named Akom who is really cool. He's an older guy, maybe late 50's. We go into his room and he's got a Book of Mormon, a Doctrine & Covenants, Pearl of Great Price, and the Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, Heber J. Grant and at least five others!!! Crazy. He said his brother who died recently was a member, and that he just likes to read about anything religious. It will be interesting to see how it goes. He is a Buddhist...and since I think Buddhism is pretty dang sweet, it'll be fun to teach him. I can throw down with some of my knowledge of the Dhammaphada :) Aunt Krissy even wrote a quote from Buddha in my little family book which I love!!!!!! Ps I love that book.
Anyway, four minutes left, gotta wrap up. One thing I can't forget: I want a package of just cheese!!!!!! There is no cheese here!!!!!!!!!!!! EZ Cheese, nacho cheese packets, blocks of cheese, anything!!!! E. Mortensen said he got a package of cheese, and that it was the sweetest package ever. So send me a flat-rate envelop chocked full of cheese :) Tons of EZ Cheese and Cheese Whiz all right?! :D I can already taste the bacon cheddar cheese whiz in my mouth :) Well actually I can't because it's not here!!!!!
I LOVE YOU!!!!!!! A lot
Buh bye,
Elder Brown
Sunday, November 7, 2010
November 1, 2010
Hey what's up everybody. It's been a pretty crazy week, it was really sweet though.
We just got transfer news, Elder Wiah is going up to Kumasi to be the Dichemso zone leader, and Elder Adams is the new district leader here in Yamoransa. Pretty sweet because now we'll get to take the phone when we proselyte, that will help so much. Elder Mortensen's new companion is named Elder Katoa, he's Samoan. He was in Abura zone (the other CC zone) for a while so I've met him a few times and he's super tight. we'll have a lot of fun in our apartment this transfer I'm sure.
So anyway on to the week. A lot of sweet things happened. First off is that we met an Area Seventy, Elder Ahadgi, at the chapel site one night. It was really sweet. (He is actually in a picture in the gospel principles book, in the eternal marriage chapter). We talked to him for about an hour and he told us some really sweet stuff. He told us to read 1 Nephi again and compare it to Joseph Smith. Pretty cool. He also has a cool conversion story, he was a stake president 3 years after he became a memeber. A bishop 8 months after being a member....serious stuff!!! Wednesday we went to farm with Bro Buateng from the Yamoransa ward (same guy we went to FHE a couple weeks ago). We thought his farm was right by his house, but nope, it was a solid hour and a half walk outside of Yamoransa. We were supposed to help him harvest some trees he was growing to make charcoal, but the chainsaw didn't work, so we walked back to Yamoransa!
Funny story- I made some syrup about a week and a half ago to use for French toast. All I used was brown sugar, white sugar, water and a little bit of Elder Mortensen's mapeline. But about four days after I made it, that stuff turned into grade A alcohol. It WREAKED. It fermented so fast it was ridiculous. Guess I'll just have to put it in the fridge next time!
Anyway, one day we were walking to meet Jacob at his house, and we passed these kid that were all gathered in a group. We saw that they were all gathered around this one kid who was playing a home made drum set! It was so sweet, he made it out of three water jugs and tomato paste cans and lids. It was legit, and he was super good! He had made a bass with the foot pedal and everything, had made a hi hat out of two tomato can lids and had like 6 other cymbals and drums. It was so sweet. I sat down and played a little bit haha. I got a pic so you'll see it at some point, but man it was so tight. Chris would have thought it was super sweet.
We went on splits with Elder Izekor on Friday and that was really sweet, he's a really powerful guy. He helped us out with a lot of the investigators we were teaching. He said that Moree is sweet and that it looks like we're doing a great job, so we'll work to keep that up!
Our baptism this weekend went well, but not as planned at all. Friday the water stopped running in Yamoransa. We have a reserve tank that we use when the water stops, but it was empty too. So we've gone without running water for a few days. We were showering with water we fetched from a place like half a mile down the road and stuff. NOT FUN!!!!!!!!!!!! Be grateful for running water. You can't do anything without it! Anyway so made it so that the font in Yamoransa couldn't fill. So we had to change it to the beach while we were at church on Sunday. We had already rescheduled it from Saturday or a couple reasons, and so it was pretty crazy to have to change it again from Yamy to Moree beach. Mankessiem were coming to join our baptism, so we had to get a hold of them and everything, crazy crazy. And then of course baptizing in the ocean is just ridiculous. But Jacob was baptized as well as Esther, so it all worked out fine.
Today's P-Day has been pretty hectic. With the water being off and everything our apartment is a mess and we could wash any of our clothes, so it was just weird. We had a banana cake party with the zone, me and Elder Bunker made em. They were really good, and we got to watch the Priesthood session of conference too. Finally got to see some of conference! I loved Pres. Uchtdorf's talk.
Well everything is going sweet here. I'm getting more and more into it, starting to lose track of days and stuff. Is it really November? I love you guys!
-Elder Brown
Go Rangers! (Unfortunately, the Rangers lost the World Series that night---Opening Dayis April 1st! :)
We just got transfer news, Elder Wiah is going up to Kumasi to be the Dichemso zone leader, and Elder Adams is the new district leader here in Yamoransa. Pretty sweet because now we'll get to take the phone when we proselyte, that will help so much. Elder Mortensen's new companion is named Elder Katoa, he's Samoan. He was in Abura zone (the other CC zone) for a while so I've met him a few times and he's super tight. we'll have a lot of fun in our apartment this transfer I'm sure.
So anyway on to the week. A lot of sweet things happened. First off is that we met an Area Seventy, Elder Ahadgi, at the chapel site one night. It was really sweet. (He is actually in a picture in the gospel principles book, in the eternal marriage chapter). We talked to him for about an hour and he told us some really sweet stuff. He told us to read 1 Nephi again and compare it to Joseph Smith. Pretty cool. He also has a cool conversion story, he was a stake president 3 years after he became a memeber. A bishop 8 months after being a member....serious stuff!!! Wednesday we went to farm with Bro Buateng from the Yamoransa ward (same guy we went to FHE a couple weeks ago). We thought his farm was right by his house, but nope, it was a solid hour and a half walk outside of Yamoransa. We were supposed to help him harvest some trees he was growing to make charcoal, but the chainsaw didn't work, so we walked back to Yamoransa!
Funny story- I made some syrup about a week and a half ago to use for French toast. All I used was brown sugar, white sugar, water and a little bit of Elder Mortensen's mapeline. But about four days after I made it, that stuff turned into grade A alcohol. It WREAKED. It fermented so fast it was ridiculous. Guess I'll just have to put it in the fridge next time!
Anyway, one day we were walking to meet Jacob at his house, and we passed these kid that were all gathered in a group. We saw that they were all gathered around this one kid who was playing a home made drum set! It was so sweet, he made it out of three water jugs and tomato paste cans and lids. It was legit, and he was super good! He had made a bass with the foot pedal and everything, had made a hi hat out of two tomato can lids and had like 6 other cymbals and drums. It was so sweet. I sat down and played a little bit haha. I got a pic so you'll see it at some point, but man it was so tight. Chris would have thought it was super sweet.
We went on splits with Elder Izekor on Friday and that was really sweet, he's a really powerful guy. He helped us out with a lot of the investigators we were teaching. He said that Moree is sweet and that it looks like we're doing a great job, so we'll work to keep that up!
Our baptism this weekend went well, but not as planned at all. Friday the water stopped running in Yamoransa. We have a reserve tank that we use when the water stops, but it was empty too. So we've gone without running water for a few days. We were showering with water we fetched from a place like half a mile down the road and stuff. NOT FUN!!!!!!!!!!!! Be grateful for running water. You can't do anything without it! Anyway so made it so that the font in Yamoransa couldn't fill. So we had to change it to the beach while we were at church on Sunday. We had already rescheduled it from Saturday or a couple reasons, and so it was pretty crazy to have to change it again from Yamy to Moree beach. Mankessiem were coming to join our baptism, so we had to get a hold of them and everything, crazy crazy. And then of course baptizing in the ocean is just ridiculous. But Jacob was baptized as well as Esther, so it all worked out fine.
Today's P-Day has been pretty hectic. With the water being off and everything our apartment is a mess and we could wash any of our clothes, so it was just weird. We had a banana cake party with the zone, me and Elder Bunker made em. They were really good, and we got to watch the Priesthood session of conference too. Finally got to see some of conference! I loved Pres. Uchtdorf's talk.
Well everything is going sweet here. I'm getting more and more into it, starting to lose track of days and stuff. Is it really November? I love you guys!
-Elder Brown
Go Rangers! (Unfortunately, the Rangers lost the World Series that night---Opening Dayis April 1st! :)
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