Moyamba Week 18

This week has been so fun. Elder Flake and I get along so well so it's really fun to be companions with him. And to clarify I have a new proselyting area but it is the same branch and same apartment. So most of the people that we teach and see during the day I already know. So it was a good amount of change with the perfect amount of consistency at the same time. The new elder in the apartment is Elder Judkins from Utah and he has been out one transfer longer than I have (since June) so everyone is really young!

Some highlights of the week are that when Elder Flake and I went to teach one of our investigators we couldn't find him, turns out he was a little ways away from his house and we saw him and went over to talk to him...only to find out he was drunk, like so far gone. It took a lot for me to not laugh, that's how drunk he was. It sucked because it meant we weren't going to baptize him before Christmas like he wanted but whatever. He moved to Freetown today to be back with his family today and we went and saw him this morning before he left and told him all this and he laughed for a solid 10 minutes when we told him we found him drunk. Not sure how much he remembered from that afternoon but he told us we were smart for figuring out he was drunk.....I thought about telling him it was hard, but I bit my tongue :)

On Friday our branch had the end of year party, basically our Christmas party. And to get ready we had to stop by the bank and pick money up and we found that the bank had put up Christmas decorations. A tree and they even were playing Christmas music! So I am not totally in the middle of nowhere. 

The party got off to about the worst possible start. It was planned to start at 2pm and no one from the branch presidency was there. And no matter how many times we called them we couldn't find them. They finally showed up and we got the program started around 3:45pm. Luckily the DJ showed up on time so at least we had music while we waited. 

Yours truly was then informed he was MC'ing the program and our the first counselor in the presidency decided to speak for an hour and it was pure gibberish. Almost all 100 people that came were asleep. Us elders were starting to wonder why people were still here.

Then the party started...we had a quiz on the Book of Mormon, young men against young women, and the primary kids recited the Articles of Faith for everyone. And then my favorite part...we pulled all the chairs and cranked the speakers and danced. The way Sierra Leoneans dance is simply just shaking what your mama gave you. So as you can imagine...I fit in PERFECTLY. We danced for so long and Sierra Leone music isn't great but it is GREAT for dancing. I was sweating really hard and laughed a bunch and overall it turned out to be a really fun party. 

I love this season as I am able to ponder of the Spirit of Christmas and the Spirit of Christ. This morning we read Luke 2 to one of our recent converts that can't read(she's 38, really common here) and as I think more about the birth of Christ, I become more grateful for all the things that he has done for me. Suffering the atonement and making it possible for me to become clean again in the sight of God. I love this Gospel and I invite all to focus on Christ this Christmas and remember the things that are in your lives because of the birth of our Savior. 

Elder Hendricks 

1.Elder Barker and I's baptism from last week 

2-3. Merry Christmas from your favorite companionship of Greenies! (Yes I am wearing red pants, Elder Kabosha gave them to me).

We took pictures at the tree in the Bank!

Moyamba Week 17

So I did indeed get transferred but it is a funny story that I will explain later. 

This past week has been packed with so many different things lets hope I don't forget them all. 

As the Christmas season is upon I am sure we all know about the Light The World campaign that The Church puts out every year. And us as missionaries were especially challenged by our leaders to light Sierra Leone. While trying to find ways to do service in the small town, one of our recent converts in the Branch invited us to her farm to help harvest groundnut. Groundnut is a smaller sweeter peanut. They eat them like Americans eat peanuts at a ball game and they also make them into a soup and put it over rice to eat. So on Tuesday we left our apartment at 7am to go pick groundnut. We picked groundnut from 7 am to 11am and it honestly did not seem like that long. We were out a ways from the town in the middle of the field surrounded by mountains and it was beautiful. I didn't take my camera but we are going back on Wednesday so I will make sure to take pictures then. 

Friday is when transfer news was given to us. Late in the evening, so it made the day really long, especially because we left the apartment again at 7am this time to clean the font for the baptism on Saturday. But inside Moyamba there is 1 branch and four missionaries split into 2 areas, Moyamba 1 and Moyamba 2. When I was sent to Moyamba I was sent to Moyamba 1. Well, when transfer news came we found that Elder Kabosha and I had been transferred. Elder Kabosha to Congo Cross inside Freetown, and me to... Moyamba 2. My transfer was transferring bedrooms. Elder Flake and I will be companions and if you remember Elder Flake came on mission one transfer after me. So, I'll be the senior companion and they'll have two inexperienced missionaries walking around trying to figure things out. But it will be SUPER FUN!

The next day we had our baptism. But Satan tried really hard not to let this baptism happen. First off we couldn't get the pump to work so we couldn't get the water from the well to the font. After we got the pump to start we found the font was leaking and not holding water. So we got that someone what fixed and then the well ran out of water. We maybe had a foot and a half on water in the font. And because they found a parasite in the river recently, going there wasn't an option. So we baptized five people in a foot and a half of water. Only two of them we were able to fully immerse on the first try. One brother, it took us 7 tries. But it worked out and they were all confirmed yesterday. 

I continue to grow each day and I am humbled each and every day as I see the conditions that those we serve live in. I love this Gospel and continue to grow my testimony that Jesus is the Christ and as we celebrated his birthday this Christmas Season I know that he was born of the Virgin Mary and came to be our Savior.

Elder Hendricks 

1. Contacted this guy, pretty much only because he was wearing a Seattle Jersey

Moyamba 16

I am so sorry for not ending a big email last week, my only excuse is that I didn't really feel like it.  I will try to update you a little on what happened the week before as well!

Thanksgiving was like any other day, which sucked because I love Thanksgiving but I guess its good to get away from all the food and football and just really think about gratitude. And while we didn't have good food on Thursday, Monday we went to Bo for our Zone Conference. We had a Zone activity where we rented the Bo Stadium (imagine like Memorial Stadium in Seattle) and played Soccer and Football all morning. It was fun to play and also see other missionaries. Then that night we went to Doha's Hotel and enjoyed some nice food. I spent 170,000 Le ($20.24 USD) and got pizza, a burger, and a strawberry milkshake. It was the first time since leaving that I had dairy and I handled it decently :)

We then had our Zone Conference on Tuesday morning and it was very spiritually uplifting and it was centered around if we are truly happy with the work we are doing. The conference ended with the mission nurse giving instruction on not dating other missionaries. So I was kinda interested in what experience prompted her to share that news for us. 

We then came back to Moyamba after the conference that afternoon and went to hang out with our Branch President and we taught him how to play Uno. His family lives in Freetown so sometimes he just wants people to hang out with him! We are always happy to help. 

In terms of proselyting this week, it went very well. It was a quick week but it was sweet. Nothing out of the ordinary besides messing with our blind recent convert small small (and teaching lessons. Friday night President Bannister said he made us food so we went for dinner and enjoyed Casava Leaf and Monkey! And he said maybe one P-Day he would take us monkey hunting in the real bush. 

In terms of funny stuff this week, on Saturday night during our institute class the door to the upstairs of the building that we use, somehow got locked and no one had the key. So it resulted in President Bannister telling my companion to kick the door in. So while we got upstairs to the Presidents Office the building is now one door short. 

Now to get to the subject of the email. Yesterday in church we were asked to help bless these kids so they can become children of record. We happily obliged and as we were standing up to stand in the circle to bless the child we were informed that the father decided he was not worthy at that moment. So take a wild guess on who got to bless the children. That's right me. I knew that I would be doing some crazy things on the mission but I never thought that I would bless a baby. But its only for experience right?

This week is that last week of the transfer and I am in no man's land if I'll stay in Moyamba or not? So who knows where I will be next week. 

I love this Gospel and I know that Jesus is the Christ and that he redeemed our sins so that we can return to live with Heavenly Father again. I love the Book of Mormon and know that it is the true word of God.

Elder Hendricks

1.Our Baptism (Maada on left was Baptized in September, we got to witness for him as he baptized his best friend Melvin.)

2. Thanksgiving Dinner :(

3. Helping a yw in the branch take her things back from the market. 

4. Sunset from the church building  

A few extra notes from emaills between Will and his mom:

Thanks for the good sports update and I was bummed about the cougs bowl game but, oh well. And yes, I screamed again about the M's. I don’t know how many rebuilding years I can take in my young life.

I have heard that you can find Nativities inside Freetown, but in terms of Moyamba, we have nothing. A combination of poverty and lack of interest I think contribute to it. We don’t have a Christmas party - they are calling it a year end party.