Power Outage

5/26/15

Hey!

I got your emails and finally made it to a cyber so don’t worry about me. The entire country has been without power or water since Sunday. Not sure exactly what the problem is, but hopefully it has been fixed. The power just came back about an hour ago, so we are capitalizing on it before it cuts out again.

We’ve had a good week; Elder Ribera was put in as the 1st counselor in the Branch Presidency. I got to give a talk and also teach Sunday School. Both went by smoothly without any problems or weird questions. Things are going well; not many complaints.

Konan and Mayamba were transferred to Togo, so now Elder Ribera has moved into our apartment to work with Legbanon, who is from Benin. Now the entire City of Porto Novo is split among only 4 missionaries. Previously, we have had more missionaries working in several areas of the city. Now we four are all located in one apartment, and we have lots of walking to get to all of the amis we have all over the city.  

We went up to the roof of our neighbor's house yesterday (4 or 5 stories up), and got to see most of the city. We saw a water tower that is by the church (where we have lots of amis) and it seemed so far away! It is hard to believe that we actually make (i.e., WALK) that long trip out so often. Then we noted other landmarks in all directions where we have amis. It's really pretty impressive the amount of walking we do here.

Rainy season has officially started, so we’ve had a couple of pretty impressive storms. The storms are nice because the air cools down a few degrees and we get more cloud coverage. The other good news is that I found the African equivalent to funnel cake. It's called Ingnyam Behnyay. It is basically the exact same thing as funnel cake, but in a ball shape. And they only cost about 2 cents each, so I’ve been indulging quite a bit in the past week.

What else has been happening?...On Wednesday we started walking to Aimlonfide from Tokpota (about an hour walk). On the way we saw a school bus pass from a school that we recognized and knew to be near the church. We waved them down and convinced them to let the Yovos hitch a free ride. That was really nice, showing up to our first lesson near the church and not being completely drenched in sweat from the walk.

Saurel is doing well. He has a baptismal date set for the 13th of June, and he looks like he will be ready for that date. We also have a few new amis, including Hilaire, who is a little older than most our amis. He is really knowledgeable when it comes to the Bible. He’s fun to teach because although he is strong in his other church, he doesn’t try to Bible bash with us. 

We keep making efforts to teach G** and another older amis. We need a member with us when we teach G** because she’s female and doesn’t have any male friends that want to follow the lessons with her. It is difficult because she lives far away, so it can be hard to get members to go with us. 

There is one other bizarre story. Apparently, there is some huge public protest or manifestation going on at the airport today (like the ones that were going on when I had my accident). All today’s flights have been cancelled. It is poor timing because the missionaries who are going home this transfer were supposed to be on those flights. They will have to stay an extra night. 

Things are going well here. Hoping to have a few baptisms in the next few weeks. 

Love you, have a good week!

Elder Walls

Walking by huge piles of garbage

Walking companions

Me and my sector

Let's play I-Spy: Can you spot the water tower on the horizon? That is where the church building is located, along with several amis. We make that walk several times a week!