Juju Men, Bloody knuckles & Answered Prayers

Well, everything is going great as always!  Man, LDS temples are so sweet! One of the missionaries in our apartment/mansion, Elder Taylor, is from Wyoming and was freaking out because the temple they announced is like right near his house. Turns out people from Wyoming are really proud of being from Wyoming. Who knew?  Hahaha. He's a cool guy though. He and I always get in these super deep doctrine talks and look up all kinds of stuff in the scriptures. The Old Testament is so crazy. But it's so cool. I got the package from Grandma Semmerling so Grandma, thank you very, very much! I'm enjoying everything. especially the germx. Haha! And speaking of packages, Elder and Sister Patterson, thank you for the Mac & Cheese. I already ate some... Elder Pabie thought it looked gross. Haha but I loved it so thank you so much!

As far as the Krio goes- I'm learning a little bit more every day. I do pretty well with understanding it, but speaking it will still take some time. I try to talk to little kids because they don't make you feel bad when you mess it up. And they're stinking adorable. Haha. But the reason they don't teach it in the MTC is pretty interesting. I was talking with President Roggia and talking about how the Krio was going and he answered that very question. He said that what they really wanted instead of us learning to speak Krio was for the people to learn English. The reason being because everything in the Church for them will be in English- the scriptures, talks, hymns, etc. and we were called to an english speaking mission. I'm still going to learn Krio though, it makes buying things in the market a lot easier. Haha. Just an interesting answer to the question though. It makes sense.

I have to admit that I'm pretty sad I don't get to see any conference this week. I always kind of took it for granted. I'm glad I was able to go to some sessions last year though. How General Conference works here (at least as much as I understand, the explanation I got was pretty unsure too), is that we get sent a DVD with like one (maybe both?) of the Sunday sessions, and then we watch it in the branch this coming Sunday. We will get the Liahona which will have talks in it though. So I'll enjoy that. I always loved conference weekend though! Haha.

K story time. So Elder Pabie and I were riding on some motorbikes when I suddenly heard the sound of drums up ahead. I looked forward and saw a group of about 20 people dancing around walking down the street. They were stopped on this really narrow bridge that we had to cross. As we got right up to them it turned out they were "juju" men. Yeah that really exists. There were some guys called "debuls" (devils) in the middle with blood on their faces dancing around wearing these crazy looking bright colored clothes. We needed to pass by them but they were all stopping us not letting us pass. Don't worry they weren't being like violent or anything. More like annoying and in our way. The guy driving Elder Pabie's bike was really annoyed and kept trying to go through the crowd and some guy started dancing in front of their bike. It was pretty funny. After a couple minutes they let us through. Later we passed by that area and they were still there. Except now there was about 75 people and there were tons of people lining the sides of the street screaming out chants and stuff while some other guys were dancing and beating drums in the middle. We drove straight through them. The motorbike drivers don't have time for that stuff. Haha. I guess the Lord doesn't really either because suddenly they were all hit by lightning. Okay not really but that would have been pretty crazy.

K second story. I hand washed my clothes today and my knuckles bled.

K third story. During this past week there was this recent convert we were briefly meeting with and she said that she was struggling with her faith. We talked a little more and she said it was because the father of her kids wouldn't ever call her or talk and she didn't understand why she was going through this stuff when she was going to Church and doing everything right. Sadly, there's a lot of single moms here. We read her Ether 12:27 and told her to pray about it and that as long as she was sincere she would truly receive an answer. A couple of days later I went on exchanges with our Disrict Leader (Elder Wood, he's from Utah. He's super cool) and Elder Pabie went to our area with Elder Wood's companion Elder Essego (He's from Nigeria and was in the MTC with me, also very cool. He likes to steal the airflow of my fan though. Haha). Elder Pabie told me later that when they talked to that sister again she said she had received an answer to her prayer. After we had left she said she prayed about it and asked for strength with everything. Later she was laying down and her phone rang. It was the man and he said he had 300,000 leones for her and the kids. Elder Pabie said she had tears in her eyes when she said all of it. I was so happy! Sad I wasn't there, but man, so sweet. Prayer really works people.

Speaking of prayers, we've already given like 3 or 4 blessings. I really can't describe the faith of people here. They're so good! A week ago we also had FHE with a part member family. We came up with the plan for it and Mom and Dad I think you would be proud to know that I picked Love At Home for the opening song. Then I told them why I loved that hymn and how it was always annoying when my parents would start singing it when I would fight with my sisters. I guess I was talking too fast though because no one laughed. A lot of people don't get sarcasm here though. So that happens a lot. They just take me seriously. Haha. It was a sweet FHE though. That family is so so cool.

Anyway, time is running out but before I go- Clayton and Nielsens, I got your letters but won't have a chance to write back until next week! And Clayton, I especially think you would love Sierra Leone. Man, something about this place just screams Clayton Bridge would love it here. True story. Alright well, I'll explain the pictures and then talk to everyone again next week!

 That's where we live. Yup. It's huge. Well the right half of it is us. The left half is where a branch meets every Sunday for the time being.

 That's a snail. The snails here are HUGE. The one in the picture is a smaller one. I saw one the other day that would be a tiny bit smaller than a computer mouse. Crazy.

 There's actually a really funny story behind how that mouse got killed but it will have to wait until next time. Needless to say it was really annoying at night but we got it.

 These are adorable African children we taught. Some of them are the children of the lady in the story above actually. Those kids are awesome.

That's a squirrel. It didn't bite me. We were buying some stuff from this lady we know and this kid walked up holding it. He said he bought it for 4000 leones, so like a little less than 1 dollar. It was really obedient actually. It just hung out in your palm. I wanted one. Maybe when I come back after my mission. Haha.

This mission is sweet and I'm loving it here! I'm still trying to learn how to do everything without the help of Elder Pabie but it's coming along. Everyone keep sending letters and packages if you feel so inclined. I love getting them! I'll do my best to write back but we're super busy all the time! Well, I love and miss everyone!

Love,

Elder Hunty