Week 24: Well, Ghana is Still Ghana, The Kids Still Shout 'Obruni' a Ton, It's Still Hot, and Humid!

Ladies and Gentleman. Boys and girls! I have an announcement to make. My Twi name has to be changed to Nana Kwame Chingalingy (skinny) because the weight is coming off! 

Man I wish the mission just miraculously would get like 1 million Cedis to put A/C units in each of the apartments. Do you know how nice that would be? They wouldn't have to keep buying new fans and fixing them. We would have A/C! I think I’m a genius for this idea to be honest. But yeah, it is just so hard to sleep even when you have fans on you. I don’t think I have gone 1 minute without sweating since I have been here haha. But yeah, now every single one of my shirts have been tailored about 2 inches from each side and a little around the arms. I feel a sense of accomplishment now! Next step will be getting my pants tailored too. By the way, I don’t think I have ripped my pants since I was in the MTC. So that’s good I guess.

Man, anyone will preach nowadays. I don’t know if it is just a Ghana thing or what. But yeah I have had encounters this week with "prophets" and a "prophetess." They will preach anywhere, in markets on the side of the road and even in Trotros. And the sad thing about it is that people actually give them a ton of money also. I don’t get it.

We have a mission tour on Thursday. A general authority is coming. I  forgot the person coming.

One thing I have to say and compliment about this country is life is so simple here. Literally, the life for little kids is so different than back home. Back home, the kids get into video games and get phones pretty early and here the kids literally play with sticks and play in the dirt and chase each other around. One thing I think is kinda funny is when they play Holy Ghost Fire. Pretty much they yell 'HOLY GHOST FIRE' and act like they are throwing something. Then the other kid falls to the ground in a hysterical way. Then he gets up and does the same thing to his friend. Haha. If only I could send videos home, people would get a kick out of it.

Well, I think this week has been a pretty good week. I don’t think we had light off for more than 30 minutes. So I guess you could say we enjoyed running water and fans this week. (Yes, if there is no light, you don’t get water)

Well an interesting thing that happened this week. We got invited to an investigator’s funeral. Apparently a military truck was driving and hit her little boy. I don’t think he was more that 6 years old. It is very sad just sitting at this funeral. I could just feel the sorrow for this family. But what I wasn't expecting is they wanted me to pray for the casket (No I didn't do a dedication) lol. I tried to throw Lewis-Reese under the bus. But, of course, they wanted the white man to do it. That was something that I have never experienced before. So after I said a simple prayer, they buried the body. Wow Ghana is full of surprises. What was a little funny about this experience, and probably never will go to a funeral in Ghana ever again because of it, is that when the casket was coming this woman, maybe in her 40's, started to go crazy. She wasn't even a part of the family. I think maybe she was mad at the military for killing this boy. But yeah pretty much she started to go crazy and take her shirt off it took 3 women to hold her back. Let’s just say I’m scarred for life now..... It’s not something anyone should ever see in their lives.....

But the sad part about this week, no baptism. Apparently, our branch made a rule that baptisms can only be held on the 2nd and last Sundays of each month. So hopefully we will have it next week. But Janet was pretty upset about it. Ghanaians don’t joke about their salvation when they are ready to be baptized. They want to get baptized. She is kinda mad that we got her hopes up. But we talked about it and everything is okay. Let’s pray for next week!

So a couple of investigators we are working on right now who are progressing is the first being Bridget. Her only problem is getting to church on time. This Sunday, we went to her house in the morning to help her with her kids. Low and behold she was at church on time to take the Sacrament. Pretty much the whole branch wants her to be baptized. The other day, the 2nd counselor in the stake presidency went to go visit her. So I hope that she can be baptize soon. She has come to church every week I have been here and even far before I have been here. But she has only made it on time twice.

The second being a guy named Peter. He used to be taught by elders a long time ago and every time we go over there he has a ton of questions about the church, although we can only meet with him a couple times a week. But the good news is, is that he is free on Sundays! He really enjoys the teachings and I’m excited to work with him.

This is pretty much who we are focusing on investigators wise for this week. The branch has asked us to work plenty with less actives. So we are trying our best to balance the two. We are trying to increase our teaching pool through contacting and even trying to get referrals from members.

This Sunday for 3rd hour they had everyone come together. This was our day to teach about how to do missionary work. All the missionaries in Adoagyiri Branch evenly contributed and we got some nice feedback from it. I talked about the importance of missionary work to start out. Elder Koetting talked about how to give a referral to the missionaries. Elder Lewis-Reese set up role plays and Elder Skog talked about being an example. So I think it went really well and I enjoy being in this branch because they really have that desire to do missionary work!

That was pretty much my week!