What a week! This is going down in the record book as one of the
most exciting weeks I’ve had on my mission so far. And from the email it sounds
like everything is going well “chez-nous” as the French would say. That’s sad
that no trick-or-treaters came to the door. I was reminded on Halloween that I’m
pumped to have a family in the future cuz it gives me an excuse to go do things
like trick-or-treating, as well as dress up in a costume. But even in Africa I
found a way to celebrate –but I’ll get to that in the email.
To answer your questions. I think I was honestly sent to Africa
to learn how to simply relax and go through life without complicating things.
Now hear me out on this one. On a mission there are a bunch of formalities, and
procedures, and politically correct things to say, and “wrong” ways to teach.
And if you’re not careful you’ll start to worry about following the procedures
so much that you don’t focus on the people. For example, you’ll go into a
lesson worrying more about perfectly presenting a scripture than helping answer
someone’s question.
Another way to explain it is kinda like those kid pageant shows
they put on tv. Do you guys remember those? How the moms are perfectionists and
go crazy psycho! And if the little kid makes a mistake the moms get furious.
And for us watching it’s like: “wooo woman, calm down it’s a little 5 year old
girl that simply tripped –I mean you put her in like 10 inch heels – what are
you expecting?” So you see, sometimes in life we go psycho when things just
don’t work out (like those kid pageants). Maybe when a date isn’t as romantic
as we expected, or we fail a test, or we don’t get a promotion at work, etc etc
etc. The list is endless. And I don’t think that that is how God wants us to
view life. In the perfectionist view – if it isn’t perfect, it’s a failure. I
think being out here gave me a MASSIVE reality check.
In this mission, I like to think that we simply work. That’s the
general attitude of the Americans here – we are here to work and that’s that,
let’s not complicate it. We go out in the morning and do our best, then come
home, share fun stories and laugh at the failures we had. Obviously we don’t
want to sit in imperfection – but all of us get that we are imperfect for the
time being. So you see, out here in Africa it is like the “front lines of the
church” and because it’s such we aren’t worried about “political correctness”
and perfect formality – we’re just looking to baptize and help others with the
gospel.
Maybe that explains why I think I’m out here in Africa and not
anywhere else. As well, I’m still so excited that I got to go to Africa and
here is why:
So Monday of last week, the Yemin family invited us over to eat
dinner with them. And this is a pretty well off family. So we go over there and
have just an amazing meal with the family. Fish and Pork and Ndolé and manioc!
The family has 6 kids, and 3 of the daughters formed a dance group –and they
are actually pretty good. They dance at festivals to sponsor new products and
such. While, we ate the dad showed us some of their videos. They’re a fun little
family.
On Tuesday and Wednesday we had a bunch of meetings with the
Mission President. We received two new Elders which meant a lot of meetings on
training and welcoming. I think on Wednesday (there first day here) I heard
“Welcome, we are excited to have you in the mission.” Almost 100 times. It’s
like, ok guys, I think they feel welcomed enough! Well they seemed a little shocked and
overwhelmed, but it’ll be fun to get to know them in the coming months.
President Monga had 3 big announcements he brought with him. One, Brazzaville
(the Captial of Congo) is opening up to white people this next transfer which
is in one week! So Monday, I’ll let you
know who the lucky Americans are. Two, by the end of the year we will receive
10 new missionaries! Three, if members don’t pick up the participation in
missionary work – the missionaries will be removed from Douala (my current
city)! Okay – confirmation – our mission president is crazy haha. But it’s
exciting to see that he is putting some fire under the members to get them
moving. Well after our minds blew up with all those announcements the week
continued.
I heard another witch story that I thought I’d share with you.
We crossed paths with a woman from California – well she is from Cameroon but
lives in America currently. She told us that she had a friend here, and the
friend never use to eat at people’s houses. Every day she would go to restaurants and eat
there. Until one day a friend of this friend convinced her to come over for
soup. The young friend sat down and was really hesitant to take the soup.
Finally after a bunch of persuasion the friend drank the soup and immediately
felt sick. She cried, “What did you put in the soup?” The host replied,
“babalou!” Which is a poison that comes from roots of a plant found in Nigeria!
(Okay, pause, what?! A woman poisoned her friend. Why?) The host continued,
“The poison will only kill a witch. I give it to every guest in my house, to
keep myself safe.” Now, I don’t really believe African folk-lore, but I can buy
this one, especially for Africa. Well the story continued and the girl friend
was fine in the end – yeah!
As well, to go along with folk-lore, while in the marché some
black magic went down. Some young lady wanted to get her hair braided and
stuff. She asked for a very complicated hair style that was supposed to take
hours. (some hair styles can literally take all day to finish) Well on this
occasion the hair was styled in 30 minutes. The young girl exclaimed to the
stylist, “How did you finish so fast? Did you just do a terrible job?” She
picked up a mirror to look at it, and saw that the stylist had multiple arms!!!
AHHH!!! No this isn’t a scene from “men in black”, just another crazy story.
They make me laugh so much.
Now sometimes, these folk-lore make it into our lessons with Amis
and then things go bizarre. I’ll have to tell you about another story next
week.
Later on in the week. To celebrate Halloween, I had a brilliant
idea. I wanted to carve an orange. It’s orange season here so you can buy a
massive orange for 75 francs (less than 20 cents). So I bought the biggest
orange I could find and went to work. My equipment consisted of a knife or two,
and a spoon. And wouldn’t you know, it worked! So well in fact that Elder Hatch
made one as well. We lite them up and in the dark, read a scary Edgar Alain Poe
story that the senior couple printed off for us – “the tell tale heart”. I’ll
send you a picture of the yellow-green-O-lanterns! (we call oranges,
yellow-greens because they aren’t actually orange) I think I just created a new
Halloween tradition for myself!
Now for the main story. This happened yesterday. Now the story
will be in normal type and I will put my comments in parenthesis and italics.
So I suggest you read the story first, skipping the comment, to understand well
what happened. Then go back and read it with my comments. Alright here we go.
Sunday 2 November
It’s a normal fast Sunday as Elder Okon and I walk through
marché central to arrive at our next teaching appointment. Now Sundays in Africa are a little different
than America. Everything is just void on the streets. The shops are closed and
there isn’t that much traffic, or people for the matter. Today in the marché
there are maybe 50 people spread out on the streets. On a normal day I make
sure my camera is zipped inside my bag so it doesn’t get stolen while I walk
through the marché. But today I rationalize; my camera is safe in the outer
pocket of my bag. And as I can see there are no crowds of people. I can see
everyone.
(Moments before entering the marche I had the idea that we
should take a taxi, but rationalized again, that we didn’t have enough money)
Well, we keep trucking along and as we our leaving the marché
territory I feel a slight bump on my side and a tug on my bag. Just ever so
slight.
(At this moment I was literally thinking about wanting to take a
picture of how empty the roads are to show you guys what it‘s like. That was
obviously an inspired thought from God)
I quickly brush my hand over the pocket to check that the camera
is there, and to my surprise it is not! In that very moment I turn around to
see if it dropped and to my surprise even more, I see a 30 year old 6ft tall
African man slipping it into his back pocket. He is 10 feet away from me and we
are walking in opposite directions.
(now pause and consider the situation, my companion is walking
in front and didn’t know what was going on, so he would be no help. As well
this man is considerably bigger and older than me. He isn’t massive but he is
definitely bigger and older. As well, I’m the foreigner in the situation. I
think, in my head the following event was purely instinct. The reaction was
literally instantaneous. When you read the story it might sound like two separate
actions, but it was more like one fluid motion. In my head I had only one
thought. If I lose that camera, I just lost a lot of memories !)
So there goes Elder Johnson. Full on sprint after the man, not
knowing what he will do, only that he will get his camera back. Getting closer,
the man is alerted to my pursuit and starts running as well. But, it’s too late
– I’m in striking distance. Continuing the chase, I reach out and grab the
collar of his jersey, determined that he isn’t leaving. I pull him back, as I
continue my full on sprint forward, causing the jersey to rip, slighty.
(Again pause, I have a number of choices here. The best option
is probably to just pull the camera from his pocket and let him be. That would
be the most non-combative option and it wouldn’t make me look like a bad guy.
But, what do I do? Probably the most aggressive option. Yeah Johnson, that
sounds like a good option haha !)
I literally jump forward and instinctively wrap my left arm
around his neck. The physics behind it all causes us to get some air time! Now
on the sidewalk, I have this big black man in a head lock and I’m yelling,
«Donne-moi l’appareil ! »
(Okay, well I’m committed now. I just started a fight with this
man. Before he probably wouldn’t have harmed me, but now a little white boy is
attacking him and he might think I’m trying to kill him! If that doesn’t give
him a reason to punch me, I don’t know what would. So I decide, there is no
going back now. If I let him go I might get hurt – so you just keep him there)
I keep holding him in this head lock as he squirms to get free,
repeating the same demand. At this point he gets twisted around and grabs my
shirt by the abs.
(Well I just lost that advantage on him. The first thought it
this – he might have a knife and he is going to stab you any second. Get
ready…set…okay, this is stupid! BUT MY CAMERA!)
(that night in telling the story to the other elders, we joking
said « god was watching that fight and thought, ohh well I guess I better make
the knife in this guys pocket disappear so Elder Johnson doesn’t die » haha.)
Afraid of being stabbed, I push him off me and demand the
camera! In the chaos of it all he had thrown it on the ground behind me. «
C’est la » is his response.
(Telling Elder Okon about it later, he told me that the man most
likely threw it on the ground to make me look like a fool. You know, a young
kid drops his camera and over-reacts by jumping on a random black man and
choking him.)
I quickly took my camera and walked off, making sure to keep
looking at him as I go.
(Now, I may or may not have done the « come at me bro » gesture
in walking past him haha !!)
Unnoticed before by me, all 50 people in the marché are now
looking at me. Cheering and congratulating me haha! The old mamas are saying
“c’est ca mon fils!” (that’s how you do it, my son) and the punk moto-taxi
drivers cheering and giving me thumbs up! I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel
like a total boss. That night I prayed and said, “God thanks for keeping us
safe, even when we do really stupid stuff”. Well I got my camera back, and
earned some major street cred.
(So it looked like those CQC (close Quarter Combat) practices
paid off. SO SICK! While walking away, this was my thought – maybe law
enforcement could be my career path – that was kinda fun! Haha)
I don’t know if I’ll ever have a story more intense than that!
Hopefully that doesn’t scare you too much. Just know that I’m safe out here and
I’m extremely happy. I doubt God would let anything happen to me. I love all
you guys and can’t wait to share all those memories I saved! Keep safe, especially when jumping on big
people’s back haha. I love you guys, once more and wish you the best for the
second term of school!
Ps – maybe God sent me to Africa to learn how to become a good
story teller?
And
we came across a bunch of tires burning in a cemetery. Kinda strange.
Our
yellow-green-O-lanterns. Mine is on the left.
A cow in a dumpster.
Cow! Whatcha be doing?
