Eric's e-mail dated 7/28/08

Kushe,

That is a greeting in Krio, and I hear it all day long. It sounds like everyone back at home is having a good time. I am glad that Brittany and Gavin are taking advantage of the great youth activities. Scout camp and girls camp don't really exist here. And Gavin only 5 merit badges? I think I did 7. But hey, remember if you don't do them at the camp then you will have to do them at home, which isn't fun. And I've never been to girls camp so I can't really comment on it, sorry Britt. So it rained in Utah.

I remember when it rained back at home, it was kind of an event. Here it is just normal life. I have to wear a rain coat most days because it pretty much rains all day. And we are in the heart of the rainy season. August is the worst month, or so I hear. It is very common to see the streets flooded, which makes it fun to get to our appointments. its kind of like a video game, where we are avoiding the big puddles of water. This city has huge gutters, like 2 feet wide and 3 feet deep but even then, the water still overflows onto the street. And since this whole city is one big rock it all flows toward the ocean. Even though I wear a raincoat I still get wet because it is still hot here, so I sweat like crazy with the coat on. Its a good thing my shoes are waterproof because wearing wet shoes would really not be fun. Just ask my companion.

So I had a very busy week this week. On Wednesday I went on splits with Elder Albright (he is my MTC mate, we came the same day). Which was really fun to see how someone else is coping with this mission. The reason for the split was his companion is the zone leader and we needed to get some investigators interviewed for baptism. It really helped me with my Krio because neither of us could speak it very well. It comes gradually, I learn a new word everyday. But I really enjoyed teaching with elder Albright.

We had a baptism on Saturday. We had 3 scheduled but only 2 were baptized. The other one, A-boy, was not baptized because our branch president did not want him to get baptized because he is going to school in a couple months where a place the church is not yet established. It really makes no sense to me, but I must obey my priesthood leaders. The others were named Tamba Kamara, and this old Grandma, we call here Grandma Jah. This Grandma has a son that is a member of the church but is less active. They live together and Elder Sadare has been in contact with this family for quite sometime. While we were trying to reactivate this family the grandma sat in on the lesson. We were reminding them of the covenant they made at baptism and the importance of taking the sacrament each week. We were reading in Mosiah 18, and this grandma expressed a great desire to be baptized. So we began teaching her and she was baptized on Saturday. This woman was all but dead according to Elder Peterson, but in Elder Sadare gave her a blessing some time ago and this gospel has literally brought her new life. You can see the change, she has been born again. Although at her age she is very fragile, so getting her under the water was tricky. Elder Jackson pulled a good manuever and kind of bear hugged her and took her down. I was kind of scared for her, but looking back it was kind of funny to watch.

The other man, Tamba Kamara, was contacted before I came. I only taught him from lesson 3 on. He is an amazing carpenter. Pretty much everything he builds is by hand tools and they are amazing. It was a really neat experience to witness this baptism. I know that Lord provided us with this success and I can't take any of the credit. We have plenty more investigators. You wanted the names so here they are. Amadu, Fatmata Sesay, Racheal, Mabinti, and Agnes. Those are the ones we are going to focus on this week. Transfers are every 6 weeks. So in a week and a half.

I don't think I'm going anywhere because my branch is actually going to be split soon. If anyone were to go it would be my companion, who has been in this area since january. I recieve mail every 3 week at zone conferences. we have a zone conference this week so I will let you know next week what I recieved. I think I answered all the questions and my spiritual suggestion of the week is to study the sacrament prayers. I love you all and Remember what you stand for.

Elder Degen