Eric's e-mail dated 6/30/08

Eric has been assigned to serve in Freetown and, for now, has internet service. Yea! He has no restrictions on who he can and cannot e-mail right now so if you would like to send him a message his e-mail address is eric_goutes@msn.com. He sounds great! Here it is:

Dear Family and Friends:

Happy monday peoples. So I am in Freetown right now, serving in the Congo Cross branch. There are only five zones in the whole mission. 2 of them in freetown, one in bo, and two in monrovia. So those will be the only places I will serve unless we expand, which is possible. My companion is Elder Sadare. He is from Nigeria as well. He actually looks kinda scary but he is like a black shrek. He is really cool to be around and we get along very well. I have been thrust into a completely different world. Everyone here speaks Krio, and yes, I am learning it on the fly. So far I can understand most people but I can't speak it very well yet. But I am learning. It is like broken English, but if you are not used to it, you won't be able to understand anything. I feel like a pirate when I speak in Krio. Savvy?

I am in an apartment with 6 Elders total. Elders Olaveson and cooper, and Elders Jackson and Kargna. Jackson and Olaveson are from the United States, with Olaveson being my white brother. The other two elders are from liberia. I get along with all of them very well. I am sleeping in a mosquito net everynight, and it doesn't bother me at all because without it the mosquito's would attack me. or maybe i'm just so paranoid about them that I psychologically need the net. I have had rice EVERYMEAL. And you all would think that what I am eating is weird. On top of the rice we usually have some sort of leave (cassava, potatoe, or green) and it looks really nasty. but it actually tastes pretty good. most of the food is really really spicy, so i will have to get used to that. The apartment we live in is one of the nicer buildings in freetown. after seeing what the members live in i'd say i'm pretty lucky. For the african elders this kind of living is a step up, but for the american elders it is a big step down. even with that step down, we are still living pretty good for the conditions. aparently I came at a good time because the gas just barely game, before that the elders were cooking with charcoal.

President Squires is awesome. I loved the small amount of time I got to spend with him. He really knows what he is doing. He told us that our purpose here as missionaries is to build the kingdom, not necessarily get baptisms. Sierra Leone doesn't need converts, they need leaders. So our time this week has been spent visiting the Less Active and Recent Converts, and not so much in finding people to teach. This is something that I will have to adjust to. but the members I have met here so far are really awesome. We had 100 people attend our branch this sunday, which is apparently pretty good. Our church is very small compared to yours at home. It is three stories with the chapel on the third floor. Which is really neat because when the windows are open you have an awesome view towards the ocean. in fact freetwon is kinda like a valley that leads right into the ocean. The whole city seems to be on a mountain. It looks really sweet. I can see the ocean from just about any street in my area.

We had a super p-day today, which means that our whole zone spent the day together, playing volleyball and basketball (but the basketball wasn't competitive, its kinda like playing with joshua's third grade team.) I hope I answered all of your questions. Oh Elder Sadare has been out since last april. I have seen so many things but I don't think I could explain them all. This city is very different from home, but I have adjusted already. The language will come over time. Oh, we come in from proselyting when it gets dark. not because of safety reasons but because the city doesn't always have power (or the people don't have lights) and we kinda need to see them in order to teach or read our scriptures. it really is the rainy season, because it rains alot. not heavy rain all the time but it can happen.

I learned something in church on Sunday. We need to have better family scripture study. My suggestion for the week is to read the scriptures and then discuss them. have the person who reads talk about what the read after they read. i hope that makes sense. And everyone needs to have a good attitude about it.

I think that is about it for this week. President Squires didn't say anything about not having friends email me. so that means that anyone can email me on this email address. the myldsmail.net service doesn't really work here in sierra leone. so if anyone wants to talk to me let them email me. because writing letters apparently takes a long time to get to me. I have only gotten one from you and one from sherrie. But don't worry about me, i'm fine here camping in africa. everything is great.

Elder Degen

Eric is now in Sierra Leone!

Hey guys,

I made it safely to Sierra Leone. I am in the Mission Home right now, we just had dinner. We had an interesting experience getting here. The airport almost didn't let us on the plane because it was full. But Brother Engemann worked his magic and got us back on the plane, in first class. It was pretty sweet. Once we arrived in Sierra Leone, we weren't quite yet in Freetown. I already love it here. The people are more friendly than in Ghana, and from what I've seen so far, Sierra Leone is much greener than Ghana. Ghana was kinda brown and it reminded me of a humid St. George. We didn't get to ride the helicopter over to the mission home because it wasn't really working. So we got to take the hovercraft instead. Yeah, an actual hovercraft that like hovered over the water. That took like and hour to get over the bay. An Elder had met us at the airport and guided us across the bay to greet us with President Squires.

I learned that we make 52 elders in the mission and it is spread out in 4 disticts across the two countries. I'm not sure where I'll be serving first but I will find out shortly, probably tomorrow. P-day is on monday so if the internet cafe's are running that is when you will hear from me next. So if you don't hear from me then the internet is down so don't worry. I love you all and i'm so glad that i'm finally here. Have a great week.

Elder Degen

Eric's latest e-mail dated 6/22/08

All is well here in the Ghana MTC. All of the Elders are really excited to get out and start preaching the gospel though. I have loved my stay here in the MTC and will miss all of the good friends that I have made here. I have learned how to say hello in 5 different languages, including one of the tribal languages in Ghana.

My schedule here in the MTC is very busy. I am actually in class for most of the day with a devotional here and there. I get up at 6:30 have breakfast at 7 study for an hour. class until noon. lunch for 45 minutes. class til 4. then we have activity time every day. during activity time we get the chance to play basketball, futball, ping pong, or volleyball. I enjoy playing all as you can probably guess. Playing basketball isn't as popular here because the Africans are not very good at it. I love playing volleyball with the Tongan Elders, we dominate the game. The most popular game is of course soccer. I have only played a couple of times but I have left my mark with some goals. they don't really trust us white people until we score. The elders that play ping pong are really good. they would give the chinese a run for there money. We then have dinner at 5. class until 9:30. then bed at 10. I know it sounds boring, but there is alot of excitement going on all the time.

I got the chance to go to the temple again this week. It sadened me that I won't be able to go back for a couple of years, but I think i'll be alright. We also had a great experience to going out and tracting with my MTC companion for 2 1/2 hours. We ended up teaching the first lesson 4 times. This catholic lady seemed interested and we left her a copy of the book of mormon. Africa is really like the 1800's with cell phones and cars. chickens and goats are running around everywhere. and People are everywhere carrying baskets of who knows what on their heads. We will get to go back tracting in the same area tomorrow to teach that same lady. I hope all will go well before we leave her for the ghana missionaries.

I leave for Sierra Leone on Tuesday. I'm not really sure when I will arrive but I'm sure you will know about it from somebody. I think that the Sierra Leone p-day is on mondays but I could be wrong.

My companion sends his best reguards. As he is standing right behind me reading everyword I type. He is a great guy even though he doesn't smile any of his pictures. He will be going back to Nigeria to serve. He loves music and can sing and play the piano very well. Thanks for telling me about the Celtics. This is the first time I have heard and all the American elders shouted for joy, while all the african elders looked at us funny. I think the draft is this week, tell the jazz to draft Roy Hibbert from Georgetown. I love you all and have a great week.

Elder Degen

First E-mail from Eric dated

Why Hello again, All is well here in Ghana. I am learning so much at a very rapid pace. I am in class ALL DAY LONG. i'm being serious. My companion is from Nigeria. His name is Elder Iyiewuare (pronounced ee-eh-wahr-ee). We get along just fine. He has a great knowledge of the Bible as do most of the African Elders. He will be serving in Nigeria. There are only 32 of us missionaries here. all but 8 are native africans. We have a couple of Elders from Tonga. I am loving it here! These africans are very enjoyable to be around. I have made some great friends that I probably won't ever see again as only 5 of us are going to the Sierra Leone mission. The food here is pretty good, i guess.

I swear they try and find ways to have rice in every meal and in every form. Like today, we had rice cereal. no really the rice was in some warm milk. I was so grateful for the night we had speghetti and ice cream. Ice cream tastes so good when you haven't had it in a while, and because it is the coldest thing I have touched since i've been here.

My teaching skills have improved so much. We have already covered Lesson 1 and this week we will finish the rest of the Lessons. President Harmon is awesome. He truly is a man of God. This is his third mission (France and Madagascar). We have already been to the temple once and we get to go again next week. It was probably the coolest thing ever. We got to do two endowment sessions and I loved them both. It is a very small temple. Most of the african Elders took out their own endowments when we went. I love it here. I will get to email you next week from this address, and from there on out i'm not really sure. my bag did come, but not until sunday night. all is well. I love you all. ELDER DEGEN

American Elders arriving in Ghana on 6/6/08 with President and Sister Harmon