Goodbye Sekondi

Dear Family,

Hello!

I'm sorry I missed [emailing] last week. Dumb cafe. Well, internet access is more limited now, in some ways, but in other ways it's really good. I'm currently emailing from the Hanlons' apartment because there isn't any other good way to email up here. Interesting, right? [the Hanlons are a senior missionary couple serving in his zone]

This week has honestly been one of the longest ones of my mission. That's also probably compounded with the fact that I didn't really get to report about last week's adventures. Well, they're in the past, this week is full enough as it is--some big changes and a lot of things to describe.

Monday was spent buying some things and preparing to leave. I bought a couple Twix bars to keep me satisfied up here in Praso. Too bad I only have one of those left.

Tuesday was a fast day. I'll be honest, I cried a couple times. That morning we did our studies and everything, and as I was giving the closing prayer for our last companion study, I gotta admit, it wasn't easy.

We went to district meeting; that was a really good one. I said goodbye to the wonderful district. Thoughts on leaving my district were.. Well, I learned so many things during my time in Sekondi. I may have spent a while there, but there was a reason for me to be there; there were things I needed to learn during each transfer, month, week, and day. And I did learn. I'm so grateful for the time I spent in Sekondi.

 

Elders Price, Allen, Barlow

Johnson, Hanson, Pohahau

We first went to visit some members, success! We went to visit Br., and she took us up to visit with her uncle. Her uncle then proceeded to explain to us that he's not comfortable with her being baptized and becoming a member. Bummers. He did it in a really kind and caring way, acting as the patriarch of the house that he is. She told us after the meeting that she's confident that after a couple visits that he'll warm up and permit her to be baptized. She's strong, just a roadblock that will eventually work out.

We then visited Akua, and she was so nice. I was really sad to be in the Asante home for the last time, but it's part of the work. They gave me a really nice gift of a shirt, and I already miss them.

We had a farewell gathering at the chapel for both me and Lancelot, the member who is leaving (has left) for his mission. It was really good. Good memories.

That evening we went up to the Julanders and sang a version of their birthday song that they sing to the elders. I played the guitar and we sang "goodbye goodbye Julanders..." to them. :) It was great.

Then packing. Lots of it.

Sad face [and this mom is wondering "where did he get that pillowcase?"]

Elder Johnson monitoring luggage

Elder Johnson and Elder Price

Then moving. Into a trotro with all my stuff, and off to Praso.

Long ride. Cramped spaces. Completely exhausted.

I arrived to Elder Keetch's stuff still there. Why? His parents are picking him up this week! So I'm actually in a threesome. But it's been impossible to unpack.. Well, it's not too much of a pain. It's cool to have him around!

The next few days have been a rush. New people, chickens pecking at my sandals during lessons, and some sweet new investigators. It's not too bushy, there are some paved roads and it's a nice area! I'm looking forward to it, and Elder Etim is a great guy.

I received a package..The Hanlons brought it to me, and I actually said it wasn't mine. No note, no nothing. I didn't believe it was for me; it didn't have my name on it. But it turns out that it's from the Julanders. I knew it right as I saw the subwoofer. Man.. That gift touched my heart. I love them.

Well, I don't have too much time for any more stories for this week. Church is back into a small makeshift sort of building, not as bad as my first chapel on mission, but it's hard to compare to Sekondi.

This is where I'm supposed to be, but change isn't easy. I love Sekondi, and I love the people there. I'm just going to work to let my heart love even more people and places! I'm actually going to be playing the piano for this branch, now, so that will be an adventure. :) Do good things!

Love,

Elder Price

P.S. Two districts of 8 people each. Only 16 people in the zone. VERY spread out, however. I'm the only American in this apartment once Elder Keetch leaves. Also, I'm glad that I had some transfers between being a zone leader in LIB and being a zone leader here. It definitely helped the transition.


Bonus Photos:

"Note the baby holding a live bird"

Heading to the Bush!

Note from Mom: Not our regular email blog post this week. Elder Price mysteriously lost internet (or power?) before writing his family email. Good thing he'd already sent me a few short emails with the transfer news:

MRP: Hey momma, I'm bein' transferred!

Me: Where to???...

MRP: a place called Praso... It's bush. REALLY bush. And I'm the zone leader.

Me: Would it be listed as Twifo Praso on the map? Like north of Sekondi?

MRP: Yes, it's Twifo Praso. :) North... ish. It's central region instead of Western Region.

Here's a map of where he's headed on Wednesday. He'll serve there for the next six weeks, and likely the six weeks after that before coming home in September.

Transferred to Praso Zone (Twifo Praso, Central Region, Ghana)

Fortunately for me (and all of you dear readers), Elder Johnson (Elder Price's companion) managed to write a fantastic letter to his mother about this past week's events and she's given me permission to share it here:

"Hey Momma! 

Another great week in Africa. We're getting Br and Th ready for their baptisms next weekend. Br is well loved in the Relief Society and is going to be a huge help to them. I am especially excited because she wants me to baptize her. Hopefully I don't mess it up, haha. 

On Tuesday I had my first Zone Conference. President gave a great presentation using the story of the tree of life in first Nephi. The point of it was for us to focus more on recent converts, and less actives rather than just talking to people on the street. It was sad to see Elder and Sister Julander give their Farewell testimonies. They will be greatly missed, and I am so thankful to have been able to get to know them. 

Takoradi Zone Conference 16 June 2015

On Saturday, while we were conversing with Vincent at his house, President Stevenson called to talk to Elder Price. He called him to be a Zone Leader in Praso which is one of the bushiest places in the mission. My new companion's name is Elder Ble. He is from Ivory Coast, and I heard that he can speak great French. I am really going to miss Elder Price. He's made a huge impact on my life, and has taught me a lot on how to be a great missionary. I am grateful for the time we have had as companions, and I am proud to call him my trainer. Even though I am sad to see him go, I am also really happy to see him become a Zone leader. He is going to be a huge blessing both to the people and the missionaries there. 

… I was able to get your package with my scripture bag, the letters, and the Sour Patch Watermelons in it. I was really happy to give Elder Price the Sour Patch Watermelons before he left. He said God Bless you for thinking of him. :). I love you all so much and the work is going well here.

With Great Love,

Elder Johnson"


Bonus photos:
The Jonfiah family had a little farewell thing for the Julanders with the Asante family and the missionaries for Sekondi ward present also. It was a really good night. :)

Asante family with Sekondi Elders

Light On!

Dear Family,

Hello! Happy Monday! It's going okay; this cafe has been pretty frustrating. But it's okay. The cafe guy decided that he could give me his admin code, so that's nice. :) I don't know what the implications of that code are for me, seeing as these are strictly linked up in a network, but who knows. If I ever have extra time I'll explore. ;)

Elder Allen and Elder Barlow both got crazy excited about Elder Latu. They both said that they knew him--really cool stuff! [Elder Latu served in Sierra Leone and was evacuated in August at the same time Liberia missionaries were evacuated from that country. He is now serving in our ward in Utah. We met him on Saturday and when we realized "the connection," we took a picture to share with Elder Price.]

Interesting stuff about new missionaries being called to Liberia. Thanks for the info! Also that's crazy to know my talk date. Ahhhh. Sept 20th. Just (not really) enough time to recover from jet lag. Again, not really. [He arrives in SLC the evening of Friday, Sept. 18th and is scheduled to speak on Sunday the 20th at 11am.]

So, this week!

"Week 11 of training: he leads it all!"

Tuesday! I successfully forgot that it was the mark of 100 days left! I remembered a few days later, and then I made a note of it in my planner. So that's how I remember that it happened. It was a good day, with a really good district meeting! I enjoyed it, and we talked about developing Christ-like attributes, with a presentation of the talk "Beware of Pride." It was a good instruction, and we had a couple good lessons. We have been teaching one investigator named J. for quite a while now, and he's really knowledgeable about the Bible. He's also blind, and we've been trying to find ways for him to read the Book of Mormon more. Finally we have decided just to read it with him, during the lessons, starting from the beginning. The lesson was great, and so was the one we had with An., later!

Wednesday was a day full of teaching. We first visited Akua (she likes Akua, and it's only technically spelled Ekua) and we helped her prepare for her talk on Sunday. It was awesome, especially because we had to teach her how to use the Gospel Library app! I enjoyed that. Then we went to teach Br.; another amazing lesson with her. We taught a couple more lessons that day, and it was a pretty simple day, to be honest.

Thursday (haha, I have a few attempts at drawing Donald duck on this day in my planner) we got a new/old investigator! One guy who we haven't met with in a long time we finally saw again! It was really awesome to see him, and the member with us, Georgina, thought that he had been taught for a long time! He's doing good; we just hope that we'll be able to see him more often. After that really uplifting lesson we taught N. and her husband! That wasn't as productive, unfortunately. Maybe one day.

Friday: a repair guy came! Not really a repair guy, but a guy who wasn't with the same group as the other inverter guy came. He knew what he was doing, and after some troubleshooting he figured out how to fix the [solar panel] system. So that was sweet for him to do! We stayed in the apartment while they were doing that. We then went down and helped those guys get a room at a local hotel, and then we finally went out and tried to teach. Too bad our appointments all cancelled. But on the way home we were given some beesap from someone living around where we live. She was really awesome about giving it, and gave it to us for free! She's really  nice, and I hope that we'll be able to teach her one of these coming days. Beesap is a local drink that is made from hibiscus petals and some other stuff, and normally having ginger. I like it. :) When we got home we had fun pretending that it was alcoholic, Elder Allen playing along, and Elder Johnson saying "you told me it wasn't!" while we were trying to have a convincing act enough to fool Elder Hanson. Too bad Elder Hanson had some on an exchange once.. Otherwise it would've been awesome. :)

Saturday had a couple things to mention! We helped Alice prepare for her talk and then went and taught Br. That was a really great lesson, she has a baptismal date now!!! June 25th! :D We're so excited for her, and she's loving everything. She wants her niece to be baptized, too, and it was just a really great lesson. :) We also taught that guy who talked to us last week about the "light" and everything. He's cool! We haven't really gone too deep with him yet, but we have high hopes. We spent the rest of the evening waiting for our appointment at the chapel. and power went off! So we had fun being scared in a big empty dark building. I'm more comfortable on the dark streets than in a dark building! ;) 

Well, during all of this, the repair guys came again, installed new batteries, and a church employee came and changed all our lightbulbs to energy saving lightbulbs! from 85 watts to 3 and 7 watt bulbs! Plus, he installed a ceiling fan. And.. Now everything is working. We're so grateful. Light on! :D

Sunday was great. Again. We had seven investigators at church! several of which was their first times! Plus, Akua and Alice gave talks. Great talks, if I do say so myself! Akua's was LONG! I was smiling throughout the meeting. It was a great Sunday. After church we did splits and I taught Br. while Elder Johnson taught Em. (basically) all by himself. He had a member and stuff, 'cause it's splits with members, but still, it's unique! I enjoyed that lesson. :) We went home and ate, and then studied, and then went out to proselyte! After we made our way messily through some mud, we started to get rained on. Then our appointment cancelled on us. And then it started pouring! And then we got stuck in the rain. And we got soaked. It was an interesting night. Ending with a wonderful dinner from the Julanders. :D They fed us taco soup and Doritos and baked potatoes and apple crisp. It was such a good dinner.. Mmmmmm..... I never expected a dinner like that on my mission, and it was even kept on the down low amongst missionaries because it was just for the Sekondi apartment. :D I loved it. Elder Johnson fell asleep on the couch, so we hid behind the countertop, turned off the lights, changed the clock to two hours forward, and Elder Julander came out saying "Elder Johnson, what are you still doing here??! I thought you went down with the others!" It was so funny; Elder Johnson legitimately believed it until he saw our slippers and coats outside the door when we were walking out. DOH! It was funny to see him try to comprehend all the implications of us going down without him and everything, especially in his dazed and sleepy state. Awesome evening. :D

Today we had a district activity with our district and the Takoradi district. We started with making doughnuts which took a really long time, but then we went up to the Julanders and ate them while we watched Ephraim's Rescue! It's still a pretty strong movie, emotionally, to me, so that's cool that it hasn't lost it's touch even though I've seen it several times! I was freezing in that room... But it was a really fun activity. :)

"Uh... too much yeast. Yeast Monster."​

Making Doughnuts

Everything is going well here, and I'm trying to finish strong. It's weird to see the time drawing nearer and nearer. I'm really nervous for this transfer news. It comes on Saturday. We'll see what happens; it will determine what the rest of my mission will be like. This work is true, this church is true, and I'm still changing. I'm glad I have more time. :) I'm excited for things like being with you guys again, playing sports (especially with Ryatt) and all those kinds of things, but I'm grateful for the time I have left. It's always comforting to think "God's will be done" with all things. I'm learning a lot. :) Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Price

"monkey location!"

  

"my area!!! :D​ " [this one and the next few]

​"the statue in Sekondi."

"Stake choir practice at the chapel!"

Making Memories

Dear Family,

Hello! Happy 8th of June, 2015! Is today significant at all, though? I don't really know. But anyway, it's great to hear from you once again! First, a couple thoughts on your email this week: Okay, okay, I do read them, I just chose not to comment on those jokes.. though I did show all the elders in the cafe the funny picture. :D  Your email was awesome! I loved the story about the new mission president for Liberia!

WHOAH MY FLIGHT PLANS. O.o Crazy. That'll be a long flight.. around 25 hours cumulative. [We received his return travel itinerary. He's currently scheduled to arrive home on September 18th.]

So this week had some fun stories! First, Tuesday. Tuesday is when we passed by a monkey! It's in our area, but we normally don't pass by that way. We happened to, so I took a bunch of pictures! :D 

Also, as we were walking through part of our area, we passed a lady and started talking to her. She was pretty obviously Muslim and we had a nice conversation; she even invited us to visit her at her mosque! I thought that'd be a unique activity. ;)

Wednesday was an exchange! I went with Elder Allen into my area. It was a really great exchange, and we had an amazing lesson with a less active member named R. We had a member with us, Georgina, who was just the perfect person to have for the impromptu lesson. The two just took off and R really opened up. It was so great to feel the spirit there, even though we didn't say too much as missionaries because we don't speak their language. :) We also taught a great lesson with our investigator, B, the one that I said might be a "slow-cooker". Yeah, no. She's doing AWESOME. She read the pamphlet a few times before we came, and had been understanding everything. But that was just the start. Wait a couple days for the really cool stuff. We also saw Alice and her mom, Emma! It was sweet; we taught them about the Articles of Faith and just helped them grow. More on them in a minute, too. ;)

Thursday was a pretty normal day, and we had a really sweet lesson with An. We were sitting with him inside his room, and we looked around and everything was so much cleaner, he had a mosquito net hanging neatly over his bed with his sweet little daughter on the bed, he was clean cut and wearing very good clothes, and then he proceeded to talk to us about how some of his old friends had visited him and looked at him and said that he's changed so much and then left his room without him having to reject them. His whole demeanor and countenance have changed, and he's so great. More later. :)

Friday.. Was quite the day. It started off with the zone meeting. Some good instruction there! But I was disappointed that the zone leaders forgot to grab packages and such when they went to Cape Coast, so now we have to wait a long time for them. This frustrated me quite a bit because the office elders called me on Tuesday telling me that Meet the Mormons was here for me (and venting about how they wanted to steal it..)! Well, I guess I'll just wait for it to eventually get to this side of the mission. [Deseret Book will ship directly to Ghana, so I ordered him the Meet the Mormons DVD online, shipped directly to him via the mission office.] 

After that we decided to go to one of our favorite rice and chicken places. They were out of chicken, so we decided to go to this new one that we had only seen. We get in there and we ask the price. It's a cedi more than what it normally is at a decent place [that's about 25-30 cents US], but after some discussion we decide to order it anyway, hoping that it's good and worth it. Well, they bring out the plates and there's nothing nice with the rice, no lettuce, no mayo, no anything by it. So that's disappointing. I did my best to be content. So I started eating my chicken. One bite. Yum! Second bite. As I'm pulling the chicken away from my mouth, there happens to be around 7 maggots squirming inside the chicken that I just opened, right there, tucked between the bone and the meat. It was such a wonderful sight, one that caused me to immediately spit out EVERYTHING in my mouth onto the plate, and nearly throw the chicken. We proceeded to be quite frustrated, and I went and drank a coke. Somewhere else. Not there. Blahhhhhh. :P (that's a far from normal thing here. All the people I've told that story, members and missionaries alike, have all said that it's terrible and nasty. Memories, right? ;))

As we were coming home from that fiasco, we noticed that it started to rain. Wonderful! So we got out of the trotro and hid underneath a bus stop thing with two small umbrellas to cover all four of us. It was working somewhat well until it started to rain sideways. The wind was strong! We finally found a place to sit inside, a nearby shop, and waited for quite a while. It ended up raining the entire day, and we weren't able to go out, unfortunately. It was also CRAZY cold. I was wearing socks, jeans, thick shirt, my jacket, and wrapped up in a sheet. The other elders said I was crazy. :)

Saturday was a good day! We started off the day going to a member that had called and asked for a blessing, but then we went and taught B again! And what a wonderful lesson that was! We brought the Relief Society President with us, Sister Zwennes, and B committed to coming to church! We also had a couple other great lessons, and finally another one with Emmanuel. :) Since he's been baptized, he's received a nice job, been given a nice car from that company, and is just doing well! He's also been able to help another member around get a job at the same place, and now they are the managers at this soon to open import store! We'll go there sometime before I'm transferred. :)

Okay, now here's the really awesome day: Sunday!!! It was Fast and Testimony Sunday, and so that means everyone could bear their testimonies. A few people were among those "everyone": Emma, with the sweetest testimony about a priesthood blessing she had received, An., with a testimony about how he didn't know any of these commandments like the Law of Chastity, Word of Wisdom, but that he has now changed his life and found happiness in his life, and Benjamin, giving his first testimony in the church about his journey here and such powerful moments of his life and being able to join this church. It was pretty incredible. I felt so sad thinking about how that might be my last Fast Sunday in this ward. I don't want to ever leave this area. :) Also, B came to church, and she had a GREAT time. :)

After church we went and visited a member, Bernice, who then took us to visit her neighbor, a lady who we had given a blessing to some time ago. We had blessed the woman because she was VERY pregnant; the baby is born now! She showed us the cute little baby boy, and we will have a couple people to teach now from this. It was so cool to see the effect that the blessing had on this woman's spirit and feelings, especially having gone successfully through labor and everything working out. A guy sitting there also told us that he wants us to teach him, that he has a Book of Mormon, and he REALLY wants to learn. He also mentioned that he "sees something around [us] that [we] might not see", and he described that he feels this light around us. That was a pretty neat thing for him to say. :)

The week's been good. I'm out of time, but I hope you enjoyed this week's letter! I love you so much. Have an amazing week. :)

Love,

Elder Price

Farewell Frisbee

Hey Family!

Another week of no mouse and all keyboard. I am getting fast at it, though. Now I'm the nice guy at the café who'll take the computer w/o the mouse! Maybe this is supposed to train me for later in my life! (You know, this is my problem with tablets, they don't have keyboards very often! It makes it so shortcuts just don't exist! :P)

I guess I'll just go straight into my week this time! I'll start with Tuesday. Bear with me here, the days really blur together. Maybe there's a story or two in this week that I just have to dig for.

Tuesday was good! We had our district meeting, another great one with just the normal district. :) 

"After district meeting fufu!"

After everything, we were able to teach Al. and An., the two investigators preparing for their baptisms! Thinking about those lessons, the lesson with An. was actually pretty funny. An. had his little girl with him as we were teaching; he had just picked her up from her mother. As we began to teach, she started crying so much. So he checks her diaper. ​He excuses himself to change it. Awesome, right? No more distractions. But little did we know that little baby hadn't eaten in a longggg time. So we are trying to teach a lesson, and she won't stop crying. Finally we finished a few principles when we decided to end the lesson there and come back the next day. Don't worry, the baby was fed and she stopped crying. Adorable little girl. :)

The next day was a bit of running around to teach some few lessons in various places: We taught Hamida a recent convert lesson, An. that one last lesson for him to be ready for his interview the next day. And we taught T., a younger girl who lives out in Ketan who is the daughter of a member and is preparing for her baptism (she's really excited for it. The only bummer is that it has to wait until 20 June!). Something awesome during the day was that when we finished teaching An. that lesson and preparing him for the interview, he walked with us outside and introduced us to his neighbor, B., a half Ghanaian, half Nigerian, woman who is interested in learning what the Book of Mormon is. We set an appointment, and the day was great! After the lesson with T. in Ketan, which happens to always be at Vincent's house 'cause she doesn't speak English, and he basically just teaches the lessons for us, Vincent gave us some Popo! It was yummy. :)   [the last time he mentioned popo was when he was serving in Liberia. He described it then as "Popo is like cantaloupe. but it's not."] Then it started to rain, and Vincent lent us some umbrellas and we made it home on the dark and scary train tracks with smokers. ;)

Thursday was (kinda) the day! At least, it was a pretty short day. Planning in the morning, followed by apartment lunch at a member's restaurant in Sekondi, picking up the shirt I got for Dad (the guy made it quite big; he said it's better to be too big than too small! We can tailor it or something if it's too massive. It's black with a cream or something embroidery; quite nice looking), the lesson with B. (aforementioned), and the interviews! The lesson with B. went great, and we're looking forward to teaching her as time goes on. She doesn't seem like a fast conversion person, but who knows, with God all things are possible! I'm excited to start teaching her. Then.. We went to the interviews! Everything went smoothly, and they both passed. Obviously, from the baptism pictures that I've sent. Anyway, it was great! We had a small PEC meeting with the bishop, and then we went home. That night we got a surprise visit from Elders Hinckley and Hodges, the Tarkwa Zone Leaders! They were sleeping at the Julanders before going to the Finish Strong Seminar the next morning. [President Stevenson describes this on his blog, it was a special event for the 60 missionaries going home within the next three months, to encourage and inspire them to finish strong.] They played a round of Scum (card game) with us and then went upstairs.

Friday. The meeting! Elder Barlow was awesome and came over and made French toast for that morning. It was so wonderful, and he made syrup, too! We really enjoyed. :) Then we all went to Cape Coast. We arrived there around 12, ate lunch, mingled, and had a great meeting! It was inspirational, and I was encouraged to work hard. Woohoo! Then we had another long ride back home. It was a really good day, though it's hard to think of anything to say about it.. Oops! The day got me exhausted, but it encouraged us to have more energy! It was funny like that. ;) 

MTC Mates (missing one or two in this photo)

The next day. Chapel cleaning and the baptism! That's a pretty good summary of the day. Oh, and I got a video of Elder Johnson saying that the Chargers are the best (he lost a bet). :D Anyway. The baptism actually went smoothly! We didn't have as many people at the baptism as we had hoped, but it wasn't too bad. Light [power] also went off right before it! But then it came on right as we were starting. :) It turned out great, and I could feel the spirit and everything cool like that! People are changing their lives, and it's great! It was a fun day, the highlight obviously being the immersion of the two, Al. and An.!

Sunday was good, too, and both came early and were confirmed just fine for Sacrament meeting. The Julanders came to the ward, too, and bore their departing testimonies to Sekondi ward. It made me sad. But at least we still have another month with them. After everything in the day, we ended up teaching a lesson to Alice, with her mother, Emma, and her father, Brother Hanson, all present. It was such a great lesson, and we talked about patriarchal blessings at the beginning, but then we talked about how awesome the priesthood is and we all shared testimonies about it. It was a really cool lesson, and I'm so happy that I've been able to work with this family. :) After that we closed and played games with the other elders, and Elder Barlow made us chips out of sliced up cassava! It was interesting, but tasty! Fun night!

Today we had a zone activity: Vienna Beach! It was a SWEET activity, full of games and some nice food. The place was a really nice area, beautiful, and it was fun to run on the beach a little bit. Something sad happened, though.. I lost my Frisbee. :( We were throwing it around, and then it went into the water.. and started to float away.. And kept going. I went after it, but I quickly realized that I couldn't go any further without swimming, so I had to come back. :( We asked a nearby guy to go and swim after it, but it was too far out for his swimming ability.. Ah, few times on mission I have been frustrated about the rule of no swimming, but today was one! Plus, the water there was actually really beautiful. So it was quite sad. But we still had fun and we played some two hand touch football and had fun! I got a cheeseburger there, too. :) A great day, today! Everything has been going on well! My subsistence (barely) held over, and everything is okay. Thank you for the great email this week, I really liked it! 

I love you all so much, and I still know that this work is directed by Him above. I hope that you have a great week, and do good things!

Love,

Elder Price

Activity at Vienna Beach

Elder Price and Elder Johnson at Vienna Beach

"The wonderful Elder and Sister Julander :) "

[I love this photo so much!]

Bonus photos:

"Cesspit Emptier"

Balloon Chargers Bolt and Chargers colored ties

Showing his love for the his team--the bolt, the jersey, Charger color ties, and his African shirt made in Chargers colors. Elder Johnson photobombing. :)

Budgeting

Dear Family,

Hello! Greetings from Ghana! I'm emailing without a mouse! It sounds great, right? I'm glad I used to challenge myself for fun back home by seeing if I could use the computer without a mouse. ;)

[I asked him if there were no other computers. He said they were all taken, and Elder Allen was in line for one to open up, so he went ahead and used the one with a broken mouse]

This week was good! ​We worked!

We started off with an inspirational district meeting from Elder Allen! That was fun. :) It was really funny to be sitting there in the Sekondi chapel with just us six. The rest of the day was good, too! We had visit #1 with Ekua for the week! We visited her twice. That was definitely a highlight for me, 'cause she always makes the days good. After her we ended up seeing a great person: An.! He's progressing great, and it's awesome to see 'cause he was a normal street contact. It's rare for normal contacting to bring forth many results, so it's a great thing to have him. :)

We've also been teaching other people this week, one being Al. Al. is preparing for her baptism on Saturday! She's so excited, and she was so happy when we gave her a copy of the Book of Mormon. That makes two to be baptized on Saturday: An. and Al. We were hoping for a couple more, but it doesn't look like that will happen. It's still amazing to have these two, and the next two will still come on, eventually. :) Most of the week was really spent teaching and doing the stuff that seems so normal for me now.

Oh yeah! Something slightly kinda somehow interesting. I was really low on subsistence money, so this past week I've been working SO hard to save my money (I only had enough for basically a week. And we had two weeks until subsistence). The miracle that happened.. We just finished the week, and I even have MORE than I need to get through for a normal, solid week! I'm glad, because it means that I can budget. I was starting to lose hope for myself. ;) I can eat something now! Or maybe I'll just keep my habits of not eating as much, for skinniness sake..

On Sunday we had something incredible: all you can eat fufu. :D :D :D (okay, I just realized how that looks, seeing as it's right after I talked about being skinny..) Sister Akim, Lancelot's mother, cooked us groundnut soup with all you can eat fufu. It was so wonderful. She did it for all of the missionaries (us four); something that the former missionaries in this area were trying so hard to get to happen. We were given bowls full of fufu and soup, and then five minutes in they came and said that we could ask for more fufu as we wanted. So Elder Johnson and I both ate more. YUMMY! :D Such a great meal. Meat was normal stuff like goat and fish.

This morning we played basketball with An. (the same one preparing for baptism). He plays basketball seriously, and we went to a local court (one that we go to pretty often) and played with him and a ton of great basketball players. It happens to be some African holiday today, so they all were off work and other things and came to play. It wasn't easy to play with them, but it was fun! My legs are dead today.. Again..

The week was good. I'm doing good, and I got my desk all organized this week; it also feels really good to have a cleaner apartment. Mission is short, and I'm trying to milk every moment I have left. The closer the end of this adventure gets, the more I'm realizing how much more I want to learn while I am out here. I am so far from being who I can be, and I have so many weaknesses still. The time for improvement is short; and I'm so grateful for this bit that I have.

I think that view could be applied to life, too.

Have a great week. :) Love you all!

Love,

Elder Price

Bonus photos:

"a random looking waterfall thingy that was interesting.​"

Apartment photos. Desks are in the bedroom:

Bathroom photos may seem odd, but I asked for them. I was trying to picture what his trash can full of water looked like and how they were equipped. This request came out of a conversation we had at Mother's Day:

Water storage: Another missionary in the apartment said (in the background) that he was going to wash his face in preparation for bedtime. I asked Rain about the water situation. He said they had a very large trash can in their bathroom that they'd cleaned out and turned into their water storage. They fill up the trash can when water is available and power is on. They have a few buckets in their bathroom that they use to dip into the trash can to pull water as they need it.

 

  

Egg Sandwiches

Dear Family,

Hi! It sounds like you had a busy week! Some great things to hear from back home. I'm sad that I missed that luau; I'd like to be around that culture again! Thanks for the great pictures and everything. :)

As for my week:

"Proselyting! So it's blurry. Sorry."

We started off with Monday night: We had FHE over with Vincent and his family! That was really awesome. It was the first time that the other elders had been into our area, and we had a nice time with them. They're such a strong family!

Tuesday was zone meeting. That was pretty depressing: people going home! Like Elder Judy, Sister Aidoo, and a couple more. It's strange to see good friends of mission to be going home like that. Ah! Mission isn't supposed to end!

Zone picture!

That day we had some great lessons with A. and J. They're both progressing, though at very different rates. A. will hopefully be baptized this transfer. J.. Who knows. But they were both wonderful lessons!

I thought I'd take this moment to advertise a certain product: Egg sandwiches. Have you had one? If so, then you've lived your life successfully. If not, then you need to. If they don't appeal to you, then (a) you're crazy, or (b) you've never had a good one. We're addicted to them in our apartment. There's a lady at the base of the hill that we live on who sells these incredible egg sandwiches. We're her loyal customers. What are they? White bread, a loaf that is sliced to whatever size (by the woman, forget pre-sliced)​ and sliced in half. Then the eggs: put into a small bowl, whisked with a fork, salt and lettuce and peppers and random little itty bitty things put inside it, stirred up, then put onto the frying pan (with oil on the pan) for it to fry, then flip the egg when one side is cooked and let the other side cook. Then fold it and put it into your bread, put the bread on the pan, wait a moment, press (like PUSH) the bread into the pan to squish it all together and toast the bread, flip it, toast the other side, and then you got a yummy egg sandwich! :D​

The next day was a good day of teaching. We taught a few lessons, and we walked SO far. (my legs are screaming their complaints even now, but I'll get to that later) But it was good, 'cause we visited a less active out there. Good work! The next day was pretty similar, though we didn't walk nearly as far. We helped a recent convert, Hamida, prepare to teach Relief Society, and then we taught G.! He's still doing great. We also had a PEC meeting in the evening that went well. I love this ward.

Friday was an exchange! I went with Elder Hanson! That was a party. :) I finally got to see the other Sekondi area! I've never been inside to their place called Essikado, but I finally got the chance! We had a great day, with more walking and hills, but things were good. Elder Hanson was fun to go with!

Saturday was a messed up day. We started with the normal chapel cleaning. Nobody showed up, except one member. So us five cleaned the entire building.. Ahh. Well, it was for a good cause. So much mopping! It took forever. After that we got ready for the day and studied. Then we went and tried to see some people! A bunch of people that we weren't able to see! So we decided to go visit a member family that is slightly into the other elders' area, 'cause we needed his full name and such to put on a baptismal record. We showed up, and they sat us down and fed us fufu. Well, don't mind if I do! ;) We didn't tell the other guys. They don't really need to know.. hehe. I like the food here. After that business, we taught an investigator, and then we visited Lancelot (in attempts to teach someone at his house.. They weren't there.)! He's an AWESOME member that I don't know if I've talked about before. He's another one of my good friends as far as members go. He got his mission call!!! He's going to Nigeria Calabar Mission, so we had a nice talk about mission things. It made for a fun evening!

Sunday was exciting! Actually, we didn't do too much. But we had six people come to church! That's a high for this area. So many progressing people! It looks like most, or all, should be coming back, too. Not just a one time thing! Plus, Ekua was called to be the 2nd counselor in the Young Women Presidency. :D I was way happy about that. But.. She did chastise us for forgetting to call her on Mother's Day. I was willing to accept a caning for that, but she was too nice to do that to me. :) The rest of the day was nice and calm; the person across the hall fed us lunch (way nice of the guy), and things are going along nicely. This morning we had a zone activity at the stake center: SPORTS! I really like sports. Football (soccer), basketball, and volleyball were the main ones I played. It's fun to play sports with Tongans. :D A lot more fun than other people. The new guy in our district is named Elder Pohahau, from Tonga (Tongatapu), so now we have two Tongans in the zone. And now my legs are in so much pain. Go hard or go home, right? Hey, did I mention that Bro Kandell put a stress ball in the package? Well, he did, and I've been throwing it like crazy around the apartment. I miss throwing baseballs! Anyway, it relieves stress, right? ;)

Things are going along nicely out here. I've been really finding some things that I can improve on, and I'm learning a lot. I'm happy. It was good to hear from you this week. Do good things! Choose the right, live the commandments, and have a great week! I love you all so much.

Love,

Elder Price

"A visitor in the house! I liked this guy."

"Just another spider in the bathroom."