Eric's email of May 5th, 2011

  Before I forget, because I forgot last week, Bonne Anniveraire à Mom!

            Also today is exactly 1 year for Elder Tingey!  He started his mission on May 5^th, 2010.  I remember when I hit one year… I was here in Yaoundé!  And that doesn’t seem that long ago.

            So this past week was very busy and eventful.  On Saturday we went au champ with Soeur Marie again.  Pretty much did the same thing, I spent most of my time with Elder Nsimba using machetes to clear out the field.  There were lots of bugs.  We didn’t get stuck in the rain though, but it didn’t get too hot either.  I noticed that when she works au champ, she doesn’t wear any shoes.  Or socks.

            After church on Sunday, we went to the Longla house, and we taught Rigobert and Melkior how to tie a tie.  It was kind of hard for Melkior because he is pretty short.  And their father also stopped drinking coffee at work.  Thankfully his kids persuaded him to drink nesquik instead.  He told us he started drinking that, and at first he thought it was going to make him throw up.  I don’t know why, but he was grateful that it wasn’t going to be as painful as he thought.

            We have been doing English class the past couple weeks.  We do it each Wednesday at 4.  I taught yesterday, and we learned about the body parts.  Elder Tingey thinks that bellybutton was not a correct word to teach, and made me teach them “navel” instead.  But we had the best turnout so far yesterday, by the end we had 10 people.

            Are sector is also ginormouse.  I spelled that wrong.  I don’t really know how to explain it, but we are all over the place.  We have to do a good job of scheduling our rendezvous’ in order to work as efficiently as possible.  A few of our people literally live au village.  Like yesterday we went to see Soeur Salomé because there a few people out there who want to talk to us, and one already got a Livre de Mormon.  Its really beautiful out there.  I wish that my whole sector was like that.  I’ve got a picture to send.  And, we had a good lesson.  At first I thought her friends weren’t understanding much or anything, but when we explained about why there are so many churches to day, I think they had an epiphany of some kind.

             We do have another investigator who is starting to progress really well, le Frère Patrice.  He is a coordonnée from a member who starting coming back to church recently, Frère Gildas.  But on Sunday Patrice came to church even though Gildas didn’t, which really impressed me.  

            And we have another new amie that was a coordonnée from Marie-Sylvie (who is also progressing very well towards baptism), named Soeur Marie-Susanne.  She lives au village, at Nyom.  But, I have really high hopes for her.  We have only had 2 lessons so far, but she loves the story of Joseph Smith.  She said about 7 months ago she stopped going to churches at all, and said she asks the Lord to show her the truth and is waiting for it.  The main thing is she lives faaaaaaaaaar.  So as she gets a testimony I believe that will help her overcome the distance and find what she is looking for.

            In the Book of Mormon, I just finished the Book of Mormon.  And I learned mostly a lot about why the Book of Mormon came forth and the role it plays in God’s plan.  My favorite chapter was Mormon 9, lots of good scriptures I can use as a missionary.  Sometimes it seems like that book is forgotten, at least to me.  And even though I’ve read it before, this time I learned a bunch that I never noticed before.

            Today I am also going to send a letter to Elder Lee in California and Elder Aldridge in New Zealand.  I wonder how many letters have been sent from Cameroon to New Zealand.  And have been sent and have made it.

Je vous aime,

-         Elder Eric Palmer

 

(Anything you want for your birthday?) Besides candy, I don't think there is anything I want or need.

(What is a DMB from your last letter?)  A DMB is a dirigeant de mission de branche.  Or branch mission leader.  We do have branch missionaries, but we don't do splits very often, but they do have other people they visit and come with us sometimes.  Yes, the baptism happens at the church, they built a baptismal font out back.

(Do you think you will meet the new mission president?)  Yeah, I will meet the new mission president.  We will see President and Sister Headlee one more time between the 13th and 18th of June, and then President and Sister Jameson come on July 1st.  So I assume I'll see him.  Someone needs to give me a release interview.

(When should we call you for Mother's Day?)  Alright, well I don't think that you could have a worse time for church.  Because here we have church with Bastos 2 from 9h00 to 12h00, then Bastos 1 from 13h00 to 16h00.  And then you are in church when it is 18h00 to 21h00 here.  Alright... hold on.  I'll send another email in a sec.

Je t'aime,
- Elder Eric Palmer

(Anyone here that you want to say goodbye to before the annual exodus of students?)  Honestly I cant remember who is there and who isn't and who is leaving and such.  So just say au revoir to anyone you feel like I should.

(When to phone.)  3-4 my time is not good.  We finish sacrament meeting at 4, and we have a meeting with the branch president right after church.  So I called the Thompsons, and we decided this.  So you will get out of church at 9 PM my time.  So since you are calling my phone, you can just call me whenever you get home.  We decided that even though it'll be a little late that would work the best.  So don't worry about calling too late, just call whenever you get home from church, which should mean something around 9 30 my time, n'est-ce pas?

And tell Scott he blew it somehow this week.

Je t'aime,
- Elder Eric Palmer