Eric's email of January 13th, 2011

Well, I looked at my planner for this week, and I didn't see many exciting things to write about.  But I'll do my best to not make this a boring email.

                First highlight, is that Jacques got baptized on Saturday and confirmed on Sunday!  And he even wore the white shirt we got him for Christmas to Church, now we just need to get him to wear the tie with it.  The baptism went well, actually started ontime.  It wasn’t that hectic, because he was the only one getting baptized.  And on Sunday he got sustained a member and also ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood.  So things are just continueing normally, not much to say.

                 

Blaise and his family are also doing well, Blaise is getting ready for his interview on Saturday, and we are planning on his family getting ready to be baptized in February.  Blaise’s only problem right now is his job, it made him miss church last week.  So we talked about the importance of the Sacrament and such, and so he said he will make it at least to that meeting on Sundays.  And Blaise even talked about how he would be interested in serving a mission.  He's on the edge of the age limit, but we can really see that he is becoming converted to the Restored Gospel.  We also presented the father, Daniel, to Bro. Cleverly, who works at the embassy and lives just across the street from where Daniel works.  And we also visited Daniel with Bro. Ndongo, and they became friends very quickly and such.

                On Saturday, we played soccer with some of the members, mostly young men.  But President Balla, who is the branch president of the other ward was there, and he was the other team’s player-coach.  I stink though.  I think mostly because I'm not used to running.  So in my head I knew what I was supposed to be doing, but my body didn’t always want to cooperate.

                We also changed the time our branch starts, we are the afternoon now, 1 PM to 4 PM.  It’s the first time on my mission where I have not been required to show up to church at 8 or 9 AM.  So one good thing is that we get to keep our normal study schedule.  But now we've got to figure out what to do in between 11 AM and 1 PM.

                I had another obstacle while translating on Sunday.  An Anglophone named Sister Elizabeth quoted some words from a hymn that I didn’t know.  It was something about “the rocks of ages”, I don’t know.  But when she saw that I was stumped, she just went off herself and translated what that was supposed to mean in French.  We should just get one of our bilingual Anglophones to translate as their calling.

                We have also continued to look for service, because according to the white handbook, going au-champing every week is not the ideal form of service.  So we've talked to some one at a school, but then we realized that la bible blanche says not to do service at schools, and then an American language center wanted more commitment that we can give.  So yeah, we are still on the search.

                Oh, and one other really cool thing happened on Sunday.  The branch reorganized a few auxileries, and one was the relief society.  La nouvelle presidente is la Soeur Therese.  She has now been baptized for 2 months, was a coordonnee that Elder Acorda and I got, and after one meeting sent over to Elder Lamb and Elder Kesler.  But, she is solid.

                Alright, well I have to hurry up and check emails, because at 1:30 we are seeing Blaise and his father, and then I want to get Ero, my favorite Cameroonian food, and then we have a rendezvous with a marine at the American embassy at 4, and then football at 5.  Wish me luck, especially with the rendezvous.

Je vous aime,

-          Elder Eric Palmer

Dear Mom,

First thing, is I do still have my passport with me in my "important stuff" folder.  (Cousin Jeff, in Argentina, doesn't know where his passport is, so I was worried.)

Thanks for the piano advice.  (He is tired of playing the piano all the time.)

(Do many people in Cameroon smoke?)  Yes Jacques was the only one baptized, and yes a lot of people smoke in Cameroon.  And every pack of cigarettes has a huge lable on them that says "smoking is damaging to your health and can lead to death and/or serious illness", something like that.

So In Blaise's family, there is their mom and dad, then Blaise is 24, Blandine 19, Ghislen 17-ish,  Rigobert 15-ish, Melchior 14, Queentine 13.  They all live together, their mom, Victorine sells food, the dad, Daniel, is a guardien, and Blaise works at the supermarche called DOVV.

(What is in achoo besides beff skin?)  I don't really have any idea about what is in achoo, so I'll ask.  And we don't eat that often with amis or members, maybe twice a month.

Je t'aime,
- Elder Eric Palmer