Gone over a month

So this week has gone well so far. We have been teaching a young women probably;y around 23 years of age, and she seems interested. Though she freaked out a little when my companion mentioned that we keep records of people who are baptized, and he just kept talking about how hard it is to have those removed, he didn't even notice how worried she was about it. and i had to explain that the records are simply Grace was baptized on this day and confirmed on this day. Not a record of her sins and everything she has done in her life. Grace came to church yesterday, she said she enjoyed the classes but didn't like sacrament, said that she couldn't here anything. 

Other than grace we also had another investigator come to church, his name is brother Nathonson, his wife is a member and he has apparently been taught all the lessons many times and just wont act upon them. He has not come to church in a long time and i had been praying for him and there he was, at church. It was a shock but quite awesome.

We also ordained two men to the arronic priesthood, on of them Torquil 26 and way awesome we'll get to him in a second. the other Brother Mackenzie is 21.\

So we have to teach Torquil all the lessons again and so we went over to his place yesterday and actually had him his girlfriend and a young man preparing for his mission, junior teach us the lesson. Him and his girlfriend are some of my favorite people here, she is Indian, im not sure where he is from but he is white. They both speak good English and its way easy to understand unlike a lot of our other investigators. It was way relaxing to be on the receiving end of a lesson, rather than teaching it.

Sadly however we only had one of our seven people that are on date to be baptized come to church. We had one day where all except one of our lessons canceled and so we went tracting, i got quite a few numbers of people who seemed interested, but when i called them the next day all except one said they would call back which means will never hear from them again. The one that set up an appointment was the last one i was calling and i was so excited when she said she wanted to meet that when she asked about 2 on monday i gladly set it up, not even thinking about the fact that Monday is pday....

My companion is great, he teaches differently than the way i like to. And we have some difference, he likes it way hot in the car, i am melting to death if he has control of the ac, however he wont let me turn it past the middle and thats still way hot. Other than that, i may or may have started driving on the right side of the road for a little the other night, and was really annoyed when he started pulling on my stirring wheel until i realized i was on the right not the left side. On a not so great note i scratched the car... It was dark and we randomly park on the side of the road all the time, so they told me to pull off to the side and wait for the member to come show us where they live, as i did so i scrapped the passenger side on a short cinder block wall that i had not seen in the dark. 

I got to see my first wildlife other than cows goats and chickens, there were monkeys all over our apartment as we went to leave for District meeting. We had been really confused where all the noise was coming from, there was a ton of them.

I really enjoyed reading alma chapter 26, and i recommend everybody goes and reads it. That chapter is way awesome, i just cannot get enough of the stories in alma!

I way miss reading and writing fiction, but ill get over it eventually. Anyway, i love and miss you all, and im way excited to hear how your lives are so let me know.\

Remember the lord knows you by name and wants you to talk to him, so pray always. Here is my favorite scripture about prayer. D&C 10:5

Botswana

Whoa, mission goes by fast, at least that's what people keep saying. 

My companion is Elder Mosweswe, he has been out for about a year now, and is from Botswana. Botswana elders go to this mission because Botswana was not letting anyone else in to share the gospel and only last transfer let people come in.

Elder Mosweswe is pretty awesome, he speaks English well though occasionally ill struggle to understand his accent i have gotten mostly used to it now. He teaches very different from how i like to teach and from how i was taught to teach in the mtc. In the mtc we were taught to teach simply and short. He teaches very long and in much detail. However that seems to be the way you need to do it here, because if you font the Africans have soooo many questions that you would then be stuck there forever. 

My first investigator was a man named Tshephang (te-pong) He came to church with a friend right before i got here and so it was our first meeting. he had got a gospel principles book from somewhere and read it all before we met him. He had lots of questions and we were not really able to get into a lesson because the questions were all over the place. However he looks like a very promising investigator. 

I have been fed a couple times since we got here, very large meals, i'm really worried i'll end up gaining weight in this mission because its rude to not eat everything. Though i have explained to a couple members that i really don't eat much food and they have been understanding. I have not eaten anything strange yet, the only thing different really that i have eaten is pap, which really does not agree with my stomach at all, and they eat a ton of it when they have it. The one things that will take a while to get used to is eating with my hands, it depends on the family and the meal but it seems as if they eat with their hands quite a bit. 

On the subject of food, today is pday, so i get to go out shopping with foreign money, that i have to keep on my card with prices that i don't know, so figuring out what to buy is gonna be fun. Cant wait till i know the money and prices and then get transferred to somewhere with different currency. :D

We have a a few investigators and several of them are on date for baptism, though we just rescheduled a couple as well. The current goal is to have four baptisms before next transfer, so four baptisms in six weeks. 

Driving on the left side of the road has been fun, it didn't take much getting used to, though occasionally i desire to turn onto the right side of the road. And i may or may not have nearly killed us the other day by starting to turn onto the right side of the road. :\ Luckily my companion was paying attention. :D

I have not seen a ton of animals, but there are often cows or goats crossing the roads or walking beside it. And there was a donkey on the way here. 

My companion thought it would be fun to play a trick on me and had a member pretend to be and investigator for us to teach. He then proceeded to go hardcore question everything, and be very difficult just to be difficult, and my companion was not helping teach. so that was pretty chill.

Sorry i don't have any pictures this week, i brought the wrong cord for my camera and i cant put an sd card in this computer. 

Anyway, i cant wait till i have more great experiences in Botswana.

How is everyone? What's up in your lives? 

Out in the Field

This morning we left for the mission. i am now in the mission home and the exciting news is that i get to email you because i am going to Botswana! They have been fighting for three years to get Americans back into Botswana and I am one of the missionaries that gets to go, all the elders here keep telling me how lucky i am. 

Also, they have serious problems with drivers losing their privileges here, because of accidents and going over the speed limit. Soooo, i will be a driver for my companion and i, which is a little sketchy because we have to drive on the left side of the road. As i went out for the test today i kept switching on the windshield wipers instead of the blinker. Also, on the way to the temple, while still in the mtc we were at a stop light and witnessed an accident right in front of us. They have much more high tech "black boxes" here that track everything you do. and that gets a lot of missionaries in trouble.

The food was great at the mtc, we are yet to find out how it will be in the mission field. I have some weight to lose from the mtc so we'll see how fast that'll go. I wont meet my new companion until tomorrow when i go into Botswana but i have heard much praise for him. 

After showering one day i came into my room and a young man if he was excited to meet Jesus (idk why i asked.) And he look at me with big eyes and asked "is he coming." Turns out he thought i had been told Jesus was coming to see us.... That was odd, i had not expected that reaction. he's such a sweet guy. 

I have been leaving this scripture with everyone as i left the mtc so i figured i would share it with all of you. D&C 6:36. Its such i great scripture for all occasions. just remember the lord loves you and is always there for you if you just look to him.I have seen so many great blessings. even just three weeks into my mission my testimony has grown in so many different respects. And i cant tell all of you how much its worth it to come out and share the gospel with the world. When we left the mtc president Ashton (mtc  president) gave us a pretty coll blessing that eased quite a few things that had been bothering me, and that was pretty sick.

I am so excited to be going out and serving the lord, and sharing the gospel with those who know not where to find it. There have been so many things happening and i just don't have the time or the patience to talk about them all.

I love you all and hope you're doing well! Remember who you're. ;)

Another Week in the MTC

Hey all! First off i am gonna let you know that you may not hear from me for another 10-14 days as i will be l;leaving the mtc and heading to my mission next p-day.

And now off to the good experiences. We went to the Johannesburg temple, it was pretty cool. the temple is fairly small but it was a great experience. Walking to the distribution center was way cool it felt like i was walking through a jungle. We will be going again on Thursday and ill send a picture of all the commissionaires as well as just the botswanna/namibia guys.

The mtc group here is pretty small, only 19 missionaries. I have already seen blessings from the individuality of it as well as reasons why the lord sent me here. There are only four Americans in this group, with a couple other nationalities. However the next group will be 45 people which is the max the mtc can hold and 80 percent of them are american. So we were really blessed to be here at this time and able to experience having missionary companions from Africa.

We had transfers this week and so i got a new companion. His name is Mataky he is from Pompeii. He is the only member in his family and his parents are waiting for him to quite his mission and come home.Because of that he has very little clothing and such, and does not even have dress shoes.

There are six of the nineteen people here going to the botswanna namibia mission. and they all happen to be in the same district except for me. so that's pretty chill. My old companion is now our district leader and that's pretty awesome.

The most frustrating thing so far is that every time i go to use the toilet there is pee on the seat, like you would think the 18 year old and older would know how to not do that. :/

So something super awesome that i have begun to do is is writing in my journal as it is scripture, its makes it way fun. and super enjoyable to read and write. I would highly encourage all my future missionary friends to do it on their mission.

Oh so mad experience, right after emails last week we went out to play sports for the days hour, and elder lee sprained his ankle playing soccer so we switched to playing ultimate Frisbee and i gave someone a giant bloody nose.

I have already grown so much in my testimony of the gospel.

Love Elder Smith