I am glad that everyone enjoyed their letters. I have been trying to
write some more family, because I miss them and love them so much, but
I only get small time so I try my very best. and about the boots
momma...I should be fine for now. You know I love shoes...but, I
should be okay for now. I don't think I will have troubles until my
year mark at least, even though this mountain is brutal, and has
potential to tear shoes in half! Also, could you check out the new
indoor beautiful nike football shoes for me and send me some pictures?
maybe you could take some of my money and save them for me for when I
get home...you know me and shoes ;)
Momma!:) I love you and all the family and all the wonderful people I
got letters from and just really everyone. Those pictures are so
awesome! wow the yard looks great for halloween. You guys really did
work this year and it looks pretty awesome. Looks like some new stuff
as well huh ;) but, it is so cool that you got to meet Elder Hale's
family! they are so awesome and I can't wait to go and meet them in
person in a couple years haha. Yeah, hit my 4 month mark today, wow
wow wi wow, huh? time surely flys by. Also, in reponse to the devil,
uh they are people who dress up in scary clothing, like giant masks
and black clothes and spikes and they dance around and stuff in the
streets and people all swarm around em and dance and and go crazy.
Just ask father, he saw it on Anthony Bourdain food show things haha.
But, thank you thank you Lauren Byrd, moma, dad, nick, katie cutler,
tHE WONDERFUL SMITHFIELD BRANCH, and bro and sis Robertson, it was so
good to hear from all of you and I am so grateful for the time you
took to write me :) thank you so very much!
But, what a sweet sweet busy exhausting week. Elder Burton and I
climbed the mountain EVERY day this week, and to be honest, i don't
know If i could do it today, so thank goodness it is pday. our quads
are so burnt out, we could barely even move yesterday, but thank
goodness we get to rest today :)
SICK again...got the sore throat, rough cough, hole in my lungs
feeling. yeah, no good...no good at all, but I am pushing through
it....as in I still run around and gym super hard and make myself more
sick...but all for the sake of staying healthy ? ;) hahaha
Had some delicious PUMPKEY for the first time this week. Elder Burton
showed me how to make it and it is so good. you put it on rice (like
everything here) but its like fried pumpkin and other stuff but I know
how to make it now so that when I get home I will definitely make it
for you guys :)
Met a woman from Virginia last week! was running home after email and
everything and this large black woman in a store called me over. She
is from Sa Leone, but has a house in Fairfax Virginia, so we talked for
a while about it and I got the family contact information, so
hopefully we can go back and proselyte there some time.
Elder Burton and I had a good ol battle with a pastor up at Treeplant
this week. He told us he wanted to hear about Jesus Christ in 1
minute, so I decided to throw the godhead at him, and prove him and
the trinity down, which I won :) he didn't like that, so he ended up
skipping his appointment and tried to battle us for the next 30
minutes, in which we won...1 Cor. 15, don't mess around haha we sabe
em bain bain! yeah...we know, we need to be more humble, but stubborn
people get on our nerves :/
I DID GET YOUR PACKAGES mommma! thank you so much. the birthday ones
came and it was super super sweet of you. Thank you so much for all
the pictures and the food and everything. It was so sweet. And Lauren
Byrd, I love you! I wrote you a letter today :) you are amazing momma
dearest, Elder Burton and I have been enjoying very very much. He told
me to tell you thank you thank you!:)
So, on the way down the other day, this small boy ran at Elder Burton
and jumped at him head first and bounced off him and hit his head
small small, he then started to lay there having a seizure, to which
we had no idea what was going on. The momma casually walks out and is
like, don't worry he does that all the time, like once a day. All the
children start grabbing his arms and legs and pulling him out, like to
stretch him, while me and Elder Burton are like uh,...I don't think
you are supposed to do that! LEF BO LEF! but, after a minute, the
seizure stopped and the boy was fine. I cleaned his bloody head off
with a rag. (now it is my shoe rag) but, ah poor kid :/
Another crazy instance, walking down the road and all the schools are
letting out so there are hundreds of kids on the road, and I see one
girl, about 14-15 laying on the road crying. Her ankle is a little
bloody and she is just coverd in dirt ( she had fallen while climbing
the path). So, I took out my good ol handy baby wipes and started
cleaning her all off (while like 40 kids gathered around us) it was so
funny. They were all like, white man, what are those paper? don't
touch the blood white man, and ah it was funny, but she was all good
and ended up limping off. What a crazy week :)
So, this week was ELECTION MADNESS. like 3 of the days each of the
parties was having their campaign days, and EVERYONE is just wearing
their party colors and partying and partying and driving around
blowing whistles everywhere. Geeze it is obnoxious and just crazy, but
the lil parties looked like fun, to bad we have MUCH better things to
do, LIKE SAVING SOULS!!!!!!!:)
Well, we had some problems this week with about 1/2 of our
investigators, who all were supposed to be baptized this coming
saturday, but all have problems with the law of chastity. We are
teaching these two boys. So, they are like the
players in their neighbourhood, sleeping with everyone, and just like
the popular kids. But, they are super progressive and LOVE the gospel,
just not this law of chastity. hahah, but we taught one on Friday
and he told us that would be hard but he would do it, we then showed
up on saturday...yeah, he had already broken it, and the other refused
to live it...so we opened up the bible and taught Joseph and Potiphars
wife at em, and david and Bathsheba, and by the end of the lesson they
both promised to keep the LOC and one of them melted my heart. He was
like, you guys can we add you on fb, and get like your emails and
stuff, I want to always be friends with you guys, even after you
leave...you don't know it, but you are changing our lives...and ah, I
just wanted to cry. It really makes me happy, and motivates me,
knowing that I do have an impact here...I am changing lives...
I was super bummed yesterday, as was Elder Burton, when only about 8
investigators came to church (which is great, but we were expecting
like 20) haha but, we were just super upset. We worked SO hard this
week. We walked so much, taught like 30 lessons and geeze it was just
a bummer. But, ELder Barth really cheered me up when he told me to
think of the miracles, not the bummers and geeze I started to see so
many. Like, 3 people were interviewed for baptisms yesterday, lots of
new investigators, a special lil girl who wants to be baptized but
isn't old enough yet, and ah it really was a great day...
So, everyday the climb to treeplant takes like 30-35 minutes, but we
were late to our DL training meeting saturday evening, so we had to
sprint down the mountain, not jog or walk fast, but sprint! we made it
down in like 8 minutes haha. Everyone was like WHITE MAN, why are you
running!? we are like uh what do you think? we either thiefed
something or were late, or being chased by a mob, you tell me people!?
haha oh boy, but we are so sore from it...ah so dead. but the training
was good. We got to get transport and go to Lumley district, which was
my first time in sa leone leaving my area, so it was really sweet.
Their area is crazy! it looks like a crappy hollywood. They even have
lined roads haha but we went to the meeting, grabbed some fry fry, and
made our way home. we were so tired...ugh...but we still gymed, and I
was able to crank out 350 pushups hahaha, I think that might be a new
personal best for me :)
Today was a lot of fun! woke up, did my laundry, wrote some letters,
had our studies, made some scrambled eggs, Elder Applyby gave me a
haircut, which actually doesn't look bad. He layered it and everything
for me :) we then went and gymed and then went out with the assistants
(elder barth, Elder Appleby) into town. They showed us this SWEET
restaurant, where we sat down and had amazing egg burgers (egg,
hamburger, onions, lettuce, cucumbers ketchup, mayo) so good, and
Swarmas ( like a meat burritto) so yummmy, and then a little cup of
ice cream :) what a good lunch! Elder Burton and I then went and
bought some jerseys (yes, I had a problem) I bought 3 haha :) I love
jerseys. Then we went and bought some fabric material in the market to
get a man to tailor us some africana hoodies out of them. yes we enjoy
very much :) it is super fun! we then went to the wood market which is
just amazing awesome crafty african stuff that is all handed crafted
and everything. geeze I love it. I want to just get everybody
something and bring it on home, but my suitcase isn't big enough and
plus I don't want to haul it all around for 20 more months, so maybe
at the end of my mission ;) which is not for a very long time. now we
are emailing...woohooo!
So, let me explain a trip to the market in a couple different
scenarios (keeping in mind in each scenarios we are the ONLY white
men, and it is VERY crowded everywhere we go). Jersey hunting - if you
are on the road and even glance up and look at a jersey, someone will
come running out and start telling you come come come! look look, its
nice right?! if you tell them thats not your team, they will tell you
so what, you can buy right?
Same thing with when I was loooking for a watch today (my casio one
fell apart, but its funny since it was so dinky and we got it for 10
bucks at walmart, and I can buy super nice watches here for so cheap.
I haggled a guy for a watch today for 12,000 (which is 3$ and it is
pretty nice looking watch). but, they all run out and start putting
watches on your arms and like oh this one, you like this one? this one
looks so good on you, you should buy 2, hahaha it is nuts!!!!!!
Material hunting - you get men everywhere pulling on you, trying to
drag you into their stores, yelling for you to come look. you got
women yelling at your, telling you try this try that, youll look good
in this haha, oh man it is nuts!
Wood market hunting - as soon as we walk in, please come buy, look at
this, handcrafted, you like em? see fish? you like the fish? haha they
are so desperate to rip us off!!! but, you got to love them.
Food hunting - my personal favorite. everyone is yelling at us, white
man what are you looking for? dno't you want pepay? can't handle
pepay? want bananas? here these are nice yes? gosh we are just like
yes we sabe whattin we dey look for, tank ye tank ye. haha its so much
fun though, people are so great :) I love them!
Funny story also, we contacted this one girl, who has a
bad reputation in her neighbourhood as the veteran...but, she is so
sweet. She is like 20, and came all the way to church all by herself,
and even said she feels so good inside when we teach her. she isn't
very educated but asks the best questions I have heard my entire
mission. She asks like "wow Jesus Christ has done so much for me...I
don't feel like I can even pay him back ever...Elders, can I pay Jesus
Christ back? How can I do it?" I am just like, YOU ARE AWESOME!:) haha
and she came to church yesterday! but, while we were teaching her on
her balcony, Gilbert walks by (keeping in mind this is on the other
side of our area , about an hour away from Gilberts house) and he
starts yelling at me and I yelled back and told him we were coming
that afternoon...show up at his house and taught him LOC, to which he
tells us "guys I got ladies all over! its not easy. I mean, even
downstaris in that house you were teaching! I got them!" and he
starts smiling and laughing and we are just like :oh..boy...shaking
our heads...hahaha geeze....
but, the mission is so sweet. I have had a rough week being sick and
all, but it is awesome!:) I love it so much. I really do miss home and
miss everyone so much, but I know this is where I need to be, and I am
pushing through. I love these people oh so very much, and am working
very hard...we are doing our very best, and our praying and pleading
for God to do the rest. Its not easy...but, if it was, what would be
the point anyways right? who wants to have an easy football game? you
got to be challenged to get better right? but, to be honest I would
love some easy tests in college....I love you all so very much family
and friends. Mother and father, nick and thomas and Laura and all my
cousins and uncles and aunts and grandparents and friends and buddies
and just all you people. You are amazing and you are in my prayers
every night...please take care, and remember that Jesus Christ
lives...He will come again...I know this to be true :)
-Love,
Elder Jesse Sumrak
the old tired guy :)
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