HOT!!

Momma! wow, thank you so much for going and getting me that camelbak,
and so quickly too haha! thank you so much :) I will put it to some
good use, that is for sure. March is the hottest month of the year
apparently, and I believe it...every night this week it was above 90
degrees when I lay down in bed to go to sleep. or attempt to sleep.
really, you wake up feeling more exhausted than when you went to bed,
you're just drenched and feel disgusting, but whatevs, such is life!

And as far as musical numbers, not really. we have done the Christmas
program, and we all sang a couple different songs, and I think we are
going to do something along the same lines for this Easter program
coming up soon, but I will let you know more :) and yeah, singing
wasn't really blessed through our posterity haha, except for you, we
are all kinda pathetic!

And yeah, ripped my pants, but I got plenty! Usually, I only wear 2
pair of pants in a week, yeah, gross right? but, that is the way sa
Lone missionaries roll, who are we trying to impress? they are nasty
as soon as we walk out the apartment anyway. but, no I don't need any
more pants, I got enough for a good while. The bikes...well, they go
very very fast haha, but, all of their speedometers, odometers, and
gauges are ALL broken, so I don't know how fast they are going...too
fast to be honest haha, but we just pray and hope for the best!

And I never see missionaries from other churches proselyting really, but I
have taught a couple from some born again and catholic churches! they
love to invite us over and try to "talk" to us and think that they can subtlety
convert us or something. It's quite amusing. and as for the
pope...yeah, love testifying of the restored gospel to some of our
catholic investigators as for reasons we all know ;) haha

haha and yep, I will hit 9 months some time this week, crazy, this was
the quickest transfer of my mission so far, and gosh its pretty scary,
it needs to slow down forreals because I don't know where the time has
gone!

But, on to the week...Ill just start with the biggest news first, so
I'll start with yesterday!
The apartment was BLAZING hot so we all decided, NAY, we are going to
enjoy. so we all took up our mattreses on to the roof and our nets and
everything. and while we were setting up we got THE phone call.
transfer news...dun dun dun! and....Elder Jones, Elder Coffie, and
Elder Symons, the 3 oldest guys in the apartment are all leaving, and
now there is going to be 8 white guys in the apartment. My area has
been split into Messima 1 and 2. I am receiving Elder Flament from
England, and the guy is a boss so I am super excited to work with him.
He is actually in the internet cafe with me right now sitting beside
me....bo is hot as tish you know? and then
2 new missionaries are coming to work on
Messima 2. so, I will have to show them all of the area and
investigators and everything and ah, just a little overwhelmed at the
moment, but I will be okay, I hope so at least. Also, to top it all
off. I am now district leader, so a whole new bunch of responsiblities
and priorities to take care of but I know the Lord's promise in 1 Ne
3:7 and he wouldn't ask me to do it if I wasn't able...yeah, thats
about the only thing thats keeping me from mentally breaking down
right now haha. but, no worries, everything will hopefully work out
like it is supposed to and hopefully nobody dies along the
way...yeah, i won't die...

but...enough of that suprising news...so, we ended up sleeping outside
last night and it was THE best sleep I have gotten in 6 weeks. So cold
and ah so good. we all woke up just feeling amazing and well rested
and just bouncing off the walls for once. Though, the dew did have us
all rather wet, we were very optimistic. spent the rest of the morning
cleaning and preparing a new room, tishload of stuff, for the 2 new
elders who are coming this week.

But, as for some good news. left the sketchy cafe last monday and
found that a new store had opened in Bo town...and gosh it is amazing!
it is like half a crappy food lion and boy is it amazing! we were
running around like little girls screaming at everything and almost
crying when we found vitamin water and cookie crisp and koolaid, and
snickers bars, and pretty much everything we wanted haha, yeah, they
all blew ALL their money...I handled myself with some dignity and only
left with some vanilla flavoring for my oatmeal...but, I'm planning on
dishing out some mad cash today when I go there :)

So, also thought it was pretty sweet last week but when we had our
zone lunch we had like 20 elders there and we were having fried rice
or something with fried chicken and everything and all the bowls were
set up and...there was one piece of boiled chicken :) Elder Burton is
such a good friend ;) he knows how I like my chicken and I didn't even
have to ask haha!

The zone meeting went pretty sweet on Tuesday and we all left inspired
and uplifted and ready to go and do some work! we talked about all the
committments we had made this year and set goals about how we were
going to achieve them and everything and it was just a really good and
uplifting spiritual experience that has really benefited me and I
already feel myself growing more from it :)

And taught this one sweet lesson this week about the law of chastity
with one girl and during the lesson this little girl comes up and
hands the 20 year old girl we are teaching a handful of condoms...and
we were like uh...and just waited until the end of the lesson and were
like, umm...you probably should get rid of those. and she was like
what? and we were like uh, those things you break the law of chastity
with...and she was like huh? and we took one of the packets and were
like THESE, and she was like, i don't understand? and broke one of the
packets open and pulled out the elastic and used it to pull her hair
back and was like, they are good hair ties? Elder Jones and I left
just laughing our head off...oh Sa Lone! Oh oh sweet sa lone.

So, have some sweet new investigators, two who are
engaged, and one other, and they all want to be baptized and are just so
excited when they meet with us. Two of them were taught a long
time ago but said they didn't understand the Book of Mormon so never
thought the church was true, but we taught Book of Mormon earlier last
week and brought them both copies and when we came last night they
both said that had read and KNEW it was true now and wanted to be
baptized :) and then one was like, I know it's true already. We were
like, did you pray? and he was like, I was about to, and then I just
felt the greatest peace and happiness so I just figured that was my
answer. why do you think I ran over here so quick when I heard you
were coming to teach? I love this gospel! to which I was like, uh wow
that is wonderful :) but, still pray and ask god, okay? hahaha :) oh
the miracles of the Lord in this magnifiicent work!

We are teaching one young lady named and when we started teaching
her she was 10 1/2 months pregnant and wanted to know if she could be
baptized while pregnant. We told her sure! and then, we showed up the
next day to teach her  and she was laying in bed and they were holding
a newborn child. fortuantely, she HAD gone to the hospital that
morning, born the child, and came home before 2 haha, so crazy and
different then back home. but, the child's name is Joshua, with the
potential to be Joshua Spencer etc. (named after Elder Spencer Jones
;) ) haha, so that would be pretty sweet, and so amazing to see the
new born child...made teaching the plan of salvation on Friday so much
more meaningful indeed!

Also...ate something delicious this week that I don't think I ever ate
back home...GRILLED CORN! so yummy, I love it so much. So cheap and
extra delicious :)

Went on exchange with Elder Penia this week to his area and had a
great time with him. But, on our way home we were walking by one of
the football fields and they were having a BIG game with tons of
people watching. it was a bunch of 20 year old women playing in a
competitive school game haha and we came just as the game ended...and
next thing you know, the girls are stoning each other, hundreds of
people are rushing the field, and police are trying to break up the
fight, and a man is on the loudspeaker microphone yelling " stop this
fighting. this is not how women behave! stop this now. Anyone wearing a
jersey who has a stone will be arrested!" haha and I got most of it on
film!

had the grossest Free Meal of my mission on Saturday. our branch mission
leader told the woman that FUFU was our FAVORITE food...yeah, we both
hate fufu, its just his favorite. little punk haha so I tried to choke
it down, but gosh it was hard and I was about to have to sprint to the
woods for my life, but fortunately the women were hungry and helped us
finish it haha :)

On to a funny crappy story. Had a carpenter go to make me a wood
carving of FINN from Adventure Time and he made it about a foot too big
and man is it wowo! gosh, it seriously is taller than my knee! it is
so crazy. and had to carry it all the way home and I swear everybody
thought it was some Juju idol or something! they were all whispering
about us praying to it or something haha, curse you wowo FINN!

but, that is really all the news this week, I love and miss you all so
very very much, I know this is the Lord's work and these are truly the
best 2 years. I love mission...Take care everyone and be safe and
enjoy life. It flies by far too fast and don't let a minute pass by!

-Love
Elder Jesse Sumrak