Week 36, Bardege, Gulu with Elder Ankrah

  Monday night was super fun though, I'm trying to learn Arabic now and while we were visiting with this one family they were teaching me a little and helping correct my grammar. Anyways they have a little boy who's about 5 years old staying with them and he's from Juba (South Sudan) so he speaks Arabic really well and he was teaching me all these phrases and casually throws in curse words while he does it and of course me being the immature young adult I am, I laughed my head off at it the first time. Then we had to explain to him not to say that. I realized some words are absolutely universal. Then Tuesday we had a terrible day because guy we were teaching, Dennis, told us he doesn't want us to come back anymore. The thing that bothered me was that I know he felt something while we were teaching him. Super sad, I hope that somewhere along the line he accepts the gospel. I wish I was going to be around when he does. Wednesday was better, but that night we had a bunch of kids throw rocks at our car. They didn't realize that I know where they lived, so later that night I went to their house and explained what happened to their Mom. She was actually gonna beat them, but instead I just told her that the kids could wash our truck the next day. I thought it was a fitting punishment. hahaha. The next day they washed the truck while we went and worked on the new chapel that is being built in Bardege. Sheesh it was hard work. Imagine doing construction work without any tools or tractors or anything.  I got to break rock for the foundation with a HUGE hammer and then help lay it. It'll be cool to come back though and see it and be able to say that I helped to build it.  I'm really glad that I'm getting to work on it. It feels cool to sacrifice to build something like that, I can only imagine how building a temple would feel. Later that day we met this guy named Oyuk, and he's such a kind guy. He has such a genuine interest in the things that we've been sharing with him and it just felt good to be appreciated. I can tell that he'll take the initiative to act on the message of the restoration of the gospel. He really wants a testimony. It was a really good teaching experience! But the highlight of the week was on Saturday... We ate cat… Hahaha it's not that good. I don't think I'd ever eat it again. It tastes like really tough chicken. Most days I eat chicken and small amounts of rice. Lots of veggies and eggs. And LOTS of bananas. Not a whole lot of variety. I keep forgetting to tell you, if you want to see what the slums of Kampala look like you can look up Unforgettable by French Montana and watch the music video. BUT turn the sound OFF. It’s not a good song. It was filmed in the slums of Kampala city, and it shows exactly what they're like. And actually, I lied, Sunday was the highlight. Sunday was great! We were able to baptize this guy Jimmy that we've been working with for a while and he shared a great testimony after. One thing that I love that I have realized here is that the people are willing to sacrifice for the gospel. They give up a lot sometimes, and I think it takes a lot of faith. The biggest sacrifice is the change of life style. The norm is partying here, so they give up a lot of friends to join the church. Another big sacrifice is travel. Some people walk REALLY far to get to church. Then the members here really sacrifice time. Opio is a missionary for fun. He shares the gospel with his friends all the time. Everyone here sacrifices something to be a member. In this branch I haven't had to do anything on Sunday except teach the investigators class. They're a lot more organized than Lugazi was.
Me and John, a guy we are teaching who is progressing well. He asks us all these deep questions and sometimes they're tough to answer. He wanted to know about the seer stones that Joseph Smith used to translate the book of Mormon last time we met. Paul is also progressing and will hopefully get baptized this week and then Opio is a member that I really like.