November 30 letter

So yes President Koch was here in Chimoio this week. Yes, I got my package, no I didn't get transferred and I didn't have any baptisms this week.

President Koch: So he got here in the morning on Sunday and came straight to church. Then he gave a big lesson to all the people instead of the relief society and Priesthood meetings and stuff. And then, we had sacrament meeting last. There was a ton a people there and it was way sick. Then we had some other meetings. We had to do a presidency meeting and the audit and some other good stuff. All in all a really good experience. Then afterwords we went went to the hotel and ate lunch with the Kochs and also the first counselor in the mission presidency. It was really good. They also checked our house out but fortunately it was way clean so that went really good.

Package: I really liked the package, especially the big thing of taco seasoning.  Thanks for putting together that album.

Transfers: neither I nor Elder Brown got transfered which is just so awesome. I was so happy when president Koch told me I was staying. Then today we got the entire transfer board and found out that elder brown was staying too and we were way happy. I will pass Christmas and the New year here in Chimoio I really am so excited.

I will say that doing skype in an outside area is just so sick. The reason is because there is no time limit so I can just talk to you guys for a lot longer. There won't be a bunch of other missionaries in the background bugging you to get off so that they can talk to their families and whatnot.

November 23 letters

To Mom:

I haven't received a package in a long time but I think this week I'll be receiving a package which should be nice. Next Monday are transfers and the mission president is coming this week to Chimoio so I'll probably get my package somewhere in there. It should be a really good week. I'm super excited for President Koch to come. He will give some trainings and he's going to do some visits with us which should be really nice. Then on next Monday transfers are coming which might mean a new area for me. I've been in Chimoio for a long time.

This week was pretty good. We had some good visits. I was sick one night and another night the weather was so bad that we couldn't go out. The rainy season has hit hard. Also, we took our first real shower yesterday for the first time in a couple weeks which was way nice. Maybe this week we'll take some more real showers because there is a lot of water through rain. Aside from the normal African problems the week went fairly well. More of our families made some good progress and we should finish it all of this week for the marriages which will be nice. I gave a training to all of the youth that are leaders (deacons quorum and stuff). It was really good and they really learned some of there duties and responsibilities. 

To Dad:

Man I seriously miss eating good food at restaurants. The best food that I can eat here in Chimoio is the food that I cook for us. To go home and try the smallest thing will just be heaven. I can't even describe the taste of even any old fast food restaurant will just be heavenly. I cannot wait for the food, It is definitely one of the biggest things for me in thinking about home. I'm not really that far off either just 7 months left. A good amount of time to really work and get things done; it should be really good. I can't say, however, that I won't see that day as the greatest day ever as you know as a former missionary. Although I will say that you left you family and home but still remained in the United States. Leaving the country to a place so poor makes it exponentially more poignant. 

Nov 17 letters

To Dad:

First off let me just say that yesterday we didn't have any internet in the city so I wasn't able to do my emailing yesterday so we came this morning to do it. 

I would have to say that the sketchy neighborhood in Philly would definitely be the rich area of the city here. All of the downtown areas in all the cities look like a crappy version of that downtown in Philly and they are the richest parts of the city for sure. 

This week was another great week for the continuation of the strengthening of the organization of the branch. We were able to start up a few new meetings and I gave a training to the home teaching leaders on how the organization needs to work and the basics of home teaching. It looks like we are going to get a really good home teaching system in. At this point I just need to look to training up the women to take care of visiting teaching as well. It's a lot of work to make lots of prezi presentations and set up the computer and projector in the chapel and find scriptures and do everything but it's all worth it because the attendance is rising and the organization is making leaps and bounds. When I leave I hope to be able to leave a terrifically functioning branch in my wake. Right now it's looking like that will be the case. 

To Mom:

We watched general conference with the branch this week on Saturday and Sunday. It was pretty good. We had a ton of meetings and other things that were really good. I explained a little bit more about those to Dad already. 

Our main families are progressing really well. We had two main families that are Bernardo and Eguiness and Mabanje and Maria. They are neighbors and were referrals from another family in the branch. They are progressing really well and should get married here in the next few weeks, depending on how the documents work out. 

Nov 9 letters

From Mom:I read an article in the Ensign about literacy in Ghana. How is the literacy in Mozambique?  Do people learn to read and write Portuguese?  Are the native languages written or are they just verbal languages?  Do most people know Portuguese?  This article said that even though English is the official language of Ghana, only about 50% of the population knows it and that the native languages are only verbal languages, so people don’t really read or write, especially the women.

From Daniel to Mom:

The English Colonies are a little different than the rest of them. They allowed the native languages to be more prevalent. In Portuguese Colonies, however, they tried to smother the native languages. Everyone still speaks them but at the same time everyone also speaks Portuguese. It's rare to see someone who doesn't speak Portuguese and if they don't they are usually way old. There are a lot of people however who can't read. Or read very poorly. There are very very few who read Portuguese better than me or other missionaries. Those languages are not written either no. 

We were watching general conference for the first time this week and I really enjoyed the conference. I really liked President Nelson's talk and some other ones from some seventies. We had some other fun experiences this week. We ate a fruit called licha. One of the families that we baptized has a tree and we picked a bunch and ate them. They are pretty good.

To Dad:

So this week was a really good week on my end. A lot of families got some good progress done on documents and also spiritually. We have a new family that is really good that I'm super pumped about. They are coming along great. 

November 2 letters

To Mom:

So this week was kinda uneventful. We get some good work done with documents and found some really cool new families but really nothing crazy that I can tell the story of.

On Saturday we took that kid who was eating the pancake to a restaurant for his birthday. He has never eaten at a restaurant in his entire life. The majority of the kids never have. It was pretty crazy. They have done so many things for the first time in their lives with us. For example, take a shower in a shower, eat a hamburger and various other foods, use a toilet, eat pie or lemon bars or any other kind of desert, cook on a real stove and much more.

Also, this week we went to the most expensive restaurant in Chimoio it cost like 30 bucks or so. I got these pretty good giant prawns.

Also, this week one of the member's house burned down so we did a service project to clean the house up to rebuild. Because all of the walls are built of blocks just the roof burned with the stuff inside but the walls are all good. So we cleaned up inside to get it ready to put on a new roof. 

To Dad:

So this week I was able to organize with some of the leaders home teaching and visiting teaching. This week I have to make 5 or 6 trainings to train the leaders of the branch. We will be going to the church every morning this week probably so that I can make prezis to train the leaders. It should help out but it is kindof a pain in the butt arranging all the quotes, reading the material in the church handbooks, finding appropriate scriptures and stuff but I think it will be worth it. Also, I've been training the branch secretary a ton so that he can do the necessary work after I leave. It's a lot of work.