Bonjour ma mère,

First of all, awesome email! I love your emails! I will try my best to
answer all of your questions... there were a lot of them this week. My
week was very good. You will hear more about it in a moment. As for
the Gladiator music, can you please send me that cd... and also the
music for the Last of the Mohican's. I love that music so much. I
listened to it a lot today when I was cleaning the kitchen. BTW, I am
going to rock the kitchen when I get home and clean it. Yes, you did
send me with mucus relief and I used it but it didn't do anything...
that was probably the case because I only used it wrong. Don't get mad
at me :) And the doctor I went to is legit. He is actually a recent
convert in our branch. He works at one of the main hospitals here in
Yaoundé and will be going to Paris soon to finish his studies. The
Thompsons always go to him when one of their missionaries has
problems. So no worries there. It would be cool to go to a witch
doctor... If I find one I might hit them up. And concerning the
steak... it is rum steak. Its way good. Okay, I think I got all of
your questions.

Just a heads up... my next pday will be on Tuesday because we are
going to have a zone conference with President Jameson on Monday. So,
don't freak out when you don't get an email from me on Monday. Also, I
really want to vote in this next election... what can I do? Is there a
way that you can send me a ballot when the time comes, and hopefully I
can fill it out and send it back in time? I hear Romney is rockin it.
Do you know what today is? It is my one year anniversary of going
through the temple. Can you believe that it has already been one
year?! Its crazy! Time goes by so fast. Yesterday was my one year
anniversary of opening my mission call... I can't believe it. That was
already a year ago. Crazy!!

We have this ami named Marcel and he is awesome. The other day he went
onto Mormon.org and was on there for 4 hours because he couldn't get
off! He said that he was trapped in and was so interested! He has a
baptismal date set for the 17th of this month. I am way excited for
him. We met him when we were teaching one of our other amis, Jean
Pierre, and I am hoping that Marcel can help Jean Pierre progress.
Jean Pierre knows that our message is true and he knows that the Book
of Mormon is true... he just wants to wait so he knows more before he
commits to going to church. He doesn't realize that he won't really
learn more until he goes to church. So we are hoping that Marcel will
help him out with that. They are good friends. Marcel loves going to
church so he can put a good word in to Jean Pierre.

So, by now you know a little bit about Remy. Here is something
funny/crazy that happened this week. We went to his house and like
always he has a bunch of questions cause he studies studies studies!
He was going through his questions and we followed him through 1
Samuel, Isaiah, Alma, Revelations, and we even went into the Pearl of
Great Price and he had already read Abraham and Moses and had it all
marked up! We have never mentioned the Book of Abraham to him and yet
he found it and studied it and marked it all up. I am always so
impressed with Remy! He was ordained a Priest yesterday and received
the Aaronic Priesthood. Our recent converts are so awesome!
The other day Elder Pister and I grilled up some hamburgers and
they were AMAZING! Everything tastes so much better now, now that we
have a grill. The grill sucks... it is African home made coal with
half of a tire rim. So it takes a long time to do it, but it gets done
and it tastes good.

Speaking of food, we went to the baptismal services this Saturday and
Maman Lucille invited us over to her house to eat and celebrate her
baptism (if you remember Franky, Maman Lucille is his mother. She used
to be a prophetess... but now she knows whats up) and they had a bunch
of meat on the table. I grabbed a lot of meat and started eating. I
picked up one meat chunk and when I picked it up I poked myself.
I flipped it over and I realized that I was holding half of a
porcupine head in my hand. They cut it in half and so I had half of
the teeth and ear and all that. There was an eye ball too... and I ate
it. Not the tastiest thing... but edible. I also ate some crazy lizard
stuff. I am pretty sure I broke the law by eating it. There was a lot
of bush meat on that table. Its okay though because it was good :)
Except the porcupine... I don't recommend it.

Yesterday, Elder Pister and I were at the church and it started to
POUR. There was so much rain and wind, as well. There are a lot of
mango trees by the church and because of the wind a whole bunch of
mangoes became flying projectiles and were taking out roofs and stuff.
It was crazy! They sounded like little bombs when they hit the roof.
They are not ripe yet so they are super hard. There are so many
mangoes here... I can't wait until its mango season so I can chow down
and stuff myself with that heavenly fruit.

So Caelan is 17... holy cow! I was sitting there on the night of March
2nd and I couldn't believe that she was 17. She is growing up way to
fast. She will be 18 when I come home and be a graduate of Mountain View
High School! I can't think about that... its just too weird. When you
told me about her seeing those kid history guys I was confused. I had
no clue who they were... but then it hit me. I remember watching those
videos with Aiden! Those guys are awesome! Are they Mormon? And why
were they at Mountain View?

So there is a song on the tv right now called Titanium and it is
awesome! Tell Caelan to make an awesome playlist for me while I am
gone so when I get home and I can have all the awesome music that I
missed. I don't really hear much over here... only Rhianna. I don't
know why they all love her so much over here.

Elder Pister and I now play catch with a baseball every morning in
front of our apartment. It feels so good to throw a ball again. You
have to be careful to not miss the ball because if you do it will do
downhill until it hits a sewage pile... that may have happened once or
twice. Sick. There is this one moto guy that comes now and plays with
us. He had never thrown a baseball before and one day he came and
Elder Pister gave him his glove and he started throwing with me. I was
so impressed! He was throwing the balls to my chest and some were
pretty fast throws. I thought I would give him some of my
fastballs...and surprisingly, he caught them! He looked like a doofus
in the process but in the end the ball was in his glove.

Here is a funny story... we met a guy at church 8 days ago and I got
his number and I told him I would call him. Well, our week was pretty
busy and I wasn't able to call him and then I saw him again at church
and I went up to him and said, "Eric, I tried calling you all week and
your phone wasn't passing!" and then he said, "I know I know! I am so
sorry! Someone took it, so I have been without a phone this past week."
haha boy was I lucky!

We have this member family that we go and visit once a week and they
live way the heck out there. One night we finally got to their house
and one of their sons saw me and started sprinting to me when I was
still about 50 yards away screaming "Elder Schmid! Elder Schmid!" and
they he almost tackled me and gave me the biggest hug. I love moments
like that as a missionary. It makes everything worth it.

Well, that was my week! All is well over here in Yaoundé! HOLY COW! I
almost forgot! Cameroon has been approved to get a District!! So,
President Jameson is coming this week and will organize it on Sunday!
Members have been waiting for this moment for years and now it is
finally happening and I get to be here when it happens. The members
here are so excited. Welp, I have to go! I love you!

Je t'aime,
Elder Schmid