Dear Mom,

 

This week was an interesting one, but nevertheless, it was a great one. We are back into the last rainy season before the dry season, so we got caught in the rain a few times without an umbrella… well, I did. I left my umbrella, on accident, over at one of our members houses. It’s not fun when you don’t have an umbrella. You get very wet, very fast. But that didn’t slow us down! The rain slows a lot of other people down, but it can’t slow down missionary work.

 

Right after we emailed last week, we went over to Tom Genning’s work. Tom Gennings is an American who works for Noble Energy, an oil company, and he is here in Cameroon every other month. I wanted to give him a letter to send when he got back to the states so we went to his office. He works, by far, in the nicest building I have been in since my arrival in Cameroon back on 6 Sept. 2011. It’s crazy! There was this huge metal box that you walked into, and when you walked into it, these doors come out of the wall and shut off the entry… then the box started to move and before we knew it we were on the third floor. It was the craziest thing. Tom is awesome. He is a convert and has a neat conversion story. As we were talking with him, he asked us if we had eaten, and we hadn’t, so he invited us to eat with him and the guys at work. So he took us up to the penthouse and had us sit down at a very nice fancy table and told us what our menu was… yes, we had choices!! I got chicken wings with rice and onions, a salad with Italian dressing, and potatoes. I was in heaven. We had a neat conversation with a nonmember man who is from England. He had some questions about the foundational beliefs of the Mormons and what we focus on. We were able to talk about the cleansing powers of the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the family. I love those two subjects so much. It was awesome speaking normal English as well. After the amazing dinner and discussion, Tom called up one of his drivers and had him drive us over to the Nuttall’s apartment. It was so weird being in a nice car wearing seat belts with a/c and a sweet sound system. Well, actually it was just stock but stock is much better than anything that exists here. It was so nice… Tom Gennings is great! He has helped me out a lot with sending letters and everything.

 

The Gailey’s are incredible. I would be totally fine with staying in Douala for the rest of my mission just so I could work with the Gailey’s. They are so funny and easy to talk to. It has been so much fun just getting to know them. When they originally got their mission call they were scheduled to start their mission in January, which worked out great for them because they had four grandchildren on that were to be born before January. One day, as they were driving down the freeway, Sister Gailey turned to Elder Gailey and said, “Hey, why don’t we just go earlier?” and they called in and had their report date changed to an earlier date! Little did they know that thousands of miles away we were praying and fasting that we could get a couple here before the Nuttalls left so that 8 missionaries wouldn’t be on their own for 5 months. That is what happened in Yaoundé and it was very difficult for the missionaries. So it was a precious little miracle. They don’ speak any french but they have the best attitude towards their mission. Yesterday, Elder Gailey bore his testimony in french and the branch loved it. The Gailey’s have big shoes to fill, but I know that they will be amazing and do so much for this branch.

 

Our investigator, Alex, is still progressing and learning everyday. We met with him almost everyday and we were able to teach him so much and he loved every minute of it. This week we taught him the law of chastity and he explained some concerns he had but once again he understood the doctrine and accepted to follow it. He has never had any rejections. I love teaching this guy so much. He hasn't come to church yet even though, a few weeks ago, he went through the trouble to change his day off to Sunday and his boss allotted him that day and he still hasn't come to church. His excuse... rain. Which is a legit excuse. It has poured these last two Sundays. But then again, that should never be an excuse. It has rained almost everyday and yet he is at work. I asked him that if it rained every Sunday throughout the year would he never come to church? He promised with God that he would be there this Sunday. He better be... that's not a promise that should be broken. I kind of laid into him today when we met with him telling him that he needs to go to church and he felt bad because he knew that he could have come. We then taught about repentance because he was hit pretty hard by our chastity lesson. We surprised him today, we didn't tell him we were coming, so we just showed up and he was reading his chastity brochure. I asked him if he had any questions and he did, and every single one was on repentance and how he can truly repent of his sins. This man is dedicated and serious and I know that he will be such a solid member.

 

This week when we did weekly planning, Elder Lavering and I set some pretty big, yet achievable goals. We thought that we were good missionaries and that we could accomplish the goals that we had set. Well, the very next day, we saw the funny side of our Heavenly Father because NO ONE was answering their phones. Our program that we fixed was a "I hope so and so will be there and this hour". We got home and were so bugged. We were like, "What the heck? Here we are setting great goals and wanting to do so much good and we get this thrown at us?" It was pretty selfish on my part to complain. So, this whole week I was thinking that our numbers for this week were going to be low and I was so surprised yesterday when we counted them because we tied our record for number of lessons taught! It is interesting how it worked out. Here I was being a little baby, but the Lord knew what He was doing and what He wanted His servants to do. I love my mission.

 

Today I went and got a hair cut and as we were walking back to our apartment I look at Elder Lavering and said, "Wanna race... barefoot?" We took a few more steps as Elder Lavering pondered the possibility...and then he accepted. We took off our sandals and I gave him a head start and we took off. We only ran about 1/4 mile but now I have two blisters... one on each of my big toes and the bottom of my feet are shredded. What the heck was I thinking? That is probably what everyone else was thinking as they saw two young white boys sprinting down the streets of Douala. Oh, I won.

 

Do you remember me telling you about Matthieu? He was an inactive member when Elder Thibault and I started together about 18 weeks ago. Well, today he is totally active and has given up his bad habits, once again, and is at church every Sunday. It is so neat seeing the change that has come into his life. He is the one who has the skin eating disease on his leg. Well, now that he is active his problem has been getting better and better and he is getting happier and happier. The promises that we promised to him are being fulfilled because of his faith and his works! It is so awesome. Every time I see him he is always telling me how much he loves me and how much he is going to miss me. I love this work so much and I love working with inactives.

 

Yesterday I gave a talk in church and I was chose to talk on some of my favorite scriptures... Alma 41:6, D&C 20:77, and D&C 46:9. I love the principle of desire and will. I love to talk in church too. I don't get nervous anymore! I just get up and talk about the gospel and share the message with love. For some reason people got the impression that I was leaving, so I had a bunch of people come up to me after the meeting and ask me if I was leaving and they told me how sad they were. No worries... I am still here until October 19th. Maybe longer... and I would love to stay longer. I love Douala.

 

This week we went over the baptism interview questions with Catherine and I was joking around with her and for the very first question I asked, "How much do you weigh?" and before I could tell her I was joking she says, "58 kg!" People here are so open about anything. I love Catherine. She is such a funny old lady.

 

Well, the mission is awesome... I tell you that every week but it is so true. There is no where else I would rather be right now. I know that my life is changing and I love seeing the change occurring in the lives of my brothers and sisters here in Douala. Have a great week!

 

Je t'aime,

Elder Schmid