Dear Mother :)

Ne me jugez pas parce que je peche différemment de vous :) (Don't judge me because I sin differently then you)  Just joking! I love you! This week was awesome and I can't wait to tell you all about it. I just gotta say that I love working with Elder Lavering. This past week we have finally come out of that awkward beginning stage of being companions and have really opened up. We are definitely best buds now. It's fun just talking about life and what not with him. He is an awesome missionary and is always wanting to further the work. The Lord always blesses me with great companions.

So, we have an investigator named Catherine. She is the grandmother of Rosalie. It has been difficult in the past talking to her because she doesn't have a phone and she is always gone to work. But we fixed the problem... we just found where she worked! She is a sitter for this old handicapped woman who can't move. So she basically does everything for her. We showed up at the house and she was sitting there on the floor with her legs spread apart and she had a Book of Mormon, triple combination, Gospel Principles, Restoration brochure, and a notebook all open in between her legs and she was doing some hardcore studying. She is awesome!! We didn't even really need to teach her the Restoration because she thoroughly studied the brochure and answered all the questions and did all the necessary studies in Gospel Principles. So she basically taught us. We have had to slow down a little bit on the Plan of Salvation because there was some confusion on who God was, but we cleared that up super fast. It is so easy to teach her because we just need to show her the scriptures and then she believes. It is as simple as that. Her granddaughter Rosalie is a little different and a little stubborn but we are slowly progressing.

On Elder Laverings first day, we were walking by the church and a security guard called us over and told us, "Hey I want you to teach me." We looked at each other and said, "Okay!" Well, we have been meeting with him and he is incredible! One of the first rendez-vous we had with him he was telling us how he wants to have the Holy Ghost and we told him that he would need to be baptized and he told us that he really wanted to because he knows he hasn't received the true baptism yet. He has been baptized twice and he said that after those baptisms there were absolutely no changes. We met with him today and we cranked out the whole entire first lesson with him and the whole time he was asking great questions and we were able to answer every single one of them and help him understand. He is a security guard for the little brother of Samuel Eto'o who is basically god #2 for the people here in Cameroon. He is a a very well known soccer player who was raised just down the road from where I live. His little brother is the owner of that "pretty" quad I was next to in that picture.

I like going to teach Alex because the AC from the apartments en haut (top) comes down and the cool air chills in the little entry area so we are not sweating like crazy. We will probably see him tomorrow or Wednesday and invite him to be baptized.

So, there has been a documentary created by the devil that has been going around here in Cameroon. It caused a lot of problems over in Yaoundé and now it is finding its way here into the homes of Douala. There has been one by the National Geographic and also one by some BBC world thing. So now everyone here thinks we are polygamist and filthy rich billionaires and that we have department stores as big as cities and what not. We have had to answer to many questions and set so many people straight. Every single one of our progressing investigators has seen it and has second guessed what they were doing with "the Mormon's".

Things with Chrispine, I think, will be coming to an end here in a few weeks. She will be moving back to PK 12 (way the heck out there) and will not be able to come to church. She will be there for 9 months. Elder Lavering and I made the trek out to her house on Wednesday and it took us about 2 hours.... just to get there. While we were there we explained the baptismal covenant and what the Lord will expect of her if she is baptized at this time and what would happen if she chose not to respect those promises. There are so many inactive members who live out there and we don't want to add another. She totally understood and admitted that she would definitely not be at church every Sunday. It is just too far away. It was sad because I loved teaching Chrispine. She always read the Book of Mormon and progressed really well. She also saw that stupid documentary and questioned our sanity and what not but after one rendez-vous we were able to ease her mind and help her understand the truth.

On a better note... PK 12 is gorgeous!! It reminded me a lot of Yaoundé because there were a lot of hills and it was sooo green. You were in the jungle and it was so awesome. When we were walking to Chrispines house we only passed a few houses so it was dead quiet. It was so peaceful and beautiful. When we showed up to her house she showed us the construction going down for their new house. When we showed up the workers all started singing and one threw me a shovel and invited me to shovel cement from the ground up the the roof. So there I was standing in cement shoveling it up in my white shirt and tie. There were a lot of people around seeing something that I know they will NEVER see again. Elder Lavering was also able to shovel a bit and we both walked away sans tache (spotless)! There was a crazy old shirtless man dancing like a drunk man on the roof with a shovel in hand. I wish I had my camera on me.

We see Abega once a week because he is also pretty far out. We were with him and his wife on Saturday and we had an awesome lesson on sacrifice. There is no question in their mind that they will get baptized... they know that they will be baptized one day. The only thing holding them back is their marriage. They need to be married first before we can baptize them. This has been the issue for over a year now. Marriages cost a lot of money so that is the problem. They recognized that they needed to sacrifice a little to show the Lord their desire to be baptized and they had it planned that they were going to fast for 3 days. The day they started Abega got really sick and was falling down because he was so dizzy. It is interesting that that happened the day they started their fast. They are always in my prayers and I hope and pray that they will be baptized before I leave Douala. That would be incredible. I love that family so much.

Yesterday, we were able to go give a blessing to a sick woman and when we walked into the house there were 4 children who had never seen a white man in person before. One of the kids who was probably 4 said, "Wow, les blancs les blancs!! Merde!! (*?*#!) and then he came and gave us a hug! It was pretty cute. I have no clue why he hugged us but it was funny.

Well, life is awesome over here. I need new vocabulary... I always say awesome, neat, incredible. Forgive me. It is weird thinking that soon I will be at my 14 month mark. Time is going by so fast. I am so grateful that I still have 10 months left! There is still so much I want to do and so much I want to improve. I'm not perfect... far from it. But I feel like I am on the pathway that leads to perfection. I love my life!

Adios!

Elder Schmid

 

Kevin and I over in PK 12... aka way the heck out there

Need any buckets?

Over at Abega's house

Over in a area called Quartier Bafia