Easter Letter

So  Benin has a new president now, Patrice Talon. No wars or problems happened so I guess the people are happy. If the people are happy the missionaries are happy, if there's electricity.

Easter time is an exciting time here in Benin. No school and people like to celebrate. Monday is also a holiday and nobody works. Brother Blessing, our Ghanian convert told us on Sunday that he wanted to attend a family home evening on Monday, since he wouldn't be working, but he didn't know where to go. Our rendez-vous with Armel fell through so we decided to do the family home evening at his house. The two other investigators who are hard to get a hold of were all there that evening and we all sat down to talk about Easter and the Savior's Resurrection. It is pleasing to see how much people know the scriptures. We had a good lesson and then we ate some cookies that we had brought for them.

Last week Elder Adjo and I had gone off into the neighborhood next to the bureau in the search for new investigators. We found a small monkey leashed to a gate. WE WILL GET PICTURES OF IT FOR NEXT TIME! Afterwards and around the corner,we met a young woman named Modestine who lives with her mother Rose, Rose's brother René and several other relatives in the same complex. We have been back to see them two times and we plan to visit again tonight! They are catholic and have a good background knowledge of the bible. They are happy to visit with us and "talk about God" as Rose says. They are very friendly people.

We weren't able to see Sandra on Tuesday this week. Hopefully next week. We did see her at the store though! We were buying Nutella and she was arranging items on the shelves.

This month will be the creation of the first stake in Benin! That will be cool. We are inviting as many persons as possible through Facebook, radio, face to face contacting and text messaging. It will be a very large event.

Well, that's about it for this week. Until next time :)

Elder Archer  [Para mama: ]

Here are some pictures taken from the car.

A truck tipped over and spilled bags of... something mysterious... at the Étoile Rouge (Red Star) roundabout.

March Letter!

We sometimes receive referrals from church headquarters through Mormon.org and other church websites. These are people who are interested in receiving a Book of Mormon or a visit from the missionaries and have made an online request. These persons are actually called before being sent to their respective missions to be sure they are sincere and have the right expectations.

One of these contacts is in our area. Our current investigator named Armel. He is a businessman and an English instructor. He visits with us for thirty minutes on Mondays before starting his class. His business is on the second floor of a three story building and the ground floor is a small shop called "Franc Prix". 

I had spoken briefly with one of the employees at Franc Prix when I used to work with Elder Bretherton. She had asked us if we were speaking German,well... we weren't. Just recently, Elder Adjo and I visited this store and on the way out, the same woman stopped us and said that she had seen us "last time". I realized that it was the woman that asked if we were speaking German. Her name is Sandra. We took her number and set up an appointment. We took a member with us to go visit her at her home. She lives with her two sisters and has a catholic background. The first lesson went very well and she was very receptive and focused. We like people who ask questions. I think she is very sincere. 

Before leaving to Ghana for a training with Elder Rasband, president Morin asked us to visit a carpenter near the office that the previous office missionaries used to visit. This man's name is «Janvier» "January". We found where he works a little ways away from the office. He is very kind and has a personality that shows intent focus and consideration for what is being shared with him. So far we have visited with him twice and look forward to future visits.

Well there's some of this week. The final round of elections are tomorrow. Who will be the new president of Benin? 

Until next time

Elder Archer

Here are some pictures:

I discovered the "night" mode on my camera! It's pretty cool.

Here are some pictures of me, that I took for putting in remembrance journals.

I'm still alive!

After around four months we finally had some rain. Everyone says that the sorcerers/voodoo practitioners do rituals to keep the rain away. Well, they must have gotten tired or needed some rain because ... there's rain now. The rain also conveniently transformed our apparent laziness of not washing the car into the wisdom of not washing the car because the rain would have ruined it. 

This week has been busy again with some random jobs. The mission president had me design an invitation to be distributed everywhere for the first stake conference in Benin. We needed several designs so the district leaders could decide on which they preferred. That was pretty fun, I enjoyed it.

Then as usual, we had some missionaries finish and return home. One of these was Elder Destribois from our district. He is home now in France. We are expecting, among other missionaries, the arrival of an Elder Asher. Seeing as how people already pronounce my name "asher", it will be interesting to see how this works out.

When bureau work is busy, missionary work is kind of suppressed. There are many preparations going on, such as getting the mission history ready to submit, creating documents concerning the stake conference, collecting new investigators contacts from the missionaries to send an invitation text for the conference, and sending out messages in regards to the elections coming up. On the other hand, our chinese investigator called us last week and said he would like to see us. We will go visit him today after writing home! Hopefully he still remembers that we don't drink fancy imperial chinese tea, or beer. (Those were offered to us in past visits)

Well still alive, still doing well. Until next time!

    - Elder Archer

 -  Picture with Elder Destribois and Elder Ajo at the airport..... and "Officework" picture

Last week was kind of interesting!

First of all, the assistants had asked us to drive the "bus" to Ouidah last Monday (the snake place). It was for a zone activity. This was the third time I had been there but only the second time inside. I didn't go inside the last time because whats to see had been already seen, but, seeing as how my it was my companion Elder Adjo's first time, I figured I'd have a second go. The only interesting part about that trip was when an African tour guide was translating French into German for a group of German tourists. There is actually a pretty solid German presence here in Cotonou along with Chinese people, and maybe some French people.

Sometimes Elder Adjo and I eat random things at the office. The other day, we realized that we had switched cultures. He was eating what we Americans could consider a "meal", and I was eating African food:

We contacted some of our online mormon.org referrals and met an English tutor who is interested in listening to our message. In the evening he teaches English at his own private business which just happens to be on the second floor of one of our favorite grocery stores. We feel that he is sincere in his desire to learn about the message of the Restoration and we've had two appointments so far. Maybe one day we will stay to attend one of his evening English practice sessions.

The best part of the week was seeing our investigators come to church! Lincoln and Komlan. Lincoln is our Chinese friend and Komlan is our Togolese friend. Considering that the missionaries in "the District" missionary training video taught a Chinese guy, I think that we have followed their example to the fullest extent possible.

Apparently I wore the same tie in those two different photos taken on two different days.

Until next week!

Elder Archer

Happy New Year!

Hello everyone!

I haven't written a "long" letter in a while, so today's the day.

Well, besides a rather momentarily painful stomach problem two days ago, I have been doing just fine.

My companion and I are generally at the office during lunchtime and we buy food from a woman down the street who sells rice, pâte, chicken, and all kinds of sauces. (Not that this has to do with the stomach problems) She has come to be known as the "rice lady". The rice lady didn't work during the Christmas-New Years period, so we had to find food somewhere else. That somewhere else became the bakery down the street where a "meal" (a cookie and chocolate milk) costs 3$ instead of your standard and filling 90 cents plate of chicken and rice. We ended up eating random things during this week and a half or so, things like cookies and avocados. A balanced diet. But thankfully the rice lady is back now so we eat more normally now.

Mondays are a special day, preparation day for the other missionaries and bureau meeting for us. The assistants from Togo travel here to Benin and all of the leaders and office people have a meeting to plan things for the mission. 

Last Monday in the evening, president Morin stepped in and asked to borrow a pen with black ink, I gave him mine (which is a little nicer than your ordinary every day pen). He said: "merci, je le rendrai après" which means, "Thank you,I will bring it back afterwards". We went back to whatever it was that we were doing when president exits his office, says goodbye to us and leaves the office with my pen in his shirt pocket. I guess he likes my pen! He came back later and I asked him about my pen and he kind of jumped in surprised and smiled as he gave it back to me. We all laughed.

Missionary work is going kind of slow for us. We give out brochures in public quite often as we come across lots of people during the day but we don't have many stable investigators. We are currently teaching a student named Moïse (Moses). He lives next door to a convert from Ghana and he picks things up pretty well. We hope that we can continue teaching him, seeing as school has just begun. As for our Chinese friend, he has been quite busy at work and we weren't able to visit him last week. Hopefully tomorrow. We asked for contacts from the members during the branch council meeting last week and they have promised to send us some. The most effective people to teach are contacts from the members. They automatically have support and an example from their friend.

We are expecting the visit of the first counselor in the Relief Society presidency and the second counselor of the Primary in February. I made some announcements for that.

I will keep you up to date.

I hope you are all doing well and are doing good things.

love,

Elder Archer

   here is "the bus" picture

    Christmas 2015

                                          Moïse

The Winter Letter

Bonjour la famille! 

I hope you are all doing fine. You are probably freezing and I'm over here ... in the sun. Hehe. 

☀☀☀  ❄❄❄

☀😧☀  ❄👪❄

☀☀☀  ❄❄❄

So I've been driving the mission bus around. "Bus". In french they say bus ("boose") instead of "van". I like driving it, it's rides pretty smooth. I found out that you're not supposed to park your "bus" in front of the minister of taxation facility's front gate or they will call the police to come take your bus away :(  now hold on a moment before you get worried.

Experience: [It was a hazy Tuesday morning, the day that certain missionaries are supposed to go to immigration to renew their visas. Elder Adjo and I are the ones that transport them there, by bus, which is what we did once they had all arrived. There is a sidewalk alongside the immigration place for parking. I have been to the immigration many times so I was familiar with where the car is parked. I found a large empty spot and I parked the van there.

We followed the others inside to the place where much waiting and little work happens. The mission bureau secretary Sister Precious told my companion and I that we could leave to run other errands since they wouldn't be finishing anytime soon.

We walked out alongside the busy road when a short old man wearing a white suit approached and he seemed to be upset. He was saying things like: "are you crazy? What were you thinking? Do we park like this?  What do you think you're doing?" I asked him if he was talking about the "bus". He said yes. We hurried over and the van and the gate that I had apparently parked in front of was open and there were two armed military watch people over there. I told them sorry sorry, I didn't realize I had blocked the entrance. The short old man said "it's not a matter of saying sorry, the police are coming to take the vehicle". I think I would have normally been quite nervous in this situation but I was actually very calm, my mind was clear, as though I didn't think much of the situation. I'm sure there was a lot of help. We just stood there for a second and I asked the group how long it would take for the police to get there. They said they didn't know. I asked if I could move the vehicle.. since that was the problem, but they said that they had already called the police so we couldn't just leave the site. 

Suddenly, the short old guy turned to my companion and said: "and you, you're African, you should have told your friend that it's not good to park here, you know that, you're an accomplice". My companion is indeed African as the man had said, but he is from Ivory Coast and I had the impression to tell the man this. "He's not from here, he is Ivorian", I said, "we are both foreigners". This simple phrase seemed to neutralize the whole situation. "Oh, he's Ivorian?" the man said. "Yes, he's not from here", I replied. The three guys exchanged glances as though they had realized an error on their part. The short old guy in white looked down and started talking to himself, kind of re-explaining to himself what had just happened, "they're both foreigners? So ... they arrive here, the white guy is escorting this Ivorian to immigration, they parked in the wrong place... huh". They also seemed to feel sorry for having called the police. Their hearts were softened, we could say. Eventually one of the military guys went back inside to call it off. He returned and told us that we could leave. We told them sorry one last time and that it wouldn't happen again. Then we left.]

So that is our immigration bus experience. Then, just a couple of days ago, we were driving the bus on a beach road and we got stuck in the sand. Normally we drive a 4x4 pickup truck but it was in the shop, so we drove the bus. Needless to say, the bus doesn't do well in the sand. A buff guy walked over and asked us if we wanted him to get the bus out. We said sure. "Avez-vous de l'argent?" "Do you have money?" he said. Haha, people here and money. He asked for 5,000 CFA which is about 9$, a good sum of money here. We refused at first but then a small army of people showed up to help, so... we agreed. The left back tire was practically buried in the sand and they picked up the back of the bus and swung it over to the more solid sand. (That makes it sound easy but they actually lifted it like five times, gradually scooting it over) Finally they got it unstuck and I pulled out a 5000 bill. Now the problem was "who am I going to give this to?" Everyone wanted it. They were like the seagulls in finding Nemo: "mine mine mine!".  I gave it to the guy who first approached us and he said he'd split it with the others.The other's seemed okay with this.

So far, the only difficulties with driving. Vehicle placement I suppose. We are now in the Harmattan season. It pretty much means that air leaves dust behind whenever it touches anything. Dusty winds. If we leave a window open, everything will be covered in a layer of dust after a few hours. It's also kind of cold in the mornings. As cold as it gets here.

We are supposed to balance our office work with missionary work in the field. It is hard to do but we are working on it. Sometimes we are very busy and sometimes it seems there is nothing to do. It's very different.

I think we will finally be able to do skype! The internet here at the office works great and we will get a webcam. I will let you know at what time we will do that.

I will send more pictures in a few days. For now here is the baguette picture. 

See you next time! :)

Elder Archer

Back to Benin

Well, I'm in Benin now. I was transferred to the "bureau" or mission office after having spent around five months in Togo. It surprised me when I found out that Id be working in the office and I felt sad about leaving my area in Togo. I had many converts there and made many friendships. I am happy however for the new experiences to come. I work with Elder Bretherton from Ventura California and we fill out paperwork, read emails, go to the post office, take people to and from the doctor, and takepropanetankstothesistermissionarieseveryweekbecausetheyinsistonnotcookingtogetherandcookingfoodindividuallyforsixpeopleonasinglegasstoveusesupthefuelprettyquickly. We have in our apartment Elder Destribois from France and Elder Yamapia from Congo. Elder Destribois likes to talk about technical sciency things like trains, cars, engines, and astronomy. He speaks pretty good English and helps us improve our French. Elder Yamapia is also a nice guy and will be finishing his two years next week.

It feels different. I feel like I'm not a "regular" missionary anymore, just because of the difference in the daily routine. We still teach people but our schedule is so variable and inconsistent that appointments aren't really sure. Recently, however, we met a chinese man at the hospital and did some "OVB". So in French we don't say "door to door" (porte à porte), we say Ouvre Votre Bouche "open your mouth" (which can be done anywhere and doesn't necessarily require a door). We introduced ourselves, gave him a brochure, and took his number. Later on, the 29th of November, we were able to go to his house and teach him. His name is Lincoln and he has a Beninese colleague that he works with named Komla. Lincoln speaks Chinese and English. He knows practically nothing about christianity but is interested to know all about it. Komla on the other hand, speaks French and English but is part of "Assemblies of God", an evangelical church, so the two are an interesting mix to teach. We taught Lincoln how to pray and he gave a kneeling prayer at the end of the lesson! It was very special. The two enjoy our company and we will see them again next week.

We recently had a visit from Elder Vinson of the Seventy. He came to speak to the missionaries and also at district conference. He and his wife are Australian, so they speak English. BUT, he gave his whole talk in French on Sunday! He spoke slowly and simply but what he did say was correct. It was a rather wonderful gift of tongues demonstration. "The gift of tongues" here in Africa (outside of the church) translates to somebody that has been "gifted" with a knowledge of the tongue of angels, translated again: somebody who screams nonsense into a microphone for the whole world to hear. Apparently "the spirit had descended upon them" a little too violently. Anyways, the Vinson's visit was a very special experience. This took place at an interesting building called Palais des congrès (palace of congresses?).

Until next time!

 Standing next to Elder Nsengyumva at the zone conference, the first missionary in our mission from Burundi.                            

 At  Palais des  Congres with people from my first area!
                             

Thanksgiving feast: turkey, mashed potatoes, meatballs, and cinnamon apple cobbler stuff.