December 23, 2013

Dear family,

Well, this is the last Africa email. It's pretty crazy. I definitely
haven't wrapped my mind around it. Denial turns out to be a pretty
effective way of making time go by.
 
I was wondering when I would be released. Sounds good. Wait, I just
reread that. He's going to release me over the phone? That can't be
right.
 
I got the emails about Jfk and I wrote down the numbers. I think this
should be doable. NYC here I come!
 
As far as having food in the airport, I'm not sure I'll have a huge
appetit. Maybe just really thick hot cocoa. And Bacon or krispie
cremes. I've been craving breakfast foods lately, maybe we'll stop by
Ihop on the way home? Nah, we are all going to be exhausted. In terms
of meals for the first few days, good meat dishes. Since it's
christmas time, that's more or less a given anyways.
 
So I heard a rumor that Elder Burkhart's luggage didn't make it back
to Georgia with him. Ouch. For the moment I have a carry on and one
checked bag. I'm thinking about checking the carryon at JFK to just
make going back through security even easier. I'll decide when I am
there.
 
As far as friday goes, I really don't care what happens as long as a
trip to the temple is included somewhere.
 
Are you ready for an awesome story? On tuesday we were at a
lesson/become dinner appointment (sometimes people decide they want to
feed us rather than be taught. It happens occaisionally). Anyways, my
companion had a baby of a couple of months on his lap. When the  baby
got passed to me, we noticed that the baby had peed all over my
companion's lap. It looked really funny and the photo is currently
protected on my memory card. The best part? The baby's name is Power
Insondable (all his first name). We usually call him "baby power."
 
Oh yeah, my other interesting story is about how during a split I was
followed for 30 minutes by a crazy guy that wants me to give him 10
000 000 F CFA (about 20 000 US dollars) so he can fly to London and
play for the Arsenal soccer team. On Sunday he was waiting for us
outside the church, so I told him I've been frauded, lost everything,
and am going to be kicked out of the country this week. Hopefully he
disappears before the new american comes into my area. My current
companion will be spending 2 weeks with an Elder from Ghana, who will
be in turn training an american as my companion goes into the mission
office. Go figure.
 
Oh yeah, and then there was the next time I was walking on the beach
due to an accident of directions, and a halfnaked guy came out of the
trees and started shouting and walking toward us. We didn't run, but
we were walking as fast as we could in the sand. Given that there was
NO ONE within a kilometer, we figured letting him get close was not a
good idea. We were exhausted by the end, overall we walked about 4
kilometers on the beach. Oof. Then we found an "American University"
that is the reason why there are so many Nigerians in our area. That
was a very interesting day. Keeping it up to the end!
 
Oh, and then there was the time that someone was flipping through
radio stations and we heard someone say "book of mormon." they went
back to the station, and it turned out to be a "Mormon turned
Catholic" from Ogden calling into a Catholic Radio Station. Go figure,
you can find ANYTHING IN AFRICA!
 
I'm currently in Mosiah in my reading of the Book of Mormon. I won't
finish before I get home, but if I'm lucky I could finish it before
the end of the year. If I'm not constantly asleep.
 
It's super weird to be at the end. Everyone keeps saying that I've
finished the mission and I keep telling them "as long as I'm still
here in Africa, it's not over yet! It's just close." I've definitely
had some reflections about how I've changed, how the mission has
changed, and what I was able to accomplish. On my own, I didn't really
do much, but I did get to be an instrument to some pretty cool things.
 
Love you all, see you soon!
Elder Christensen