April 12, 2010

Yay!! We got two new pictures which we haven't gotten for a while. The first picture is of Sam at a baptism and the second one, I believe, is Sam with his companion and his other two roommates. He didn't give an explanation.

Hey everyone!

Haha do you guys even stay at the house anymore? Seems like everytime I hear from you you are leaving on another trip! HAve fun in New York!!

Ya, I'll be there this Saturday when everyone gets baptised. It should be a pretty big service. The zone leaders left us with one canidate too but we'll be working hard to find a lot more for next time.

Yes I got the photos last week! Thanks! It was great to see all of you guys!

Haha here they all speak fon-bay. A lot more complicated than the language in Togo but I'm getting the hang of it. But here a lot more people speak French than in Togo so its a lot easier.

It rained a little bit one night last week, but not really (of course it chose to rain the night i had my clothes drying outside haha). Elder Leavitt has been actually pretty sick lately. His fever got up to 103 the other night. At the same time, when he got robbed he got pushed down and messed up his knee so thats been hurting him too. He got it x rayed and is sending it to SLC but he thinks theres a screw from his old knee replacement surgery sticking out (not good). AND to make things worse, the whole week they were here the power was hardly ever on and the license on their car expired so they couldnt go anywhere. Not a good situation. Remember them in your prayers. Of course i still take my doxy everyday. Only the less inteligent or lazy missionaries dont.

Way to go bearing your testimony Jack! I'm proud of ya.

Had a good week this week. Got to know my area and our investigators pretty well. I gave a talk about missionary work in church sunday and also taught the english speakers in elders quorum. Akpakpa is more upperclass than Gbedjromede is, we teach a lot more well to do people here than before. I really like that. Nothing tooo exciting happened this week, just the same old same old. Still enjoying being a yovo in africa. Seriously, that makes you immediately the most popular person in Africa. Everywhere you go you hear "yovo!", the kids love you, all the woman want to marry you to get to america...its quite the life haha. But you really have to make sure that the people want to get baptized because they have a testimony. Elder Holland was in the Ivory Coast not too long ago and he talked about making sure people are attracted to the church because of the gospel, not because we have nice buildings or things like that. It was a really good inspiration.

Can you believe that next month i well already be able to call again? Crazy, that six months went by fast.

Well, I still love being Elder Bertoch. Being on a mission has taught me so much, both temporally and spiritually. I know i will be so much better prepared for life because of these two years. I know that Jesus Christ is our example and our Savior. I know that Joseph Smith was his prophet and restored his church. I love this gospel and i love sharing it with the people that dont know it.

Love,

Elder Bertoch