May 10, 2010

We had a great conversation with Sam yesterday. He sounds really well and very happy. He is still staying healthy, but has lost a lot of weight. He eats mainly rice and some kind of potato. He told us of a zone meeting they were having when a king crab walked through it. The zone leaders (from Ivory Coast), stopped the meeting, held the crab down with a stick, cut it's pinchers off and took it home for dinner. I suppose if he were willing to do that, he could be eating crab too. He says, though, that he mostly sweats off the weight.

Sam was saying that in Benin there are two main religions - voodoo and the Catholics. People from Benin are not very friendly to them and generally want nothing to do with the church. The branch he is in is made up of members from Nigeria, Togo and Ivory Coast. They are worried what will happen if the members move back home. They are working hard to try to teach people from Benin. However, it is difficult to get married in Benin until you have two children, so that makes it a little tricky.

They haven't had much rain even though it is the rainy season. The Africans are blaming it on the Chinese. They say the Chinese have built a big machine that blows all the clouds away. They got a little rain the other night, so Sam was saying the machine must have broken down. He was also saying how very dusty it is there. There is always a thick layer of dust on the table and on the floor. They have to clean it off before sitting down to study and they have to sweep the dust off the floor every day. They use fans in the apartment, but it is so hot you still need to open the windows.

That covers the highlights of the conversation. Of course, we updated him on a few things here, which would be of no interest to anyone reading this blog.