Riley in Africa : I, Missionary

It is really interesting having a Tahitian in my apartment because he has seen all the same movies I’ve seen, watched the same TV shows and stuff. However, he watched it all in French. As we have been discussing moves and TV shows I have found sometimes in the French translation of English movies they change words and names. The ones I thought were funniest are Hogwarts is Poudlard, Squidward from Spongebob is named Carlos, Gollum from Lord of the Rings is Toby. All these things made me laugh, a lot.

So, last Monday was Christmas but on Tuesday we had our Christmas party. The food was super good but the presentation of the nativity and stuff was pretty sad. Our zone was in charge of a skit about the nativity but our practices were weird and ineffective so when it got to time to do our sketch no one knew what to do so we all looked like losers fumbling around. We sang an impromptu off pitch version of Oh Come all ye Faithful and called it good.

The rest of the week was not too eventful. My comp was pretty sick and slept a ton so I went back to my killing old missionary techniques to not go crazy.

We had a branch activity on Saturday and it was insane to see how we had about 100 individuals present 80 of them were under 12 which is the most people I’ve ever seen at the church building. Sadly, when it came time for church the next day there were about 10 people on time for church.

New Year’s is a super big deal here for some reason. The idea of the year changing is super crazy and people love blowing lots of money they don’t have to party and shoot of fireworks all night long. It was kinda cool to get on the roof and see the whole capital a light with little African firecrackers and this morning the city was so clam, everyone in their beds hungover, so great.

“Does believing you're the last sane man on the planet make you crazy?” is a quote from I, Robot. This quote often passes through my head as I see the different personalities of people here; missionaries, members and investigators alike. I don’t know what it is but I’m sure everyone here is insane. We teach this mama who is just crazy. We call and ask her if we can come over she says yes. We get there knock on the door, no one answers. Then we see her next time she gets mad we didn’t come. Then she remembers that right after she hung up the phone with us she went to sleep. And she randomly laughs really loud at nothing. All of her past experiences, she has to act out. I love teaching her because you never know what’s coming next. I asked her if she believed in Jesus Christ and she went on this rant about how she is a prophetess and got a vison about how the Catholic church is a church run by evil men. It was a very crazy piece of theater we watched. I watched a Muslim chastise a bunch of other Muslims for celebrating Christmas. I also can teach people the same thing in a million different ways and they will never remember. I love my investigators and this people is really open I just wonder if it’s just me that’s crazy or it’s just everyone else.

I was also blessed with a few people that came to church on their own so we might have some people who progress. I haven’t had an investigator come to church since I got here to Porto-Novo, so a little progression was great to see.

I get to come home this year I’m so happy. I did all of 2017 here in Africa and on my mission. It has been a million dollar experience that I’ll cherish, but I wouldn’t pay a cent to do again.

Pictures from the Missionary Christmas Party

At the Christmas party we got a bunch of cards from random members of the church. I got a drawing from a primary kid with the same name as me, it was just a coincidence, but it was crazy. So thanks, Riley.

Thanks to the Ellingford family I got some pizza ingredients for Christmas. So on this New Year's Day I embarked on a quest to make an African Pizza