"Its amazing to get to see the gospel change so many lives, especially when you get to watch it happen progressively while you teach them! The people here love talking about god, but its amazing to see someone actually grow a testimony of the restored gospel and know the things are true; and also to know that you were a part of this conversion."
"Ha! so the people think that only white people live in America because whenever some one says im American they say “American noir?”(black American) and then laugh but im glad im not white because they get called all sorts of names here ha some of the children are afraid of the white skin, its pretty funny actually."
"Oh yea and I eat fish heads now they are so good! They just fry the head up with some oil and then just eat the whole head, my companion says that you get more wisdom when you eat a fish head, then I just laugh."
Monday, November 22, 2010
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Catch up on Jamin's news...
Hello Family and Friends!
Here are some excerpts from some of Jamin's past letters; he is doing GREAT!!!
From the MTC...
Aug 2nd: This first week has been so crazy and i have learned so so much about gospel principles and the french language it has been insane!! I have learned so much french that every single one of my dreams have been all in french ha its insane and just this morning i realized that i was alsleep and i was saying french words out loud as if i was studying it was crazy, i have prayed so much for help on this and i surely have been blessed! The spirit is so strong here and there are unlimited possibilities to how great i can be! im so excited to serve!!!
Aug 19th: So this past week has been great and i realized i have learned more french than i thought i did ha everyone at the MTC enjoys hearing us speak french because its so cool and they say that i speak it with a creole dialect which is great because thats what ill need in africa! i have been teaching alot of lessons and im getting better and better at it! And im learning more and more and studying sososososo much! and i really hope we get to have an apostle come and talk to us this week it will be so exciting! ha alright keep Me up to date!!
Sept 9th: This week has been really fun and still so much studying and french and our teachers even teach all in french so im picking up french really fast but there is always alot to learn! ha THere was some weird thing that the elders were trying to do is they were alltrying to do a pull up with this other elder on their backs ha and he is about 130lbs and i heard that no one could do it, everyone was just yelling and it was some contest and then i hear people say i bet the juggenaut could do it and i was like okay ill try and i did it, it was pretty hard especially since i weigh alot but i did it anyways! Ha there were these new elders that came in that were from tokyo japan and they are crazy hahaha they dont speak that much english and its like they are all on some sort of drug becauset they are so excited to be in america and they see me and they all just look ( ha they dont see black people ever there!).
Sept 24th: i am so excited that i get to leave on monday! Ha last night the elders and i and 3 other people( it was an exclusive party ha) had a awsome late night ha because all of there other parents have been sending them ALOT of food and they all wanted to get rid of it, so everyone grabbed their excess food and we just piled it on to one of the rooms floors and it was a massive pile, we took photos because we knew that this was going to be epic! ha and one of the elders had these fake mustaches and we each put one on and, people thought we were so weird but they wanted to come with us and chill but i had to kick them out since i was the bouncer and this get together was exclusive ha! and we all just dug into that pile ha it was insane, there was so much food and candy and soda ha oh yea and 2apples and 2 small loaves of french bread ha! And yes ELder kitchen does leave with me on the 27th he will be with me! Well it is almost time for me to get out there and start doing my best to spread the gospel i am so excited that i get the chance to go to the craziest continent on this earth! I'll call you in monday!!
(For a fun peek into life in the MTC right before leaving for the mission field check out the three videos posted on Jamin's MTC companion's blog, eldershanekitchen.blogspot.com. They will amaze and delight you!)
From Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire...
Oct 4th: Okay i am writing on a french african keyboard so it is kind of difficult to type and im already not very fast at it! The weather is crazy differnet and it is usually pretty hot with like 70-100percent humidity its insane! the french here is crazy i am learning really fast here because everyone here thinks that i am a native and so they are tougher on me but i can take it ha, but they tend to like to poke fun at me because im just as dark as them but i dont have there accent ha and they always say that i am very big man ha, but in french! My companions name is Elder Tshibasu and he is from congo and he has a thick african accent as well ha but he is a really good teacher! here in abidjan they eat alot of rice so for about 3 of the days in a row here i have eaten rice with beef and a tomato and onion sauce ha! but my fqvorite is the spicy spicy chicken with yam and some kind of fried rice, i dont know what it is called in french! here we do not get to wach general conference but we get it in the liahona about 3 months after it was broadcasted! the living quarteres here are sufficient for our needs ha and ha if you can live here then you can live anywhere with anything ha, its great though and the showers are always cold, which is nice becquse it is so hot here, ha showering with a bucket is always fun! I want to tell you every thing but it is hard ha i cqnt type fast enough i have tons of photos for you though! I love you all very very much
Oct 11th: If i say i am from america i will be moree unsafe ha like people will try to follow me home or give me their children or ask for money or try to mug me, just pretty much ill get alot more attention than needed! oh yea qnd elections are coming up pretty soon, so we have to come home early because it gets crazy at night and like at the end of the month all the missionaries in cote divoire are getting transfered to different appartments so we dont get caught up in all the riots qnd get hurt or kidnapped, its very exciting here! Everyone is very opinionated and loud! I ate my first snail at a memberes house we were eating FUTU(which is when you take a whole banana, peel and all and mash them until it is like a dough ball and you eat it with any kind of sauce) Well any ways i saw this squishy thing in the sauce and i thought it was fat, since we had fish in the sauce as well, but my companion said i had to eat that and i said what is it, and he said i wont tell you until after you eat it! and then he laughed! So i took half of it and stuck it in my mouth and when i bit into it , i thought that i was going to vomit but I held it down! It was just like rubber!
I know that i have a huge work to do here. and even in my broken french when i teach this gospel i know the people can not even deny that it is true, i can see it in there eyes and the eyes are the way to the soul. i know the lord blesses his missionaries, we are his soldiers he gives us everything we ask and he protects us. and it takes alot of faith to go out and speak to people who you cant really understand and dont know. It takes faith to get up in the morning and go back out again when you know it will be rough ha its not easy, but i like it, i love it. you have to go out with faith knowing that someone is just waiting for the gospel to come to them, i can see it you can just see the change in their eyes it is crazy, i cant put it into words. i have seen the many weaknesses that i have but i have also seen how the lord makes me strong when i have faith in him.
Nov 1st: Well This week has really been interesting Ha ! well I don’t get much time on the computer because the president has said that he wants us all back to the apartment quick. The people have not taken the elections very well and we are actually not allowed to leave the gates today because things are not going well ha! But the area we are in is called Angré and if things get worse than we will all get shipped off to Benin! So I am living in an apartment with 13 other missionaries, and my new comp is Elder Shaffer he is a newbie from America like me. Ha its funny because they put the two new people together. But we are getting lots of new investagators so that means we are not doing a bad job! Its exciting we have some really interesting people that we know like one of our investagators that we have named Austin ha (he is from Nigeria) so we have to teach him in English, it is actually very difficult to teach in English now because I have forgotten some words and the sentence structure for English but it is okay I like it!
Nov 8th: So i am back in my old apartment now with my old companion, but in a couple weeks we will be leaving again because of the second elections! so n the other area with my comp elder Shaffer we got a lot of investigators which was great and I am excited to go back and see them again.
I will do my best with trying to give info on the culture in africa its not easy because theres alot of stuff i have to do!! there are alot of fun and cool crazy things that go on here but there are also lots of bad and scary things also, ha dont be afraid mom i work with the spirit! its been a really great eye opener here ha im so glad i can live here for 2 years to see and expirience it!
Here are some excerpts from some of Jamin's past letters; he is doing GREAT!!!
From the MTC...
Aug 2nd: This first week has been so crazy and i have learned so so much about gospel principles and the french language it has been insane!! I have learned so much french that every single one of my dreams have been all in french ha its insane and just this morning i realized that i was alsleep and i was saying french words out loud as if i was studying it was crazy, i have prayed so much for help on this and i surely have been blessed! The spirit is so strong here and there are unlimited possibilities to how great i can be! im so excited to serve!!!
Aug 19th: So this past week has been great and i realized i have learned more french than i thought i did ha everyone at the MTC enjoys hearing us speak french because its so cool and they say that i speak it with a creole dialect which is great because thats what ill need in africa! i have been teaching alot of lessons and im getting better and better at it! And im learning more and more and studying sososososo much! and i really hope we get to have an apostle come and talk to us this week it will be so exciting! ha alright keep Me up to date!!
Sept 9th: This week has been really fun and still so much studying and french and our teachers even teach all in french so im picking up french really fast but there is always alot to learn! ha THere was some weird thing that the elders were trying to do is they were alltrying to do a pull up with this other elder on their backs ha and he is about 130lbs and i heard that no one could do it, everyone was just yelling and it was some contest and then i hear people say i bet the juggenaut could do it and i was like okay ill try and i did it, it was pretty hard especially since i weigh alot but i did it anyways! Ha there were these new elders that came in that were from tokyo japan and they are crazy hahaha they dont speak that much english and its like they are all on some sort of drug becauset they are so excited to be in america and they see me and they all just look ( ha they dont see black people ever there!).
Sept 24th: i am so excited that i get to leave on monday! Ha last night the elders and i and 3 other people( it was an exclusive party ha) had a awsome late night ha because all of there other parents have been sending them ALOT of food and they all wanted to get rid of it, so everyone grabbed their excess food and we just piled it on to one of the rooms floors and it was a massive pile, we took photos because we knew that this was going to be epic! ha and one of the elders had these fake mustaches and we each put one on and, people thought we were so weird but they wanted to come with us and chill but i had to kick them out since i was the bouncer and this get together was exclusive ha! and we all just dug into that pile ha it was insane, there was so much food and candy and soda ha oh yea and 2apples and 2 small loaves of french bread ha! And yes ELder kitchen does leave with me on the 27th he will be with me! Well it is almost time for me to get out there and start doing my best to spread the gospel i am so excited that i get the chance to go to the craziest continent on this earth! I'll call you in monday!!
(For a fun peek into life in the MTC right before leaving for the mission field check out the three videos posted on Jamin's MTC companion's blog, eldershanekitchen.blogspot.com. They will amaze and delight you!)
From Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire...
Oct 4th: Okay i am writing on a french african keyboard so it is kind of difficult to type and im already not very fast at it! The weather is crazy differnet and it is usually pretty hot with like 70-100percent humidity its insane! the french here is crazy i am learning really fast here because everyone here thinks that i am a native and so they are tougher on me but i can take it ha, but they tend to like to poke fun at me because im just as dark as them but i dont have there accent ha and they always say that i am very big man ha, but in french! My companions name is Elder Tshibasu and he is from congo and he has a thick african accent as well ha but he is a really good teacher! here in abidjan they eat alot of rice so for about 3 of the days in a row here i have eaten rice with beef and a tomato and onion sauce ha! but my fqvorite is the spicy spicy chicken with yam and some kind of fried rice, i dont know what it is called in french! here we do not get to wach general conference but we get it in the liahona about 3 months after it was broadcasted! the living quarteres here are sufficient for our needs ha and ha if you can live here then you can live anywhere with anything ha, its great though and the showers are always cold, which is nice becquse it is so hot here, ha showering with a bucket is always fun! I want to tell you every thing but it is hard ha i cqnt type fast enough i have tons of photos for you though! I love you all very very much
Oct 11th: If i say i am from america i will be moree unsafe ha like people will try to follow me home or give me their children or ask for money or try to mug me, just pretty much ill get alot more attention than needed! oh yea qnd elections are coming up pretty soon, so we have to come home early because it gets crazy at night and like at the end of the month all the missionaries in cote divoire are getting transfered to different appartments so we dont get caught up in all the riots qnd get hurt or kidnapped, its very exciting here! Everyone is very opinionated and loud! I ate my first snail at a memberes house we were eating FUTU(which is when you take a whole banana, peel and all and mash them until it is like a dough ball and you eat it with any kind of sauce) Well any ways i saw this squishy thing in the sauce and i thought it was fat, since we had fish in the sauce as well, but my companion said i had to eat that and i said what is it, and he said i wont tell you until after you eat it! and then he laughed! So i took half of it and stuck it in my mouth and when i bit into it , i thought that i was going to vomit but I held it down! It was just like rubber!
I know that i have a huge work to do here. and even in my broken french when i teach this gospel i know the people can not even deny that it is true, i can see it in there eyes and the eyes are the way to the soul. i know the lord blesses his missionaries, we are his soldiers he gives us everything we ask and he protects us. and it takes alot of faith to go out and speak to people who you cant really understand and dont know. It takes faith to get up in the morning and go back out again when you know it will be rough ha its not easy, but i like it, i love it. you have to go out with faith knowing that someone is just waiting for the gospel to come to them, i can see it you can just see the change in their eyes it is crazy, i cant put it into words. i have seen the many weaknesses that i have but i have also seen how the lord makes me strong when i have faith in him.
Nov 1st: Well This week has really been interesting Ha ! well I don’t get much time on the computer because the president has said that he wants us all back to the apartment quick. The people have not taken the elections very well and we are actually not allowed to leave the gates today because things are not going well ha! But the area we are in is called Angré and if things get worse than we will all get shipped off to Benin! So I am living in an apartment with 13 other missionaries, and my new comp is Elder Shaffer he is a newbie from America like me. Ha its funny because they put the two new people together. But we are getting lots of new investagators so that means we are not doing a bad job! Its exciting we have some really interesting people that we know like one of our investagators that we have named Austin ha (he is from Nigeria) so we have to teach him in English, it is actually very difficult to teach in English now because I have forgotten some words and the sentence structure for English but it is okay I like it!
Nov 8th: So i am back in my old apartment now with my old companion, but in a couple weeks we will be leaving again because of the second elections! so n the other area with my comp elder Shaffer we got a lot of investigators which was great and I am excited to go back and see them again.
I will do my best with trying to give info on the culture in africa its not easy because theres alot of stuff i have to do!! there are alot of fun and cool crazy things that go on here but there are also lots of bad and scary things also, ha dont be afraid mom i work with the spirit! its been a really great eye opener here ha im so glad i can live here for 2 years to see and expirience it!
Monday, November 8, 2010
Elder Jamin Lewis entered the Provo, UT Missionary Training Center on July 28th.
I find it funny how Jamin looks just like the Africans accept for the fact that he is so much larger! This is his companion and an investigator in the middle.
This is their chapel, pretty different from ours.
Jamin loves the people of the Cote D'ivoire, this is a picture of a member and the member's daughter.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)