Emailed Tues 29 Sep 2009
Hey!
First off ill tell you how my week was and then ill answer all of the questions you guys had! So last monday (yesterday) for our P-day activity we were able to go to the beach and play ultimate frisbee with our whole zone! it was freakin sweet and way fun. The week was kinda lazy and boring due to the fact that Elder Hurst wasnt feeling to well and from about wednesday on we were just chilling in the apartment hoping for him to feel better. so we werent able to actually do to much missionary work this week :( Yesterday though was probably the most awesome day of the mission so far! We got permission from president to go to cape coast and check out the castle because elder hurst hasnt seen it yet and he is leaving soon so he really wanted the chance. It was sad to actually be there and kinda see how bad it was, but it was a really good experience and we had a really good time! We took some really sweet pictures that Elder Hurst will show you when he gets home, and i believe he will be bringing home my memory card so that will be cool for you guys! After the castle i had my first american cheeseburger in ghana and it was so good! i miss that kind of food, but i have been doing pretty well learning to make different things that i like. I miss milk alot, but im not really having to much trouble.. we have powder mild but it really tastes nothing like the real thing lol. The weirdest thing was as we were walking back to the trotro station to go back to our apartment Lanaya Wallace saw me and elder hurst just walking down the street and she talked to us for a little while which was really cool! (Note inserted by Mom - Lanaya is a friend from high school who is in Ghana working at an orphanage.)
Now is the time to answer all the questions!
My area is Kojokrom ward and it is a ward even though only about 80 or 90 people come every week, and the whole thing is in fante so it is very hard to understand, but i make it through. We have our own chapel which is actually a very nice place so that is good!
I have been sun burnt but it really isnt bad at all! i got a nice transisition because when i got here it was the end of the rainy season so it is only starting to really heat up now, i just keep putting the stuff on my nose and it doesnt really get burnt! The mosquito net doesnt bug me at all. i just tuck it into my bed when i go to bed at night and its like im in my own little room, i kinda like it.
There are 3 missionaries training in our apartment and 3 being trained me, elder hurst, Elder Jackson (from Centerville), Elder Hill ( from kaysville, who knows Blake Carter, melindas friend from BYU) Elder Hancey (from Logan) and Elder Musetsi (from South Africa) we get along really well and have a fun time in our apartment after all of the missionary work is done. We don't really know the language to well. all of our trainers can sortof get along while teaching lessons, but the ward missionaries are a big help in teaching and translating. As for learning we just try to pick up whatever we can.. its hard but im learning.
As Elder Hurst was sick i began playing elder hills guitar which we are aloud to have! and i really am debating buying one here so i can learn and get really good! that would be sweet
It is ok for anyone to email me, and i am allowed to right them back so you can tell anyone and everyone who would like to email me too. And about the blog you can tell anyone about that too!
Sorry this one is kinda short, the power cut out at internet cafe and i lost my whole letter to you so i had to rewrite the whole thing :(
But ill keep you posted keep the letters coming.
Love
Quinton
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
I had eight baptisms for my first baptism...
Emailed Mon 21 Sep 2009
lol but really my first baptism was this week and we had eight people! It was sweet, we were supposed to have nine though but one kids parent wouldn't let him get baptized so we need to go and have a little chat with her to straighten her out! But it was an awesome thing to see so many people get baptized and hopefully the people im teaching now will follow in there footsteps!
It's been a strange week, and it flew by way fast. Apparently alot of my MTC mates are already getting sick with malaria and stuff so that kinda stinks but were praying for them so they will get better. two kids in my Apartment who were in the MTC with me have already gotten malaria! its sorta crazy, One of them is named Elder Jackson and he is super tall and a way cool guy. A couple days after he got over his malaria which only lasted a day he got sick again and has been pretty much out for the past couple days. So he has just been sleeping in the apartment cuz he is to sick to get up :( we think he has typhoid, so President came yesterday to give him some medicine and stuff so he will get better! But as for me im just happy that i haven't been sick yet and i wanna keep it that way so make sure you guys pray for me!
One other thing i think that i should tell you guys right now is that i am definitely going to come home with some pretty bad broken english and possibly a hard accent because Elder Hurst has a big accent and we don't actually talk to good because when we are teaching we kinda have to dumb it down a little sometimes, so thats just a warning, but i think its sweet. As for the twi and fante languages im trying to learn but its really difficult. In Kojokrom were i am now it is mostly fante speakers, and it is harder to learn fante then it is to learn twi so elder hurst is teaching me the twi stuff that he knows and usually the understand. How are you is "ete sen" in twi but it is "oh te den" in fante so ya im slowly learning different things, there is two extra vowels added into the twi language and they say the vowels different so it is harder to read.
Church is a different experience because the speak mostly fante during it so it is hard to pay attention when i don't understand anything, but it helps that they add english words in every once in a while because they don't have words for alot of things in fante.
There is alot of things that are different over here but i am making the best of them and im loving every second of it. As i walked into church last week a learned something. The women that have babies are not bashful as to where they breast feed apparently. I never thought i'd see someone breastfeeding in church but apparently its a regular occurance lol. Its pretty awkward.
The food situation is good, i eat a buttload of egg sandwhiches, alot of rice and spaghetti so im liking it. During the MTC most of us white elders got really constipated and that made things uncomfortable for 4 days. President Harmon gave me some laxitaves and they didn't work! So eventually are started keeeping track of what days i was able to "relieve myself" so i knew if i went longer then 4 days i would need to do something about it, but now i am on a very good schedule!!! :) (i thought you guys would want to know) ((This is an edited version of how Quinton described his new diet and the effects.))
Fufu is pretty good, ive had it twice and i really like it, but my favorite African food or drink ive had so far is called Alvaro, its a kind of soda pop thing and it's very close tasting to Vault so obviously i love it! The pineapple's here are the greatest things i have ever tasted. thats about all i can think about now.
Keep the emails coming its really nice to have some connection with the outside world :)
Love you all,
Quinton
lol but really my first baptism was this week and we had eight people! It was sweet, we were supposed to have nine though but one kids parent wouldn't let him get baptized so we need to go and have a little chat with her to straighten her out! But it was an awesome thing to see so many people get baptized and hopefully the people im teaching now will follow in there footsteps!
It's been a strange week, and it flew by way fast. Apparently alot of my MTC mates are already getting sick with malaria and stuff so that kinda stinks but were praying for them so they will get better. two kids in my Apartment who were in the MTC with me have already gotten malaria! its sorta crazy, One of them is named Elder Jackson and he is super tall and a way cool guy. A couple days after he got over his malaria which only lasted a day he got sick again and has been pretty much out for the past couple days. So he has just been sleeping in the apartment cuz he is to sick to get up :( we think he has typhoid, so President came yesterday to give him some medicine and stuff so he will get better! But as for me im just happy that i haven't been sick yet and i wanna keep it that way so make sure you guys pray for me!
One other thing i think that i should tell you guys right now is that i am definitely going to come home with some pretty bad broken english and possibly a hard accent because Elder Hurst has a big accent and we don't actually talk to good because when we are teaching we kinda have to dumb it down a little sometimes, so thats just a warning, but i think its sweet. As for the twi and fante languages im trying to learn but its really difficult. In Kojokrom were i am now it is mostly fante speakers, and it is harder to learn fante then it is to learn twi so elder hurst is teaching me the twi stuff that he knows and usually the understand. How are you is "ete sen" in twi but it is "oh te den" in fante so ya im slowly learning different things, there is two extra vowels added into the twi language and they say the vowels different so it is harder to read.
Church is a different experience because the speak mostly fante during it so it is hard to pay attention when i don't understand anything, but it helps that they add english words in every once in a while because they don't have words for alot of things in fante.
There is alot of things that are different over here but i am making the best of them and im loving every second of it. As i walked into church last week a learned something. The women that have babies are not bashful as to where they breast feed apparently. I never thought i'd see someone breastfeeding in church but apparently its a regular occurance lol. Its pretty awkward.
The food situation is good, i eat a buttload of egg sandwhiches, alot of rice and spaghetti so im liking it. During the MTC most of us white elders got really constipated and that made things uncomfortable for 4 days. President Harmon gave me some laxitaves and they didn't work! So eventually are started keeeping track of what days i was able to "relieve myself" so i knew if i went longer then 4 days i would need to do something about it, but now i am on a very good schedule!!! :) (i thought you guys would want to know) ((This is an edited version of how Quinton described his new diet and the effects.))
Fufu is pretty good, ive had it twice and i really like it, but my favorite African food or drink ive had so far is called Alvaro, its a kind of soda pop thing and it's very close tasting to Vault so obviously i love it! The pineapple's here are the greatest things i have ever tasted. thats about all i can think about now.
Keep the emails coming its really nice to have some connection with the outside world :)
Love you all,
Quinton
I can finally email!!!
Emailed Mon 14 Sep 2009
Hey hey everyone!
So i am finally able to now get my email account set up! i am way way super happy because it was hard writing the few letters that i did because my hand really got super tired and my handwriting is terrrible so you probably couldn't even read it!
But ya so this is my first week out of the MTC and it is freaking awesome. The MTC was alright, but it felt more like a prison more than anything, me and some of the kids in our district kind of compared it to being in Carthage Jail, religious jokes are funny, because literally it was a jail! they had an electric fence around the whole compound! lol but it was still really fun getting to know all the guys and trying to speak French with all of the different French elders from Congo and the Ivory Coast. Our MTC group was the biggest group to ever go through that MTC with 61 missionaries i think so it was a little crazy but fun. President Sabey also said that he has never ever heard of 28 missionaries going to a single mission at one time ever...anywhere! so we're just breaking all kinds of records over here!
President sabey came to the MTC to tell us where we were going and who are companions would be and stuff, and I have been assigned to be in Takiradi, Kojokrom ward. I'm not in Takiradi but im about twent minutes outside of it and we live in a freakin legit jungle! It's crazy ha so then i figured out who my companion was and guess what.. Elder Hurst is my companion!!! crazy huh, but way cool. so he is my trainer and i will be his last companion on his mission before he goes home! So its great. we live in an apartment with to other companionships and so we have a lot of fun! Me and Elder Hurst get along really well and its kinda nice because he has already been in this area for a couple of transfers so he knows it pretty well and we have just went straight to teaching people! I was scared out of my pants at first when i realized i actually had to teach real people instead of fake people like we did at the MTC, but once we started teaching different people it was actually really easy and it kind of started flowing. Im obviously not a Pro yet but im working on getting better.
Also do you remember how my mission call said English speaking on it.. well i have come to learn that it was a typo! :S some of the people we are teaching only speak twi (which is actually pronounced chwee) or fante and i just have to let elder Hurst do the talking and sometimes even he doesn't understand it all. So i have alot of studying to do so i can learn to speak with alot of people...and understand when we go to church because at church they speak primarily a mix between fante and twi and it is really really hard to follow, but im trying and praying and studying so evetually it will come.
Oh ya sorry i just keep going on and on, but i have alot of things to say... Africa is crazy i seriously have just been dropped into scenes from Nationial Geographic stuff and it is really different, but its so interesting and i'm loving it.. You will be so surpised when you see some of the different pictures i have taken they are pretty cool. I am getting used to the food, i had fufu for the first time last night at a persons house and it was pretty good. They eat tons of food here so i also need to get used to that lol
There is a baptism this week and there is nine of them! ha its funny because people are really so ready to accept the gospel here it is awesome. We feel blessed to be in a country were we really don't even have to knock on doors because literally the people just come to us so the proselyting is really fun!
I just got the email you sent to Elder Hurst and it sounds like you guys are having fun, Brandy's team is doing pretty legit and tell here i'm proud of here cuz those are some fast times! and tell her to keep it up! Now that i have this email i can actually email anyone so you can give it out to people and tell them to write me on here so hopefully i don't actually have to write tons of letters because emailing is way easier and faster!
I think that is about all i have to say right now but ya tell me how everything is going back home and ill keep you updated everyweek on here!
I love you all,Quinton
P.S. Usain bolt is nuts i cant believe that anyone is able to run that fast... just my two cents lol
Hey hey everyone!
So i am finally able to now get my email account set up! i am way way super happy because it was hard writing the few letters that i did because my hand really got super tired and my handwriting is terrrible so you probably couldn't even read it!
But ya so this is my first week out of the MTC and it is freaking awesome. The MTC was alright, but it felt more like a prison more than anything, me and some of the kids in our district kind of compared it to being in Carthage Jail, religious jokes are funny, because literally it was a jail! they had an electric fence around the whole compound! lol but it was still really fun getting to know all the guys and trying to speak French with all of the different French elders from Congo and the Ivory Coast. Our MTC group was the biggest group to ever go through that MTC with 61 missionaries i think so it was a little crazy but fun. President Sabey also said that he has never ever heard of 28 missionaries going to a single mission at one time ever...anywhere! so we're just breaking all kinds of records over here!
President sabey came to the MTC to tell us where we were going and who are companions would be and stuff, and I have been assigned to be in Takiradi, Kojokrom ward. I'm not in Takiradi but im about twent minutes outside of it and we live in a freakin legit jungle! It's crazy ha so then i figured out who my companion was and guess what.. Elder Hurst is my companion!!! crazy huh, but way cool. so he is my trainer and i will be his last companion on his mission before he goes home! So its great. we live in an apartment with to other companionships and so we have a lot of fun! Me and Elder Hurst get along really well and its kinda nice because he has already been in this area for a couple of transfers so he knows it pretty well and we have just went straight to teaching people! I was scared out of my pants at first when i realized i actually had to teach real people instead of fake people like we did at the MTC, but once we started teaching different people it was actually really easy and it kind of started flowing. Im obviously not a Pro yet but im working on getting better.
Also do you remember how my mission call said English speaking on it.. well i have come to learn that it was a typo! :S some of the people we are teaching only speak twi (which is actually pronounced chwee) or fante and i just have to let elder Hurst do the talking and sometimes even he doesn't understand it all. So i have alot of studying to do so i can learn to speak with alot of people...and understand when we go to church because at church they speak primarily a mix between fante and twi and it is really really hard to follow, but im trying and praying and studying so evetually it will come.
Oh ya sorry i just keep going on and on, but i have alot of things to say... Africa is crazy i seriously have just been dropped into scenes from Nationial Geographic stuff and it is really different, but its so interesting and i'm loving it.. You will be so surpised when you see some of the different pictures i have taken they are pretty cool. I am getting used to the food, i had fufu for the first time last night at a persons house and it was pretty good. They eat tons of food here so i also need to get used to that lol
There is a baptism this week and there is nine of them! ha its funny because people are really so ready to accept the gospel here it is awesome. We feel blessed to be in a country were we really don't even have to knock on doors because literally the people just come to us so the proselyting is really fun!
I just got the email you sent to Elder Hurst and it sounds like you guys are having fun, Brandy's team is doing pretty legit and tell here i'm proud of here cuz those are some fast times! and tell her to keep it up! Now that i have this email i can actually email anyone so you can give it out to people and tell them to write me on here so hopefully i don't actually have to write tons of letters because emailing is way easier and faster!
I think that is about all i have to say right now but ya tell me how everything is going back home and ill keep you updated everyweek on here!
I love you all,Quinton
P.S. Usain bolt is nuts i cant believe that anyone is able to run that fast... just my two cents lol
Sunday, September 20, 2009
First Letter from Ghana
Written about Mon 24 Aug 2009
Quinton arrived at the Ghana MTC on Friday, Aug. 21, 2009 and probably wrote this letter within a few days after arriving there. This letter came through the missionary pouch service and was postmarked Monday, Aug. 31 PM in Salt Lake City and arrived at home Tuesday, Sept. 1 in the AM.
Quinton arrived at the Ghana MTC on Friday, Aug. 21, 2009 and probably wrote this letter within a few days after arriving there. This letter came through the missionary pouch service and was postmarked Monday, Aug. 31 PM in Salt Lake City and arrived at home Tuesday, Sept. 1 in the AM.
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