Dear family ,
This week was a good busy week that is for sure. Tuesday was mind and
Elder Langi’s last day together, we went around and said goodbye to a
bunch of people and so that made the day a littler longer but it was
really good. Wednesday was the day of transfers . That morning me and
Elder Langi decided to go get hair cuts , so he went first and the guy
did a really good job so I told the barber to just do the same thing
with mine as he did with Elder Langi, well some how he didn’t get what
I was saying I ended up with a shaved head haha, I seriously have the
worst luck with hair cuts out here but o wells what can ya do. Usually
for transfers we all go to Tesano so we can pick up our new companions
and drop off our old ones but my new companion was coming from an area
really close to mine, so that morning we just went to the other
missionarys apartment and I dropped off Elder Langi there and I picked
up my new companion. When I first met my new companion I didn’t know
that it was him, I looked at his tag and it said Tshibangu and I was
looking for something starting with a CH because that is how it is
pronounced. So ya I figured out that you spell my new companions name
Tshibangu but it is pronounced Chibangu haha. Like I said last week he
is from the DR congo and has been out for about 8 months now. He was a
little bit quite the first few days but he is warming up. He is a
really chill guy and I like him a lot and I think we will get along
just fine. Thursday was another not normal day as well ha. Every
month they have MLC (Misison leader Council) but it is usually just
for the ZL’s to go to meet with president and what not, but since It
was the beginning of the year they invited all the DL’s to come that
day to, so me and Elder Forrest went to that together. It was at the
temple sight, the thing that I was most pumped about is that I was
going to see Tolar for the last time. I seriously can not believe that
he is going home. It is weird because we have done so much together
and he is one of my best friends now and he is going to be home on
Wednesday, dude is just leaving me to dry out here haha. I’m happy for
him but sure am going to miss him, we had a lot of good times together
but its chill because when I get back we will have some more. MLC was
ok, honestly its meetings like those that make me miss my mission back
in Liberia. Things are just done so differently here and I am still
trying to adjust to them and the way that things are run. I guess its
what ever though. Quick side note, right now here in Ghana we are
going to a season called Homaton or something like that , and its
basically a bunch of dust and crap coming from the north part of
Africa is being blown down here, anyways, it sucks. IT has been so
dusty and like , its so bad you can hardly see the moon at nights
because of how much dust is in the air, it was really bad on Thursday that is what made me think of it. I think it is supposed to last all
month to. Anyways that literally took like all day for us on Thursday . Friday was finally back to normal and so was Saturday. This Sunday was 100x times better than my last 2 Sundays have been. We finally had
4 people come to church this Sunday. I was really excited, and one of
them is scheduled to baptize next week , so we will have a baptism
next week that will be really sweet. It defiantly helps with the
transition of areas. I have been here for almost 1 month now though
and I am starting to get used to things here. Things are looking up
though so I am excited, still got a lot of work to do. Its crazy, no
matter how much you do or how much you work , there is always more to
do. Just so many people out there who don’t have the gospel, it blows
my mind how lucky I am to have it, out of all the people in the world
I am a part of the small percent that gets to have to gospel.
Anyways, I hope that you all have a great week and that you are all
doing well. Love you all,
Elder Bowring
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
January 5, 2015
Dear family,
Well happy new year, I cant believe that it is 2015 already, its so
crazy. Well this week has been pretty eventful, forone, we had
transfer news, and my companion is leaving me, I am a little
disappointed about that one. I have only been with him for 3 weeks
and they are taking him and I am getting a new compa nion , his name
is elder chibagu, he is from congo, so that should be pretty
interesting, I don’t know him at all but it will be chill iguess, just
keep the changes coming . Me and my companion have been working out
butts off this week and we didn’t really get the result we wanted.
This week was the first week I haven’t had any investigators at
church back to back weeks, it s tough some times. The city is a lot
harder that where I was at and people are just must stubborn I guess
but jit is teaching me a lot of patience and a lot of diligence. New
years was good this year, we had a ward party on new y ears eve that
started at 6 but people run on Ghanaian time so it didn’t get
started till about 8 haha. It was fun though, they just got a bunch
of big speakers and put them out in the parking lot and had a bunch of
food and stuff so we just went there. Also , we left the party for a
bit of time and went to a p izza place in our area with the other el
ders in our apartment so that was really good and nice, the party
lasted all night long at the church but we had to be in our apartments
at 9:30 so we just stayed up and chatted until 12 in the apartment to
usher in the new year, wasn’t to fancy though, just a few people s
hooting off fireworks. WE had a lot of success at the party though,
we had a few investigators and a less active family that showed up so
I was pumped about that, but none showed up to c hurch. This week I
got a good taste at what its like to be a district leader over the
sisters, me and Elder Forrest (o ther DL over the sisters, he has 4
and I have 4 but they all stay together) were over at their apartment
last night for 1 ½ hours sorting out some stuff, it was ridiculous
but I will just leave it at that, its de f intly a new experience that
I am not used to , that is for sure. Im sorry, this week is just a
blur, like I said, we just worked really hard this we ek but didn’t
get any success. We do have a lot ho have alo of potential though.
Esp elly we found a LAfamily who is really sweet , the mothe r and 2
of her 3 children are baptized but her husband is not a member and
her younger dau ghter who is 9 is also not baptized so we are
working with them and are hopefully going to baptize the daughter
this month. I am excited fo r them because we even found a good
investigator who stays with them so I have my hopes up for them. My
mind is still blown that it is 2015 , 2014 was really a good year
and I learned so much, I cant believe that it has come and gone so
fast, I am excited for the new year, its crazy to think of all the
things that are going to be happening this year but it srue will be ex
iting, Definly a lot of changes going to take place but we will see
what happens. Sorry this is shorter than usual but not to mu ch else
w ent down this week. Th is next week will be pretty event ful though.
This keyboard that I am using sucks to so I am just going to end here.
LOove you all very much and hope you have a wonder 2015 .
Love Elder Bowring
Well happy new year, I cant believe that it is 2015 already, its so
crazy. Well this week has been pretty eventful, forone, we had
transfer news, and my companion is leaving me, I am a little
disappointed about that one. I have only been with him for 3 weeks
and they are taking him and I am getting a new compa nion , his name
is elder chibagu, he is from congo, so that should be pretty
interesting, I don’t know him at all but it will be chill iguess, just
keep the changes coming . Me and my companion have been working out
butts off this week and we didn’t really get the result we wanted.
This week was the first week I haven’t had any investigators at
church back to back weeks, it s tough some times. The city is a lot
harder that where I was at and people are just must stubborn I guess
but jit is teaching me a lot of patience and a lot of diligence. New
years was good this year, we had a ward party on new y ears eve that
started at 6 but people run on Ghanaian time so it didn’t get
started till about 8 haha. It was fun though, they just got a bunch
of big speakers and put them out in the parking lot and had a bunch of
food and stuff so we just went there. Also , we left the party for a
bit of time and went to a p izza place in our area with the other el
ders in our apartment so that was really good and nice, the party
lasted all night long at the church but we had to be in our apartments
at 9:30 so we just stayed up and chatted until 12 in the apartment to
usher in the new year, wasn’t to fancy though, just a few people s
hooting off fireworks. WE had a lot of success at the party though,
we had a few investigators and a less active family that showed up so
I was pumped about that, but none showed up to c hurch. This week I
got a good taste at what its like to be a district leader over the
sisters, me and Elder Forrest (o ther DL over the sisters, he has 4
and I have 4 but they all stay together) were over at their apartment
last night for 1 ½ hours sorting out some stuff, it was ridiculous
but I will just leave it at that, its de f intly a new experience that
I am not used to , that is for sure. Im sorry, this week is just a
blur, like I said, we just worked really hard this we ek but didn’t
get any success. We do have a lot ho have alo of potential though.
Esp elly we found a LAfamily who is really sweet , the mothe r and 2
of her 3 children are baptized but her husband is not a member and
her younger dau ghter who is 9 is also not baptized so we are
working with them and are hopefully going to baptize the daughter
this month. I am excited fo r them because we even found a good
investigator who stays with them so I have my hopes up for them. My
mind is still blown that it is 2015 , 2014 was really a good year
and I learned so much, I cant believe that it has come and gone so
fast, I am excited for the new year, its crazy to think of all the
things that are going to be happening this year but it srue will be ex
iting, Definly a lot of changes going to take place but we will see
what happens. Sorry this is shorter than usual but not to mu ch else
w ent down this week. Th is next week will be pretty event ful though.
This keyboard that I am using sucks to so I am just going to end here.
LOove you all very much and hope you have a wonder 2015 .
Love Elder Bowring
December 29, 2014
Dear family,
Well this week was great, it was awesome to be able to talk to you guys on Thursday , that was definitely the high light of my week for sure and I am just debating on ending my email there since I told you most on Thursday haha but for those who weren’t on the call I will give ya a nice update. Well things in our area are coming along nicely and we are still meeting some really sweet people and getting to know members and people better. It honestly didn’t even feel like Christmas until Christmas eve at like 7. We decided to go Christmas caroling as
a district , so it was me and my companion with 4 sister missionaries all caroling. Africans don’t really know what Christmas caroling is all about haha , Christmas eve was just like a regular night here, not to many people doing anything out of the normal, just a few more
people buying some fire works and shooting them off. We went in the sisters area and did our caroling and visited some members and some of there investigators. WE also stopped into a pharmacy on the side of the road and sang some carols there, it was funny because we went in
there and some people were just looking at us weird but we started
singing and they enjoyed it and it was nice. That is one thing,
Ghanians are all just so nice. When we visited the members homes, they
didn’t know what was going on either, they would invited us in and
they would get there hymn books and join us haha but it was still all
good. I thought it was a good way to feel the Christmas spirit.
Christmas day was good, I had some presents to unwrap and then I was
able to give 2 stockings to everyone in the apartment so we all got to
gether in the morning and we were able to open up some Christmas
presents so it was really cool and felt like Christmas. Grandma and
Grandpa B, thanks for the wood tie, its sick haha everyone loved it, I
wore it on Saturday and people thought it was the coolest thing ever,
they kept asking if I made it my self. We just then got fed on
Christmas and I was full as could be, then we called home which was
awesome. The next day was a little hard, still had you guys on my mind
a lot but it was still a good day. It was a little rougher this week
at church, we didn’t have any investigators come to church but we did
get 2 LA guys to come so I was excited about that and then the sisters
had a baptism after church on Sunday which was really good. The guys
name is Emmanuel and he is an awesome guy, got to interview him and
all. The service was pretty disorganized so I just got tossed up there
to conduct the whole thing and do it all but it went pretty well. I
literally don’t really have anything else to say except we are
enjoying here. Today we went to a new mall that they built here in
accra and holy crap it was so nice. Just like a mall back home. I
haven’t been some wehre that nice my entire mission. I was like
uncomfortable there , I am screwed when I get back home because I
don’t know how to handle my self in a nice area like that and I don’t
know how to spend money any more either haha. It was nice though, I
cant believe that 2014 is over and that we will be in 2015 this year,
that means I am coming home this year, just blows my mind. I hope that
you all have a wonderful new year and that you all had a merry
Christmas , I love you all and wish you the best,
Elder Bowring
December 22, 2014
Dear family,
This week has been quite the crazy week and a lot of stuff going on,
so I guess I will just start from the start of the week. Tuesday was
the last day in my area in Nsawam so we went around and we had some
lessons with everyone and just basically went around and said good bye
to everyone. It is always weird to do that, I really hate goodbyes ha
but its just all a part of being a missionary. I am really going to
miss all of those people in Nsawam. For Christmas I gave Joshua one of
my Niners shirts so they will be well repped over here in Africa. Well
Wednesday was transfer days. I was lucky and I had the Berretts come
and get me and take me to Transfers. We went to Tesano to get our new
companions and there wasn’t that many missionarys there. Usually there
is just a ton of missionary but it was a really small transfer. I met
my new companion there Elder Langi. He is from Tonga and has been out
for about 7 months now. He didn’t know any English when he first came
but now he speaks really well. I am pumped to because I actually have
2 other Elders in the apartment with me . Elder Forrest (we came
together to Africa and were in the MTC at the same time so its cool )
and Elder Crandall from Utah. Anyways, we went strait to our new area
and apartment and my new apartment is a lot nicer than my last one but
it was trashed when I get there so we have been cleaning up a bunch
today. Anyways, things here in Dansoman are a lot different that is
for sure. One big thing is that it is hotter here than it was in
Nsawam. Nsawam was a really green area with a lot of rain and
vegetation but here is just dusty and hot. Its killing my white shirts
haha. Its more of a city area here to , Nsawam was like a little more
Rural but here there is a lot of people crammed into our area and is a
lot more city. Anyways, as soon as we got here me and Elder Langi sat
down and started talking about the area and what not. Well he told me
a bunch of stories of the Elder that I came to replace and from the
stories that I have heard he is the most unserious missionary I have
heard of. I wont go into detail but I will just say that his mind
isn’t really focused on missionary work and that just frustrates me.
It just pisses me off to see missionarys not take there missions
serious, and because he was so unserious our area is crap. Honestly I
feel like am just starting a new area. Not many people at first to
teach and see so this week me and Elder Langi have been working our
butts off. I love Elder Langi, he is just ready to work hard and do
work especially after his last companion. I feel bad because he really
tried with the last guy but the last guy just didn’t listen and wanted
to do his own thing. We have really been working hard on just finding
new people but also trying to get to know the members more and use
them more. Dansoman is actually a ward here, its my first ward that I
have served in so its weird calling our bishop , bishop. I am used to
branch president haha. The members seem like they are more than
willing to help us though, we just need to put our effort forth. There
is a lot of potential in this area and I think me and Elder Langi are
going to turn things around here. Its amazing to see the small little
miracles that god blesses us with though when we do our part and try
our hardest. I have seen so many this past week in him helping us find
people to teach. For instance yesterday we had a lot of bounces so we
were walking to go and try to follow up with somebody and we ran into
another member from another ward going to visit his Uncle and so he
told us he wanted us to teach his uncle so we went there and contacted
the uncle and his wife and his kids. It was a miracle that we just
randomly ran into that guy. I have seen a lot of little things like
that happen this week. So we defiantly have our work cut out for us
here but we are up for the challenge for sure. One thing that sucks
about the area though is that there is so many fetching Muslims in our
area. I swear more than half of the people we contact just tell us
they are muslim which means leave I don’t care for your message haha.
Anyways things here are going to be good. We have a some good work our
equipment here in the apartment to so I have been loving using that. I
cant believe that it is Christmas this week already. Doesn’t feel like
it at all. They just don’t get pumped for Christmas here like we do
back home. We honestly don’t have anything planned for Christmas this
year so I don’t how it will be. A member invited us to come chop
(eat) fufu with them so we will be doing that. I hope that all of you
have a great week though and that you all enjoy your Christmas . I
love you all so much.
Elder Bowring
This week has been quite the crazy week and a lot of stuff going on,
so I guess I will just start from the start of the week. Tuesday was
the last day in my area in Nsawam so we went around and we had some
lessons with everyone and just basically went around and said good bye
to everyone. It is always weird to do that, I really hate goodbyes ha
but its just all a part of being a missionary. I am really going to
miss all of those people in Nsawam. For Christmas I gave Joshua one of
my Niners shirts so they will be well repped over here in Africa. Well
Wednesday was transfer days. I was lucky and I had the Berretts come
and get me and take me to Transfers. We went to Tesano to get our new
companions and there wasn’t that many missionarys there. Usually there
is just a ton of missionary but it was a really small transfer. I met
my new companion there Elder Langi. He is from Tonga and has been out
for about 7 months now. He didn’t know any English when he first came
but now he speaks really well. I am pumped to because I actually have
2 other Elders in the apartment with me . Elder Forrest (we came
together to Africa and were in the MTC at the same time so its cool )
and Elder Crandall from Utah. Anyways, we went strait to our new area
and apartment and my new apartment is a lot nicer than my last one but
it was trashed when I get there so we have been cleaning up a bunch
today. Anyways, things here in Dansoman are a lot different that is
for sure. One big thing is that it is hotter here than it was in
Nsawam. Nsawam was a really green area with a lot of rain and
vegetation but here is just dusty and hot. Its killing my white shirts
haha. Its more of a city area here to , Nsawam was like a little more
Rural but here there is a lot of people crammed into our area and is a
lot more city. Anyways, as soon as we got here me and Elder Langi sat
down and started talking about the area and what not. Well he told me
a bunch of stories of the Elder that I came to replace and from the
stories that I have heard he is the most unserious missionary I have
heard of. I wont go into detail but I will just say that his mind
isn’t really focused on missionary work and that just frustrates me.
It just pisses me off to see missionarys not take there missions
serious, and because he was so unserious our area is crap. Honestly I
feel like am just starting a new area. Not many people at first to
teach and see so this week me and Elder Langi have been working our
butts off. I love Elder Langi, he is just ready to work hard and do
work especially after his last companion. I feel bad because he really
tried with the last guy but the last guy just didn’t listen and wanted
to do his own thing. We have really been working hard on just finding
new people but also trying to get to know the members more and use
them more. Dansoman is actually a ward here, its my first ward that I
have served in so its weird calling our bishop , bishop. I am used to
branch president haha. The members seem like they are more than
willing to help us though, we just need to put our effort forth. There
is a lot of potential in this area and I think me and Elder Langi are
going to turn things around here. Its amazing to see the small little
miracles that god blesses us with though when we do our part and try
our hardest. I have seen so many this past week in him helping us find
people to teach. For instance yesterday we had a lot of bounces so we
were walking to go and try to follow up with somebody and we ran into
another member from another ward going to visit his Uncle and so he
told us he wanted us to teach his uncle so we went there and contacted
the uncle and his wife and his kids. It was a miracle that we just
randomly ran into that guy. I have seen a lot of little things like
that happen this week. So we defiantly have our work cut out for us
here but we are up for the challenge for sure. One thing that sucks
about the area though is that there is so many fetching Muslims in our
area. I swear more than half of the people we contact just tell us
they are muslim which means leave I don’t care for your message haha.
Anyways things here are going to be good. We have a some good work our
equipment here in the apartment to so I have been loving using that. I
cant believe that it is Christmas this week already. Doesn’t feel like
it at all. They just don’t get pumped for Christmas here like we do
back home. We honestly don’t have anything planned for Christmas this
year so I don’t how it will be. A member invited us to come chop
(eat) fufu with them so we will be doing that. I hope that all of you
have a great week though and that you all enjoy your Christmas . I
love you all so much.
Elder Bowring
Monday, December 15, 2014
December 15, 2014
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Fishing on P-day today |
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High tech fishing pole |
Well this week was a pretty good and crazy week so i will start off with the craziest thing. We were cleaning at the chapel on Saturday morning when the branch president asked me a quesiton about something we were doing as a misison and so i didnt know what was going down so i called up president hill and asked him, Long story short i got my awnser along with him telling me that i am going to be getting transfered on Wednesday. I am not going to lie i am excited for the
new opprotunity but i am a little bummed to be leaving. I am going to an area called Dansuman (not sure if that is how you spell it) to be the DL over there. It is more in Accra and is like City from what i hear so not to pumped about that. My new companion is named Elder Langi (from Tonga) so that should be chill. I am in just a 2 man apartment so that will be a new experience for me. I have only stayed in like 4 to 6 man apartments. To add on , the only others in my district are 4 sister missionaries. Not sure how i feel about that. I guess i will just have to do my best to whip them into shape haha. I am really sad to be leaving though, i wanted to stay atleast until after christmas, i love these people here in Nsawam so much, the branch is just awesome and of course i love my Recent Converts to, they are just so awesome. We had an awesome plan for christmas to, we were going to baptize our deaf investigator who i have been working with since i came, then go to the Berretts to have a christmas party over there and then i had it lined up to go and skype at Joshua's on his laptop but now i dont think i will be able to skype any more for christmas. My apartment is really sweet to and we were all ready for christmas. It is definitly a bittersweet feeling leaving at this time. I had to say goodbye to my branch yesterday. This is my first time saying good bye to a branch officailly. My first transfer on mission was weird and they did it on a Saturday. My next one was when i was emergency transfered to Tolar and then my next was when i was kicked out of an entire country haha. LIke i said i was with President Thompson when i recieved my transfer news so when he found that out he said that to send me off he wanted me to give a talk in sacrament meeting , so i had to give a talk yesterday and say my goodbye. It went really well though. It is going to be a crazy week this week.
Anyways, Tuesday was a really good day, we had our christmas conference and they split it up in 3 days and did it bi zone. My luck, me and Tolars zones got put on the same day so i got to spend the day with him.
him alot as a companion. Definitly a life long friend.
church on Sunday and had an awesome lesson with him. THe spirit was there so strong. A huge testimony builder to me that the gospel is true. THis guys has been coming to church for 7 weeks now with out
really getting a good understanding on the gospel but now he is and he is just progressing so fast. He is even getting his LA buddy coming back. Also we are starting a Sign language class at the branch and he is the teacher for it and we did our first one this week and it was just awesome. I am really going to miss him alot. I am just going to miss everyone here alot, Especally Joshua. We tried to go fishing again this mornign with him but had the same luck haha, but i just love hanging out with him and he is honestly just a good buddy now. Anyways, i am going to have a big change this week so next weeks email will probably be pretty informative as well haha. O ya, i got my thanksgiving package on Tuesday with my football in it. Thanks so
much, strait loving that thing. Best present ever, i even sleep with it haha. Anyways, love you all and i hope you have a wonderful week.
Love,
Elder |Bowring
December 8, 2014
Dear Family ,
Well this week was a pretty normal week I wouldh have to say , nothing
to much out of the oridanary. It was really good though. I am really
getting along with my new companion Elder Peterson and we are doing
hard work together. This week we got our bikes going again, its been
about 3 weeks since I have ridden my bike because my companinos bike
was busted but we finally got a new one so that was nice to get riding
bikes again. This week I would have to say our biggest focus was to
just teach so that is basically all we did all week and that is just
how I like it. I sit here and think , I am just greatful to be on a
mission where I am at , where I can just teach all day long. If I
wasn’t teaching I am not sure what I would do. This week we have
focused a lot on seeing Felix and Celistina , our son and mother who
we are teaching. They loved church this past week, especially the
mother. We have one small problem though,and that is anytime we go
there for a lesson, we have to fight for time to talk haha, Celestina
can straight talk. We will start off talking about Word of Wisdom and
she will want to make a contribution and about 20 min later she has
moved from the word of wisdom to how everyone in her community calls
her a witch because she teaches her son to follow christ haha she is
all over the place but I do the women, she is funny. We are really
working on seperating them from there chruch though and that might
take time. These past two Sundays what they have been diong is waking
up at 4:30 and going to there church which is all the way in Accra and
then they will leave and ride in a Tro-tro for about an hour to come
attend church down in Nsawam. They love the church a lot but are
having a hard time leaving there church completely , although
Celistina did turn in a letter of Transfer to her bishop so that they
can stop going. We will defintly be praying for something there, we
are trying to baptize them on christmas but that wont be possible
unless they stop going to there church. WE will see what happens, but
I know that they will come, its just a matter of time. We are also
really focusing on our deaf guy now to. We are pusing him to also be
Baptized on Christmas day. We found out that one of the Elders near by
can speak sign languange so we are going to have him come up and teach
him everything and then we are going to baptize him christmas . What
is cool to is that we are going to have him start teaching sign
languange as a class on Sunday after his baptism so that the branch
members will also know sign languange and then it will just open up
the door for a bunch of deaf people here in Ghana. There is actually
quite a bit in our area so this could just open up the door for all of
them getting the gospel. I am really excited to see how it all goes.
Only thing that is making a little nervous is that we have transfers
news coming this Saturday and I don’t want to leave, if I left I would
have to miss all these peoples baptisms. I am hoping for atleast one
transfer here, and it would also just be nice to spend christmas here,
we have an apartment full of all americans and I just love the branch
here so we will see what god has planned for me. Sunday this week was
pretty good, Darius Celistina and Felix (the big 3 ) All showed up for
us this week and it was also fast and Testimony Sunday. Everyone one
in Ghana had Specail fast for Liberia and Serria Leon so that was
really cool. My new ZL is from Liberia to and the odds, his home
branch back home was Paynesville 2 (hint,that was the last branch I
served in) and he knows just a bunch of the same people I do so it was
cool to talk to him about that. This week will be a pretty good week
though, we have a christmas conference tomorrow in Accra that will be
really sweet, I am mostly pumped because Tolar is going to be there
and I will get to see him again. Dude strait goes home in 5 weeks, I
cant believe it. Anyways, I am trying to think of anything extra
ordinary that happened this week. I was riding my bike one day on the
side of the road and I got hit by an orange that somebody chucked from
there car, that was cool haha. Anyways, i hope that you all have a
great week, love ya tons.
Elder Bowring
Well this week was a pretty normal week I wouldh have to say , nothing
to much out of the oridanary. It was really good though. I am really
getting along with my new companion Elder Peterson and we are doing
hard work together. This week we got our bikes going again, its been
about 3 weeks since I have ridden my bike because my companinos bike
was busted but we finally got a new one so that was nice to get riding
bikes again. This week I would have to say our biggest focus was to
just teach so that is basically all we did all week and that is just
how I like it. I sit here and think , I am just greatful to be on a
mission where I am at , where I can just teach all day long. If I
wasn’t teaching I am not sure what I would do. This week we have
focused a lot on seeing Felix and Celistina , our son and mother who
we are teaching. They loved church this past week, especially the
mother. We have one small problem though,and that is anytime we go
there for a lesson, we have to fight for time to talk haha, Celestina
can straight talk. We will start off talking about Word of Wisdom and
she will want to make a contribution and about 20 min later she has
moved from the word of wisdom to how everyone in her community calls
her a witch because she teaches her son to follow christ haha she is
all over the place but I do the women, she is funny. We are really
working on seperating them from there chruch though and that might
take time. These past two Sundays what they have been diong is waking
up at 4:30 and going to there church which is all the way in Accra and
then they will leave and ride in a Tro-tro for about an hour to come
attend church down in Nsawam. They love the church a lot but are
having a hard time leaving there church completely , although
Celistina did turn in a letter of Transfer to her bishop so that they
can stop going. We will defintly be praying for something there, we
are trying to baptize them on christmas but that wont be possible
unless they stop going to there church. WE will see what happens, but
I know that they will come, its just a matter of time. We are also
really focusing on our deaf guy now to. We are pusing him to also be
Baptized on Christmas day. We found out that one of the Elders near by
can speak sign languange so we are going to have him come up and teach
him everything and then we are going to baptize him christmas . What
is cool to is that we are going to have him start teaching sign
languange as a class on Sunday after his baptism so that the branch
members will also know sign languange and then it will just open up
the door for a bunch of deaf people here in Ghana. There is actually
quite a bit in our area so this could just open up the door for all of
them getting the gospel. I am really excited to see how it all goes.
Only thing that is making a little nervous is that we have transfers
news coming this Saturday and I don’t want to leave, if I left I would
have to miss all these peoples baptisms. I am hoping for atleast one
transfer here, and it would also just be nice to spend christmas here,
we have an apartment full of all americans and I just love the branch
here so we will see what god has planned for me. Sunday this week was
pretty good, Darius Celistina and Felix (the big 3 ) All showed up for
us this week and it was also fast and Testimony Sunday. Everyone one
in Ghana had Specail fast for Liberia and Serria Leon so that was
really cool. My new ZL is from Liberia to and the odds, his home
branch back home was Paynesville 2 (hint,that was the last branch I
served in) and he knows just a bunch of the same people I do so it was
cool to talk to him about that. This week will be a pretty good week
though, we have a christmas conference tomorrow in Accra that will be
really sweet, I am mostly pumped because Tolar is going to be there
and I will get to see him again. Dude strait goes home in 5 weeks, I
cant believe it. Anyways, I am trying to think of anything extra
ordinary that happened this week. I was riding my bike one day on the
side of the road and I got hit by an orange that somebody chucked from
there car, that was cool haha. Anyways, i hope that you all have a
great week, love ya tons.
Elder Bowring
December 1, 2014
Dear Family, well this week turned out to be a lot different than I thought it was going to be but it was still a really good week.
Tuesday was the last day that me and Elder Taylor were together so he kind of said his goodbyes to every one in the area and what not. On Wednesday we went all the way to the stake center which is about an
hour away for transfers. It was kind of a hassle , we had to get a taxi and put all of Taylors luggage in there and then our Branch missionaries luggage as well and then we had to pick up another missionary on the way. Luckily the taxi driver was one of our investigators so that helped a lot. Well we got to the stake center
and I found my “new” companion Elder Mmbulika and talked to him for a bit and he seems like he was a pretty chill guy. Right after I got finished talking to him one of the AP’s came up to me and said President wanted to talk to me. IT took me about an hour to see him but I finally did and he told me that some things had happened to day before so there was a little change it the transfer and that instead of me receiving Elder Mmbulika , I would be Receiving Elder Peterson. So long story short my new companion is Elder Peterson. He is from Spanish Fork Utah and has been out for 14 months now. I was a little taken by surprise but we just went with the flow. So because of that, now our whole apartment is American and everyone is from Utah haha. Elder Peterson is a chill guy though and he works hard so that is all I can ask for, we are getting to know eachother better but he is a
really good missionary and I think that we are going to do really well together so it will be exciting. Anyways, fun fact, we were out of water this week from Sunday all the way until Thursday. For some reason they just weren’t pumping us water so we just didn’t have water for anything. Finally we just couldn’t do it any more so we called a
water truck and payed them 280 Ghc to fill up our Tanks in the back and then we also saved a bunch of people in the compound haha, so we finally got some water on Thursday so that was nice. Just in time for Thanksgiving. We didn’t do to much for Thanksgiving but we figured we had to do something so we just got some good sausage and some French fries and did some hot dogs and French fries with some sparkling cider haha. It was pretty good but nothing like Turkey and football. This week other than that has just been a really good hard working week. It was pretty awesome on Friday we asked to Branch president to come and Help us proselyte. For some reason I have just like always been intimidated asking them to come with us because I don’t like to bug people I guess haha but he was totally game and happy to come and help us and he really helped us a lot. We saw a Mother and Son who we have been teaching for a little while. There names are Felix and Celistina
and they are really sweet. It just kind of taught me that even though I am uncomfortable doing something like maybe asking a member to come and help with us or something like that , that I need to just do it
any ways because it was so worth it. That is something my mission has taught me a lot to trust myself more and to just get out of my comfort zone and do things that I don’t normally do. Sunday was a really good
day, Felix and Celistina came and our Deaf guy did again (he has came 5 times, still trying to figure out what to do with him ) but on top of all that we were able to get Big shoe and Caius all Confirmed, I was just stoked about that. This week we having been working a lot with big shoes wife Patience to try and get her and the his 2
daughters to come. I was pretty sure that she was coming this week because we had a really good week of teaching her but I guess on Sunday morning her pastor came by to pick her up for church. I felt bad because big shoe seemed pretty bummed about it but we are just going to keep on doing our thing. Well I hope that you all had a really Thanksgiving , I was missing you guys a little bit but its cool, I cant believe that it is already December and just how fast this last year has gone, to say that next year it 2015 and that I will be coming home next year is just blowing my mind . Time flies for sure. I sure do love you all and I hope that you all have a wonderful week. Lvoe
Elder Bowring
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