Hello! So I'm writing on Monday again, because we are in Nairobi again, and when we are anywhere besides Kilungu, we have P-Day on Monday.
So last week I was emailing in Nairobi. We were there for Zone Conference, which took place on Tuesday. Tuesday we had to all (there was about 15 of us at the APs flat) wake up early, 5:30am, so that we could all shower and get ready to go the mission office by 8:30. When we got to the mission office, all the District Leaders, Zone Leaders, and Assistants to the President had a leadership meeting with the Mission President, his wife, as well as Elder Renlund and his wife. Elder Renlund is a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, and presides over the entire Africa South East Area. After they got out of the leadership meeting, we were all led to the chapel and before entering we had the privilege of shaking Elder Renlund's hand and introducing ourselves to him. Immediately upon meeting him, you could feel the spirit radiate from him. We quickly sat down in the Upper Hill Ward chapel, and then began Zone conference.
Elder Renlund began by addressing us, and showed us scriptures addressing the purpose of a General Authority/ member of the Quorum of the Seventy. He read with us scripture both from the Old testament, New Testament and from Doctrine & Covenants, showing that both in ancient times and in modern times, the duties were the same. He then told us that he was sent to tell us something from the First Presidency of the church. There were three things that he told us.
1. Thank you for accepting your call to serve as Ambassadors for the Lord.
The way he described each of the three things was powerful, the spirit was so strong.
After he spoke for a short time, he turned the time over to President and Sister Hicken. Sister Hicken talked to us about health and safety. That is her responsibility because she serves as the mission "mom" so she is like a nurse to us. She emphasized the necessity to keep our hands clean and to shower regularly. ( I guess there were two missionaries in the past who competed for who could go longest without showering...they lasted 12 weeks each.) After she spoke, President Hicken addressed us. I really liked what he talked about. He spoke about the need for us to always be true to ourselves and to others. We cannot be one way at a certain time, then another way later. We must be firm in the way we are. We can grow or digress, but there is no room for being two faced and flip flopping between good and bad. I really liked it because, it's like if our goal in life is to become more like our Father in Heaven through Jesus Christ, then we need to follow the example He has set for us. God doesn't flipflop between good and bad. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. We must do the same if we seek to become like Him. Before we were allowed a break, Sister Renlund spoke to us for a few minutes asking if we have any questions or things we need advice on to help with our missionary work. She wrote a few ideas on the board, then we were allowed to take a short break. We took a short 10 minute break where we were able to socialize with the other missionaries.
After the break, we returned and gave her our ideas and or questions. I mentioned that it would be nice to have a knowledge of how to apply each of the topics. Too often are we told things and just expected to know how to apply them to the work. I've seen that too often, and I would say that I have done that in the past, where I am told something and then don't know how it applies to me, so I just set it aside for another time. She liked my suggestion. There were a total of 13 topics on the white board, so she and Elder Renlund each took turns in addressing a topic. They worked well and showed us how when married, you are to work together as a companionship, supporting each other and building each other up, as well as giving honest, constructive criticism when appropriate. I learned a lot from each topic they spoke about. I loved the stories that Elder Renlund used. He is a cardiologist and spent 14 years in schooling before he said he could consider himself a cardiologist. After all the topics were spoken about, we were closing up, but President Hicken got up and said that he had forgotten to mention something.
He informed us that in the past few weeks, he has had a absolutely terrible feeling about the missionaries riding on Picky Picky's. He said that the spirit strongly made him aware of this. He said that from now on we are no longer able to use Picky Picky Taxi's for transport. This was a shock to everyone! Especially us in the hills...we use Picky Picky's all the time, especially to get to baptisms and Kyambeke. We have baptisms coming up this weekend, so we will have to walk down to Kyambeke. We figured it out to be around 15+ kilometers (9 miles) to get there. We will go down on Friday, stay the night at the Zone Leaders' flat, then walk back home Saturday after the Baptisms. He told us that if needed, he will find each area that needs it a new way of transport. I'm not sure what he could do, because bikes would kill us because of the dangerous hills and a car would make us a target for theft...so i guess "the Lord will provide."
After the conference, we ate delicious ham sandwiches and fruit salad. That is probably what I look forward to most when coming to Nairobi, the food. It's a nice change from the regular rice, soup, pasta, or bread. We stayed in Nairobi that night with a couple other companionship's. Its always a lot of fun being with other Elders, our scriptural conversations get quite intense.
The next day we got up and we had planned to all go to the Bus stage, but our other elder set had to go to the mission home to get medicine. We figured okay we will just wait at the APs' flat. We were there for a total of two hours, then we went to Uhuru Park in the center of Nairobi where we said we would wait for the other elders. We sat there for two hours. It felt a lot like what I would imagine Central Park in New York feeling like. Tons of people busy about their day, coming and going to and fro from work. It would be the perfect time to contact people, but we had no pamphlets, and it isn't our area so we would be referring everyone to other elders. Elder Ita and I went to go get some food at Tusky's the local mart. We bought some strange packaged food from the bakery. The day before we had also gone to Tusky's to get food for dinner and on the way back home I bargained for us to get our shoes shined at one of the shoeshine huts for 75ksh ($.86) for the two of us. While they were shining our shoes, I talked with one of the people and gave them the only pass along card that I had on me which was the 13 articles of faith which I keep in my white handbook. She informed me that she is a Kamba from Nunguni (where we go to email) and she will have to read the 13 articles of faith when she finishes work. Who knows if she'll actually read it, but it's doing all I can do while in Nairobi. Anyways, when we returned to the park with our food, we were immediately surrounded by child/ teenage beggars. It was annoying because they would surround us and start fake crying then get really close and not back off. Elder Ita did not like that at all because they were harassing him for his food. Elder Ita finally gave them his food under the condition that they go away. Immediately when they left, more came, and Elder Kazomba handled them this time by saying "what do you think we are, a super market?!" It was hilarious, because when the African elders would say go away, they would leave, but when us white elders said go away, they do nothing.
When we got to the bus stage around 3:00pm, we tried to use our "private matatu driver" but he was trying to charge us an outrageous amount 500ksh ($5.71) each... we were looking for more around 350ksh ($4) each, but because it was late in the day, it was peak hours, so prices are way up. We decided to wait for a big bus to come. Less than 5 minutes later a big bus came and we were the first ones on. Elder Utonga and I sat in the very front so we could see out of the front window (I found out it was a bad mistake on my part.) we sat there for a while and I had Elder Utonga teach me "Sitake" which means I dont want, so that I could get rid of the bus vendors. After close to 1.5hrs we were on our way, I soon realized that the 12cm of leg room I had up there was not a good idea. It felt fine at first, but then I was in serious pain trying to adjust myself sideways, but nothing was working. My body was stressing from that so I was heating up and sweating haha, it was funny. Luckily, I did see wildebeests and a giraffe on the ride home!! My first real wildlife! The Giraffe was about 400m away, but hey I could still tell it was a giraffe, so I'd say that counts! We got home around 9:00pm and were exhausted, so we cooked food and went right to bed.
On Thursday, we visited Kikoko area. It was a productive day. We saw many people and we are now going to plan to baptize the daughter of Brother Mutuku. She has a slight mental handicap, so she is really quiet, but she knows English and reads the scriptures daily. So I don't see a problem. I asked her parents and they really want her baptized. I think she is older than 22 but I'm not entirely sure . We taught Mama Rhoda, and after the lesson we went and fetched water with her. She walks a FAR distance to get water, and then it's just a small stream that naturally filters the water for drinking. It was a cool and greatly humbling experience. They get water twice per day! We visited Brother Lenard on the way home and taught him a lesson. He is doing much better now. He is walking with the assistance of a walker, so he is working on strengthening his legs.
Friday, we went to Matua and taught every family that was available. There are always so few families available there, so its hard, but luckily everyone is a member there, so we are just strengthening them. We taught sister Christine's daughter and in the mean time, the children attacked me for sweets. They were all jumping on my arms and legs, and I was lifting them in the air, it was quite a sight. We taught Big Mike for the first time in a while and at the end of his lesson, he asked a whole bunch of random scriptural questions as usual. It's fun answering his questions, because I think he deliberately tries to ask confusing questions. When we taught sister Pillowmena, she gave me a ton of Loquats, so I was happy and ate those all day. They all tell me to dry out the seeds so that I can take them to the states. I'll have to look into it, that way my children can eat Loquats some day. I like them because they are really tart and they make your cheeks pucker, kinda like eating a Warhead.
Saturday, we had expected to be going to a members home to eat. He lives on the other side of Mitini, so he had told us to walk to the church then call him and he would meet us and direct him to his home. We walked all the way to the church, and then called him. When we called him, he said he had to cancel because he was at the hospital with his whole family. Elder Kazomba just accepted it and said okay we will see you another day. Elder Kazomba didn't really believe him though, because we could see his home from the church, and the mama was standing there looking at us. So we continued with some stuff we had to do at the church, we had to print some things for members and such, as we were doing so, we received a call from the APs saying we needed to go to Nairobi either right then or early Sunday morning. We said okay, we will come in the morning. The rest of the day we were mentally freaking out because all they said was that the President wants to talk to you. Uh Oh.. what happened or what did we do was all we could think about! That night the APs called again to check in on us and told us that it's nothing big but that we need to be there.
Sunday, we got up at 5:00am, and got on a Matatu to Nairobi at 6:00am. We made way good time and arrived at 8:00am. We attended the Upper Hill Stake Conference (a large church meeting with several congregations from the area). There were so many missionaries there it was crazy. It was funny because when we left Kamba land, we thought we looked good regarding our clothes and such, but then when we were sitting in the meeting, we were like "oh geeze our clothes are filthy! what happened!?" We look good in Kilungu, because everyone's clothes are dirty, but in Nairobi, everyone had nice pressed suits, WHITE shirts, and clean clean clothes. It was a bit embarrassing, but we accepted it. After the meeting, we met with the Mission President. He brought all of us into his office and told us that we were there in regards to Elder Nyirenda (our third companion). His sister had passed away unexpectedly and the Mission President wanted to tell him in person. It was a very shocking and sad moment, not good to ever hear. It was not what we expected at all when called to come to Nairobi.
So thats it, we are now in Nairobi, and Elder Kazomba is getting his feet checked at the hospital because he has some strange foot fungus that is making the bottom of his feet white and raw, kinda like if you spent a lot of time in the water, then your feet got pruned and you scrubbed off that skin. We will be in Nairobi probably till tomorrow morning then we will head home. What we thought to be an in and out trip to Nairobi has turned out to be much longer.
This is Elder Kazombas last week on the mission, so it is going to be a busy one, full of visiting members and eating food. Then it will be concluded with baptisms on Saturday.
Till next week, who knows when I'll email, could be Monday or Tuesday, so just giving you a heads up...
Love always,
Elder Hiltbrand
Scripture of the Week:
So I mentioned this one last week, but I thought I'd pick out some of my favorite verses.
6 Thou fool, that shall say: A Bible, we have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible. Have ye obtained a Bible save it were by the Jews?
7 Know ye not that there are more nations than one? Know ye not that I, the Lord your God, have created all men, and that I remember those who are upon the isles of the sea; and that I rule in the heavens above and in the earth beneath; and I bring forth my word unto the children of men, yea, even upon all the nations of the earth?
8 Wherefore murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word? Know ye not that the testimony of two nations is a witness unto you that I am God, that I remember one nation like unto another? Wherefore, I speak the same words unto one nation like unto another. And when the two nations shall run together the testimony of the two nations shall run together also.
9 And I do this that I may prove unto many that I am the same yesterday, today, and forever; and that I speak forth my words according to mine own pleasure. And because that I have spoken one word ye need not suppose that I cannot speak another; for my work is not yet finished; neither shall it be until the end of man, neither from that time henceforth and forever.
10 Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written.
11 For I command all men, both in the east and in the west, and in the north, and in the south, and in the islands of the sea, that they shall write the words which I speak unto them; for out of the books which shall be written I will judge the world, every man according to their works, according to that which is written. (2Ne 29:6-11)
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