Letter and Photos from April 25, 2016

Daniel Buchanan <daniel.buchanan@myldsmail.net>  Apr 25 at 10:38 AM

To       

Hi, all!!

So this week has been pretty intense! Cool things have happened.

-So one time we were trying to meet with an investigator and there are some little girls that are always around there, and they're normally excited to see me, but the past few times have been quite humorous. So I ride up on my bike and they come running and they start touching me and poking me and everything, and then they point at my watch and says "your watch is nice." and then my ring "your ring is nice." and then my pants "your trousers are nice." and continue to list things until eventually one of them says, "your everything is nice!" And on another day, one says, "you're beautiful," and on yet another day, one just stares at me for a solid 30 seconds and then just says, "your face is nice." Hahaha, I had trouble holding in the laughter. It was cute, but it was really funny at the same time.

-So if you ask other Americans who came at the same time as me, they'd pretty much all tell you they can eat like three balls of banku now, but this week I ate one entire ball all on my own for the first time, haha, and then a few days later I had one and a half and I didn't feel like dying anymore... so I thought it was worth mentioning that I can fairly easily eat swallow foods now, haha!

-So this week, I finally had my first baptism!! It was wonderful finally seeing a visible result of my efforts here. It was a woman named Janet. She's an investigator whose baptismal date we had to postpone several times, but she was finally baptized yesterday, and it was great. The font was quite an ordeal to fill—we had to climb up a tower (like, the height of a two-story building) to get to the water tank, put a hose in to get the water flowing, but it look like 45 minutes, and then the font we have is a portable one, and it had a hole in it so it was leaking while we were filling it, but thankfully we were able to stop it. So it was kind of an ordeal, but everything worked out well. It's such a joyous experience witnessing someone choose to follow the Savior, Jesus Christ and embrace His gospel. I know it really will bless us so much—not only in this life, but in the eternities. The gospel is real. I know it is. I know the Savior, Jesus Christ, lives and that He loves each and every one of us so incredibly much.

I love you all! I hope everything's going well for you. Thank you so much for all the love and support you give me. It means more to me than you know; I really appreciate it.

With love,

Elder Buchanan :)

This first picture is a delicious meal we made. Experimental fried rice and mashed potatoes sent from my awesome mom :D

This is Janet, the woman we baptized yesterday. She's fun. I'm so incredibly happy for her.