Month: December 2019

Today we traveled with Pres Sossou, his returned missionary nephew, Ble, and Hervé Koffi, the Mission Director of Communications to a village in Ahoutoue, about an hour or more north and east of here.  You can see that it’s out in the beautiful countryside on the way to Grand Alepe, where we have several branches of the church and a district.  We went through Abobo and the congested traffic in the markets and crowds and vendors and then on out into the countryside.

This country is green, lush and many places look like tropical jungles, filled with large canopies of trees covered in vines.  As you look around, you will see patches of banana, plantain, cassava, yams, and fields of cocoa and rubber trees.  There are palm fruit trees  everywhere, many have beautiful ferns growing out of the crevasses their trunks.  There are also coconut palms with tall smooth trunks.  You can tell there is plenty of water here, from streams, rivers and from rain.  It’s beautiful, hot and humid, a paradise with scattered villages and simple good life.  It was here that the Church first began in the Ivory Coast.

The branch in Ahoutoue was doing a Light the World service project today and President Binene asked us to go visit them. They were cleaning their local hospital. By the time we finally got there, they were almost finished. The hospital was small, with 4 or 5 rooms. No one was there–it was more like a clinic with a birthing room and an exam room and one room with an old broken bed. There was a kitchen with very little in it. There was a lot of grass all around the building and the members had cut all the grass with machetes, men and boys, working hard, sweating like crazy.

The women were inside cleaning the rooms and when we arrived, they were cleaning the floor with buckets of soapy water, bending over, pushing went soapy rags and towels across the floors. Children helped too. It was hard work in this hot and humid place, but there was light in everyone’s tired eyes.  Light because of the selfless service they were offering.  They were so happy  we had come to cheering them on.

We learned that one of the Pioneer members of the church was there, working with them. His name is Affouê Yapi, Lucien. (They tell their names surname first, then first or given name).  He was baptized 2 Nov 1980 in Leon, France and has been faithful and true ever since. He and his children were baptized in France. His wife was baptized later. They came to his home village in Ahoutoue and tried to find people to teach the gospel to. It was hard. They prayed that Heavenly Father would send someone to them. A year or so later, a German family named Assard moved to Ahoutoue. The husband is from the Ivory Coast and the wife is German. They contacted Lucien and ended up moving to the same village, where they started having church meetings together in the home the Assards built.

The Assards were baptized in Germany in 1980s. It was 1986 when they came to this village with a 15-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter who spoke no French. The kids went to local schools and learned French and integrated into their African culture.

Brother Assard worked for Mercedes Benz and was back and forth between the Ivory Coast and Germany.  These 3 established the church here. They are the very first members in this country, true Pioneers. They were delightful.

Sis Assard is a cute little German lady who got her English, French and German all mixed up when I spoke to her in German. She and her husband had been working in their yard and when someone went to get them to come meet us. They lived near by and they came right over.  They were hot and sweaty like we were.  It was so fun to visit with them.

The Assards served as temple workers in Accra–2 years  then he was called to be a member of the Temple Presidency for 3 years (2015-2018). They’ve been home now about a year and they said they have a lot of work to do in their garden to get things back into shape. He was Pres Sossou’s Stake President when Pres Sossou was called on a mission.

These Pioneers were gentle kind solid salt of the earth folk. They were so warm and welcoming. All were hot, tired, dirty and sweaty, but happy. Sis Assard said her “top dream” is to attend the Abidjan Temple someday. She considers all the members here her children. It was a sweet thing to get to meet them.

They were very interested to learn about about our work in Mali and how we are helping the Pioneers establish the church there.  What a great day! We took a group photo of all the branch members in their yellow Helping Hands vests. Everyone was hot and sweaty. The mopping ladies were dear. We kissed cheeks, one to three. They loved that I wanted their photos and selfies with me too. The young kids were also so happy to be in photos with us. I think it mattered to them that we drove all that way to see their good works, Lighting the World.

These good men cut the grass all around the hospital with their machetes.

Here are some pictures of the hospital rooms:

And here is the burn pile at the end of the work day:

We loved being here today, with these wonderful members of the church, who did a huge service to their village.  They worked hard and long and without fanfare, quietly making their beautiful corner of the world a better place.

Well, there was a bit of fanfare.  This little troupe of singers and dancers happened by while we were working!

This is Elder Kwizera from Burundi, a small country that borders the Congo in eastern Africa.  He is the only missionary serving right now from his country.  Elder Kwizera is 26 years old and the only member in his family  His friends introduced him to the church a few years ago.  He recognized truth  Elder Kwizera is well educated, he speaks English beautifully, and he is a bright star and a pioneer in his country.

Today was our third Zone Conference, held in Abobo.  It was equally wonderful and uplifting to be with this group of Elders and Sisters.  The future here is so bright and so good.  There is such a powerful feeling in these gatherings.  I wish you all could feel it.

To learn more about what we did in this Zone Conference, please see the previous posts.

The lunch line!

The good member sisters who prepare our meals are wonderful!  This food is delicious.

Cleaning supplies were distributed to apartments needing them.

Birthday boys!

The missionaries travel to and from these conferences in transport buses like this one:

The Abobo Stake Center:

Today we traveled with the Binenes to the Cocody Stake Center for our 2nd Zone Conference there.  It was an excellent day, especially being with all of these amazing missionaries.  Here are a few of their faces.  (All of the photos taken at these conferences are posted in albums on the missionary FB page.)

The proceedings of the day were described in the previous post, so take a look there to learn what happened here.

 

Today we traveled with President and Soeur Binene to Adzope for our first of 3 Zone Conferences.  It’s so great to meet with all the missionaries in the mission during these 3 days.  Our meetings are interesting, instructive and helpful, and we can feel the goodness of those called to serve here.  It’s not an easy place for many.  It can be oppressively hot and humid.  Things don’t always run smoothly.  The food and culture are different for some of us, but we all agree, this is a Great Place to be.

I enjoy taking photos of the missionaries, because I can be their mothers’ eyes.  They don’t always have access to picture taking or wifi to send photos home, so I do what I can when I’m here.  All of the photos I take are posted on the Mission Facebook page.  These are some of my favorites, representative of what happened today.

Here’s a brief outline of our Zone Conference schedule:

Song, Opening Prayer

One of the Assistants reads a page of announcements and policy instructions–like phone usage.

Pres Binene talked about some issues and policies, things that need improving.
He talked about phone calls with parents.  The rule is the missionary must initiate the call and only on P-days. He asked the missionaries not to take all of their mission problems to their parents–like things in apartments that need to be fixed, or troubles here. He said we can solve these problems here. Don’t worry your parents about them. He talked about missionaries who don’t go out to work because they’re “tired.” He said if you’re sick, we can get medical help. Being “tired” is not a reason to stay in. He said you are not a hospice helper to your companion. Get to work!

Next we had 2 short talks. I think they invite everyone in the mission to prepare a talk on one subject, then in each conference, an Elder and a Sister are picked to present theirs. Sometimes they announce it after the opening prayer so the 2 can scramble to get their thoughts together if they need to.  Sometimes they have no warning!

Then each of the 2 Assistants give a talk/training. Elder Kabambi talked about how to become more pure (Jacob 3:1-4). He has pleasant and good spirit.

Elder Tenney did a lesson from PMG, then had us compare the stories of Lehi and his sons and the Rich Young Ruler, and we talked about consecration.  Then he told a personal experience about a talk his brother shared with him when he left on his mission.

Then the last hour + was Sis Binene teaching about integrity. She used several scriptures to illustrate her points–Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, George Miller in the D&C (who had no guile), Job and the 2000 Strippling Warriors.

Then we had a 30 min lunch break to eat our rice, plantain and drumsticks from the Styrofoam boxes.  This food tastes good. The rice is flavored well. The drumsticks tasty. The Sisters sit together and the Elder sit together.

After lunch we reconvened for the last part–all Pres Binene. He spent the first hour reading from and telling them things in the new Missionary Handbook. Then he said a bit about being careful with sacred funds–don’t spend the missionary allotment money on clothes or on things that aren’t mission expenses. He said they upped the allowance awhile ago because missionaries weren’t eating well. Today he said, “You’re still not eating well. Maybe we should take the money back!” and everyone responded to that with a “no!”

He talked a lot about the difference between being a member of the church and a convert to Jesus Christ. There was discussion. There was a section of stuff from PMG on the Doctrine of Christ and faith and repentance. He’d have us read a section in PMG then he’d ask for what did we read, and people would parrot things back. Then the last 45 min he had us do role plays.  We had to teach 2 other missionaries about faith, then about repentance. We were done at 4:00.

Afterwards we took a group photo.  Sister Binene handed out bags of medications for each companionship or apartment.  Supplies are also distributed and any packages that have arrived at the mission home.

 

Here’s a look at what the Dokui Zone did today in their area!  They cleaned up several streets that surround the Dokui Stake offices.  The people passing looked with wonder at the selfless service these missionaries gave.  It was fun to watch them Light the World in this corner of the Abidjan East Mission!

Today for P-Day, every zone in the Abidjan East Mission did a service project in their area to Light the World.  We had a great time beautifying the lovely little park in the Cocody Zone’s area!