Month: October 2020

The Move to the West Mission

This afternoon we packed our things and moved next door to the Abidjan West Mission.   We had a bag of our lunch foods (yogurt, muesli, peanuts, crackers, dates, dried mangos, etc.), our language study books and dictionaries, and my shower things (I use the office shower because we don’t have enough water at our apartment).  That’s our office life in a bag or two.

John went right to work.  He does not skip a beat.  We’ll continue to help as much as we can in the East Mission, as they learn to fill in behind us.  It’s good the offices are side by side.  We are excited to meet and to learn to love a whole new mission of missionaries.

Today at the Office

Elder Kouame and Elder N’zi are our office Elders.  We love them and are grateful for their help every day.  Elder Kouame is our mission secretary and Elder N’zi is our financial secretary.  They help keep things running smoothly here.

Our 2 Sisters from Adzope came to the office today for interviews.  They were in town for a doctor visit.  It was great to see them.

 

Pres and Sis Lewis Depart

Daniel and Betty Jo Lewis, Ann and John Lewis

This evening Pres and Sis Lewis said goodbye to Abidjan for awhile.  They are on their way home to Orem to stay for a a few weeks while receiving some medical care.  We wish them well.  We will do our best to hold down the fort while they are away.

Now it is up to us to carry on and move the work here forward!

Bro Yai, who works at the temple site.
John & Ann Lewis with Bro Miliate, driver and Bro Yai, Mission Executive Secretary.

Emergency Food Supplies

Today in the East Mission, the emergency food boxes were prepared.  They will be distributed to each apartment in our upcoming zone conferences.  These supplies are intended to be a 72 hour kit for the missionaries in case we have any disturbances that cause the missionaries to stay inside during the upcoming elections.   We hope we will be prepared if there is need to be.

We have 30 apartments of missionaries right now and about 95 missionaries.  Each box contains 5 kg of rice, a bottle of oil, a tub of tomato paste, canned meat, canned peas, spaghetti noodles, sardines and some bullion cubes.  We also through in some small treats.

We are grateful for church leaders who have made it possible for us to prepare in this way.  We know that those who are prepared, need not fear.

Elder Soua Arrives in the West Mission

Today the Abidjan West Mission received a new Elder Soua from the Yamoussoukro area.  The hour of his mission is come!  I enjoyed sitting in on his welcome, orientation and trainer-trainee training with his companion.

Elder Soua is a great young man. He’s 25 years old now.  A few years ago, he and his cousin were working in the streets, shoveling out the trenches and 2 missionaries approached them and started talking to them.   He and his cousin agreed to listen to the lessons and were taught. Both were baptized. His cousin, Elder Bah, is now serving here in our East Mission. Elder Soua was a professional soccer player (goalie) and made some amazing life changes when he accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ.  He is an amazing young man.

Elder Soua with his trainer, Elder Kamara.

Tonight the Lewises will board a plane and return to the States.  This was their last day on the job here for awhile.  We will really miss them.

 

A West Mission Office Meeting

Today was Pres and Sis Lewises last office staff meeting for awhile.  Tomorrow they return home for his medical needs.  The Lewises are well- organized and efficient.  This office will carry on, with their help from afar.  We’ll do our best to help here.

We met with the Assistants afterwards.  Elder Tshibanga has just been called to serve with Elder Agbahounzo.  These are fine missionaries and we look forward to working with them.

 

 

 

 

 

The Bonoua Apartment

After our morning in Adiake, we drove to Bonoua to get a feel for that place.  Our missionaries were also evacuated from here.  We have a ward in Bonoua, a busy lively town.  Here are some of the street vendors we drove by on our way to see the Elders’ apartment.

Here is the gate to the old missionary apartment.  We have stopped paying rent here for now.

My favorite part of this place was the colorful mosaic flooring.

And I loved the views from this hilltop.

Our Missionary Apartment in Adiake

After church in Adiake we went to see our missionary apartment there.  It’s been empty since the Elders were evacuated in March because of COVID.  The street to the apartment was barricaded because they were digging the trenches along the road.  Trees had been cut down to make way for these new street improvements.

These trenches are bigger than you might think.  We crossed over them and walked to the missionary apartment.

These kids were sure having fun with their wheelbarrow skeleton!

Beautiful neighbors.

Here’s where our missionaries lived while they were here.  The gate to the compound was locked, so we weren’t able to go inside.

I hope these pictures bring back some happy memories for those who have served here.  We are all praying that our evacuated missionaries will return to us someday in the future.

A compound fence across the road from the apartment:

Amazing house plants!!

A load of coconut husks.

A shed full of coconuts.

Pineapple fields on our way out of town.

Attending Church with the Branch in Adiake

This Sunday we traveled to Adiake to attend the Branch there. On the map below, Adiake is on the left side of the large lagoon in the middle.  The drive to Adiake took about an hour and 45 minutes, through lush green countryside with fields of pineapple, cassava and rubber tree groves.  It was a beautifully wet and rainy tropical day.

We drove by lots of pineapple farms along the way.

We were greeted by children who live by the church compound.

Here is the baptismal font inside the compound.

And here is a side building where large meetings can be held.

We followed COVID procedures, cleaning our hands before entering, and social distancing the chairs.  We had about 25 attending today–on their first day back at church since March.  As the word gets out, more will come.

Pres Blet is our new Branch President here.  He was called to this position in August and set apart with one counselor today.

Here are some of our faithful members waiting for the meeting to begin.

This is beautiful 13-yr-old Lune-Carmel  who loves the gospel.  She showed me the Book of Mormon given to her by the missionaries who taught her–Elder Van Duzer and Elder Nkinzi.  She knew all of the missionaries who have served here and she’s not forgotten them.

The new counselor and his family:

After a wonderful testimony meeting, we visited and took some pictures, then we walked out around the compound to where we could see the lagoon.  This place is like a piece of heaven.

We loved being here today.  Next we drove to the place where our missionary apartment is.  We hope to refill these areas with missionaries again soon.

After the meeting, we walked around the back of the church compound and through some young cassava fields to where we could see the beautiful lagoon.

 

 

 

 

Here’s a neighboring 7th Day Adventist church.

Next we went to see the apartment where our missionaries here lived before they were evacuated in March.  We hope they will return here soon.  There are so many good people here who will be blessed by our message and the truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

A peek into an elementary school classroom

Here’s a look at one of the classrooms at the school where we had our wedding party today.   Here’s what the the children learned on this Saturday morning.

This is one very full classroom.  There is not even room to walk between the desks.  This one class has 118 children, probably 4-5 to each desk.

Here are the stats for this class.  There are 48 boys (garcons), 70 girls (filles) with a total of 118.  The next column shows how many were present today and how many were absent.  The class president is Joussouf Konate.