Dear America,

It's been a great week in the life of Elder Nelson. I'm having such a great time here in Kronum 2 Area. 

I have close to no time to email. Limit it to just a couple emails that I have to read, then I would have infinitely more time to write.

The children here love me. I have not seen any other white people here except for the other missionaries at zone conference. The children call me "obroni", which means white man in Fante. On Sunday I had a group of them run up around me, hugging me and grabbing my arms and asking me if I was dead. I laughed and laughed and told them that I was not dead. The older people love it when the obroni plays with their children. And the obroni loves playing with the children while his African companion teaches their parents in Twi. So it all works out great. Shouts of "obroni!" follow me constantly.

I'm getting better at speaking without a terrible American accent. I'm also trying to learn some Twi from Elder Antwi. It's slow going, but it'll happen.

I'm having such a great time here in the field. I love being able to answer questions for people and show them truth. The hard part is when they don't keep commitments or when they are so stuck in their own ways that they refuse to change. They don't think they need anything more. I just tell myself that we need to find the people that the Lord has prepared for us. They are the ones who are humble and seek earnestly for the truth. A lot of people here don't even know very much about Christianity even though they are Christians. So they will believe pretty much anything we tell them. But they feel no need to change or become better. On the other hand, they're always willing to listen to a message about Jesus Christ, no matter which church you're from. Always. So that's good, I guess. They just don't know what the phrase "long-term commitment" means. Oh well. That's why we have the Spirit to guide us.

I'll tell you a little more about my companion, Elder Antwi. He is a lot like me, and doctrinally sound, friendly but not crazily outgoing, and fluent in Twi. So he's like me but a much better missionary. He's great at contacting, but would always rather work through the ward. He's smart and fun and obedient. I'm so glad I have him. Our area is interesting. We are both new here and we're basically re-opening the area. There are no records, no contacts, and no white men. Elder Antwi has only ever been in brand-new areas, and he is almost 8 months old on the mission. He says that the mission president has a lot of trust in us, which is interesting because I've only talked to the mission president for like a minute and a half maximum. Whatever. I'm Elder Antwi's first son and he is my father. There are four missionaries in our apartment, and they all know what they're doing. Except me. It's a great apartment to be in, so I'm learning lots. Our apartment is pretty nice. Not by US standards, of course, but I wasn't expecting US standards anyway so I'm fine. Sometimes we even have power. Occasionally. Whenever we're out contacting. Haha not really, but that's the way it seems. We've had power one night this week. The rest are in the dark. We proselyte until 7:30 every day because it gets dark at 6:00 and we don't want to waste daylight eating. I like it this way. I'm more focused. Elder Antwi is a great Ghanaian cook. He made soup with rice this week. I've eaten rice every day here, and it's really good.

I sleep spread-eagle on the mattress with no covers. It gets to be a rather pleasant temperature at night when the sun goes down. But we're going into the hot, dry season, so that might change.

Welllllll that's all for now. Hopefully we'll get to know the ward better and get some referrals. Until then, it's contacting, contacting, contacting.

Have fun in Idaho!

Love,

Elder Nelson