Ten Months, 2 Million People & Black Bananas

I've been out ten months!  That's so long. But it's gone so fast!  Ha ha ha, we joke around that I should already start packing my bags because the plane is coming for me!  Of course, it's a little sarcastic for me. For Elder Kenner, however, he's on his last 13 weeks.  Yeah, the plane is pretty much waiting for him.  I think ten months is somewhat of a milestone because I've reached double digits.  That's the first step to reaching 24 months, right?  Ha ha ha.

I love getting Aunt Staci's letters too!  And I can't help but call her "aunt."  I'd call her "Mom" if the job wasn't already taken! ;) Wow, I can't believe Boomer left for Singapore 20 months ago!  I'm so excited for his brother Joshua in Mozambique.  African missions are just plain sweet (so long as they aren't apostate, like many of them are prone to be *cough* *NIGERIA**cough*).

Here's my adventure of the week:  EASTERN POLICE.  Wow, that place is the closest place to Hell I've ever been in my life!  East and West Freetown is essentially divided by this main juncture, and is pretty much the only route to pass from east to west, or vice a verse.  It's land-marked with the large Freetown Eastern Police Station, which overlooks the humongous junction.  So, it's a two lane road on which EVERYTHING happens.  Elder Purcell and I had to go to "town" (meaning the West end, as it is much more "town"-ish than the East) to find him some new proselyting shoes.  Getting there wasn't bad, because we simply chartered a taxi.  We enjoyed at one of the Freetown supermarkets (the closest thing to a K-Mart I'll ever see!) where I bought a bag of fajita-flavored Doritos (25,000le) and a Transformers-themed Risk board (I couldn't pass that up, even though it was 62,000le).  All in all, town was nice, even though it took three hours to get there.

The worst, however, was getting back.  Option A is to charter another taxi, but from the west at that time of day, the cost would have been too great.  Rather, we opted to try our luck with poda-poda's.  So, we walked along the main thoroughfare from the west towards Eastern Police.  Unfortunately, we reached Eastern Police before we found a poda, which took us about 45 minutes to walk.

By that point, I was already tired, but we had to continue down the road to find transport back to Wellington.  To describe it simply, Eastern Police is packed with people.  PACKED!!!  I wondered how 2 million+ people could live here, I FOUND THEM ALL IN ONE PLACE!!! EASTERN POLICE MARKET!!!  The entire road (yes, the road itself, not just the sides) is packed shoulder to shoulder, and those that aren't moving find themselves a spot where they stand to sell something. What happens when a poda/semi-truck has to pass?  The vehicle swims through the people like a fish through water.  It's crazy, I'm telling you.  Right as the poda is about to mow them over, the people all "jam-jam" to the sides of the road, completely sardined like you can't believe.  The podas roll past so closely that you have to turn your feet sideways so that they aren't rolled over.  Man, that place sucks like nothing.  It stinks!  Oh it stinks!  Every horrid smell in the world is there, plus the massive population!  We walked (pushed, rather) our way down that road for almost two hours before we were free of the "jam-jam."

One thing really struck me there.  The market is supersaturated with all of the same product, and similar products tend to coalesce into a section of all the same thing.  E.g., bananas.  I saw a huge section of at least thirty different banana sellers, selling all kinds of bananas.  Red ones, yellow ones, green ones, big ones, small ones. Then I saw one woman, who was sitting and staring off into the distance.  I could see in this woman a loss of hope.  What was she selling?  Black bananas.  Nasty, smooshy, black bananas.  Why? Why on earth would you sell that?  No one would in their right mind buy such a thing.  Well, for this woman, it's all she has, and all she can manage to make a living on.

Do you realize that this seller of black bananas has the potential to be a goddess?  Wow.  It totally blew me away to think of that. Stripped of class and circumstance, we are all the same, regardless of where/who/what/ANYTHING!  She can have hope, love, peace, and joy through the gospel of Jesus Christ.  Wow.  It totally blew me away. The gospel is for everyone, so share it with everyone!

That's cool with the Mormon.org stuff.  I ran into the site a year or two ago, and even considered making an account at the time.  Of course, I didn't know my record number, so I couldn't, and then I just forgot to ask.  It'll be on my "to do" list when I get home.  It's such a cool way to do missionary work even when you're not actively doing it!

Oh, by the way, I've decided that I REALLY want to be an EFY counselor sometime when I return.  I just remember looking up to all of the returned missionaries who were counselors, and how they were all just an awesome example to me and to hundreds of others.  I kind of want to reciprocate that too.  I'd want to do it in Tacoma, just like before, at least one summer.  What do you think of that?  Of course, a de ya fos (I'm here first).

Love,

Elder Vaughan