Hey everybody!
It's hot. Work's a-ok. Elder Kruger and I doing great! (More pictures at the end of this email.)
Felix's Wedding:
Felix and his wife are getting married! It was poignantly sweet that only Elder Kruger and I populated the chairs in the marriage hall. Normal Malagasy tradition is that there's needs to be an extravagant party full of expensive chicken, drinking, dozens of cars honking down the road, colorful dresses and suits. However, Felix wanted so bad to be baptized, he didn't wait to save up that money, but decided to save up his money for going to the temple. Here are some pictures!
A little kiss, a little hug...
Blessing:
After Felix's wedding, we ran over to a member's house to give their 4 year-old grandson a blessing for the sick. For the past two months, this family hasn't had any good sleep or a moment of quiet time because the kid cries 24/7. I'm pretty sure he has muscular dystrophy: muscular stiffness, trouble sitting up, falls over a lot. During the blessing though, the kid kept straining his neck up to see who the heck was playing a weird version of Jenga on its head, and in self-defense of our laying on of hands, he started scratching at the priesthood with his nails. Little winces of pain showed through the blessing I was giving as I started to talk much faster, randomly emphasizing and yelling a random word in each sentence when the kid would dig his nail into my skin. When it was done, he stopped crying, which was a good sign, but he gave me a look like, "What the heck were you just doing to me?"
Bike Race at Hotel De Ville:
Conveniently, on our way to one time, we were able to stop and cheer on Elder Kruger's favorite investigator, Lova, in the esteemed yearly Mahajanga bike race. Unfortunately, Lova's bike broke, so he was forced to stop halfway through, which stunk because he finished 2nd the year before.
But, it was totally worth coming to the race, because near the end, something horrible almost happened. A large, fancy Ford Ranger truck came barrelling in on the bike track without permission from the police directing the traffic. Noticing his mistake, he tried to zoom off to avoid trouble. But as karma would have it, another policeman had just allowed a bus to enter the same street, abruptly cutting off the truck's getaway. The truck turned hard to the right, lost control, then veered to the left as the tail swung out and bashed into a cement pole, untimely totaling his new truck. Soon following, throngs of Malagasies, whooping and hollering, sprinted over to see the mess. It was crazy. Luckily nobody was hit.
Malagasy Morsel of the Week - Volamena & Mavokely:
Two of the most frustrating words in Malagasy. Whoever created them must've also thought of the pronunciation for colonel and bologna in English. 'Volamena' technically means gold, however 'vola' by itself means money, and 'mena' by itself means red. When I look at gold, my first thought isn't, "Mmm.. that's red. That shiny, yellow stuff is kind of red." Then, to make things worse, 'mavokely' means pink. Broken apart, 'mavo' alone means yellow, and 'kely' means little. Which is saying, pink is 'a little yellow.' Ah, I've never thought about it that way--probably because yellow has literally no flippin' business to do with pink!!
Stories for Next Week
-Apostate Flimflam
-Foker and Lightning
Love you all!
Elder Soper
Found this gigantic chameleon in the middle of the road. It's bite hurt worse than I thought it would.
Elder Kruger wanted a flexing pic, but it's been awhile since I've known how to flex--just curl your arms and make an angry face right?
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