Elder Cody Graham: Week #4 - Keanu and Curry and Rastas, Oh My!

This week has been pretty crazy!

One thing I forgot to mention last week was a homeless guy named Reggie loves the missionaries and always gives them nicknames based on actors. Elder Fowkes is Paul Walker and apparently I am now Keanu Reaves? Can't say I know exactly what he looks like but I'll take what I can get out here (I DO know he's in the Matrix movies).

See the resemblance? Hmmmm....

Every Sunday, Sister Meadow (from the branch) feeds us dinner and holy crud she puts SOOO much food on our plates, but I've been destroying them which is good. Last week was stew peas and yesterday was brown stew chicken. Everyone says they're really different from each other but it is all just rice, peas and chicken to me so it all tastes the same, but I like it all! I also tried Elder Banton's curry goat on Wednesday which was pretty good but it smelled horrid.

So I'll let you look up what this stuff is but I think the greatest inventions Jamaica has so far are Bulla and bag juice. Soooooooo dang good and really cheap. I also love Jamaican Kola, I don't know how to describe it but it's just Jamaican soda and its way good.

Bulla

Kola

Bag Juice

On Tuesday, we were biking back home when we saw a guy flagging us down. His first question was "Do you keep the Sabbath Day holy?" So yeah we got ambushed by a Seventh Day Adventist but it was fine, Elder Fowkes is really good at being bold and honest with people while also being respectful. Not quite sure how he knew where we were going to be, when we were going to be there or how long he waited for us but anyway, bless his heart.

Elder Fowkes, (left) Elder Stewart (middle,
he is our branch president) and I with our lobster feast

On Wednesday, this AWESOME guy we know, Alton (sea fisherman) gave us probably $50 worth of lobster for free and so we feasted that night!

On Friday night, I bought some jerked chicken that must have been way undercooked but I didn't see because it was dark.....I wasn't feeling good Friday night and Saturday so (being the genius that I am) I took some pills to try to get better asap and I might have taken too many at once sooooo yeah haha. I think I got a little dehydrated. So I was getting up from closing prayer of our comp study and my ears plugged and my vision got really dark and cloudy and so I stumbled to my bed and just layed there until my head stopped spinning. I tried to get up but I was still dizzy so Fowkes told me to just stay down...I felt bad for screwing up the day but he understood.. 3 hours later I was able to move around without passing out so we went out and finished the day's appointments like nothing ever happened and I've been great since then. Just a minor speed bump hahaha but no biggy.

Our church building (usually along with the goats
who do our landscapting for us)

Sunday was way cool! I gave a talk on the Priesthood, then some guy walked into church and after talking, we found out he's an elder's quorum president in New Jersey but he is visiting family down here. He took us to his aunts house where we taught her and she seemed pretty interested. He is WAY excited that he introduced her to us. After that, we went and taught another lesson to these two ladies, Marvia and "T West" (that's all we know her as). Turns out, from the last time we saw them to this, Marv read the ENTIRE Book of Mormon...she read it in a week?!?!?!?!? how crazy is that! We will see what comes of that, she didn't pray about it at all but she said she would this week.

Oh also, we played Jamaican Domino with some super old rastas (Apparently one of them is a reggae artist and just got back from tour in Belgium?? You do you, rasta mon). But we got their info and gave them some pamphlets so that is pretty cool haha.

So for Tamara's baptism on Saturday (March 14) Elder Fowkes will baptize her but I get to witness which means I'll be getting in the ocean as well!! Elder Fowkes is awesome. We get along great and have a ton in common. Like I said, he is really bold when teaching and I admire that about him. He's a dang good trainer and this companionship was definitely inspired.

The pictures that Anakay sent you were just pics of us talking after church. Explanation: I received a friend request on Facebook from Anakay, a lady in Cody’s branch. She posted a bunch of pictures of the elders after church – it was fun to see candids of them!

Our branch has about 35 active members and maybe 60 total members so we work a lot with less active members throughout the week.

My bike is not great but not terrible either. It works. And no I am not sun burnt, and never did get sun burnt so that is good.

That's all for this week. Until next time. One love!

Love,

Elder Graham

p.s.

"One Love" is Jamaica's motto/slogan, just so you don't think I'm turning too hardcore of a rasta, I just like to talk to them, that's all. I don't even accept the weed they offer so I'm staying obedient!