Baptism of Pascal!!

Hello,
The transfers have began. My companion Elder Monson was transferred on Friday.   I will be training a new missionary in the area that I am in now. I will not meet my "kid" until Thursday. Until then I will be living and working with the Zone Leaders.

The area is still going really good, we had 18 people at Church last Sunday and Pascal received his confirmation. I baptized him on Saturday at 2:00 pm.

Here are some other photos from the week.

Elder Allen

Twenty to Church

**We got  letter from the mission president that there is the Bubonic Plague in Tamatave, which is Sam's last area he was in. They have pulled all of the missionaries out of that area for now.  Luckily Sam is back in Tana doing great.  But I did get on his case to take his Doxycyline!!!  Always an adventure!!  Thanks for all of the love, prayers, and support!    Jenn

Hello,

There is nothing too new this week except that the work has been getting better. We had over 20 investigators at church this week and it was the first time for about five of them. Five regulars did not show up so the newbies made up for it. Next week if all goes well then we could possibly have 30 investigators at church. That would be the dream. We have been getting more and more investigators from the family of diligent investigators. They tell their families about the church and then they ask if they can learn from the missionaries as well. It has been pretty cool. We also have a Baptism this Saturday for Pascal.

These are some photos of Elder Monson's and my own suit that we just had made. It was about 110,000 Ar to make one. That is like 40 dollars.

Something new from this week is that last Monday while on a bus I was talking with the guy next to me who seemed to know a lot about the church. I got his address and then we went to talk with him that next day. When we got there he pulled out all the standard works and opened them up. He had every page full of marks and cross references. Every single line was highlighted in a different color. He went off about our church and how he knows it is true and started to rant on about all of his studies. He wants to go to America and share his studies of the Bible, The Book of Mormon, D&C, and the Pearl of Great Price with the Prophet. He is a pretty passionate guy and I felt bad telling him that I could not pay for his trip there.

That is the week.
Sincerely,
Elder Allen

Greetings from President Foote

Dear Parents,

Greetings from the Madagascar Antanarivo Mission.
We are continually blessed to be able to work with such tremendous Elders and Sisters in this Mission.
Recently, there have been incidents of the bubonic plague in a few of the communities in Madagascar.  We are taking every precaution to insure the safety of each Missionary.​
As a precautionary measure, we have temporarily moved the Elders in Toamasina (Tamatave) to Antananarivo.  All other missionaries remain in their assigned areas.
All Missionaries are required to take doxycycline each day and for thirty days after their return home, as a preventative measure for malaria but also is prevenative for many other diseases, including bubonic plague. It is very important for them to take this medication. We would ask you to encourage your missionary to be obedient in this matter.
We reiterate that these moves are precautionary.  The missionaries are safe and we have measures in place to keep them safe.  
Please continue to pray for your missionaries and for the Malagasy people  and the great work that is going on here

Sincerely
Raymon D. Foote
President, Madagascar Antananarivo Mission

A Pretty Good Turn Out

Hello,

The weeks have been going by quite quickly lately. We had about 20 investigators come to church yesterday. It was a pretty good turn out.

We have a baptism coming up for a young man named Pascal. He is a really smart kid that just understands it all. We do not have to do much explaining with him. He also comes to church every week. We have a couple of pretty cool families that we have been teaching lately as well. They all come to church and are all going to be baptized next transfer.

I have sent some photos of a plane that Elder Monson and I found while walking around in our area. It was pretty cool.

I finished reading the New Testament last week and I am almost finished with Doctrine and Covenants. I have read everything except the Old Testament, except I think I will just start reading the Book of Mormon again.

Last Monday I wanted to get a hair cut but I do not trust the Malagasies because they always give the missionaries "black man" cuts. That is all they are good at. I walked over to a hair cut place with my old comp, Elder Wilson and asked the guys if we could just use their clippers. It was really funny because the whole time the Malagasy guys were studying the way to cut a white man's hair.

That is all from the week.
Sincerely,
Elder Allen

The Most Comforting Truths

Hello,

This week was pretty nice. We just had a Stake Conference last Sunday and I got to see a lot of people I knew back in Ampefiloha.

Funny story actually.  On our way to the conference we heard someone calling us over from across the street in English. There was a white lady and her white husband in the back of a car. We walked over and started talking to them. It so happened to be the American Ambassador and his wife. They told us they had been in Mada for about four weeks and they look for LDS missionaries wherever they go. They travel around the world a lot. They actually ended up giving us a ride to church. During the drive the lady kept telling us that she had so many LDS friends. She called herself a "Dry Mormon". They told us if we needed anything to just call them. She said we could eat at their house, swim in their pool, and if we needed someone to sew our pants that she would do that. Nice people.

Something I have been noticing more and more lately is that Malagasy Children are just like Ewoks from Star Wars. You hear little voices speaking a weird language behind you and then when you turn around they jump and then scurry away from you. It makes me think of Return of the Jedi every time.

Some bad news from this last week is that one of our investigators died. We were walking around heading to appoitments when a lady ran up to us and said that Gi is dead. At first we did not quite understand but then we realized she was talking about a man that we had previously started teaching. We walked with her to the house and there were a lot of people there. It so happened that he had died just barely. His dead body was on the bed and his wife was crying over it. Someone told her that the "Prayers" are here so she turned around in tears and looked at us. A man pointed at my companion Elder Monson and asked him to pray. So we prayed for the peace and comfort of this family and then placed a Plan of Salvation book with them. The message is always centered on how families can be together forever. That is  one of the most comforting truths.

Sincerely,
Elder Allen