Letter from Josh 1 June 2009

Hey, Family!!!! This week was really good, also fairly interesting, meaning I have a good story for you today. First the meeting with Helen went good. she had read this week, she didnt understand a word of it, but the important part is that she is trying. sometimes it sucks that this isnt a swahili speaking mission. and we got her to church this week too, thats one of the interesting stories. So at the end of the lesson on Wednesday we commited her to come to church. when she agreed we told her we would go and pick her up and travel with her to the church so that she could know where it is. Sunday morning when we were walking into the area that she lives we got stopped by some guy sitting in his car at the front "gate" (not really a gate just a big whole in a brick wall). The place where she lives is army housing because her father is a soldier. So the guy in the car told us that we shouldn't be in there because we were not natives. We tried to explain that we had been there several times before and we just wanted to pick up our friend to bring her to church with us. This made the guy even more angry. I thought he was a taxi driver by the way he was dressed and such, so i told him, "sir if you are so concerened about it then you are more than welcome to accompany us to her place and back to the gate, you are also welcome to join us at church if you like, but we are going to be late so we are going to go and get her now." Well, it turns out that guy was not a taxi driver, but the general in his off duty clothes. yea, my mistake. and i gues he didnt like me telling him what I was going to do rather than pleading for the permission to do so. So he asked for our passports and visas and etc. and we gave him the copies that we carry with us. then he asked for the originals saying that the copies were of no use to him because anybody could "doctor them up." When we told him the originals were in Nairobi with our mission president he got even more mad, i didnt know itwas possible, buti guess it was. he said "why in the Hell are your visas in a completely different country? How can you possibly think it would be ok to be living in one country while your passport and visa are in a completely different country?" Eventually he told us that one of us could go to pick up Helen if the other one stayed behind, and the one that was going had to go with two armed guards while the other stayed with him. He didnt care about the never leave your companion alone rule and wouldnt have any thing to do with it. so i went to go get Helen with the two guards. suprisingly they both apologized to me and said that they recognized me and didnt know what the generals problem was. After we got back to the gate the general asked Helen who her father was and took dow her information as well as ours from our passports and then told Helen that she would have to talk to him privately after she returned. It was pretty intense and in the middlethere I thought I would end up in the jail. Then at church (we got there thrity minutes late but they waited for us to start the meeting, this branch cant do much without the missionaries, although the other two were there on time so I am not sure why they waited.) ne way, one of the speakers taught about the worth of souls and how satan is going to do everything he can to stop people from joining us. It was powerfull and came at just the right time for too. iIjust feel bad for Helen cause I am sure her private meeting with the general wasn't such a happy thing. We have to call her today to find out how it went and if we will ever be aloud to her place again or if we need to find somewhere else to meet.
I also found out that Steph is engaged this week. I guess I found out last monday in her e-mail to me but didnt know if she was joking or not because we write fairly often and she hasnt said anything about dating anyone and then tells me that she is engaged. I am really excited for her though! it was just a shock since she skipped the whole dating part from the way i found out. I am just wondering if you guys knew anything about it earlier, because on mothers day you asked if we write at all and I said yea every now and then and then you all went quiet. This was mostly just a reality check for me of how disconected i am from everything at home now. I have no idea what is going on with anybody really.
Thanks for the blog mom, it helps a lot, but it is still just completely different. But overall it was a good week. I am busier now than I have been before on my mision. It really is crazy how packed our days are. We even ran in between some of our apointments this week just to make it on time to the next one. It has been really fun. Anyways, I love you guys! Have a great week! And remember that I love you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Love,Elder Harris