10 Years, I Mean Days, in Africa

Hello everyone!

Well, as I'm sure you all know, I made it to Africa! After many flights, security checks, and customs, I finally made it to Benin...just to find out I'd be going to Togo, on another flight, with more security checks and customs. 

We got into Benin late on Friday night, and some of us got taken to stay at the mission home, while others went to different places with different elders. Little did we know, the Elders that got taken to the mission home would be assigned to Togo, I being one of them. We stayed the night there, and the next morning we got breakfast, and some training. After training, the Elders that were assigned to Benin went to their assignments right away, while the Elders going to Togo had to wait. See, when we got into Benin, we had to get tested for Covid, and they took our passports until our test results came back, and we weren't able to go to Togo until Monday. So for Saturday and Sunday, we would get to stay in the mission home, which had AC, and hot water, and they made us three meals a day. Also, we went out proselyting on Saturday and Sunday, with the AP's and Office Elders, because there are no restrictions in this mission! We can go out proselyting, knocking doors, and inside peoples homes, because for these countries, Covid hasn't been an issue. 

On Monday, we flew out to Togo, which was pretty hectic. After finally making it, on a very long 24 minute flight, we went to the Stake center, and met our companions, and went to our new areas. I am with Elder Kazadi, who is from the Congo, and our area is called Attiegou. We are in Lome, the capitol of Togo, which is where most of the missionaries are in Togo. Elder Kazadi speaks pretty good English, which has been such a blessing. My French is not as good as I thought it was haha.

After we got settled it, we started proselyting right away. We spent all of last week out in the city teaching lessons, and getting to know people. Everyone here is so nice, and receptive to our message. In fact, we found like 6 new people in two hours, which was pretty awesome. I can't really understand what they say to me, but I kind of just smile and say ''Bonjour'' or ''Bonsoir'' depending on the time of day. Also, all the little kids here love me. Whenever I walk by, they sing ''Yovo, Yovo, Bonsoir'' which, Yovo is what they call white people, and bonsoir for good evening. I just smile, and wave, and say bonsoir, and they love it. 

Other than that, things are pretty normal. It's taken a while to adjust to the different culture, and everything else they do differently here. It's also so hot here, all the time too. I'll get up at 6:30, and it's already hot outside. It probably doesn't help that I came over here in January, where it was a lot colder in North Carolina. But yeah, things are going pretty well.

I hope everyone has an awesome day, and an amazing week!

Elder Orchard

We were walking home one night, Elder Kazadi felt a raindrop and looked at me and said ''Run'' and this is what I looked like when we got home!

Elder Kazadi and I doing service.

Elder Kazadi and I at Zone Conference.

Getting Prepared for Benin

Hello Everyone!

It has been a crazy couple of weeks. So, I'm not sure who knows this and who doesn't, but I am headed out to Benin on January 21. Yep, that's this Thursday! I am super excited, and it's way earlier than I thought that I'd be going out, that's for sure! 

Transfers happened this past week, and because I am headed out to Benin soon, I got transferred up to Raleigh. I'm super sad to leave Leland. The members there were so awesome, and the missionary work was starting to take off. I'm sure that Elder Alexander and his new companion will do great though! It's super cool up here in Raleigh. The only downside is that I'll only be here for about a week, which stinks because the members here are so awesome! We got to meet a bunch of them yesterday at church, and over the past week, as some of them have been signing up to feed us. I wish I could stay longer, but I am also super excited and ready to get out to Benin!

I'll only end up spending about three months in North Carolina, but it has been a blast so far. I've met so many wonderful people, and had some weather that I can't complain about. But in all seriousness, it has been an awesome couple of months, but I am ready to head to Benin, and serve the people there. I have some tough challenges ahead of me, but I know that as I rely on the Lord, that I can get through those challenges, and I am so ready for them.

I'll try to keep y'all posted as much as possible from Benin. 

Au Revoir

Elder Orchard

 

 I finally got to see the ocean before I left the Wilmington area!

 

This is where I'll be going in Africa

 

Christmas and Covid

Hello Everyone!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and is preparing to start the new year. 2021! That's insane! 2020 has been an insane year, to say the least, and I'm sure that we are all ready to start 2021. It's crazy to think that a year ago, I was only halfway done with my senior year in high school, and now, after this week, I will have been on my mission for 4 months already! Time really does go by too fast. 

As I'm sure you all knew, this past week was Christmas! I got to call my family on Christmas morning, and we even got to open presents together! I got to see Amara open the presents I got for her, a toy Baby Yoda, and a Dr. Seuss book. She cuddled the Baby Yoda gift, and it made me so happy to see that! Isn't it so awesome to give gifts and see the reaction of those you give the gift to??? It made me think of the gifts that our Savior gives to us, and how happy he is when we appreciate those gifts. I had a wonderful time celebrating the birth of our savior, and really pondering the gifts that He has given us. Jesus Christ has been a great light in my life, and I can never thank him enough for the gifts that he has given us. 

A couple of weeks ago, the Assistants in our mission gave us a challenge: Teach 15 lessons, whether that be member or non-member, in a week. My companion, Elder Alexander, and I thought about what kind of message would be best during this time, and obviously we decided to find a Christmas lesson. We could have gone with the Christmas story from Luke 2, or the prophetic message of Samuel the Lamanite in Helaman 14, but we decided to go for something different. We decided to share the prophesy given by Alma in Alma 7, verses 10-13. As we studied these verses, I gained a greater appreciation for our Savior, and all the things he truly suffered for us. We decided to share this message because it not only prophesies about Christ's birth, but his life, and all the things he would do for us, to fulfill the atonement. If you haven't read those verses, I highly recommend that you read them.

About a week before Christmas, my companion and I were exposed to Covid. In order to take a precaution, we quarantined until we got our test results back. Neither one of us really got sick, and our results came back negative the day before Christmas, however, we still had to quarantine during Christmas. As much as it sucked being in quarantine, I learned a couple things. First of all, the people of Leland, NC are seriously the nicest people in the world!! When we got quarantined, we reached out for some help with groceries, supplies, etc. and we got such a great response!! We definitely had a ton of food, cookies, and other things! Secondly, I learned how to better manage my time. This has always been something that I struggled with, but I guess it took being stuck inside to learn that haha. Lastly, I gained a better appreciation and knowledge for our scriptures! It's truly amazing that we have these books, and that we can read them so conveniently. It's also amazing how these scriptures were written thousands of years ago, but they can guide us through today's challenges! Also, I learned how to solve a Rubik's cube haha. 

I can't wait to start 2021 as a missionary!! It's so crazy to think that 2021 will be the only year that I dedicate fully to missionary work, so I better make it a good one!

Happy New Year!

Elder Orchard

My companion and I with our awesome Christmas tree the Weaver's gave us

My Christmas decorations

The cube

Another thing I did in quarantine was buckle down on my French and make a thousand note cards haha

First Transfers!

Hello Everyone!

These past few weeks have been pretty crazy. For anyone wondering, the weather is still holding up here. It is almost December, and it is currently 75 out, so I can't complain about that. Transfers are this week, which means that a lot of missionaries will be coming in and out of this area. Fortunately, I am still in the Leland ward. I am still in training, so I will be here for this next transfer, but who knows after that! I could be in a completely different area in six weeks!

These past couple of weeks, we have been able to get a lot of service done! Our friend, Buddy Watkins, and his family are moving, so we got to help out with that over the past couple of weeks. We got to load up the truck a couple of times, and then one time we went over there to rake leaves to get his house ready to sell. It was so awesome to see how grateful he was, and it made us feel so good for helping him. His family is so awesome, and they will be missed.

We also helped another family move this past week. It fell on the same day as our district council, so we were able to get all 8 missionaries in our district in on the move that day. Other members of our ward were there as well, and the move only took a couple of hours. It was awesome. Afterwords, one of the members of the family wrote about it on Facebook, and she was very appreciative of what we did, and it made us feel so good. Other than that, we have had other service opportunities, but that's been our main one over the past couple of weeks.

For those of you that don't know, missionary work has changed a lot since the pandemic has started. Before Covid, we were able to knock on doors, and street contact to find new people, but now, we obviously can't do that. Now, a lot of our finding is done through our Facebook page, Following Jesus Christ in Wilmington and Jacksonville. On this page, we make videos about different topics to try to invite others to come unto Christ. It's super cool, because people will reach out to us. It's like they are knocking on our door, how cool is that!

Things are moving along here in Leland. There's a lot of potential, and it's only a matter of time before missionary work really starts rolling, and we can't wait!

Elder Orchard

 

In front of the USS North Carolina

 

Here is a little bee that wanted to hang out on my hand

 

The dumpster is a walk, so we had to use our big brains to find a solution haha

Service and Disc Golf

Hello Everyone!

I'm coming up on almost a month in North Carolina already! It has gone by crazy fast. I'll let you in on a little bit of what's been happening.

First of all, it is beautiful here! Today (Nov 9) it was 82(insert degrees sign here). Yes, that is right, it was 82(insert degrees sign here) at the beginning of November. Sorry Nebraska people haha. I am pretty close to the coast, so that is probably playing a part in that. I still haven't seen the ocean yet, but hopefully that will happen soon. Fingers crossed. I'm not allowed to go in the water, or on the beach, but it would still be cool to see the ocean, and be on the pier, stuff like that. 

We have been able to get a little bit of service here, but not a ton. We have been helping a lot with a recently baptized member moving. We helped him once the first week we were here, and twice in the past week. It has been so awesome to help him move, and I know that he really appreciates the help. A week or so ago we helped clean up the park after a storm rolled through, but other than that, we haven't been getting too much service.

We have three people in our teaching pool right now. Two of them have been coming to sacrament meetings consistently, and so that is super awesome! I can see that they are progressing, which is awesome. 

The best part out here so far is the members/the people in general. They are so nice! Everyone is just so kind, and you can tell that they really care about you. The members in our ward are super awesome. I can tell why everyone loves it here so much. 

If something absolutely crazy happens, then I will for sure let everyone know haha. I might move this to a biweekly blog post. I'm not sure yet, but whatever I do, I will try to be more consistent with my blog posts.

I hope everyone is doing great!

 

Grant

 

 

 A dog and I while we were helping with a move.

 

 My disc golf disc

Week 1 - Leland, North Carolina

Hello everyone!

So, this has been a crazy week so far. As you all know, I flew into Raleigh on Tuesday afternoon. All of my flights went well. I was a bit worried, because I've never flown by myself before, but it all went well. I even met some other missionaries on the flight to Raleigh, and get this: one of them was a sister missionary who is Elder Ward's cousin! If you don't remember, Elder Ward was my companion in the at home MTC. He told me that I might meet her, and he was right. 

After we got into Raleigh, the Assistants to the President (APs) were there to meet us at the airport. Normally the President would be there to meet us, but he was stuck in meetings, which was understandable. That same day that we came in, around 10 or so missionaries were going home, so he had to take care of that. However, after we got to the mission office we got to meet President and Sister Maurer (pronounced more-uh). They are super nice, and they are from Australia, which is super cool! We got some training, and some dinner that night, and then we went to a hotel to stay the night.

The next day, we got to meet our new companions. My companion is Elder Alexander. He is pretty cool, you can tell that he is dedicated to the work. He will be a great trainer. We got placed in Lelend, NC, which is about as south as you can go, and only about 15 minutes from the beach! I knew I wanted to see the beach, and that is a very real possibility now! However, Elder Alexander and I have to whitewash the area. This means that they pulled the two Elders that were here before, and placed two new Elders (us) here. Normally, when someone gets transferred, one person stays, so that there is always one person that knows the area. Because we are both new here, when we got here we didn't know anybody. It has been hard, but I know that we will get through it.

The best part of North Carolina has definitely been the people. Everyone is so nice here, and I can attest that southern hospitality is real. The members of the ward were all so kind and inviting, and it was a nice welcome. We have already had meals with 3 different families of the ward, and we've been here less than a week. That part has been awesome.

Hopefully by next week we will be teaching more people, and I will have more to share.

Elder Orchard

 

 

 This is the view from our apartment. We are on the third floor.

 

There was a Christmas tree set up when we got here. Not sure whu, but we'll probably leave it up.

 

Here is kind of an overview picture of my apartment.

 

This is my desk, with all my study materials.

 

Here is my bed area.

 

 

Preparing for NC - Weeks 4/5/6

Bonjour!

Comment va tout le monde aujourd'hui?

Well, I said that I would try to send out an email at least every other week, and I failed at that. There just hasn’t been much to write about that’s new, with the same things going on everyday, but I’ll write what has been going on.

So, since I’ve been preparing to go to North Carolina, there have been some things that I’ve had to get that I wouldn’t need in Africa. For example, we had to get me a new suit. I’ll add a picture down below, but I really like it, and it fits me well. They recommended two suits, but only required one. We figured, since it’s just a reassignment, we’d get me just one suit, and send me out with one of Coleman’s old suits, which fits me well enough. I also had to get a smartphone, which is unfortunate, since my Africa mission did not require me to get a smartphone, and since North Carolina is only (hopefully) a reassignment. Plus, they have all these requirements with the specs, storage, make, model, a whole bunch of stuff. However, we did end up finding one, for a pretty good price.

So, this last weekend was General Conference. For those of you who don’t know, General Conference is basically when all the general authorities of our church meet to address the members of our church. It is held on the first weekend of April, and October every year. Normally, people can go watch the conference in Salt Lake City, but obviously due to Covid, that didn’t happen this time. However, it was still a great experience to hear from them! I’ll share some of my thoughts/favorite talks. Dieter F. Uchtdorf shared probably my favorite talk of the conference. Basically, he talked about how God has prepared us to live in this time, and that he hasn’t forgotten us. That really resonated with me because of my reassignment, and being a missionary for Covid. It really made me realize that God has planned on me going to North Carolina, and that there are people there who need my help. 

I could talk all day about what I learned from General Conference, but I’ll just share one more insight. Another talk I liked was by Gary E. Stevensen. He talks about how we can be blessed, even if we are facing afflictions. He shares the story of Nephi from the Book of Mormon, and how one of the first things he says is “having seen many afflictions in the course of my days, nevertheless, having been highly favored of the Lord in all my days” (1 Nephi 1:1). The first thing that Nephi writes is that he endured many hard things, but he has also seen many blessings. I think this can be applicable to anyone, knowing that we can go through tough times, and see many hard things in our lives, but that doesn’t mean that we are stripped of God’s blessings. Those are just a few of my thoughts.

As most of you know, this past week was my last week in the MTC. Just yesterday, Friday, was my last day of classes. I am definitely not fluent in French, but I am getting better quotidien (everyday). Plus, I am going to an English speaking mission first, so that will give me some more time to polish my French. These past six weeks have definitely flown by, and I did not think they would. I still remember my first day of classes, and how stressful it was. I remember thinking that these six weeks would drag on, and I would never leave the MTC. One reason it has flown by is definitely because of the people I met here.

Now, you probably don’t know these people, but I’m going to say why I am thankful for each and every one of them. Starting off with Elder Ward, for being my companion, and being an awesome friend. Elders Comer, Albertelli, and Wright for always goofing around, and making me laugh. Elder Woolston for sharing jokes, and talking about Avatar, Lord of the Rings, and other cool stuff. Elder Weyand for being basically fluent in French, but not rubbing it in our faces, but using his skill set to help us out. Elder Woodbury for his wit, and for his epic photoshop skills (I’ll attach a photo below). Sister Schnebly and Sister Howard for their infinite wisdom, and helpfulness for when it comes to French. Also, Sister Schnebly put together this awesome video of all of us bearing out testimony that I shared on my Facebook page. Sister Royall for having an amazing testimony, and always inspiring for me to become a better missionary. And finally, Sister Reed, for always encouraging me when I am down, and for always making me laugh. Like always. Also, my teachers, Soeur Sorena and Frere Lerohl, for always believing in us, and for just being great teachers. I love and appreciate everyone in my district, and these six weeks would have gone so slow if they weren’t here.

Now, I am just ready to hop on that plane to North Carolina on Tuesday, and get ready to teach the gospel to those who need it. I can’t wait to get out there and meet my new companion, mission president, and everyone else there. It will definitely be an interesting experience, and I’ll try to keep up on my emails. Hopefully, I’ll have more to write about once I get out there, and I can keep a weekly email. I feel bad for not including much, but like I said before, it’s been more or less the same thing everyday. I’m certain that will change here soon.

Au revoir,

Elder Orchard

Here is our “District Photo” Elder Woodbury Photoshopped us all in there.

-Top Row (Left to Right) Sister Royall, Sister Reed, Elder Albertelli, me, Elder Ward, Soeur Sorena, Elder Weyand

-Bottom Row (Left to Right) Sister Howard, Frere Lerohl, Sister Schnebly, Elder Wright, Elder Woodbury, Elder Woolston, Elder Comer

Here is a little throwback, in honor of the start of October

Here is my dapper suit