"Oh yeeeeaaaah, and we had CAT last night. I had the spine though, so there wasn't a lot of meat. But I hate to say it... it tasted like chicken! :)"

Dear Family and Friends,

     Guess. What? The building is finally finished! It is such a relief. The materials came on Wednesday, and we all set them up and cleaned on Friday and Saturday, then worshiped for the first time there yesterday. It was so sweet, we had a breeze vacuuming through the chapel, fans everywhere, I was actually comfortable. But the best part is that it was quiet. Very reverent, it was the first sacrament meeting I've had in Ghana that actually felt like church. We had a lot of members there, and two people who aren't even our investigators. We just met them on the street and invited them, so we were surprised when one of them showed up 45 minutes early, haha.

     And, on Saturday morning we had a service project for the village. All of us members got on our LDS Helping Hands jerseys and cleaned up the roads and burned the trash. It was powerful, it was all part of branch president's plan to usher in the church here. We got a lot of publicity, which was really good, and I got a lot of pictures. Ha, ha,  Brother Myers was just running around waving his shovel in the air and blowing a whistle yelling, "Wonko! Wonko! Wonko!" and clapping his hands. I think it just means, 'let's press forward", or something. Oh, and he's past 60 years old. I love that guy!

      Also, I forgot to mention last time we emailed, that Elder James and I finally used the guitar to talk to people! We had literally nothing to do last Saturday, so we busted out my LDS guitar hymnbook and threw a little something together. It was actually pretty successful! It was good to show people that we DO like music and  having a good time in our church, when it's appropriate. All the churches here just clap and sing and make noise for their 'worship' service.

     In spite of the building being ready, things are still really slow for us. It will take some time for things to pick it up in this area, maybe even to the end of the transfer in mid-April. We'll see. I still hope we both stay in this area for at least one more transfer. Elder James thinks I'm going to train. Eh. Maybe. We've been working super hard to get an apartment in our area, too. We've been cabbing back and forth everyday and we have to come home early or we won't get a cab home. And we skip lunch everyday. It would be such a blessing to have an apartment in the area, whether we are still here or not when it actually happens. Someone will benefit from it. We're touring an apartment in one of the villages owned by a University of Cape Coast lecturer on Tuesday. Fingers crossed!

     So, there is something funny that happens in Ghana when there is a football game. When the Ghana Black Stars play, people go NUTS. We never know when the games are happening without a telly, but we can hear it... randomly at night you will hear the entire city erupt in cheering. I'm not kidding, every Ghanaian with access to a TV goes absolutely berserk when their team starts winning. The first time it happened, the first thing that came to my mind was, "Oh no, zombie apocalypse!"  It's funny. But I am getting sick of the lights off we keep having here. We didn't have a ton when I first came, but the last 4 weeks, the lights have gone off every night, and only in our apartment complex. I hate it. Haha I would mind too much not having light, but not having a fan when you go to sleep at night is torture here. I wish someone could send me light power in a package...

     Elder James and I are still just enjoying our food like crazy. This week, we succeeded in making some giant calzones as big as my face, and we built a stuffed-crust pizza. I realized that almost every picture we've taken together is with our food, haha. I'll miss this companionship when transfers come. Oh yeeeeaaaah, and we had CAT last night. I had the spine though, so there wasn't a lot of meat. But I hate to say it... it tasted like chicken! :)

     Anyhow, things here are going, going gone. I'm at 6 months in 10 days!

Love,

Elder Clinton Doggett