When the bush calls...

4/24/23

Super cool week. I realized in my last email I left out some funny stuff. One cool thing was going to the Kissi's house. The Kissi family is Ghanaian but they were all born in America except for the parents. Sister Kissi lived in America for 20 years, that's longer than me. She worked at Olive garden for a while too. When we visited we still ate Ghanaian food don't worry. Some super good Banku and Okro stew. They even had crabs in it! I forgot to take a picture so you'll have to look one up yourself, sorry. It was weird because walking into their house felt like walking into a different country. When we finished she gave us pistachio ice cream too.

I went on exchange with Elder Adams this week. Elder Adams is from West Jordan Utah so we know some people who know each other. His hobby back home was to go to the gym so he's a pretty strong guy. We had a great day with 7 lessons though. Love the guy I'm gonna miss being in his zone.

Well now we get to the title of the email. On the way back from the exchange with Elder Adams I received a call from President Jacobsen. He told me straight that he wanted me to train this next transfer in an area called Nyakrom. I was super surprised because I only have 3 month left and I was fully ready to finish in Odorkor. Nyakrom is in the Swedru zone. One district is in the Swedru town and the other district is spread out in the Bush. I'm in the Odoben district, the Bush one. It'll be a super cool way to finish my mission. I will find out who I'm training tomorrow when we go to the mission home.

•Week 14•

Perspective is everything

Simply the way you choose to see life is the way that you will see it. I've served with a lot of different people with a lot of personalities out here and I can say that pessimism does nothing but make your life worse. No matter what situation or what circumstances you find yourself in, you can choose to be happy. Look for solutions to problems not for more problems. One of the greatest pathways to happiness is gratitude. I encourage everyone reading this to be more grateful in your life. Take some time right now to list 10 things that you are truly grateful for and you will instantly start having a better day. Choose to look for the good and not the bad. Choose to be happy no matter what comes your way.  

Contacts

Facebook - Aidan Holyoak 

Email - aidan.holyoak@missionary.org 

Thank you all for reading, I'm grateful for every single one of you!

Elder Holyoak

Dinner with the Kissis

Gbawe District Council 

President Jacobsen

Exchange with Elder Adams

Man Power

Storm a brewin'

Goodbye Ordorkor

Ghana

🙂

L.A.P.D. go catch me

4/17/23

This week was pretty cool.

The work in Odorkor has been interesting lately. Our biggest challenge is still that we don't have bikes for our area. We walk sometimes up to 45 minutes just to get to a lesson. We are managing it though and we hope to get bikes soon in the future.

On Wednesday we had Zone Interviews with President and Sister Jacobsen and we got to stay the whole time. Making sure people got there on time and watching packages. It was all worth it though I love hearing and learning from the Jacobsen's.

We also had our multi-zone conference this last Friday and it went great. We talked all about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. (Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and Enduring to the End) It was also my trainer's last multi-zone conference so he bore his testimony. That is really weird, that'll be me in 3 months. There were 11 people who bore their going home testimonies. A lot of cool people are going home. Elder Gemah one of my previous comps from Liberia. Sister Sunday who is the coolest sister in the mission and is from Nigeria is also going home. Sad to see people go.

We had a funny experience today with a guy who didn't speak a lot of English. He walked up and we went through the basics.

How are you?

What's your name?

Where are you from?

When we told him we were from the USA he looked at us and said. "AY, L.A.P.D. go catch you and send you back."

15 weeks

Well if I added everything up right I should only have 15 weeks left which means I have 15 P days left. I thought it would be cool to share one thing that I have learned on my mission each week until I go home. So here it goes.

•Week 15•

Failing to Plan is Planning to Fail

I have really learned the importance of planning on my mission. Every day we wake up and form a plan of things that we want to accomplish and every week we do the same thing. The truth is if you don't plan how you're going to do something you probably won't do it right. Time is the most valuable thing in this life and the way to budget it is by planning. I heard someone say once that when you are planning for your week, make sure to plan for the "Big Rocks" first before you try and squeeze the little rocks in. That means at the beginning of the week you can set time apart for things like family, friends, personal hobbies and interests, etc. But always put the most important things in life in your schedule first. If you don't plan your months, weeks, or days you will find that time is just slipping by without achieving any of the goals or aspirations that you have.

Contacts

Email - aidan.holyoak@missionary.org 

Facebook - Aidan Holyoak 

Well I hope I didn't talk too much but I plan to see you all next week.

Elder Holyoak

Proselyting with Marilyn 

Cool Paths

RIP Sister Sunday

RIP Elder Asante

Waiting at interviews

Multi-Zone

Paddington

Fufu

🍝 Spaghetti🍝

4/10/23

This week wasn't too eventful, but I'll jazz up this email to make it seem like it was.

Probably the most noteworthy day of the week was P day. We ended up going to 2 different district activities on the same day. At the first activity they were watching conference, eating food, and playing card games. One of my new favorites is a game called Skull King. It's a pirate card game and it's a ton of fun.

When we finished there we headed over to the other activity at the beach. We aren't supposed to swim, so people were talking and others were playing soccer. There was a big dog running around playing with the soccer ball too. Some dudes got into a fight but they both apologized to each other afterwards. My comp and I did a little race and he smoked me, he also did cross country in high school. Regardless we both had sore legs the rest of the week. 

On Wednesday we had MLC again. Crazy that another month has already passed. It was my Father's last MLC so that was weird. Lunch was baked spaghetti and I had a lot. Some announcements too... we're going to be receiving white sisters in our mission near the end of the summer, but don't tell anyone. I won't live to see the day anyways so it doesn't really make a difference.

We had the baptism for our friends Kezia, Esther, and Ezekiel along with a child of record on Friday. It went great and we had a ton of members there. All of the converts are part of good families so I know they will grow well in the gospel.

Our Relief Society President called us on Sunday and told us to come over. When we got there she didn't have anything we could help with, any questions, or concerns. She just wanted to feed us, and it was spaghetti with red sauce. It was really good. The sauce had a little Ghanaian twist on it but it was awesome that she made it for us.

Scripture of the Week

Helaman 3:35 - "Nevertheless they did fast and pray oft, and did wax stronger and stronger in their humility, and firmer and firmer in the faith of Christ, unto the filling their souls with joy and consolation, yea, even to the purifying and the sanctification of their hearts, which sanctification cometh because of their yielding their hearts unto God."

Contacts

Email - aidan.holyoak@missionary.org 

Facebook - Aidan Holyoak 

Well I hope you enjoy the pictures. Have a good week!

Elder Holyoak

P-Day

Beach P-Day

Baptisms: Ezekiel, Kezia, Esther, and Grace

MLC

RIP Elder Asante

MLC

Spaghetti

👃

Double Up

4/3/23

I missed last week so you get a double email this week.

On Monday we bought a basketball for our apartment. You can usually squeeze some basketball into your morning routine, so that's been fun.

On Thursday that week I went on exchange with Elder Mutombo, my District Leader. He is from the DRC and he's a super fun guy. He speaks really good English even though his home language is French.

We've been getting a little bit of rain recently. It's not too often, but when it rains it pours. The streets get huge puddles and dirt gets eroded so a lot of it collapses. Sometimes bridges get taken out completely. 

I figured I could talk about what we usually eat for lunch. Usually it's one of these: Fried Rice, Jollof Rice, Gobɛ(Beans and Plantain), Fufu, etc. One of my favorite drinks in Ghana is Chocolate Malt. It tastes like a chocolate bar and it's super filling. Pictures of the food are below.

We have a lot of promising people in our teaching pool right now and we even have 3 of our friends on Baptismal date. We plan to have their baptism this Sunday so I will keep you updated. One of my favorite people we are teaching is actually moving to Nigeria this Wednesday. Another guy we were teaching just randomly told us he was moving to New York City. We lost both of them, but we said we could help them find the missionaries in their areas.

I went on an exchange in Bortianor this last Thursday with Elder Parks. Elder Parks is from Iowa and he kinda looks like the guy in Ratatouille. Bortianor is a costal town and you can see the ocean from their apartment. The Bishop's wife made us Lunch and Dinner. We are even going there today to see the Beach.

Spiritual Thought

I don't want to write too much so I'll just go to my spiritual thought. I hope you were able to listen to or watch General Conference yesterday. If not you should go and watch Russell M. Nelson's talk about Peace and Contention. The whole talk is about replacing Contention with Peace. He said we should communicate with EVERYONE with dignified dialogue and mutual respect. Contention ruins relationships, goals, and reputations. I really recommend that you watch the talk and find ways to use it in your life this week.

Contacts

Email - aidan.holyoak@missionary.org 

Facebook - Aidan Holyoak

Thanks for reading, enjoy the pictures. Laugh more, Smile More!

Elder Holyoak

Gbawe District

Rain

So Good

Dinner with Sister Bishop

Elder Christensen 19 month party

View from the Bortianor Apartment

Exchange with Elder Mutombo

Exchange with Elder Parks

Dawg

Gobe

Wele

Jollof Rice

🤲