It is very hot!

Mom and Dad,
Hey sounds like everything is good, and happy birthday mom! how old are you now? I can’t remember if you’re like 53 or 54 or maybe that is totally wrong, but I hope your birthday was sweet. I forgot about the address again. We live in an apartment complex that’s pretty nice...I know that does not help you at all but I’ll try to get the address for you guys. Before I forget the address to send stuff to is 301797 Francistown, Botswana. I guess that’s it; I asked the senior couple up here and that’s what she told me.
The week has been good and it has been extremely hard though. The zone leaders had to take the car to Joburg so me and Elder Van were left with the bikes all week and I got 5 freaking punctures on my bike in the span of 4 days, and he got one. With a combination of the heat plus crappy Botswana bike tires we were just getting owned this week. It is very hot here as well, like to the point of not safe I swear but we still have to work. My companion is still crazy but I love him a lot he is such a hard worker. We are also both working on his racism, ha-ha. He like knows that he is so racist and he wants to fix it, it’s just hard for him so I’ve been trying to help him.  We were riding the bikes at night actually when I got my 2nd flat of the week. So we were just walking and there was like a herd of cows just chilling across this huge ditch, so he decided he wanted to try and hit them with a rock. So he was just like standing on the main road just chucking these rocks at the cows and he finally hit one. And just by hitting that one, all the cows just stood up one by one and just stared at us, ha-ha it was pretty funny....I think you just had to be there.
A pretty cool experience happened this week. So we get like 1 hour of personal study each morning, and last week one morning I was reading Jesus the Christ and studying about parables. And I was studying the one about the Sower in Matthew 13: 1-8, and just like hectically studying the chapter for some reason. And we went to one of our father led family's for the night and I asked the mom if she had any questions, and just randomly she said she wanted me to explain to her Matthew Chapter 13: 1-8 because she did not understand. It was pretty sweet. Right when I opened to the chapter I realized it had been the exact one I was studying just like 10 hours ago, so I thought that was really cool. It ended up being an awesome lesson.
Another thing happened to me and my companion this week. So there is a place here called BDF Camp Botswana Defense Force....kinda funny because I have no idea what Bot’s is trying to defend. I don’t think anyone would want anything here. Anyway, we are teaching people in the camp and we just went there the other day and we rolled up in the car just talking to the guy and all of a sudden we looked forward and two guards are just chilling right in front of the car with their AK47’s pointed right at are faces....it scared the heck out of us. Then the guy we were talking to said something in Swanna and waved his hand at the guys and they lowered their guns and just walked away?? I was just like what the heck? It was really random and scary; and its funny, Elder Van is always saying how racist the guards are to white people and I have never believed him, and after that happened he just looked at me like; I told you so. It was pretty funny.
Thanks a lot for putting some money in I really appreciate it. I really try not using the card to much but I’ll pay you guys back one day I promise. But how is everything going at home? Is work good dad? You never really talk about it too much. How is Joey and Jason and all them doing? Today I found out Elder Hill was a plumber before his mission so we were just talking about it today and just how there kinda similar jobs, even though we all know pipe fitting fire sprinklers are the best. But hope everything is going well at home. Sometimes I worry that you guys are not like telling me everything … if things are not going good. But I pray for you guys everyday and hope everything is going well with the family. Love you guys though and talk to you all next week.
Elder Justin Brey

I love my new area!!

Hey,

So I’m in my new area and its really sweet, I thought Francistown would be just as ugly as gabs but it’s like really pretty here it’s a lot greener then I thought it would be and the streets are a lot nicer the people are also really nice. My companions name is Elder Van Heerdan from South Africa and he is freaking wild. He is actually an Afrikaans guy (white person from Africa) and all those times in Nelspruit making fun of the Africans people I actually get one as a companion....nice one. But he is sweet ha-ha I have never met a crazier person before. I’ll just describe how my first day went with him. He flipped someone off while we were driving, hoped an electric fence, broke into a house (for a good reason) and he is in the process of buying a donkey for who knows why....He has only been a member for a year and did not know about the church until he went to Utah to visit his dad for the first time and started taking the discussions. He is really powerful and loves to work, sometimes though I just have to tell him not to do things. But I think we should have a good time together. Ya I was kind of worried about being over a district but it’s not too bad now, In my district there is the zone leaders, me and my companion and the sisters...just a side note I am emailing and my companion is next to me and while we were emailing elder copans (the zone leader) called my companions name so he would look over and see a white man and a black woman who are a couple and he was about ready to explode, ha-ha he is a bit racist just because the way he was raised and elder Copans knows it drives him crazy when he sees that so he thought it was pretty funny I just had to tell him to settle down again. Anyway not too much has happened this week just getting to know the area a lot and meeting new people and things.

Just to tell you before I forget I am like really low in my account for like food and stuff and we just like barley got the money I have no idea what happened to the money, I don't know if I just budgeted really bad or they made a mistake but I have like 50 dollars to last me the rest of the month and I was just wondering if I could have some help until I look at the things I have bought. I’m not sure what happened but that would be nice, sorry about that. I’ll try to just live as much as I can on the card as I can until it’s out though.

That’s really sad about sister Schow. I will put her in my prayers as well. That’s really true what you said though dad that’s what I noticed with my last companion is you cannot just call them out right there. He always would tell me how annoying everyone was in his last flat and how mean they were.  I realized it probably was not really them that were the problem so I just kind of tried to lead by example.  Like doing his dishes and stuff when he would not do them and just not saying anything. And honestly that is extremely hard for me to do because when someone bugs me I let them know. But it taught me a great deal of patience. Luckily elder Van Heerdan is like super clean, almost to the point of crazy but its good because I actually became very clean as well in my last flat so it works.  But this will be kind of short sorry I did not answer everything but I wanted to try to send pictures so love you guy’s a lot and take care!

Justin   

A little bit of stress, but I am good...

Hello,

Well the week was pretty good, Sorry, I did not really mean to sound down last time, it’s just been a bit stressful lately. It’s been a bit difficult with my companion, he is a really good guy he just takes some patience.  He gets up late like every day and he is always sleeping whenever he finds the time to.  I don't know what to do.  I love him, it’s just difficult. And the problem is he has had really hard companions his whole mission I guess  so he says that I’m his favorite companion.  So it’s hard to tell him the things that bug me I guess. But it really has been getting at me lately, a lot of little things are bothering me lately but I’m good. We get along fine. Actually pres called me Saturday and said I will be going up to Francis Town, which is by the way the farthest away possible I could get from the office, I will now be about 11 hours away from the office, so I’ll be the new district leader there. It’s also a very good area, everyone says you can just pick up a stone and throw it and whoever it hits you get a baptism. I don't thing that’s true though....so I’m pretty excited to go, I’ll leave tues or wed. The only problem with up there is that it is extremely hot, like very very hot up there it can get to like 115 to 120 degrees …its very crazy and there is no AC in the flats, so not to excited about that but ill deal with it.

I’m really sorry to say that I forgot my camera again but I will really try to bring it next Monday so I can send some pictures. My last Sunday in G west was actually really good, we had 2 baptisms of a mother named Neo, who is one of our recent converts Tsholos mom. And then another lady named Tumelang, we also had lots of investigators at church which was really sweet as well. But I’ll try to send the pictures to you guys. It sounds like you found the right house, the neighborhood we stay in is pretty nice, it’s not Nelspruit but it’s alright. Bots is really not that pretty especially g west, but I here Francis town is a lot nicer so we’ll see.

We had a pretty cool experience this week though.  So we have been teaching one of Tsholos friends Gaone, its actually the same girl that we thought had a crush on my last companion… but anyway she is doing good now and is on bap date for November.  She has been a hard investigator but is changing a lot since we have started teaching her.  I think I’ve talked about her a few times before, but we were talking to her the other night and she started to express a lot of things to us. Like how she never knew who her parents were and she has no idea who her real family is and just some sad stuff.  She has currently been staying with Tsholo and her family for a very long time. She just does not really feel like she knows who she is and it bothers her a lot.  She also expressed a lot of other things about herself that she was having problems with and a lot things came out which was good because we kind of found some things that have been holding her back from her baptism. And so we told her that we feel like we should give her a blessing and we explained what that was and when we were done teaching we went in the house.  She picked me to give her a blessing and after I gave the blessing she just looked at us with tears in her eyes and then she shook our hands and ran in her bedroom without saying anything....so at first I thought I said something wrong or, so I was kind of nervous.  We ended up talking to her a couple days later and she said the blessing touched her a lot and she feels a lot better about things, so that was really cool I thought. Now she is almost like a completely different person then she was before. So ya… I just feel like the Lord has some really good things in store for her.

It was also kind of funny the other day. So as I told you guys, we cover 2 wards a young single adults ward and a family ward.  It’s a bit awkward when we are contacting people and stuff because they always ask what time our church starts and first we have to ask the question...well are you single or are you married? Because each ward starts at a different time, so as you can imagine it can be very awkward sometimes especially when you contact like a 19-20 year old girl and you are asking her if she is single or not...it sometimes comes across the wrong way. So me and my companion went to kfc a couple days ago and went through the drive threw. At the window there was two 19-20 year old girls and they asked us the question of what time church starts and I asked them if they were single or married?  They both took it the completely wrong way and started flirting with us like crazy and it was super awkward, because we had to wait for them to give my card back and they are just like sitting here talking to us and like telling us they want to get married so bad and things and we are just laughing like super hard in the car trying to explain to them that’s not why we were asking but they did not understand so anyway it was really kind of awkward. Need to find a new way to ask people that question now.

But sounds like Halloween was fun.  I don’t think people here even know what that is but I guess I’ll be able to have a good Halloween next year. But thanks for the letters, excited to get the package don’t really need anything else just mainly the white shirts...like lots of them because I’m just going to throw all of mine away because they look sick, But that’s really mainly like all I really really need but anything else is fine but thanks a lot love you guys here from you next week.

Justin   

Getting 2 baptisms this month.

Hey, it’s really good to hear from you guys, I sent you an email with the directions to our house from Molopo crossing, and I hope you’re able to find it. I guess I kind of gave the directions as if I was driving in a car going to our house from there, so just pretend you are driving in a car and I think you should be able to find it. Oh and we live in a house.

The week was pretty good it’s been a bit stressful instead of getting 4 baptisms I think we will end up getting 2 which is 1 bellow are goal of 3, but I think we should make up for it next month. It’s always just freaking church attendance, if people just CAME TO CHURCH we would have like 20 baptisms every month. I don't understand why it’s so hard to take 3 hours of a day and just come to church. But anyway everything is going pretty well just been hard kind of lately.  What Matt said is very true, many of the missionaries that soon go home get really lazy I have also experienced that as well. I guess they just feel like they have done all that they need to do and they just don’t see the need to keep working.

The pictures were awesome, I think Kennedy had the coolest costume ha-ha I loved it, especially the one where she looks ticked off in her penguin suit I was laughing pretty hard. I also liked moms costume as well, (Where’s Wanda)  I don’t think I have ever seen someone dress up as that before....so very unique. That’s really cool that BYU is doing so well with football, that’s sweet news.

And I’m not sure about the parasite thing, I have really only gotten really sick like 2 times, once at the very beginning of my mission then when I first came to this area.  We actually thought that I had malaria I can’t remember if I told you guys that that one night I woke up shaking like extremely bad, so bad that my bed was even moving across the floor. I woke up and my companion asked to give me a blessing and we went in the other room and I sat down in a chair, it was hard for him to give me the blessing just because I was shaking so bad but after the blessing I went and laid in my bed and went straight to sleep. Then I woke up feeling very cold and throwing up. We are still not really sure what it was, I had all the symptoms of malaria but we don't know. I can’t remember if I already told you guys that. But this is also going to be kind of short I need to get going soon but hope everything is going well back home and hear from you guys next week. Oh, and if you have not sent the package yet that would be sweet if you could send my capo on my guitar that would be nice. But love you guys take care!

Love

Justin  

Funny funny story :)

Hello,
Glad everything is going well, the week has been pretty good. Sorry that you cannot really find are house, the way they do the streets here and stuff is so retarded. That’s unfortunately all the info I can give you guys. As far as landmarks and stuff by us there is not much. Once you go out of our house and down the road to the main street and take a left there is a roundabout that is not too far. Then  you take a right at that round about and it will eventually take you to a mall called Molapo crossing. that’s the closest thing to us that is kind of big that I can think of.  Don’t know if that helps. I would think you would be able to find are house by the plot number and the phase we are in because there is only 1 plot number with that name. But hope you can find it.
My shirt size is like a 15-16 right now I have 15 but think a 16 would be fine. I’m glad you guys got the laptop working hopefully it helps nick.  That’s sweet… it sounds like she is doing really well in school. I loved your talk by the way, it was really good I wish I could have been there when you gave it but I just printed it out so I can read it whenever I want to. I’ve heard that story about James e Talmage before. But I never heard that the Jesus Christ actually appeared to him.
We are still hoping for are 3 baptisms we might even get 4 if all goes really well. But it’s just always really stressful when it comes down to the end of the month and you can never be like 100% sure if all will get baptized. But they are all looking pretty good, Yesterday we got to watch general conf it was really good and are investigators really liked it a lot so that was sweet to see that.
That’s sweet that Matt is back, ha-ha when you said that about when he got off the plane and no one would talk to him it kind of made me think that that’s how things are here. Like everyone will say hi to you as you walk by or just start off with a random conversation. That’s one of the things that’s really nice about Africa is all the people LOVE talking..Sometimes too much, but I suppose that’s good for missionaries.
The week has been good though, last night me and my companion went to Winnies house again and we ended up being there for 4 freaking hours! ha-ha we taught her the lesson in about an hour then as we were getting up to leave her mom told us to sit because she was making dinner for us so of course we never turn down food so we sat and ended up playing Uno with Winnie until the food was done...it took a very long time for some reason but it was really good. We also got news this week that elder rose (the greeny) will be getting ET this Saturday because his days in bots are out. This is becoming a major problem with this mission and is hurting bots really bad. Missionaries just keep coming and going coming and going and its killing areas, so far about 3 areas have had to be closed just because bots does not want to give anyone residency for some stupid reason. So hopefully they will soon work all this out. Something kind of funny and embarrassing happened this week.  So we got a call from the sisters that one of their investigators babies needed a blessing and Elder Rose was in the shower and my companion was not ready so me and Elder Mobashora from Zim had to go give the blessing, When we got there it was just the mother and her baby and the sister missionaries.  We just talked a little bit about what blessings are, and then I started to anoint the baby. Then the baby  started to cry so the mother just decided to FEED HER BABY RIGHT THERE!! I don’t know if you remember or if I told you but people here do not use bottles to feed there babies, they feed there babies with the things that God gave them… and so while I’m giving this blessing the mother just pops it out and starts feeding her crying child and it was one of the most awkward things that has happened on my mission!!!  Especially with the sisters standing right next to Elder Mombashora and I.  I had to keep opening my eyes making sure that my hands were still on the baby...so anyway that was kind of a weird experience this week.
I don’t know is you guys remember the color code thing.  Where you take a test and find out what color your personality is...but the guy who invented that is now in our mission, his name is Elder Hartmen, and last p-day he came to the whole zone and was teaching us about this color code  and also using it to help us know how to get to know are selves and are investigators . It can also help us to solve the needs of some of the people we teach and things like that. It was actually really cool and this might sound kind of nerdy, but I took the test and I am mostly a Red with lots of Yellow and a little Blue and like no White. Just in case you wanted to know...it was pretty sweet you get to kind of find out a lot about yourself and this is also helping with are investigators as well. So thought you guys might want to hear that. He is a really cool guy . It is really cool to have him and his wife in this mission. I think they will help out a lot. He also grew up in Southern California, so I also mentioned that my mother grew up in Southern California too.
That’s cool though to hear that kid is doing better in your room mom, I wish you luck with him.
That was the week pretty much, time keeps going by faster and faster its crazy!  Love you guys a lot and hope the week goes well.  

Love Justin

I should be in bots till the end of the year.

Hello,
You are going to murder me....I forgot the address again! I’m really sorry I don't know why I always forget.  I’m writing it down in my planner this week so I’ll most likely for sure remember. And about my computer it does not work anymore, when I was home after I logged on it would not work at all and I was going to take it in to get it fixed but seeing that I was leaving soon it did not really matter.  I think I downloaded to much crap on it and plus I have no idea what my password is anymore. Sorry. If you can get it working you can have it though.
Thanks a lot for your talk.  I’m really excited to read it. I can’t remember the last time you gave a talk. I think I must have been really little, because I cannot remember. Ha-ha the week has been good though, sorry for my last email I just was out of time. How it works here is you have to pay for a certain amount of time and I forgot money last time and only had like 30 min on my account so I was rushing to email. But the week was good.   I actually finished the Book of Mormon again so that’s always pretty sweet.  I am now starting to read the New Testament and Jesus the Christ. The President told us that once we feel we know the Book of Mormon pretty well the next thing we should study is the new testament and so I thought it would be cool to read both that and Jesus the Christ at the same time.
Also, randomly before I forget…  I really need more white shirts, like quite a few more. For some reason Africa does not believe in like just normal plain white shirts with a pocket. Mine are getting really bad and really sick. So I’m not really sure of the brands down there,  but if there is any way you could get some that  are longer, mine always come untucked and it’s kind of annoying just because I think I’m a little taller. But ya… just did not want to forget to mention that.
Everything is going pretty well with are investigators.  We are still hoping to get 3 bap this month and really praying that we can get that.  Everything is still going well with my companion.  He is a cool guy, it was pretty funny a couple days ago we were taking the other guys to their appointment and I was driving and elder rose told me to take my very first right turn after the roundabout.  He did not specify weather that road was tar or dirt, and so I turned on what seemed to be my first right on a dirt road which ended up not being a road at all and we going pretty fast so we were like digging in this little Chevy  Aveo and everyone is like screaming at the top of their lungs and I have like no idea what to do, but finally we stopped and my companion got out so he could back me up all the way back to the main road.  I was not really paying attention to him and going really fast in reverse and he was like running for his life I guess ha-ha it was really funny.  He is kind of a bigger guys and I bet we just looked really stupid to people that were driving by on the main road.  Just seeing a bunch of white guys driving a car in reverse chasing another white guy on something that is not even a road.  Ha-ha, so it was pretty funny.
And yes I do have to email the president every single week and send in are stats that we got over the week, its kind of a pain sometimes but also nice.  That’s cool that you boar your testimony.  I did as well last week in the ysa ward, As missionaries though they tell us not to go up unless there is along gap so I just count to like 25 sec and if no one gets up I get up…not to spiritual I guess.  And I will most likely be in this area until the end of December or the 1st of November.  I could possibly be in bots the rest of my mission because I will most likely only have 2 more areas before I come home.  I kind of hope that’s not the case.  I am missing South Africa pretty bad.  Bots is nice but it’s just way to slow for me. I like South Africa quite a bit so hopefully I’ll go back before I leave but if not it’s all good. I’ll try to send some pictures next week.  I actually forgot my camera today but I’ll try to do better.  Love you guy’s a lot and talk to you guys next week.

Love, Justin          

Funny story told by Mom and Dad

Hello,
So Dad, I was laughing pretty hard when you told me the story about your accident.   I can totally picture mom just rolling over and going back to sleep ha-ha...even though of course you did not do that :) (I will post a little insert of the story that Justin is talking about from each of my parent’s letters, so you can hear both sides of the story…it’s kind of funnyJ)

 I remember going to the priesthood session with you, those were some good times. And then after the priesthood session was over we would always go to that place called Deans or something? or trading table (I think he means Training Table J) and you would always get the mushroom burger and I always thought that was sick. I remember these things...I like the pictures that you guys sent me a lot (thanks to mom) but I would like that picture of you and mom and I promise dad, I don’t care what your hair looks like.  I think my favorite one was of mike sleeping, that was pretty sweet.  Last time I also asked you about sending me a copy of your talk dad.  If it’s alright I would still like you to send it, I wanted to read it.

And I’m really sorry I forgot again to get the address of where we are living. Today has been kind of crazy and I’m actually kind of in a hurry right now but the week has been really good.  Me and my companion are having fun together.  That is also very sweet about the temple in Durban that was really cool news even though it’s not quite in our mission. Ha-ha that’s really cool about Logan and being like super interested in all the planets. Man I miss the grand kids like crazy, back home sometimes I just thought that they were like monsters sometimes, but I miss them a lot.  I like it when you guys tell me things like that.  I’m really sorry this is so short, I’m kind of in a hurry.  Hopefully I will be able to tell you guys a little more next week.  Take care… Love you guys.

Justin   

Dad’s side of the story:

We had General Conference yesterday and today. After Priesthood, Ray asked me lots of questions about how you’re doing. Anyway, on the way home after eating I got into a small accident on the freeway. I was making a lane change and looking to make sure there were no cars next to me when all of a sudden the traffic ahead of me were all coming to a stop. By the time I looked in front of me it was too late. I made a mad dash to the other lane to avoid hitting the car in front of me but I still clipped the car’s left rear bumper. We both pulled over and I gave him my insurance information. It did very little damage to his car and you couldn’t even see anything on my truck. This is the first time I have ever hit anyone and I felt really bad. The guy was really good about it all but my guess is that they’ll have to replace his rear bumper. It’s really hard to fix plastic bumpers without replacing the whole thing. When I got home mom was asleep, but she woke up and asked me why I was so late. I said that I was in an accident and she said “Oh,” and then rolled over and went back to sleep! Oh well!!

Mom’s side of the story:

Hi Justin,

 It looks like I need to clarify dad’s e-mail a little.  When he came home from conference, I woke up and asked him why it took him so long in getting home – then I thought he said, “There was an accident and that’s why I’m late!  I didn’t hear him say he was in an accident – that’s why I went back to sleep…. I didn’t find out until the next morning that HE was in the accident!  Had to straighten that out! 

Hello,

Sounds like the week was good for you guys, Thanks for getting those stats dad. It’s crazy 1 in every 6 people has aids?? That’s still a lot!  I love teaching the law of chastity to people here especially when you see a couple hugging and kissing in the street,  you just walk up and give them a pamphlet...it’s nice. I’m so sorry I totally forgot about the address again.  I need to write it down somewhere this time so I don’t forget.  And ya, you can send those shoes if you want I guess, I did not really think about bringing them, but it would be great to have them. Also if you happen to find my Ugg slippers I used to wear all the time that are kinda thrashed, can you put those in the package as well? 

So it sounds like dad gave a really good talk in sacrament. I was wondering if you could maybe send me a copy of your talk so I can read it.  I wish I was able to be there for your guy's talks.

The week has been good though on our side. We are now teaching Winnie and Ikenna all the recent convert lessons, and just so you know I think that Winnie has been my absolute favorite person to teach on my mission.  Ha-ha… man she is so crazy. Each time we go there she just goes on and on about something.  Like for example… one time when we were there, she literally went on for 20 min about how she did not trust her boy friend and it’s just really funny hearing her talk. I wish you guys could meet her, she is really funny.  Then another time we were there and she started talking to us about how her neighbor wanted her to come and cook for her.  So she went over and cooked for her and the lady told her that she would give her 800 pula for her service but when Winnie was done cooking the lady told her she was only going to give her 200 pula. So Winnie was mad and she went in the ladies kitchen and ripped the microwave out of the wall and took it to her house. She told the lady she can have it back when she gives her the money...ha-ha that just about killed me when she told us this. So we began to tell her that she should clean it out really nice and bring it back to the lady and apologize.  The next day she did it. When the lady asked her why she was bringing it back Winnie told her that God said that she had to.  So I thought that was pretty sweet. Also I and my companion gave her mother a blessing because she was getting really sick. Right after we gave her the blessing he and I both got really sick and we have just been dying this whole week ha-ha.  Then when we went there the next day the mom came up to us with a big smile and told us how grateful she was for the blessing and that she was all better.  At the time we were both very sick… so we thought that was kinda weird....

A cool experience also happened just last night.  We were both just sitting down to plan for the next day and we got a phone call from this guy named Mike, which by the way I have not heard since I was back home.  He told us that he was reading this pamphlet that was called The Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and he found a number on the back, so he called it. We told him that we could come teach him more about it.  We were trying to give him directions to the church and we mentioned that we stay in phase 4. Then he asked me, "Oh, so are you guys the ones that are dressed in black and white?" And I told him that we wore white shirts and ties and then he said that he sees us every day because he works right by are house.  So he came over this morning and he wanted a Book of Mormon before we even taught him about it. So we gave him one and we are meeting with him this week. So that was a pretty cool experience. He said that he just found the restoration pamphlet under a bunch of books at his cousin’s house and he started reading and loved it. He said it’s what he has been looking for. So hopefully the lessons will go well.

Something else funny also happened while we were driving to the mall the other day.  My companion almost nailed like 20 monkeys running all over the street!  It was super random… we were just driving along the road and a heard of monkeys just decided that they were going on a rampage or something.

Also, that name sounds really familiar to me… the Stonehockers?? I’ll have to see if I can find them. It’s great to hear from you guys and good luck with the kid in your class mom and also with your piano lessons.  Remember, I’m expecting you to be awesome when I get back,  so just keep that in mind J Love you guys.

Justin    

Hey hey

Hey hey,

Ha-ha my hand is fine now and I think I will soon get over the trauma. Well, the week was a bit stressful with everything we had going.  We just barley dropped off my companion (elder Makosa) to the mission office in Bots.  It will probably be the last time I see him unless I ever go to Zim.  Now I and Elder Richeson are officially companions.  He is from Grantsville.  I am not for sure where that is but he says it’s close to Salt Lake.  He is a really cool guy, I think we will get along really well. He actually reminds me a lot of Jordan, it’s kind of weird.  And Swaziland is not part of our mission anymore they changed it right when I came out on my mission.  They do not allow us to go out into different countries.

And yes, I heard aids is very bad there.  I think it’s also extremely bad in Botswana.  My last companion said that it was 90% of the population and I told him in no way is that correct.  I was kinda wondering if you guys knew anything about that.

Oh, and I did add up my baptisms.  I have 25 now and I think we should get 3 more next month.  So the work is going pretty well.  The crazy thing is that 25 baptisms is actually not that high in this mission. So far all of my areas have been some of the hardest in the mission. Mochudi is a very small village with many people who do not speak any English. Nelspruit was considered the hardest area in the mission and now I’m in G-west which is also a town.  I love it though and I have really enjoyed all my areas. There are places like Francis town which baptizes like crazy.  I mean like sometimes they will get 20 baptisms on just one Sunday, it’s really crazy. Africa is prepared to hear the gospel. 

 That really stinks about BYU.  Hopefully they will do better next time. I don’t really have too much to say today just because it’s been kinda crazy lately. It’s hard with lots of Elders staying in the same flat but its back to normal now so it should be better this week. Are baptisms also went really well with Winnie and Ikenna.  They also got confirmed this Sunday. I love you guys a lot!  Tell everyone I say hi and take care.

Love

Justin  

I will be praying and fasting for BYU to WIN this week!

Mom and Dad,
How is it, it’s great to hear from you guys again. Ha, ya my hair was pretty short then that’s how short I usually cut it when I cut my hair but it grows really fast still. That is crazy that eggs are white...blows my mind, and Elder Rose is not my new companion he is actually the greeny in the flat, the one that we played the joke on. But I actually just did get a new companion today. We got a call late a couple of days ago by the AP's telling us that Elder Richeson is going to be transferred to our area. We actually just went and picked him up today from Francis Town, which is also in bots. It is a very long drive so I am pretty exhausted. But he is a really cool guy, I actually knew him when I was in South Africa. He is from Utah as well, near Salt Lake and has been on his mission for about 8 months. So we will be in a 3-some until my companion gets transferred next Tuesday. And Winnie is the other girl that I was talking about and she is doing really well and is being baptized this Tuesday with another kid named Ikenna.

That is really weird that I did not know the Warr’s, are you sure it’s not Watts? Because there was a couple called the Watts, and they were really cool. If they were transferred in June that means that I would have been at the transfer meeting and I don’t remember seeing them...strange.

That stinks about BYU. When you say they are playing Utah do you mean Utah state or Utah? I guess I’ll find out, I shall be doing much fasting and praying for them to win :)

This week has been cool though, it was funny we actually had some like Chinese missionary people come to our door this week and it was one of the most awkward things. It was like this old lady and her husband and I went to the door and right when she saw me she just said, "Oh, the Church of Christ!" Then I stood there awkwardly, and I could not understand one word which was coming out of her mouth. All I could understand was that she was talking about "God the mother," then my companion came to the door because he likes bashing with people and when she saw him she just took off and left. It was really weird. I was trying to listen to her but it was a challenge. We also went back to my companions girl friend’s house..just kidding, and she said that she was starving because she does not know how to cook. So we made her fish and my companion grabbed a pan and told me to feel like how heavy it was, so I put my hand under it (not knowing that it had actually been heating up) and burnt my hand extremely bad. So I have had my hands wrapped for some time this week but they are good now.

Something also kinda funny happened this week. So we like have these 2 dogs that live at the house right next to us, and all the Elders in the flat besides me like taunt them and stuff and just try to make them mad, and it bothers me. I always tell them not to do those things..so you would think that these dogs would be on my side, right?....wrong. The other day we were getting back to the flat on our bikes and they were just chilling by the gate like always. But as I came up they like jumped up and just charged at me and were like acting like they were going to kill me. So I grabbed by bike and just started yelling VOETSEK! VOETSEK! at them (it means like get lost in Afrikaans) while stomping my bike at them and man they like wanted my freaking blood I swear. And so now it’s like a joke because I’m the only one that does not bug them and I was the only one they wanted to kill....racist dogs.

I’m glad to hear everything is good though. I love getting your guys pictures, and to answer moms question, I have not really gotten any letters for a long time. Nikki sent me a letter about a month or so ago, but other than that nothing really. Everyone says that once you reach about a year everyone just stops writing (ha-ha) so I guess its kinda true. But it’s starting to get scorching hot here again. Oh, and there is no Spring in Bots, it just goes to extremely cold to extremely hot, there is no in-between, sadly. Oh, and to mention about the next package there are these books called, ‘The Book Of Mormon Made Easy’, I think, and it comes in like 3 different sections. Like 1 Nephi through Mosiah, then like the next book goes from Mosiah to 3 Nephi, kinda like that and it goes through the book of Mormon verse by verse and they are just sweet books. So I don’t know if you can find those but they are very cool. That’s really all I can think of for now though. Your guys packages are always awesome no matter what is in them. But I better go so love you guys a lot, hear from you next week!

Elder Justin Brey

What color are Eggs?

Hey mom and dad,

I hope you two don’t fight to much over who get's to write first when you’re trying to email me...I do have a very random question for the both of you, what
color are the eggs in America?  I saw a white egg in the store and I was
like wow! I have never seen a white egg before, and then elder Rose told me
that all eggs are white in America....and I honestly cannot recall an
egg looking any different then brown. So if you could just let me know
it’s been bothering me for quite some time.

I gave my pair of shoes to this guy in my last area, then I also gave my other suit to Nelson and
a couple pair of shirts,  I also gave away some pants to some
investigators in this area because they did not fit me anymore. But I
still have lots of stuff so don’t worry.  But ya, I was very glad to
finally find a pair of shoes that fit me.

I’m not sure how many baptisms I have...I think its 20 something maybe
30 but I’m not sure, I’ll have to check when I go back to the flat. In
preach my gospel there is a place where you can write all of your
baptisms so ill have to count.  We should be having 2-3 more this
month, we could get 5 but we are just hoping to achieve the goal of 2 for
this month.

Glad you guys had fun with grandma.  It sounds like she misses grandpa
a lot.  I wish I was able to see her as well, but I will be able to when I
get back.

You saw Harry Potter? How many Harry Potter movies are there? I
swear this is like the 9th or 10th one? A movie you should go see is
Captain America.  I really wanted to see that before I left and I saw a
billboard for it. So go and see it, then you can tell me how it is. Man, talking about
football makes me trunky,  but I like you guys giving me updates. That’s
sweet that they won their first game...even if it was by a small
amount it still counts as a win.

The week has been really good though, we started teaching Tsholos (one of
our  Rc) friends, Her name is Gone, when I get back I will have to
teach you guys how to pronounce these names because they are not
pronounced as they look at all. But her friend is pretty cool we have
been teaching her a lot lately, she was like extremely into her last
church which was like a happy clappy church, at first she had a
very hard time excepting the things we were teaching her, but now she
progressing really well. We told her that we are not there to convince
her and that the only way that she will know if this is true is by
praying.  Then she told us that she was already convinced by are
teaching...ha-ha, kind of cool but not good.  She still needs to pray. She
also has like piercings all over her face, we were talking about
that last time we were there and it was super awkward. She asked us if
her piercings are bad and my companion turned to me and said "uh, my
companion can answer that for you." I felt like I was shambocking her
but she finally understood. She also has a crush on my companion...which is not good!  She always tries to sit really close to him( ha-ha) and one time she was like pretending that she had something
in her eye and she asked him to get it out, it was really funny and I
never let him forget that. If she was not progressing so well we would
probably drop her but we can’t. It’s sweet on mission to just see people change so much. When we first started teaching her she like screamed Jesus in her prayers and acted like she was being tortured or something when she was praying,  but now she is calming down.

The other day me and my companion went and got new backpacks as well
and there are these two soccer teams in South Africa called the
Chiefs and the Pirates.   They are like huge rivals, so we found some
Chiefs and Pirates backpacks. I got the chiefs one and he got the
Pirates one, so it looks pretty sweet when we are walking side by side
down the street with are backpacks on. We think it will be a good
trackting method...

But it’s great to hear from you guys! I love you a lot and I will hear from
you guys next week, take care.

Love
Elder Justin Brey

Another letter from Elder Brey Brey :)

Hello Mom and Dad,

Seems like everything is going well, And I meant to say Victor, Is kind of confusing because his father’s name is victor as well, lots of people here name their children after them or they well name their children the same name as there surname....which is really weird to me.  I would not want my name to be Brey Brey, I feel that would be strange, so sometimes I call him Vicky to avoid confusion… so my bad. But his baptism was sweet it was a very stressful day.  I think I already told you guys this but we attend two wards, one is the young single adults ward and the other one is the family ward, so the day is very long for us.  We go to church around 10 and get back around 5-6 because of  baptisms or meetings or whatever else pops up. So I will never be complaining about going to church for 3 hours ever again. But anyway the baptism was really cool all in one day his father received the priesthood so he could baptize his son, Victor (Vicky) got baptized and then he also got confirmed. It was the first time on my mission when someone got confirmed on their baptism day. So it was a pretty good day.

The week has been really good though, we recently baptized a kid named Kennedy, he is like 26 years old and we were teaching them about missionary work.  A few times ago we gave them like branch missionary badges, and the next time we came back Kennedy and another member we were sitting down with this girl in the front yard teaching her about the book of Mormon! Ha-ha it was really cool and kind of funny!  Kennedy was all dressed up with his branch missionary badge on (no one ever puts those on) it was pretty sweet. Then we also ran into the ma that owns a tuck shop and she speaks like 2% English, but we gave her a book of Mormon one time in swanna and she was reading it and she was like in Alma! It was crazy!  We asked her if she likes it and she nodded her head. It’s just too bad because it’s extremely hard to teach people who do not speak English and we were told by the president not to really teach people that will not understand, but it’s just sweet that she is reading it.

My companion will most likely be leaving this transfer which is too bad…he and I really get along well.  He has been one of my favorite companions, we have fun together. The other day we were teaching one of our recent converts Thsolo, and we are also teaching her mother and brother and her friend hoping to baptize them in sep or October, but the funny thing is that we for the longest time have not known the name of Tsholos brother so we always just call him like man and brother and stuff and it’s kind of obvious that we do not know his name.   We have just been waiting for one of them to say his name, and we were there last night and they yelled his name (which was Kabe) and so my companion thought that he heard the name correctly so he called his name and it was like so off from the actual name and we just all started laughing it was pretty funny.

Hope you guys have fun at grandmas, tell her that I miss here and love her lots. And don’t have too much fun in Vegas dad, we all know you go crazy down there J But, I love you guy’s a lot and hope the week goes well. Oh,  I also forgot to say I bought some shoes this last week if you did not notice I only had one pair of shoes because I gave away the others and so 1 year on one pair of shoes gets kind of hard so I went and bought some new ones that should last the rest of my mission. And just so you know it is nearly impossible to find my size of shoe here, apparently I have big feet... and no stores carry my size but I finally found some which were about 500 pula which I think is about 60 bucks but just thought I should let you know, sorry they were kind of expensive, I really hope to repay you guys everything someday and thank you so much for all the support. Love you guys!

Elder Justin Brey  

I gave a loonnggg talk this week :)

Hello,

I’m honestly not sure who Vickie is.... I think you might mean blessing? And ya Winnie is awesome, she is like the most energetic person I have met in bots.  Most of the people here are very slow and just very chill but she is completely the opposite.  And I’m pretty sure she will be baptized in September. We have had some really good experiences, the other day we did a Mormon helping hands service for this park right next to are chapel (which is still by the way not done) it was a pretty sweet service and a lot of work was done on the park.  We were there for about 6-7 hours with all the YSA and we changed it completely around.  Me and my companion were also asked to give a talk this Sunday and we were able to each pick are own topic.  For my topic I chose to speak on patients, just because I have never really heard anyone give a talk on that before.   The talk was supposed to be like 10 min, so when we got there I honestly thought my talk would take about 5 min because I really did not write much down.  I was the 2nd speaker and I ended speaking for like 20 min, I did not even realize how freaking long it was.  My companion was not even able to speak...ha-ha he was actually pretty excited and ended up thanking me.  But the talk went really well it was kind of my first talk in like an actual ward, all my other talks have been in like units and branches in groups of not many people, in like schools and furniture stores so I was like actually a little scared just because it was so different standing up there.

The pictures are awesome by the way I like them a lot. I love it when you guys send pictures. I can’t believe how huge all the kids are, man there getting big, it’s weird.  Lagoon seemed like it was a lot of fun.  I can’t remember the last time I went there.  It’s also weird how school is also starting up again for you guys.  I feel like mom was just telling me that she cannot wait for summer to start (in like every single email) and now school is starting again. It’s pretty sweet actually a lot of the kids in Africa love school I was kind of surprised to find that out but whenever you talk to like a little kid they just love school and their favorite subject is always math and they all want to go into accounting.  So then I begin to go off and tell them how my brother in law is in the same thing. It’s also kind of sad though at the same time there is always strikes going on here, like for example- it all starts with petrol strikes so then when the petrol strikes happen that makes all the food prices go up and basically everything else and when that happens people begin starting to strike because they feel they are not getting paid enough money.  Then all these strikes brake out and then all of a sudden kids don’t have teachers, sick people don’t have doctors, people’s garbage does not get picked up and everything just turns into a mess.  Something I noticed that happens a lot in South Africa and also a little bit in bots.

What! I had no idea Casey was pregnant, that’s pretty sweet. I wonder how many kids they will end up having....there was this senior couple in the office that had like 48 grand kids. I don’t know, that seems crazy to me it would seem like that would have to be like all you do is have kids to have that many. I guess it’s the circle of life though. But love you guys a lot I still need to write my presidents so I will need to say good bye, but hope the week goes well and good luck with school.

 Love, Elder Justin Brey    

Some cute pics I found of Justin!

I was going through my old pictures and found a few cute pics of Justin when he was little, so I thought I would share a few of them with everyone! Enjoy!!

This is Justin at Carrie and Mike's wedding reception. 

I thought they were funny because for one he is so very serious!!!

And two, he never actually played the trumpet, except this one day at their reception.  It was cute!

Justin LOVED to dress up as a cowboy when he was little, sooo cute!

Justin and a few friends playing.  I think Justin is wearing one of Casey's old dance outfits...funny!!

More Baptisms

Hello mom and dad,
The week went pretty well. Our baptism went really good yesterday and the water was soooo cold. She asked me to baptize her so I had to get in the water (obviously) and it was the coldest water I have ever baptized in my whole mission. The hot water at the chapel we are going to now does not work so it was just straight cold water, man I thought she was going to pass out. Her testimony was really good though. That’s my favorite part of the baptism is when the people get up and bear their testimony, that’s the point when you really get to see the change in them. The best part about missionary work is when you actually see the people just completely change from their old self to their new self, I love it.

We should hopefully be having another baptism this Sunday for this kid named Vicky. He is the son of the family we baptized recently and he came down for school and now we are teaching him and trying to prepare him for his baptism. It was also really cool that at the baptism, Victor (the father of the father led family we just baptized) gave a super good talk at the baptism. It was really cool to hear him actually give a talk for the first time. We also found him a white shirt and some pants and a tie for Sunday, so he looked pretty sweet as well.

We are teaching some really cool people though at the time. Recently we have been teaching this girl named Winnie. She is a girl who actually called us from a pass along card...which never happens. And while we were talking to her on the phone she sounded like completely Muslim, so we were very confused because people that are Muslim do not usually want to hear a message about Jesus Christ. But we called and we were trying to get directions from her and I think she gave us the worst possible directions to her house that she could have but somehow we found her house. I tell you it was 100% by the spirit. It would be like me calling you guys and telling you I like live next to Wal-Mart in AF when I actually live in like Provo by the BYU football stadium. It was that bad. But anyways we finally met her and to our surprise it was a black girl that spoke exactly like a person from the Middle East. It was so strange. I think she like grew up by a lot of people from the Muslim faith because her whole conception of everything is like so strange … but we were thinking of dropping her after the first visit just because she was like very strange. But we went back and she read like everything we gave her and understood everything perfectly and now she is like the sweetest investigator we have. She was also telling us that after the day that we came, 5 different people from different faiths came and asked her if they could teach her...which is really crazy because that never happens. She was telling us that she thinks that Satan does not want her to hear the message that we have for her. But anyway she came to church yesterday for the first time and she loved it … but I just thought I would share that because I thought it was kinda cool. She is pretty sweet and is on date for September.     
Ha-ha ya I love messing with Elder Rose he is a good kid. That is an awesome story by the way with the lady that served you was the same lady in the movie. That was also made like what, 4-5 years ago? So that means that she has probably been working at that Arctic Circle for quite a long time.

I have actually been thinking about prayers a lot lately. As a missionary we pray like a thousand times a day, and I have been trying to figure out how to like mix up my prayers lately. I have been feeling like I’m just getting in like a rhythm of the same prayer and its starting to bug me, so I liked what dad said a lot about that man. 
I’m glad girls camp went well, sounds like you had a lot of fun. I also did not realize that it has been that long since you guys have seen Casey. It does not seem like it’s really been that long but I guess it has. Crazy. But love you guys a lot hope your week goes good take care!
Love, Elder Justin Brey

Played a funny prank on the greeny!

Hey mom and dad,

It’s totally fine that your emails are short...I understand.  This week was pretty good though. The two people who were baptized got confirmed the other day.  It’s always kind of a relief when they get confirmed because there baptism is not complete unless they get confirmed a member.  I’ve heard of some people never coming back after they get baptized, luckily that has not really happened to me yet. I have been blessed a lot to be sent here. The lord blesses us a lot with finding people the people are truly prepared in Africa. We are having another baptism this Sunday of a lady named Blessing from Zim, we have been teaching her for a while but did not think she would be ready to be baptized in August.  We went there last week and she told us she is ready, so we had the interview and she passed!   That was pretty sweet.

We had transfers this week and neither I, nor my companion are getting transferred.   Elder Muchuno is the only one getting transferred in are district and is going back to SA.

We pulled a pretty funny prank on are greeny Elder Rose.   The night before everyone finds out what is happening is the night that the pres calls everyone if they are getting any leadership positions.  So I decided to take their phone and switch my name and the presidents name under his contacts (so when we called it looked like pres was calling).  So we were all just chilling in the living room and I went in the back room and made the call and asked for Elder Rose and I began telling him how great a missionary he has been and was just asking him how his studies were going, then I told him that I was praying a lot and decided to make him a trainer! Ha-ha he actually thought it was the Pres calling him and he accepted his special assignment.   After I was done I went in the other room and he looked pretty excited and told me that the Pres wanted him to be a trainer.  So then I took out are phone and acted like we had a missed a call but instead I called there number and when he picked up I just said, “How are you elder rose?” Ha-ha… he died!  It was pretty funny, but kind of sad.   Anyway we all got a pretty big kick out of that, training at 6 weeks old!?!  We also got to go to a diamond mine last Friday.  It was pretty cool, we got to see how they make diamonds and everything.   All the people there were super serious like we were not allowed to look at the ground just in case we saw something like a diamond or anything.  And if we dropped anything on the ground we had to be “escorted" off the property, it was pretty sweet.

Sounds like you guys are pretty busy, I hope you have a good time at girl’s camp mom, those girls probably have a good reason for doing what they do to you.  It sounds like you get them just as good as they get you.... and I will keep you in my prayers dad :) I always do.   Love you both have a safe drive to the camp and take care.

Love,

Elder Justin Brey

 The rest of the pictures were taken at the Diamond mines.

Happy Birthday Justin!!

Hey mom and dad,
Thank you again for wishing me a happy birthday.  As I already told dad it was very weird,  I actually forgot it was my birthday until the Morgan’s called to wish me a happy birthday. That is kind of a funny story about the guy who woke up in the morgue!  That would be freaking terrifying though waking up in a cold dark little space.   I would probably wish that I was dead… ha-ha.   And yes I have heard of Black Mambas (a large snake) many times.   I’ve seen about 2 or 3 of them so far on my mission.   Me and my companion tried to run one over with a car one time because,  if you see them they say you need to kill them.   A family in my last branch had one living in their back
yard which was about 7 feet long.   I sent you guys a picture of Frick holding the skin that it shed, so yes I know about them and how dangerous they are.   And yes,  I did finally get my package!!  Thank you very much to everyone!   Everything is very nice.   I was really excited to get it.   I was not really able to get a birthday cake,  but sister Morgan made me cookies.   I don’t think  any of our investigators really knew it was my birthday.  Birthdays are not really too big of a deal here
for anyone.   It’s just kind of like another day… kind of sad, ha-ha it’s a lot different then what I’m used to at home.

 That’s crazy that you are starting school again soon, it seems like you were just telling me that you were so excited for summer to start.  It’s awesome that girls camp is soon,  I’m sure your excited!   I still remember the time that I went with you and dad up to girls camp when I was little and I picked up a char coal that I thought was a rock, then Nicki  had to hold a cup of water for my hand all the way back home…. ha-ha, looking back it’s kind of funny, but not so funny at the time!

 We have been pretty successful with baptisms, we are getting 2 more this Tuesday.   Tsholo, a 21 year old girl who is like one of the most awesome investigators I have had so far!   She is totally into the gospel and reads the Book of Mormon like crazy and has soooooo many questions
every time we go over.   We are planning to baptize the rest of her family in September hopefully.  Then we will be having Kennedy (awesome name right) but it is actually a guy.   He is also very cool,  a little more quite but still knows the church is true.   I don’t know if I told you but are chapel is under renovations right now so we have to meet at the elders chapel in Brodhurst which is making it very hard on us because no one wants to go that far for church.  But Kennedy gets to church every Sunday.   He is very dedicated to the church.
Any way’s… love you all and thanks again for the package! Talk to you guys next week.

 Love, Justin

Justin posing for a tea commercial!

The church building is under renovation.

Painting for a service project.