7 Nov 2005 10:10 AM Nigerian time

Dear Family,

We just finished cleaning the house. Sister Gilmore may have explained that every Monday (our P-day) we clean the apartment. I sweep and then mop, she cleans the bathrooms and kitchen. The broom is an American style broom but the handle on both the broom and mop are only 4 feet long. So I have to bend over to use both and by the time I am done, I have a back ache. We have looked for longer handles but can’t find any.

Had to look in my Missionary Daily Planner to see what we did last week. The Church issues every missionary a spiral bound 6-week planner (like a Day-Timer). We use it for scheduling our days, to do list, etc. The young missionaries also use it to keep track of their key indicators. Part of the new Preach My Gospel is setting goals and keeping track of 9 key indicators. The 9 key indicators are baptisms and confirmations, investigators with a baptismal date, investigators who attend sacrament meeting, lessons taught to investigators with a member present, others lessons taught, progressing investigators, referrals received and contacted, new investigators and lessons taught to recent converts and less-active members. By tracking these indicators the missionaries can see their progress, and see where they have to expend the efforts. I wish we had this when I was a young missionary.

Well this past week included a trip to the bank, our first Friday night at the movies, a quick trip to Lagos, and our first inspection of a missionary apartment. I will let Sister Gilmore tell about the apartment inspection. She said I should tell about the bank trip.

The Branch here in Sagamu was organized two years ago and was part of the Abeocuta District. Abeocuta is a city about 40 miles to the northwest of Sagamu. The Branch here was part of that district until this summer when a visiting Area Authority told the Mission President that it shouldn’t have been made a District branch and should be a Mission branch. The difference is that as a District branch the District is responsible for servicing it and the Branch leadership reports to the District Presidency. A Mission Branch is independent from any districts and reports directly to the Mission President. A Mission Branch is typically too far away from a District, the District is not capable or strong enough to service it, or the Branch is too weak. In the case of Sagamu, it due to all three.

Anyway, in August of this year, Sagamu was separated from the Abeocuta District and was made a Mission Branch. As part of that change, Sagamu was separated from the Abeocuta 2^nd Branch, got its own Branch President, etc. Part of establishing this branch on its own is setting up a bank account. The day we arrived, the Mission President handed me a bank application form, some Branch funds and said I needed to take charge of setting up the bank account. That was two months ago.

After being here about a week, the Branch President in a Branch Presidency Meeting suggested that we go down to the local branch of First Bank and set up the account. So I got out the application I have been given and we all met down at the local branch. We were going to have 5 signatories on the account, so all five of us showed up, the Branch President, 1^st and 2^nd Counselors, clerk and myself. When we arrived, we waited for about 20 minutes for the new accounts manager, then sat down at his desk. He proceeded to tell what we would have to do to set up an account. The application is 15 pages long. Unfortunately I hadn’t looked at it before we went to the bank. It hadn’t been filled out, so we couldn’t open the account. The application requires information about the Church, such as its incorporation, other accounts, two reference letters, etc, etc, etc. I had to take the application back to Lagos so we could get the necessary information, including a copy of the registration document when the Church was registered here in Nigeria in 1996. Additionally, for each of the signatories the bank wants two passport pictures, two forms of ID, and a copy of their power (NEPA) bill. The forms of ID include drivers license and national ID card. For me, because I am a foreigner, the bank wanted copies of my passport, visa and ID card. Even foreigners are required to get an ID card.

The problem with the national ID card is that nobody has one. The government here requires everyone to have one but no one ever gets one. The problem is that each state is required to produce them, but the State governments aren’t doing it. So nobody has one. For us missionaries, we are required to submit our passports to the capital, Abuja, so they will issue us our national ID card. They are so slow that none of the senior missionaries or Mission President have yet received theirs. And the Mission President has been here 18 months. If they don’t get their passports back by the time they need to leave, I don’t know what they will do.

So because I don’t have my ID card, I was told by the Mission President to write a letter saying that I had applied but had not yet received my ID card yet.

After filling out the application as best I could, and gathering our information and the signatories again we made our third trip to the bank. The second trip, Sister Gilmore and I made by ourselves. We visited the Bank Manager, put on airs, etc. He was very cordial, and then introduced us to the accounts manager (who I have previously met) and told him to help us when we returned. So Friday, Nov. 4^th we met at the bank again.

When we arrived, the bank gate was closed and they wouldn’t let us in. So we parked and walked up to the gate. We discovered that it was closed because they had the Mol-Pol in there. The Mol-Pol (military police) were that because they were either delivering or taking a large amount of money from the bank. The mol-pol had two jeeps, one open, the other enclosed and 8 armed guards. Everyone who wanted to go to the bank had to wait outside the gates until the mol-pol drove away with their sirens blaring and weapons pointing.

When we finally got to the accounts manager, he reviewed our application page by page (20 minutes). We had to fill in a few more things, and then he began reviewing our proof of ID. First, he wanted a copy of my national ID. I reviewed with him the above issues, showed him the letter I had written and signed but he still wanted a copy of my ID. After about 10 minutes he agreed that a copy of my Nigerian driver’s license, a copy of my American passport and a copy of my Nigeria visa, two passport pictures and the letter explaining why I didn’t have my Nigerian ID card was enough ID to establish who I was. I also had to give him a copy of our NEPA bill even though the bill didn’t have either our address or our names on it.

The bank also requires a 20 naira stamp. I guess in case they need to send a letter. Although they don’t have postmen who make deliveries. 20 naira is 14 cents. Only problem, the Post Office doesn’t sell a 20 naira stamp so we bought a 50 naira stamp instead.

Then the other signatories had to produce their ID. They had forgotten to bring theirs. None of them have national ID cards, the Branch President has a driver’s license, and the 1^st counselor and clerk have no forms of ID. So we left the bank after about 1 ½ hours without our account open. The 1^st counselor and clerk are going to have to make up ID of some kind. The 1^st counselor will go to his work and see if his boss will prepare on a company letterhead an ID for him. The clerk will copy his student ID. They also have to come up with copies of someone’s NEPA bill. We will try again when they get this information. Hopefully, it will work and we will be able to set up a bank account. Until then I will have to continue to hold all the fast offerings, hand carry the tithing to Lagos and distribute Branch budget expenses out of my “operating” funds.

I have 50,000 naira (about $250) that I use as a working fund to pay for Church and missionary expenses. Because this is strictly a cash economy, we have to carry cash on us to pay for any expenses that may occur. Missionaries receive their living allowance once a month at Zone Conference. But this doesn’t include other expenses such as NEPA, or water bills, bicycle repairs, etc. Some of the missionary apartments don’t have running water, so we have large plastic water tanks (1,000 liters) that are filled up and they take their water from them for cleaning, bathing, and filtering water for drinking. It sounds primitive and it is. But it is what they are used to doing before their mission so they don’t think it is unusual. So I carry my briefcase with me at all times in case there is an expense. We fill out receipts and once a month in Lagos I account for the expenditures and get another 50,000.

Second topic. Friday night movies. Sister Gilmore and I decided that if we could have Friday night movies in the Branch downstairs it would provide entertainment and an opportunity for the members to socialize. They don’t have movie theaters here. And the ones they have apparently show the wrong kind of movies, so no one here has been to movies. Some people have TVs but I think they watch Nigerian soap operas. They don’t watch American shows on TV. Last Friday night was our first movie. We showed The Other Side of Heaven. About 25 people came. It was ok for our first time. This Friday we are planning to show Finding Nemo. The Mission President has a copy so we will borrow his. Surprisingly, people here have never heard of it. They haven’t even heard of Walt Disney. When I asked, they didn’t know who Walt Disney was, but they had heard of Mickey Mouse. So we will see what happens. We take our TV and video player downstairs, put it in front of the chairs and turn it on. If this succeeds we will have to come up with some more movies. We are sorry we didn’t bring more. We brought The Other Side of Heaven and The Work and the Glory (part 1).

Victor Dixon was baptized yesterday. If you read a previous letter, he is the man we taught with a group of women (one was his adopted mother). He is university trained, a teacher here in Sagamu. He is quiet spoken, very intelligent and has a humble spirit. When we taught him the first lesson, he asked why the Book of Mormon was necessary since we already have the Bible. When we explained that it was another witness of Christ, that it contains the fullness of the gospel, and answers many questions not answered in the Bible. He very humbly said, “I believe that” and promised to read it. He did, he prayed, attended church and was converted. He was baptized about one month from when we met him. When asked what he liked about our church, one thing he said was that in our church each person can ask questions, can learn for themselves, and there is a quiet, reverent spirit in church.

Many churches here beat drums, dance around and make a lot of noise.

He was baptized behind our apartment building in a portable font. The font is about 7’ long, 4’ wide and 3 ½’ deep. It has a metal frame with a plastic liner. It isn’t big enough that I could be baptized in it. A young man baptized two weeks ago who is now a Priest did the baptizing. Victor is about 6’ tall, It took three tries to getVictor baptized. A combination of inexperience by the young man, Victor stiffened up and the small font all contributed. On the third time he went all the way under, just barely. A 20 year old woman was also baptized. That one went off perfectly. In retrospect we should have had Jeremiah baptize the young woman first.

This concludes this week’s letter. Love, Dad.