Crazy Cool

HAHAHAHA!!! I'm sorry, that is so funny that you ask about my bike! Cause here in St. Paul, there must be some sort of voodoo black magic going on, cause within the last 2 weeks, ALL 4 ELDERS have had some big bike problems!! It all started when Elder Hanks got "hit" by a car. All it did was lift him onto the hood. But he had 3 spokes break in 2 days. Then Elder Nelson had issues with his bike. Then my shifter stopped working very well. My cables were pretty stretched out, so I had them replaced. It worked great for a day, then my chain broke. So I had to replace the chain, and since then I have had both chain and derailer problems... Then 2 nights ago, Elder Howards brand new bike broke too. Ridiculous. So I'm pretty frustrated with my bike at the moment. But Brother Bingham is going to fix it; he used to work in a bike shop.

This weekend hasn't been a good one for me, at least health wise. On Saturday, I was unnaturally exhausted all day, just sapped of all energy. Then Sunday, I felt like I was getting a chest cold or the flu or something. Then last night, I woke up at one in the morning with a really intense pain that striped from one shoulder to the other. It killed when I laid down, and the only way to ease the pain was to sit upright. So I sat up and slept as much as I could the rest of the night. I still don't know what it was, but I'll find out. Gees. Worst pain I've been in in a while!

Other than that though, Habtamu is doing AMAZING! Totally getting baptized this Saturday! He told us his whole story of how he got here, and it's quite an incredible story. HOLY SMOKES. So get this:

When he was in Ethiopia, he was a salesman. For whatever reason, he was thrown into prison, and was there for a week and a half. He said that in the Ethiopian prison, that they torture you. When he got out, he ran away and paid a smuggler 2000$ to take him to Mexico. When in Mexico, he paid another man 1000$ to get him into the U.S. border into Texas. The man never showed up. So he found another guy, and that guy's son led him across the border. They had to swim a great distance, and hop a lot of fences, but when they got in, the border patrol caught him, and then let him go a couple days later. Now he is waiting to see if the states are going to grant him asylum. He finds out November 16th. Also, turns out he has a wife in Greece that will join him if he can stay! But the coolest part of the story, I think, is when he got to Minnesota. He got here in February of 2009! The same time that I left on my mission. How crazy cool is that?! So he's doing awesome.

Don't really have an update on Jason and Anna at the moment.

Not much else to say!

Love you all
ELDER BROOKS