Read About Elder Troy Snyder's Experiences

Troy had the wonderful idea of soliciting questions from his family. Here are the questions submitted and his answers. (The photo above is from when he was in the MTC in Accra, Ghana)

Grandma Snyder - Are there any animals close to you. Like elephants or zebras, or giraffes? -Nope! There is a zoo about 7 hours away in the other mission. Most of the animals we see on TV come from East Africa... Like Kenya. It's a bummer. I thought I would be going around on safaris teaching people.

What is your favorite activity to do on P-day?  Besides washing your clothes by hand:-).
Love, Dad - Well I have 2. Going to circle and buying cool African stuff. 'Circle' is a super busy market. imagine the Boise farmers market.. then subtract the 20 foot road and gaps in between the shops. Add about 400 more shops, people selling things on their head and grabbing your arms, and add a terrible stink. So we have to climb through tiny alleyways trying not to get robbed and lost. It's like a maze. Plus everyone see's 'white people' and triples the price. So much fun. Other than that I like to play volleyball! We have a net at our chapel. We played it today.. so much fun, even though I suck.

Have you been eating weird food or drinking weird drinks? Kyle Snyder - Weirdest food would have to be banku with palm nut soup and willy. It is a ball of mush that you dip into other mush. The banku is a soft ball of mashed corn that has been boiled and turned to mush. palm nut stew is mushed nuts deep fried in oil. Willy is cow skin. It's like rubber. So you grab some corn mush and dip it in nut oil mush and swallow it. You don't chew most foods here. Banku is really sour so if you did chew it you would most likely throw up. The weirdest drink is either Iced-kenkey or ginger lemon juice. The first one is Mashed corn meal.. like that Mexican "masa" stuff they use to make tortillas. They mix it with canned milk and put sugar in it. I about threw up after my 1st sip. I will never drink it again. The other was strait lemon juice with strait ginger. It literally burns your insides while drinking it. Both are terrible.. and I wouldn't recommend drinking them.

Rebecca: How do the people treat those with special needs? My mom found a video of a car driving along the streets of a town you mentioned in one of your letters. I couldn't imagine how I would get anywhere in my wheelchair. I hope they know that all of God's children are special because Jacey said that where they live the people with disabilities are treating like they committed some great sin and are cursed from God. - Well to be honest.. it's just like Jacey's place. I have seen some of the conditions and heard some stories and it makes me sick.  I don't want to describe them. I feel so bad. People treat them like their parents or the individual himself  have sinned against God. It's not right.

Thomas: Are you doing good on your mission? He also wants to know what the bugs are like? - Well it's going great! :D There are so many weird and different bugs here. 1st of all there are billions of mosquito's. They have giant ants. They have dung beetles. (those are fun to watch) They have giant flying beetles that have one horn on their heads. And they have a lot of spiders.. big ones.. that look like crabs.. run really fast.. and that are flat.

Lorena: What is school like for kids? - School here is called: Primary, JSS, and SSS. (elementary, middle school/junior high and high school) Each one has levels.. and if you don't pass you don't progress. There are older kids in the lower grades because of this.  Here you have to bring money and pay everyday to go to school. Most schools are like open rooms with desks and a chalk boards.  I guess anyone can be a teacher here.. so a lot of people just start their own schools to make money. We have a primary right next to our apartment. At about 7 am they start singing and playing drums. It is awesome studying while they are "learning" in school.

Alyssa: she wants to know who you've kissed and have you seen anyone that is possessed. - Oh yeah I forgot that I was supposed to tell you "before" I left. Darn that time has come and gone. :) - To answer your other question.. kinda. There are a lot of crazy people that do witchcraft stuff. It's pretty crazy looking. They walk around a curse things and people. I have heard that it is even more popular in the village areas. They do stuff like casting out devils and what not. A lot of black magic.

Randy: what is the grossest thing you think you will eat before you get home? Other than rotten food, it would have to be larva. An elder showed me a picture of what he ate out in the 'bush'. It was banku with larva soup. It had a handful of big larva's. he said they pop in your mouth and it was like Man v' Wild. So yeah that's going to be a tasty meal when I get to it.

Sarah: can you get me a gorilla? Really.. I just managed to catch an elephant. I will have to let it go and look for a gorilla now. At least a gorilla will take up less room in my suit cast unlike the elephant.

Rachel: what was the scariest house you went to.- Well most of the houses in my area are the size of an average bathroom in America.. so they are not that scary. There is however an area in my area that is super nice.. I call it Beverly Hills. There is huge mansions there. I guess I was a little bit scared contacting them because they actually have doors.. and huge walls with gates. Not knowing who was going to answer the door is kinda nerve racking. But we actually met this man last week who lives in a huge house. It's going well.

Lydia: how many times have you almost died and how? Well besides everyday on my bike riding through traffic probably only twice. The first time I almost died was when I was trying to sleep during light off  'power outage'. It was terrible. The second being when I was walking home one day after dark and we almost got killed by a gang of drunk men.  

Susan: what do the people there think of America? Are there  many white people where you are? - So most people here see America or the UK as paradise. There is a term they use here. "I need to get out" It's like everywhere else is the outside world. Every person we come in contact with wants us to take them to America. I now tell most people I'm from other countries. Scotland, Spain, Green land, etc. Most think that if they get to the US or UK they will be rich. Thinking that  jobs will fall from the sky and the government hands out money. Most American movies just show the rich fancy places in the US and UK and they think that everywhere and every city is heaven. - Actually there are a lot of Obrines (white people) here. Mostly UK. They live in the nice parts of town and drive really nice cars. We see a lot of 'them' in the mall. Basically if anyone moved here they would be rich. The US dollar and the UK pound go so far here. You can get a super nice Hummer 3 or Land Rover for 10,000 or 15,000 GH cedis About $5,000 to $8,000 dollars. It's weird.

Ryan: have you seen any really big scary creatures yet or anything pop out at you? Nope the scariest thing would have to be the crab looking spiders. They are pretty big and run really fast. They love sleeping under my bed and up in the corners of my room. There are a lot of cockroaches that live in my microwave. Like over 1,000! Every time I warm something up.. they usually end up in my food. Somehow they survive the microwave when it's on.

Kate: what food do you eat there? The main foods are Rice, Vegetables, and Fruits. They prepare them in many different ways. Most often you will find banku (mashed corn that ferments or molds for a couple  days. and they form it into a ball.) fufu (mashed yam and plantain) or rice balls. Each one of these they dip into nasty soups and stews [with fish or goat] and they swallow them. it's pretty awesome...

Cohen: is it scary over there? It's really not that bad here. It was intimidating at first but not so much anymore. Just the fact that  I am so far away from home. Like if there was some sort of war or crisis I feel like I would be stuck here forever. haha Its sometimes scary when people say they want to feed us missionaries and we don't know what is going to be put on our plate. That is always interesting.

Morgan: How do the people treat missionaries there? - Missionaries here are really common. Most churches here have days set apart for evangelizing (missionary work). So most people are really accepting.. basically everyone will sit down and listen to us. Well there is a ton of Muslims though. (I am hopefully going to buy a Qur 'an) 90% of the people here will never say no to a discussion. Now, being white has its ups and downs. Everyone yells at us or calls us oBrunies (white man). We defiantly get people's attention but the problem is everyone wants a oBrunie friend. So most of the time they aren't interested in the teachings.

Hannah: What is your favorite/least favorite food? My favorite food would have to be jellof rice or fired rice. jellof rice is cooked with stew (tomato) and served with chicken. It's really good. My least would have to be banku.. I talk about banku somewhere else in here. haha But the pineapple here is to die for. So tasty and so cheap. I eat one a day.

Mallory: How are you liking your companion? My companion is a cool guy. He is from Fiji. He has been out for over a year now. He is teaching me some Fijian. We get along good. That is key to teaching people. Working together with your companion.

Nancy: Are the people in Ghana nice? Do they like having missionaries over? People here are so nice.. well the majority. Its uncommon to pass strangers on the street that don't greet you. If you pass anyone eating food.. they will invite you to eat. Everyone helps everyone. It's pretty cool. It's going to be weird going home and not greeting every living soul that passes by. - yeah most people like us for the most part. haha A lot of them think we are Jehovah Witnesses. The people that know we are LDS think we drink blood and sacrifice people. That's always fun to correct them.. But yeah most people are really accepting. It's nice.

David: What do the people in Ghana think about the temple there? Well the temple is in the main part of the city. Most people in my area have never seen it. But the people that have think it's the nicest building in the world and they want to go to church there. Some think that we do sacrifices in there. haha As of January it's been here for 10 years. We had a big celebration for that. A lot people saw the video that was playing and got interested about it. It was really cool.

Well that took forever to write.. I hope I answered your questions OK! -Elder Snyder

Elder Snyder, That was much better than OK. I vote for GREAT. Thanks! 

Love from Grandma and Grandpa Pettingill