Salutations Daholo!

So here I sit, typing a letter in a cyber in downtown Analamahitsy as I slowly watch my few final hours of teenagerhood flee from before my eyes. I try to reach out. I try to call them back. Am I ready to be.. to be.. twenty? Unsurety fills me as I look to the faces of all those around me. All these.. adults. How did this happen? Could three years have already past since I prepared my young, innocent, long-haired self for my last year of high school? And seven since I entered into the 'crazy years' of life? Time is a beast. An unrelentless animal tearing away at my clock. So what now? I will blink and I'll be turning Twenty One. Okay, I can handle that. Then what? Doubled. Fourty. Time keeps going and flowing without a freckle of space showing. And yet, here I sit in this cyber. Downtown Analamahitsy. And it just keeps going.

Well I hope you all liked the intro to my upcoming book; 'Time Warriors II, Lazer Crusaders meet the Crunch Lady' coming to shelves October 2013. 
PRANKS
Okay, I'll quit being so weird. But seriously though, my birthday tomorrow! I've sort of been counting down the whole month. Maybe I should be like the other missionaries who forget about their birthdays and it goes by without them noticing. And maybe I could. But I could never forget about Harry Potter's birthday. Not in a thousand years, and the just happens to be the same day.. so therefore I didn't forget.
Anyway.. so how have things been this past week? 
Back on Saturday, while Marsh and I were waiting for a bus to take us back home, he said to me pointing to an area between two buildings, "I think I am going to go stand over here." "Okay" I replied, finding nothing immediately strange about that. As I watched him stand over there, I looked with amazement to see a quite spectacular fountain of vomit shoot out of his mouth. So yeah, he's been sick the last few days. He's better now though. We lead the culprit back to the pizza we ate for lunch on Saturday. I, too, at pizza, but did not get any similar affects from it. I guess that's just the luck of the draw.
Another point of interest of what happen this past week, one Elder who I have been living with these past three month, Elder Horsley, took of on a plane on thursday. He finished his mission! Anyway, there is one point in our area that is really good for watching planes take off from the airport. So we had just happened to be going there on Thursday at three, so we saw his plane take off from the airport. It was a pretty cool experience to see that happen. It was a neat experience. 
Anway though, I don't have too much to say this week. I added some pictures, so I hope you enjoy those. 
Hopefully that package will get here soon!
Try to think of some questions that I can answer next week, haha. I think I like replying to those more than trying to think of what to say. 
Oh yeah, I don't know where Kong Yen and his wife were yesterday, but they didn't come to church. I need to find them. They are still up for the 18th for their Baptism Date which I am still excited for. They are way cool. They got a new gate built by their house, so you know things are going well with them.
Anyway, I love you all long time!

Elder Bergera the Kong Yen finder.

What up in the hood?
Yeah, sorry about not writing to you last week Brittany, things just get mad busy sometimes and computer time disappears in seconds I swear. I will try to write you all now, even if it only a sentence or two, okay? haha and no, I haven't gotten the package yet, but It may or may not be at the office right now. I usually don't go until after I email. but I will thank you all before hand!
I really don't know what to tell you all this week though.. it's been a good week. 
Oh yeah, guess what? We got Kong Yen and his wife Etienne a baptism date for the 18th of August. That was the first date that sounded best for them, so it's good. I am really excited for it! We have about 10 people who have set a baptism date for that date, and I am praying that all of them will stay diligent for that date. That's just the problem here. I am sure there could be tons and tons of baptisms every week, but I just really want to make sure that the people I baptize are going to stay, you know? Just really finding and teaching diligent people. We've had kind of a miracle lately too. We teach this one family, and they have been fairly diligent. The mom comes to church pretty well, but the dad is sick ridden in bed (i wish the miracle was about him suddenly getting great health, but it's not.. yet), anyway, they have one daughter who was always kind of wishy-washy in lessons. Halfway there, halfway not. Aina is her name. Last sunday though, she came to church. She sure surprised me! And then yesterday she came again, and she's talked about how much she wants to be baptized now. I couldn't believe it! I love things like this, just seeing the change the gospel brings. Did I bring it to her? No way! There's no way I could change someone like this, only the holy ghost in someones life could bring that change; I just offer it to them. If they take it, sweet! And seeing people who accept it against your expectation is humbling. 
I would send pictures today, but everytime I plug a usb into this computer, it shuts down. Next week?
Next week.
An elder in our house goes home this week, so now his companion (Elder Morgan, from my mtc group) has a mini. That means he has a member who is preparing for his misson work with him for the time being. This mini missionary will be living in our house until at least August 22nd when the next transfers happen (transfer news last night, no changes here :D). It's way cool though, cause now he can help us make some way good malagasy food. Yesterday we had mankahazo and coco. Mankahazo is the roof of this tree, and when cooked with coconut, it is waaay good. I didn't really like it the first time, but I like it a lot now. And also, the other day he cooked tsaramaso (a type of bean) in a coconut sauce for the loaka of our rice, and had an excellent dinner. 
So I have been eating too well. 
:3
So yeah, you know how it is. I am just keeping it easy. I have a goal to read the entire entiriety of scriptures. So far I have finished the book of mormon and a good chunk of the new testatment. I should be finished by the middle of August with the new testament. Then I'll be in a one-way battle with the old testament. Oh boy.
Well, I will try to send you some pictures next week. 
Thank you for your email and love and all of the goods!
I love you all!
My postcard offer still stands! and I was thinking about that actually, you could probably just send those pouch right? I don't know that address.. I don't remember it, but if it works than that just got about 60 cents cheaper! all the better! Do it! haha i'm so lame.
Eny ary.
Elder Iceberg

Yay Johnny!

All right, so this week I had an idea. 
It's basically just a scam to get mail, but that's okay. Okay, I am doing an official postcard trade-off, which means for everyone that sends me a postcard from Utah/America, I will send you one from Madagascar! It's a deal! Yeah! Do it! Genuine Malagasy Pictures! haha, I just basically want postcards.. so.. yeah. That's the news for the week.

Elder Austin Bergera
Madagascar Antananarivo Mission
BP 5094
Antananarivo 101
Madagascar

^ I'll just put that there.^

Anyway, scam over. 
So how are you all doing? I'm doing good. This week has been a good one for sure. The pizza place buy our house moved locations... to be even closer to the house! haha, so it's pretty sweet. Also, Casa Pizza started making even more things than just pizza. They have one thing called.. well I don't remember.. it was french, but pretty much it is a ball of rice and loaka (the stuff they put on rice) and then deep fried into a ball of deep fried rice ball. It's sort of like America meets Madagascar in the culinary perspective. I'll try to take a picture of this little piece of wonder soon.
Other than that.. let's see.. Well I gave a talk in church yesterday! It was my first time giving a talk in Malagasy, so that sure was something. I really enjoyed it though, and it didn't seem too difficult. Like, it just felt like i was teaching a lesson at an investigators house, but just to a really big family, haha. Now, as far as how well I did? I'm not sure, but they seemed to understand it, haha. Fr. Fetra even quoted something I said in his priesthood quorum lesson, so I suppose that is a good sign. For some reason branch I am in now likes to have missionaries talk a lot more than my first branch did. It seems like about once a month now, but Marsh and I have already decided that next month will be Marsh's turn. It'll be good for him.
Sorry, no new pictures this week. I slacked pretty hard in picture taking this week, but don't worry. I am going into this week with a fresh new commitment to take as many pictures as I can. 
Kong Yen hasn't been baptized yet. He had to go out pretty far away recently to go do rice stuff, I am not exactly sure. Whether it was actually working the rice or what, I am not sure. But he should be back this week, and we'll give him baptism date for sure. I have also set up a time this week to go work with a lady to has been a member in our area for a really long time. Now really long here in Madagascar basically means 10 years or over. If you find people who were members back in the 90's... dang. That's pretty good. The church is still way new here. One thing our new President Adams said is that we are like the Pioneers of missionary work here in the country. It's just way new still, and one day he thinks it'll be as big as Brazil. But yeah, I am were with a member and I am going to start trying to visit a lot of less actives. Cause we have to support the members that we have before we try to get new ones! It's good though. It's way good. 
Today we are going to try and go to the 'Croc Guy.' The Croc guy is a guy who will actually bind books in crocodile skin. I ordered a mini book of mormon through the office, and once it gets here I will take it to this guy and get that baby croc skinned. It should be pretty cool. Other than that though, I don't expect this p-day too be super duper uper guper exciting. I need to buy new pants though, like jean pants, cause this one has a big rip down the crotch, haha. I have been wearing them for about a month like this, which sounds bad, but that really actually means like 4 days (mondays). So yeah, I'll go buy some more pants. 
Oh yeah, you asked what you will call us teenagers once we come back, for we will no longer be teenagers. We already had that covered. You can call us 'The Treefort Gang.'
So.. .other than all those things I don't really know what else to talk about. Things are still good. I still haven't lost a lot of weight like I thought I would. I am getting close to filling up my second journal (which leaves two to go, haha thanks Brittany), and my hair is still short!
Well I will catch you all next week! Transfers are next week, but I imagine I'll be staying here for a while longer.

I love y'all.
Elder 'Tapioca Puddin' Bergera

PS Marsh and I have been making some sweet tapioca pudding lately.

I went to a Lemur Park this morning! I attached some pictures for your viewing pleasure. That park was actually technically in my area I think, but it took about a 45 minute bus ride to get to anyway. It was actually really cool, way in they middle of nowhere. I liked this park a lot better than they zoo we went to last week. Yeah, the zoo had a lot bigger variety of different things, but this little park just had free roaming lemurs hanging around. I just bought a kilo of bananas before hand, and we went down to the park, paid 10,000Ar, and walked in to see a tree full of lemurs! They jumped down off of the tree, and if you have ever seen lemurs when they travel on the ground, they are soooo funnny! They just bounce sideways in whatever direction they are going, haha. They are soo cool. We tried super hard to get them to crawl all over us and on our heads in a goofy fashion, but they resisted. They would come down really close and party though. I would just put a piece in my hand, then they would grab my hand with their funny human-like hands then pop that banana in their mouth. I seriously think that Lemurs are my favorite animals now. Their poof balls funny selves are just too cool not to love. 
And that was pretty much our p-day today. At least the exciting part. 
Oh wait! Actually, while we were walking down the street in downtown Tana after eating lunch, we saw some kids riding skateboards. Because of that tech deck you sent me, a lot of these other Elders know that I really like to skate. So while we were walking by, one of the Elders I was with asked if it was okay for us to try it out. They said yeah, so I hopped on, haha. I didn't really do anything super cool, just a few pop-shuvs and what not, but man.. it felt good! haha, and I am pretty sure all the kids thought that I was cool. Maybe. I was sort of worried before that I had lost my entire ability to skate, but I don't think it is ALL gone yet, haha, so that's comforting. Seeing skateboards here sure is rare though, I think that was probably the... third time I have seen one. I don't think I could handle seeing them all the time though, haha. I have gotten really trunky every time I see them, haha.
Other than that though, not too much is going on. I am really hoping for a baptism soon though. I don't know why, but it seems like the area I am in now just moves slower than my last one, but it's all good. I have a super cool investigator named Kong Yen, I don't know if I have told you about him or not, but he is super cool anyway. He just makes me super stoked to just be able to teach him, that is how cool he is; him and his wife Etienne. I tried to give him a bap date a week ago, but he says he is just really worried about entering into the church and not knowing everything. I let him know that it is okay to still not know EVERYTHING and be baptized, but that baptism is a convenant we make with God to show we are ready to obey him. In our last time he gave us a coconut, and right now he is out in the country taking care of rice, but he should be back soon and I will definitely get a date for him. I am really stoked on him and his wife. We actually got him as a referral from a member from my previous area, Antsirabe. That's when missionary work is the best: Referrals!
Oh yeah, my new mission President is from California, and his wife is from Switzerland, and apparently she is fluent in Swiss! Which I am somewhat interested to hear. 
While working with a member this week, we went to a time, but the people weren't home, so we went and talked to a man who we saw on the path up to the house. We set up a time to come back, and on the next day, we came back. As we were teaching him, we found out that he is from a place called 'Diego' which is waaaay up on the north point of the island. This also explained why I had an especially hard time understanding him, for he spoke a different dialect. I assume he has grown accustomed to the main dialect us missionaries learn, 'Merina,' for I could understand him all right. He's cool though, and I am really excited to see how the lessons will go. 
Anyway, I think that's about it today. Not too much going on besides that, haha.
Have a great 10th - 16th of July!

Elder Gidro
"The Lemur King"

hEy mOmmMMMmm, 

Okay, so the three pictures in a really quick, non-descriptive manner:
1 - The departing Pres. Donnelly with the new incoming Pres. Adams
2 - Me with a (cooler in real life) tree
3 - An old fasana, aka tomb, in the cool zoo we went to today

So yeah, that's about it! We went to a zoo today in hopes that we would be able to get some lemurs to crawl all up on us, but all the lemurs in this zoo were in cages.. so next week we will try to go to a different park that apparently has free-roam lemurs. Coolstuff.
Things with Marsh have been going well. I have really liked training so far. Yeah, it pretty much makes me do all the talking for now, but ol' Marsh is already improving on the language which is way cool. And now, he has already been on the mission longer than the Mission President!! haha. He's just got the whole 'new missonary' view at it all, like it'll never end, but I keep telling him that my last eight months have gone by really fast, for they feel like they have! I always felt like i wasn't ready to train, but when it came, I found out I was ready, haha. It's good. Life goes fast out here, and before you know it one-third of your mission is already done! But yeah, he is way cool. I lucked out by getting a cool kid. 
But yeah, we went to a Zoo today, which I really enjoyed. They had a few crocodiles, but nothing close to what the crocodile farm had. This park basically just had a large amount of cranes that pooped on trees. You would've thought they painted the trees white. Speaking of crocodiles, I am going to try to get a miniture book of mormon binded in crocodile skin. It should be pretty cool. 
Anyway, it's 5:30 right now, the sun has set, and I need to get on my way. 
Thank you for all your love!
You da best!

I'll see you in half a fortnight.


"Under my Elder Bergera-era-era-eh-eh-eh"

Post Script: Oh yeah, I was thinking, if you ever did want to give me a birthday present for my birthday, I have thought of a few things which would be of great worth to me. G-2 pen refills, warheads (cause malgasy kids are fun to see eating warheads, haha. Marsh came with some and we gave them to some kids during our English class, haha. way funny), jellybellies (I thought about those the other day, and I don't know why buy they sounded soooo goood), and those Gellin' Dr. Scholls things (My shoes have been keeping pretty decent condition, all except for the inside soul. I don't know why, but it's been getting all gnar'd up. I guess I am just a hard walker. My belly's getting bigger... buy my legs are ripped up.) Also, and this is just a whatever thing, but I have heard a thing called 'perfect pushups' which caught my attention... so.. you know... if at all possible.. haha. I just want to try to work out more, cause I don't know why but I am gaining weight. I am about... 98% sure. But I want to get better at workout out, so.. yeah.

I am alive again! Woohoo!

Okay the name of the big holiday which is going down today is called the Vingt-Sis, which is french for 26th. Technically that would be tomorrow, but I guess a lot of the partying will be going down today too. It's way cool. Yesterday we actually saw a pretty big party going down in Sabotsy Namehana (our area) with tons of people around a big stage with two malgasies dancing on it. Pretty big parties going down in this place. But yeah, the 26th is the fetim-pirenena (or the national holiday), where they received their independance from France, if I am not mistaken. It's pretty sweet. they have tons of fireworks on sale on the streets and things, and apparently there will be a big fireworks show going down tonight, so who knows. Basically life is a party. I guess the most important thing to note today is that I was able to find a ciber to email you, so never fear. Bergera is here. 

Let's see... what else 'is the news...'

I picked up my new companion last Thursday! His name is Elder Marsh from Tremonton, Utah, and he's a really cool kid. Seeing him now in his p-day clothes I can now tell you that he's a real cowboy. He keeps me in on the quality on the cows we see too, for Madagascar has a lot of cows, if you didn't know. And they all have a weird hump on their back, but Marsh usually lets me know how they are doing. Suprisingly a lot of the cows here are skinny (not really suprising though lol). He's come straight to the mission field though, ready to work which is way cool. Definitely a good quality to have for sure. We've been working way hard since Friday, haha only three days, but we've been working really hard anyway. We've been actually been having a ton of people coming up to us, asking about the church. I don't know if it's because we are TWO white guys now, instead of just me (I haven't been with a non-malgasy in a while), but a lot of people have been coming up to us, so I am really hoping to see some growth in this branch. Yesterday we had a big branch conference with a lot of the other leaders from around Antananarivo. In the conference they talked about how we have to work really hard and get more people to church if we want to become a ward. My old companion Gino actually came to the conference because his bishop was coming anyway, so he tagged along. haha he told me how his last few days as a non-missionary has been, haha, he says being home is way weird, haha, but I told him that he's moving on to the next stage now! The first photo I attached is a picture of me and him a few moments before the office elders picked him up to begin the end of his mission. 

Oh yeah, you said you wanted more pictures of me, so I'll give you three. Yeah, I've kind of been gaining weight I think, but oh well, haha. I don't really know how, but it's happening. I've started a real workout though every morning here with Marsh, so hopefully we'll see some results soon. I'm just bulking up for this cold winter down here, hahhahahaha lol lol lol. 

The second photo is me and Marsh a few moments after we found out we would be companions! Way precious!

The third photo is a cool story. Well remember how I told you about the special branch conference? Well yeah, the night before, the APs asked me for directions to the church, so I gave them the directions obviously. I can't not. So I expected someone new to be coming to church, but I wasn't quite sure. Maybe them or something, but I didn't know. Anyway, about halfway through the sunday school in pops a vahaza head, and after a few minutes of really looking, I spotted the familiar face! One of my MTC teachers, Brother Jenkins! Ahaha, I couldn't believe it, haha, it was way crazy. I had no idea he was even coming here to Madagascar, super nuts. Apparently he is here for a month doing some non-profit organization work for something, I didn't really understand it to tell you the truth. I don't really understand things like that, but it was cool anyway. I was way stoked to see the guy. It super weirded out Marsh though, haha. Just imagine seeing a familiar face like that after being in the worlds longest flight and just experiencing everything that comes with a new country, haha. I was pretty surprised, but he was mega shocked haha. It was way cool though. He actually came with us for member help too for a few hours to teach some lessons which was way cool. I can understand his malagasy now, haha. It's way cool. Oh yeah, he had a really nice canon dslr camera with him, and he let me shoot some pictures. awwww mannnn.. so good. Way good. way good. 

that's all the pictures for this week though. I'll try to get some real doozies for next week. 

I think that about does if for this week though. Things are going real well and I feel I'm all up in the groove now. 

Give cat a good 'bro hug' for me.

Okay, peace it out all on the other side, 

Secretly Sincerely,

Elder 'the fun don't stop' Pops Bergera

Hello Mother (and all others who feel so obliged to read this),

I am sorry I was not able to email last week. You see, usually we email in the morning, and it works out all right, but last week we tried to postpone emailing until the evening. But as the evening drew near, the prospect became more and more difficult due to traffic and other such eveningly happenstances that the point came to where the light hope of emailing grew dimmer and dimmer until it vanished entirely. Don't you worry though, as a missionary I learn new things every day, and part of learning is knowing when to take knowledge from failures. As you see, I am now emailing in the morning (or the morning here, yesterday night for all you westerners), and thus, my email is in existance once again. Thank you, thank you. I am back.

And that's why I didn't email last week! But another thing about not emailing last week is that I didn't get to email the Mission President, which isn't good. We are to do that every week, but I forgot. This is especially signifcant because he only has two weeks left now! My mission president right now is President Donnelly, a really cool man from Zimbabwe. I've really enjoyed having him as the president, for real. I'm going to miss him for sure. On July 2nd the new president will take over. President Adams from California. It'll be different, but who knows! It'll be good too, I mean, they are all called of God so you can't go wrong there. I'll miss the zimbabwe accent though, that's for sure. 

Okay, I also have a bit of news! Yes, so if you remember, my companion right now is very close to 'dying,' which is to say, he finishes his mission on Thursday! It's been a hoot of a time here with Elder Raoilson, but every mission has an end. Yes, so of course I will be getting a new companion, right? Okay, and I found out not too long ago that I will be training! My kid... yes. They will get here on Wednesday, and I will get to pick him up from the office on Thursday. I am way stoked! I will get to be this Elders first companion, so it really makes me want to just work super hard and let him have an awesome, successful first area, and first experiences here in the mission. It's way exciting! My only worry is that I am going from having a native companion who can obviously speak the language, to becoming the head speaker of the companionship. Just a bit of a concern, but I know that if I trust in the gift of tongues, it will all work out. I've got God on my side, so nothing should be a conern right? It'll be good though, I am way excited.

And I think that is the biggest bit of news this time, not too much craziness going on. Next Thursday is the biggest holiday in the country, so that'll be cool. It's their 'fourth of july' of sorts. I'm really wondering what it'll be like, haha. If there is anything you need to know about Malgasies, it's that they love rice. But the next thing would be that they love holidays. They go crazy. It's way sweet and only slightly scary.

So I attached a couple of photos, let's take a look shall we?

Photo #1 Washing Clothes

Here we see some malagasy women washing clothes in the river. They have a saying here which I forgot, but it says something about how this country wouldn't run if it weren't for the women. It's way true, they do so much work. I mean, it's the same everywhere, women are great. Yes. But here you see them carrying stuff on their heads all the time, and washing clothes in rivers. Next level kind of stuff. Then they always lay out the clothes to dry in various places. Sometimes they lay clothes out on very pokey, cactus-like plants which poke little holes in them, but they don't mind. One time I used a method they use to wash clothes to get oil out of my disney sweater when I slept on a Reeses once. It works.

Photo #2 My first companion

I have had the great pleasure of living with my MTC companion Elder Fox these past two months. Unfortunately, he will be transferred on Thursday. Thankfully, he is going to a mega sweet province called Mahajanga which is the northen most province open to missionaries, and right up on the coast. I am super stoked for him. Anyway, in this picture I just wanted to showcase one of his unique talents: Origami. He's pretty good at origami. 

Photo #3 Gino

My third companion, Elder Raoilson (aka gino), will be going home in less than a handfull of days. Here we see a picture of him yelling and scolding, just like normal. haha, just kidding, he never did that. He's a good guy. This was our sunday lunch spot for a couple of weeks there. Gino is a pretty mean cook, and he made us some sweet lunches on Sundays. We live too far from our house to go home for lunch on sundays, so we just packed it with us. Before he goes home he promised to teach me how to make a mean voanjobory loaka. It's a type of bean sauce to put on rice. Malagasies always think it's funny to hear a white vahaza say they like voanjobory, but it's way good! Voanjobory sy henakisoa for life.

Oh yeah, yesterday at church they gave all the fathers a tie for fathers day. They said missionaries count, haha. 

But yeah, that's about it. I can't think of much else to say this week. 

Rah rah roo!

Elder Mpihinan-bary