Kindred spirits
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Amram Musungu knows the look of forlornness. Ten years ago he left the back bush of his native Kenya to come to Salt Lake City with little more than a knapsack of clothes, a fistful of money and a burning ambition for a better life.
So when he and his wife were driving home one evening about a year ago and saw the wide-eyed bewilderment on the faces of five children and their parents wandering a Salt Lake City street, he abruptly turned around.
The family of Fabian and Rosette Bahati had arrived only days before after being airlifted from the Democratic Republic of Congo, refugees of a war-torn country in central Africa.
Amram spoke Swahili and his wife, Noelle, spoke French. Between the two they fashioned a conversation and became instant friends with the Bahati family. A quick search of the family's bleak apartment found their cupboards were bare, they had no money, and their children were to start school in two days.
Struggling newlyweds themselves, Amram and Noelle shelled out half of their $500 in savings that night to put fellow Africans on their feet.
That's how he was taught by his mother in their simple adobe hut home in the bush of western Kenya, and that's how he lives now.
"My mother would never send anyone away hungry if we had food," said Brother Musungu. "If it was the last morsel of food in the house, even if her children would go hungry, she would feed the visitor first."
Amram loves people, and he loves sharing the gospel.
"I want to share the gospel everywhere I go," he said in a recent Church News interview. "I came into the Church through missionary work. It means so much to me. Noelle and I live to be instruments in sharing the gospel."
Brother Musungu's love for the gospel and his African brothers has opened the door to many opportunities to teach and baptize.
Various religious and governmental relief agencies have brought many African refugees to the Salt Lake area. Brother and Sister Musungu, with their native language abilities and familiarity with African customs, routinely assist missionaries.
"We work with hundreds every week," he said. "When we meet, I tell them we have something that will change their life, if they will give it a try."
Many are responding. During the one-year period from September 2006 to 2007, more than 30 African refugees were baptized. Since his arrival in Salt Lake City 10 years ago, Amram has been part of more than 100 baptisms, the largest baptismal service being 18 — with six the smallest.
Amram Musungu was born Aug. 28, 1978, in the small village of Hamuyundi in western Kenya near two national forests and surrounded by deep blue lakes. Life with his eight siblings was happy. Together they worked their two-acre farm to eke out a simple existence.
He never wore shoes, and, in fact, never saw his grandfather as anything but barefoot.
Principles of love and goodness ruled their humble home. "I was reared in the best family," Brother Musungu remembers. "My parents were devoted Christians who taught us to pray. We always attended Sunday services before eating. I never remember my mother as anything but kind. She never spoke ill of anyone.
"At times, when there was no food, I saw tears in her eyes as we went to bed, hoping there would be food the next day."
Primary school was located seven miles down the dirt road. Amram entered school when he was big enough for his right arm to reach over his head and touch his left ear, the sole requirement for admittance. He was 5 years old.
Seven miles of walking or running doesn't seem as long if there is music in your head, he said. So, learning from his father, he whistled or played music in his mind. This became more important years later when he entered high school and walked a dozen or more miles each day, which was not a problem if he set off before the rooster crowed.
This daily musical training prepared him with voice and pitch to join the Mormon Tabernacle Choir as one of two of African descent in the choir.
Two experiences in the next years would reshape his life — the death of an older sister when he was 14, and then moving to Nairobi, the capital, to live with a brother.
"My sister's death was a very painful experience for the family," he said. "She was married with a 2-year-old daughter. She was everything to our family. We were concerned over the loss of her relationship and feared never seeing her again."
Shortly after her death, Amram was to sent to live with his brother in a very poor area of the nation's capital where he slept in a small room divided by a curtain.
A cousin living in a better part of town invited Amram to meet two young men. Brother Musungu remembers walking out of the slum area using shortcuts between the shanties, then seven miles across town. He knocked on the back door and was greeted by Elder Russell Price from Mesa, Ariz., the first white man to ever shake his hand, and Elder Fredrick Thomas from Sierra Leone in west Africa.
"There was an immediate friendship," Brother Musungu said. "We felt like lifelong friends."
The first discussion was taught. The second followed the next day. Amram felt a joy from the message that prompted him to call five other cousins to attend. A special peace came during the fourth discussion when he felt an empowering assurance that he could be with his sister again.
In less than a week, he felt to be baptized.
For fear that his parents might protest, he decided to wait for an opportune time to share his newfound faith. Three months after hearing the first discussion, on June 7, 1992, he scaled the ladder attached to a large water tank in the backyard of the rented home and was baptized.
"Everything changed," he said. "Baptism opened a new world." He was among the first few hundred to be baptized in the Kenya Nairobi Mission, which had been created less than five months earlier.
In short order, Brother Musungu gave his first talk, wore his first white shirt and was given his first calling. "I learned at an early age how great the gospel is," he said. For the next several years, "I learned to study and pray and give discussions like a missionary," working daily with the full-time missionaries.
About four years later, Amram received a surprise call from the mission president, saying the Lord needed him sooner than expected and he was to report to the mission home in two days. By that Friday, he had been set apart as a full-time missionary.
He served for 27 months, taking the gospel to the far reaches of the mission that included neighboring countries. With the bearing of each testimony he felt increased strength.
Upon conclusion of his mission, he rode the bus a few hundred miles to his village, where he stepped off and began walking the three miles to his home. Part way there, his mother saw him from atop a hill, dressed in his black shoes, white shirt and suit. She ran down the dirt path and gave him the first hug he'd ever received from her.
In his honor, the family killed a chicken for a feast and paid tribute by allowing him to sit on the wooden chair as he recounted missionary experiences. A family of faith, they hung on every word as he shared his testimony and taught them the gospel.
Buoyed by new feelings of ambition and desires to do good, Brother Musungu was no longer content to return to his barefooted past, but sought for the opportunities afforded by education.
He'd heard his companions from the U.S. speak of Church-sponsored schools and, after applying to four institutions, was promptly accepted to LDS Business College.
He then faced two problems: paying for a flight to Salt Lake City without an income, and then paying for schooling once he arrived.
Visit after visit to one government office after another was met with the same disinterest. His parents sold a portion of their farm to help pay air fare, but it was only a small drop in a big bucket.
The challenge seemed insurmountable. Where to turn, what to do to earn several thousand dollars without meaningful employment?
"I never give up on my dreams," said Brother Musungu.
The notion to visit two men came to mind; one a businessman in the sugar industry, the other, a foreign diplomat. Each listened to his plight, then opened his wallet and gave from his heart.
He arrived in Utah with $50 remaining in his pocket. He soon procured a 20-hour a week job at LDS Business College, and was then graciously given a place to stay in the basement of a retired couple who was touched by his plight and impressed with his sincerity.
These were simple days of surviving on bread and oranges.
From the time the college doors opened in the morning until the lights were switched off at night, Amram was cracking the books. In two years, he graduated with three degrees and an accounting certificate.
He continued his schooling at Westminster College and the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. During this time he met Noelle Nkoy, who was born in Utah, but raised in her father's native Democratic Republic of Congo. Her family knew of the Church and had met missionaries, but felt no interest.
Amram and Noelle became friends. After a time, she asked to attend Church meetings. She began asking questions. Soon she asked Amram to baptize her.
Two years later, with the Salt Lake Temple in the background, he asked her to marry him. They were married in the temple on April 15, 2006.
From their earliest married days, they've been companions in their missionary efforts. "Sharing the gospel has always been easy for me," he said. "I have always loved missionary work. If I had to choose between eating and teaching, I'd choose teaching," he said.
Teaching fellow Africans now consumes much of their time. When he is not working at his employment or singing in the Tabernacle Choir, they are assisting missionaries somewhere in the Salt Lake Valley most nights, usually with the support of other baptized members from Africa. Because of escalating interest, they teach in groups, often in meetinghouses where there is sufficient space.
"Hundreds are moving here from places like Burundi, DR Congo, Rwanda and Sierra Leone to escape the civil strife," he said.
They come not knowing the language, or the customs or even how to buy food at a grocery store, which food is foreign to them, he said.
Like so many others, the Bahati family listened to the gospel because of the love they felt from Brother and Sister Musungu. They were baptized a year ago and sealed in the Bountiful Utah Temple in December 2007.
Acquainted as he is with being forlorn and desperate, Amram Musungu knows even better the radiant countenance of his fellow Africans who are filled with the light and joys of the gospel.
E-mail to: shaun@desnews.com
