An Awesome Awesome Evening

Hey everybody,

Woosh it was a good week. To be honest it was another classic missionary week. Nothing wild or out of the ordinary happened. We spent a lot of the week doing some finding and door knocking and trying to situate our teaching pool. Right now we have a good chunk of people who just aren't too serious and don't really want to progress but are willing to meet us. Those are the people we have to kindly drop and move on. I had a good week all in all. Se lemme tell you about it....

On Monday we had an awesome awesome evening following emailing. We went to the church and watched the 40th Anniversary of the Priesthood Celebration. OHHHHH BOOYY it was fire! I honestly loved it so much. Prior to watching it, Brother Backman from our ward bore his testimony and gratitude for the revelation in sacrament. He talked about how it changed his life beginning with his mission in South Africa, then his marriage, then his career across Africa. During the broadcast I was caught up thinking about how it has also blessed my life. If the revelation was never received, I would not have been able to serve here in Uganda and Ethiopia. My mission has changed my life in so many ways all thanks to this blessing of the Priesthood to all worthy male members of the church. ANYWAYS, back to the broadcast. So I don't know if all of you have seen it but you should. It is a big celebration/performance put on with singing and dancing. There is a super nice gospel choir performing unique and upbeat songs and yada yada. I felt the spirit throughout the performance as they told stories of early African "Pioneers" and sang and danced. I want to add my testimony, as it has played a big role in my mission, that the revelation given to President Spencer W. Kimball was inspired by God and came exactly when it was needed. I have been questioned, grilled and mocked over such a thing and my testimony continues to increase. No matter the past, all worthy male members of the church can hold the Priesthood and that is a great blessing! Go and watch the broadcast!

My teaching pool is doing really good right now. We still have some great investigators. Joseph was not able to be baptized this week. He had to make an emergency trip to South Sudan for something and will be gone one week. So he will be baptized on the 30th of June. Likewise Flavia and Jacob will be baptized on the 30th. Kita came to church!!!! She is awesome. She even has some referrals for us we are going to meet tomorrow! So we will have more to teach this week. Everything is going good for us. 

Unfortunately I am missing World Cup though.... Bummer. All in all it is going well for me. I hope and pray I stay in Nsambya for the rest of my mission.

That is it guys. Thanks for the love and support. Have a great week!

Love,

Elder McLain

My shirt the Elders made in Ethiopia. 

Just got it! "Straight outta Addis"

Hope's Wedding. 

She is an investigator but is quickly moving with her husband to Canada. 

Like the flames??

 Me and Elder B at the wedding

Planning while on the back of a pedal boda (bike)

I Went Back To The Future

Hey guys,

This week was really cool! We worked hard and got a lot done. It was a relatively normal week for us. We stayed busy, had some success but likewise had some upsets. That is how missionary work goes though. If you can't get over upsets quickly than a mission would be very difficult. SO, let me tell you about the week............--->

1. We have been teaching Joseph and preparing him for his baptism. It will be this Friday! Joseph is doing really, really well and progressing at a level I haven't seen in a long time. I can honestly say that of any people I have taught on my mission, South Sudanese just comprehend so well. AND they speak a really nice English that I love. It sort of reminds me of British English. Anyways, Joseph is great. And as I said last week we started teaching his nieces he stays with. They are enjoying the messages too and will likely be baptized in the coming weeks.

2. Flavia is still just doing A okay. She is progressing at a great pace too and has incredible understanding of the messages. It is as if she knew a lot and our short messages are connecting the dots for her. She is looking forward to her baptism next Saturday. A funny short story about Flavia took place in Sunday School. We were sitting in a room with about 40 people and she was called on to answer a question. She was asked "How do we receive the Gift of the Holy Spirit?" She got a bit nervous (because she hasn't received or seen someone receive it) but answered and said, "I believe it is following our baptism and goes along with our confirmation. Worthy men lay their hands on your hand and give you the gift of the Holy Ghost." ............ My companion and I were super proud. The teacher said that was true and she somehow loudly leaned to us and said, "BOOM, I am a genius!" hahahaha. Then a returned sister missionary raised her hand and tried to correct Flavia for saying Holy Ghost instead of Holy Spirit and that ghosts are evil. Flavia responded confidently that evil ghosts are evil but the holy ghost is holy. She even told her to read in Acts 19 where it refers to the Holy Ghost as a Ghost. It was soooooo awesome. Flavia is a genius for sure!

3. We found a new investigator named Kita. She is 17 years old but seems much older. She is also from South Sudan. We taught the Restoration first lesson and she loved it. We committed her to baptism on the 29th of June. She was excited to accept and even said she will be bringing her friends to our next appointment on Tuesday. 

4. Another new investigator is named Ayantu. She is from Ethiopia! She is a 7th Day Adventist but is somewhat interested in our church. She enjoys the messages but of course is caught up on the sabbath day being on Sunday instead of Saturday. So when we meet tomorrow we are talking about that.

5. We dropped a few investigators this week :( We were teaching some powerful people that are easily ready to learn but just won't come to church. It isn't that they don't want to but rather that they don't know what their priorities are. So when something comes up on Sunday, they put that before church. Soooooo this week we are going to do some door knocking and street contacting to fill up our teaching pool again. I think back on my favorite moments in my mission and they all come from finding and door knocking so I am really excited for that. !

To answer your questions about the people I work with, I would say 75% are Ugandan. A majority of the people we talk to or find are Ugandan. But still daily I am meeting Congolese, Kenyans, Tanzanians, Rwandese, Ethiopians, Eritreans, Somalians, etc... 

As far as Ethiopia goes, things have improved. I am still the most recent missionary to transfer from there but I think next transfer they will send some people up. Work permits are becoming easier to get now! 

I just tried printing off President Nelson's talk and our internet cafe is out of ink. I will try to speed read some of it today. Or print it next week. It seems to me that President Nelson is doing a super job interacting with members across the world, both youth and adults. I love that about him. He is a great man.

And yeah, I am gaining weight! I am getting healthier here I think. The food I eat isn't the healthiest. There is a lot of oil but overall I am getting a better variety of things that are good for my body. So I am happy!

OKAY I had a super cool experience this week! So there is a family that was living in Ethiopia and working for USAID. Just as I went to Ethiopia they moved to Uganda. Then I returned back to Uganda and found that I was serving in their ward! They are the Backman family. Brother Backman is from the US and Sister Backman is from Ghana. They have 4 kids. So this Tuesday we went to their house for dinner. As we were sitting at the table, Brother Backman was asking all of us where we are from. When he got to me I mumbled, "provo" because I always get beef for being from Provo... Anyways, after I told him he was like, "have we talked about this?" I told him no. He asked the school I went to and I told him Timpview. He asked where I lived and I said above Timpview. His brow wrinkled and he said, "Which ward?" I told him the Edgemont 14th. He asked which street and I told him 920 E. He then told me he grew up in the condominiums in Quail Valley. I was shocked and told him I was raised in a house across from the tennis court. He said he loved that court in High School. Skipping a lot of detail, Steve Backman was raised in the condo next to the Anderson condo and across from the Palmers. He knows everyone in the ward and said he was good friends with the Reichman's son. He knows the Reeves and their kids, Miners and their kids. Going on and on he just told me all about his teenage years in Quail Valley and that when he went on his mission he had no idea what he would do for a future career. He was called to Johannesburg, South Africa and served there for 2 years. On his mission he fell in love with the people, the place and everything about it and quickly decided he would come back to Africa for work. Right now he works to improve child education across the continent and is doing really well. It is crazy to me and this is why I say, "back to the future".... I was also raised in the same neighborhood, about a stones throw from his house. I also was a bit confused on a future career. I was called to the same type of place and during my mission have gained a great love for the place and the people. Now I have decided my career path will involve coming back to Africa and working on water resourcing. He said his mission was the greatest blessing and biggest life changer for him. I can definitely say the same! So I met somewhat of a future version of myself this week. Brother Backman is awesome!

That will wrap up my week. Hope everyone is doing well back home. Congrats to Josh Palmer for returning safely. I am proud of you man! See you all soon :) 

Love,

Elder McLain

The Backman family! 

Brother Backman is from Provo, Utah and Sister Backman is from Ghana! 

At a burger shop and this American woman came in and asked, "so what kind of cheese is on the cheese burger?" Like come on this is Uganda girl not America. Of course the worker responded and said, "its just cheese."  Hahahaha    I was like.........

Me doing business

 Getting soaked this week!

 Went puddle jumping

 My stack of planners. Uganda is more dirty than Ethiopia. 

Can you tell when I served in Uganda and Ethiopia?

Little Donkeys for lunch today! 

I had a chicken burrito.

Making friends in Nsambya

Helloooo!

Woooooosh another week down. This was the 6th and last week of the transfer so we received transfer news on Saturday. As expected, I am staying in Nsambya and with my companion Elder Barnum. In fact, only 1 of the 8 missionaries in the area is transferring. So it will be the same as last transfer. Super happy about it. I am enjoying this place a lot. So 6 more weeks here!  Things are going really well for me and my companion right now.

This week my comp was sick. We spent a lot of the week inside and so I spent most of my free time writing my college essays and reading. He was sick for about 3ish days with bad migraines and the sweats. Almost like a knock off malaria. He is all better now and we are working again. We had some really great things happen. For new investigators, we didn't find many but we did receive a few referrals that are powerful. I will just share a few highlights from the week:

1. Teaching Flavia... We saw her on Wednesday evening and began sharing the Plan of Salvation. It started out okay until we got to the Fall of Adam and Eve. She got incredibly offended when we told her that the Fall was part of God's plan. Sooo we spent the next 30 minutes just talking about it. The lesson ended on a bad note and we even feared to go back. It was sad because Flavia is so super darn powerful and for her to get caught up over such a thing was just difficult for us to understand. She called 2 days later and said she was trying to humble herself and wanted to meet again. So we went back on Saturday and finished the lesson. From there it was great. She loved the idea of the spirit world and other doctrines. She came to church on Sunday too! We confirmed her baptismal date for June 23rd.

2. Meeting Benson. Benson is a referral from a girl in the ward named Charity. She just saw him on the street and started sharing with him. Later she took us to him and we shared the Restoration. Benson has a great comprehension and loved the message. 

3. The man, Joseph. Joseph is the South Sudanese we found a few weeks back who ended up having friends in the church. We finished the lessons this week with him. He has been taught everything and is powerful as ever. He is preparing to be baptized mid June before he takes his trip to Juba, South Sudan. At the end of the last lesson we were following up on his reading and asked to see his Chastity pamphlet. He mentioned that his nieces refused to give it back to him. After digging deeper we discovered that he has 3 nieces living with him who are reading all of the pamphlets and even the Book of Mormon when he isn't using them! So we asked if we could begin teaching them too and he said they would love it! So now we are teaching Joseph and 4 others in the same house.

Those are the highlights from the week. Noah's mission call sounds awesome! I would have loved to go there myself and speak Vietnamese!! Lucky him.

Alright, that's a wrap for the transfer and the week. Have a good week! 

Love you all!!

Love,

Elder McLain

My friend Kenzo

Attending church with Flavia

 Church with Castro and Alpha

 Castro, Barnum, and me

Me and Patrick

Some random little kid's glasses

Settling back into life here in Uganda

Hey Everyone!

Another pretty good week here. Again, a classic week as a missionary. We just went about our business and got some good work done. I have for sure settled back into my life here in Uganda so things are going well.

Hmmm, I don't have much to report this week. My mind is just seriously blank right now and I don't have anything to add. Today we drove out to Masaka to visit some crocodiles. It was pretty cool! And that is about it for unique stuff this week.  

Sadly, I have to run because we have an appointment in about 20 minutes... We are getting REFERRALS like crazy. We are asking though and working hard for them. This morning a member called us and set us up to teach someone tonight at 6:30... Sweet! We also found a new family! They are really powerful and actually know our Bishop so they can be fellowshipped well now. They aren't married legally so we might need to work on that. Wedding soon??! Everyone else is still progressing well and things are going good for us. Sorry the update is so short. 

Have a great week!

Love,

Elder McLain

Some kids....somewhere

baby croc. 

They wouldn't let me hold the big one...

 Everyone fell asleep on the bus.

 I enjoyed the ride

 Bickin back

A comp pic (Elder Barnum)

Slow Days Fast Weeks

Hello!

Eish the weeks are going fast now. I am in that classic "slow days, fast weeks" feeling right now. It is quite funny because in a way it's nice and in a way I just can get exhausted and really burnt out before the day is over. Maybe an effect of working out harder in the mornings. I dunno. By the way, I bought some protein (vanilla whey) and take it morning and night with some morning work out. Obviously it is too soon to see a difference but the nice thing is there is an elder in my district that lifted and all that jazz back home. He is giving me good advice on how to effectively lift and use the protein. Maybe it'll help me put a little meat on my bones - haha.

Anyways, the week was good. We found some promising people. First is a family of 6! The Alfred family. So Alfred is from the east. He has a farm in Mbale, Uganda and is preparing for harvest so he is back and forth all the time. He has a wife living in Jinja and 6ish kids. A lot or all are of baptismal age. He has heard about the church in the past and wants to know more. We have shared with them twice and they came to church on Sunday! It was great for them. They said they even have more kids coming back from Jinja this weekend to teach. We are going to set a baptismal date for the family this week. They have one small problem, they want to be baptized in fresh water, not tap water because Christ was baptized in fresh water. To make things easier on them, we will probably just go to Lake Victoria and have a member perform the baptisms there. It will be powerful! 

Second is Flavia, or Faith. She is also from those ends of Mbale/Palissa. She is a super smart, educated, well mannered and cool girl. She is 22 and has a bachelors degree in something medical and is already working and very independent. This week we taught her a lesson which could have been my most spirit felt lesson in a long time. We tried to begin with a lesson on the Restoration. She politely declined saying she wanted to skip the "basics" and go straight to the word of God. We kept telling her that it wasn't "basics" but something she should learn before we began. Then she dropped the child of record card and said she would struggle to learn from us knowing that both of us were born into our church and not converted. She was being super duper difficult. So I calmed everything down and just testified of the uniqueness of our message and that if she took 15 minutes to listen, we would share with her things she had never heard. She finally decided to listen and we went on teaching her a most powerful Restoration lesson. We had a returned missionary member with us who helped teach and it went so well. She was incredibly attentive and then pieced so many things together that we didn't even teach. For instance, she realized that all of the talk in the Bible about a restitution and restoration of all things is answered according to our doctrine. So to wrap up about her, she is super duper uper luper powerful and we are excited for her. She will easily be a future leader in the church.

Next is David. He is a younger guy, probably around my age. He is Catholic but was taken by the Book of Mormon. He loves the messages and is so interested in the new doctrine he is learning. We picked him up in town this week and walked with him to church. He enjoyed it a lot. Another promising investigator.

We also have a lot of Muslim investigators right now. Like 4 to be exact. I think I talked a little bit about Helen last week. She is fun to teach because she knows nothing about Christianity, the role of Christ, the Bible and so forth. So we are teaching her absolutely from scratch. Mostly about the Godhead and the Atonement. It is really fun and new to me. She is great and is progressing well!

That is my update on the work here. Everything is going good!

I hope you have a good week! Love you all!

Love,

Elder McLain

Meeting my MTC Brothers. 

First time seeing Elder Mbuli and Elder Mokoena since we left the MTC

Also Elder Gooch

Made some Ethiopian food for the district

This is my normal

Hey! 

It was a good day yesterday and great to talk to everyone! A good call home!  A bit odd actually. It didn't feel as "special" as the other ones. Not in a bad way but it felt really normal almost like it is something I do frequently, hah. I wish the audio would have been a little bit better BUT beggars can't be choosers! The audio was a bit rough but all in all it worked out okay. I was spoiled the last time with good wifi at the Marriott soooo this time it was a bit worse. It's okay though! I was happy to have enough time not to feel rushed or anything at the end. Funny enough we literally ran out of stuff to talk about. That was a first! I enjoyed it a lot though. It sort of recharged me for my last few months before I come home. 

This week was good. The missionary work was very normal and we worked well. At this point in my mission everything seems very normal and not much stands out to me or gets me so excited. Not in a bad way, haha. I think you understand what I mean. Like if a monkey came and jumped on me... For me that is super normal but for you guys it is unique. I just don't think to write home about such things and soon forget they even happened. 

As far as work went this week we found a few new investigators. The first is the Congolese family I told you about over the call. We have an appointment with hem on Tuesday and I am excited for it. Another is named Aisha (goodness, another Aisha). She is a Muslim in a way. She was born Muslim but has never really practiced. When both of her parents died she just dropped it all together and has been without religion for a while. We picked her up Sunday morning and walked with her to church. She loved it and loved how friendly everyone was. So we are excited for her. Another is Joseph. I might have mentioned him earlier. He is from South Sudan and is really a smart guy. He is 28 and in the later years of his college. He is really interested in the church. Currently he is Jehovah's Witness but has found many flaws in that church. Right now he is pretty happy with what he has found in ours. Right now, that is the small update on our work this side. 

Well, I believe that is it for the week. Again, it was great to see your guys yesterday. Have a good week! I Love you all!!

Love,

Elder McLain

CRAZY CONNECTION OF THE DAY! Courage's current companion is Elder Cooper's older brother! Elder Cooper is the adopted Ethiopian that came on his mission with me. I met him at the airport and we have been pretty much best buds since we met. He is from Salem Utah and we will probably be good friends at home. And his older brother (not adopted) is Courage's companion! How awesome is that?!

Elder Tamakloe (Courage - on the right) with Elder Cooper 

I am too blessed!

Hey guys,

Well it was a pretty eventful week for me in Nsambya. I am still seriously adjusting to the life and culture of serving here in Uganda. I have easily been the most culture shocked on my return to Uganda than any other time in my life. I think it is because going to Ethiopia I hadn't really immersed myself into any culture and was still pretty much a typical American teenager. But now coming back to Uganda, even after knowing the culture before hand, I had fully immersed myself in the culture of Ethiopia and am really confused and whacked up on how to act/talk/travel here. All things I do I am pretty much noticed haha. My companions and the members can easily tell that I have not been in Uganda a long time. In fact, most of the Nsambya ward thinks that my companion is training me!  I just let them all think what they want, haah!

So first things first, I fell sick this week! Funny enough I started out on Tuesday with a bad cold. I had a fever, chills, sore throat, head aches, plugged ears and all that jazz. It lasted a good 3 days and kept me inside most of the time and out of the hot sun. On the third day I woke up with a paining eye. Wasn't sure what was wrong and so I just went about my day. By Saturday my eye was just super duper fat and in the most pain I have been in on my mission. Seriously it was so painful! I called Sister Collings and she had me go to the doctor to get it checked. I guess I got Staph in my eye....  or rather on my eye lid. It was one of the more painful things I have experienced in a long time. I really didn't think something so small could hurt so bad. Every single tiny movement just made my whole face ache. So I pretty much spent Friday - Sunday laying on the couch with an ice pack and a good book. It was an eventful weekend! I was able to go to church though. Can't miss that one! Right now it is all a bit better. I think by tomorrow i should be back to regular proselyting schedule. So that is my week for the most part!

Now I can tell you a little bit about my ward. Nsambya ward. As I said earlier in my serving here, I was trained in the neighboring area Makindye. While I served in Makindye I was ALWAYS jealous of Nsambya. It had a higher attendance, nicer and cleaner area, more active members, etc. You name it Nsambya had it. So I was thrilled beyond thrilled to find out I would serve here. And now, 18 months later it is still the best! Our ward is about 115 active members strong. Kind of funny that this ward alone has more active members than the entire country of Ethiopia! gulp.... Anyways, it is powerful here. We have about 12 ward missionaries assigned from the branch to help us and almost any of them can help at any time. And they do! We have members from Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Ethiopia, Congo, Kenya, Ghana and Liberia. So across the board we have members who can speak most any language found in West, Central and East Africa. And that helps us a lot. We can find people who will help us teach in Luganda, Swahili, French, Kiswahili, Kinyarwanda, Amharic, Tigrigna, and so on. So yeah, we got the hook ups. We have some seriously awesome members. Some of my favorites for the time are these: 

Castro: He is a Ugandan that was baptized a little less than a year ago. He is around our age and super energetic about the work. He can help us any time and is really fun to be around.

Patrick: Hahaha Patrick is a joker. He has been a member for years and is in his late 20's. He knows missionaries and the mission cultures really well and pretty much fits in perfectly as a missionary. He is a good friend.

Aisha: She is from Burundi. She speaks 1 million languages (not really of course) and was formerly Muslim. She is super willing to help us at any time. 

Bishop Omuya: He is a younger and energetic Bishop. He is a returned missionary and is powerful when it comes to helping the work here. I think that is why the work is so strong in this ward. If the Bishop or Branch President is active in the work, it will do well.

And there are a few other members but because of time I will just go forward. I will probably talk about them over time. So, the ward is doing really well!

As for investigators, we are a bit low right now. I came into a somewhat slow area. And then immediately fell sick and we haven't been able to do much work yet. So this week will be a critical week for us and we will be doing a lot of finding and teaching to progress the area we are in. Just a few investigators we have are these:

Joseph: He is a South Sudanese man who has been living in Uganda for some time. He is 28 and educated. He is super duper powerful. I can't imagine he would not be baptized in the coming weeks. He was found while walking home and "talking to everyone". 

Alfred and family: They were an old family that was learning for a while and dropped. They have now been contacted again and we are reteaching them. It is a family of 8, 6 are of age to be baptized. They progress slowly but could soon be baptized.

Aisha: She is from Western Uganda and is the niece of a recent convert. She is Muslim but loves church and is willing to learn more. She came to church this Sunday and we will start the lessons with her soon. She is 18 and has a 1 year old baby. Great girl.

And so that is my wrap up of the work and the ward I am in. I hope it's sufficient and you can get an idea of what work is going on here. It is all going pretty well. Side note, I live in a super nice and brand new apartment that is in the middle of the bush. Imagine that! It is sooooo sweet. Nice shower, kitchen and all that jazz. I am too blessed!

Have a great week everyone! 

Love,
Elder McLain

Classic Uganda

My Ethiopians friends here in Uganda. 

Keeping me up on my amharic!

 Alpha's birthday party

 Visiting Nylam's house

 Got a Staph infection in my eye. 

Looked like a goob for a couple days. Still do actually.

 At Nylam's again.

Not sure what I'm doing 

I met Jackson Long (formerly Elder Long) today!
 It was pretty cool to see an older missionary again. I miss those days!

My last meal in Ethiopia.

Yummy Tibbs Firfir