Christmas!

Best Christmas present EVER!!! He is doing so good and it was so good to hear his voice and the little bit of an accent that he has already picked up! He loves Ghana, loves the people, and loves being a missionary!  We love him and LOVE seeing him so happy!  

Transfers Dec. 18, 2017

Hey Ma, I've tried to send my email twice but it won't work, We're on the worst computers I've ever seen and I only have about 20 seconds to type and send before it deletes it. Sorry there's no long email this week but we had two baptisms. One was a 14 year old boy and one was a fisherman.  Elder Hess will be transferred this week and my new companion is Elder Nick Phiri (pronounced Fury like nick Fury on the Avengers ha ha) from Zimbabwe.  Elder Hess was in the MTC with him and says he is a cool guy.  No pictures this week again, I think I have a virus on my card because I can't get anything to open up.  Welcome to Africa! ha

The Polar Express Dec. 11, 2017

Well this was a pretty exciting week. We went to the mission home and had our Christmas Zone Conference. It was just some small instruction and then we ate bow tie noodles with chicken and pea alfredo sauce. It was sooo good. We also watched the polar express and lots of the Africans thought it was a little strange because they don't know who santa was but it was fun. This is the last week of the transfer so Elder Hess might be gone. Other than that its been a normal week.

 Tarkwa Zone

 We had discussions about the Savior.  Our first mission purpose is to "seek the love of the Lord".

the entire mission got to be part of the Hillam Family Christmas Pageant. I am a Shephard.

"Holy Ghost Fire!" Dec. 3, 2017

Well, this was a pretty good week. We had 8 new investigators, and now have 10 investigators with a baptismal dates, but since everyone decided to travel all at once we had a big fat 0 for inv. at church Sunday when we usually have like 5 or 6, at least. We did get to play some volleyball at Axim beach hotel today right on the beach. They have really good American food there and one of our church members is in charge of it and a few others work there. It was really nice to acually do somthing on p-day other than wash clothes and clean the apartment. This week has gotten really really hot and we get 20 yards away from the apartment and we're already soaked in sweat. There's been lots of Church Crusades, which is just a really loud all night church program which will usally last about a week. We have a few close to the apartment and all we can hear all night is preachers yelling "Holy Ghost Fire" and then speak in tongues, which is usually just the pastor yelling one word over and over like "walawalawalawala".  
 Missions are really sweet you just have to stop worrying about anything but the work, when we're set apart we're literally set apart from the world. We dont have to worry about getting a job or money, you don't have to worry about friends, you don't have to worry about yourself, you do your part and the Lord will take care of everything else, for all that God has done for me, Two years of 100% is the least I can give back, and God will bless me and my family and the mission isn't just for God but it has already truly converted me and will give me skills that I can use my entire life. I have probably tripled my testimony in the 3 months (on Wednesday) that I've been out. And that's everything new for this week!

Dirty Font Nov. 27, 2017

Hey! There wasn't tons new that happened this week. It's hard to believe it's almost December and there's no snow on the ground at home. I've been out in the field for 2 months as of yesterday and I can't believe it. It still feels like I just got here. We celebrated Thanksgiving with instant potatoes and meat from the meat stand and there was no football, so not quite the same as at home haha. 

And something I forgot to mention last week, when we started filling up the font, we went to sunday school and when we went to check on it the water was nasty. Turns out that the pump for the well at the chapel broke and it filled with city water but we went through with the baptism anyway. But thanks to the Clemets ( our elderly couple for Axim) it was fixed the nexy day haha. Other than that its been a pretty normal week.

 Dirty Font

Interview with the President this week

 

African Antelope

African Bee

Baptism! Nov. 20, 2017

Well, I finally got my first baptism this week. It was the Elders quorum president's wife and their family is super excited cause now the whole family are members. Her name is Sister Yankey and she was the 2nd person I ever taught and she didn't make it easy but after 8 weeks we finally got it done. It was a little slow when i got here but now if everything goes as planned by the end of December we should have 5 more baptisms. 

I'm loving Ghana but there's a joke that your body doesn't get used to the food, your body just gets used to diarrhea haha. The food here is still super good though. Other than that it's been a pretty normal week, and as always, it's been getting hotter and hotter everyday.

Sister Yankey

   

How many Members can you Cram in a Van! Nov. 13, 2017

This week was pretty exciting. We had our district conference ( a district is a small stake like a branch compared to a ward). We had to travel to Takoradi for it and so the church got 3 15 passenger vans. Well we fit 33 in each van and it was super crammed and way hot and we had to travel 2 hours there and another 2 hours back. It was a super good conference though. It's been getting hotter and hotter then just randomly rain crazy hard for an hour then back to hot and twice as humid cause of the water evaporating, but what I hear this is nothing compared to how hot and humid it'll get in January. We also got 2 new Elders in our apartment straight from the MTC. Both of them are from the DR Congo and speak French but they've gotten pretty good at english. We're finally going to have a baptism this week for a lady named Sister Yankey. Her husband is the Elders Quorum pres. and was one of the original members in Ghana.  The church has only been here for 40 years. So it's super exciting to their family because their whole family will finally be members. 
Because of the dry season there has been a ton of roaches. We usually have 2 in the apartment a day that we kill. They're all around 3 in long and can fly. Elder Hess even had one in his shoe once. We were getting ready to exercise and he was putting on his tennis shoes, and because its so hot we usually don't wear socks when we work out cause we sweat too much if we do, but he put his whole bare foot in and realized there was something in his shoe and  ripped it off and a huge roach fell out haha. We now check all of our shoes before we put them on. Other than that Ghana is still awesome, the mission is still awesome, and I'm still loving it.

 Elder Owens (elder hess' trainer), Elder Hess (my trainer), Elder Brown (elder Owens is training and my mtc buddy) & Me

      

Lots of Travels Nov. 6, 2017

This week has been a pretty busy week. On Monday we traveled 2 hours to Takoradi and spent the night with the Elders there. Then Tuesday we traveled another 2 hours to Cape Coast to do our follow up trainers meeting. We traveled the entire 4 hours back to Axim that night. Then the next day we had to travel back to Takoradi for a Mission tour with Elder Nash of the seventy. The tour was really good and we got to hear 4 hours of talks from Elder Nash. We then spend the night in Takoradi again and we finally made it back Friday Afternoon. It's been super hot though and last night it started raining harder then I've ever seen and a crazy thunderstorm and we had no power from 8:00 at night until today at about 2:00. We got our hair cut today and the barber totally butchered Elder Hess' hair but mine turned out alright haha.  

 (He was telling us more about his week and he must have lost power or wifi (very typical) because we got cut off in the middle!  We'll take whatever we can get and we'll look forward to next Monday! ;)

this is a car we saw ... we laughed at what it said above

When it Rains it Pours...Literally! (...in Blessings too!) Oct. 30, 2017

Well, I've made it halfway through my training. People say the first 6 months of your mission are the slowest and if this is slow then the next 18 months will feel like 2 weeks. I love my mission and I love Ghana. It's been getting hotter and hotter everyday and super humid, but on saturday it rained super hard. It started out really hot in the morning then it just randomly started raining harder than I've ever seen. Within 2 min the streets were full of running water and we got super wet. To get around we were walking through water and trying to get around the really big streams of water but there was just too much. It rained like that for about 2 hours and just stopped and it got hot again. When it's hot after it rains its super humid and we didn't really dry off cause we got super sweaty. Luckily that morning I took all my clothes off the lines and brought them inside, but Elder Hess didn't and his stuff got wet and some fell off the line into the mud. Other than that its been a pretty normal week. We have 8 people with baptismal dates.  I've really started to pick up on the local dialect. And as they say here Ubishiai (until we meet)

the street about 2 minutes into the storm

HOT! Oct. 23, 2017

These last two weeks were pretty good. The dry season finally hit and when I said Ghana wasn't as hot or humid as I expected I take that back. I'm still loving it here in Axim and we've been teaching a lot more people lately. There's a man named Richmond and when we first met him it was because he was at a shop that his daughter, who we were teaching, owns and that lesson was just pretty much a 45 min argument over what the gift of tongues was. The spirit wasn't present at all and finally Elder Suah, who was with us because his companion was at a district leader meeting, bore his testimony and it was super strong and the argument stopped. Anyway, he agreed to take a Book Of Mormon and wanted to meet again. When we went to teach him again I wasn't too exited because I thought it was just gonna be another bible bash, but he was telling us how he was skeptical about the BoM but he read the intro and some parts and he was really interested and the next couple lessons were really good. He's super smart and its nice to teach someone like that cause most of the other people we have to simplify a lot cause they don't understand very well. But I'm still enjoying every second of the mission and it's been a great experience so far. I've only been in the feild for about a month but I've improved in so many ways spiritually.

Elder Harris 

  Our church building

 Baptismal font

We kill a few of these roaches every morning.  They're about 2 inches long.

Rain Rain Rain Oct. 9, 2017

This week it rained more then I've ever seen. It was probably raining 70% of the time and it gets super muddy. The mud here is really thick like clay and the bottom of our pants always get so muddy. I've had a lot of FM's (free meals) this week and there are some interesting meals in Ghana. But one member made us spaghetti and it was good but there was so much pepe on it. They really put pepe in everything. The power goes out all the time too. It doesn't get incredibly hot in the day but you sweat like crazy. It also gets really cool at night. Its weird here cause it gets light at 7 in the morning but is dark by 6:15 and everyone goes to bed at like 6:30-7 except the people who drink all night. Everybody here loves the U.S. and always want us to tell them about it cause they all want to go there. I've seen way more American flags and things like that way more than any Ghana stuff. Church here is also in Fante or Ezma so me and my companion can't understand a word so it gets a little boring but its still fun. I am learning a little fante.   I'm still loving Ghana and the people here are really sweet. 

 This little guy's name is Courage and he is my favorite.  They are new members and any time we come by, their mom, Sister Beatrice feeds us amazing food.  She is a great cook.  She makes these cinnamon pancake type things that are so good.

I Made it to the Mission Field Oct. 2, 2017

        Well, I finally made it to the mission field and its been great, my companion, Elder Hess, is from Ashton. It's funny we live about 15 min away yet the first time we ever meet just happened to be in the middle of Africa haha. I'm in a town in west Ghana called Axim and its awesome. Were right on the coast and we have a balcony on our apartment that looks over the ocean. I guess we also have the best apartment in the cape coast mission and its probably the nicest building in Axim. People here are awesome and especially the members. All the little kids always yell "obroonie" over and over when they see us and run up to give us high fives. The food here is actually pretty good. I finally had Fu-Fu and its actually really good. Its just pounded casava in a bowl of groundnut soup. The problem is that its really filling and I had to eat like 3 pounds of it in a gallon of soup and the rule is you have to eat it all, i could barely finish it and then when I thought I was given another bowl. Luckily one of the other elders there loves fu-fu and when the sister wasnt looking he hurry and took half of it but I still had to put down another half a bowl. I was so full I didn't eat untill lunch the next day. I also already own a machete cause we farm every saturday morning on a member Brother Armoos farm. He grows pinapples, mangos, and casava. He also has to kill at least one python a week cause there's so many at his farm. All the fruit here is amazing and especially the pinapple. Brother Armoo is known for having the best pinapple in all of West Ghana so I'm excited for the harvest at the end of this month cause I guess he gives the missionarys loads of 'em. I'm really loving Ghana and I'm glad this is where the Lord wants me to be. 

 First meal in Mission Home

President and Sister Hillam from Idaho Falls, Idaho

 All the new missionaries from the MTC

getting some training before we head out

Elder Hess from Ashton, Id

                                     
                                                              Pineapple farm

My machete is about 3 inches wide to compare how big this centipede is.  It's bigger around than my finger.

Our apartment.  We have mosquito nets although so far I have only seen maybe 2 mosquitos.

MTC

Hey Mom, I made it to the mtc and I'm doing good. The plane rides were not that bad but they were really long, we never had more than a 30 min layover at any of the airports. At salt lake there was 35 elders. It wasnt as hot as I thought and the humidity wasnt as bad as iIthought it would be but there's definitely a difference. We're the 2nd group to go through the new mtc and theres 200 exactly. I'm companions with a native ghana missionary Elder Osei, he's going to serve in Nigeria. Africa is not what i thought and Accra is a really big and modern city. The airport lost all three of the bags for the natives and I was at the Ghana airport for 4 hours before they finally found 2 of them and are sending the third one today, I will have to stay at the mtc for 3 weeks but im glad im not a french speaking mission cause they have to be here for 2 months. I already miss home a little but glad I'm here. I cant wait untill i actually get out on my mission cause from what I hear the mtc isnt that fun. Tell everyone hi, love ya 

 1st companion- Elder Osei from Kumasi, Ghana.  He will be serving in Nigeria

 We still get American food once in a while.

 this little tiny Elder is 25 years old

my bedroom 

view out of my bedroom window in the mtc.. Accra