Not for the Faint of Heart

Anything I buy, I buy off the side of the road and I have to bargain for the price!  It stinks being white. Because every time if they don't know you, well they Oh Broney price you!  That's where you are white and they think you are rich, so they double their usual price.

I think I was telling people lately that my name meant loved messenger of God.

Oh and our name in Swahili is Mguu (mm-go). So yeah it's pretty cool so far yeah!

Gracie I love all of the pictures you do for me! I have them all in a special box! :)  

Here for Christmas I don't think they get very much unless they lived in America or they are rich. Christmas here is going to be mostly a regular day, but if I was in the bush (the bush is like the forest or wild) I would get fed sooo much!

The kids here love me, so I help them with all sorts of stuff and sometimes we walk them to church! It is cool!

Dude I wish I could watch movies here. Actually if I wanted to I could do it so easily.  Because I have a dvd player for training, or our land lord has a huge tv that he would definitely let me use if I asked. And I can get 2 movies for 1 Cedi.  So temptation is there, but not really. I am too busy studying and serving to waste time with a movie. But don't worry in 2 years, I am going to not move from the couch for a few days ;)

I wish I could play more soccer, but man there is no time! Most of the time I don't even have clean laundry!

Yeah so funerals back home are terrible.  Here our land lady died last Sunday and we had a week of partying! Like fully 7 days of over 100 people in our compound eating food.  And last night was the last night, so they spent thousands of dollars on music, alcohol, food, chairs, and a bunch of other random stuff.  There was a couple hundred people stuffed into our compound.  We even had a drunk dude passed out on our roof!  It was so fun!!  We couldn't really participate, but we live there so I got a ton of food and mineral (pop).

 Elder Thornhill and I went out back and got to pound fufu for this lady named Matilda.  She is like the hired help almost.   For pounding fufu, there is like a wooden stump with a cake pan sort of cut out and it is flat and smooth.  And you have a huge stick that has been manipulated to look kind of like a flower at the bottom and  you smash it.  Thump Thump Thump.   All the while  you are pounding, you have someone with their hand in the stump turning the fufu.   It goes fast, and it is dangerous, so it was super cool!

I am adjusting pretty well I think.   Today, I had to wash out a pot with my hand... oh yeah the pot was completely filled with 5 week old stew that had maggots in it.   Yep, mission is sweet!

NOT FOR THE FAINT HEARTED:

 Also for a wedding on Saturday, they butchered a cow like 3 feet from our apartment.   It was sooo cool!! It took like 10 minutes to die, because they just cut out a chunk of its neck.   And it was squirting blood all over.   It filled a bucket and a bowl!   The cows here are already scary looking!

Oh yes I have gotten 2 packages so far!!  And I got a lot of the song lyrics!!  Which was awesome, because it came as 40 some odd letters.  And I just looked like a boss with all that mail :)  Yeah does the dear elder website cost anything? (not to some missions...Ghana Accra West has a free mailing option.  He got them the same week we submitted them online, much faster than regular mail)

I don't know what kind of celebration they have here for Thanksgiving, or if it is even a big deal.  ELder Thorhill and I are the only Americans in our apartment.  We are going to get dashed a rabbit today, and we are doing that for our Thanksgiving haha.  When someone gives you something for free, we say they dashed it.   So we are doing family home evenig at this member's house, and they have a small rabbit farm.

Ok so Cedi, the money, is said like See-Dee.  And Twi is said like Chwree, but the"w" is almost non existent and the "r" is really fast and short.  The things here are weird to say,  so it's hard to accurately describe some of the sounds over email, but don't worry I'll do my best!

The work is hard, but it is also sweet.  I never know how a day is going to go, and every week my goals and expectations are destroyed.  Every week I get on my knees and sweep up the pieces, because I know that no matter how poorly things are going or how sad the outcome of my week, I have something to say and the more I say it the more will listen. I have been called to serve and I intend to do that by serving people and the Lord. I don't have to convert everyone, I just have to love them.

Love Elder Legg