See my sister's mission blog here!

Monday, June 24, 2013

Yes, Some PICTURES!!!!

Hey family!!!! Guess what!?!?!? I got some of the pictures to work. Here's a few of them! I hope to have more up soon!


got to see an awesome sunset!! i was way happy because we dont see them very often!!!!!

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
So this guys name is Bruce he is a refugee from ivory coast, he is a member and he is awesome!!! he has had a lot of hardship he lost his wife recently and he has 2 little girls. he works in a small scale mine and anywhere else he can to help support his little girls. i love the guy

 
just a picture of me in the road:)

 
So you remember how i did a service project and moved dirt for a foundation of a house, well we went to see how it was coming and its doing great!!! they are building now and have the first round of bricks in!! its huge!!
 
Here's two pictures of the foundation before... Remember these???
 
 

 
 
 

The Work is Moving On!

Hey guys! Here's the new letter for the week!
I am still working on all the pictures, and I think I'm making some head-way, so we'll See if I can get them together pretty soon here!

Dear Family!!!!
Every week here is so awesome!! and time just seems to fly by!!! it was only yesterday that june started and now its basically over!!!!!! i am loving it out here!!! i wish you could all come and see how amazing it is here. the people, the culture, the heat, hahaha everything!!!! its all incredible!!!
Tuesday we woke up early because we were having zone conference. we traveled from tarkwa to takoradi about 2 hours and then takoradi to sekondi about 15 minutes. we had an awesome zone conference. Sister Shulz called up everyone who has had a birthday in the last 3 months and gave us all a present!! it was sweet because i got something and i wasnt even here on my birthday!! hahaha then we had instruction for 3 hours. all of it was based on being obedient to the rules and making sacrifices!!! hahaha i just remembered that i emailed you guys last week after zone conference so ill just move on hahaha
Wednesday we were back in our area and back to work. we have been teaching a lot of great people and i love them so much!!! the old woman, sister paulina, She is so amazing!!! whenever we come she either makes us food or buys us ice cream and she is so powerful in our lessons!! she is going to be baptized this sunday!!! i cant wait!!!!! wednesday night we had mid week and our branch president brought a movie with him for us to watch. Its called "Our Testimony" its about the history of the church in Ghana and it is awesome!!!!!! Dad if you can get your hands on a copy you should!! it really is incredible!!! it was nice because it fired everyone up that was there about helping us with missionary work.
Thursday, Friday and Saturday were all awesome too!!!! good hard working and teaching days!! i am getting better at the language but im still really far from being good at it. i have gained a great love for the scriptures and for studying!! when we do personal study i start reading and studying different things and it feels like 2 seconds and its over!! but in reality i study for an hour!!! i wish i could do more!! haha being out here on mission is so incredible!!! i wish i could just bring you out here for a day and show you what its all like!! you wouldnt believe it!
Sunday was great!!! church went awesome!! we had a bunch of investigators come, including these guys that weve been teaching for a super long time!! they have never come since i got here. i promised them if they came i would make them pancakes hahaha. so today that is what i did and they loved them. after church we went to a members house and they fed us lunch and we had a good time. we then went and met with a few other members and had lessons with them because they had some questions for us.
Today was nice we got everything done that we wanted to and i even got my first ghanaian haircut!!! its awesome!! so thats the week!!!! i hope you all are doing great and being safe!!!! i love you!!!!
Love, Elder McGuire

Saturday, June 22, 2013

Crazy Week On Two Different Continents

Hey Everyone! This is Elder McGuire's letter to us from this past Tuesday (the 18th). I'm sorry it has taken so long to get this one up (I have been at Youth Conference all week). Here's the letter, Enjoy!
Oh, and I'm still working on getttingthe pictures to work, so I'll see if I can get them up this time.

Dear Family!!!
Wow! it sounds like so much is going on back home!! a new furnace??? a new roof??? a new grill?? what next??? tell me youre going to re-model the basement bathroom:) hahaha it all sounds great!!!! thats so awesome that jason finally got out! he is going to enjoy!!
As far as this week goes it was great!!! so last monday night instead of going back to tarkwa we stayed the night in takoradi because the next day was combined district meeting. so we had fun staying at the apartment here with all the elders. its nice to be able to talk to and have fun with them.
Tuesday we had a good district meeting and then headed home for tarkwa. because we went to the cocoa factory last week we didnt have time to wash or shop so we came back and did those things and still had time for a nice lesson by the end of the night.
Wednesday we were back to work out teaching again. this week we worked alot with our recent converts and also with the 2 candidates for baptism upcoming next week. in all the lessons we spoke about some gospel principle related to family. in one of our lessons we even took all our pictures from home and showed them to everyone!!! so i have missed you guys this week a little more than normal but its all been great. i appreciate all of you so much!!! thank you for all that you have done for me so that i could be here today. this really is the best thing that i have ever done!!!
Thursday was great because we got one of our members to come out proselyting with us. we always get so much more done when the members are helping us out. we were able to teach a bunch of new people and its good because when we teach with members the people can see just how normal we really are. Thursday night we were walking back and some people stopped us and asked us all of these questions about the church. they had all heard a bunch of rumors about us and it was sad to see some of peoples perceptions about the church. some of them made me kindof mad too but we did our best to help them understand the truth about the church.
Friday was also good because again we had a member with us and we had a lesson for almost every hour in the day. it was sweet!!! now given almost every one of them fell through we still managed to teach a lot and to meet some good people on the street. that night the member that was with us took us out to dinner and it was awesome!! they have this soda here called Alvaro that is awesome!!! if you can find it in america you should try it! so we had fun with that.
Saturday was a slow day because all of our members were in takoradi for leadership training and a lot of our investigators were out of town as well. luckily tarkwa is a big place so we went and explored some new areas we didnt know very well and did contacting. we also did get to teach 1 of our investigators who is a 12 year old boy named Parden. we've taught him a lot but we have hit a brick wall with him. his parents arent sure that they want him to read the book of mormon so teaching has come to a stand still but we are still doing our best to work with him. so saturday instead of teaching a lesson with him we played ping pong and a board game with him and just strengthened our friendship with him. it was great and we were able to talk to some of his friends about the church too.
Sunday was the best day this week!!!!!!! we woke up and got ready for church and prep. our lessons and were ready for church to start. the mission couple assigned to our area showed up!!! he is also president shulz's Counselor. so President and sister Bybee came. and guess what they brought me?!?!?!........I got the package!!!!!!!!!!!!! along with 4 other letters!!!!!!! they showed them to me just as we were starting church so i couldnt open them till later!! but it was okay. church went great!! and You remember prince??? man he is so powerful and me and him are like best friends. he has also made great friends with another guy in the branch and he is loving it!! AND he is going to be the 1st counselor in the new young mens presidency too!!!! im so happy its indescribable!!!! this guy is awesome!!!! so after church we went to a few members homes for meals and also got to teach a great lesson. then finally we came home and i got to open the letters and the package!!!! thankyou so much!!! the sauces and the mixes will be awesome!! and also the candy is sweet!!!! thank you so much!!!! hahaha
Ok so monday was p-day we did our washing and shopping and had some people from cape coast come out and look at the font to see if they can fix it. we went to email and some one in the night had come and dug up the internet cables for the town out of the ground and stole them!! so there was no internet in tarkwa!!! thankfully today we had zone conference in takoradi so that is why im emailing on tuesday. this week has been great!! i hope everyone has a great time at Journey!! and i hope mom and the boys have a relaxing time at home!!!! i love you all!! have a great week!!
Love, Elder Bradley McGuire
P.S. no mom i havent had any sickness and the mosquitos arent any problem its all good!!

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

No Pictures! :(

Sorry family! Elder McGuire did send us many more pictures this week, but they just aren't working with my computer. It may take some time and some fiddling with, but I should have them up and going soon! One of the funny things about this whole thing is that the computers that Elder McGuire is using are so out of date that my new laptop just can't handle it! But it luckily we've been able to work past a lot of those things. Here's hoping I can get these pictures to work too!


He Likes FUFU!!!

Hey Guys! Sorry this one's a little late! It's been crazy!

Dear Family!!!
Wow!! it sounds like you all have had quite the week!!! i hope you are all having fun!!! it sounds like its been a blast!!!!!! out here has been amazing!!!!! So if you remember last week while i was emailing it was raining a ton!!!!! so since it was raining so much we ended up staying the night in takoradi at one of the elders apartments there were 8of us and it was so much fun!!!
We finally got back to tarkwa around 2 pm tuesday and we hadnt done any of our washing or shopping or cleaning or anything so the rest of the day we finished all of that stuff.
Wednesday was a working day and we taught a bunch of really good powerful lessons and had a great time. Thursday, friday and saturday were all the same work work work!!! it is so awesome being out here. the people are great and the culture is amazing And i never thought i would say this but I ABSOLUTELY LOVE FUFU!!!!!! hahaha it is so good ive had it 4 times this week and i love it!!!!! i am going to learn how to make it so when i come home i can let you my wonderful family taste it;) hahaha it has been raining a lot lately!! rainy season is in full swing and it rains for at least 4 hours everyday and it rains HARD!!! luckily we are in lessons most the time that it is raining and we have our umbrellas to keep us dry the rest of the time. but we do still get pretty wet but its all fun.
Sunday was really good. our investigators all came to church and they all understood the lessons really well. then after church we went to a members house and they fed us this stuff called red red. its fried plantain with beans and rice and it is awesome!!! we then had another meal at the branch presidents home right after and it was really good fufu. also on sunday we were walking through town when one of the crazy homeless people stopped us and talked to us. we talked for a second and then said that we had to go. She asked us for money and we said no as usual. as i was turning away from her she took my planner out of my shirt pocket and started to walk off with it!!!!!! i yelled and said hey give it back! she said "Give me money!!" i said no! just give it back to me. she said no i want money!! so i was going to give her about the equivalent of 10 cents because usually that makes them happy. She said no i want more than that. i said no just give it back. hahaha she then acted like she was gonna rip it in half so i just said "forget it!!" and we walked off. i was mad because we only get planners once a transfer and i hate using loose paper. i had also just gotten some new contacts and referrals in it. luckily i had an extra planner that i had got at the mtc back in provo when i worked there so its all ok but it was just kindof a crazy experience haha.
Today for p-day everyone in the zone came to takoradi and even president shulz came and we toured a cocoa factory here in the city. it was pretty sweet but we werent allowed to take pictures inside but it was cool. this week has been awesome!!! i hope you all keep having fun and be safe!!!!!!! mom that is so awesome that you ride so much!!! the branch has about 50 members here and is growing. im pretty sure we walk at least 15 miles everyday because tarkwa is huge!!! we actually got a scary call this week from president shulz. he had previously told us he was planning on sending more missionaries to tarkwa in july. we have been working hard with the members to set up a group that would eventually become another branch but the members arent really doing much about it. president shulz told us that if a unit isnt established no missionaries will come and he will pull me and elder moleme out of our area. its sad because the area only opened in november last year!!! so we are working super hard to get it going!!!! anyway thats the week!!! love you guys!!!
Love, Elder McGuire

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

New week, New PICTURES!!!! :)

Elder McGuire sent lots of really cool pictures, but they just aren't downloading the right way.

Here is one picture that Elder Cardon's mother sent to us. This is a picture of zone conference.

Elder McGuire is in the back row, the 2nd from the right.

New week, New Stories!

Sorry it has taken me so long to get Bradley's letter up this week. Things have been a little crazy! Anyway, here's his letter for the week.... (with pictures to follow of course.)

Hey Family!!!!!!
Wow!!!! what a week!!!! i dont even know where to begin!!!! this week has been soo amazing!! i guess ill start back at monday
So monday when we went out proselyting we went and held family home evening with some members in our ward. it was kindof a last minute thing but they made dinner for us and it was a really awesome night!!
Tuesday was really good and it was cool for me because i led almost all of the discussions and lessons that we had and they were all really sweet!!! the spirit was way strong and it was so encouraging to me to be able to be doing better in my teaching!!!
Wednesday went great!! we had a lot of lessons and it also rained a ton!!! rainy season has officially begun out here it has rained everyday this week and it has made it hard to make it to all of our lessons but we are doing our best and have done pretty good considering all of it.
Thursday and Friday were also basically the same, just hard working days and meeting with a bunch of people!!!! on thursday we met this guy on the street and he asked us to come teach him the next day. we came and the lesson went great!! he told us that he has had a way hard life his parents died when he was 12 then he lived with an old man for 5 years until the old man died. he is now 22 and has been on his own ever since. he has never really gone to church or knew much about Heavenly Father or Jesus Christ. I asked him how he would feel if i told him he could see his parents again one day and he was so happy that he almost started crying. the spirit was so powerful and it was a great lesson and afterwards he asked us if one day he could be a missionary like us!! it was so sweet, we told him if he worked hard and listened to what we taught that he could make it and he told us that he would!!
Saturday came around and we had a great day!! we taught a bunch of lessons and they were all great!! halfway through the day it was raining and the only place for us to get out of the rain was in a bar. it was raining super hard so elder moleme took a video of it and while he was doing it a drunk guy thought he was taking a picture of him and was angry and he took elder molemes camera and almost threw it on the ground but we stopped him and got it back and calmed him down but it was super funny!!!! then that evening our district leader came and interviewed the 14 year old girl for her baptism on sunday and she passed and did great!!!!
Ok Now for Sunday!!! So sunday was a super busy day and was by far the best day this week!! we woke up and got ready for the day and then went and picked up that kid we met thursday for church. then we got back just in time for church to start. church went awesome!!! so if you remember that old woman sister Paulina, she finally came to church!!!!!!! sunday was her 60th birthday and she wanted to start coming on that day so she came and it was great!!!!!! all of our investigators came this week and it is the first time that has happened since ive been here. after church we had a baptism!!!! it was for a 14 year old girl named abigail. She is so awesome and i was the one who got to baptize her. again our font was leaking so we had to do another sitting baptism. we are getting someone to come from headquarters to fix it this week. after church it started raining an rained for 4 hours!!!!! we finally got to leave the apartment at 5:15, the branch presidents wife called and told us to come and eat dinner with them and so we ran down there and ate with them. then at 6 Sister paulina called us and told us since it was her birthday she wanted us to celebrate with her and her family. they came and picked us up and took us to a way nice resteraunt that reminds me of a nice one back home and it was way sweet!!! they bought us this curry chicken with french fries and it was the best thing ive eatin since i got here!! then they pulled out this huge tub of ice cream and made us eat the whole thing!!!! it was soo good but we were soo full!! earlier this week since it was her bday on sunday we took some pics with her and i made a frame for them out of a cardboard box and athletic tape and it was sweet. she treats us like her kids now hahaha she is so awesome!!
Today has been great!! we came to takoradi today for a combined pday and we all played basketball and football and had a blast!! we then went out for lunch and now are all emailing. were kinda all stranded at this internet cafe because there is so much rain that there is 3 foot deep river outside the door and its making it so people cant leave, and most of the roads are flooded too so i hope i get back to the apartment before late but i doubt it. it sounds like everyone is doing great back home!!!! make sure to be having fun as always!!!
I love you guys!!!
Love Elder McGuire