Week 52- Happy Anniversary! 1 year!!

This week was pretty awesome! It was my comps birthday on saturday and we had a family night planned with some members and investigators and like half the branch showed up. And i guess they knew it was his birthday somehow... So after it was all over they brought out a cake and started singing to him. 

I drank my first milk that came from a cow from here. (usually its milk from portugal). Its super sour from here. But they love it so i stayed strong and pretended i liked it haha.

Also for firsts i was on divisions and i was working out with one of those giant rubberband things and it slipped up and whacked me in the eyes. I was slightly terrified i was going to be blind haha. But it was fine just had to sit and put some ice on it because one of my eyes wasnt adjusting but its all good now.

I gave like my second talk in church on the mission haha. And had like 4 minutes to prepare it. Oh well i hope it helped someone!

Still just walking a lot of dirt paths in the country side to teach people. And when its super far hopping in the back of trucks. That basically sums up whats going on in this area haha.

Happy early birthdays Cyrus and tim! Party it up! 

Im getting worse and worse at these letters haha! sorry!

Love you all!

Love 

Elder McMullin

Week 51

Well this week is gonna be short... sorry! The branch here is really cool. its different because i went from a ward of like 20 years to a branch of 3 years. And yet we have more rms in this branch haha. But its a nice change to be working in a branch again.

We had a couple investigators at church this week which was a really nice change haha. A couple of them were brought by a member that actually lives in portugal in the ward of my companion. Strange huh. Well he really wants us to teach his family before he heads back to portugal here in a little bit so we will be teaching them. 

We had our first zone meeting here that i was here for. I only knew like one person in the zone and ive been out for quite a while but thats what happens when your mission is divided between islands. 

As for the christmas season i have only seen one place with decorations and it is like a mini market store thing. And it mainly is selling just like the streamers or whatever they are called. The only christmas lights ive seen were on a mini christmas tree in our church building but thats it. oh well. And for info on when we will be skyping ask mom i gave her a bit of info. ill give more next week if there is any more.

Our area is suuuuuper spread out. but its cool and all farm like and what not. 

Love you all!

Elder McMullin

Ps i have gotten all packages! thanks a ton! love you all!

Week 49- TRANSFERED!

Transfered! well i am now on the island of Santiago. in the zone of Assomada in the area of Cabeca Carreira. My compation is elder duarte and i am finishing his training. His family is from Cape Verde but he has grown up in portugal so he is portuguese technically. I only have like an hour with him but he seems like a really cool guy.

I found out i was being transferred saturday so i could be in sao felipe so i could make it to the boat in time monday, because no haices on sunday. SO the boat was fun. its 4ish hours of people just puking and puking. but they happened to be playing avengers 2 on the tv for everyone, so i was too busy with that to puke. but i still havent seen it with volume. or of my own choice so we still need to watch it together when i get home. I think i might have been the only missionary not to puke haha. or at least dry heave. If i ever go again though im definetely going to use some vomadrin.

Well i dont have much time but ill explain my area a bit. its like rolling mountains and corn fields. its actually suuuuper pretty. i like it a ton. and its nice and cool. There is one problem though. i can not see the ocean anymore. im gonna miss that. its my area most like home so far haha. it feels like fall at home here with corn fields and dirt paths. i like it.

We are sneaking up on christmas here and i will be calling you from this area! im pretty excited. as for thanksgiving we dont do anything. they had their most similar day awhile back and it just had a ton of corn. its pretty good.

Also i sent pics last week but i just looked and they never sent so ill have to resend them next week. sorry. dont have much time because of all the travel today but i love you all!

Love 

Elder McMullin

Week 48- November 16, 2015

Heeeeyyyyy so i decided to write the big email a bit earlier even though you are sleeping so i would have time to do it today. ill come back later to finish my internet time and to write you lovely people that i havent responded to yet. And i will bring and send photos at that time.

As for this week nothing too out of the ordinary. Our zone leaders came down and did divisions with us. The elder i was with was the first elder that was a native that i did a division with here six months ago..... haha ive been in this area for so long. This sunday is transfer day! but i should be staying to finish training elder schlichte. Also seeing as the other elders in my district are training i think we are all staying the same. But one cool thing is my mini that i served with is leaving for his mission this upcoming week. But he didnt get his visa yet so he will be serving here in cape verde until he gets his visa. I hope i will see him again before he heads out to brazil. 

As for exciting news my creole is getting pretty good.... Thats one upside to staying in the same area. you dont have to switch dialects so you just can learn it. But we cant teach in it and also i have to teach my companion portuguese so i dont speak it. But it makes me pretty happy.

Also i played soccer for the first time in like 6 months today with the other elders here. it was just 3 on 3 but it was a good time.

Sorry the longer i stay in one area the less i have to tell you about the area.... but we had some corn. that was cool. but their corn is not sweet corn. still a good time. and some papaya and some squash and some soy beans. good times.

Welll until next week!

Love you all!

Love 

Elder McMullin

Week 47- Zone Conference

Sorry.... same thing as usual we didnt have time to write yesterday so we are writing now. 

Well this past week was  abit crazy. our schedule got all whacked out because we had a zone meeting on tuesday so we didnt mark any appointments that day but then it was changed to a different day on which we already had dates marked.... so it turned out really confusing and a week where we didnt have as many lessons as we should be having. 

On the plus side we started working with a family that we used to be working with in the past and we talked to them about marriage and we marked a baptismal date for december that means they have to plan and have the wedding before then. it will be a lot of fun working with them so that all these things can happen.

Your weeks all sounded super awesome. Good job ori! way to win! and i hear that cy was a beast in football this year. Im sad i have to wait another two years to watch you guys play football because i will get home in winter but you guys should totally start basketball so i can watch you wreck in that too! and lacrosse boys. Best sport ever. just sayin!

Thanksgiving is creepin up here pretty fast do you all already have plans? Sorry i dont have much about my week but i love you guys!

~Love Elder McMullin

Week 46- new companion meeting members and investigators

Sorry once again things came up on p day. this time the internet place was closed. Dont know why but oh well!

Well this week was a pretty good one. Introducing a lot of members and investigators and a lot of other people to my son, because it turns out i know pretty much everyone in my area and the majority of people in the group as well. it was funny i was contacting with my mini a bit back and he was trying to contact and he was like what about them? and i would tell them the name and what happened and stuff like that. after awhile he was like you have already contacted the whole town! i dont think i already mentioned that but it was a good time. its true. thats what happens when you have 6 months in a small town. so that means i start contacting them again! its a really awesome town though but i am a bit ansy for when i will get a new area. still working hard here though i promise!

Its wierd training because i honestly feel like i was just barely being trained. i remember going through all of the exact same things (i know. cliche right?) but cliches are cliches for a reason. because soooo many times its so true. Elder schlichte is a cool guy though. i feel like we are getting along well. i just hope im helping him because he doesnt have a four elder house like i did. he has a lot less people speaking portuguese and a lot more speaking criole and he doesnt have schwarma.  So i hope im making it not feel as lonely. its tough being the only one that cant communicate with other people on this whole side of the island. but hes learning well and the members and investigators really like him. haha probably more than they like me lots of times!

I realized today that we are going to be talking for real here in a month! thats so crazy! We only have one more call after this one..... mind blown right? i hope i can find a good place to make the calls here. not like last time. that internet was horrible. 

Thanks for the halloween pics from those that sent them... and those that didnt..... you have some splainin to do. and some pictures to send.... do as i say and not as i do! haha. 

Love you all !

Elder McMullin

Week 45- Posting late .. written 10/27/2015

Okay first off siblings im only on week 45. you guys cant stop writing me already. we still have another year to go. 

Okay well once again i wasnt able to write yesterday im writing a bit late. a few things happened yesterday so we werent able to write. One was we had interviews with president mathews and a meeting with trainers and verdinhos (greenies). It was a good chance to talk to him and to his wife. they are both really good people. Sister Mathews mentioned how i was getting to be one of the old guys. it was suuuuuuupppper weird. Also the power was out alll day yesterday and just barely came on today. so it was impossible either way.

As for the rest of the week i went to another elders area to do some baptismal interviews. It was all raining and i was rocking my sandals and it was all raining and muddy. good ol times. it was my first time ever doing a baptismal interview and they were eventful to say the least haha. id explain it all but it would be long and confusing. needless to say some things happened so we werent sure if it would be allowed to baptize so i told the guy that he might have to wait then i got another call from president and he said we had the good to go. And then some interviews with some younger family members. But it all turned out well in the end.

Another day we went up to our group and it literally rained alllll day. so we had quite a few days this week where we were soaked all day.

As for all the other stuff ill send it to you next week i hope thats okay but i dont really have time today. just this short amount of time to write you. Love you all!

Love 

Elder McMullin

Week 44- New companion finally arrived

Elder McMullin's new companion was supposed to picked up at the Mission Home in Praia on Friday, but Elder McMullin's flight was canceled to the island where Praia is. So then the new Elders were going to fly to Fogo, but they missed their flight. Probably because they were waiting for their luggage to arrive. It didn't arrive with them Thursday night. Poor Elders. So since they missed the flight they had to take a boat over to the island of Fogo. Here is his email he was finally able to send this week.

Hey sorry this will probably still be pretty small but what happened was pretty much what you guys already know. My plane there was cancelled they missed their plane here so they took the boat here.

My son is Elder Schlichte. He is from morgan utah he is really tall and im pretty sure i played him in lacrosse a few years ago. We pretty only have one day together at this point.

As far as work i havent been able to go up to our group for like a week and a half now and im dying to go back up their because we have quite a few people up their that we need to teach. We finally get to go up their tomorrow that is if nothing happens this time.

Wanna know something really wierd? I have the most time on the mission out of everone in my district. And im pretty far up there in comparison to the whole zone too. its super wierd for me. Sorry i dont have much more to talk about this time.... i was jumping areas soooo much this last week.

Love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 43- New companion on Friday

Sooooo for right now i have a cape verdian mini missionary named elder da graca. I've known him pretty much ever since i've been in this area because he was a mini for a different missionary in my district then. Hes just staying with me until i go pick up my son here in a bit. I fly to praia to get him on friday. I was told he is from utah and i was told his name but i don't know how to spell it so i guess you will have to wait til monday to know what his name is. I was told he is from morgan utah.

Last week was a pretty good with elder cruz before he went home. We got  a lot of good work done and we were able to teach one of our really cool investigators a ton and he was able to be baptized on saturday. The only thing was elder cruz had to leave saturday morning so he wasn't able to see it. So i stayed the rest of the week with some other elders that work close to us. We both work in the same ward but we both also have groups. After the baptismal service of the people baptized the ward had an activity where they grilled a ton of chicken so we had some investigators go to that right after and we ate some chicken and had a really good time. The only thing is one of the missionaries that i was with was pretty sick. He got sick the day before and it lasted til at least monday or tuesday. But then he was transfered to another island. I've actually been in the same zone as him my whole mission until now. But now all of the island of fogo is training except our zone leaders and sister training leaders. 

That's my quick update and ill try to get a better one on monday. Love you all!

Elder McMullin

42- Party for Elder Cruz

Hey loved ones. Sorry i wasnt able to write yesterday. The internet places were all closed for some strange reason so we didnt have access to interwebs or computers. Ill try to give a good email with details this week. 

So this week was conference and we were able to watch parts of it. but not all of it. we saw both the morning sessions and the priesthood session and due to some random stuff we werent able to watch the other sessions but ill probably download them in english or something along with the other sessions because we listen to the talks in portuguese and they use big words. also its brazilian portuguese so its harder for me to understand. It was cool that we got an investigator to go, and he was waiting the whole time for president monson to talk. 

Oh yeah also a couple of you asked about transfers.... thats next week. this sunday so ill tell you next monday.

Well the party was a success, Me and elder toledo made a ton of things with some help from the other elders. We made tacos with beef and onions and homemade flour tortillas. Homemade chili. Horchata. Rice pudding. Tres leches cake. It took quite a long time to cook but it all turned out really well. One of the cape verdians was asking me why the only things i know how to cook are mexican recipes haha. I didnt really realize it til he pointed it out to me. We were also going to make the mexican corn but all the corn on the cob here isnt quite ready yet but it will be here in a little bit. There are sooooooo many corn fields here right now. Im sure ill find some goat cheese here and make a ton of delicious corn. Cheese is a bit tricky though. 

Well as far as other cool things happening here it rained again and wrecked the roads in our group again so we have to do some more walking again. but at least they should have some good crops and no one was injured or anything. 

Well i think thats about it for today. Thanks all i love you!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 41- first sunburn in Cape Verde

Sorry ive been tryin to get pictures to work for a bit but they still dont want to work so maybe next week... keep your fingers crossed! Hey before i get started on my weekly update for you , we are doing a go away party next p day for my comp and its all mexican themed because hes mexican and is going home. If you could send me any ideas in the next hour four mexican recipes that i could make for it id love the ideas. thanks!

Well this week was fun. i dont remember if i mentioned last week but we finally helped someone in their fields. it was a ton of fun and i got sunburned for the first time i think since ive been here. 

Its hard to think of different things that have happened in the last week. it was a fairly uneventful week. We are teaching in both of our areas. now we go up to our little mountain area three times a week and we are working with the family of our recent convert. The main thing is trying to get people to church. Whenever it rains they pretty much see it as a get out of church free card haha.

Well the other elders had a baptism this week and it was running super late so it kinda messed up our day but we still had to head up to our area so we got a taxi but it couldnt go up all the way because the rain was making water river things in the road so we had to run up and had the taxi wait for us. That was a fun experience. unfortunately even after we taught day of the lord they didnt make it to church on sunday. But we will teach them some more this upcoming week.

Besides that just working like usual. There is only two weeks left in the transfer so im getting super curious who my next comp will be seeing as elder cruz is going  home. But thats about it!

Love you all!

Elder McMullin

Week 40 - Another baptism

Hey everyone. Sorry i wasnt able to write a big group email yesterday. The internet in the town was weird and we had to do some cleaning and inspections and waited on a guy to fix some things in our house that never ended up coming. 

Last week was a pretty awesome week. We had divisions and i taught in another area for the first time in like 4 or 5 months. I was with a missionary from utah that is pretty new on the mission. His name is Elder Toledo. It was a really fun time and i was able to teach with him and also with a member from that ward that served a mini mission a little while back so it was really fun to have him help us for that day. Its fun being with young missionaries because i am ÂLWAYS with super old missionaries as my companions.

Also when we did divisions our district leader was able to do the baptismal interview for our investigator and he was able to be baptized this last saturday. It was awesome and it seems that it has made a lot of people in that group that he lives in excited for the work and we are hoping to be able to help it become a branch here in a little while.

And we want to try and help the ward that we are working in as well try to get excited for the work again. So we are trying to work better with the members and we have been teaching a guy that went to church a ton in the past come back and get baptized. He could be a huge help. He already overcame a huge word of wisdom problem and wants to fix the rest too now.

I think thats about it for this week. Sorry that i was late this week. Love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 39- Rain! Maybe a baptism!!

Hey, sorry i don't have a lot of time today a lot things were goin' on. So this will probably be shorter than you would like it to be.

Well we got a couple more rain storms randomly and it ruined the roads up in our group area. I'll try to send pictures next week. it was really cool though. and no one died so its all good. It will take awhile to fix though so we have to walk a bit more but that's all fine and dandy.

We found a super cool guy that really wants to be baptized and shows it by coming to church and reading and praying and everything.

I got the package! thanks a ton. Everything specially the sriracha is making me and elder cruz quite happy. We eat pretty much everything with it. 

Also, i think every single one of my shirts now is either ripped or stained.. not sure how that happened. don't send any shirts yet i might just get them tailored and fixed and what not here. i'll tell you other wise. 

I've been really close to sending someone home in the past but its really weird actually doing it. Elder cruz will be headed home oct 13 or so. he's still up and kickin though.

Sorry thats the quick overview. Im happy to hear all my bros are starting like girls.... well one still likes himself more but thatll change.... haha. love all of you!

Love elder McMullin

PS~ And thanks for the emails from the girls mom asked to email me! I will try to email back. I was only able to email Makenna.

Week 38- No baptism

Hey lovely family members and friends,

Well for the weekly update i think ill start off with the bad news. you know so it can end on a good note.

Well the bad news is pretty sad. at least it was for me. So i told you last week about the 18 year old that we have been working towards baptism with. Well he was going along great and was supposed to be baptized this saturday, but something came up, and its not just a problem we can talk about with him and testify of the truth because what happened was that he got a call from his dad. His dad said you are going to the us to live with me in 3 days. So long story short he is on his way to live in boston or brockton right now. There was this little going away party that he had that they invited us to eat some dinner and cake with them. It was a really good time. Part way through a town drunk slash crazy man that everyone knows and loves showed up and joined the party. His name is antonio ba casa, which means anthony go home. haha so i can barely understand his criole but i guess he speaks english too... and by taht i mean he says he does and then says things like goo goo gaa gaa. So he talked to me like that and it was hilarious. He also refers to me as branco. which means white. And then we said good bye to the investigator and told him not to forget to talk to the missionaries in boston.

Another really cool thing that happened this week was the ward we are in had a mini mtc where they got members to come and participate and do missionary work especially with less actives. it really helped the frequency of the ward and it helped bring a lot of less actives back and i hope the members will continue to help them stay not just be done with it because the activity is done with. But it was a super awesome activity.

Also you asked me about my comp. He is elder cruz. hes from california but his parents are from mexico. Probably the only reason why he likes me is because i make him horchata a lot. Hes a cool dude and a really hard worker.

Well thats it for the week. Thanks for the letters love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 37- Hurricane Fred is approaching

well it sounds like you guys all have heard about the cool hurricane on its way here. haha i found out about it yesterday in church. as of right now its just rain and a tiny bit of wind. but we are getting ready in case its bad with food and water and whatnot. im sure all will be well. 

as for transfers elder pettingill is leaving and im staying and im getting my old zone leader elder cruz. this is his last transfer so im killing him and will be in this area for at least 2 more. that means a total of 4 transfers in all which roughly is 6 months. thats a big chunk of time in one area but thats okay. its a really pretty area and its got some really cool people. haha i only get old people as my comps.

As for the work its moving along but its slow but we do have one 18 year old boy/man not sure what youd call it at that age but he is getting ready to be baptized next week and he is a boss so that should be really good and should go through quite well.

Well thats about it for this week sorry im in a bit of a hurry because we have to go to sao felipe to get my new comp and then come back. Love you all. you should hopefully hear from me in a week! 

Love elder mcmullin

Week 36- RAIN!

Wow we have been getting a crazy amount of rain here this week. There has been like 3 thunderstorms this week and they are super cool and loud. One of the times a flash was huuuuge and we heard it right after. It was pretty awesome. The only downside to the rain is its sooooo hot and humid before and after.

Well this week no one showed up to church due to some stuff with investigators children and things of the sort but we went and talked to them yesterday and we got it all sorted out.  

This is the last week of transfers and as of right now pretty much anything could happen. I could leave or stay and either stay with him and kill him or get another comp. I guess you guys will all find out in a week!

We had a zone conference in the main city on fogo earlier this week and it was a good time getting information from our leaders and they also sell schwarma there so i was quite excited about that. I have not been eating enough schwarma since i left sal. none in fact.

Sorry i dont have a ton of cool news this week... But it was great hearing from all of you especially the ones i dont normally hear from haha. Thanks for all the support!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 35- More investigators!

Well we had a couple investigators at church again! And we have been working with the family thats been going and they have a baptismal date for the 29th. Its a man a woman and a few children. All the children but the girl have already been baptised in the past so we marked with the girl and the mom and the dad. Haha but something wasnt clicking for them. We explained how you need the priesthood to be baptized and they are like of course! That makes sense! so can you be baptized. well me and the my daughter can but my husband was already baptised so he doesnt need it. oh yeah what church was he baptised in- well the catholic church. Well its because of the  restoration that we have the priesthood so the other churches dont have. Oh we understand elders but hes already been baptised so hes good. So we just kind of left it because we didnt have a member with us so we went and talked to the member who gave the family to us as referal. he kind of just face palmed and said he would take the bishop because the bishop is the ladyºs brother and they would explain it in creole so they can understand. So that was a fun time haha. I think we are gonna go check how that went tomorrow. 

There is another man that came to church last week but didnt show up this week for some reason. Hes great at reading and praying and listening to us and he says he already knows the book of mormon is true and everything is so we dont know why he doesnt show up to church every now and then. maybe he was working in the fields we will check that out when we go up to our group, which we do wednesdays and fridays. But besides that we have taught just about everything besides law of chastity because we can never get his woman to sit down with us. 

Also me and elder pettingill made some sweet wings this and week and some horchata and all sorts of things. I eat so much more when we cook at home haha. So thats all my sweet news of this week! Love you guys!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 34- Five Investigators at church!!! Hooray!!

Well to start off i have some good news. we finally had investigators make it to church! 5 of them! Its a good thing too because it was getting pretty hard. It was great to have them come though. You cant really progress if you arent willing to make it to church.i hope you will forgive this email for being short because i have to send pictures too.

One super sad thing was one the families that we are teaching seperated. Sad for a ton of reasons. They arent together they have children together, we dont know if we can even find them or talk to them anyways because we think they moved out of our area. its super sad. What makes it worse is that the problem has been having a ton of family issues. the mans parents both died within two weeks. one of the daughters fell and was in really bad condition. luckily the doctors did really well and she is fine now, but there has been lots of problems lately for them. but they are all really good people so whereever they go i hope they talk with missionaries.

But we also have gotten more cool families. we are teaching like 4 families nad they are all super cool. Another plus side is  i found dr pepper in a small village here. whoooooooooooooooo!

Week 33- rain!

Rain finally came this week! Which is very good because it is very needed here. And its rained for like the past 4 days. The only down side to that is when it rains everyone has to go out to fields and semiar. plant seeds so next year they can have food and what not. So its been tough to find people at home this week and not many people came to church.... But hopefully we will be able to do some good service this upcoming week with all the planting and caring for their crops. None of the members have let us go with them yet. Its kind of annoying they think that because we are americans we cant do anything. They literally told us we couldnt do it because we would get blisters and callouses as if we have never had them before. people are silly. They think america is full of pansies and tell us how awesome cape verde is but all of them are really trying to get visas to go live in america haha. But they are really fun and nice people.

Another good thing about this week is my comp is actually a really good cook so this week i have eaten chinese food, mexican food, some fried chicken sandwhiches, and some mashed potatoes and gravy. It was gladly welcomed haha.The food here is good but not much variety. I should probably try to learn from him seeing as i still will have many comps that probably dont know how to cook.

Thanks for sending a package i will tell you as soon as i get it. Im guessing it will be in 2 months or so. so probably around october ish. 

The area should be exploding in green pretty soon here so i will try to get you some pictures. Hopefully as the planting calms down the people will want to give us some time to thank god for all the things they have recieved. The members too. We fasted for rain this past week and we are getting it so hopefully we can get some members back to church this upcoming week! 

Thanks for all the support! love you guys!

Love Elder  McMullin

Week 32

Well i guess i will tell you more about my companion. His name is elder pettingill. his family lives in bountiful. So dad and christine might know them. i will send them the names of his parents to find out. He is really fun and we had some good work this week. He reminds me a bit of tim. He heads home in october.

One funny story of this week was we were in a store and started talking about how we needed rain to some people and some drunk dude was like 2 days. itll be here in two days. And two days later we went back up to that area and it didnt get a real rain storm but it was sprinkling. We were quite impressed with the knowledge of that drunk dude. But unfortunately it didnt get any real rain and the place is still really lacking. 

Another thing that was going on this week was a catholic holiday for some saint happened in our area. it was quite annoying. people were drunk and everything and it was just not a good time to get work done. the worst part was we had an investigator whose woman almost left him because he drinks but he quit. well we saw him in a trunk spraying beer all crazy. Then later that day we found him in handcuffs. so we have to go see what is up today. i hope it is all okay and his woman wont leave him because they have a child together.

Besides that we have had some pretty good lessons. We have some couples that need to get married and we really need people to get to church but we will have to keep working on that this week. Thanks for all the emails! love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 31- new companion

Picture from the 4th of July. They had their own little celebration.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Well this email will probably be short. yesterday was transfers and elder lundeen left. My new comp will be elder pettingale. I am actually with him right now. I met him my first day in cape verde he trained my mtc comp. He is also on his 2nd to last transfer. Haha president likes to give me old elders i guess. But elder pettingale seems to be a really cool guy and we should get along well.

This week was another slow one for our area. im not sure what we need to do better but hopefully this change will help something and we can find out what we need to do to help the people and the ward and groups here.

Its crazy hearing how much things are changing at home even though ive only been gone for 7 ish months. Keep up the good updates. and get chum writing me. hes the worst at writing me. It sounds like you guys are having some fun family get togethers. dont be having too much fun without me. Ill try to get some more pics to you next week. hopefully by then the rain will start here. the lack of rain here is hurting the farmers which is pretty much everyone in my area. Love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 30 Pictures of Fogo- Elder McMullin's area

 Elder Lundeen- Elder McMullin's companion

Week 30- Finally some pics of Fogo

Well you will be unhappy to hear i wasnt able to get a camera in sao felipe  but it was fun and we had a good zone meeting there. A couple of people that came here with me were there one of them being my mtc comp elder bannerman. it was cool seeing them again.  And i gotta say the highlight of the week was that they have soft serve ice cream place in sao felipe. it was amazing. Im quite excited to go again. 

Oh yeah a really funny story about the trip to sao felipe. I guess usually the elders on the other side of the island (us) get a hiase but for some reason our district leader decided to get a hilux. this is a truck. so we rode in the back of a truck for a few hours with a lot of like potatoes and other things that people needed to transport there. The six of us were in the back and guess what else was there. A goat. A little things about goats. they do not like to sit still. and the rule everything that can go wrong will go wrong... it did.. haha the goat moved so its back side was facing elder clegg. he pretty much jumped onto my lap and the goat did not want to move. Elder clegg didnt want to move it so he did a little things to try to lure him away but it didnt work and before long the goat was peeing on the bench where he was suppose to be sitting. then the truck driver realized and came back and man handled the goat to the front and tied him up better. it was quite the trip. it was like around an hour and a half to two hours to get there. Also it was super foggy. It was a fun day.

Downside was yet again no investigators at church. Well we got one more week of this transfer to try to get someone to come. But there is an inactive couple that are coming back and they are super fun to talk with.

I saved some good news for the end of this letter. i was kidding i was able to get a camera so im sending some pictures now.

 Love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Ps happy late birthday p ori ryland cade and any one else with a birthday!

Week 29

well this week was pretty fun all in all. we had special training by the mission president and his wife and it was really cool. oh yeah and i forget to tell you last week we met the us embassador for cape verde. it was pretty random.

Well this upcoming week i will finally be going to sao felipe and be able to get a camera because the town i live in (mosteiros tras) does not really have any.

sao felipe is on the other side of the island so we have to take a haise to get there. 

We still werent able to get any investigators to church this sunday so its starting to get a little bit frustrating.  One reason is because there is always some sort of party or saint day going on here. people love their saint days here. apparantly one is happening the end of this month that is suppose to be bigger than carnival. not sure if they were serious when they said that because carnival is a pretty big deal here. 

we had an alright party of our own for 4th of july. and 5th of july because that is cape verdes independance day so the elders in our district had lunch together. we were able to make burgers fries and onion rings. it was pretty good. and i was able to find franks sauce. its awesome finding american stuff. So when me and my comp found rootbeer it was crazy and a tender mercy from the lord. My comp had it for the first time in almost 2 years. 

One cool story was we found this cool area between two of our mountain areas and it like hidden between two mountains and you have to climb down to find the house of the dude we were looking for so we taught him and his wife and his wife was super pregnant. like had already passed 9 months. i was afraid we would have to help deliver a baby, but we finished the lesson and came up a few days later and we heard that she had the baby a couple hours after we had left the house haha. So we dont think they remembered to read the book of mormon or pray about it. but they live very hidden away so she had to hike after her water broke to get to a taxi. 

Well thats a couple of cool things that you might be interested in. thanks for all the emails. love you guys!

Love elder mcmullin

Week 28

Well this letter will probably be super short. We have to go and make sure our house is super clean and everything is well there because we  have house inspections sometime this week. 

This week we did some good work but yet again no one shows up to church. Its one of my big pet peeves because it happens to me all the time.

This morning we did a hike down and checked out some cool sights, we found a pretty cool cave when we did it. I will send you some pictures when i get them from the other elders. Dont worry i should be getting my camera next thursday so only a little more time before i can take a lot of pictures for you guys.

I went on my first division this week with someone that pretty much only speaks portuguese. it was a really fun time to try out my portuguese skills for a whole day. It was really fun and we had pretty much no problems communicating the whole day.

Sorry it was so short.... ill try to get more next week... Love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 27

Well this one will be real short because i dont have much time. I cant get a camera except here in mostieros. sao felipe is the main city on fogo and i only go there once a month for zone meeting so in a few weeks i can buy one but i kind of need money in my acconunt for that. so there are two options, either mom can switch money from my savings into checking. or you guys can be generous and donate money for a camera haha. either way is cool with me but i need money in my checkings account either way so i can take it out with my debit card.

Well this week there were like 30 more people at church so that was pretty bomb. We still didnt have a ton of lessons but we are working on that. Remember how im not suppose to tell you health problems? well i still am. ive been having some in grown issues but im taking care of them and they are fine. remember the rule no one ever contacts my mission president asking about my health. you only ask me. but yeah so  i get to rock sandals again while preaching and what not. but its not too bad. my mission is quite the adventure haha. speaking of adventure have fun on trek mom. i know you love that kind of stuff haha. 

Thats cool that johns nephew and wife know my comp. hes really chill, hes a fun guy. i always tell him im going to marry his little sister.... i dont think he likes it haha.

Well my 6 month mark was last week. We had some nice pancakes for it. Theres some cool american things here if you search shops. they dont really know how to make pancakes but we do and they were quite tasty. One of the other missionaries here played lacrosse in high school and we talk about it sometimes and we got elder lundeen to want to play it. and ive decided i need to find a way to play it when i get back. not sure how but i need to!

Cool story, i think i mentioned how there was a girl that we gave a blessing to randomly one day because her mom told her to ask a missionary for one? well she is already getting baptised this week. Thats a huge miracle. Like crazy big. Thats a great example of easy missionary work. She didnt try to teach her everything she didnt say you have to join our church, she just said if you need help ask a missionary for a blessing. Kind of like Elder nelson, if you need help , ask a missionary. I thought that was a sweet story. The lady really turned her life around.

Well thats about it for this week. Love you all!

Love Elder McMullin

Week 26- island of Fogo

well you guys had a ton of questions this week and i have quite a few things to talk about. first off ill just tell you how the travel went down because that will answer quite a few of the questions you have. i left monday night on a plane headed from sal to praia. in praia the aps picked us up and we stayed the night at their house. we woke up at 4 in the morning so we could get back to the airport on hop on a plane to fogo. our plane left at like 6 30 or so and the flight was just like 30 minutes. all the flights in cape verde are super short. we got there but we were on the other side of the island where the zone leaders live so we stayed with them until like 11 then we took a haise that went around the island to get to our area. it took quite a while and there were a ton of people packed in one haise. mom or dad said they saw something about watching youtube videos and it looked like the areas were either green and lush or black volcanic rocks. this is super accurate. driving to our area i saw both of these things but my area is more of the green mountainous lush area.

 we have a ward and a group in our area so we have 5 hours of church on sundays. and the group we pretty much climb a mountain to get up to and the first time we did it was my second day here. i was used to sal which is flat and windy so its cool but here its temperature is close but with much less wind and much more hills to climb. and i  was sick most of this week so i was dying climbing the mountain. its all good now though but mom would love this area. but as we know hiking isnt my favorite thing in the world. but the area is still super cool.  one thing that was sad this week though was the frequency of church dropped a ton this week. not sure what happened though.

my new comp is elder lundeen. he is from hurricane utah and he has two transfers left. i will probably kill him but there is also a chance he will be transfered for his last transfer.(kill is when you are the last comp  to a missionary before he goes home) that has been happening quite often recently here. he is fun and a cool guy and really likes the work so we work pretty hard.

for p day what we have done so far is we played ping pong! it was super awesome. i missed ping pong quite a bit. they have this center for youth place where you can go play games for free and not many people use it so we went there and played. its a pretty cool place but it has some interesting art work. maybe ill send a picture of what i mean next time. i dont think we can leave to go see the volcano. i dont think president matthews really likes when missionary leave their areas to do tourristy things.

oh yeah another really cool thing about fogo is it has mountain dew so i have been enjoying that so i dont need that in my package anymore. and i think i will buy a camera here. 

ill tell you more about the people here next time when i know more about them but  i think thats about it for this email. thanks for all the emails ill try to respond to as many as i can right now. love you all.

Love Elder McMullin