"My mission really sounds kinda hard-core, doesn't it?"

Mommy!

Walukuba IS an interesting place! It's just getting better as I go. I am reallly starting to love it here. The people are just fantastic. Living conditions? Well, we have running water most of the time, and the electricity... It's like, mixed with the water haha. When you take a shower, you usually get shocked a couple times cause for some reason the power runs in the water or something like that. But, we do have more consistent power here than I did in Masaka. It's not too bad haha. Just gotta be a little more careful here, that's all. Yeah, Morris is with us. It's a 4 man flat. Districts in the mission are usually 4 missionaries. Sometimes 6 if there are sisters. I do wash my own clothes sometimes, but we usually hire a branch member to do it for us. It takes time, ya know? Lets see, it's way hotter, way noisier, and way more flat than Masaka. Victoria falls...? That's in Zimbabwe, mom. Silly head. I'll get pictures off today hopefully. The branch is established well, but the missionary work is really hard here generally. There are about 500 members on record, but we only get a Sacrament attendance of around 90-100. So that's difficult. Sad stuff? TONS of mud huts, with no electricity, tons of people missing legs or arms, just lots of death here in Uganda, really. It's still a 3rd world country, so you would expect to see some pretty eye-opening stuff. But, I'll save the other stuff for when I'm home. I'll tell you eventually, don't worry! hehe.

Teaching is going well. Really well. We have done a lot of finding here this last week. TONS of new people. Really good stories. Charles and Roggers and Robert are our prime gators right now. They are getting ready for baptism soon. Our goal for the transfer is 3. Hopefully we can get these 3 then a couple more. And yeah, everyone has their weird African name, then an 'English' name. There are sooooooo many Roberts, and John Bosco's for some reason. Whatever. I'm getting to learn a little bit of Acholli, but mostly Musogan, which is almost identical to Lugandan.

We were fed by THE most amazing lady I've ever met in Uganda. She is 79 years old. Her name is Jajja (grandma) Mary. She made us some awesome g-nut paste with ca'unga. ALSO, she made some HOMEMADE peanut butter. It's just amazing. She said it brings her and her family some excitement in their lives, haha. But yeah, we got talking to her about her church history. She has been a member for 22 years, and her son was the first Jinja district president, and the first Bugembe branch president. She has 12 kids, and has been to the temple and done all the work for 6 of her dead children, and both her parents. Then, she met Gordon B. Hinkley in 1993 in Kenya, Nairobi. She has a fantastic testimony. She learned how to speak English by reading the BOM, and lots of fasting and prayer. She really is an inspiration. Seeing her really gives me more hope for the people here. Seeing that they could some day be awesome pioneers like she is. Powerful stuffs.

Man, Mamma G was super sick yesterday with this GIANT nasty boil on her back. We gave her a blessing and stuff, and man, there was NBA TV playing in the back room. Just saw a few things. Jimmer is signed on with the Bulls now, and Kevin Love is averaging 34 points a game. He's ridiculously good this season. But yeah, that's all I saw hah.

I did get those recipes! Thanks so much! They've really helped me actually. Anything you want to send is great. They are all do-able here. So send whatever. You're the best momma. That talk you sent had a few mistakes on some of the facts, but it's okay! haha My mission really sounds kinda hard-core, doesn't it? It really doesn't seem so most of the time. This is just so normal to me now. But yeah, anything you wanna put in that package would be awesome. Pres. Hunter is a great guy. I hope I get to visit with him when he is here. That would be stellar.

Haha don't worry about our backyard. We are good at killing those things. Go look up in D&C 84 about the poison of a serpent not being able to harm us. Hopefully that'll give ya comfort! hah

So fun little thing I just remembered. We tracted into a guy who lived in LA for 20 years. He LOVES the Utah Jazz, so we got to talk about that for a while haha. It was actually really nice.

Yep. It's toasty. We played a bunch of rugby with a couple other zones this morning at the church grounds. I got fried. It's pretty dusty right now, and we haven't really had rain for 2 months. It's supposed to start later this month though.

You know, Africa is just awesome. I've been working on making myself have fun, lately. I can honestly say, this transfer has been my best so far. Elder Matli is just the best. He's such a cool guy, and we really learn a lot from each other every day. Glad to have him here. We'll continue to try hard, don't worry haha. I'll keep prayin' for you guys, don't worry. But yeah, thanks for being the coolest momma ever, and thanks to everyone else for being such great friends and family. So much support, I love it. You guys are the best ever. Love you all a TON.

Elder Beardall