Another new companion on the way

hey guys

it sounds like the christmas party was pretty fun!

i got alot of stuff to spill today so i'm just gunna go through the last couple of emails and give my answers to your questions and my thoughts about those, then tell you about the past few weeks for me.

sorry if i repeat some stuff i've already told you, i'm not sure what stuff i told you in my message that got lost last week...

it sounds like your meeting with the lehr's and evans's was sweet. tell me more about it this week, mom. thanks for sending colby's homecoming talk.

two weeks ago when i was sending the christmas videos home i sent a ton of emails but i think most of them didnt make it through. in one i explained that some of the videos wouldn't send because they were too big. i took five videos 1. me talking about christmas in ghana and stuff 2. me scaring some kids 3. me eating fufu 4. me standing outside of ngyircia talking about ghana and 5. me wishing everyone a merry christmas. it sounds like you got number 2 and number 5, sorry uh?? you'll see the other videos when i send a cd home, they were pretty good. i was excited about it. i hope it all went well though.

real quick i want to make sure i have this correct in my mind. i think i've sent you all of my pictures and videos up until and including my elder halling days. is that right?? i want to make sure before i delete all of my old pictures to make room for more. mom, as soon as you can, could you do me a favor and send me the print outs of all the pictures i've sent you?? (like the print outs you sent me last time, that was perfect). i just wanna make sure you've got all of them before i erase my memory cards.

for the christmas call, i'm ok with anything. the conference call from last time worked perfectly fine, so if you wanna do that again we can. or if you wanna just do it like we did the first time thats cool too. i think it will be best for me to buy credit here like last time, so i'll do that in the coming days. i havent thought about what time i'd call, but i'd assume it'd be in the evening time here, which would be late morning time there if that works with you guys. let me know your thoughts about that.

mom, i got two packages and a newsletter last sunday. thanks thanks thanks. i really appreciate it!! i can't believe all my friends are starting to come home now.

i got a call from elder eke and he LOVED the quotes you sent him. he was really happy. elder yapo called me to thank you yesterday after he got the general conference ensigns. last pday elder ekaette was super happy and talked a ton about how much he loved you. his companion, elder nzuki, seems alot like elder ekaette, very innocent and very loving. he related to me an experience. he said that after he watched general conference, he was really worried about how he'd get the talks so he could spend time studying them. he basically told me, with the broadest smile on his face, that that ensign that you sent him was an answer to his prayers!

so leaving sekondi fast fast like that was kinda tough. the toughest part was saying bye to sarpong and joel at the same time. that about killed me. that was maybe the first time my whole mission i've cried i think. on that tuesday i had a couple of hours to be able to go to the area and say goodbye to whoever was home. i got to see alot more of the people than i thought i would, so it turned out ok.

kumasi is really big! it makes cape coast and takoradi look like a small village. my area is called bantama. the ward just split, so we are in the bantama 2nd ward. elder lehr and his companion are over the 1st ward. there have been some problems in the ward with some things that the past missionaries have been doing, so we're reparing that relationship. i'm also trying to learn kumasi really fast cause i feel useless following my companion around. i think i have my area down pretty good, but outside of that i'm still working on it. but yea i'd say right now those are my two big focuses (or focai, if you will); learning kumasi and getting close with the members so they see that we are serious.

we had a baptism on sunday. a young woman named mary, who's in her mid twenties. basically, her story in a nutshell is she was in another church but decided to find a new one. she was searching for the right one and she dreamt about the lds church twice. now she's baptised!! haha. she's really cool. she's my favorite person i've met in bantama so far.

bantama is a cool zone. i just wanna learn the area faster. my companion, elder kamara, is one of the chillest people i've ever met. he has no strong opinions about anything. to put it in perspective, i have to make almost all of the decisions because he has less of an opinion about everything than even i do. he's a really sweet guy i love being with him.

i'll spend a little time talking about sunyani, now. sunyani is about 2 hrs north west of kumasi, and kumasi is as far north in ghana as the church goes. that is, until a few months ago. it is a city of more than 100,000 people that has just had missionaries sent there. they're having some really cool experiences there, basically starting the church from scratch in the city. i was stoked when i found out that sunyani is in my zone! so last week we went up there for splits, it was really special to see. it's not as densely populated as the other parts of ghana i've been to and is much more organized and cleaner. i'll tell you more about that place in the next little while i'm sure.

so today we just got transfer news. elder kamara is going to the cape coast zone to be right next to the mission home, and elder christenson is going to be my new companion. he is my mt and is from utah. i havent been around him a ton on my mission, but he seems like a sharp kid, i'm excited. but it sucks that elder kamara is leaving. they are sending two more missionaries up to sunyani and opening up a couple of new apartments around the zone, so that's exciting.

so that's my life here in kumasi. ask me any questions about stuff that doesnt make sense and stuff that you want to know more about.

the more time i spend in ghana the more convinced i become that every part of this country is just sweet.

love you!
elder mackay

by the way, what the heck is going on with john and sharie in cali?? i thought they were in texas. how in the world did he book dinner with ol' mitt?? i'm so confused haha!!