Elder CJ Rees

It was so good to see you and talk to you Christmas Day!  When Madison came on the screen I was so surprised.  Wow! It was so good to see her and crazy that we are both missionaries.  It felt like we were home for just a few minutes.  Thanks for making me laugh Kaden and thanks for making my Christmas special. Nacala is way crazy!    They have never seen people with white skin here so they just stare at me and want to touch my hair and skin all the time.  It is kinda uncomfortable to have people touching and starring at me all the time - haha.  It feels similar to my last area but it is a lot more beautiful.   Our area is right on the coast.  The sand is white in areas and we see massive cargo boats coming in every day in the port.  The down side is we have not had water for the week.  We have been showering with a bucket.   There are a lot of HILLS!  It feels like I am in Florida again.  Tons of w...

"I also got to meet some people I have never met before like Elder Rees. He's from Kaysville and went to the same high school that I went to. I got to mess around with him so that was awesome! I love Elder Rees!"  - Elder Hayden Grange For part of the mission activity we had a spiritual conference part. We set up tables and had different rotations with trainings for the missionaries on Preach My Gospel sections. It was great! We also did some other activities and played some games. It was weird because we were allowed to wear normal clothes.  It felt soooo nice haha! The next day we went to an orphanage and did a service project! The orphanage is on a lot of land and some of us helped trim bushes and lots of other yard work. It was really dirty so there was a lot to do. Other missionaries cleaned up others things and made lunch for the kids that range from kindergartners to 12th graders. We got to eat with them, played with them, and then did a talent show...

So crazy story, I’m getting ET!!!! (Emergency Transferred) Elder Francom and I are going to the middle of the jungle.  No missionary has ever walked here before.  We leave this Wednesday, so we will not be calling home for Christmas on the 19th any more.  We fly to Nampula and then get in a Chapa (van) for like 3 hours and go to our new area right off the coast of Mozambique.  But no one knows yet,  President is announcing it on Wednesday!! This place only has 25 members and Missionaries have never been here before .   The AP’s said there is a ton of work there.  I AM OPENING UP A NEW AREA!! I will be calling home on Christmas Day when we are in our new area.   Can you pray for me to understand the language and be able to speak it?  Once I can understand them and talk with them so they understand me, this mission will be so fun.   My health isn't great, but we are going to a new area and I’ve heard that t...

Hey fam, The week was crazy and kinda rough... I've been pretty sick this week throwing up and stuff.  This does not help with the stink.  It is so bad, but I'm in Africa - I think getting sick is going to be part of the mission.  It sounds like this is pretty normal, not too worried about it.  We walk about 1 hour to get to our area every day and to get to the city its about 2 hours away.  That is where we have to buy our food.  That is a really long walk or we ride chapas (vans).  They cram people into them.  The food here is good.  it is really hard to buy healthy food because its way expensive.  An apple is like 200 meticais - that's like a whole meal in America. So ya kinda a bummer.  One crazy thing here is the energy - aka the power. It shuts off like every 20 mintues. In our house we didn't have power last night so we didn't sleep at all because it was so hot!! They put a sort of air conditione...

Well its way crazier then I thought.  We walk everywhere or ride vans crammed with Afican’s in them.  We walk about 10ish miles a day.  It makes me so tired, but I can adjust to that. The heat is terrible but an easy adjustment. The language still is dang hard for me to understand.  It’s been really hard just adjusting to everything.  Especially, not being able to understand anyone.  There are also tons of different dialects here.  It is hard to tell when they are speaking portuguese or a dialect. I have been able to understand all the lessons.  When Elder Francom teaches I can understand and easily follow along and then he will ask me to share my testimony or some more information and I can do it. Really funny, but I say tons of orarcoes (prayers) hear because everyone wants to hear a tall American Boy speak to them.  Also, I haven’t seen a white skinned person yet besides the missionaries. It’s physically been pretty to...