A child is born.

Sziasztok kedves barátaim!

"For unto [me] a child is born, unto [me] a son is given: ... And his name shall be called Elder Allred"

So another transfer day has gone and past and this time I was given the opportunity to spend this transfer with Elder Allred who is straight out of the MTC and ready to work! He's super cool, he's from Colorado and just loving it being here in Hungary.

  So on tuesday after we emailed, Elder Stringham and I had the opportunity to take all the brand new missionaries on their first streeting adventure in Hungary. It was way fun, they were all super pumped to use as much of the Hungarian that they learned in the MTC as they could and they had plenty of interesting experiences with the random Hungarians on the street.

  On Wednesday I got to transfers bright and early to be there ready for the meeting where we would be getting assigned our new missionaries, which was super fun but also way hectic. We then went out tracting for Elder Allred's first time ever, we had a super cool experience that wasn't quite a 4th floor last door situation like President Uchtdorf spoke about, rather a second 10 story building last floor situation. We were just tracting in some 10 stories and we had been having a lot of people either not pick up or not want to listen to what we said, then finally someone let us into the building on the very last floor after Elder Allred asked if we could share a message in his best MTC Hungarian. We were able to share the message of the restoration with them and then testify to another person of their ability to live eternally with their family and we're hoping to return to them some time and share more about the gospel. I have a testimony that new missionary miracles are definitely a real thing.

  Thursday was our normal super hectic day with district meeting, MCM and english class, but we were able to have a super fun time at district meeting and it gave us an opportunity to learn more about each other. We also had a fun time out tracting in the pouring rain, luckily Elder Allred's coat has a hood, but unfortunately mine does not, so yeah.

  Friday and Saturday were really good working days and we've got some people now that we should be able to meet with in the coming weeks, so that'll be nice to actually have some investigators in Elder Allred's first transfer.

  Sunday we got to take Elder Allred to church for the first time, which also included ward council, it just reminded me of my first sunday when I had absolutely no idea what was going on. I actually had the opportunity to translate for the first time too, it's super crazy to think that only 6 or so months ago I was in Elder Allred's situation and now I'm able to translate for someone else. We're also doing a country wide book of mormon challenge this week, where all the members are meant to give out a book of mormon to someone and invite them to a meet the mormons night that we're having on saturday, so we got to role play with a bunch of members to practice that too which was fun.

Well life is definitely crazier once you become a senior companion but I'm still loving every minute of it!

All the best!

- McKim Elder

PICS!

Haven't actually taken any with Elder Allred yet, but sometime, so sorry.

                                                                    Last comp pic with Elder Stringham

                                                                                    Budapest skyline

Elder Stringham and I's last meal before transfer call. 

I'm going to be a dad?

Sziasztok!

Well another nine weeks have passed and that brings us to the end of my third transfer here in Hungary. We got our transfer calls nice and early this morning to tell us of the wonderful news of where we will be spending the next nine weeks and I will be... staying here in Buda, so I'm going to spend my first 8 months here in the beautiful city of Budapest. Though, I did get the slightly terrifying news that I am going to become a Dad, meaning I'm getting a brand new missionary fresh out of the pre-existence (MTC). It's definitely not going to be easy because I'm still pretty young in the mission and my language skills aren't quite where I wanted them to be before I train, but it's going to be an amazing experience. I won't know who I get until tomorrow, but I'll get to meet him today because we get to take all the new missionaries (that arrived maybe 2 hours ago) streeting around the mission home, which will be good fun.

  The week leading up to transfers is always super crazy but we had plenty of fun still this week. On Wednesday we got to have our zone day for reaching the challenge, so we spent the whole day playing some sports and we got to watch the movie Zootropolis together as a zone, it was a super fun day and I highly recommend Zootropolis to anyone who hasn't seen it yet.

  Thursday we headed over to the Hivatal early in the morning and luckily got everything done for our residency card stuff without a huge hassle, but it's always a bit of a pain dealing with Government offices. Then when we came back, our landlord was replacing our washing machine which was great because we've had to handwash all of our clothes for the last 3 weeks due to the old one breaking down. Handwashing was especially bad because with it being fairly cold here now, it takes a couple days for anything that gets that wet to dry, so the new washing machine is definitely nice. We then had our final district meeting as well as teaching English class, so it was a pretty packed day.

  Friday we went out to Budaörs and we finally found ourselves a new investigator, so we were able to teach her a really good lesson about the family and a bit about the plan of salvation, she really loved it. Then we were able to head back and start our splits where I got to go with my good friend Elder Robinson again, we didn't really have any crazy miracles this time, but we did get a lot of good work done which is nice.

  The next few days were mainly just spend preparing for the transfer and making sure everything was in order in case we got whitewashed out, but we did go get probably the best burger  that I've had so far in Hungary.

So that was pretty much my week, I'm excited for the things to come in the upcoming transfer, we're coming up to some of the coolest holidays in Hungary so it'll be cool to see Budapest during those times.

Minden jot!

-McKim Elder

Hivatalos hegyek - official mountains

So we're already entering into the final week of another transfer, it's pretty crazy to think about, but next time I email, I'll probably be getting a new companion already (possibly even a new city). President Szabadkai didn't give me any hints in my interview so I guess I still have another week or so before I know if I'll leave the big city at any point in time haha.

  This week was pretty good. We started off with interviews on monday, which were pretty normal, I didn't get any new crazy information or anything, so I don't know whether I should be excited or terrified for the upcoming transfer, but I guess we'll just see what happens.

  We spent a bunch of time this week getting a whole bunch of stuff ready for our residency cards, it's kind of ridiculous how much paper work and stuff we have to do to be able to stay in this country, but we do what has to be done. So we have been getting a bunch of forms and stuff and photocopying heaps of stuff this week which has been fun, but only to prepare us to going to the big scary government building this week, which should be super fun.

  We were able to find some super cool areas while we were out tracting in the cold this week. It's always a nice tender mercy when you get a pretty view of the city after you finish a long street of houses. We had a cool tracting miracle this week though, a man let us in to the building and we went up to the top. The first door we rang a man came out and we bore testimony of the book of mormon to him, he said he wasn't religious but if the book has really helped us in our lives then he would leave to read from it. The next floor down we were able to talk to a woman, who after talking for a while about her beliefs regarding the Bible and prophets, allowed us to share about the Book of Mormon and how we have a living prophet today. She loved everything that we shared with her, especially the promise in Moroni 10, and said she would love to learn more about us and attend church some time.

  Other than that, we met with a guy who was super drunk during our teaching, so we'll see where that one goes in the future I guess. Our zone was also able to meet our zone challenge last week (an average of 7 tracting days and 2 member presents each week per companionship over 4 weeks), so we get to have a zone day on wednesday, where we get to watch a disney movie, have lunch and hang out as a zone, so it should be pretty fun. It also got really cold this week, which means sweaters and coats made a come back, looking forward to that Hungarian winter!

Hope you all have great weeks.

Viszont!

- McKim Elder

                                                                   The Mall right near our apartment

                                                                    #JustTractingViews

Split Miracles

Üdvözlöm titeket!

So another wonderful exciting week is gone and past, with many more stories to share.

Monday we were able to head out to a little town called Budaörs for P-day, where we basically just went to Ikea and did some other shopping, but following that I was able to start exchanges with my old companion Elder Robinson. We had a super cool experience when we decided that although we had finished all the tracting that we needed to do, that we would continue on and do the next floor in the building before we finished. No one was being kind to us, until we knocked on the door of a nice old woman, who after a bit of conversation took, took us down to a little store at the bottom of the building and bought us some delicious drinks. The blessings of diligence!

  Wednesday was pretty crazy because I started the day by going to the doctor. There was the possibility that I had Pneumonia, but as far as the doctors are concerned I'm going to be fine, so that's comforting. We then had 2 different appointments suddenly get set up for that night so we were rushing around a lot, but it went well. I even had the opportunity to give a blessing to one of the members in Hungarian, which was super scary, but God speaks Hungarian and he was speaking through me, so it was fine.

  Thursday I got to go on exchanges with another of my old companions, Elder Winkel. We were also given some gifts from a nice old woman, but this time it was Old Testament study cards in Hungarian and some strange books, might come in handy some day. We were also able to meet a man named Robi, who was super excited to hear about the gospel and wants to meet with us, but we're not sure if he's in our area or not, so we'll see what happens there. We also had zone conference which was super good, it was all about learning the language and how we can improve our language studies. Super helpful.

 Then finally this weekend we had the opportunity to watch the first 4 sessions of General conference. Luckily I was able to watch all but one talk in English, so it was a really great opportunity to hear the inspired words of our church leaders. I loved them all, I don't know if I could really pick a favourite to recommend to everyone, so just watch them all I guess haha.

Today is interview day, so next week we'll see if I have any clues about what I'll be doing at transfers.

Sok szeretettel,

McKim Elder

                                     Elder Robinson and I with our drinks that we got from the Néni