Dear everyone,

Lusaka is great. Elder Ulloa and I had a pretty good week. Better than the last two for sure.

We still have only one baptismal candidate: Maron. She's doing well and should be baptised on 12 April if all goes as planned.

Yesterday was district conference for all of Lusaka. In the morning before we left, a man knocked on our gate and told us that his uncle who was a member of the Munali branch (Joseph Mutale, probably 50 years old) had passed away the night before. He had been sick for several weeks but it came as a surprise to us. As soon as the conf. was over we went to the family's house in an area called Kalingalinga and visited the two daughters, Natasha and Lorraine. The wife/mother is staying in Zimbabwe but I'm sure she's coming here for the funeral. They were setting up for a traditional funeral and waiting for all of their relatives to come, so we were sitting and waiting under this makeshift tent on the side of the house. While we were sitting, a huge wooden board, probably 10 feet long, fell from the roof perfectly between where I was sitting and where Elder Weight was sitting. It very nearly hit Elder Weight's nose. Pretty scary. The Lord protects His servants!

District Conf. was held at the Libala chapel. The members in Munali branch were supposed to have a bus pick us up in the morning at 9hrs in Mutendere, but it didn't arrive until 9:45 (the conf started at 10) so we barely barely made it on time. Also, a bunch of unaccounted-for members of Chainama branch came to board the same bus so we ended up having 65 or 70 people on one small bus, haha. Good thing there are no seatbelt laws in Zambia! We were crammed like sardines. Anyway we made it just on time. It was a great conference. President Bester spoke on food storage and financial preparedness, which is a very needed topic.

This morning we got up early and the Besters took the four Munali elders (Weight & Olanya, Ulloa & me) to breakfast at a very nice restaurant called the Taj Pamodzi. All-you-can-eat breakfast buffet. The best breakfast I've had on my mission for sure. Yum. Afterward we had our President interviews with him. As always, it was great. He always has great insights on things that help me out later.

Sorry, no more time. Have a great week everyone. I know this is the Lord's church!

Elder Mckay Moline

Dear everyone,

This is a bit later than usual because the power was out in ALL of Lusaka this morning.

My first week in Munali. It was a really weird week. So there are 4 elders who stay in our house. Elder Ulloa & I, and Elders Weight & Olanya (Kampala Uganda). Elder Olanya is straight from the MTC and he didn't arrive until Thursday so Ulloa, Weight, and I were in a threesome until then. Except for on Wednesday I went on exchanges with Elder Lawrance (the same one who was with me in Ndola) in his area which he is whitewashing which also happens to be my old area in Chainama branch. So he knew next to nothing about his area (not even how to get there) so I went on exchanges to show him around Chelston and Avondale to the members' places, etc. So he is still pretty clueless about the area but I'm sure he'll be fine. Hopefully he can do some things there that I couldn't. It was a bit strange being back again. We saw the Mwakamui family and the Kazelas (with the one-eyed kid).

Thursday we had to stay in for the first half of the day because there was a plumber in our house fixing our toilet. We had a devotional in the evening Thursday. We talked about the ten commandments. It was good.

The house we stay in is nice, though really old and really dusty. The walls and floors are falling apart in some corners. We've been doing some heavy-duty cleaning though. The area we stay in is called Helen Kaunda (named after the wife of the first president of independent Zambia, Kenneth Kaunda), just at the edge of another big 'compound' called Mutendere. Elder Ulloa and I work in half of Mutendere, UNZA (University of Zambia), Kalundu (very nice houses), and Ngombe which is a high-density area far from the church. We have a pretty big area. A lot of walking.

Yesterday was my first Sunday on mission having sacrament meeting in a real chapel! It was pretty exciting, but at the same time I guess it really doesn't even matter. The attendance at church was meager unfortunately.

I've really got to go now.

Love you all!
Elder Mckay Moline