I am always just going going going!

I am always just going going going!

But I love it. I barely have time to think for myself.

Its great to be able to just be helping the mission out and the other missioneries! I love doing all the behind the scenes work!

This past weeks work included and was not limited to:

-Confirming flight schedules for the outgoing missioneries.

-Confirming arrivals in the missionary training center.

-Arranging special changes for emergency situations and moving missionaries to different parts.

-making santiago trips to make sure all missionaries have valid Chilean visas.

-Cleaning out an old missionary apartment.

These are just some of the various things we do each week! Each of the 6 weeks of the 6-week cycle include different tasks! So this week we are taking care of new missionaries and old missionaries.

Its alot of office work, but at the same time, I get to conocer (to know) almost all the misisonaries in the mission. I also know alot of their first names (Which is weird becuase we refere to other missionaries as Elder or Hermana and their last name)

I cant tell you all the little lessons I learn from God, from other people, and learn about myself each week! Ive been trying to write them down.

One thing that I have noticed lately is there are alot of people out there that just ask you for 100 pesos here. Which is like 20 cents. I started trying to give them a nice little picture of Jesus for a reminder. Its really interesting that these people wont except a free nice little gift. I leaves me in awe everytime that reject it. How could someone turn down a reminder of Jesus and what he did for us because they are too focues on getting money. So how can this relate to you? Just as the homeless man is constantly focused on recieving more money and forgets what this life is really about, are we often forgetting as well? Are we too wrapped up in facebook, texting, cars, work, or other things and forget some of the more important things in this life as in Religion, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, family, and striving to achieve true happiness? Hmm. Seems as if we all fall into patterns and start to justify and tell ourselves that Work is more important than church, so we skip church. Or we find that drama in highschool proves to be too much and we skip out on church activities. Well I have had these same problems as well. But we can all get better. I challenge anyone who reads this to take 10 minutes out of each night and offer up a solemn simple prayer to our Heavenly Father who has given us SOOOO Much. (Everything that we have) Just try it and find the blessings that come with it. Just 10 minutes to think, pray, and meditate. I can write about it all I want, but you will never know until you try these things. So unlike the homeless man who is focused on getting his money and less about the important things in life, we need to be a little bit better and sit back and thank God for everything we have. So theres my thought of the week.

Yesterday we spent the day in Santiago again. Its really a cool city! I have a blast going up there. We were able to spend the day with a married couple of missionaries who are so cool! They are called the Walls. I learned alot from them in that day. We also got to eat at the Mtc. It was way good!

Today we ended up going to the same beach we did last week, but this time we relaxed a little more and adventured a little less. Fun fact of the day: I had to pay 40 cents to enter the bathrooms today. Interesting.

I had a wondeful week! I hope you all did as well.

"We show God our loyalty and Gratitud by progressing forward and becoming better than we were the day before"

Love,

Elder McGee

Well hey hey hey!

Another week come and gone! Sometimes I think about time for a second, and it’s so slow, and then I think about it again and another 2 weeks has gone by.

This week we had a few mentionable experiences! We got another rental car because the one that we had went into the shop, so we got this little white racer car, and its stick, and it’s pretty fast. So we had a lot of fun with that!

One night we took an Elder up to the airport at about 12, and didn’t get home till 3ish or so. It was way fun cause we went up with the Assistants as well. So those nights are always fun! It’s interesting here because the speed limits say 100-120 kilometers an hour, so it different like that!

Another day we did some service for a lady in the ward who had an almond tree. It was super cool to climb up into it and just shake the whole tree as hard as you can. It was actually pretty tiring. But it was so cool because thousands of almonds just fell out of the tree onto the concrete below. It sounded like hail. But we swept them all up and then put them in bags. There were SO MANY!

On Monday we went up to Santiago and did some visa work and other stuff for the mission and then we stopped by this really cool little South American mall place. They had like everything you can imagine. Cool backpacks, cool Latin shoes. It was basically like a huge Mexican souvenirs place, but Chile style. I bought some cool stuff and talked a lot of people down. It was cool to see what my Spanish could get me (:

Another day we marinated some chicken in pineapple juice all morning and then cooked it up. It was amazing (:

As far as the missionary work goes, we have been able to get out and teach a few lessons here, which have been GREAT. But most of our work is just finding people in the government buildings or hospitals and then passing their information to other Elders! It’s great to find spiritual experiences around anywhere. I think one of my favorite parts about each day is just to go out onto the balcony and pray for as long as my heart desires. I just listen and overlook the beautiful downtown form 9 stories up, and enjoy the fresh air with a hood on and just meditate. I have really been just rebuilding myself as a person. So that’s my challenge to you all this week. Find 10-15, maybe even 30 minutes. Put your phone in another room, put on some comfy clothes, and just find a nice spot preferably outside and just enjoy what God has given us. Enjoy the wind, the nature, and just pray and find out who you really are. Find out what you want to do and what you should do next to get there. “If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door.” The only way we can build that door is if we ask for a little more help from God.

Today, can I just say was absolutely amazing! We went down to a little place called Constitution. It probably one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen in my life. This place was just amazing! Ill just try to send some pictures so you get the idea! We woke up at 5 this morning to drive the 4 hour drive down south. We have a little rental car for right now, and this little thing is awesome! I drove us down. We all just had a blast and everyone said it was the best pday in their whole missions. One of them who is going home said that as well! And he’s had 2 years of Pdays!

If you want to be blown out of your mind, read this talk:http://speeches.byu.edu/?act=viewitem&id=1966 it absolutely changed my mind and made me a different person. I highly recommend it. It talks about how Christ’s sacrifices are already made. We will never pay him back. The only thing we can do is live right, follow the commandments, and be obedient to his words. If we are falling into sin and falling into things of the world, we are not showing Christ our love. I think often times we say we are Christians, and we believe in Christ, but this talk really showed me that we do not love Christ if we are not doing the things that he wants. We should not be messing around with sin at all. Just read the talk. (:

“Our most significant opportunities will be found in times of greatest difficulty,” –Thomas S. Monson

For real, you guys are great. I love you all.

Love,

Santiago, working out, and living the goodlife!

Wow where to start!

Lets just say that this was probably the fastest week of my life with everything going on! Its amazing! Just having a blast!

We started a diet in the house with live in with 4 elders. So we are all working out and eating super healthy things like salmon and celery! Its great and I feel good! We are doing like 2 miles every morning as well! Its wonderful to take care of our bodies that God has given us and to really feel more energy and feel happier (:

On Tuesday we got a call from President early in the morning that we were to go up to santiago to pick up 2 gringos from the airport. We had no description of them whatsoever and the santiago airport has tons of people in it, Im sure you can imagine. So we saw some new misisonaries who couldnt speak a lick of spanish and we helped them change out some of their money, and then we saw some missionaries who were going home while we were waiting! So after like an hour of waiting we finally met the two guys we were to pick up. They were coming down to film Elder Archuleta and a video they are working out which is kinda like an extended mormon message! Little did I know that these guys had the future job that I would love to do! We talked for the next 2 days as we were in charge of taking them up to santiago to film and record a song. These guys have worked on alot of the bigger videos the church has made. One of them directed the Jospeh Smith movie, and the other had made almost all the mormon messages. It was so thrilling to be able to help them out filming and talk aboutt all the different things about the film career. I mean these guys are literally emplooyeed by the church and go around making mormon messages and filming alo of what the general presidency of the church do! They had been to all countries in the world except for 2! How cool of a job to work for the church traveling and making movies! I just had such a ball! As well has hanging out with Elder Archuleta who is a super cool dude! We recorded a song up in Santiago, and they filmed around a little bit, and let me play with their Canon Mark III´s (: It was like a dream come true to kinda see what I could do in the future if I keep Gods commandments and do what I need to do like serve the mission!

 We were in Santiago and we had the misison van which actually doesnt have a back window. So we parked in kinda in front of the temple and left for about 20 minutes. We had come back to see that everything in the car was kinda scattered around outside, and there were about 15 cops coming from everyone on their dirtbikes and in their cars. We had been robbed in the 20 minutes that we left the car! They tackled the robber right in front of us and cuffed the dude. He had gone through the whole car and took the radio, my back with everything in it like scriptures and pen drives, and the film guys suitcases which fortunatly didnt have their expensive cameras! But it was juyst crazy, so we had to go to the police stattion and file a report. The police here are called Carribineros! They wear green uniforms. But it was all just so crazy! I couldnt believe it. But we got everything back and he didnt make it away with anything! So thanks to God and his blessings, I got all my stuff back! It was just crazy.

We also got to go down to the most southern part of the mission this week with president to a place called Talca. It was cool because we did a signing of a covenenant with a hospital down there. It was really formal. They took pictures and everything, Then I got to go see my buddie Elder Loveridge which is always great to see the guys I came out with. We checked out a cool mountain overlooking the city of Talca.

Today we tried something I had never tried before called Donut Burgers. We made burgers and bought dunkin donuts and bacon and made a sandwich out of it. It doesnt seem like it would be the best, but i would highly reccomend it! It was truly ricisimo! ( Delicious)

So that was my crazy fast week in a jffy!

I hope you all had a wonderful week like I did (:

Love Elder McGee

Wow. Excellent week!

Wow. Excellent week! Cant believe how fast it went by. Its awesome living with other super awesome dudes becuase the time just volars! (Flys)

We had some really fun times this week! One of which involved me learning how to drive stick. I never knew how too before. I told my companion that I wanted to try it out because one of our cars is a manual! So I hopped in the drivers seat, stalled it twice and then I was on my way. So I drove around for the rest of the night, and then it was time to head up to santiago the next day! So I drove all the way there, and had some fun times driving around with a manual in downtown santiago. I stalled a few times and got a couple honks, but I was pumped! Took me like 10 minutes to learn. One time we had to go underground 2 levels to park. There are parking lots just below the streets and city. Its cool. Anyways, the little spiral hill to get in there was sooo steep! It was crazy! But fun. Im always in for adventures!

While we were in santiago we had to pick up carnets, which are like a ID here. We had to pick up like 34 of them. So we went downtown and there is always a huge line, so we waited forever until we got to the front and then the lady told us that we cant take out that many. So I dont know where it came from, but I totally threw down some direct words, and sweet talked her into talking to the manager and we got the job done. Its cool being a misisonary without really going around just teaching people, because we still receive tons of blessings. I dont know where the spanish came from nor the direct words form my mouth, but they got me what I needed thanks to our loving Heavenly Father who blesses us so much.

Its fun being in the office because you hear evry single little detail of the mission. It makes me just wanna be so obedient! Some people do some stupid stuff.

Another awesome experiance we had was when I accidently left the headlights on in the car and the batetry died. So we had no way to get back home because it was late and we didnt wanna call anyone! So we tried to push start it, and it didnt work after pushing as fast as we could. So then we went back up stairs to look it up on the computer and we found out how to really do it. So we did everything we could on our part. We thought of the idea, and tried it but it didnt work. So then we reached out and tried to get help from the computer, and it still didnt work. So then we finally humbly asked our Father in heaven to help us out a little bit. I love the moments when I pray knowing that something is possible. Knowing that God will pull through if we do everything we can and then humble ourselves before him. So we did it another time after the prayer, and boom the car turned over! It was such a moment of victory inside my heart. Its truly amazing the blessings that come if we do our part and then ask for more help.

Last week we went on the roof of our apartment! We ate papa Johns and just overlooked all of Rancagua! It was beautiful! I am so blessed to be able to have all these oppurtunities!

Last night there was a broadcast for all the priesthood men in Chile, Argentina, uruaguay and paraguay. Elder Rasband of the 70 and Elder Ballard from the 12 spoke. They pretty much told everyone to stop being lazy. It was pretty palo. (Direct) They pretty much just called all the bretheren out for not helping the missionaries. It was cool cause they spoke in english and they had a trasnlator. But the spirit was way strong and it was cool the be apart of that!

Today was amazing! We drove about 2 hours into the mountains with a mini van! The mountains here a absoulutely beautiful! We found a cool river, and found an amazing lodge. We then ate lunch and drank matte overlooking all of rancagua! Today was just beautiful. We visited Coya, its a small little mining town! We even got a flat tire and changed out the wheel (:

I am just living up the life here in Chile. I dont know if Ill be home in a year a half or not (; I love the poeple, the experiances and the land here!

I hope you all had a faboulous week in Springvegas and other parts of the world. You all inspire me to be better and work harder every day (: Thanks for all the support!

All my life I thought I was preparing for a mission, and now that Im here, I realized the mission is just preparing me for life.

"Dont Give up the things you want most, for the things you may want now."

I got alot of pictures to send this week (:

Love,
Elder McGee

Que pasa familia y amigasos??

Que pasa familia y amigasos??

Les extraño mucho, pero se que están bien (:

Día de San Valentine se paso, pero fue buena (:

This week was crazy. They call the first week of every change "Semana Loca" (Crazy Week) here in the office, because we send people home, and we get new people in the mission. And then somehow there is always something else crazy that happens!

So basically, this week started off on sunday.

We got ready for Church that morning and then President called us and said an Elder got a concussion and needed to go up to the hospital in Santiago. So immediantely we went down to Curico which is about 2 hours and south, picked up the Elder, and then drove 2 hours back North to Rancagua, and then preeceded to go to santiago another hour north. So we missed Church my first week here in the office, which is a big deal, because Chuch is seriously the best part of the week! But its fun to help people out and this elder needed some help. So I ask myself " What would Jesus Do?" and I think he wouldve healed people (: So we took him back home and then drove back to rancagua. So a good 10 hour drive this on sunday. Then we got prepared to send home all the old guys who were "dying" in the mission. It was really fun, we had amazing fajitas and I had to say goodbye to one of my really good buddies who I met at the begginning of my mish, and he really helped me out.

So then we get a call about the same Elder who needede to go to the hospital, so we did the same trip of 8 hours or whatever to santiago, and we left him over night this time. So we finally got back home at like 330 in the morning on tuesday, and we had to be back up for the New misisonaries welcome at presidents house. So we had some really good hamburgers on this day.  It was fun to meet all the news, and see how excited they were to come out into the mission.

So then on tuesday, we had to go pickup the Elder again. So it was our third trip to santiago in 3 days. And while all of this was going on, we were coordinating the changes. Which is when like half the mission (250 people) changes house or places! So it was just wild.

I understood why they call this week La Semana Loca. So then the next couple of days we just did a bunch of office work for all the people that went home and the people that came out. We enter alot of Data into the computers for everyone, and we change around all the info for where the people live in the mish, and just do alot of stuff with their visas and other good stuff. Its fun, but I got a little wrestlous from being cooped up in the office for a few days. But its a fun atmosphere. Just knowing all the little things that are going on in the mission, and helping evrryone out! I think I am going to start making videos soon! Which would be tight, its just I dont have much equipment to work with (:

Today we went to a ferria in the morning, which is just a super cool thing that Chileans do. They shut down the streets and just sell a TON of fruit and clothes. Its like a huge garage sale, but eveyrone brings their own tents and sells stuff super cheap. So today we bought like blueberries, and nectorrines, and bananas and a ton of fruit for like 10 bucks. but we bought enough to last 4 hungry dudes for a week. Its super barato (Cheap) then we went shopping around a couple places, and got ready for the week. I think next week were gonna go north to a really cool place for PDay (:

So thats basically my week!

I love the Elders we live with!

We have a blast. Today we bought matchich ment teal ties.

Last night we drank matte on our 9th floor balcony looking out onto downtown Rancagua talking about life.

I couldnt ask for a better life right now. Im so happy (:

Love you all!

Hope you had a great valentines day with your loves. We bought roses for the asistents to the president (:

Photos:

Good ole view of our balcony

The amount of matte we drink. Each packet makes a liter

Have an awesome week!

Elder McGee checking out.

Que pasaaaa amigos y familiares!!

Que pasaaaa amigos y familiares!!!!

La semana pasada ha sido tan buena!

My new house is amazing, we are overlooking the downtown of rancagua! Its way cool. We are on the ninth floor of some really nice apartments with a balcony and a bunch of windows. It may seem normal for all you all at home, but here in Chile this is like luxury! Its tight. We have cars to drive around, and I have my own phone. Its cool, cause not many others get to have opurtunities like this, so for that I am very thankful.

My new companion is named elder Archibald, and hes awesome. He is from Alberty Canada. (Forsyth family will be proud) We have already had a great time this week. We drove down the the most southern part of the mission named Talca. Its fun to be doing road trips, and enjoy the beautiful mountains of Chile!! We also ate a famous place called Donde Alex. They are famous for their "Completos" Which is a chilean Hotdog with extremely good bread, an inch of Palta (avocadoes) and and inch of mayonase. I dont know why but they are so greattt. (:

Lets see, Also my buddy from the MTC, Elder Loveridge was in Talca as well. It was good to see him for a little bit as we dropped off 5 boxes of book of Mormons to their zone.

Today was way fun. Everyone in the office hopped in the car and drove about 2 hours south to find a place in Chile that would be a buffet. Becuase those dont exist here. But we got there and it was closed, so we ended up driving a little farther and just ate at some hole in the wall place that served empanadas. It was cool though. It was basically like the front porch of someones house, and everyone here has grapes. Because grapes are Chiles number one export. So the little walk up to their house was like a roof of grapes hanging down. It was pretty cool!

Apart of having all these fun experiances, Im gonna learn how to drive stick so that Dallas will be proud of me because the office has a mission car with Stick. Also I started learning how to play Ukelele, and also harmonica! So thats pretty cool!

It was also fun this week helping with the Changes, because we got to help decide where people go, and who they will be with. No one in the mission even knows yet, and they wont know for a couple more hours!

Also we got a new asistent to the president this past week as well. He is actually one of my buddies that I met in the first few weeks of the mish!

So as far as the spiritual side goes, its cool to just read the scriptures on the balcony overlooking Rancagua. Its also even cooler to have 8 guys living in one house and singing awesome hymns at random times of the day. We have alot of fun, but its great becasue everyone knows it cool to be spiritual. Thats something you cant just have, Its somthing you gotta work hard for. My comp and I have a goal to baptize someone while being in the office. The last guy that did it was about a year ago. Its just diffulcult becuase we really dont have any time to go out into the Campo (field) But I had some wonderful experiances reading the bible this week, as I am reading in The Acts. What a wonderful book to explore and learn about the life of the only perfect man who ever lived on this earth! If we can all just be a little happier and work to be a better person all day. than we would enjoy life a little bit more. I kinda have gained the legacy of always being happy, and the other Elders were asking me how I do it. I told them there is never a reason to be sad. There are alot of aweful things that can happen to someone in this life, but like it says in D&C 122:7 All challenges are for our benefit. God would never give us something that we cant handle, and the only way we can overcome it is to just put that smile back on and continue on with life. Because Satans goals is to make us miserable! SO BE HAPPY! WOOOO.

I love you all and thank you for being my awesome support of family and friends. 

I sincerely thank you all for all the little things that have made a difference in my mission and life!

Love,

Elder McGee

Hey family and friends!

Hey family and friends!

I dont have much time this week, but I wil type as fast as I possibly can!

This week was great as always, and I cant believe January already went by! Only 11 more months of 2014.. Its gonna fly.

As far as events went this week, we had an activity on friday, where called karamate. Where everyone drinks matte and sings karaoke. It was really fun! Its interesting here in south america, because everyone knows alot more english than we know spanish. I think its because they listen to alot of songs in english!

We have our recent convert Aquiles whois doing awesome. We bought him a triple, which contains the book of mormon, and 2 other awesome books. thats why its called the triple, anyways, on his table he had his triple and hhiis book of mormon. (the blue one) and we had a discussion about how his reading was going, and he told us that the triple was more interesting, even though they are the same book. We all laughed, and we explained to him that they are the same story. haha.

Last night was pretty hard because I had to say goodbye to my new family. Im not gonna lie, it was pretty hard because there is a good chance I could never see them again. But I will see my family at home again. But we had a big barbeque, and enjoyed times together. I gave them my final little goodbye speach and they all cried, and it was just great and sad. I also bore my testimony yesterday, which was a little harder in spanish, but the ward building was full of people and many told me they cried with my testimony. Its hard because tese people are truly my family now, and I have to say goodbye to them because Im leaving this area today!

Im gonna miss these 2 elders Im with too. We had an awesome time together and really just enjoyed the mission to the max. Working hard, and playing hard.

Saturday, we painted the back of this families house bright green. I love all the colors people paint there houses here (:

Anyways, thats about it on my week!

I hope you all have a wonderful beautiful snowy week, Ill keep getting tan for all of you (:

Love:

Elder McGee