Here's my district. Love these guys
top: me, Hansen, Igen, Muhlstein
bottom: Shuenman, DE LA PAZ, Nelson, Welch, Whisenant, Belnap (my comp)
O haio gozaimasu minason!
Sorry I wasn’t able to get back on yesterday to send this. My comp and I got done with our temple session (always great) and a lady asked us if we had a few minutes to come help with laundry. I was excited about the opportunity to serve! Though she unloaded a huge pile of socks and showed me the tedious way of folding them. Almost 2 hours later we said that we needed to leave to make it in time for dinner. When we left the temple we saw the sickest sunset and the temple looked great. I realized that I hadn’t seen a sunset since I got here because we are always in class. No picture of the sunset though pictures don’t do justice. Plus I am trying to avoid being too basic.
Not the craziest part of my day though. We begged one of the teachers here to get us Panda Express (we all miss food outside of the mtc) Greggory said that if we did really well with SYL (speak your language) for the next week we would do it. So we did yesterday. I got a Mountain Dew which I have greatly missed in this caffeine free prison ;) That first bite made me so happy. While we are sitting there eating and talking a cop car pulls up and this British guy that works for the MTC hopped out. Our teacher was like “ah busted, I can’t get in trouble right now” The man asked us how we knew this man. Greggory said that he was our teacher. Of course the man asked who the district leader was. At which time I tried to take as much blame as possible by saying it was my idea and that’s how we motivated ourselves to speak our language. It was p day so I had a little scruff on my face and the man chewed me out for it. Our teacher is such a stud I don’t want him to take any heat for this. I learn so well from him. The enforcer asked if he knew this wasn’t allowed and our teacher honestly didn’t. The rules say that he teachers can’t bring food to the “classroom.” I don’t see the big deal. The man said we should have known because “you don’t see anyone else doing this, I haven’t seen this in the 15 years I have worked here.” I couldn’t help but think “Aren’t we supposed to avoid doing what everyone else does?” I’ll be super angry if anything happens to my teacher.
Getting pretty annoyed with the rules here. I think we deserve a little more trust. Elders back in the day used to be able to take a bus on p days and go to the mall. Sometimes they would even attend BYU football games (which I wouldn’t mind cheering against the Cougs). The mall?! We can’t even get some panda express as a reward for working on the language. I sound super negative. I just don’t like rules that reward the people that just lie or purposely break them. For example we could have just walked to Panda and no one would have noticed. Though we knew that was against the rules. So we tried to do it within the rules. This place is a jail sometimes, though I still love it. My teachers are awesome, Spirit is strong, district is sick, and language is fun. Just the ups and downs I guess.
Earlier in the week our upperclassmen left for Japan. So crazy! I am stoked for them and it really got me excited. My district beat the cereal eating record here at the MTC for a single district. Previous record was 73 now it’s 83 for a single sitting. Elder Nelson of my district ate 15 bowls. What a stud.
My comp and I are still teaching the investigators. One of them doesn’t believe in God so we are just helping him pray to know if He is real. This was our 5thlesson. I decided to tell him again that I know God loves him and wants him to be happy now and eternally. I asked if that’s something he wants. All he said back or at least all I understood was that he prayed and as usual he didn’t feel anything. My comp and I sat in silence for about 15 minutes. The investigator finally just went to the bathroom. We quickly go some words together and told him that God doesn’t always answer our prayers right away or how we want Him too. He just has to keep showing faith. Later we asked our teacher (who acts as our investigator) if he needed to go to the bathroom. He said, “No we just needed some time to think” lol.
Sorry to those of you who aren’t LDS, this may not make a ton of sense. Let me know if you have any questions. At last Tuesday’s devo for some reason I was crying through the opening hymns “Choose the Right” and “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.” The Spirit was strong. I knew there must be someone special waiting to come through the doors. Sure enough Elder Nelson of the 12 came out right after. His second visit while I have been here. I believe that Elder Nelson and the rest of the 12 disciples have been called of God. There is no other way I could have felt His presence in that building through the Spirt. One of the things he said was that we need to learn how to trust ourselves, and never break that trust. I love that, if nothing else, you will always have yourself. Whether religious or not, do what makes you happy, not necessarily for the here and now but for your future and future family. Commit to it, and “trust yourself” that you will fulfill it. I needed to hear that just as much as anyone else. His wife talked about “being desperate” and used it in every sentence. I realized that I need to be desperate for success as a missionary as I was desperate for playing time my senior year of basketball.
Sorry lots to say this week! Again no hard feelings if you are getting these emails and don’t want them, just let me know
Ai Shite Masu
Supakuman Choro
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