Thursday, September 4, 2014

Letter #5

Tuesday, 2 September 2014 (4:06 PM)

So I'll start with yesterday, which most of you know as Labor Day. Here in the MTC it's just another day at the MTC. The only difference is that we didn't get any mail. It's kind of weird being in here and knowing that everyone else still has lives. I feel like life should be on pause right now while I get ready. So, ya. Nothing too special about Labor Day.

So Saturday was not fun at all. At the beginning of the day nothing was really wrong. At the end of the day my throat felt like I ate a bunch of crunchy dry leaves, my nose was melting from the inside and my head was being beaten upon by tiny rubber mallets. It was not fun. And too make things worse is that the tissues here are not all that soft. My nose was redder than my hair. Then, one of our roommates, Elder Draper, hurt his back somehow (maybe a bulging disk) and he was barely able to walk. It was no fun Saturday night. We both laid in our beds while the others went to gym time. He's almost fully recovered now, but we're still keeping an eye on him.
So I forgot to mention this last week, but when the new elders came on that Wednesday, we sang to them a French Hymn called Souviens-Toi. It only exists in the French Cantiques, and it's really cool, but it is super creepy when the whole floor is singing it and some of them are tucking in the new elders. Thankfully I didn't have to go through that. But it's tradition.

So you know how we get ice cream on Wednesdays and Sundays?  Well this last Wednesday I ate 5 bowls in 2 meals. It was fantastic. Tomorrow I'm going for 6 :).

So generally I've been learning lots of spiritual and french stuff. I'm starting to actually gain some confidence in my speaking skills. Our "investigators" (teachers who are acting) are progressing pretty well and this week we actually get to Skype a native speaker, probably from Montréal. Super exciting and kind of nerve-wracking. We'll see how that goes. We are hopefully going to receive our travel packets at the end of this week or beginning of next. I'm just so excited to get out into the field and teach and see the sights and meet the people and try the food and realize how much I can't speak French. OK, not so much the last one.

I'm so glad that everyone is doing great! Shay, good job being the hola hooping champ. Nik, nice work making a fool of yourself in sacrament. Kennion, I'm glad to know you're still rocking the sliders. Mom and Dad, love you much. Tell Payton that's awesome and I hope he's doing ok. Thanks for the pictures too, except I have now filled my little picture book and many of the pics are sharing a page. Again, thank you so much for the emails, the letters, the packages (when I asked for the Lego set I was mostly joking, but I was still super excited to open the package to that. I built it while everyone was napping today. It was fantastic), the support, the love, and everything else you all do for me!

A tiny revelation I had whilst learning from Frère Call:
So recently we've had some different "investigators" with various back stories and circumstances. So I've been trying to remember different approaches for things like "I've already been baptized" or "My family is all this other religion". What I was doing was memorizing answers for a multiple choice test. But then I realized during this particular lesson that I needed to rely more on the spirit. I don't need to know how to fix every problem and conflict. What I really need to know is how to follow the promptings of the spirit. Everyone is different, therefore every answer is different. But Heavenly Father knows where everyone's been and what they all need. We just need to listen and act.

Love,

Elder Perkes

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