August 27, 2009
Dear family and other people.
Well I'm now officially 1/3rd of the way through my imprisonment, er, I mean experience in the MTC. It's actually quite odd, on one hand I feel as though I've just gotten here and time has flown by, but on the other hand I feel like I've spent my entire life here. That, and that it's hard to remember what life was like before the MTC, one of the elders in my district commented that a veil has been placed over our minds separating our life now and that of before. Really, it's almost like that.
Anyway, this last week was pretty epic. On Tuesday for our devotional Elder Richard G. Scott made a "surprise" visit and that was our devotional for the night. It was epic, at first it was rather dull, he was using a power point and I was like: "What?! We have an apostle speaking to us and he's using a powerpoint!? Of the all things he could say to us, he uses a power point to demonstrate what we've been hearing in every devotional for the past 3 weeks, namely teaching by the spirit. And I guess he picked up on that cause about 15 minutes in to that he just stopped, said he was going to change his talk at a whim and discard his powerpoint presentation. And then he did a couple of epic things. First of all, in his words he "used his apostolic power" to give all of us there in the room who were going on foreign speaking missions, to confirm upon us the gift of tongues. That was epic, I'd never heard of any general authority doing that to hundreds of people at once, and he also confirmed upon us a shield of protection, for the sisters in particular. So yeah, it was pretty epic. And then he told us awesome stories from his days as a missionary in South America and how the spirit led him to dodge drug smugglers and revolutionaries like Che Guerva running guns through jungles and whatnot. So yeah, it was pretty cool. I'd say more but I don't have the paper with me from which I took notes on during his talk.
Oh and on Sunday we did the Oquirrh Mountain Temple dedication, which was okay, though I very nearly fell asleep during the hour or so before it actually started, and my companion Elder Wood says he saw angels during it. Now there's something of interest, Elder Wood has been getting weirder and weirder lately. The other day we're in the Referral Center (RC) where we make calls and do chats on computers with investigators and whatnot, I'll be more specific with what the RC in my huge family letter that I'm working on. Anyway, we were in the RC on our computers and mine was taking along time to log in. I was sitting there patiently waiting for the computer to load when Elder Wood said something about a prayer for the computer to work, I was only half listening and I thought he was joking, but he launched right into a prayer, in Spanish, asking God for my computer to work. At first I stared at him with the "are you freaking serious?" look on my face. The prayer was short, and afterwards he looked up, saw it was still loading and then slapped his forehead and said that he used the incorrect tense and conjugation of 'trabajar'. So he started praying again, using the correct conjugation I presume, this time I bowed my head respectfully. And when he finished lo and behold my computer finished loading.... Yeah he's insane. He then praised the lord and chastened me for my lack of faith. I was still staring at him like he was an idiot, and if that prayer hadn't worked he probably would have wanted to give my computer a priesthood blessing.
By the way mom, back when we were in San Diego Elder Wood's last lame was 'Wilde' or maybe Wildewood' or something like that. His parents have separated since. So maybe that'll help you. Oh and I made the comment about not being able to read Arabic because, mom and aunt Becky, your handwriting is so loopy and cursive-y that it looks like Hebrew or Arabic or something. And definitely not something using the Latin alphabet.
Spanish is coming along better, in PMG there is this excerpt from the 1st vision that we are to memorize. You know the part with "I looked up and beheld two personages.... This is my beloved son, hear Him." And all that. Well I memorized it first in English and now I have it down in Spanish too, which I thought was amazing cause it's like two whole paragraphs and I have the memory of a small mammal and can't remember what happened 5 minutes ago, something that Elder Wood tells me all the time, and he's right. Har har.
Okay so not much else of importance has happened. I'm still working on letters for y'all, it takes mucho tiempo and Yo no tengo mucho tiempo por escribir. So be patient, it will be epic and rather detailed.
Ummm.... What else? I've got five more minutes of e-mail time. I need to come up with a subject line too. I think I will use song titles from my gentile music that I no longer have and miss very much. Hymns have gotten real old real fast, even in Spanish. So today it's gonna be “Seasons in the Abyss”, like I wanted the blog to be called.
Again, thanks for all the letters and stuff, my whole district thinks it's unreal how many letters I get, I tell them they're from my chicas back home, har har~! And for the stuff. Speaking of stuff, I could use a lint brush, I know you said I wouldn't need one dad but you should see my pants when the come out of these nasty dryers. Oh and could you get me Adam's address too? That'd be great. So that's all for today, don't get into my stuff and have fun with school. Oh and Austin I was laughing so hard when mom told me she signed you up for ballroom dance. BWAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!
Elder Rice
Brutalness
Hola familia and other people.
Today is my second P day! And yes I only get to do e-mails on P day both reading them and writing them, and for only 30 minutes. So where to start. I'm working on letters for all of you, as I won't get to everything in 30 minutes. So they'll come eventually, don't count on them anytime soon. Thanks for all the stuff, especially for the hangers and the clippers. I had some pretty gnarley claws and I was considering buying some from the book store. And now that I have hangars I don't have to put my pants in those nasty drawers.
Speaking of the MTC book store it's really neat. It's basically the same as the BYU book store except everything is like 40% off! We have a blue card and every week $6 gets put on it. We're to use this for laundry, buying stuff from the book store, vending machines, etc. It's cumulative too, so by the time I leave I'll have quite a bit to spend on random junk. I haven’t but much from there, just a name tag clip, washing detergent, a small spanish verb book that has like the 300 most used verbs that it highly recommended by everyone.
Spanish has been going a lot better! For the first week it was tough, but then it finally clicked for me one day when I finally figured out that using personal pronouns is entirely optional in spanish, that it's rarely used. Before then I was staring at these sentences and wondering where in the world the "Yo" was when I clearly saw that the verb was in the Yo form. What a lazy language... Anyway, we're progressing really fast, and I'm keeping up somehow. We've already finished with present, imperfect, preterite, and present progressive tenses. Quite a bit but they have these neat computer programs that help a lot, I drill my self on conjugations for at least a half hour each day.
Oh and in my last e-mail I mentioned my companion Elder Wood and that he went to Carmel Creek when I did. Anyway, it turns out that we might have actually knew each other, we were in the same class, same ward, and my friends were his friends. That and he's still in contact with them! They're like his best friends now. Remember Antonio? I forgot his last name even though Elder Wood just told me five minutes ago. But Antonio among others, are on Elder Wood's mission e-mail list, so he's gonna tell them about me. He says he remembers me but I don't remember him. He remembers me as the little blond kid that was always in trouble all of the time at school and didn't like being at church. That sounds pretty accurate, but I don't remember him, though he claims that YOU, mother, arranged to have him come over to our house one day so that I could "make a new friend" or something ridiculous like that. I told him no way. There's no way my mother would do something stupid and incredibly lame like that!
What else? Oh and I figured out the secret behind the uncleanliness of the MTC, you're exactly right dad, they have the missionaries do the cleaning. No wonder... Saturdays at 6:30 AM is when our zone does our time cleaning stuff. Last saturday we cleaned bathrooms, it sucked. Not even that but the manner of cleaning the various bathroom fixtures is to splash chemicals all over them, wipe it around, and then pour water on it to rinse, and then towel dry. Obviously that doesn't get things very clean, but I'm grateful cause it takes like 10 seconds to clean a toilet and there's no scrubbing involved. Now there is a MTC custodial staff, but they just direct us around, we do the real work.
Hmmm... What else? Oh, the other day we had lesson from a sub teacher that we called the 'J-Dub 101' Lesson. Our teacher, Hermana Barker, served her mission in Brooklyn, the supposed center of J-Dubdom. Anyway we had to get to know her as an "investigator" and then teach her. It was tough, we failed miserably, halfway through our 10 minutes that Elder Wood and I were "teaching her" we found out in a very unpleasant manner that they don't even use the same bible we do! Thus we were totally defeated halfway into it, and she stopped us right there and started to tell us how we ought to teach. It was kinda fun, the J-Dubs have some weird beliefs, most of my district thought that they are freaking crazy and they must be stupid to believe such things but I for one, think that their beliefs are just as bizarre as ours.
8 minutes.... Moving fast. Gym time is fun, before I got here I thought Gym time would be miserable because all I'd ever hear of people playing was basket ball. But there's a field too! And I can play soccer! My companion hates soccer and loves basketball, so we alternate everyday. I've gotten pretty beat up from soccer, supposedly there's not supposed to be any heads or slide tackles allowed, nor are we supposed to keep score but it never turns out like that. Anyway I was pretty sore after the first few days and I have a slight and temporary limp in my left leg. It's incredibly fun and brutal! And we don't have any hispanics that share our gym time so we're all equally bad, save for a few souls. When we go to the gym I'll just play volleyball, a lot of people play it there. The last couple times I've been playing with a district that's going german speaking and thus I was able to converse with them and to apologize most sincerely to this one girl who's nose I almost broke when the ball hit her straight on the face when we both went for it.
Umm... 4 minutes. Not much else to say. The food is still terrible, probably always will be. But I'm almost use to it now. Not much else I have to say, or at least that I could say in 3 minutes. I saw Bro. Manwaring in the temple today. And don't try and "run into" me there, that's not supposed to happen. So I love you all. Oh! and also Mom and Aunt Becky, please write in a language that uses the Latin alphabet, I cannot read Arabic all that well.
And no Austin you cannot have the speakers nor the ipod dock.
-Elder Rice
Today is my second P day! And yes I only get to do e-mails on P day both reading them and writing them, and for only 30 minutes. So where to start. I'm working on letters for all of you, as I won't get to everything in 30 minutes. So they'll come eventually, don't count on them anytime soon. Thanks for all the stuff, especially for the hangers and the clippers. I had some pretty gnarley claws and I was considering buying some from the book store. And now that I have hangars I don't have to put my pants in those nasty drawers.
Speaking of the MTC book store it's really neat. It's basically the same as the BYU book store except everything is like 40% off! We have a blue card and every week $6 gets put on it. We're to use this for laundry, buying stuff from the book store, vending machines, etc. It's cumulative too, so by the time I leave I'll have quite a bit to spend on random junk. I haven’t but much from there, just a name tag clip, washing detergent, a small spanish verb book that has like the 300 most used verbs that it highly recommended by everyone.
Spanish has been going a lot better! For the first week it was tough, but then it finally clicked for me one day when I finally figured out that using personal pronouns is entirely optional in spanish, that it's rarely used. Before then I was staring at these sentences and wondering where in the world the "Yo" was when I clearly saw that the verb was in the Yo form. What a lazy language... Anyway, we're progressing really fast, and I'm keeping up somehow. We've already finished with present, imperfect, preterite, and present progressive tenses. Quite a bit but they have these neat computer programs that help a lot, I drill my self on conjugations for at least a half hour each day.
Oh and in my last e-mail I mentioned my companion Elder Wood and that he went to Carmel Creek when I did. Anyway, it turns out that we might have actually knew each other, we were in the same class, same ward, and my friends were his friends. That and he's still in contact with them! They're like his best friends now. Remember Antonio? I forgot his last name even though Elder Wood just told me five minutes ago. But Antonio among others, are on Elder Wood's mission e-mail list, so he's gonna tell them about me. He says he remembers me but I don't remember him. He remembers me as the little blond kid that was always in trouble all of the time at school and didn't like being at church. That sounds pretty accurate, but I don't remember him, though he claims that YOU, mother, arranged to have him come over to our house one day so that I could "make a new friend" or something ridiculous like that. I told him no way. There's no way my mother would do something stupid and incredibly lame like that!
What else? Oh and I figured out the secret behind the uncleanliness of the MTC, you're exactly right dad, they have the missionaries do the cleaning. No wonder... Saturdays at 6:30 AM is when our zone does our time cleaning stuff. Last saturday we cleaned bathrooms, it sucked. Not even that but the manner of cleaning the various bathroom fixtures is to splash chemicals all over them, wipe it around, and then pour water on it to rinse, and then towel dry. Obviously that doesn't get things very clean, but I'm grateful cause it takes like 10 seconds to clean a toilet and there's no scrubbing involved. Now there is a MTC custodial staff, but they just direct us around, we do the real work.
Hmmm... What else? Oh, the other day we had lesson from a sub teacher that we called the 'J-Dub 101' Lesson. Our teacher, Hermana Barker, served her mission in Brooklyn, the supposed center of J-Dubdom. Anyway we had to get to know her as an "investigator" and then teach her. It was tough, we failed miserably, halfway through our 10 minutes that Elder Wood and I were "teaching her" we found out in a very unpleasant manner that they don't even use the same bible we do! Thus we were totally defeated halfway into it, and she stopped us right there and started to tell us how we ought to teach. It was kinda fun, the J-Dubs have some weird beliefs, most of my district thought that they are freaking crazy and they must be stupid to believe such things but I for one, think that their beliefs are just as bizarre as ours.
8 minutes.... Moving fast. Gym time is fun, before I got here I thought Gym time would be miserable because all I'd ever hear of people playing was basket ball. But there's a field too! And I can play soccer! My companion hates soccer and loves basketball, so we alternate everyday. I've gotten pretty beat up from soccer, supposedly there's not supposed to be any heads or slide tackles allowed, nor are we supposed to keep score but it never turns out like that. Anyway I was pretty sore after the first few days and I have a slight and temporary limp in my left leg. It's incredibly fun and brutal! And we don't have any hispanics that share our gym time so we're all equally bad, save for a few souls. When we go to the gym I'll just play volleyball, a lot of people play it there. The last couple times I've been playing with a district that's going german speaking and thus I was able to converse with them and to apologize most sincerely to this one girl who's nose I almost broke when the ball hit her straight on the face when we both went for it.
Umm... 4 minutes. Not much else to say. The food is still terrible, probably always will be. But I'm almost use to it now. Not much else I have to say, or at least that I could say in 3 minutes. I saw Bro. Manwaring in the temple today. And don't try and "run into" me there, that's not supposed to happen. So I love you all. Oh! and also Mom and Aunt Becky, please write in a language that uses the Latin alphabet, I cannot read Arabic all that well.
And no Austin you cannot have the speakers nor the ipod dock.
-Elder Rice
Week 1 Recap
Family and anyone else who may be reading this,
I finally made it to P-Day. I thought it would never come, it finally did. Now this is going to be rather short for I have only 30 minutes to write this email and five of it was already spent setting up the e-mail account, so try to ignore all of my typos.
Anyway, I have so much to say and so little time, so for actual detailed accounts of my exploits you will have to rely on my illegible letters. So, where to begin? Day 1. If I had to associate one word with the MTC it would be 'Madness' cause that's exactly what it is. The first day was a day full of: "go here, get this, go there, get that." I was loaded up with books and sent to the room that would be my residence for the next couple months.
So we don't have to pay for the essential package of books we got. We got a Preach My Gospel, which will heretofore be mentioned as the PMG, in spanish. A bible and book of mormon in spanish. The cool thing is that the Bible we have is a Catholic one, it's really cool, it has this baroque, old world look to it and in it. So much more cool than our stale protestant like standard works.
So loaded with all of this I finally got to my room with my luggage. There I met Elder Allbee, not my companion but he was in the same room with us, his companion is Elder Manship. Elder Allbee is cool, he's a fellow metal-head so we get along quite well.
Elder Wood is my companion, he's from San Diego and it turns out that he went to the same elementary school that we did when we lived in San Diego, Carmel Creek Elementary School, so we must of been in that school together. Elder Wood is amazing, he's had 3 years of spanish already and is like 6 tenses ahead of the rest of us and knows his scripture mastery really well, like down the page number. But he and I have nothing in common, that and I cannot really understand him, he can't say his R's so to him my name isn't 'Elder Rice' it's 'Eldwah Wice' it irritates me to no end but I've gotten used to it now and now I only have to ask him to repeat things once. So now you know that his english is bad, now imagine his spanish! Like I said before, he knows it really well but he cannot, for the life of him, pronounce anything. He relies on me for pronunciation, of which I believe I am rather good at. One of our teachers said that I sounded almost like a native, so that's good. Elder Wood will only talk about Spanish, nothing else. He get's really annoyed at this habit of mine. I have a tendency to go out of my way to talk to anyone with Cyrillic or Slavic characters on their name tags or striking up conversations with those going German speaking.
Spanish has been tough though, especially after a couple years of German. Several times now when I give the prayer or anything else that requires me to speak spanish under pressure I end up speaking Spanish, German, and English all in the same sentence. It's kinda funny, and I enjoy letting my district hear the mighty language of German and how much more awesome it is than any wimpy Latin language.... Oh and I think I figured out the secret of going on foreign speaking missions. Most everyone I've talked to has had at least 3 years of the language they're going to. So, Austin and Aidan, take 3 years of whatever it is you want to speak and don't take ANY Spanish at all, or else that will cancel out anything else.
So, the MTC, the room was terrible, I was expecting something dirty but it was just nasty. It smelled terrible, like an old wet sock in that's been left in a corner of Cove Point or something. The only thing that smells worse is Elder Wood's feet, I have to vacate the room when he takes his socks off so I won't gag. The food isn't that bad, but nor as good as others have pretended. Rather less than mediocre actually, at first it was nice being able to eat curly fries at both dinner and lunch and as much as you wanted but after the first 3 days my bowels were being torn up something terrible and now I just mostly eat salads with the occasional something else more meaty. I've got six minutes left so perhaps I shall give a more detailed descriptions of the food later.
Our district consists of 12 people, who's names I don't have time to mention. 6 of us are going to Houston, 4 to Chile, and 2 to Guatemala. We're an odd bunch, lots of weirdos, but weird in the churchy way, as in a tad bit overzealous, in fact we once had a heated discussion about Geology and the age of the earth and other things that I won't go too much into cause I have a couple minutes left.
Okay so I need a few things, clippers, whites socks, about 3 or 4 pairs, two more pairs of garments, dri-lux, round neck, medium sized, and a contact lense for my left eye. I lost down the sink the other night. So please send as soon as you can, the contact will take awhile I know but i have a minute left so I love you all and almost but not quite miss you.
- Elder Rice
I finally made it to P-Day. I thought it would never come, it finally did. Now this is going to be rather short for I have only 30 minutes to write this email and five of it was already spent setting up the e-mail account, so try to ignore all of my typos.
Anyway, I have so much to say and so little time, so for actual detailed accounts of my exploits you will have to rely on my illegible letters. So, where to begin? Day 1. If I had to associate one word with the MTC it would be 'Madness' cause that's exactly what it is. The first day was a day full of: "go here, get this, go there, get that." I was loaded up with books and sent to the room that would be my residence for the next couple months.
So we don't have to pay for the essential package of books we got. We got a Preach My Gospel, which will heretofore be mentioned as the PMG, in spanish. A bible and book of mormon in spanish. The cool thing is that the Bible we have is a Catholic one, it's really cool, it has this baroque, old world look to it and in it. So much more cool than our stale protestant like standard works.
So loaded with all of this I finally got to my room with my luggage. There I met Elder Allbee, not my companion but he was in the same room with us, his companion is Elder Manship. Elder Allbee is cool, he's a fellow metal-head so we get along quite well.
Elder Wood is my companion, he's from San Diego and it turns out that he went to the same elementary school that we did when we lived in San Diego, Carmel Creek Elementary School, so we must of been in that school together. Elder Wood is amazing, he's had 3 years of spanish already and is like 6 tenses ahead of the rest of us and knows his scripture mastery really well, like down the page number. But he and I have nothing in common, that and I cannot really understand him, he can't say his R's so to him my name isn't 'Elder Rice' it's 'Eldwah Wice' it irritates me to no end but I've gotten used to it now and now I only have to ask him to repeat things once. So now you know that his english is bad, now imagine his spanish! Like I said before, he knows it really well but he cannot, for the life of him, pronounce anything. He relies on me for pronunciation, of which I believe I am rather good at. One of our teachers said that I sounded almost like a native, so that's good. Elder Wood will only talk about Spanish, nothing else. He get's really annoyed at this habit of mine. I have a tendency to go out of my way to talk to anyone with Cyrillic or Slavic characters on their name tags or striking up conversations with those going German speaking.
Spanish has been tough though, especially after a couple years of German. Several times now when I give the prayer or anything else that requires me to speak spanish under pressure I end up speaking Spanish, German, and English all in the same sentence. It's kinda funny, and I enjoy letting my district hear the mighty language of German and how much more awesome it is than any wimpy Latin language.... Oh and I think I figured out the secret of going on foreign speaking missions. Most everyone I've talked to has had at least 3 years of the language they're going to. So, Austin and Aidan, take 3 years of whatever it is you want to speak and don't take ANY Spanish at all, or else that will cancel out anything else.
So, the MTC, the room was terrible, I was expecting something dirty but it was just nasty. It smelled terrible, like an old wet sock in that's been left in a corner of Cove Point or something. The only thing that smells worse is Elder Wood's feet, I have to vacate the room when he takes his socks off so I won't gag. The food isn't that bad, but nor as good as others have pretended. Rather less than mediocre actually, at first it was nice being able to eat curly fries at both dinner and lunch and as much as you wanted but after the first 3 days my bowels were being torn up something terrible and now I just mostly eat salads with the occasional something else more meaty. I've got six minutes left so perhaps I shall give a more detailed descriptions of the food later.
Our district consists of 12 people, who's names I don't have time to mention. 6 of us are going to Houston, 4 to Chile, and 2 to Guatemala. We're an odd bunch, lots of weirdos, but weird in the churchy way, as in a tad bit overzealous, in fact we once had a heated discussion about Geology and the age of the earth and other things that I won't go too much into cause I have a couple minutes left.
Okay so I need a few things, clippers, whites socks, about 3 or 4 pairs, two more pairs of garments, dri-lux, round neck, medium sized, and a contact lense for my left eye. I lost down the sink the other night. So please send as soon as you can, the contact will take awhile I know but i have a minute left so I love you all and almost but not quite miss you.
- Elder Rice
Secret Code?
I guess the parents of a new missionary are the last to know.
In his mailing address is says Houston Texas Mission 1006
Well 1006 is his departure date from the MTC- Oct 6th.
Good to know.... Glad the people at the delivery place told Michael.
In his mailing address is says Houston Texas Mission 1006
Well 1006 is his departure date from the MTC- Oct 6th.
Good to know.... Glad the people at the delivery place told Michael.
Care package
Needless to say, I am still thinking about Alex's letter. Last night all I dreamed about was being in the MTC, I kid you not...
Just so you know we gathered up his Scotland Shirt, 10 hangers and his water bottle and Michael took them over the place that has same day delivery to the MTC. I liked Mom's idea of shelf liners and lysol, may just have to do that too.
Just so you know we gathered up his Scotland Shirt, 10 hangers and his water bottle and Michael took them over the place that has same day delivery to the MTC. I liked Mom's idea of shelf liners and lysol, may just have to do that too.
First Letter from Alex
Wow! Is the first thing I will say. Second, Alex hand wrote this letter and since his handwriting leaves much to be desired, Michael and I translated it and typed it up to be posted here. Also just so you know, before Alex left he and I discussed this blog and it's purpose and that I would post his letters here and if there was anything he did not want me to post to let me know. This is an account of his first three days in the MTC.
Now my notes before the letter, since this is my blog too. I had no idea what to expect as a first letter. But I am glad that he is holding nothing back (that I can tell). The night before Alex left, a friend of mine described her son's first letters and I was like "really?!" Very similar to what Alex has written...I am glad that he is keeping it real.
So here it is:
Dear Mom and Dad,
Our Branch President’s wife told us that we should write our mothers. But I know that everyone is going to read it so I might as well address it to the whole family as well. We are to write about our first day here in the MTC. Well it was pretty crazy. I was brought in a whirlwind of “take this, go here, take that, go here!” It was confusing but I’m fine now. I’ve got a load of paper and books. Anyway this letter shall be short as I only have five minutes to write it, thus explaining my handwriting which is worse than usual.
So the MTC is really dark and filthy, when I finally got to my room it had that terrible old smell, but more juicy and moldy. I am terrified to actually put my clothes in these nasty drawers and cabinets. Oh and it turns out that I actually do need some hangers, so please send about 10. Oh and I could use a water bottle, you know the green one? I think it still atop my bookshelf thing in my room. Oh and I need one more t-shirt, preferably my Scotland one.
So the room, yeah it’s pretty nasty, worse than a cheap hotel. The bathrooms are abominable, you can clearly tell the last time someone had a nosebleed in one of the sinks and the toilets…I won’t even go there. Other than that it is not so bad. Everyone is really friendly, sometimes too friendly. It turns out that the room I’m in was the “party room”. Not too long ago when some elder,, now gone had it all to himself would always get tons of food that his family would send to him.
So my companion is Elder Wood, a quiet kid, quieter than me. He’s from San Diego and there’s a funny story about that, I won’t share it until I email you on my p-day so you can actually read it. The other Elders who share my room are nice guys, I forgot their names at the moment, heck, I don’t remember anyone’s name but my own and my companions. Well we got to know our district and zone. I have been designated as the senior companion of myself and Elder Wood. Anyway this one Elder, one of my roommates is perfectly at home in this dank environment. He is always eating doughnuts and he just leaves them sitting out by the window or in front of the mirrors and they go bad but he still eats them after several hours.
Well this new page is being written at the end of day two. This letter was supposed to be finished and sent yesterday but I didn’t finish it because I am really quite long winded. So when you finally get this I hope you all haven’t thought that I have forgotten about you. There simply isn’t time to do much of anything. My p-days are on Thursdays and this Thursday didn’t count so it will be awhile before you actually get an email from me.
Like I said today is the end of day 2 and I have already felt like I have been here a week. I am just not used to being awake for such long periods of time. Well the food here is rather sub-par as was expected, like cafeteria food you will find anywhere else. But it is not very good. It tastes okay, okay enough to eat, but after an hour you feel the effects and I always feel sick an hour or so after eating.
Well I was going to end but seeing as though I have a whole other page to go through. Well now it is Friday night. It’s been a long day. My mood swings between eccentric and upbeat to apathetic and angry. My companions are sometimes great and sometimes I wish they would die horrible deaths.
Learning Spanish has its ups and downs. Yesterday we were suppose to start praying in Spanish. Well I was called upon by my district leader to give the closing prayer at the end of the class session. I totally butchered it, stumbled over those stupid words with too many vowels “ agradecemos” in something (could not read Alex’s writing). Halfway through I gave up and switched to English, the other Elders were snickering during the whole thing. I was feeling rather low and ashamed that I couldn’t remember everything. After I finished it took all of my effort to maintain my composure and I was angry. Not at them, well may just a little, but more with myself for not even saying the whole thing in Spanish. But the guy who was our teacher for that day, Brother Someone kind of told them off afterwards. But even so I was still very unhappy. Some of them came and apologized to me later, which I was grateful for, but dang it!! I hate Spanish!
I am pretty good with pronunciation but I can’t remember the grammar to save my life. Since then, all of today, when we started getting language training my German is all coming back to me. I gave three public prayers today. One was in Spanish, the other came out in a hodge podge of Spanish, English and German. As under stress my brain more readily pulls out German words rather than Spanish, much to the confusement of the other Elder’s.
Well once again, it is time for lights out so I think I will end here. Please don’t send me any food. I appreciate the hot fries, but I just don’t have time to eat outside of meal times. Today I got a package from Grandma and Grandpa with chips and salsa, which was nice, but I don’t know what I am going to do with it.
Anyway I don’t miss any of you yet, but I am still alive.
Elder Rice
*please send 10 hangers and my Scotland shirt.
Now my notes before the letter, since this is my blog too. I had no idea what to expect as a first letter. But I am glad that he is holding nothing back (that I can tell). The night before Alex left, a friend of mine described her son's first letters and I was like "really?!" Very similar to what Alex has written...I am glad that he is keeping it real.
So here it is:
Dear Mom and Dad,
Our Branch President’s wife told us that we should write our mothers. But I know that everyone is going to read it so I might as well address it to the whole family as well. We are to write about our first day here in the MTC. Well it was pretty crazy. I was brought in a whirlwind of “take this, go here, take that, go here!” It was confusing but I’m fine now. I’ve got a load of paper and books. Anyway this letter shall be short as I only have five minutes to write it, thus explaining my handwriting which is worse than usual.
So the MTC is really dark and filthy, when I finally got to my room it had that terrible old smell, but more juicy and moldy. I am terrified to actually put my clothes in these nasty drawers and cabinets. Oh and it turns out that I actually do need some hangers, so please send about 10. Oh and I could use a water bottle, you know the green one? I think it still atop my bookshelf thing in my room. Oh and I need one more t-shirt, preferably my Scotland one.
So the room, yeah it’s pretty nasty, worse than a cheap hotel. The bathrooms are abominable, you can clearly tell the last time someone had a nosebleed in one of the sinks and the toilets…I won’t even go there. Other than that it is not so bad. Everyone is really friendly, sometimes too friendly. It turns out that the room I’m in was the “party room”. Not too long ago when some elder,, now gone had it all to himself would always get tons of food that his family would send to him.
So my companion is Elder Wood, a quiet kid, quieter than me. He’s from San Diego and there’s a funny story about that, I won’t share it until I email you on my p-day so you can actually read it. The other Elders who share my room are nice guys, I forgot their names at the moment, heck, I don’t remember anyone’s name but my own and my companions. Well we got to know our district and zone. I have been designated as the senior companion of myself and Elder Wood. Anyway this one Elder, one of my roommates is perfectly at home in this dank environment. He is always eating doughnuts and he just leaves them sitting out by the window or in front of the mirrors and they go bad but he still eats them after several hours.
Well this new page is being written at the end of day two. This letter was supposed to be finished and sent yesterday but I didn’t finish it because I am really quite long winded. So when you finally get this I hope you all haven’t thought that I have forgotten about you. There simply isn’t time to do much of anything. My p-days are on Thursdays and this Thursday didn’t count so it will be awhile before you actually get an email from me.
Like I said today is the end of day 2 and I have already felt like I have been here a week. I am just not used to being awake for such long periods of time. Well the food here is rather sub-par as was expected, like cafeteria food you will find anywhere else. But it is not very good. It tastes okay, okay enough to eat, but after an hour you feel the effects and I always feel sick an hour or so after eating.
Well I was going to end but seeing as though I have a whole other page to go through. Well now it is Friday night. It’s been a long day. My mood swings between eccentric and upbeat to apathetic and angry. My companions are sometimes great and sometimes I wish they would die horrible deaths.
Learning Spanish has its ups and downs. Yesterday we were suppose to start praying in Spanish. Well I was called upon by my district leader to give the closing prayer at the end of the class session. I totally butchered it, stumbled over those stupid words with too many vowels “ agradecemos” in something (could not read Alex’s writing). Halfway through I gave up and switched to English, the other Elders were snickering during the whole thing. I was feeling rather low and ashamed that I couldn’t remember everything. After I finished it took all of my effort to maintain my composure and I was angry. Not at them, well may just a little, but more with myself for not even saying the whole thing in Spanish. But the guy who was our teacher for that day, Brother Someone kind of told them off afterwards. But even so I was still very unhappy. Some of them came and apologized to me later, which I was grateful for, but dang it!! I hate Spanish!
I am pretty good with pronunciation but I can’t remember the grammar to save my life. Since then, all of today, when we started getting language training my German is all coming back to me. I gave three public prayers today. One was in Spanish, the other came out in a hodge podge of Spanish, English and German. As under stress my brain more readily pulls out German words rather than Spanish, much to the confusement of the other Elder’s.
Well once again, it is time for lights out so I think I will end here. Please don’t send me any food. I appreciate the hot fries, but I just don’t have time to eat outside of meal times. Today I got a package from Grandma and Grandpa with chips and salsa, which was nice, but I don’t know what I am going to do with it.
Anyway I don’t miss any of you yet, but I am still alive.
Elder Rice
*please send 10 hangers and my Scotland shirt.
MTC Mailing Address
Here is Alex's official MTC address:
Elder Alexander Harrison Rice
MTC Mailbox #203
Houston Texas Mission 1006
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793
Also you can go to dearelder.com and send a letter for free. To see how it works click on "write a letter". Down under letter selection there is a box, scroll down to "Provo MTC". If you click on the "instructions" button you will see how it works. No stamp, pretty nice.
I can't wait to hear from him next week.
Elder Alexander Harrison Rice
MTC Mailbox #203
Houston Texas Mission 1006
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793
Also you can go to dearelder.com and send a letter for free. To see how it works click on "write a letter". Down under letter selection there is a box, scroll down to "Provo MTC". If you click on the "instructions" button you will see how it works. No stamp, pretty nice.
I can't wait to hear from him next week.
Set Apart as an Elder
This evening we met with President Francom who set Alex apart as an Elder in the church. It was a very spiritual experience and we are grateful for this opportunity for Alex, now to be known as Elder Rice.
Michael then presented Alex with his old missionary tag that say "Elder Rice" with "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints" written underneath it in Spanish.
We got back to the house at 10pm and sent Elder Rice promptly to bed.
We will get him packed in the morning and about 12:45 we will drive the whole 2 miles to drop him off at the door at the MTC.
Michael then presented Alex with his old missionary tag that say "Elder Rice" with "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints" written underneath it in Spanish.
We got back to the house at 10pm and sent Elder Rice promptly to bed.
We will get him packed in the morning and about 12:45 we will drive the whole 2 miles to drop him off at the door at the MTC.
Two days + to go...
Last night we finished labeling most of all Alex's belongings. Today I ran and got some last minute things. I think we are ready. Tomorrow night we will pack and then we go at 9:00pm to have him set apart as an Elder.
I fixed one more of his favorite meals and between today and yesterday there should be some good leftovers for the next few days.
I made:
Chinese Five Spice Pork
Lo Mein Noodles
Egg Rolls
We don't eat this heavy on a regular basis and it took very little to fill us all up. Like I said "leftovers" for the next few days.
I fixed one more of his favorite meals and between today and yesterday there should be some good leftovers for the next few days.
I made:
Chinese Five Spice Pork
Lo Mein Noodles
Egg Rolls
We don't eat this heavy on a regular basis and it took very little to fill us all up. Like I said "leftovers" for the next few days.
Last Supper
Tonight I fixed one of Alex's favorite meals at his request. It was fun to be together as a family and enjoy our time together.
Our favorite Cuban food:
Vaca Frita
Rice and Beans
Tostones (Fried Plantains)
Banana Cake w/ cream cheese frosting
Our favorite Cuban food:
Vaca Frita
Rice and Beans
Tostones (Fried Plantains)
Banana Cake w/ cream cheese frosting
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