Oh hey there everyone!
So I got changed! Now I´m in a place called Posta Leiva which is right outside of a city called San Lorenzo, which is right outside of Asunción. The area that I´m in is still kinda fieldy and cowy and chickeny, but it has much more city than La Paloma for sure. And, our house is freakishly huge here. My comp and I share it with another companionship so that´s pretty cool. My new comp is Elder Sperry from Idaho. Woo! He´s pretty cool and he kinda looks like me so that´s always exciting. The other companionship in our house consists of a Latin Zone Leader and a brand new kid. I´m going to learn a lot more spanish with the Latin elder around and it´s fun to watch the new kid try and figure things out. He´s kind of paranoid about the food and all that good stuff. I swear I wasn´t that bad when I got here, but maybe I was. So yeah, the new area is pretty sweeto, and we work really hard here. I´ve given up and started using a sombrero here even though it makes me look retarded. I don´t want to die of skin cancer.
My first p-day was nothing special, but it was kind of cool to finally be with other companionships on monday. We played some basketball and then ate at some super market cafeteria thingy. With the changes on Thursday nothing too exiting happened this week except for I´m somewhere new now. The church here is much stronger and more organized which is nice. We had 90 in church on Sunday and normally it´s over 100. And church is actually 3 hours long here instead of 2! Other than that, I don´t really have anything new to report except that Sperry and I are workin walkin machines and we´re doin some good stuff. There´s already a lot of good members in the area and we have some cool investigators. Keep being good back home, and be safe! I love you all and I pray for you all too :D
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
January 10, 2011 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Oh sup guys!
First off, I´m happy to report that my birthday went much better than New Years. Some of the ward members threw me a surprise party! It was pretty sweeto. I kinda knew that they were planning something cause they tried to speak Portuguese in front of me, but I know enough that I knew something was going down! But all in all it was nice and we had some pizza ish stuff and cake and whatnot and it was lovely! I think one of the people there posted some pictures on facebook and whatnot so go search for them if you wish! I´m glad to hear that another magical package is going to come one day! For future reference for whenever you wanna send stuff here is a list of good things that I like eating. Corn nuts (Todd sent those so he knows whats up), beef jerkey (teryaki or original), mini m&m´s, sourpatch kids, jolley ranchers, brownie/cookie/cake mixes, and whatever else you think would tickle my fancy. Now like I said, those are just suggestions for the future and whatnot, so if in a year you feel like you wanna send stuff, there ya go! :D
We´ve got one more week left in this change so this may be my final week here in La Paloma. Presidente may want to keep me here for another month and a half so we´ll see what goes down! I´m not sure if I want to leave or stay. I just don´t think about that too much and what happens, happens. I´ll be going into change number 3! Yeah! Other than that, it´s just business as usual down here in Paraguay. It´s hot and humid and we walk a lot, but it´s all good. We´ve got some good investigators down here, and one of them read the BOM all by herself from the beginning so that´s pretty legit. We just need to convince her husband to not be a poop head and whatnot. But yeah, all is going well down here! I think that´s all I have for this week, but I shall write again next week! Maybe I´ll know the changes next monday! Woo! I love you all!
Love,
Elder Morris
First off, I´m happy to report that my birthday went much better than New Years. Some of the ward members threw me a surprise party! It was pretty sweeto. I kinda knew that they were planning something cause they tried to speak Portuguese in front of me, but I know enough that I knew something was going down! But all in all it was nice and we had some pizza ish stuff and cake and whatnot and it was lovely! I think one of the people there posted some pictures on facebook and whatnot so go search for them if you wish! I´m glad to hear that another magical package is going to come one day! For future reference for whenever you wanna send stuff here is a list of good things that I like eating. Corn nuts (Todd sent those so he knows whats up), beef jerkey (teryaki or original), mini m&m´s, sourpatch kids, jolley ranchers, brownie/cookie/cake mixes, and whatever else you think would tickle my fancy. Now like I said, those are just suggestions for the future and whatnot, so if in a year you feel like you wanna send stuff, there ya go! :D
We´ve got one more week left in this change so this may be my final week here in La Paloma. Presidente may want to keep me here for another month and a half so we´ll see what goes down! I´m not sure if I want to leave or stay. I just don´t think about that too much and what happens, happens. I´ll be going into change number 3! Yeah! Other than that, it´s just business as usual down here in Paraguay. It´s hot and humid and we walk a lot, but it´s all good. We´ve got some good investigators down here, and one of them read the BOM all by herself from the beginning so that´s pretty legit. We just need to convince her husband to not be a poop head and whatnot. But yeah, all is going well down here! I think that´s all I have for this week, but I shall write again next week! Maybe I´ll know the changes next monday! Woo! I love you all!
Love,
Elder Morris
January 3, 2011 -- La Paloma, Paraguay -- P.S.
I forgot to tell everyone that I played a trumpet today in Saltos! I just had to write you really quick to let you know. It was a terrible trumpet with awful valves and some crazy back pressure but it was a trumpet and I played it and it made me happy! And the brand was something I´ve never heard before. It was like Fanto or something weird. Yeah Paraguay!
January 3, 2011 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Hey fam and friends!
It´s been a magical week here in La Paloma full of mystery and intrigue! Well, not really, but it´s been exciting I suppose. For starters, the packages finally arrived yesterday! I got the one from Celeste ( :D ) and from the family ( :D )! We were all pretty sure that the packages were stolen because they were sent from Asunción (8 hours away) and didn´t arrive for over 1 and half weeks. We´re still not sure where they actually went first, and the shipping company wouldn´t answer the mission office´s phone calls, but all is well now because they came! And as far as I can tell, they all came intact and full of wonderful lovely things. Thanks you guys! In other exciting news, I celebrated the new year on the toilet! WoooOOooOo! On December 31 my comp and I decided to treat ourselves to some tasty food so we ate at El Costillon here in town and it´s pretty dang good. We ate armadillo! I ate a lot, and maybe I ate too much, but anywho all of it decided to come back out at midnight. It was awful! I wasted 40 mil on the world´s fanciest puke. I was sick out of both ends for the next day, and my comp was sick out of his bottom, and so we slept all day because we couldn´t go do anything. I think my comp went to the bathroom 13 times during the day. All in all, it was a great New Year´s!!!
Other than that it´s been business as usual I think. We went out to Saltos today to take out our January allowance so that was exciting. Then we got our packages out there and I opened them today :D The fun blow up thingies came a little too late, but they shall be saved for next year and it shall be epic. Grandparents, your email worked! I´ll email you a precious email after this. Someone may need to help them, but good job for learning something new! In other news, our we got a new ward mission leader. It´s now the kid that´s leaving on a mission in 3 months, which is weird, but at least something will get done for 3 months! He seems pretty excited to head on out. It´s now hitting him that 24 months is a long time. Hahaha poor kid. I just tell him "Esta bien! Va a pasar muy rapido!" I don´t think he appreciates that. I wanted him to go to the States and get punished with English, but he´s off to Rosario Argentina. He wanted Paraguay...weird.
I think that´s all I have for this week family! I love you all and I hope you had a wonderful New Year´s! I hope none of you had to spend it like me. I did get to watch a spider eat a fly though. But yeah, I got the packages so that´s fatty sick, and it´s almost my birthday! I´ll be a big ole bad 20 year old! Yeah! Make sure you make this year better than the previous ones. Tenemos que mejorar cada dia y cada año! Feel free to send packages whenever you want. As you can probably tell, they make me kinda excited :D Send whatever you want. Candy is lovely. I love you all! Stay safe! Stay smart!
Love,
Elder Morris
It´s been a magical week here in La Paloma full of mystery and intrigue! Well, not really, but it´s been exciting I suppose. For starters, the packages finally arrived yesterday! I got the one from Celeste ( :D ) and from the family ( :D )! We were all pretty sure that the packages were stolen because they were sent from Asunción (8 hours away) and didn´t arrive for over 1 and half weeks. We´re still not sure where they actually went first, and the shipping company wouldn´t answer the mission office´s phone calls, but all is well now because they came! And as far as I can tell, they all came intact and full of wonderful lovely things. Thanks you guys! In other exciting news, I celebrated the new year on the toilet! WoooOOooOo! On December 31 my comp and I decided to treat ourselves to some tasty food so we ate at El Costillon here in town and it´s pretty dang good. We ate armadillo! I ate a lot, and maybe I ate too much, but anywho all of it decided to come back out at midnight. It was awful! I wasted 40 mil on the world´s fanciest puke. I was sick out of both ends for the next day, and my comp was sick out of his bottom, and so we slept all day because we couldn´t go do anything. I think my comp went to the bathroom 13 times during the day. All in all, it was a great New Year´s!!!
Other than that it´s been business as usual I think. We went out to Saltos today to take out our January allowance so that was exciting. Then we got our packages out there and I opened them today :D The fun blow up thingies came a little too late, but they shall be saved for next year and it shall be epic. Grandparents, your email worked! I´ll email you a precious email after this. Someone may need to help them, but good job for learning something new! In other news, our we got a new ward mission leader. It´s now the kid that´s leaving on a mission in 3 months, which is weird, but at least something will get done for 3 months! He seems pretty excited to head on out. It´s now hitting him that 24 months is a long time. Hahaha poor kid. I just tell him "Esta bien! Va a pasar muy rapido!" I don´t think he appreciates that. I wanted him to go to the States and get punished with English, but he´s off to Rosario Argentina. He wanted Paraguay...weird.
I think that´s all I have for this week family! I love you all and I hope you had a wonderful New Year´s! I hope none of you had to spend it like me. I did get to watch a spider eat a fly though. But yeah, I got the packages so that´s fatty sick, and it´s almost my birthday! I´ll be a big ole bad 20 year old! Yeah! Make sure you make this year better than the previous ones. Tenemos que mejorar cada dia y cada año! Feel free to send packages whenever you want. As you can probably tell, they make me kinda excited :D Send whatever you want. Candy is lovely. I love you all! Stay safe! Stay smart!
Love,
Elder Morris
December 28, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Oh hey family!
This will be mildly short I think because we talked like 2 days ago, which was quite nice by the way. It sounds like you all had a wonderful time for Christmas and whatnot and that makes me happy. Try to keep the Christmas spirit going! My only piece of new news is that we super cleaned our whole house today so now it´s not so ghetto looking. We even walk on it barefoot without being too scared of the Pike :). Other exciting news is I finished the Book of Mormon for the first time on my mission this weekend and that was nice. I encourage all of you back home to keep on reading it, and if you aren´t then you should most certainly start. No matter how many times you´ve read it, there will always be something new in there for you :D
Other than that, I don´t think I have anything else to say to you all for this week. I love you all and I´ll write something a little bit more exciting next monday!
Love,
Elder Morris
This will be mildly short I think because we talked like 2 days ago, which was quite nice by the way. It sounds like you all had a wonderful time for Christmas and whatnot and that makes me happy. Try to keep the Christmas spirit going! My only piece of new news is that we super cleaned our whole house today so now it´s not so ghetto looking. We even walk on it barefoot without being too scared of the Pike :). Other exciting news is I finished the Book of Mormon for the first time on my mission this weekend and that was nice. I encourage all of you back home to keep on reading it, and if you aren´t then you should most certainly start. No matter how many times you´ve read it, there will always be something new in there for you :D
Other than that, I don´t think I have anything else to say to you all for this week. I love you all and I´ll write something a little bit more exciting next monday!
Love,
Elder Morris
December 20, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Oh hey people!
Well, Christmas week is here. And it´s really hot when it´s supposed to be snowing, so that´s really weird. Right now it´s actually raining a lot. But anywho, this week was pretty exciting. This week we had one of the Assistants to the President come do a division with us. He actually just sorta popped in at 10:30 one night which was most unappreciated but that´s okay. The next day we did contacts and all that good stuff. It´s weird to listen to the elders that sit in an office all day come out and teach again. It´s clear that they´ve had a break from it for a while. He went so deep into doctrine that it hurt my head, so I can´t even imagine how the investigators felt. But, all is okay now and he´s in some other part of Paraguay. We also had a little Christmas party thingy of sorts last week with the elders in our zone. Pres. Madariage came and we watched video clips of the First Presidency Christmas thing and they gave us a shirt and stuff with our mission name and whatnot. Then we went and ate at some place named America. The food was okay, but nothing exciting. This week we were supposed to have a branch dinner or something but the President here in La Paloma went to Asunición for the weekend and didn´t call anyone to lead church or anything. Sooo nobody actually knows whats going on, and church was pretty much a disaster. You all better thank your lucky stars that you have a real church meeting on sunday!
Other than that, it was business as usual here in La Paloma. It was hot, but finally not so rainy, and good things like that. We went to Shopping America today in Salto and bought us some cheap ties for our musical number on Sunday. They are kinda fuzzy like they are trying to be wool, but they aren´t. Yeah! This week will complete 2 months here in Paraguay and 4 months in the mission already so that´s kinda weird to think about. This week I get to talk to you on the phone! Hopefully. :D Sadly, the only package to make it for Christmas was Todd and Rachel´s, so hopefully some Paraguayans didn´t steal the other ones and eat all the good stuff. We´ll see. The good news is that now they are all Birthday packages!
I think that´s all I have for now, family and friends. Keep working hard back home and remember why we really celebrate Christmas. I look forward to talking with you on Saturday! Woo! I love you all!
Well, Christmas week is here. And it´s really hot when it´s supposed to be snowing, so that´s really weird. Right now it´s actually raining a lot. But anywho, this week was pretty exciting. This week we had one of the Assistants to the President come do a division with us. He actually just sorta popped in at 10:30 one night which was most unappreciated but that´s okay. The next day we did contacts and all that good stuff. It´s weird to listen to the elders that sit in an office all day come out and teach again. It´s clear that they´ve had a break from it for a while. He went so deep into doctrine that it hurt my head, so I can´t even imagine how the investigators felt. But, all is okay now and he´s in some other part of Paraguay. We also had a little Christmas party thingy of sorts last week with the elders in our zone. Pres. Madariage came and we watched video clips of the First Presidency Christmas thing and they gave us a shirt and stuff with our mission name and whatnot. Then we went and ate at some place named America. The food was okay, but nothing exciting. This week we were supposed to have a branch dinner or something but the President here in La Paloma went to Asunición for the weekend and didn´t call anyone to lead church or anything. Sooo nobody actually knows whats going on, and church was pretty much a disaster. You all better thank your lucky stars that you have a real church meeting on sunday!
Other than that, it was business as usual here in La Paloma. It was hot, but finally not so rainy, and good things like that. We went to Shopping America today in Salto and bought us some cheap ties for our musical number on Sunday. They are kinda fuzzy like they are trying to be wool, but they aren´t. Yeah! This week will complete 2 months here in Paraguay and 4 months in the mission already so that´s kinda weird to think about. This week I get to talk to you on the phone! Hopefully. :D Sadly, the only package to make it for Christmas was Todd and Rachel´s, so hopefully some Paraguayans didn´t steal the other ones and eat all the good stuff. We´ll see. The good news is that now they are all Birthday packages!
I think that´s all I have for now, family and friends. Keep working hard back home and remember why we really celebrate Christmas. I look forward to talking with you on Saturday! Woo! I love you all!
December 6, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Oh hey there family and friends! Another week has come and gone. This week marks the end of my first change in Paraguay and over 1 and 1/2 months. We havent gotten any word on if any of us are going anywhere yet so thatll be for next week. In exciting news, the first package has arrived! Todd and Rachel take the trophy for the first package in Paraguay so kudos to you! It was much appreciated :D Right now Im in Salto, which is why Im not using apostrophes. I dunno how to make one on a stupid Portugese keyboard so whatevs. Nothing too exciting happened this week. It rained like 5 of the 7 days this week which always puts a big halt on missionary work, especially when 90% of the roads are mud. That was an interesting experience. Another funny story: we were in Shopping China (a huge store full of stuff from the states) and the Elders from Saltos found some handcuffs on the shelf. There was a key inside so they figured itd be safe to just put em on. As it turns out, the key was to a briefcase that was next to the handcuffs and the store didnt have a key after all. Luckily after much searching they found a worker who knew how to take them off using a paper clip, but it was a good story nonetheless. That was a pretty funny prank that someone did with that key.
Other than that, its just good ole times in La Paloma. It gets hotter and more humid which is always a treat, but at least my skin isnt dry right? I wish I was there for some fun Christmas festivities. Theres nothing cool here for Christmas. Just really really crappy fireworks. And for the Christmas call of sorts, I dunno what were actually doing. Supposedly we just call from the church or something maybe, but I will have to do some fancy investigative work. I think thats all I have for this week. It was rainy and uneventful but sometimes that happens I suppose. Keep on keepin on back at home and do good stuff!
Love,
Elder Morris
Other than that, its just good ole times in La Paloma. It gets hotter and more humid which is always a treat, but at least my skin isnt dry right? I wish I was there for some fun Christmas festivities. Theres nothing cool here for Christmas. Just really really crappy fireworks. And for the Christmas call of sorts, I dunno what were actually doing. Supposedly we just call from the church or something maybe, but I will have to do some fancy investigative work. I think thats all I have for this week. It was rainy and uneventful but sometimes that happens I suppose. Keep on keepin on back at home and do good stuff!
Love,
Elder Morris
November 29, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Oh hey guys!
So don´t worry, only Laura won the good sibling of the week award. Good for you Laura! But, enough of that...anywho this week was pretty magical I suppose. Nothing really happened over here holiday-wise, because they obviously don´t have Thanksgiving here. The elders from Salto came on over to La Paloma and we baked a Betty Crocker cake that one of them got in a package so that was pretty tasty. The cool thing that happened on Thanksgiving was my first baptism! Woo! I´ll send pictures of that next week, cause my camera is out of batteries currently so it´s being charged. It went nicely especially since the guy that was supposed to actually plan the baptism flaked out in the hour before it was going to happen. But we pulled it off and it was nice. And the daughter of the lady that got baptized wanted to swim in the font...precious little kids. I also gave a talk during sacrament meeting this week so that was cool. My spanish was pretty legit. We dropped some cane on the members so they´d actually do something with their lives so hopefully we did something useful. To drop cane in spanish is bajar la caña by the way. That´s a little spanish lesson for you. In other news, we deep cleaned our bedroom today! I´ve never killed so many spiders in my life. I´m being super cereal right now. But, we took all the furniture stuff out, and we mopped and such and then sprayed for bugs and now it just looks swell! Now I can go to sleep and not wonder if I´m going to die. We found like a black widow thing last night, but it was brown instead. But it had the hourglass thing so I dunno what it was. Anywho, it was huge so we decided to clean for P-day so we wouldn´t find any more of those at night. And my comp doesn´t have any money anyway so we weren´t going to do anything else fun. I budget. Like a champ. So I have money :D But yeah, I hope you all had a good Thanksgiving! It makes me kind of sad knowing that a chocolate pudding pie was just sitting there all lonesome, looking for someone to eat it. I baptized though, so that´s a fair trade I think. It was really really hot earlier this week, but then it rained so that was nice. But now it´s just really humid and hot so it´s icky outside. It´s good to know that christmas packages are en route! There´s a girl getting married in our branch and she turned 15 a week ago...and that´s normal here. Paraguay is weird! The good news is that in our tracting this week, we found a pretty legit lady so we´ll see how that all goes down! I´ve got one more week in this change and then I have 15 more. It´s crazy! But yeah, it´s been a good week here in La Paloma. Oh and someone got shot a few days ago! I didn´t know him or anything but it was some sort of girlfriend issue I think. I´m safe and happy and now my house is very clean! Muy limpio! So now I´m just pleased as punch. I think that´s all I have for this week. Keep bein cool and smart back there in Los Estados Unidos.
Love,
Elder Morris
So don´t worry, only Laura won the good sibling of the week award. Good for you Laura! But, enough of that...anywho this week was pretty magical I suppose. Nothing really happened over here holiday-wise, because they obviously don´t have Thanksgiving here. The elders from Salto came on over to La Paloma and we baked a Betty Crocker cake that one of them got in a package so that was pretty tasty. The cool thing that happened on Thanksgiving was my first baptism! Woo! I´ll send pictures of that next week, cause my camera is out of batteries currently so it´s being charged. It went nicely especially since the guy that was supposed to actually plan the baptism flaked out in the hour before it was going to happen. But we pulled it off and it was nice. And the daughter of the lady that got baptized wanted to swim in the font...precious little kids. I also gave a talk during sacrament meeting this week so that was cool. My spanish was pretty legit. We dropped some cane on the members so they´d actually do something with their lives so hopefully we did something useful. To drop cane in spanish is bajar la caña by the way. That´s a little spanish lesson for you. In other news, we deep cleaned our bedroom today! I´ve never killed so many spiders in my life. I´m being super cereal right now. But, we took all the furniture stuff out, and we mopped and such and then sprayed for bugs and now it just looks swell! Now I can go to sleep and not wonder if I´m going to die. We found like a black widow thing last night, but it was brown instead. But it had the hourglass thing so I dunno what it was. Anywho, it was huge so we decided to clean for P-day so we wouldn´t find any more of those at night. And my comp doesn´t have any money anyway so we weren´t going to do anything else fun. I budget. Like a champ. So I have money :D But yeah, I hope you all had a good Thanksgiving! It makes me kind of sad knowing that a chocolate pudding pie was just sitting there all lonesome, looking for someone to eat it. I baptized though, so that´s a fair trade I think. It was really really hot earlier this week, but then it rained so that was nice. But now it´s just really humid and hot so it´s icky outside. It´s good to know that christmas packages are en route! There´s a girl getting married in our branch and she turned 15 a week ago...and that´s normal here. Paraguay is weird! The good news is that in our tracting this week, we found a pretty legit lady so we´ll see how that all goes down! I´ve got one more week in this change and then I have 15 more. It´s crazy! But yeah, it´s been a good week here in La Paloma. Oh and someone got shot a few days ago! I didn´t know him or anything but it was some sort of girlfriend issue I think. I´m safe and happy and now my house is very clean! Muy limpio! So now I´m just pleased as punch. I think that´s all I have for this week. Keep bein cool and smart back there in Los Estados Unidos.
Love,
Elder Morris
Noveber 22, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Hello everyone in the states,
All is normal here in La Paloma. Nothing too exciting happened here this past week. The baptism got moved from last week to this week because the lady had to go to another city for important lawyer stuff or something. But, now it´s on thanksgiving! Woo! They don´t actually know what thanksgiving is here so it´s not that exciting for them. The teaching continues to go well, except we keep finding all these families that only speak portugese and now neither of us missionaries understand them, so we just kinda have to move along on our way haha. I just got back from Saltos again, which is always a magical adventure. I got burger king! Saltos is super fancy like that. They even take your tray for you after. We call that chuchi here. Church on Sunday was pretty nice. We got some less actives to finally come back to church so I hope they enjoyed themselves and whatnot. But, after church, it rained for like 5 hours so I got in some good BOM reading. And our power went out like always so we made some sweet ghetto candle holder things for candles!
We also found some sweet lizards that live in our house. And my comp beat a dog last night that was barking at our bedroom door. Poor doggy. People here don´t really like dogs much. Or cats. Or any animal. But, such is life pretty much everywhere outside of the USA I think. It´s exciting to know that Christmas packages are en route! For thanksgiving, I don´t think we are doing anything exciting or fun. I´ll probably have toast. I´ve started to like toast a lot here. The milk is awful though. It´s irradiated and such so it doesn´t get refrigerated and it tastes funny and all sorts of awfulness. In the spirit of Thanksgiving here are some things I´ve learned to be thankful for while I´ve been here...
1. Carpet
2. Shower heads that don´t electrocute/dump boiling or freezing water on you
3. Little bugs
4. No bugs
5. Toilet paper that isn´t streamer paper (it´s always a party at our house :D)
6. Not having to wear flipflops always
7. AC
8. Laundry services of sorts
9. Mosquitos (trust me, there are much much worse)
That´s just a precious little list of fun things. But, really it´s not so bad here. It gets hot, but then we just go find shade to walk in. And it´s fun to spend all day talking to people about awesome stuff, even though I can´t do much talking yet. Oh yeah, and food that I eat here is pretty much the same all the time. If we eat at a brasilero´s house it´s the beans/rice/meat. If we eat at a Paraguayan´s house its pasta/meat. Then we get juice which is nice. At our house when we eat there I eat toast with jam, and yogurt. Lots and lots of yogurt. It´s super runny here like those smoothie things I love, but instead of being 2 dollars for a teeny bottle thing it´s 1 dollar for a liter! Woo! I drink a lot of that good stuff. And we can´t drink the water in our house, so I drink lots of brazilian soda. Cause Paraguayans can´t make soda. So that´s what I eat pretty much. It´s a lovely existence really. You´d be proud of my budgetting skills. Seriously. But I think that´s all for this week. Next week I´ll tell you what I do every day or something exciting like that. I can´t give it all to you in one letter or you´ll stop writing me. But anywho, keep up the good work back on the homefront! I love you all!
Love,
Elder Morris
And for next week, I command that all my siblings write to me. Do it.
All is normal here in La Paloma. Nothing too exciting happened here this past week. The baptism got moved from last week to this week because the lady had to go to another city for important lawyer stuff or something. But, now it´s on thanksgiving! Woo! They don´t actually know what thanksgiving is here so it´s not that exciting for them. The teaching continues to go well, except we keep finding all these families that only speak portugese and now neither of us missionaries understand them, so we just kinda have to move along on our way haha. I just got back from Saltos again, which is always a magical adventure. I got burger king! Saltos is super fancy like that. They even take your tray for you after. We call that chuchi here. Church on Sunday was pretty nice. We got some less actives to finally come back to church so I hope they enjoyed themselves and whatnot. But, after church, it rained for like 5 hours so I got in some good BOM reading. And our power went out like always so we made some sweet ghetto candle holder things for candles!
We also found some sweet lizards that live in our house. And my comp beat a dog last night that was barking at our bedroom door. Poor doggy. People here don´t really like dogs much. Or cats. Or any animal. But, such is life pretty much everywhere outside of the USA I think. It´s exciting to know that Christmas packages are en route! For thanksgiving, I don´t think we are doing anything exciting or fun. I´ll probably have toast. I´ve started to like toast a lot here. The milk is awful though. It´s irradiated and such so it doesn´t get refrigerated and it tastes funny and all sorts of awfulness. In the spirit of Thanksgiving here are some things I´ve learned to be thankful for while I´ve been here...
1. Carpet
2. Shower heads that don´t electrocute/dump boiling or freezing water on you
3. Little bugs
4. No bugs
5. Toilet paper that isn´t streamer paper (it´s always a party at our house :D)
6. Not having to wear flipflops always
7. AC
8. Laundry services of sorts
9. Mosquitos (trust me, there are much much worse)
That´s just a precious little list of fun things. But, really it´s not so bad here. It gets hot, but then we just go find shade to walk in. And it´s fun to spend all day talking to people about awesome stuff, even though I can´t do much talking yet. Oh yeah, and food that I eat here is pretty much the same all the time. If we eat at a brasilero´s house it´s the beans/rice/meat. If we eat at a Paraguayan´s house its pasta/meat. Then we get juice which is nice. At our house when we eat there I eat toast with jam, and yogurt. Lots and lots of yogurt. It´s super runny here like those smoothie things I love, but instead of being 2 dollars for a teeny bottle thing it´s 1 dollar for a liter! Woo! I drink a lot of that good stuff. And we can´t drink the water in our house, so I drink lots of brazilian soda. Cause Paraguayans can´t make soda. So that´s what I eat pretty much. It´s a lovely existence really. You´d be proud of my budgetting skills. Seriously. But I think that´s all for this week. Next week I´ll tell you what I do every day or something exciting like that. I can´t give it all to you in one letter or you´ll stop writing me. But anywho, keep up the good work back on the homefront! I love you all!
Love,
Elder Morris
And for next week, I command that all my siblings write to me. Do it.
November 22, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
This week has been normal and fine. It´s been super cloudy pretty much all week which is really nice. But, other than that it´s just been work as normal. I´ve already been in Paraguay for over a month now which just blows my mind. It´s good to know how much mom is improving and whatnot since I´ve been on my mission. It really is a testimony builder that I´m where I´m supposed to be and we´re all being blessed for that.
We really got the branch president and mission leader here in La Paloma to step it up, and already we´ve gotten 10 more people in church, so hopefully they keep active and things start picking up here. It´s been an amazing experience so far and it´s quite nice. It´s hot though, and it´ll only get hotter! And in the spirit of Thanksgiving, thank you for all the things you have done for me in life so far. I can´t imagine how tough it would be to be a dad sometimes, so thanks for not killing us or anything. Thanks for doing all the things you needed to to do to help me be where I am right now. But yeah, that´s all I have for this week, so you have a good week back home! Tell the fam I love them.
Love,
Elder Morris
We really got the branch president and mission leader here in La Paloma to step it up, and already we´ve gotten 10 more people in church, so hopefully they keep active and things start picking up here. It´s been an amazing experience so far and it´s quite nice. It´s hot though, and it´ll only get hotter! And in the spirit of Thanksgiving, thank you for all the things you have done for me in life so far. I can´t imagine how tough it would be to be a dad sometimes, so thanks for not killing us or anything. Thanks for doing all the things you needed to to do to help me be where I am right now. But yeah, that´s all I have for this week, so you have a good week back home! Tell the fam I love them.
Love,
Elder Morris
November 16, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
So, this has been a pretty intense week so I hope I remember everything. First of all I had zone conference yesterday which is why I´m writing today, so hi everyone! Sooooo I have another new companion haha. That makes 4 for me now so far. Yeah. My last trainer got special changed out because some sister missionaries were being harrassed by some dude in another area, and after some crazy flipflopping and new area openings and people being swapped everywhere, I now have a new trainer here in La Paloma. Elder Goodwin was pretty mad because after 5 months of work here in La Paloma he was about to have a baptism this friday, and then he got changed out. And he got changed back to the first area he had, and he was there for 6 months already. I hope he has fun! To do this switch and whatnot Elder Goodwin and I had to go to Asunción on Friday night. We got there Saturday, made the switch, and then pretty much just left back to La Paloma again. So that was 16 hours of driving and we had to wait in the bus terminal in Asunción for 3 hours because the office elders were busy and they just left us there. And so we got back in La Paloma on Saturday night just to sleep and whatnot. We had church in the morning, and it ended an hour early because for some reason our pres didn´t assign talks or anything so that was interesting. And then, that night we had to go to Asunción again for zone conference. There weren´t any more tickets for the bus (says the lady) so we had to go to Saltos for the day so we could get tickets at their terminal. I don´t know why they magically had tickets there for the exact same bus, but whatever. When the bus came at 1130 at night, the other companionship that was with us said we should just sit in the front on the upper level (double decker buses rock) even though it wasn´t our assigned seating place. I pointed that out and they said that it´s Paraguay so they won´t really care. Long story short, at 2 in the morning we get woken up because the people who actually were assigned the front finally got on the bus, and they kicked us out. We go to the back to our seats and there were people in them already sleeping and whatnot, and we didn´t wake them up cause we felt bad. Sooooo I ended up standing for 4 hours on this bus at 2 in the morning. It was awful. I´m never listening to other dumb people again. The ride back to La Paloma that same day went much more smoothly and I was able to sleep and it was nice :D But yeah, that´s my sweet bus story. It was a lot of traveling and whatnot.
My new comp is pretty cool so that´s nice. I´ve only been in La Paloma for like 18 days so I don´t really know the area, and Elder Cannon (new trainer) has never left Asunción so it´s a wonderful adventure trying to find everything and remembering where it all is. It´ll be good though! My Spanish continues to improve. If I´m really really lucky, I can carry on a really short conversation with people without looking new and dumb. So that´s pretty cool. I´ve still got a long way to go but it´s all good! And I dunno who owns that pool or anything like that. My new comp is from Mesquite by the way. The lady that´s supposed to get baptized on Friday has been out of town, but she gets back tonight so we´ll go talk to her and tell her that Goodwin is gone now. It should all be good but we´ll see. But, I´m out of time for this week so I shall write again next monday! I love you all! Keep being precious and whatnot.
Love,
Elder Morris
My new comp is pretty cool so that´s nice. I´ve only been in La Paloma for like 18 days so I don´t really know the area, and Elder Cannon (new trainer) has never left Asunción so it´s a wonderful adventure trying to find everything and remembering where it all is. It´ll be good though! My Spanish continues to improve. If I´m really really lucky, I can carry on a really short conversation with people without looking new and dumb. So that´s pretty cool. I´ve still got a long way to go but it´s all good! And I dunno who owns that pool or anything like that. My new comp is from Mesquite by the way. The lady that´s supposed to get baptized on Friday has been out of town, but she gets back tonight so we´ll go talk to her and tell her that Goodwin is gone now. It should all be good but we´ll see. But, I´m out of time for this week so I shall write again next monday! I love you all! Keep being precious and whatnot.
Love,
Elder Morris
November 8, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Oh hey!
So it seems that emailing is sketchy or something, because I dunno if it´s all making it through...I sent like 10 pictures last week, so someone tell me if they came, or just the other two? Anywho, on with the news that I hope actually gets sent to you all...one day I´ll figure out all of this crazy technology and stuff.
It has gotten sooo much hotter here. I was about ready to die today, and it´s only like a week into summer. I don´t know if i´ll make it haha. I don´t ever know the exact temperature here, which is good cause I don´t really wanna know. I´m sure dad has something on his phone. Next week is zone conference so that´s cool. We get to take the bus back to Asunción for a nice visit. And the exciting news is that La Paloma will witness it´s first baptism in over 8 months next week! We´ve been working on the town doctor who is pretty much the coolest guy ever. He has read and received all the lessons and whatnot, but refused to come to church ever because he absolutely hates our branch president. This past sunday, the pres tried to cancel church, and then said we could have it if we set everything up. So, we did and we told Doctor Martinez that he should come to church finally becaue the Branch President wasn´t gonna be there. He said yes, but then didn´t come and it was lame. We found out that he just slept in cause he had to take an emergency trip to Brazil for some reason. We went to his house and decided to take a different approach to the family. We asked the wife to be baptized and she said yes. Woo! The doctor promises that he´s going to get baptized, and we´re hoping his wife being baptized will spark his desire more. He really needs to get over this Pres hating thing. Hopefully it all works out and she gets baptized next week :D They have two kids too, so we´ll see how everything goes!
The nationwide voting has finally ended on Sunday as well, and I´ll be glad to not here the dumb cars blasting the voting propaganda all night long. We got really good food out of it though so that´s okay! Lots of meat.
I´ve seen lots of big bugs, which Celeste will be glad to hear. We killed a moth last night that was bigger than my handspan, and of course I got some sweet pictures so don´t you worry about that! I also saw the coolest bug of my life. It´s a beetle of sorts, and it has two big green spots on its head that glow in the dark like a firefly, but they never turn off. So it´s like two big green eyes that just move around. It was pretty crazy. A cockroach attacked my comp in the shower so we had to slay that one as well. I didn´t know that they can fly.
I think that´s all of the exciting news for the mass email, so peace out yalls! Oh yeah my Spanish is getting a lot better. But, it´s actually Castillano and not Spanish. But yeah, it´s getting better. Woo! Anywho, keep up the good work at home! Be smart and be safe! I love you all.
Love,
Elder Morris
So it seems that emailing is sketchy or something, because I dunno if it´s all making it through...I sent like 10 pictures last week, so someone tell me if they came, or just the other two? Anywho, on with the news that I hope actually gets sent to you all...one day I´ll figure out all of this crazy technology and stuff.
It has gotten sooo much hotter here. I was about ready to die today, and it´s only like a week into summer. I don´t know if i´ll make it haha. I don´t ever know the exact temperature here, which is good cause I don´t really wanna know. I´m sure dad has something on his phone. Next week is zone conference so that´s cool. We get to take the bus back to Asunción for a nice visit. And the exciting news is that La Paloma will witness it´s first baptism in over 8 months next week! We´ve been working on the town doctor who is pretty much the coolest guy ever. He has read and received all the lessons and whatnot, but refused to come to church ever because he absolutely hates our branch president. This past sunday, the pres tried to cancel church, and then said we could have it if we set everything up. So, we did and we told Doctor Martinez that he should come to church finally becaue the Branch President wasn´t gonna be there. He said yes, but then didn´t come and it was lame. We found out that he just slept in cause he had to take an emergency trip to Brazil for some reason. We went to his house and decided to take a different approach to the family. We asked the wife to be baptized and she said yes. Woo! The doctor promises that he´s going to get baptized, and we´re hoping his wife being baptized will spark his desire more. He really needs to get over this Pres hating thing. Hopefully it all works out and she gets baptized next week :D They have two kids too, so we´ll see how everything goes!
The nationwide voting has finally ended on Sunday as well, and I´ll be glad to not here the dumb cars blasting the voting propaganda all night long. We got really good food out of it though so that´s okay! Lots of meat.
I´ve seen lots of big bugs, which Celeste will be glad to hear. We killed a moth last night that was bigger than my handspan, and of course I got some sweet pictures so don´t you worry about that! I also saw the coolest bug of my life. It´s a beetle of sorts, and it has two big green spots on its head that glow in the dark like a firefly, but they never turn off. So it´s like two big green eyes that just move around. It was pretty crazy. A cockroach attacked my comp in the shower so we had to slay that one as well. I didn´t know that they can fly.
I think that´s all of the exciting news for the mass email, so peace out yalls! Oh yeah my Spanish is getting a lot better. But, it´s actually Castillano and not Spanish. But yeah, it´s getting better. Woo! Anywho, keep up the good work at home! Be smart and be safe! I love you all.
Love,
Elder Morris
November 1, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Yay it´s another pday! I´m not sure where to start really, but whatevs. To dad, you did find our church house thing, and it´s a covered walkway between the two buildings. And I can´t tell you the address to our house as I´m sure it doesn´t really have one...But if you go on the dirt road that is right by our church house, it´s a long ways along that dirt road. But yeah that´s pretty sweet how you can see what´s going on. And yes, the city of La Paloma is really small, but the outlying area is huge with few houses far between so it´s pretty awful going out there, and it´s all walking. Woo!
Interesting things of this week: so my comp still had stitches in his toe cause of his toenail, so I continued to work with someone from Asuncion who took the bus ride with me. That elder went back to the city when Elder Goodwin (from idaho) felt he could walk and the local nurse lady said he could. Me and my new comp worked for a day and then went to the doctor to check up on his toe. I think this was on Wednesday. The doctor called Elder Goodwin a bad patient and forbade him from walking anymore cause the dust here can carry some nasty infections, so we were pretty much stuck in our house for 2 days. I read. A lot. And then, since I´m new and the Pres. doesn´t want me to have a bad first experience, he sent me and Elder Goodwin to Saltos, which is furth east. You can actually see Brasil from the city, so that´s kinda cool. But I went on splits with the Elders there, and that was pretty exciting. Saltos is actually pretty rich as far as Paraguay goes, and they have cool stores there. We stayed there for like 3 days or so, but we´re now back in La Paloma and the stitches are out and now we´re good to work!
Another sweet story. Maybe mom won´t appreciate this, but it´s a good first week story. In saltos there is a store called shopping china, and it has all sorts of american (weird right?) goodies. One such goody is mentos! They are actually really cheap there, so I bought a lot last pday and was eating them. Monday night I was chewing on one, and actually broke my tooth in half. It´s the one cavity I´ve ever had in my entire life and it refuses to stop giving me grief. So anywho the next day I went to the local dentist to see what could be done with my half tooth, and I got work done for 80 mil guaranies. Which is......less than 20 dollars! How cool is that???? I got an entire tooth repaired and such for like dirt cheap. And so far, I haven´t died or anything so I think it´s all good! But that was pretty exciting.
So far it´s been pretty calm here. I did find out that La Paloma is quite the mafia hotspot for drugs and such. And the mafia is very intertwined with the local Politics, and our Branch President is really political. And nobody likes him at all, and people are like afraid of him. Sooo I think that our Branch President is involved with the mafia, so that´s kinda cool. And when Elder Goodwin and I were in Saltos for church, our pres. here in Paloma cancelled church next week for the elections...I´m not sure what he´s trying to do, but we´ll keep on working and such. Hopefully, if it works, there will be pictures with this email, so you can do what you want with them. In two years I´ll explain the confusing ones I guess. I don´t have much more time, so I think that´s all for this week. La Paloma is really nice and really hot and really dirt roady. I already have exciting stories to tell, but I don´t wanna type them, so wait till Christmas I suppose and I shall call and tell.
Anywho, that´s it I think. I love you all! Keep on praying and being cool people.
Love,
Elder Morris
And the pictures are being dumb. One day it´ll work.
Interesting things of this week: so my comp still had stitches in his toe cause of his toenail, so I continued to work with someone from Asuncion who took the bus ride with me. That elder went back to the city when Elder Goodwin (from idaho) felt he could walk and the local nurse lady said he could. Me and my new comp worked for a day and then went to the doctor to check up on his toe. I think this was on Wednesday. The doctor called Elder Goodwin a bad patient and forbade him from walking anymore cause the dust here can carry some nasty infections, so we were pretty much stuck in our house for 2 days. I read. A lot. And then, since I´m new and the Pres. doesn´t want me to have a bad first experience, he sent me and Elder Goodwin to Saltos, which is furth east. You can actually see Brasil from the city, so that´s kinda cool. But I went on splits with the Elders there, and that was pretty exciting. Saltos is actually pretty rich as far as Paraguay goes, and they have cool stores there. We stayed there for like 3 days or so, but we´re now back in La Paloma and the stitches are out and now we´re good to work!
Another sweet story. Maybe mom won´t appreciate this, but it´s a good first week story. In saltos there is a store called shopping china, and it has all sorts of american (weird right?) goodies. One such goody is mentos! They are actually really cheap there, so I bought a lot last pday and was eating them. Monday night I was chewing on one, and actually broke my tooth in half. It´s the one cavity I´ve ever had in my entire life and it refuses to stop giving me grief. So anywho the next day I went to the local dentist to see what could be done with my half tooth, and I got work done for 80 mil guaranies. Which is......less than 20 dollars! How cool is that???? I got an entire tooth repaired and such for like dirt cheap. And so far, I haven´t died or anything so I think it´s all good! But that was pretty exciting.
So far it´s been pretty calm here. I did find out that La Paloma is quite the mafia hotspot for drugs and such. And the mafia is very intertwined with the local Politics, and our Branch President is really political. And nobody likes him at all, and people are like afraid of him. Sooo I think that our Branch President is involved with the mafia, so that´s kinda cool. And when Elder Goodwin and I were in Saltos for church, our pres. here in Paloma cancelled church next week for the elections...I´m not sure what he´s trying to do, but we´ll keep on working and such. Hopefully, if it works, there will be pictures with this email, so you can do what you want with them. In two years I´ll explain the confusing ones I guess. I don´t have much more time, so I think that´s all for this week. La Paloma is really nice and really hot and really dirt roady. I already have exciting stories to tell, but I don´t wanna type them, so wait till Christmas I suppose and I shall call and tell.
Anywho, that´s it I think. I love you all! Keep on praying and being cool people.
Love,
Elder Morris
And the pictures are being dumb. One day it´ll work.
October 25, 2010 -- La Paloma, Paraguay
Hola family and such! Just to start off, emails are pretty much the way to go here. You can keep sending the dearelder things if you want, but get here like 3 weeks later and emailing is pro, so absolutely anyone that wants to email, do it cause I´ll get them every monday instead of 3 weeks late. We sent you letters during our first day festivities, but I knew I´d email so it´s not that good. But yeah here I am! The phone calls were pretty lame cause nothing was working and it made me sad, but that´s okay.
So good stories so far, the overall trip took over 30 hours of travelling so that sucked pretty bad. And then we got to Beunos Aires in Argentina and that was pretty nice so I thought it´d be okay here. And then we flew to Asunción...it´s quite ghetto but that´s okay. We spent the night in like a halfway house or something and that was nice with 16 missionaries stuck in this little house. I´d put a smiley face thing there but I dunno how to make a colon on a spanish keyboard... anywho, the next day we all got our trainers! Everyone except me that is. My trainer was stuck at his house because of an ingrown toe nail, so I sat alone. All the other new elders just laughed at me and they all went with their trainers to various nearby cities and whatnot. But the jokes on them, because I got to go with the missionaries who are about to go home, to a place called Paulitas which is some sweet Brazilian meat eating place. I didn´t have a companion so they had to bring me along! They said it´s the best food in Paraguay so that was pretty cool that I got it on my first day.
The next day we travelled to my area which was 7 1/2 hours away. Woo! That was pretty much the longest bus ride of my life. But finally we arrived to a place called La Paloma Del Espíritu Santo, or La Paloma for short, which is on the border of Brazil, almost exactly east of Asunción. It´s one of the farthest areas away from Asunción and I get to be trained here. Because it´s so far away from civilization and so close to Brazil, they speak Spanish, Brazilian, Guarani, and Castillano. I can´t even speak spanish so it´s rough trying to know what anyone is saying because it´s like whatever language they want to say. I´m learning a lot and i´ve already met some sweet families!
So far I´ve seen some sweet stuff. I saw like 100 pigs eating garbage out of this huge dump, I saw a pinapple plant, monkey, anteater, parrots, some cool man playing the harp, my first breastfeeding, my second breastfeeding, and last night I found a tarantula trying to get into my house. It´s quite the party here! I´d send pictures, but I totally forgot my cable for my camera, so I´ll be sending all of them next monday and then you guys can do whatever with them. My house is nice I guess. The floors are tile instead of dirt so that´s better than most here. My stomach has yet to fall victim to the water/food, but tonight is my first dinner cita with one of the members, so my money is on that meal.
So far, it´s been an interesting but very good experience here in La Paloma and Paraguay! Oh yeah, and today for Pday we went to Saltos which is even closer to Brazil so that was kinda cool. I took a picture of it cause you can see Brazil from the town! Woo! But that´s all I have time for for this week so ádios mi amigos. I´m alive, happy, and preaching the gospel, so keep praying for me, but don´t you worry! All is well!
Love,
Elder Morris
P.S. Remember emails are pro now. So send the other things if you want, but emails. Yeah!
So good stories so far, the overall trip took over 30 hours of travelling so that sucked pretty bad. And then we got to Beunos Aires in Argentina and that was pretty nice so I thought it´d be okay here. And then we flew to Asunción...it´s quite ghetto but that´s okay. We spent the night in like a halfway house or something and that was nice with 16 missionaries stuck in this little house. I´d put a smiley face thing there but I dunno how to make a colon on a spanish keyboard... anywho, the next day we all got our trainers! Everyone except me that is. My trainer was stuck at his house because of an ingrown toe nail, so I sat alone. All the other new elders just laughed at me and they all went with their trainers to various nearby cities and whatnot. But the jokes on them, because I got to go with the missionaries who are about to go home, to a place called Paulitas which is some sweet Brazilian meat eating place. I didn´t have a companion so they had to bring me along! They said it´s the best food in Paraguay so that was pretty cool that I got it on my first day.
The next day we travelled to my area which was 7 1/2 hours away. Woo! That was pretty much the longest bus ride of my life. But finally we arrived to a place called La Paloma Del Espíritu Santo, or La Paloma for short, which is on the border of Brazil, almost exactly east of Asunción. It´s one of the farthest areas away from Asunción and I get to be trained here. Because it´s so far away from civilization and so close to Brazil, they speak Spanish, Brazilian, Guarani, and Castillano. I can´t even speak spanish so it´s rough trying to know what anyone is saying because it´s like whatever language they want to say. I´m learning a lot and i´ve already met some sweet families!
So far I´ve seen some sweet stuff. I saw like 100 pigs eating garbage out of this huge dump, I saw a pinapple plant, monkey, anteater, parrots, some cool man playing the harp, my first breastfeeding, my second breastfeeding, and last night I found a tarantula trying to get into my house. It´s quite the party here! I´d send pictures, but I totally forgot my cable for my camera, so I´ll be sending all of them next monday and then you guys can do whatever with them. My house is nice I guess. The floors are tile instead of dirt so that´s better than most here. My stomach has yet to fall victim to the water/food, but tonight is my first dinner cita with one of the members, so my money is on that meal.
So far, it´s been an interesting but very good experience here in La Paloma and Paraguay! Oh yeah, and today for Pday we went to Saltos which is even closer to Brazil so that was kinda cool. I took a picture of it cause you can see Brazil from the town! Woo! But that´s all I have time for for this week so ádios mi amigos. I´m alive, happy, and preaching the gospel, so keep praying for me, but don´t you worry! All is well!
Love,
Elder Morris
P.S. Remember emails are pro now. So send the other things if you want, but emails. Yeah!
October 18, 2010 -- MTC Provo, UT
Well team, the day has arrived; it is now my final P-day in the CCM! Needless to say I'm pretty nervous right now, but that's okay. I usually look at my journal before I write this email to give me some ideas of what to write, but it's currently being written in by our teachers, so I don't have it. So yeah. I'll try my best. :D First off, anyone who wants to write me before I head on out must send the dearelder tonight (monday) for it to get to me in time. So you should do that if ya'lls wants to!
Last night we had a fireside, and Mr. Beeson's (English teacher AF) mom and dad spoke. His mom is absolutely nuts. She sang like half of her talk. And then Mr. Beeson (teacher) got to speak too, and he was funny as always and it was good. I just wrote that to say that I know exactly why he is like how he is. Other news for this past week is scarce. On Sunday, the branch presidency randomly calls on two missionaries to give talks in spanish, and one of my roommates, Elder Albertson, was picked. I'm just glad it wasn't me. :) It was also my final sunday as the music coordinator. I got to choose the song that the leaving districts sing for the rest of the congregation, and we made one of the sisters cry cause we're so awesome. Yeah, I picked the song that made her cry. Three of the five districts in our branch head out some time this week so the branch is going to be pretty small for a while.
In other news, Elder Swenson's (roommate) lady friend from back home sent us all yo-yo's for some reason so we've been playing with those at night. They even light up when they yo(?), so we use them with the lights off. It's pretty dang exciting! I'm happy to report that I've had chocolate milk for every single meal in the CCM, and I'm a happy 144.8 lbs. I'll come back at like 115 probably, but at least I left at a normal weight! Our final gym was on Saturday, and it was zone 1 vs. zone 4. We won of course (zone 1 rules!) and it was a pretty intense game. Elders actually got removed from the game cause they kept heading the ball and that's frowned upon in these parts. I had to get sassy on one of the zone 4ers, but it was for a good cause so don't you worry! The day before this epic soccer game, was another district's final gym time (because they left today), and I gave one of them a bloody nose within the first 5 minutes. He wasn't allowed to play anymore because they didn't want him to start bleeding again, so I pretty much ruined his final gym time. I got the ball though...I felt bad.
I had my final temple trip in the states today, and that was pretty magical. It's weird to think that if I go within the next two years, it'll all be in Spanish. Sigh. I'll be good by then I hope. We also had a lot of testimony meetings and whatnot this past week, and they were all really good! But that's all I have to say for today, family and friends! Send dearelder things tonight if you want them here before I leave, and then someone will post my new address with which to send things to and whatnot. I love you all! Keep praying and being good people! Next stop: Paraguay!
Love,
Elder Morris :D
Last night we had a fireside, and Mr. Beeson's (English teacher AF) mom and dad spoke. His mom is absolutely nuts. She sang like half of her talk. And then Mr. Beeson (teacher) got to speak too, and he was funny as always and it was good. I just wrote that to say that I know exactly why he is like how he is. Other news for this past week is scarce. On Sunday, the branch presidency randomly calls on two missionaries to give talks in spanish, and one of my roommates, Elder Albertson, was picked. I'm just glad it wasn't me. :) It was also my final sunday as the music coordinator. I got to choose the song that the leaving districts sing for the rest of the congregation, and we made one of the sisters cry cause we're so awesome. Yeah, I picked the song that made her cry. Three of the five districts in our branch head out some time this week so the branch is going to be pretty small for a while.
In other news, Elder Swenson's (roommate) lady friend from back home sent us all yo-yo's for some reason so we've been playing with those at night. They even light up when they yo(?), so we use them with the lights off. It's pretty dang exciting! I'm happy to report that I've had chocolate milk for every single meal in the CCM, and I'm a happy 144.8 lbs. I'll come back at like 115 probably, but at least I left at a normal weight! Our final gym was on Saturday, and it was zone 1 vs. zone 4. We won of course (zone 1 rules!) and it was a pretty intense game. Elders actually got removed from the game cause they kept heading the ball and that's frowned upon in these parts. I had to get sassy on one of the zone 4ers, but it was for a good cause so don't you worry! The day before this epic soccer game, was another district's final gym time (because they left today), and I gave one of them a bloody nose within the first 5 minutes. He wasn't allowed to play anymore because they didn't want him to start bleeding again, so I pretty much ruined his final gym time. I got the ball though...I felt bad.
I had my final temple trip in the states today, and that was pretty magical. It's weird to think that if I go within the next two years, it'll all be in Spanish. Sigh. I'll be good by then I hope. We also had a lot of testimony meetings and whatnot this past week, and they were all really good! But that's all I have to say for today, family and friends! Send dearelder things tonight if you want them here before I leave, and then someone will post my new address with which to send things to and whatnot. I love you all! Keep praying and being good people! Next stop: Paraguay!
Love,
Elder Morris :D
October 11, 2010 -- MTC Provo, UT
Mba' e chapa! (guarani) :D
Anywho, not much has happened in this past week that is new and such, but there are a few things. First off, we got our travel plans! We ship out of here 4am next wednesday and fly off to chicago and then miami. We then take a nice flight down to buenos aires. Mmmmm. From there we don't actually know what's happening. Hopefully we get a push-plane up to Asuncion, because it's a bus otherwise. The trip just down to Argentina is 23 hours worth of traveling, and then we have to get to Paraguay somehow. So that's pretty exciting. :D We only have nine more days here which is pretty nuts. Somebody back home needs to take the assignment to look on Dearelder.com to see if they work in Paraguay, cause I'm told they do which would be handy. And I'm not sure of my new address down in Paraguay cause it's in my missionary booklet thing at home, so if a family member would like to post that somewhere nice, it'd be much appreciated. I still have one more P-day in the CCM so we still have a little time of sorts.
In other news, a water line in the field broke, so it's been closed for forever and it makes me sad. We've had to play basketball. I hate it! Hopefully it reopens tomorrow so we have one more week of soccer. And here I've now seen Brock a few times, and he seems happy and whatnot. I also learned that Isaac Healey has been delayed a week for some reason, so my group leaves a week earlier than him and we came in a week later. :) Spanish is still rough, but it's getting much easier. And someone sent one of my roommates some chocolate-covered bug things, and so we ate them. They got stuck in our teeth. I lost 3 lbs. between sunday and wednesday, but I'm now back up to my exciting 144! I think that's where I'm staying until Paraguay. Then we'll see what happens.
I don't really have anything exciting to report, because each week sort of blurs together and whatnot, so sorry if this is lame. I'll have better stories in two weeks or so. :) The main thing is someone needs to check up on the mailing situation on Dearelder, or maybe you're all writing some nice handwritten ones. We'll see! It started getting colder here, so I'm most pleased to get back into summer in 9 days. I'm sure that'll change once I step off the plane. Pray so I don't die, please. :) It's been a good 7 weeks, and I've learned so much good and crazy stuff, but I'm super excited to get out there and preach! That's all for now everyone. I love you all! One more email from me next week, and then it's off to Paraguay!
Love,
Elder Morris
woo!
Anywho, not much has happened in this past week that is new and such, but there are a few things. First off, we got our travel plans! We ship out of here 4am next wednesday and fly off to chicago and then miami. We then take a nice flight down to buenos aires. Mmmmm. From there we don't actually know what's happening. Hopefully we get a push-plane up to Asuncion, because it's a bus otherwise. The trip just down to Argentina is 23 hours worth of traveling, and then we have to get to Paraguay somehow. So that's pretty exciting. :D We only have nine more days here which is pretty nuts. Somebody back home needs to take the assignment to look on Dearelder.com to see if they work in Paraguay, cause I'm told they do which would be handy. And I'm not sure of my new address down in Paraguay cause it's in my missionary booklet thing at home, so if a family member would like to post that somewhere nice, it'd be much appreciated. I still have one more P-day in the CCM so we still have a little time of sorts.
In other news, a water line in the field broke, so it's been closed for forever and it makes me sad. We've had to play basketball. I hate it! Hopefully it reopens tomorrow so we have one more week of soccer. And here I've now seen Brock a few times, and he seems happy and whatnot. I also learned that Isaac Healey has been delayed a week for some reason, so my group leaves a week earlier than him and we came in a week later. :) Spanish is still rough, but it's getting much easier. And someone sent one of my roommates some chocolate-covered bug things, and so we ate them. They got stuck in our teeth. I lost 3 lbs. between sunday and wednesday, but I'm now back up to my exciting 144! I think that's where I'm staying until Paraguay. Then we'll see what happens.
I don't really have anything exciting to report, because each week sort of blurs together and whatnot, so sorry if this is lame. I'll have better stories in two weeks or so. :) The main thing is someone needs to check up on the mailing situation on Dearelder, or maybe you're all writing some nice handwritten ones. We'll see! It started getting colder here, so I'm most pleased to get back into summer in 9 days. I'm sure that'll change once I step off the plane. Pray so I don't die, please. :) It's been a good 7 weeks, and I've learned so much good and crazy stuff, but I'm super excited to get out there and preach! That's all for now everyone. I love you all! One more email from me next week, and then it's off to Paraguay!
Love,
Elder Morris
woo!
October 4, 2010 -- MTC Provo, UT
Oh hey there my family and friends and such!
So this week was much more exciting! The big news is that my Paraguay group is now shipping out on the 20th instead of the 25th so I now officially have like 2 weeks left in here...CRAZY! We're not sure why they bumped us up, but anywho that's pretty exciting and awesome! In other news, Gen-con was awesome. I'm glad you all saw me on the tv :D I'm such a star! It was an amazing experience to sing up there, and I'm so thankful I got the opportunity. I touched one of the organ pipes on the way out so now I'm even cooler. And I actually took notes on the sessions for the first time ever, and it actually makes a difference! Who woulda thunk? I really liked Elder Holland's talk in the Saturday morning session. Many people crying in the CCM, that's for sure. Thank you, my family, for letting me come out here :)
I'm now officially fully immunized for Paraguay which is exciting I guess. And Elder Gaylord got mysterious cupcakes the other day! We don't know who they are from, but they tasted good and I haven't died yet so I think we're all good! I've also noticed that I can't spell half of anything anymore. It's sort of depressing, yet exciting. Engrish are hard meow :( Spanish is hard too, so pretty much I'm just bad at spelling and speaking anything! But, my spanish is getting better and better, and now we only teach in Spanish and actually teach instead of just going through lessons and whatnot so it's super cool. I was super nervous today because now we're leaving even earlier, but then I went to the temple and, long story short, I'm stoked out of my mind to get to Paraguay.
For funny stories this week, nothing too exciting happened. I've still kept my chocolate milk streak alive for every single meal. And now I weigh 144. :D I think maybe those are related. And then Elder Sears (the one who fell on his face) tried to pose as an investigator on mormon.org <http://mormon.org>, even though we all told him to not waste their time. He said "hola" to the person and then promptly received a "elder, log off now and don't log onto mormon.org <http://mormon.org> from the MTC." It was pretty funny. Apparently they know. And during one of our useful nightly conversations, our district talked about Jedi's, the Avatar from the last airbender (not the blue people), and then wizards like Harry Potter. I now poll you all! Which of the three would you rather be? You can also choose pokemon trainer, but nobody did here. Cast your votes. The avatar would beat anyone in a fight, but you can choose whomever you'd like. Todd picks jedi already I predict.
In other news, our teacher Hermano Coles is pretty much the smartest scripture person I've ever met in my life. He's told us things that would blow your minds! I wrote them down, so you can read them in 2 years if you all behave yourselves.
That's all of the excitng news for this week. A lot happened, and a lot changed. I'm more excited than ever to ship out and preach the gospel. Thank you all for your prayers because I most certainly need them. I keep praying for you all, and I know that my serving a mission is blessing you all back home! I love you all! Keep on keeping on and stay true to the faith! Two more weeks and I'm off to Paraguay. Yeah. Exciting! Oh and you should all definetly go to the temple within this next week. It's amazing, and I promise you'll learn something new and exciting if you do. I think that's all for this week. I love you all, my friends and family :)
Love,
Elder Morris
So this week was much more exciting! The big news is that my Paraguay group is now shipping out on the 20th instead of the 25th so I now officially have like 2 weeks left in here...CRAZY! We're not sure why they bumped us up, but anywho that's pretty exciting and awesome! In other news, Gen-con was awesome. I'm glad you all saw me on the tv :D I'm such a star! It was an amazing experience to sing up there, and I'm so thankful I got the opportunity. I touched one of the organ pipes on the way out so now I'm even cooler. And I actually took notes on the sessions for the first time ever, and it actually makes a difference! Who woulda thunk? I really liked Elder Holland's talk in the Saturday morning session. Many people crying in the CCM, that's for sure. Thank you, my family, for letting me come out here :)
I'm now officially fully immunized for Paraguay which is exciting I guess. And Elder Gaylord got mysterious cupcakes the other day! We don't know who they are from, but they tasted good and I haven't died yet so I think we're all good! I've also noticed that I can't spell half of anything anymore. It's sort of depressing, yet exciting. Engrish are hard meow :( Spanish is hard too, so pretty much I'm just bad at spelling and speaking anything! But, my spanish is getting better and better, and now we only teach in Spanish and actually teach instead of just going through lessons and whatnot so it's super cool. I was super nervous today because now we're leaving even earlier, but then I went to the temple and, long story short, I'm stoked out of my mind to get to Paraguay.
For funny stories this week, nothing too exciting happened. I've still kept my chocolate milk streak alive for every single meal. And now I weigh 144. :D I think maybe those are related. And then Elder Sears (the one who fell on his face) tried to pose as an investigator on mormon.org <http://mormon.org>, even though we all told him to not waste their time. He said "hola" to the person and then promptly received a "elder, log off now and don't log onto mormon.org <http://mormon.org> from the MTC." It was pretty funny. Apparently they know. And during one of our useful nightly conversations, our district talked about Jedi's, the Avatar from the last airbender (not the blue people), and then wizards like Harry Potter. I now poll you all! Which of the three would you rather be? You can also choose pokemon trainer, but nobody did here. Cast your votes. The avatar would beat anyone in a fight, but you can choose whomever you'd like. Todd picks jedi already I predict.
In other news, our teacher Hermano Coles is pretty much the smartest scripture person I've ever met in my life. He's told us things that would blow your minds! I wrote them down, so you can read them in 2 years if you all behave yourselves.
That's all of the excitng news for this week. A lot happened, and a lot changed. I'm more excited than ever to ship out and preach the gospel. Thank you all for your prayers because I most certainly need them. I keep praying for you all, and I know that my serving a mission is blessing you all back home! I love you all! Keep on keeping on and stay true to the faith! Two more weeks and I'm off to Paraguay. Yeah. Exciting! Oh and you should all definetly go to the temple within this next week. It's amazing, and I promise you'll learn something new and exciting if you do. I think that's all for this week. I love you all, my friends and family :)
Love,
Elder Morris
September 20, 2010 -- MTC Provo, UT
Hello friends and family! Hola mi familia y mi amigos!
So it's really setting into a schedule around here, so fun and interesting things are scarce. We got a new Branch President yesterday, which is neato. The elders going to the Dominican Republic got shipped out on wednesday or something. I'm quite jealous. We Paraguayans are now about halfway done with the CCM (MTC). The month mark is comin up in a few days which is pretty exciting. That's like a real piece of time so now I can say one month instead of 3 weeks :D
And reguarding my sweats and whatnot, since it's going to get muy frio soon, I'll need the pair of either gray or blue sweats that are hiding in my clothes and then like one more shirt of sorts. Just pick one that isn't dumb. Let laura pick. And feel free to include something tasty in there if you want! Tee hee! This next Thursday will be our first lesson completely in Spanish, which is kinda crazy. Our teacher is moving us up a week cause he's nuts so we're starting it all a week early. My roommate downed a mountain dew (shipped in by his family of course) in under 13 seconds which was pretty impressive. I was frightened! And I've only missed one day so far in my journal! You'd all be so proud!
Yesterday Elder Gaylord and I taught a sweet district lesson or something. I don't actually know what it was. But it's kinda cool how now people just assign us stuff to do less than an hour later and it's no big deal. Back home I would've freaked out. So that's cool! Aaaaaannnnndddd I was called as the Branch musical coordinator! That pretty much means I just pick the 3 songs and then pianists in priesthood and sacrament meeting. I'm so legit now. I'm thinking it'll make Elder Gaylord and I immune to the next District Leader position, but we'll see :D And we did choir a few weeks back, which I've forgotten to write about, and then filled out some sweet paper to maybe be in the MTC choir for General Conference! :D It'd be in the Priesthood session I'm guessing, so only menfolk have a chance to see me, but it's still sweeto. But maybe they don't want me. We'll see. I told them I was a music major, but whatevs. And one of my teachers is taking a ladyfriend to visit his family in Cali this week!!!! Maybe he'll get married :D
I appreciate all the fun letters you guys send me! Make sure to take advantage of that while it lasts for 5 more weeks. Because after that, letters may be few depending on where I am in Paraguay. It's pretty awesome here that's for sure. The weeks are seemingly flying by, and that's kind of crazy. This place is like a testimony factory which is also nice. My spanish is coming along I think. I can actually carry on semi-decent conversations about family and work and such. Mi padre trabaja con computadores! How fancy is that? Pretty fancy! I'm soooo excited to fly out to Paraguay. It's going to be crazy awesomely cool. I went to the temple today and that was nice too :)
I think that's all I have for this week. Everyone keep on keeping on! Stay true to the faith! Be still, and know that He is God (Psalms 46:10). I hope you all have a fantastic week, and I hope the grass in the barnyard grows like a champ! I love you all and I know that the work we are all in is the most important work in the world. Never forget who you are, and work your hardest so at the last day you may stand blameless before God. And never hesitate to ask Him for anything. God looks for any excuse to bless his children (I mean, look at Alma the younger. The worst of the worst saw an angel of the Lord and was converted.) If you need anything in life, just pray. :) That's my magical thought for the week. I love you all!
Elder Morris :D
So it's really setting into a schedule around here, so fun and interesting things are scarce. We got a new Branch President yesterday, which is neato. The elders going to the Dominican Republic got shipped out on wednesday or something. I'm quite jealous. We Paraguayans are now about halfway done with the CCM (MTC). The month mark is comin up in a few days which is pretty exciting. That's like a real piece of time so now I can say one month instead of 3 weeks :D
And reguarding my sweats and whatnot, since it's going to get muy frio soon, I'll need the pair of either gray or blue sweats that are hiding in my clothes and then like one more shirt of sorts. Just pick one that isn't dumb. Let laura pick. And feel free to include something tasty in there if you want! Tee hee! This next Thursday will be our first lesson completely in Spanish, which is kinda crazy. Our teacher is moving us up a week cause he's nuts so we're starting it all a week early. My roommate downed a mountain dew (shipped in by his family of course) in under 13 seconds which was pretty impressive. I was frightened! And I've only missed one day so far in my journal! You'd all be so proud!
Yesterday Elder Gaylord and I taught a sweet district lesson or something. I don't actually know what it was. But it's kinda cool how now people just assign us stuff to do less than an hour later and it's no big deal. Back home I would've freaked out. So that's cool! Aaaaaannnnndddd I was called as the Branch musical coordinator! That pretty much means I just pick the 3 songs and then pianists in priesthood and sacrament meeting. I'm so legit now. I'm thinking it'll make Elder Gaylord and I immune to the next District Leader position, but we'll see :D And we did choir a few weeks back, which I've forgotten to write about, and then filled out some sweet paper to maybe be in the MTC choir for General Conference! :D It'd be in the Priesthood session I'm guessing, so only menfolk have a chance to see me, but it's still sweeto. But maybe they don't want me. We'll see. I told them I was a music major, but whatevs. And one of my teachers is taking a ladyfriend to visit his family in Cali this week!!!! Maybe he'll get married :D
I appreciate all the fun letters you guys send me! Make sure to take advantage of that while it lasts for 5 more weeks. Because after that, letters may be few depending on where I am in Paraguay. It's pretty awesome here that's for sure. The weeks are seemingly flying by, and that's kind of crazy. This place is like a testimony factory which is also nice. My spanish is coming along I think. I can actually carry on semi-decent conversations about family and work and such. Mi padre trabaja con computadores! How fancy is that? Pretty fancy! I'm soooo excited to fly out to Paraguay. It's going to be crazy awesomely cool. I went to the temple today and that was nice too :)
I think that's all I have for this week. Everyone keep on keeping on! Stay true to the faith! Be still, and know that He is God (Psalms 46:10). I hope you all have a fantastic week, and I hope the grass in the barnyard grows like a champ! I love you all and I know that the work we are all in is the most important work in the world. Never forget who you are, and work your hardest so at the last day you may stand blameless before God. And never hesitate to ask Him for anything. God looks for any excuse to bless his children (I mean, look at Alma the younger. The worst of the worst saw an angel of the Lord and was converted.) If you need anything in life, just pray. :) That's my magical thought for the week. I love you all!
Elder Morris :D
September 13, 2010 -- MTC Provo, UT
Oh hai thur everyone!
Soooo it's kind of crazy to think, but its been almost 3 weeks now. One more and I'm 1/24th done...what the crazy?!?! Anywho, this week in review:
Elder Gaylord caught some sort of icky virus so we got to leave the confines of the MTC and visit the real world. A random jogger girl was excited to see us, so that was neato. And Elder Gaylord was prescribed mucinex and claratin...pretty much the lamest thing ever, but I got a free walk out of it I guess. In cooler medical news, the flu has hit the MTC with a vengence. One of our district members got quarantined this week, and had to live in 4m with all of the other undesirables. He got to nap all day and sleep in till 10, so I'm not quite sure who won this round. Because we were in contact with him for so long, we all got free boxes of Tamiflu ($100 normally) so that was kinda cool I guess. He has now returned to us and all is well. And in other other medical news, I've got some sort of awful cold thing which is no good, but I'll live.
I went to the temple this morning which was very nice.
The missionaries on my floor have recently discovered that our little work out stretchy band thing can be used as a sling shot, and have tried launching quarters, jawbreakers, and tape balls. The quarters stick into doors, the jawbreakers explode, and the tape balls are fun to dodge I guess. I'm so proud of them. I wasn't part of it by the way! I'm mature! ahem. And we learned how to use our name badges as kazoos! That is pretty cool.
Last tuesday was a devotional, and by far the most spiritual day I've had in my entire life. Writing an email about it doesn't really do it justice, but long story short, I know I'm supposed to be here. I love this gospel, and everything it's done for me in my life. Just in these three weeks, my entire love and knowledge of our Savior has increased dramatically. I sorta wish I had my scriptures on hand, but I dont :( but I found a scripture that says we are forgiven of our sins every time we bear testimony of the Savior, so that's a real comfort to me here, seeing as I bear testimony like 1000 times a day. And another scripture that says Christ suffers not only for our sins, but for our infirmities, fears, and other things of that nature. So make sure all you people back home never delay allowing Christ's atonement to help you for pretty much anything. I'm so beyond stoked to share my love with the people of Paraguay.
We taught our first plan of salvation this week! woo! And then later that day, we had to teach an entire lesson, while switching off speaking every minute. It was pretty tough but Elder Gaylord and I are pretty pro so we did well. I even finished his testimony once for him, cause he ran out of time :D
Once again I apologize for the randomness of my emails, but I just write as things come. One of my roommate's lady friend from back home sent tasty cookies to him this week and we ate some. They were oh so delicious and it made me happy. And as far as my schedule goes from day to day, I have an hour each of personal study, companion study, and then idioma. Which is language :D To fill in the rest we have big chunks of class time, where we learn more spanish and more gospelly type things. On tuesdays and sundays, we have a devotional/fireside which is nice. We also have blocks of Missionary Directed Time, where you can do pretty much anything as long as its useful. Anything being, gospelly things or buying gospelly things at the bookstore, and teaching and such. Then we have 50 minutes of gym time each day which is nice. I scored a goal this week :D It's getting cold now in the mornings, so eventually I'd like one of my hoodies of sorts and then maybe sweats. And one more t-shirt :D
All in all, the MTC is pretty dang sweet. It gets pretty repetitive from day to day, but it's an amazing learning experience. And I have still had choco milk for every meal. Thanks for all of the letters you guys send to me! It's quite nice to get mail. It makes me feel cool in front of my district. Which reminds me, the Dominican Republic people in our district leave tomorrow I think. :( Our district is shrinking down to only eight people! I think that's all I have to say for this week. Everyone stay strong and keep on keepin on! Make sure you keep sending fun letters, cause in a month (kinda), I'll be in the jungle somewhere so who knows how often I'll get mail there.
I love you all and I pray for every single one of you every day. I know the Lord is blessing me for being here, and I'm pretty sure he's blessing you too :D Now it's time to go do laundry or something! Woo! Pray for meh! Oh yeah and if you have Erin's info, forward this to her please. :D
Love,
Elder Morris
I love you, mommy :D
Soooo it's kind of crazy to think, but its been almost 3 weeks now. One more and I'm 1/24th done...what the crazy?!?! Anywho, this week in review:
Elder Gaylord caught some sort of icky virus so we got to leave the confines of the MTC and visit the real world. A random jogger girl was excited to see us, so that was neato. And Elder Gaylord was prescribed mucinex and claratin...pretty much the lamest thing ever, but I got a free walk out of it I guess. In cooler medical news, the flu has hit the MTC with a vengence. One of our district members got quarantined this week, and had to live in 4m with all of the other undesirables. He got to nap all day and sleep in till 10, so I'm not quite sure who won this round. Because we were in contact with him for so long, we all got free boxes of Tamiflu ($100 normally) so that was kinda cool I guess. He has now returned to us and all is well. And in other other medical news, I've got some sort of awful cold thing which is no good, but I'll live.
I went to the temple this morning which was very nice.
The missionaries on my floor have recently discovered that our little work out stretchy band thing can be used as a sling shot, and have tried launching quarters, jawbreakers, and tape balls. The quarters stick into doors, the jawbreakers explode, and the tape balls are fun to dodge I guess. I'm so proud of them. I wasn't part of it by the way! I'm mature! ahem. And we learned how to use our name badges as kazoos! That is pretty cool.
Last tuesday was a devotional, and by far the most spiritual day I've had in my entire life. Writing an email about it doesn't really do it justice, but long story short, I know I'm supposed to be here. I love this gospel, and everything it's done for me in my life. Just in these three weeks, my entire love and knowledge of our Savior has increased dramatically. I sorta wish I had my scriptures on hand, but I dont :( but I found a scripture that says we are forgiven of our sins every time we bear testimony of the Savior, so that's a real comfort to me here, seeing as I bear testimony like 1000 times a day. And another scripture that says Christ suffers not only for our sins, but for our infirmities, fears, and other things of that nature. So make sure all you people back home never delay allowing Christ's atonement to help you for pretty much anything. I'm so beyond stoked to share my love with the people of Paraguay.
We taught our first plan of salvation this week! woo! And then later that day, we had to teach an entire lesson, while switching off speaking every minute. It was pretty tough but Elder Gaylord and I are pretty pro so we did well. I even finished his testimony once for him, cause he ran out of time :D
Once again I apologize for the randomness of my emails, but I just write as things come. One of my roommate's lady friend from back home sent tasty cookies to him this week and we ate some. They were oh so delicious and it made me happy. And as far as my schedule goes from day to day, I have an hour each of personal study, companion study, and then idioma. Which is language :D To fill in the rest we have big chunks of class time, where we learn more spanish and more gospelly type things. On tuesdays and sundays, we have a devotional/fireside which is nice. We also have blocks of Missionary Directed Time, where you can do pretty much anything as long as its useful. Anything being, gospelly things or buying gospelly things at the bookstore, and teaching and such. Then we have 50 minutes of gym time each day which is nice. I scored a goal this week :D It's getting cold now in the mornings, so eventually I'd like one of my hoodies of sorts and then maybe sweats. And one more t-shirt :D
All in all, the MTC is pretty dang sweet. It gets pretty repetitive from day to day, but it's an amazing learning experience. And I have still had choco milk for every meal. Thanks for all of the letters you guys send to me! It's quite nice to get mail. It makes me feel cool in front of my district. Which reminds me, the Dominican Republic people in our district leave tomorrow I think. :( Our district is shrinking down to only eight people! I think that's all I have to say for this week. Everyone stay strong and keep on keepin on! Make sure you keep sending fun letters, cause in a month (kinda), I'll be in the jungle somewhere so who knows how often I'll get mail there.
I love you all and I pray for every single one of you every day. I know the Lord is blessing me for being here, and I'm pretty sure he's blessing you too :D Now it's time to go do laundry or something! Woo! Pray for meh! Oh yeah and if you have Erin's info, forward this to her please. :D
Love,
Elder Morris
I love you, mommy :D
August 27, 2010 -- MTC Provo, UT
Hi everyone! My P-day is Monday (as you can tell) and it has been a crazy five days. I've already learned how to pray and bear my testimony in Spanish, and I've already tried it out with my companion, Elder Gaylord, on random missionaries. :D It's kind of scary to approach strangers even in the MTC, but it's already gotten easier and such so thats good. We've given our first discussion to people, but not in spanish yet. That comes in week six. This has pretty much been the longest 5 days of my life, but every single person says it goes by faster now that the first sunday has passed. I went to the temple grounds yesterday and sat for like 2 hours with our zone, but we were supposed to only stay for 1 hour. oops :) I didn't know though! And by the way, tell everyone that wants to write me to use dearelder.com <http://dearelder.com> while I'm in the MTC. Celeste already did that cause she's pro and I got a letter on my second day :D soooo use that so I don't have to wait till monday to read my sweet mail. My room is probably the best one in our district so I'm super thankful for that! My companion Elder Gaylord is from Gilber, Az. I'm sure Celeste would like that...And my other two roommate Elders are from Pocatello and Saratoga Springs. I've sorta been labeled as the funny kid in our district (who knew?) so I suppose thats exciting. I have sweet Spanish books now and I sound less like a Gringo now!
Spanish is the new English in the MTC. I've never seen so many tags with La Iglesia De Los Santos De Los Ultimos Dias in my entire life. I fell asleep in sacrament meeting :D I'm trying to make you proud daddy! It won't happen again I promise. I just bought some sweet detergent and a shirt so I can wash my other gym shirt so thats nice. For gym, our entire zone plays some other zone in soccer so thats pretty exciting. We've won every time so far and I nailed some kid right in the face two days ago with the ball. It was pretty sweet.
I'm glad Destry is sleeping nicely now and I hope everyone is happy. Tell me when Brian stops being an illegal alien. Oh yeah and sorry this email has no structure. I'm just sorta writing things as they come to my head. The food here is pretty nice. I've eaten more than I've ever eaten in my life so we'll see how that goes. I know some of you out there are happy to hear that. :) I've had chocolate milk with every single meal so far and it's my goal to do that for 9 weeks. Just an interesting note, I'm scheduled to leave the MTC on Oct. 25, and coming home on Aug 28, 2012 says my papers. My maestros are pretty dang cool, but for some reason they are being switched so I have new ones today. I hope they are as cool as the last ones! Waking up at 6 is pretty much the most awful thing ever, and I have yet to get used to that one, but apparently one day I will. The beds are also no bueno at all. I just got back from the temple today and that was a really good experience. It's kind of neat to see that many Elders in one place. Feel free to write me as often as you want, by the way, as it gives me something exciting to look forward to at the end of each day. Just use the dearelder thing and it'll get here the next day, and then I'll reply to all on Mondays. :D anything handwritten is also quite nice woo woo! And assuming you'll forward this to Celeste, I'll have to handwrite your personal letter as I'm not supposed to do it here, so just hold on tight for that one and keep deareldering me. :D
I've already learned so much, and my Spanish is coming along quite nicely. The elders from our district that are going to the Dominican Republic
P.S. make sure to use dearelder and write as often you want :)
Spanish is the new English in the MTC. I've never seen so many tags with La Iglesia De Los Santos De Los Ultimos Dias in my entire life. I fell asleep in sacrament meeting :D I'm trying to make you proud daddy! It won't happen again I promise. I just bought some sweet detergent and a shirt so I can wash my other gym shirt so thats nice. For gym, our entire zone plays some other zone in soccer so thats pretty exciting. We've won every time so far and I nailed some kid right in the face two days ago with the ball. It was pretty sweet.
I'm glad Destry is sleeping nicely now and I hope everyone is happy. Tell me when Brian stops being an illegal alien. Oh yeah and sorry this email has no structure. I'm just sorta writing things as they come to my head. The food here is pretty nice. I've eaten more than I've ever eaten in my life so we'll see how that goes. I know some of you out there are happy to hear that. :) I've had chocolate milk with every single meal so far and it's my goal to do that for 9 weeks. Just an interesting note, I'm scheduled to leave the MTC on Oct. 25, and coming home on Aug 28, 2012 says my papers. My maestros are pretty dang cool, but for some reason they are being switched so I have new ones today. I hope they are as cool as the last ones! Waking up at 6 is pretty much the most awful thing ever, and I have yet to get used to that one, but apparently one day I will. The beds are also no bueno at all. I just got back from the temple today and that was a really good experience. It's kind of neat to see that many Elders in one place. Feel free to write me as often as you want, by the way, as it gives me something exciting to look forward to at the end of each day. Just use the dearelder thing and it'll get here the next day, and then I'll reply to all on Mondays. :D anything handwritten is also quite nice woo woo! And assuming you'll forward this to Celeste, I'll have to handwrite your personal letter as I'm not supposed to do it here, so just hold on tight for that one and keep deareldering me. :D
I've already learned so much, and my Spanish is coming along quite nicely. The elders from our district that are going to the Dominican Republic
P.S. make sure to use dearelder and write as often you want :)
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