Sunday, June 23, 2013

June 22, 2013

There are a few side notes from Mom written in red :) 


Kamusta mga Tayo, (Hello my family and friends)

     This week has been great! Not too much has happened but it was still really good, or  “sobrang mabuti” in Tagalog! We got our travel plans yesterday. I fly out of Salt Lake at 11:30, to Portland, then to Tokyo, then Manila! I will hopefully be able to call at every layover.  It’s crazy that it is actually happening and I am going to fly across the world! We are all excited to be in Tokyo for a bit, we have a 2 hour layover there.  With the flight time and the International Date Line we will get there 2 days after we leave, that's really weird to me.  Hayden didn't give us a specific day but he should fly to the Philippines sometime during the week of July 1st.
   
    Tagalog is coming along really well. We have finished the formal lessons and our teachers are teaching the conversational parts of the language so we can talk with personality. I am really happy because most of it makes pretty good sense. Some words are a little crazy though. Our teacher told us that on Star Wars the Ewoks (those little fuzzy brown people on Endor) speak a mix of Tagalog dialects! I thought that was really cool. She said that when they see C-3PO they say something like, "look at the shiny plant, it so beautiful". That will be the first movie I watch when I get back J

     On Tuesday we had a really good devotional about the power that we have as missionaries, and how we need to teach by the Spirit. I really enjoyed it right up until the last little bit. Right as the speaker was finishing up the Elder directly in front of me threw up all over kingdom come….It was filthy!  The scary part was that after he threw up he passed out. We woke him up and his companions walked him out. Luckily we were at the top so not many people saw. The worst part was the smell. We had to sit through a closing prayer, which seemed to last longer than temple dedication prayer, trying not to lose our cookies ourselves. I tried to hold my notebook up to my nose hoping the ink and pages might help. I feel bad for whoever had to clean it up, especially the steamed vegetables.... remember a few letters ago when I said they give us Cannon Center leftovers…well I'm pretty sure that I was right.

  There is a stomach bug going around the MTC, so I have been careful to keep my hands clean. Luckily there are lot of clear stuff ("clear stuff" is what our family calls hand sanitizer) dispensers everywhere, whoever thought of that stuff was super smart:)
 
   On a better note I am really excited to hear the Prophet speak tomorrow! It should be great, all of the mission presidents have been walking around today but I have yet to see any Apostles. The songs I’ll be singing with the choir are really good. Maybe I’ll be on camera!  We did see Hayden during the closing song of “Called to Serve” which was awesome!!! 

   A quote I read this week I really liked, it goes "talent is like oil, it’s discovered in unexpected places and in surprising quantities." I would challenge everyone to branch out a little bit, because you never know what you may be really good at.    
   
  That's great that Marlee passed the driving test, and about Kelson’s mission call. What is Paxon's address? I wanted to write him a letter or two. That’s a really funny story about the dog chasing the calf down the middle of Old State street; I wish I had been there to see it.

  I got both packages this week, the one with the hand grip and the one from Dear Elder. Thank you very much, they are both really great! I am already getting rock hard forearms, and the watermelon carmel corn was really good. I also liked the scripture in D&C…that line in my blessing stuck out to me as well.

  Aunt Becky sent me a huge thing of cookies the other day which I love. It was really nice of her!!

  I hope you all have a good week, and enjoy summer.

Ingat ( a form of goodbye) at Mahal Kita 

       Elder Hayden Merrill

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