Week 2

Hola familia!

CAFETERIA

Mark and his food-loving friends will love the cafeteria. This is how it goes down. You can have milk, chocolate milk, juice, soda, etc. at every meal. Wednesdays and Sundays they have ice cream from the BYU creamery. You can have cereal, toast, or pb&j at every meal. Every Friday night they order pizza. Breakfast always includes bagels and fruit, over-sugared yogurt (which makes me sick dad :( ), and then waffles and pancakes, and some form of hashbrown, eggs, and sausage or bacon. They also have some hot cereals that they change out but it isn't the same as making your own oats.

Lunch and dinner are almost always filled with fun things like hamburgers, cheeseburgers, chicken sandwiches, chicken nuggets, etc. They also have lots of meat and potato dishes and so on a so forth. There are a vast multitude of desserts including pie, cake, brownies, and cookies at each meal. They also have soups on occasion and a salad bar as well as a bar where you can get a wrap made to your desire.

And it is all that you can eat. It is no wonder that people gain wait here. (Don't worry, so far so good).

GYM

The gym isn't very gym-esque. They have volleyball, foursquare (HELLO fourth grade), and basketball. They have maybe 10 weight machines and about 6 ellipticals and 4 stationary bikes. We aren't allowed to go outside so most of my time is spent running around the track and stretching.

LATVIAN

The language continues to blow my mind. There are over 100 possible noun and adjective endings. The words can sound really similar and you see them with so many different endings that it is hard to point out that it is the same word. Entertaining story: my name tag is wrong. They put the long a sound over the wrong a and so instead of sister it says large mass. On other noteworthy namecalling, the elders in my district have a tendency to call me Elder Lindstrom when they are talking about me to the zone...I don't know if this is a good thing.

LATVIAN CURSE

This week we were informed of the dreaded Latvian curse. Apparently we have a very special and different mission. Not only are there very few people who serve, they all get very close, still hang out for an obnoxiously large amount of their post-mission lives, and get married to each other. My group intends to break this curse (especially since the elders have girlies). Don't worry mom, I DON'T flirt with the elders. I realized how young they were when I say Allen Conners the first day....weird!

TRC

The TRC is the teaching resouce center and generally a missionary's worst nightmare. It is where you practice teaching investigators (and in your language if you are learning one).

DEVOTIONALS

My favorite devotional was on this Tuesday (we have devotionals Tuesday and Sunday nights). Brother Snow of the 70 came and spoke very simply but powerfully. He talked to us about how we bring the message of the Son of God as the shepherds did and how we invite others to come unto Christ. He talked to us about how we are just the conduits that help investigators feel the spirit. He told us that we preside over the changing of hearts.

STUDY

I have been reading conference talks and came upon a really great one that reinforced the idea in my mind that we need to act like what we want to become today. If we sit around waiting to become something then we will become nothing. We should all try to be good people now and be who we want to become.

TODAY

We got to go and clean the temple for three hours. Dearest mother, I luckily didn't have to clean the toilets. I did clean things with a q-tip though. Feel free to check any of the fake ferns for dust. They won't have any because I had the honor of cleaning them. :)

PEOPLE

Ok, here we go

SISTER BAILEY Is this cute blonde southern girl. She has a boyfriend who writes her every day. She has a very strong testimony though her parents are less active. This makes SISTER HUNTINGTON, a wild brown haired very not Californian California girl upset that the boy she is planning on marrying right when she gets home only writes her 2-3 times a week hand written. SISTER SMITH is from Canada and takes being a missionary very seriously. She has graduated from school and doesn't like to be late. Her companion is SISTER BURNHAM from Oregon. She loves politics and doing her hair. I don't think I've seen anyone fix their makeup/hair so much in one day. ELDER BARET was our zone leader. He leaves for Greece with his companion tomorrow. He is this super tall teddy bear. His companion is Elder Greciano. He's Spanish but doesn't look it. He is awesome as well. ELDER MOYE is a Texas sweetheart recent convert. He is definitely from Texas. And that is about all I have time for. You'd be surprised how many elders have girls though. It is nuts!!

Alex left this week. Fun stuff!

Elder Russell M. Nelson and wife with us all weekend and spoke in RS and Priesthood Sunday morning.

I have a testimony of this church. I know that the gospel is true and that this is God's work. He loves us and has created a plan for us to return to him.

Random thought from Elder Baret (Belgian elder going to Greece) "It doesn't matter where you serve, but how."

Dad, Scotland is over his jet lag and we don't let him eat sugar anymore. I'm praying for him lots. I have a hard time teaching with him because he doesn't really study and doesn't like to practice or anything. I am working on loving him and serving him and praying for him though. Gotta love learning experiences.

XOXO

Masa Lindstroma