Randy's Mission to the Philippines: MTC Zone Conference... (11/30/08)

I'm back! I'll get caught up on these soon enough, one of these days. I do want to make it out of the MTC and onto the Philippines (and out of 2008, for crying out loud)!

This is one of the last Zone (I think) conferences Elder Booth had. As you read in the letter, a lot of these guys are heading out, leaving Elder Booth's District as the oldest one. You're next, guys! Good luck out there!

Here's a letter written the day after the pictures:

Date: December 1, 2008 9:44:31 AM PST

"Hello everyone. I hope everybody had a great thanksgiving, and I hope you missed me dearly and wished I were there. I'll just assume you did. That makes me feel a little better inside. My Thanksgiving went well, like I said in the letter they let me write on Thanksgiving. Actually now that I think about it, I pretty much wrote most of the cool stuff in that letter, so I'm sorry if I repeat some of the stuff I wrote in there.

I will start off by saying thank you very very very much for that packages Anderson and Rawson family. You made me feel pretty special when I got two packages in one day. I could just see the jealousy in the other elders and that's always fun. I am enjoying eating everything you sent me. Oh, and I'm pretty sure I thanked mom for the cookies, but oh well - saying it again won't hurt anybody. Thanks mom. I think this last week flew by faster than any other week I have been through. It was here one second and then gone the next. I imagine that is how the rest of my mission is going to be like though, so I might as well get used to it.

I am still learning a lot every day. I have just come to the conclusion that I am never going to learn enough so I figure I won't think about it and try to do as much as I possibly can. Like I said in my letter I wrote, the lesson went really well. I took Ryan's advice and just mainly focused on learning how to put sentences together. Then a couple days before we actually taught I memorized most of the words I wanted to use for the first lesson. I am coming to find that flash cards are man's best friend. I carry them everywhere with me.
We are also trying to be a lot better at speaking our language. My district does about three days a week of no English. We have come to find out it is a lot easier to be obedient and not talk about worldly things when you don't really know how to talk about them. I am never more spiritual then when I am just speaking tagalog.

The speaker we had yesterday was really good. I actually can't remember his name right now, but I'm sure you will get over it. He was part of the missionary council or something. He really stuck it to us and was very blunt. Those are my favorite kind of talks. There is no better motivator than guilt. He really made me feel like I wasn't doing good enough so now I hope I can use that to do better.
Oh and I think the craziest thing that's happening this week is the oldest districts are leaving from our zone. I am going to be in the oldest district at the end of today. I would have to say that that is a little unsettling to think about. I don't know if I will ever really feel ready to head out there. Yet, at the same time, I want to get out of this place. I guess I will just have to focus on the second one so I can motivate myself to actually leave when the time comes.

Well, I love you all. I'm sorry this letter is a little random in its organization but I really don't have the time to do any fine tuning. Thanks again for everything and I will try and make sure I get the letters out that I missed last week".

See ya and I love you all.
Keep the lord on you mind
Elder Booth

Mingling after the Conference...