#7 MTC

Hey family,

Thanks for the letter this week. This week has been pretty good. It was fun to get the package from Mom. Now I have a bunch of snacks and stuff. It’s pretty exciting. Everyone here is really excited about conference. I don’t know why, but apparently conference is more exciting than any other holiday or day on your mission. Pretty cool stuff. We all wish the MTC choir was going to the Conference Center, but they're not doing that this time. Anyway, it isn’t that big of a deal.

Well it is cool that you made a fire pit. I saw the picture, which looked cool. Did you just get some pavers and mortar or something like that? Pretty cool stuff. I want to go roast some marshmallows or hotdogs or something. Hopefully Owen isn’t "smelting" too much. Just kidding, I actually hope that he is. You'll all have to send me a picture of a molten soda can or glass bottle. It sounds pretty fun. I want to smelt. Well, it sounds like everything is all pretty good.

That’s also great about Henry and his 100 deadliest things book. I'm interested to see what kind of spiders are in Nicaragua. Maybe Henry could look them up and tell me? So Dad, I can’t believe that you get to be a Webelos leader with Uncle Mark. That sounds really fun. You'll have to show the kids the potato gun. That’s also cool about the Boise Temple. Do they really anticipate 350,000 people to go through it? That is ridiculous! Well hopefully you don’t get any crazy people asking hard questions.

I am getting really excited to go to Nicaragua. We were talking about it last night and what it will be like. We have heard a lot about Colombia and Peru because that is where our teachers are from. Anyways yeah I'm getting really excited to get out there. Oh, you were asking about the travel itinerary. We get the travel itinerary 10 days before we leave the MTC, so that should be next weekend or something like that. I'm really excited to get the airplane ticket. I think that we have 19 more days here.  The church always flies Delta and they will be getting us on the plane probably early in the morning on October 22nd. I’m glad that we don’t have to worry about visa stuff. There were a couple guys in our zone going to Spain who didn’t get their visas. Out of 12 guys, only 1 got his visa on time. Pretty crazy stuff.

Well this week in the MTC was about the same as every other one. We just studied a bunch, learned Spanish, and learned how to teach the gospel. Each day we have a 3-hour block with the teacher learning Spanish, and later in the day we have another 3-hour block about learning the gospel. And the time between is just spent studying and preparing. The days are pretty busy. I think that I'm getting better at teaching though.

So this morning we went to the temple and did some temple work. It was pretty cool, and we ate in the cafeteria, which was really good. When we all walked out, some lady came and was talking to us about how she had received some crazy revelation and wrote a song about some scripture. We were all kind of confused.

Anyway, aside from that we had a pretty crazy squirt-gun fight in the residence. We played the equivalent of one-in-the-chamber from Call of Duty. Bailey and Owen will know what I'm talking about. Anyway, P-Days are really fun here, and there isn’t much to do in the MTC, so we have to get creative sometimes.

Well, that is about all that is going on here. I have some pictures on my camera. If I get a chance I'll try to send some home. Well, its great to hear from you all, and I am excited to hear how things are going next week. I love you all and miss you.

Nos Vemos,

Elder Stark

#6 MTC

Hey family,

It’s great to hear from you all again. It sounds like all is well, and that you are all having fun. That is cool that Dad gets to work with the dance festival thing. Hopefully Bailey and Owen have fun. I remember the dance festival thing I had to go to. It wasn’t very fun. Anyways that’s cool though that the Prophet will be there. We still haven’t heard from an Apostle at the devotionals here. We keep hoping that there will be one, but none yet.

Last week we watched a Brigham City Temple dedication. It was cool, and I have never been to one before. This morning we went to the temple, and I did some temple work for a guy named "Robert Philips". Isn't that what Bishop Philips name is? Anyways the temple was cool. My comp fell asleep at least 15 times, and I had to keep elbowing him to get him to wake up. Then like 30 seconds later he would be dosing off again. Funny stuff.

Next weekend is going to be General Conference, which I hear is really fun on the mission. We were hoping that by being in the choir we would be able to go to General Conference, but sadly I don’t think that the MTC choir is singing this time. They sung in April, and I think that it is just a once per year deal. Anyways its fun being in the choir. 99% of the people in the choir have no idea what the conductor means when he says "sing a C", so it’s funny. During conference I think that we just go to the gym and sit in the bleachers and watch the thing on some big TVs. I don’t know for sure though.

All is well here. We leave in like 3 weeks or something, and this week we become the oldest district in our zone. Some guys in our district became the Zone Leaders, and I became the District Leader a couple days ago. It’s pretty cool.

I think that I’m getting better at Spanish. I was looking at the grammar book, and I’m pretty sure that I know all of the conjugations. There is something like 8 tenses and 13 different types of conjugations, and I think I know most of them. It’s a little tricky though. There is one called the subjunctive, and past subjunctive, which are pretty confusing. Aside from those, I think that the Spanish is pretty easy. All you really need to know are the conjugations, verbs, and words. It is funny seeing the new districts come in, and not know any Spanish. I was in their shoes 5 weeks ago. It’s funny seeing people that I know here.

Nothing much this week has happened that is super exciting. We just do the same old stuff: sit in class, teach mock investigators, study, and that’s about it.

So I got an email from Elder Rodgers this week, and we was still asking about that picture dictionary. I think that he might want it, but I don’t know for sure. It’s good to hear that those scripture covers arrived at the house.

Well, to answer Henry's question: No sorry, there are no more bananas. Lo Siento. The banana-ing has come to an end. Now we have squirt-guns. A kiwi would be good though. I’m glad to hear that Henry is still keeping up the good work, and looking at buying pocketknives and airsoft guns. Also that is cool that Owen got his permit. Make sure that he doesn’t wreck the car like Bailey did. Chiste! But seriously, don’t wreck the car.

Anyways I think that is about all for this week. I forgot to take any pictures this week, so lo siento. Well, it’s fun hearing from everyone. I love you all and miss you.

Elder Stark 

#5 MTC

Madre y Familia,

Hey! I’m glad to hear that all is well, and that you are all having fun. Hopefully you get better soon from your stomach flu. That’s no bueno. Lo Siento. Anyways I was really really excited to hear about Sam's mission call. That is very very exciting. When we were at BYU, Derek's sister was serving in that mission, so I heard a lot about it. That is really exciting. He said that his sister had spent to that date, all of her mission in El Salvador. Anyways, I am really excited to hear about that. Tell him congrats from me. We will definitely have to go back after we are all done. The Guatemala CCM is a really cool place. We just had some Elders in our district head down there, and they say that it is really great. Apparently the food there is really good, and they have a ping pong table. Lucky! That is also really cool that we get to be so close to each other. It is awesome that he is learning Spanish too. It seems like 60% of everyone in the MTC is going Spanish speaking. I’m really excited about his mission call, and I'm also really excited to hear where Katie goes.

Well this week has been pretty uneventful. We do the same old stuff every day. Oh something funny is that I joined the MTC choir. It’s pretty cool. I’m really horrible at singing and stuff, but there are a lot of people who are worse. We sung a pretty cool song, and sometimes the camera pans over us in the choir. Sadly I didn’t see myself this devotional, but whatever. I probably would have started laughing or something.

Last night we had a wrestling match in our room. It was pretty fun, and we had a lot of people in the room. It was more like a brawl/free for all. Anyways it was really fun. Owen would love it here. There are a lot of missionaries here who are really good wrestlers who wrestled for colleges. What made the wrestling match more extreme was the fact that we turned off the lights, so it was pitch black. It was really fun, but also scary. Last week I got a knee to the nose, which hurt. It was alright. I kicked Elder T. in the jaw (on accident of course). So we are even. Also the banana-ing has come to an end. It was getting pretty out of control, and Elder T threw a banana down the hall was one night and made a big mess. It was funny, but we decided that it would be best to stop.

So I bought some scripture covers like 3 weeks ago, and they are pretty cool. There are a lot of cool looking ones here at the bookstore. Oh and thanks for the package. It arrived here yesterday, and the cookies were really good. They are all fresh and soft. I really enjoyed them, and I still have a lot left so that is good. Oh in our zone there is a guy who played basketball with Riley at the Moses Lake college. He is cool.

Well Spanish is coming along really well. Each week we have a District goal for how many contacts we have to do. A contact = figuring out their name, where they're from, and where they're going, and bearing your testimony. We were doing contacts, and I was bearing my testimony to some guys in a lunch line. They had been here for a week or something, and they were impressed with my Spanish. I was like "oh that’s cool". Anyways, I think that I’m getting better. I can actually read the scriptures in Spanish and understand what is going on. The scriptures are really confusing by the way.

Well I don’t really know what else to say. It’s all pretty fun here and I’m having a good time. We teach investigators pretty much every day or twice a day. We also teach at this place called the TRC (Teaching Resource Center), and we teach real people. This week we taught an old Guatemalan guy. It went well, but he spoke really quick, so it was hard to understand. I kept having to ask him what he just said. And he kept correcting our grammar and sentence structure. It was interesting. I’m excited to get to the point where I can hear native speakers, and understand what they say. I was looking at the calendar and I've been here for a month. Only one more month until we get out into the field. That will be exciting.

Well this is about all for this week. I need to go take my laundry out of the washer in a second. I love you all and miss you.

Con Amor,

Elder Stark

#4 MTC

Hey familia,

I’m glad to hear that all is going well. Last week there were a bunch of Elders who lived in our hall who went to Nicaragua North. They were all pretty cool, and we were really good friends with them. They were saying that their travel plans were Salt Lake to Houston to Miami to Nicaragua. Kind of weird. Anyways, I’m pretty jealous. I wish we could get out into the field. The CCM is really fun though. Anyways, 2 more elders from our district left.  Luckily they were going to the Guatemala CCM, and they weren’t going home. Now we have 7 guys in our district. Its pretty funny, we have like the smallest district.

So last week when I was doing my email time, I sent a couple sentences to Elder Rodgers. I got about a paragraph back from him, and it was fun to hear how he is doing. He said that he is now the meyor companion, and that he is doing pretty well.

Well not much is going on here; pretty much all we do is study and eat and study. Every day we usually teach a lesson. We have 2 investigators which we practice teaching. It’s pretty cool. So we had a lesson a week or so ago with one of our guys. Before the lesson we prayed that we would have the words we would need to know in our mouths. Anyways, the lesson went really well, and I didn’t really have any troubles at all speaking the language. I just pretty much knew all of the words. It's pretty cool to see prayers answered like that. That happens a lot too.

So about 2 nights ago, Elder D. got bananaed. Anyways, Elder C. (the prankster guy) put a ton of bananas in his bed, closet, suit, pillows, and pretty much every where else. Surprisingly, Elder D. was pretty upset. He was all mad and stuff. Anyway, around 11pm the bananas started flying. I think Elder D. threw the first one. Well, the end result was a bunch of gross bananas everywhere in our room. It was really funny once the bananas started flying. I think the plan is to banana him again tonight. Pretty funny stuff.

Oh and last night, we came into our room, and found a huge thing of concrete from the floor all busted up. So, I guess the construction workers measured wrong, and they drilled a big hole into our room. There was concrete mud and water and stuff all over Elder D.’s luggage. He was pretty mad about that too. We were talking to the maintenance guys, and they don’t know what was going on. Well, basically the end result was that there is a big chunk of concrete and carpet missing from our floor. I took some pictures, and if I get a chance I’ll send them to you. It was pretty funny.

Also, last night around 11pm (that’s when all the jokes are made), we started spontaneously making monkey noises. Like, everyone in our room was hooting and howling like monkeys. We did it for a while, and then heard a knock on the door. We all shut up for a while, and carefully opened the door. Sitting outside our door was a banana. There are a lot of bananas in our building. 

Well, I don’t know what more to say. Tell Dad that I see a lot of Danish missionaries here, and its funny to hear them speak. All is going well, and I'm not sick anymore. Spanish is coming along really well; it’s hard, but it’s coming. We do H.S.I (Spanish for Speak your language), and I don’t really have to think much about what I need to say. We spend around 8-10 hours a day studying the language and the gospel, so pretty much the whole day is centered around learning Spanish. It’s cool. Well, that’s about all that is going on here. This week went by really quick. I love you all and miss you.

-Elder Stark