First email

Hey everyone!

So, first week, first P Day, and I think I gave too good of advice to everyone when I told them to ask specific questions, because now I have too many to answer and not enough time. I have maybe 40 minutes but I really have a lot of questions to answer.

Anyway, important ones first.

My companion is Elder C, and he is really cool, which I would say even if he weren´t potentially reading over my shoulder at any time. He´s really quite chill and has an amazing mastery of the Bible and Book of Mormon. We had a companionship inventory the other day, which I had sort of expected to hate (having heard stories from other missionaries of drama and confrontation and other things that I generally try to avoid), but it was really good. We agreed on a few goals in Spanish, in staying positive and happy (that was his goal, not mine), and helping each other learn scriptures. I appreciate his missionary skills and commitment and he appreciates my learning and intellectualism (which is also the first thing Bronwen noticed about me. I guess it´s really obvious.) He´s the district leader, and the two of us are the zone leaders. It´s only for two weeks so it isn´t as big of a deal (our whole zone is advanced Spanish, so no one is here long), but it has been a good opportunity to serve.

Quick funny story, then back into questions! Elder C and I were at breakfast (the food is ok, but too rich and not real enough, plus it gives everyone terrible gastrointestinal problems), and he was going to get some cereal so he grabbed a spoon, but didn´t end up using it. He got a little egg on it, but nothing else. When we went to return our trays, the guy in charge took the spoon off of Elder C´s tray and pulled us aside and around to the side of the cafeteria, where there were two cops waiting. The cafeteria head gave us a hard look, and asked us ¨What is this, elders?´¨ Elder C thought he was mad because he was making them wash a spoon that he didn´t use, so he responded something about how he had meant to get some cereal and then decided not to. The cafeteria head said ¨And is that an excuse to destroy church property?´¨ Elder C and I looked at each other and we were definitely both thinking¨ It´s just a little egg, hermano.¨ Anyway, at this point we realized that the spoon was bent, and he thought that Elder C had been bending it for fun, because a lot of the spoons had been coming back bent. Of course we both told him that he hadn´t and he believed us (companionships are a a real blessing sometimes) We got a lecture after that, because the cop had prepared a lecture and had to give it to someone, but I just appreciated the idea that there was a serial (cereal) spoon bender  running around. If you think the BYU police log is funny, wait till you hear the MTC one...

Okay, back to questions! How´s my Spanish coming? Pretty well, actually. I´m understanding about 90% of what is said and am able to convey about 20% of the things I want to say. It was funny though because my district has six people (the two of us and two sets of hermanas), and four of them are native speakers, and there´s one other gringo, who is near fluent, and is also a linguist). I´m almost definitely the worst at Spanish in my district but not in my zone. Plus, I had the opportunity to talk to some of the missionaries that are here six weeks and I realized that I´m definitely in the right place. They didn´t even recognize words like fue, or simple things like that. So sure, I´m almost floundering and can barely communicate, but comparatively I´m doing great. And the best thing for me will be to get out into the mission field.

As Sam can tell you, the weather has been beautiful out here. I almost wish it were colder so that I could appreciate my mission more, but it is impossible to complain about it being this warm and sunny.

Oh, here´s a trial that I´m facing in the MTC. I keep having really cool ideas to daydream about, board games I could create, short stories I could write, ways to improve ideas that I already have... but there´s no time to daydream out here. And whenever I zone out in class, I totally lose the thread of conversation. When I zone out in classes in English, I´m usually still attentive enough to be able to jump right back in whenever without missing much, but Spanish requires more attention. Oh well. Trials of being a missionary.

Being a zone leader has been good. Technically, the zone we´re going to lead is going to be the one that comes in tomorrow, but we´ve tried to step up a little. One of the Elders was having a hard time and wanted to go home, but we tried to be friendly and get the others to tone down the ribbing going on, and I gave him some of the candy from Mom´s package to show him that we cared about him and wanted him here. He really is doing fine, but he has some speech impediments and maybe minor learning disabilities that make him feel like he doesn´t belong. We´re trying to convince him otherwise, and I think it is working.

Hmm... I think I´ll end the general letter here and have a few more specific responses to individual letters that you have all sent me now.

Love you all a whole lot,

Elder Dearden