Hey Guys!
How's it going for everyone? I'm doing great out here and am having a great time. I actually really like the schedule that we are on, it's not too bad at all. Some Elders don't like it, but I have no problem with being in class for most of the day and waking up early. The only hard part for me is how much pressure everyone puts on us to feel the spirit and teach by the spirit and things like that. But anyway, I'll start by answering some of the questions you guys sent me in your letters. Thank you Mom, Dad, and Dani for writing me, I really love getting mail. Its like getting a text, no matter what it says, you feel good because someone is thinking about you... Oh! and a big thank you to Grandma Ellen for sending me those cookies. They are delicious and all of my friends that I shared them with say thank you too. Anyway here we go.
How's it going for everyone? I'm doing great out here and am having a great time. I actually really like the schedule that we are on, it's not too bad at all. Some Elders don't like it, but I have no problem with being in class for most of the day and waking up early. The only hard part for me is how much pressure everyone puts on us to feel the spirit and teach by the spirit and things like that. But anyway, I'll start by answering some of the questions you guys sent me in your letters. Thank you Mom, Dad, and Dani for writing me, I really love getting mail. Its like getting a text, no matter what it says, you feel good because someone is thinking about you... Oh! and a big thank you to Grandma Ellen for sending me those cookies. They are delicious and all of my friends that I shared them with say thank you too. Anyway here we go.
Elder Fausett had been in a threesome since the first day because there were apparently an odd number of Russian missionaries. He had to move over to my district, so I felt bad for him, but I am really glad that I did not have to change districts.
The Rosetta Stone and my other studying have helped quite a bit, and I have been able to help a bunch of the Elders during language study. There are some very bright guys in my district. But I think they expect you to learn most everything on your own, so I've just been trying to study hard and push myself.
I have not seen anyone else from home besides everyone who I have already mentioned, but a bunch more of my college friends came in last week so that was really awesome to see all of them and a bunch more are coming in the next couple weeks.
I have a couple questions for you guys to investigate. See if Dave knows Elder Tyler Harris from Alpine, he's in my district and is a close friend. And ask Grandpa if he knows a Logan Topham from Lehi because someone in my branch presidency's daughter married him and they always almost cry every time they see me because they are so excited to see what it will look like when their grandsons grow up or something like that. But it did remind me of how much my Grandparents love me and are proud of me, so that gave me a nice morale boost.
So, funny story, we were working on our testimonies in Russian the other day and I wanted to tell my teacher that "I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God" but apparently I said "I know that Joseph Smith killed a prophet of God" so that's not good.... I'm glad I got that one out of the way in the MTC. The words for "was" and "killed" are much too similar and whoever invented Russian should have thought about that beforehand- ha ha.
I'm going to get a few picture prints in the mail today, I'm still working on a way to send you guys some digitals but I don't know if it is possible. I will also write my message to Bren and respond to Dani's letter in that letter because I'm short on time.
I love it when everybody asks me questions in their letters because it gives me a good idea about what I want to write. But I'll tell you guys a little more about the day to day here. The schedule is pretty standard. 2- 3 hour class sessions. 1 hour personal study, 1 hour language study, and 1 hour of TALL which is a computer program to help you learn the language which I really like and I think it is pretty helpful. The class sessions are different than I expected. About 1 hour is language teaching and practice, 1 hour is basically studying PMG and learning about how to help investigators make commitments or something like that. And 1 hour the teacher leaves the room and pretends to be an investigator who he taught on his mission and the companionships go out and take turns teaching him while the others do companion study, its interesting. In some ways it helps to practice, but in other ways its weird that they are pretending to be someone else.
Oh, and to Rob - they had delicious Chicken cordon bleu last Wednesday. They do it when the newbies come to give them a good first impression of the MTC.
Love you all!
Elder Topham
