This week has really been a blast because there has been so much going on. This week, because of the new Mission President Seminar, everything has been a little different than usual.
With the Mission President Seminar, none of us actually got to meet any of the quorum, but those missionaries who were getting new Mission Presidents for their mission, got a chance to meet them Monday night. Only one missionary in our district got that opportunity. It was Elder Francis, who is going to New Zealand, Chinese speaking.
So far, I have been with three companions the entire time. We have been doing splits relatively often for choir and a few other things, but generally I am with Elder Love and Elder Nixon. They both are really great companions. We all come from different types of backgrounds and different styles of families, but it really is great because it makes each of our lessons different and more interesting because of it.
Also for the number of weeks I will be in the MTC. It looks like I will be here for the entire nine weeks. They still do ones that are shorter, such as two weeks or four weeks, but that is predetermined before you actually come into the MTC. Also, my mission president only likes missionaries to come on the transfers, that way it is easier for him to organize things. Which is a little bit of a bummer for one of the sisters in our district. She was in the fast track Chinese going to Taipei as well, but because of visa delays, she missed her chance to go three weeks ago.
For email timing, here at the MTC, we only get an hour, but our Branch President is pretty relaxed on that. He just says make sure that it doesn't go over two hours, or we will need to have a chat about it. As for out in Taiwan, I have heard a lot about the Mission President. Just yesterday, we ran into a branch president that knew him and his comments were that we did something right in our past life to get President Day. For emailing, it doesn't sound like he has a time limit, just that you can only check your email on p-day. And for when you first get to Taiwan, the way you find out who your trainer will be is similar to a game show. He has a power point set up that has a spinner of all the trainers, and with the click of a button, it will spin to who your trainer is. From what I heard from the last district of Missionaries that went out, that is what happens because President Day likes to make it more exciting and fun for the new missionaries and the current missionaries. So, I am really excited to get out there and meet him.
Now for the events of the week.
Monday was pretty relaxed. We spent most of our P-day out at the field because the main gym was closed off for the Mission President Seminar as well. They were using it for some of the bigger presentations and activities for the seminar. We also went to the temple in the morning, and I can now understand some of the comments that I have heard from Trent about how long initiatory can take, we were there for an hour and a half, which is almost as long as a session. After P-day was finished, we had class and taught one Chinese lesson. The lessons in Chinese are getting easier, but they still have a ways to go before I am ready to teach a full lesson in Chinese.
Tuesday, the biggest thing that occurred was the devotional. For the devotional, we had six of the twelve apostles there. There was: Elder Bednar, Elder Oaks, Elder Nelson, Elder Christofferson, Elder Anderson, and Elder Ballard. Elder Christofferson was the one who actually spoke to us. He talked about us doing missionary work, and standing for what we believe in. My favorite comment he made had to do with people may not believe what you are saying, but they can not disprove your witness of God and his gospel.
On Wednesday, we got to host again. It was really fun, but also really hot. I didn't have a thermometer, but it sure felt like it was in the nineties when we were carrying all the suitcases around campus for all of the newly arriving elders and sisters. This week, there were 450 new missionaries. However, I have heard from the branch presidency that one of the weeks coming up, there are going to be 500 English speaking missionaries plus however many foreign speaking missionaries as well. It is really going to start getting packed here at the MTC for the next few months.
For Thursday, we were only teaching lessons. We taught one of our Gold Tags today and then one of our Chinese investigators, which is one of our teachers. It really is a blast teaching in English because you know that you can get your point across, but the Chinese ones are always more interesting. We were trying to talk about the weather and thunder storms, but we didn't know the Chinese words. But we finally were able to explain what we were saying after describing the sky as exploding and there being lots of light. We all got a kick out of that explanation for a thunder storm.
Friday, we only had one lesson, which was absolutely amazing. We also had all of our study time to prepare for the lesson in Chinese, which felt great. One thing that I have really started to notice at the MTC is the importance of prioritizing what you want to do because you don't really feel like you have enough time to get everything done, but with only having to prepare for one lesson, it actually felt like we did have the time, which was so nice.
As usual, for Saturdays, we had TRC, which is where people from the "outside world" come in and we teach them in Chinese. All the people we taught were return missionaries from Taiwan, but it was really fun because if we didn't know a word and our companion didn't know the word, they would help us out or spend more time trying to explain what they were saying in Chinese, which was really nice.
And for Sunday, it was pretty good. The biggest thing for Sunday is usually the devotional and then the movie that follows. The devotional this time was given by Stephan B. Allen, who is over all the missionary work for the church. His talk was mainly a bunch of short films made by the church. Mom and Dad may know what they are, but they stopped using them a while ago. They are old LDS commercials, advertising for the church. He then would relate them to missionary work. The biggest thing he talked about though was serving your mission to its fullest, because as you do that, you will learn to love others and love the Lord. Which he said would pry be the greatest thing you will learn on your mission, is how to love others.
Anyways, time is about up. Thanks for all the letters and prays.
Love,
Elder Okeson
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