May 24, 2011

5/24/11

Dear Family,

I'm glad to hear that everything is going so well at home.  I wish that I could have gone to see the new pirates of the caribbean with you, but I think I can wait...  It doesn't help when Dad tells me that it was equally as good as the first one!  Oh well, time is flying here. 

This week went by incredible fast.  I can't believe that tomorrow I will be starting my 3rd week here!  I'm almost a third of the way done!  I'm learning so much and know that even if I left now I would be SUCH a better missionary just from these first few weeks at the MTC.   

Tuesday will be my P-Day for the rest of the time that I'm in the MTC as far as I know.  We just get time to do laundry, write letters, go to the temple, and then we have the devotional at night.  We never find out who it is until they start speaking, (pretty much) so that's really stressful.  It'd be cool if the prophtet came...  Gordon B. Hinckley's son spoke last week and it was PRETTY COOL.

Today my companion went home for something he didn't clear up before coming out, so it's really hard to keep my mind on anything else as of right now, I didn't really want to talk about it a whole lot because I know that it was the right thing for him to do.  He wants to come back out whenever he can, so I just told him when we said goodbye that I'd "see him in Mexico."  It's sad that he left, obviously, and it's so weird how close two people that are always around each other can get in such a short period of time.  I'm in a trio with the other two Elders in my room for today, until I talk with the Branch President.  He'll decide my fate, but as of now I'm just kinda the third wheel.  My guess is that I'll probably stay in this companionship of three until I head out into the field...

On Saturday we got the wonderful opportunity to go into this place called the TRC (Training Resource Center) and meet some "investigators" in Spanish and then teach them the first discussion in English for like ten minutes.  We were originally supposed to teach the person for 35 minutes, but it ended up being much shorter than that, obviously...  We had to share an investigator with another companionship because there weren’t enough volunteers that night, but it was still a wonderful experience.  The funny thing is that the last person that we were sent in to meet was supposed to speak Spanish, but he was just so old and started talking to us in English.  It was weird talking to someone in English haha... 

  

I'm sorry this e-mail's pretty boring and that I didn't really say much...  Hopefully I'm a little less down next Tuesday, but I love hearing from you and talking to you :)  I love you all so much!! 

Love always,

Eric

Eric's MTC Address

Elder Eric Austin Moore
MTC Mailbox #226
MEX-CUER 0712
2005 N. 900 E.
Provo, UT 84604-1793

Or you can send him a letter through dearelder.com, just use mailbox # 226 and MEX-CUER 0712.

1st Letter from the MTC!

Hey!

I only get 30 minutes on the computer a week, so I'll try to write fast!  The MTC is really not that hard of an adjustment for me.  I know that BYU for sure helped me a lot with that and yeah, it is really weird that I'm in Provo.  Every time that I go up the stairs to go to my room, I look out and see that big "Y" on the side of the mountain.  It really didn't hit me where I was until I saw the Y for the first time. 

So the first day that I got here, they walked me up to the main building where I got my tag and everything, and then Elder Enriquez, my host, took me to get my books and room and then we went into the classroom to drop everything off, other than my suitcases of course...  So in the classroom, we waited around for a little while until everyone got there and we met our companions.  Mine's name is Elder Jenkins, and we were a little shy around each other at first but now we're really becoming great friends.  Well how couldn't you be friends with the person that you always have to be in sight and sound of!  He is from Mesa, Arizona, and I asked him if he knew Chuck Linton and he said no, but that he worked for a music store owned by his family or something like that. 

So after meeting our companions, we all went into this assembly hall in the main building and we had a "welcome to the MTC" type of fireside thing where we got to sing a lot of songs and hear from the MTC Presidency.  We didn't sing called to serve, which was kinda sad, but whatever.  We sang "Armies of Helaman" or whatever that primary song is called, and they took out some of the words and replaced them with "we are now the Lord's missionaries" and that's where it really hit me that this was for real.  It was a wonderful welcome fireside and all of the MTC presidency is pretty amazing.

I slept really well the first night, most likely all thanks to my pillow I brought, and have been fine every night until last night, when I got a bunch of letters from Jordyn Prestwich, Chelsey, Caitlin, and Cally.  It really is the best feeling ever getting mail, and I can get letters and packages any day of the week, so don't hestitate to write me whenever you want. :)  How weird...  I just got to make a smiley... :) :) :) :) :)

So you're probably wondering how my Spanish is coming along...  Well let me tell you:

I've got the purpose of being a missionary memorized and I'm trying to get the first vision down too, but they're hard to memorize!  We're learning about first semester spanish stuff right now like conjugating present verbs and gender / number of words, etc.  It's pretty basic, but I feel like in 3 or 4 weeks I will have reviewed everything I've learned in 4 years of Spanish.  It's not like a Spanish class at all really.  We learn Spanish with the gospel at the same time, so we really are just learning to give the discussions and meet people and other basic principles you need to know before going out in the field.  Classes here are long and a lot of the time boring, but there is a certain spirit that I never have felt anywhere else that is just amazing. 

The thought of heading out to Mexico is both incredible and terrifying.  I love that I will be able to be a free person once again and that I will be attempting to bring others unto Christ, but the thought of just going out there and having a trainer that speaks no English or something keeps me on my toes in the MTC.  I don't know what I would do if I was like some of the missionaries in my district and had to go to an all-Spanish MTC 
three weeks after getting here...  Those two Elders, Hokanson and Reeves might not get their Visas soon enough to go down in two weeks though is what I hear, but oh well...  AHH  only 7 minutes left :( 

So I am doing really really well.  I thought that I would just try to impress you by reciting, from memory, the purpose of a missionary en español.

Invitar a las personas a venir a Cristo al ayudarlas a que reciban el Evangelio restaurado mediante la fe en Jesucristo y Su expiacion, el arrepentimiento, el bautismo, la recepcion del Don del Espiritu Santo, y el perseverar hasta el fin. 

Pretty good, eh?  

You can send letters through DearElder.com just in case you didn't know..  And thank you so much for the cookies :) They are delicious!  No time left gotta go...  Love you :)

Love,

Elder Eric Moore

Eric Entering the MTC--May, 11, 2011

Eric entered the MTC--Mission Training Center on Wednesday, May 11, 2011.  He will be there for two months and will be doing extensive language training as well as learning how to preach the gospel.  I will post his letters on this blog as soon as they start coming to me.