Week 9 August 5, 2010

Dear family,

First of all, I'd like to say sorry because I didn't call at the airport like I said I would. I was at the airport and I had money to use a pay-phone, but none of the phones worked at all. My P-Day is now on Thursday.

This is my third day in the mission field and it's pretty good so far. On Tuesday morning, Elder May and I had to wake up at 1:45am because he had to finish packing and leave by 3, and then I had to finish packing also and leave by 5. I was tired for a lot of the day, needless to say. When we got off the plane, we got to the mission home and filled out some forms and got our credit card and everything like that. We had interviews with the mission president and he said that Bishop Olsen (I think it was him who filled out my papers, I'm not sure) had a lot to say about me. After we were done, the mission president said I have to be half the missionary my bishop said I'd be.

We then went to Transfer Conference and I met my new companion, Elder Parker. He's from Alabama, but he took 3 years of Spanish in high school, so he can speak Spanish pretty well. Elder May was a good companion, but I have to say, Elder Parker is really funny and really outgoing. We make jokes about each other time, and he's really easy to get along with. I've done a couple of street contacts, and usually Elder Parker will fill in for me when I'm at a loss of words. We also have Elder Tuione from Samoa and his "dad", Elder Whetten. They're all really funny and we like to joke around with each other, too. Today for companionship study, both we all did a door contact with one other Elder and the other two would say what we did well, and what we could improve on, just like the MTC. It was good because none of did the exact same thing and we could learn from each other.

We met an investigator that we saw yesterday and they offered me a bike they had that they got from goodwill since they knew I didn't have one. I said sure, and so they brought out a Schwinn bicycle that's actually in pretty good condition. Since it's not in perfect condition, I'll pay some money to fix it up so it can last a long time.

My Spanish is getting a little better since I'm with a companion that can actually speak Spanish. I feel like I'm getting a lot better at understanding, I just need to work on speaking it well. Our apartment isn't that clean and we're supposed to have an inspection tomorrow, so I don't know what we're going to do for that.

That's pretty much it from me.

Elder Meiners III