Last Week of the MTC

We concluded last week with a beautiful devotional by Brother Wright and Sister Janett Thurston (I'm not really sure who they are, but I enjoyed it!).

We've continued the same 5 teaching experiences. กบ (Gob) has been interesting. Sometimes it seems like he's moving forward, other times like he's just shut off to our message. Our teacher, Bro. Tirrell (who portrays กบ for us in lessons) says this was his hardest investigator he ever taught- and he taught him when he was a year out on his mission, and fairly proficient with the language. So imagine us struggling with it, having a year lesson of learning the language and teaching. But it's all good. Bro. Tirrell says he's never been กบ before, and he was thrown off when he gave us who he did (teachers pray extensively to know who to "be" as our investigator before we come). In our Wednesday lesson with กบ, he was actually drunk which surprised all of us, so we just retaught him the lesson, and (hopefully she did) had his wife talk with him about the gospel.

แคลร ์ (Claire with a silent r) is progressing nicely. She found some anti-mormon stuff on the internet and had the sense to ask about it. We've most recently committed her to reading everyday and now we're getting her to pray about it. Our next (and last) appointment with her is Wednesday, where we'll try to get her committed to baptism.

As District Leader, I go to branch council. This week it was very intense- I don't actually want to know about everybody's issues! But I guess it 's cool that I get to be part of the solutions, and helping them. Also on Sunday I was released as sacrament coordinator, which I've held since our 1st week or so. Our sacrament room has moved once again (3 different rooms over the course of our stay), and since I've been practicing, I played prelude music before sacrament, and I wasn't terrible!

Our devotional speakers were the Martinos (MTC president and wife) and they just told us their story, and the unknown impact the missionaries who converted them have. It was a cool change of pace. We watched "Recognizing the Holy Ghost" by Elder Bednar for our film. It was great, until the last 5 minutes when it froze. So they took it back 10 minutes. . . until it froze in the same spot. So the Branch President presiding over the room just stood up and told a related story.

Yesterday we hosted open house tours. We had an hour long mandatory orientation over it, then we did it a few hours later. We got on a bus that went to the nearby stadium parking and just chilled while people got off and a new group got on. It was exciting to be so far away from the MTC! We got to use the PA system on the bus, but there were so many people on the bus that almost no one heard us. We just introduced ourselves and told them we were there for questions. We didn't lead the tour, just followed them. It covered most of our grounds, but they were moving us so fast and the walkway was so narrow, and we had to stay sight/sound of companions that we barely talked to anyone. They finished with a small video, and we returned to class.

Friday we got our flight plans! We are leaving on Monday at 5:30 am, flying Cathay Pacific on all 3 flights. We'll bus up to a train that will take us to SLC, fly to LA, fly to Hong Kong, fly to Bangkok. I believe it's about 25 hours overall.

Even though the temple is closed, we have the opportunity to go in today for 3.5 hours and do some service. It's taking a huge block out of our last pday, which is making us rush through some other things but we are still pumped.

We are going to do some last minute packing and haircuts and laundry and such on Saturday. I'll have the opportunity to call in LA and probably Hong Kong. I think my mission president will email the fam when we arrive.

So excited! Almost THERE!