Elder Taylor and Elder Millet Watching Stadium of Fire Fireworks from the Provo MTC, 2 July 2016
Here are some random thoughts for you from my second week at the MTC:
I ran into an elder named Elder Wiggins. Thought it was cool how close his name is to Ender Wiggin from Ender's Game. I love that book.
Seen more friends from BYU. My old home teachee from BYU is here, Matthew, or rather, Elder Davis. I saw him wearing a melting Rubik's cube shirt and got a picture with him. Also found some elders on my floor that solve the cube as well. None are speed cubers. One just learned and the other enjoys puzzles in general and has solved a 12x12. So I solved it a few times for them and got a 29sec and 30sec solve. Which is good, even for me. Also solved it for some district members a different night and Lowmexay (low-me-sigh) was dying. We all bust up laughing so much in the residence.
Oh I did get around to trying foursquare and I'm actually not too bad. Elder Hughes from my district and I were doing awesome today. We'd get to king and knight position and take everyone out. Although I'm not as good as Elder Hughes; he was in for so long everyone got out at least three times. Also had some good times playing monkey in the middle with a frisbee. Had a couple great jump catches; so much fun. Also finally got around to timing my mile for the first time in a few years and got a 6min58sec. Not the best but I was happy with it. I also think I can go faster so I'll have to try again. I've got plenty of time. Seven more weeks.
The district and roommates are a lot of fun. We tell all sorts of stories, mainly them, and funny stuff just happens so we have jokes. Back on the second day or so one of the Elders wrote "hola=tree" on the board and Sister Snooks wrote it down in her notes, and we all had a good laugh about that. Now we say Hola as a greeting within the district. Sister Snooks gets roasted (called out?) by Lookruu Garlick a lot too. The funniest one was when we were all chatting and she was telling a story about how she got a tiny bell stuck in her ear when she was little and had to go to the doctors to get it out. Then Lookruu started talking and was telling us we needed to SYL more (Speak your language) and used the sentence, "I got a bell stuck in my ear." Quite amusing in the moment.
Oh another funny story where Sister Snooks stars. So we're practicing grammar and Lookruu asks everyone questions. He gets to Snooks and asks, "Is Elder Taylor a prophet?" Elder Otto asks, "How do you say will be?" and then Snooks says yes. Everyone busts up laughing. In her defense she was exhausted, we all were, and Elder Tan was whispering, "say yes. Say yes." right next to her.
Whenver Lookruu Garlick leaves at the end of the day (9:30ish, I know right?) we all get loud saying goodbye and we love you in Khmae. Well one day after he left he had to come back in to get something he had left and we were all getting loud again and he just shushed us motioning down with his hands continuously. It was fun. Also I've been trying to get a picture with him to show y'all but he said only when we leave for Cambodia. However, I got a photo of him when he was leaving so y'all can see him.
Got around to trying out the waterproof function of my camera and tried taking photos of the temple from half underwater. I'll include some of my better ones.
Fun fact, I also fit under the water-fountain in our class building.
Investigators. So boong Sophol is no longer our investigator and is now our teacher. I was a bit upset because my companion and I were going to invite her to baptism in the next lesson. Now my other teacher, lookruu Garlick, will be our investigator. We teach him tomorrow and I'm a bit nervous about that.
We have been practicing teaching more in class and it's going well, steady progress. We had to teach short overviews of the gospel in 3 min slots, then 1 1/2, then 30 sec. I'm telling you once it gets down to 30sec it's hard to tell someone, in Khmae, about the church and get it all out. Khnom dung taa preahvoobeda sua srolan neak (key-gnome dung taa pray-uh voo (o as in toe) bee da sua sro (o again)-line knee-eh) I know that Heavenly Father loves you.
The music here is amazing. Maybe it's partially because I can't listen to music whenever I want anymore, but I love hearing the musical numbers at devotionals. We had an amazing sister play a version of Hie (High? Som to ~sum toe: sorry) to Kolob that I'd never heard before, but it was phenomenal.
Also praying in Khmae is amazing. I can say a basic prayer in complete Khmae but often have to use Khma-nglish. I'll get there though.
It can be a struggle, but it can also be a blast. I love doing the Lord's work and can't wait to teach his children in Cambodia about the good word. Love y'all!
Elder Taylor
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