Lots of Dogs

Some weird things that have happened to me so far:

-A dog randomly sat down in a puddle and sat there for hours

-A dog followed us around and we named it Pepper, and we led it to a place in the neighborhood where all the dogs were barking at him, and he just sat there the rest of the day listening to the barking dogs and doing basically nothing

-A dog clung to me like velcro and I couldn't get it off

-The stick bug left our home but the senior Elders next door found it INSIDE their house

Some good foods I've eaten:

-Some delicious pie

-A navajo taco

-A cheeseburger from a weird restaurant called Amigos

-Potato. 

-Some delicious Kool-Aid

-A banana and peanut butter sandwich (so good)

I did a transfer a few days ago with the Zone Leaders for a day, and they were fun. Not much really happened that day other than a few shut doors and an interview about how I'm doing (I'm doing good, by the way).

  Sorry, I haven't been able to get out to take pictures much! But I can still post the few that I have :)

Edit to add from mom:  In Elder Rainey's letter he says they have NINE people lined up to be baptized!
It's also been blowing lots of sand.  

I think they look like cardboard cut outs in this one.  :/

________________________________________________

The mission presidents wife, Cheri Adams, posted this photo on Facebook.  The Elders on the right are serving in Monument Valley.

I have been messaging Elder Rainey's mom and found out some great things that helped me until I heard from Isaac.

2 senior missionary couples live by them and kind of look out for the elders. They are great!

They can check their email only on p-day. They do that at Br. Nielsen's house. He's the ward clerk. Not sure how he lives on the rez because he's white. Only the Navajos can live there. The missionaries can live there because they live on church property.

On p-day, they only have an hour on the computer. It goes by fast. Br. Nielsen has 3 computers though. Sending your son snail mail letters in addition to short emails is best because they have so little time, but LOVE getting snail mail.

Yes, p-day is Monday. Since they go to a member's home to email, they don't have to worry about a public place (like a library) being closed on a Monday holiday. They workout at the local high school gym. They drive wonderful pickup trucks. No bikes.


Plus a letter from the Mission President:

Here I am, in Kayenta! This area is part of the Navajo nation, and the only way you can live here is if you have a job here, are Navajo, or your married to a Navajo. I can live here because I live right next to the church (I'm basically in the parking lot!). So many things have happened, I don't think I'll remember them all. First of all, I should tell you all a little bit about the area. There are a few neighborhoods worth mentioning; Monopoly, New NHA, Old NHA, Top of The Hill, and Bottom of The Hill. I live at the Top of The Hill. My favorite area here is Monopoly because the roofs of all the houses are colored in reds, blues, and greens, and sort of looks like the houses in the monopoly board game.

 Another thing about this whole area is that the only grass in the entire area is at the church. Everything else is just hard-packed dirt or pavement. Some people are growing trees, but they take a lot of work.

The people here are really nice as well. I have yet to see anyone call us names or throw things or anything like that.

I've been learning a lot of the Navajo language as well. Here are a few of the words that I've learned:

Oh - yes

YaT-ey - hello

Ahyehe - thank you

Doh-da - NO!

Ti-ga - no...

Doh-beega-da - Not good

Hako-oneh - Goodbye

Beega - Good

Twoh - water

Yadalah - What the!?

That's about the extend of my knowledge so far. I may learn more later.

I've taught so many lessons each day here in Kayenta. The very first day I invited the Hunts to be baptized, and they said no. The next time I met with them they fed us Navajo tacos, which is like a taco but on a pie... sort of. 

I've also taught an investigator named Tina Zonnie, and she seems to get the Gospel perfectly. She's what they call a 'Golden investigator'. She was repenting before she even knew what it was! Also, she's super nice.

There's... a lot of dogs here. Some cats, but mostly dogs. Lots. and lots. of dogs. Everyone has at least one dog, if not, then about 3 dogs is pretty average, I'd say. Well, there's some cats too. But mostly dogs. Yeah.

There's this one dog named Princess that doesn't bark, is super tiny, and is the most hyperactive dog on the planet. That dog was really adorable.

I'm not allowed to use words like 'cool' 'awesome' 'sweet' and a few others, just because it sort of ruins the image of being an Elder. You won't see me typing them, either!

I'm also not allowed to shoot lightning fast emails, because it's like texting, I suppose.

Google Hangouts is against the rules

I wake up normally at 5:30 in the morning and that gives me a lot of time to do study work. Here's some scriptures I found:

Alma 5:30-31 (this one's for you, Jacob! hehe)

Ether 12:12

Moroni 7:33

Ether 9:27 (Elder Stead's scripture)

Helaman 5:12

2 Nephi 31:20-21

I'm only given an hour to work on my Emails, so I wasn't able to say everything I wanted to, but next Monday I can probably tell you all a little more.

Oh yeah, and I'm in a trio! So instead of having one companion, I have two companions. Their names are Elder Stead and Elder Rainey.

My P.O. Box is 151 Kayenta, Arizona 86033

 Elder Rainey (left) Elder Stead (Right)

This stick bug we found was just this morning!

I wish I had more pictures to send, but I guess I never had the time. I promise to take some better photos next time I write!

I haven't really had time to write letters either because my schedule is reaaaaaallly fixed tight. I'll see if I have time to write some today, but if not, then I'm gonna have a really hard time finding the time to write letters. 

He's Arrived

We wanted to let you know your missionary has arrived in Farmington and is now at the Mission Office for training.  He will be here for dinner this evening and will stay with a member family in Farmington for the night.  After orientation tomorrow he will go directly to his area.  We will send you the address as soon as possible.

Thank you so much for sharing your son with us.  We will love him and take good care of him. 

Sister Lowe

New Mexico Farmington Mission Secretary

We wanted to let you know that your missionary has arrived in the mission field and is doing well.

He had a good night’s sleep and had training this morning. He is now headed to his area.

His trainers are Elder Rainey and Elder Stead.  They are serving in Kayenta., AZ  The address is:

P. O. Box 151

Kayenta AZ  86033

Sister Lowe

New Mexico Farmington Mission Secretary

Some interesting things I found online about Kayenta:
Like other places on the Navajo Nation, it is illegal to serve alcohol. Arizona does not observe Daylight Time; however, the Navajo reservation does.  
There is an LDS church.  
Also a tiny grocery store, post office, library, McDonalds.

The newest missionaries with their Trainers.

Airport Phone Call

I was beginning to think it wouldn't happen, but then the phone rang!
Isaac departed the MTC at 4:20 am with his first flight leaving SLC to Denver at 8:54 am.  There were 32 missionaries in the group so I knew there would be a long line to use the pay phones unless he could find a kind soul that would let him borrow a cell phone.
My phone rang at 8:27.  Which surprised me cause I thought he would have been on the plane by then.  He said there were other missionaries waiting to use the phone behind him so we only go to talk for 8 minutes and 47 seconds.
It was so sweet to hear his voice.  It was even more sweet when I could hear the tears in his voice.  He is NOT a crier.

Here are some of the questions I asked him:

He attended the Provo temple twice: once endowment, once initiatories.
He's ironed one shirt.
He ate only three bananas.
What can we do to better help him: pray.
He loves pictures ... send more!
He wants to get mail everyday.
The hardest thing for him has been being away from family.
He hadn't been too homesick until this phone call.
 The best thing has been making friends with his district.

It was a cry fest for me but so good to talk with him.
My overall impression is that he is doing very well!

 Isaac was able to give Justin a very quick phone call while in the Denver airport.

MTC Week Two

I've been through a lot in the past week. I met up with two new TRC (teaching resource center) investigators: one is named Mariah, who is super friendly with me and Elder Kahle. We've taught her about the plan of salvation and how it helps your family live together forever. The other TRC investigator is named Jaclyn, but she likes to be called Jaxsie (Jaxie? Jacsie?). She is shy, but she wants to be a crime investigator like in the T.V. show 'Bones'. She always seems to have her face in some technology while we're there, so it's hard to get our messages across to her at times. However, the great thing about her is that she read the Book of Mormon when we asked her to, and she seems to really be loving it!  We've taught her about the Plan of Salvation also, and we taught her how to pray. Next time we meet, I'm going to ask her if she would like to say the closing prayer, which I think would be a great learning experience for her.

Anyway, about me...

I'm having a great time in the MTC! I'm getting along with my district and it's great to see all the new missionaries come in every Wednesday. At night, everyone tells them to shake their sheets out for spiders and that there's a dance on Saturday. I'm sure there are other pranks that I'm not aware of, too. 

During exercise time I usually play spike ball or Kan-jam out in the field. No, I haven't played four-square. I'm supposed to take my glasses off for exercise time, so I feel sort of blind during it. We always run back to the residence quickly so that we can catch a shower before other people fill them up. That's all I do for exercise time here.

I've met a lot of teachers here as well as missionaries. Some of these include: Brother Kitchens, Sister Ditto, Sister Geis, Brother Dishman, and Brother Lyon. They're all excellent teachers (Brother Kitchens is in a wheelchair and hasn't told us why yet, and nobody has the guts to ask him) and they have taught me so much about talking with various kinds of people.

There is a TON of study time in our schedule. We get around five-ish hours of study time in total, and that's just companion study. There's also personal study and district study, all of which are great ways to share scriptures or other ideas with other people.

I got to hear Dallin H. Oaks talk about the Preach My Gospel! It was pretty cool. For the most part, he was quoting things from the scriptures and from the PMG. He quoted a lot of things from PMG chapter 5, which was pretty interesting. He also talked about how a lot of us don't seem to realize how big of a deal Resurrection is. It was pretty cool.

We turned this Spongebob toy into a little basketball and made a hoop out of duct tape in the residence. It's pretty fun.

I got the new bag, and it's awesome!!

  The district saying goodbye to Brother Dishman. (Left to Right) me, Elder Moulton, Elder Kahle, Elder Robison (in the back), Elder Anderson (sitting magically in the air), Elder Hodges (below), Elder Swapp, Brother Dishman, Elder Reed, Sister Caceres, Sister West, Sister Sattler, Sister Constantine, and Sister Coley.

 Our district on paper by Sister West.

Elder Kahle being the guard in a cool piece of art.

red sun (from all the fires around)

I found Cameron Miller (Elder Miller, now) while I was in the MTC! He's doing a service mission and has already been there for about 9 months. I look weird too. 

EXTRAS:

I'm little sick, so I don't feel like having too many sweets and junk food. I think pretty much everyone is sick. It's just a cough and a sore throat.

I asked him what he did today: 

It was mostly just laying around in the residence and talking. We did laundry and ate food and stuff. Later today I get to talk with my 2nd TRC investigator. Then I go to class and that's pretty much it for my P-days here in the MTC. I'm sure that the P-days out in the mission field are going to be a lot more work than what goes on here, but I'm going to enjoy myself as much as possible while I'm still here these next few days. I leave this Monday at 4:20am and I need to figure out how to pack my clothing and stuff properly. It's definitely going to take some time.