Erich at the MTC – Vol. 4 (of 9)

It would seem being able to sight-read means I now have obligations to play the piano. :D

Okay! Random ice-breaker out of the way now. This last week has been pretty good, and the only way I can possibly approach it all in a timely fashion is to present some of the content in my journal. Ready for the flood?

The speaker for last Sunday’s fireside (which I totally forgot to mention in last week’s admittedly lame post) was awesome – he showed us many of the ads from old Mormon ad campaigns. They were all a little cheesy, but some were touching. I’ll write about a couple of my favorites just to start you off.

I can’t remember the name for it, but the speaker gave some background for the first I’ll mention. This one had children actors – which are always difficult to work with. Sometimes they simply have to forgo the “acting” part. For this particular one, they took the favorite toys of a boy and a girl – a toy car and a dolly that sleeps, respectively, and aged 6 and 4 (I think?) respectively. The production crew placed the boy’s toy car inside the doll’s body while the boy was watching them, and then gave the doll back to the unaware girl – and they filmed the ensuing chaos.

During editing, they dubbed it with an audio clip of a married couple having a dumb argument. Put together, the clip was sort of humorous. At the end, it has a screen with the following text:

“If you think childish arguments hurt your marriage, don’t kid yourself.”

This is analogous to companion relationships as a missionary – though I realize that not everyone reading this will know what I’m talking about. So, time for a little education!

Firstly, we believe that missionaries should serve in twos – small enough so as not to be overwhelming when we enter and teach in the homes of others, but also good for the safety of the missionaries – buddy system, anyone?

Next, each pair – or “companionship”, as I’ve mentioned before – is assigned to an area in which we are expected to proselyte and reside. Generally, companionships stay within an area for six weeks, though the mission president may decide to have one or more missionaries stay. These terms are simply known as “transfers”.

I mentioned a mission president – this is a man who presides over the entire mission area, which is the largest physical area of management that isn’t totally executive in nature. My mission president, President Gonzaga, presides over the Maceió, Brazil mission – which is, of course, the city of Maceió itself, and the surrounding area (though I’m not positive how far that extends).

The mission presidency manages things underneath him in terms of “zones” – certain companionships are designated as zone leaderships, who collaborate with district leaderships in the zones – so, to make a little chain of the management scale, it’d be like this:

President -> Zones -> Districts -> Areas (I am here!)

I’m lucky enough to only have duties as missionaries in an area right now. I don’t have to deal with the headaches of reporting, which is one of the primary functions of missionary leadership. It’s also worth noting that all of these presidencies are in the form of companionships – zone and district leaderships are in companionships, and the president with his two counselors have their wives helping them fulfill their roles.

Anyway! Totally random tangent. The point is, though, as a missionary you live, walk, teach eat with a companion – so it’s important to have a good relationship with him (or her, for you Sister missionaries!). “Stupid” arguments certainly aren’t unheard of with 19-year-old males living together basically 24/7. I’m lucky – I haven’t had any serious disagreements that communication and a minding of our purpose hasn’t solved in my current companionship.

Speaking of changing companionships, our district got cut in half again because some more visas came in…including my companion, Elder Shaw. :( I guess it’s okay, though. I’m switching rooms down the hall and will be living with the zone leadership (Gooch and Perkins!) . I also get to be companions with the radical Elder Barnard. This will be weird…only two Elders for everything the district does now.

Again I digress…and I’m not even halfway through the week!

I must congratulate the wisdom of those friends who have sent me letters (three! :D), for they have forever earned a smidgen of love. Imagine what would happen if you send 5001 letters… ;D

Also. I must point out how disappointed I was that nobody in my district recognized the Assassin’s Creed symbol when I showed one that had been drawn in one of my letters. I think I may be the only serious nerd in my entire district…buuuuuut that’s meaning less and less since the district keeps getting bisected.

Anecdote of the week: For some reason, my alarm clock has been jumping around the hours – I totally wok up my companion at 3:30 one morning because my clock had somehow skipped ahead three hours. We were all suited up and ready to go to the temple…then he checked his watch. That day required some serious Ibuprofen. :<

“ELDER. It’s 6:30.”

Welp...time's running short - gotta wrap this stuff up. Here's a bullet list of some otherwise interesting things:

• Applesauce cookies. Freaking good. :D
• I heard through the grapevine that my one and only TWIN (eggs!) got his papers in. WHY DID YOU NOT TELL ME THIS, TWIN?
• Speaker for the fireside yesterday was also fantastic. "When a member doesn't magnify their calling, sometimes it is because they don't have motivation. But most of the time, it's because they simply haven't been taught. Likewise are our investigators. When they don't progress, sometimes it's because they honestly don't have interest. But most of the time, it's because we haven't taught them how."

Hmm...STILL NEED MOAR SPIRITUAL STUFF. Perhaps I should open this up, make the blog more interactive! What do y'all want to hear? Write your answers in the comments!

On Mon, Jan 16, 2012 at 2:27 PM, Erich Gubler <erich.gubler@myldsmail.net> wrote:

Howdy again everyone! I've added a few people to the mailing list. I promise I didn't mean to forget anyone! It's just that time here isn't very conducive to thinking about that sort of thing any other day of the week.

My update's a bit short, but meh. :) I only hope that y'all will write me soon! Otherwise, how am I to know you're even reading?

Erich at the MTC, Vol. 3 (of 9)

So, my opening thoughts for this post regard the volume of people asking me if or assuming that the MTC is “fun”.

If you can answer “yes” to any of the following questions, then yes, the MTC is fun:

· You like teaching random strangers about a (very) brief history of the LDS church, informing them why you feel they need your message, and encouraging them to feel the Spirit.

· You like eating food that bespeaks “mass production”.

· You like going to bed before 11 each night.

· You like learning a new language for 8 hours a day.

· You like learning gospel doctrine/preparing lessons/teaching others 8 hours a day.

· You like having 16-hour days.

· You like people.

· You like feeling the Spirit.

· You like self-improvement.

· You like having a constant companion both physically and spiritually.

Most of my non-LDS friends that read this will probably react at first like “Bwuh…what?” Then again…most of the LDS ones will probably wonder too. XD

Alright. Now that that’s out of the way, I’m gonna review my journal. Can’t remember beans at time of typing. Which reminds me…I totally forgot to write in my journal for the first two days of this. But that’s alright, because I got me some more letters! :3 I won’t mention any names, but suffice it to say that they’ve made me really happy!

My companion got these enormous packages from his family this past week filled to the brim with nut mixes and otherwise “kosher” vegetarian food. My personal favorite’s the V8 – he’s usually willing to let me bum one off him. They taste fine, and on the plus side I get a serving of veggies (I must be honest…rather in short supply here. See comment about the food above.) He got quite a bit of stuff, and he’s a little worried that if we get our visas that he’ll have to ditch some/all of it. Mebbe we ought to weigh our bags and gauge how much extra crap we can acquire from the MTC before we have to lose something.

Portuguese is making (seemingly) slow but steady progress. I’m now aware of many names for concepts I’d have to handle based on previous concepts I’ve seen, and the technology-assisted language learning labs here are excellent for ironing out your understanding with grammar. I sort of wonder how the Rosetta Stone software compares with it – I hear it takes a similar approach to the software we’ve got here. My only regret is that BYU’s had a direct hand in developing it – I take altogether too much pleasure in finding bugs in the software. I’m attempting to make an account with their JIRA issue tracking instance, because I’ve got about thirteen little reports to make. Matt Peterson, stop laughing right this instant. :P

I must take a brief instant to reiterate: MAIL PLZTHX. If I don’t respond in a week, make sure you’re sending to the right address. ;)

Anecdote of the week:

I totally got a Sister to “swear” by accident on Saturday. I gave the following line to Elder Shaw that evening:

“Well, Elder…let’s make like exorcists, and get the heck outta here.”

A Sister looks over and says “I don’t get it…WAIT. Hah!” Her companion, wearing a puzzled expression, asks “Wait, what did he say?”

“He said…let’s make like exorcists, and get the hell outta…gah, whoop!”

I told them they’d make a spot in my journal and blog. :P

Man, the longer I’m here, the more it feels like a blur. I’m learning a lot, and I’m certainly making the progress the program here hopes for…but I can’t wait to actually get out into Brazil. The people of Maceió are sounding more and more interesting as I learn about Brazilian culture and food. I kind of wish I had minha professora here to give me an inside perspective, but it’s good to hear an American point of view.

Hmm. This week’s post is kind of short, huh? I’ll see if I can’t tease more content from my experiences. Might have to get spiritual in this joint. :P But only time will tell!

Até logo!

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