Escape from Alcatraz

So just a quick story but basically last night I went to go use the restroom real quick before going to bed and when I came back they already turned the lights off in the room, so I didn't want to turn it back on and disturb them, so I shut the door and left the lights off. I then took a step and felt Elder King's bag on the floor. I was so distraught! I felt as though it was my civic duty to move the bag so some poor soul wouldn't trip on it in the middle of the night. In my efforts to bend down and remove the hazardous object, a metal chair attacked me. I fought valiantly, but my efforts were futile... the chair was mighty and it slashed me! After suffering his vicious blow, I gathered my strength and crawled towards the light switch. I flicked the light on, but my foe had retreated. I then departed into a place of consolation and began to care for my wounds. My foe had left his mark. At this point Elder King finally decided that he should maybe roll out of bed. He then discovered me in my fallen state, battered and broken. He called for help and our angels in blue appeared. They delivered me into a temple of healing. There angels of green treated my wounds and ensured my survival. It was a long arduous process but at last I arose, strong and confident. As we returned unto the land of wait, we discovered we were lost. There was no way to contact those blue angels that had brought us unto the temple. We acquired a seer to contact our angels, that they might take us back into our own world. We were brought back into our place of residence. And we rested.

Almost Gone!

This last week has been pretty simple as far as weeks go in the MTC. Just more classes, devotionals, and teaching lessons to investigators. This week we should be getting our flight plans and stuff. So far Elder Andreasen and Elder Clemens have been transfered to California. It looks like the rest of us will be going to the Philippines but the last group of missionaries had like 6 more people get reassigned the Saturday before they were suppose to leave so we really don't know yet. Fingers Crossed though! 

I saw Elder Garr (last sunday?) so I made sure to get a few pics for mom. I don't really know what else to say so i'll just end it here. I have a fun story to tell ya but i want to send you pics with the story so you'll get that later today. If you have any questions or anything then I could definitely email you guys some more.

Love ya! Gihigugma nako kamo!
Elder Shirley

(some day these two will be at USU together and eventually be pilots!)

potential flight plans

You should also mail like a burner phone or something so that i don't have to deal with finding a payphone in the airport. We just got our potential flight plans but if anything it's making us more worried that we might get let down because they won't tell us till Tuesday if our visas went through or not and if they don't go through then we'll be getting transferred around the US.

Elder king is the one in front of me, Elder Stastney is the one right next to me, and elder Andreasen is the one farthest on the right

Kahoy sa Kinabuhing

Elder Nowlin from our district really likes taking pictures of our rings and stuff so here's this before I forget. "Kahoy sa Kinabuhing" means tree of life. Oh ya i got a ring by the way.

love ya! Miss ya! hope to hear from you soon!
elder shirley

Andam ako sa pagadto sa Pilipines!

(I asked Spencer to make a group email to send out ... apparently he does NOT want to do that ... so, check this blog)

I'm positive that I told you already that i didn't want to do a weekly mass email. also the kezboard i[m using is messed up so the z and the y kez are switched and the ' is switched with [ and its reallz annzoing but this is just how i[ll be tzping. I[ll trz writing my emails so that you can just copy and paste to the blog but i really don[t want to write a generic email everz week. As far as Pday clothes/exercise clothes go, if you could get me some of the same kind of shirts that we had gotten at fred mezers that[d probablz be best and then mazbe send me just like one more pair of gzm shorts and a few more pairs of compression shorts for exercising. I don[t have the email from mz mission president so if zou could forward that to me that[d be lovelz. I do have mz driver[s license with me and i do have mz debit card but i don[t think we ever made photocopies of anz of those besides mz passport.

so funnz storz, i actuallz met jackson in like five seconds. Everzdaz mz yone has a long table that we fill with people from our yone but everz wednesdaz we alwazs end up with new missionaries being mixed in with us at our table. Elder King and I sat down right in the middle of a group of new elders because there were no other seats at the table. As soon as I sat down I looked at the name tag of the elder sitting across from me and asked him what language his name tag was in and after he told me it was Marshallese that[s when I actuallz looked at the name on the tag and then at his face and realiyed it was in fact Elder Garr that I was sitting right across from so that was kinda crayz.

Everz sundaz and tuesdaz we have a devotional. Our last devotional we had Elder M Russel Ballard talk to us about Joseph and Hzrum Smith so that was fun. Everz sundaz we all write a five minute talk on whatever the assigned topic is and then right after we have sacrament thez stand up and call one sister and one elder to give their talk. Zou never know if zou[ll have to give a talk or not so some missionaries will write reallz good talks and then not actuallz talk and then other missionaries just relz on the basis that there[s 70+ of us now and chances are it won[t be them and thez[ll just make sure thez have a scripture thez can share.

Our investigator has been progressing but we were thrown a curve ball zesterdaz when we tried teaching the word of wisdom. While i was listing off the things we need to avoid I could tell that out investigator was getting a little uncomfortable and we asked what concerns she had about following the word of wisdom and she prettz much told us that everzthing she said she shouldn[t do she alreadz does so that was exciting, needless to saz i think we[ll be continuing our discussion on the word of wisdom in our next lesson.... The thing is though that all of our fake investigators are based off of real people that our teachers taught in the philippines so the word of wisdom reallz is a huge problem over there. It[ll be interesting trzing to help people over come these habits that thez have just gotten so used to.

We had more familz nights in our dorm this week. We have prettz much started a tradition of having chips and salsa everz week and just eating a ton of food that we[ve all gotten from familz and friends. Some of the pictures below are of our first familz night this week but we actuallz ended up having two so i[ll send zou the others later when one of the other elders emails me them.

I miss 70 degree weather soooo much. Everzdaz in class i[ll look outside and think that it looks reallz nice and it[d be reallz nice to go sit outside but everz time we do I just die from how hot it is. I don[t know how i[ll survive in the philippines.

We should be getting our flight plans around Tuesdaz so we[ll know then whether or not we[ll be transfered or if we are going straight to the philippines. I[m reallz excited to leave even though I[m not nearlz as good in the language as I[d like to be.

I hope that zou[ll have a good week and get outside and enjoz it, if nothing else just enjoz it for me.

Andam ako sa pagadto sa Pilipines. Gihigugma nako kamo! (I[m readz to go to the philippines, I love z[all!)

Elder Shirlez

The mural is of 1 nephi chapter 2 when nephi prazs to know if Lehi[s dreams are true.

 We had more familz nights in our dorm this week. We have prettz much started a tradition of having chips and salsa everz week and just eating a ton of food that we[ve all gotten from familz and friends. 

I realized the other day that i always forget to say things in my email that i wanted to say to you so that's pretty muych what my letters to you will be like. i wrote you a letter a couple days ago so i don't know when itll get there but it has somethings that i forgot to mention these past few weeks. 

Not a ton has happened since last friday. just more studying and practicing and working and practicing and studying. we're starting to get a hang of the language. We're by no means fluent but we can get through lessons a lot better. 

Shelby sent us some chips and salsa last week so that's pretty much the only thing i took pictures of this week besides murals. Hope you're all doing well! Love ya lots!

gihigugma nako ikaw!
elder shirley

"Important"

Hey so there is a missionary here that looks exactly like an actor I like. Like actual spitting image. I can't remember his name or any good movies he has been in so I need you to look him up. I know he is the main character in the movie Night Crawler. If you could send just like a screen shot of like his face/name and the list of movies he has been in I'd love you even more than I already do. Secondly can you send me my senior picture, like the one that is actually in my yearbook so i can show my companions. We're all trying to show each other pics of what we looked like before our mission.

Thanks so much!
Elder shirley

MTC murals

MTC murals ... only found here...

The one of the wave is moses parting the red sea. 

The one of the lone man I think is Nephi. 

the grass one is of paul on the road to Damascus.

The dinner one is of Martha preparing for Jesus's arrival.

The campfire one is of the brother of jared getting the 12 stones from god. 

The one of the mountains and city with the three or four guys is of the sons of mosiah on their way to teach the lamanites.

gihigugma nako ikaw!

Hosting was really fun. We kind of got didn't get the full experience because we were working in the oversize lot so any car that couldn't fit in the garage got sent our way which really wasn't a whole lot. I got to escort to elders that are actually in my zone so that was fun. Elder King keeps saying that he really only escorted "half" a missionary because he got tired of waiting for his turn so he escorted an elder with Elder Nowlin and that ended up being the only missionary that he got to escort. I think we all are really hoping that we get to escort again but I'm not sure if it'll happen. I was really surprised to see Sister Anderson again but I'm glad that she was able to send the photo of us to grandma so
that you guys could see. 

Not a whole lot has happened this week besides the changes to our zone of the older missionaries leaving and the newer ones coming in. Our zone was already the biggest zone in the world but now it's even bigger. 21 missionaries left but we got 36 new missionaries so there's an additional 15 missionaries in our zone. I think we have something like 75+ missionaries in our zone. I forgot my camera so i'll send pictures later today and i'll write you a little more. I really have to pee so i'm cutting this short for the moment.

Love ya! gihigugma nako ikaw!
Elder Shirley

In that first group picture you sent the order of names is as follows from left to right.... 

Sister Smith and then her companion sister fisher, sister Boone and then her companion sister Angilaw (not 100% sure how to spell her name), then it's elder Davis (our new district leader) and his companion elder Nowlin, and then finally just me and Elder King.

Week 3?

nagamatay ako. (I'm dying) It is so hot here. This last week I did a whole lot of teaching, we've taught an investigator at least once a day and so we've been spending a lot of time preparing lessons. We've been so busy preparing lessons that it has been hard to also study the language but without studying the language then it makes teaching the investigator harder so its been a wonderful cycle of stress. We finally actually started learning the grammar of Cebuano and we are all still pretty confused because they have different ways to conjugate verbs depending on the focus but the sentences pretty much don't change the meaning when we change focus and with each different focus you have to use different markers in the sentence to show what is in focus and what is not in focus and its ridiculous. I understand the language enough to get through lessons though so that's been nice and with all the lessons we've been preparing we've gotten a lot better at teaching simply and through the spirit which makes lessons so much better.

Thanks for using the Dear Elder thing, it's really nice getting letters in the middle of the week. We made it a goal to not check our email unless its pday so getting letters is really our only way around that. Thanks for emailing me my AP scores, I was so happy to see them. It made me sooooo happy to see I didn't waste my time with those classes. We didn't do a whole lot to celebrate the fourth of july here. We had a shortish devotional with our zone about religeous freedom and then they let us stay up later to watch fireworks because you could see them from the MTC. Sounds like youve had a fun week, thanks for the pictures, I love getting pictures!

Higugmaon nako ikaw! (I Love you!)
Elder Shirley