We just received the following hand written letter from Matthew today. It covers his first week in the mission field just like the email we received earlier in the week.
Hola Mi Familia!
I'm in Georgia. Alma to be exact. It's a little itty bitty town on the northeast corner of the mission. It has 6 stoplights, 2,000 people, and lots of drugs. It's been interesting.
I went to the airport and called you guys [he called home the day he left the MTC]. It was an early morning and it was raining. We piled in a bus and set off to the Salt Lake City Airport. I called you then got on the plane. It was a smooth flight and it was a big plane. The second part was a much smaller plane. Consequently, it was awful. It was bumpy and I didn't get to sleep at all. The Elder next to me was unfazed and fell right asleep. He kept sleep kicking me the whole flight.
We arrived and loaded into a big van as we met President Jensen and Sister Jensen. They're really nice. We were quite cramped in the van. It was a 12 person van and there were 15 people.
We made it to the mission home alright. It's quite beautiful. It reminded me a bit of our house inside. I have pictures of the outside. President Jensen talked to us and gave us some info/pictures. We had a dinner of sourdough sandwiches, chips, and a nice drink. It was delicious after so many weeks of MTC. Something simple and light. The MTC wasn't bad, it was just fun to have something that wasn't mass produced. We time to talk to our family and tell them where we were headed and our address. Then we all sat as President Jensen spoke. I sat criss-crossed-apple-sauce-indian-style on the floor. He told us how the mission was and how it was going. He told us important info and mission rules. One thing I'm excited about is we are allowed music! Maybe for Christmas you can send me an iPod with some Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Inside Out, Chad Woolner, missionary music essentials, etc. I will need some speakers though. No headphones para mi. Anyway, we got granola bars and were sent to bed. I slept okay but was quite cold. The AC fan was right above me and was blowing on me. I got quite cold. I only had a sheet on my air mattress. I found some towels and used them to survive. The next morning we had blueberry pancakes and hash-browns. It was delicious - especially the pancakes. I don't usually like pancakes but these were good. Maybe Sister Jensen is magical?
Anyway, we packed up and since I was headed east, I had to wait. I said goodbye the the remnant of my district and hopped into the car with Elder T since Elder L told me to (Elder L is an assistant to the president). We tried to visit some people who sent us away but we were able to see just one person. Anyway, we tracted for several hours and saw some really cool houses. This one house was an original 1830's era house. It was beautiful. It had, what looked like, mahogany flooring, brick and stone walls, ivy, and a red velvet carpet on the stairs. We had only a few people who were rude to us. Most people told us that they were happy in their respective denominations. A few people thanked us for the hard work we did. That made me feel a little better but I was still a little sad after tracting. We came back to the mission home and loaded up our stuff. Elder F and I drove the big van with our bikes on the back. We stopped at a place called Firehouse Subs. They had this cool machine that dispensed drinks. It had a touch screen and you select different flavors and brands as well as additives. If you wanted vanilla Sprite, you could get it (Don't get it, regular Sprite is much better. It was fun to try though). We got sandwiches and mine was really, really big. I couldn't eat it. It was greasy, cheesy, and kept squirting it's juices out on my hands. I ate about 72% of it. Not bad I'd say. It was good though. We finished up and we headed off to Valdosta. We grabbed Elder Y and Elder M, who had hung out there for the day. We then drove to Douglas. We crashed there for the night. It was packed. There were 10 Elders in a 2 bedroom apartment. I slept on the couch which was quite lucky of me. Most guys slept on the carpet. My companion slept on linoleum. I offered him the couch but he just wouldn't take it. He took NyQuil, talked for a while about things. Most of the stuff he said was kind of random so I think it was the NyQuil talking. After 10-20 minutes, he shut down and I slept on my love seat.
We awoke the next morning and, in our pajamas, loaded the car and set off into the sunrise (we drove northeast I think - we drove towards the sun). We arrived in Alma and put my bags inside. We showered, got dressed, and took off on our bikes. We only get 700 miles a month here in Alma. We have district meeting tomorrow which takes 41 miles and we were at 659. So we had just enough miles. I saw some interesting people that first day. Sister W, the L's, L, and Brother D. I'll tell you a bit about each one though. Sister W is interesting. I'll tell you more about her later.
The L's are a nice family that were recently reactivated. They want to get sealed as a family which is a big goal for them and we're going to help them make that goal. Sister L works as an accountant. Jobs are really hard to get in Alma. Brother L fixes/customizes old cars for fun. He told us all about a truck he's working on. Those are the big things here in the South. Trucks and chihuahuas. The truck he was working on was a cool red one that had blown it's engine due to a clogged radiator hose.
L is really big. Not as tall as me but much bigger. He's a less-active member. He gets a lot of his information from televangelists so we try to teach him correct doctrine. He's a really nice guy who really tries hard to be a good member of the Church.
Brother D is awesome. He's a tall and skinny. He's very quiet but it's fun talking to him. He was baptized two years ago by some missionaries after they had been talking to him for a few months. He's a very, very strong member of the Church. He has his baptismal certificate on display as the centerpiece on his mantle. He's an amazing guy and we visited him a couple of times this week since he doesn't have a whole lot of visitors.
We've been working hard and riding [bikes] is of the ways. My legs were pretty sore for those first five days. I haven't grown butt calluses but they're coming. My bike's been pretty solid. The brakes got a little unadjusted from the bike ride over here but we fixed the rubbing and it's fine. You'll have pictures soon enough. I'll send the SD Card next P-Day.
I used my other two good stories in my email but I still got one more. We went over to Sister W's. She was raking massive amounts of leaves and burning them. We helped out. I raked and Elder H tended the fire. Sister W scooped up the piles I made in her wheelbarrow. We cleaned up about 50 or 60 wheelbarrows of leaves. We had quite the fire. Then Sister W got tired of scooping. She was going to set all of the remaining piles on fire. We told her, "No, you need to do it in this fire pit over here." She promised she would watch it and even got a chair and sat in front of the pile. We told her that she might set her grass on fire. She said she didn't have enough grass to catch on fire. We told her it might set the tree above it on fire. She assured us it would be fine. We somehow convinced her to not set everything on fire. She put away her matches and grumbled, "You guys are no fun." We scooped up more leaves and dumped them on the fire. Sister W made a 'hmmm' noise and disappeared. We poked the fire to open up some air holes. Sister W appeared with a gasoline can. I started to say, "Wait, I don't think that's a good idea." and got to "don't" when she started spraying. I have to admit if was kinda cool but then she just threw the whole thing on the fire. My companion backed up and we looked at each other. There was a small bang and a fireball. It was quite awesome actually. We collected the tools and wheelbarrows and brought them back to her trailer. She looked at the wheelbarrow and said, "That's getting to be an old wheelbarrow." She then threw it on the fire. It was pretty funny.
That's pretty much been my week so far. It's pretty rainy right now. We're headed to FHE in not that long.
Here comes the good part. Question and Answer.
Q: Cockroaches?
A: Yes. Moving on...
Q: Car, bike, or both?
A: Both
Q: How much do I love and miss you guys?
A: Loads [picture of dump truck and cement mixer full of love]
Thank you so much for all your letters. I really appreciate them.
Big loves,
Elder Matthew Carlson
No comments:
Post a Comment