1st letter

Heyo. How's CT? You guys are back, right? So ... MTC. Oh- thank you for that package! That was way cool of you guys, but I already feel like I'm gaining weight fast in here haha so send some nutritious stuff if you can. Then again anything that's safe for a 4 - day box ride to the MTC can't really be nutritious. Um I don't remember much of the questions you guys sent me. Keep using DearElder- I get those letters every night so I can read em before I go to bed. Just tell me stuff about what's going on in everyone's life. You feel so cut off from civilization in here, despite being 5 seconds away from it. So some basic info- my companion is Elder Evert. He's from outside Sacramento- about my height and stuff but definitely much more built. He played Offensive Line for his high school. Um, There's 10 of us in my district- two sisters. 28 of us came in at once going to Philippines, only four of us are going to Baguio though. So that makes it even crazier that I'm in Faber's mission. After the third day I felt like my head was going to explode from all the Tagalog they throw at us. It's crazy though how much has changed since day one though. The teachers only speak in Tagalog really, so day one I had no idea what they were saying but by day 3 I can almost always understand at least what they want. We learned to pray and bear our testimonies in Tagalog by Saturday... it's tricky. All the adjectives come first and then the subject is in the back of the sentence, so it is opposite of english and spanish and what not. So that's the biggest stumbling block to overcome. Like instead of the church is true it's totoo ang Simbihan (true the church). the ng word is used so often, but that's spoken like 'nung' and mga makes anything plural. Like in english we had an 's' to the end of a word, but in Tagalog they tack on mga before it. So instead of friends it's mga kaibigan. Oh, and mga is pronounced like 'munga'.

So yeah, how's everyone doing? Send me some DearElders about what's going on. I got a reaally bad cold already and last night was the worst, but today I'm starting to get over it. We went to the temple today and did a session, it was really nice that early in the morning. Good start to the day. Oh, but because my companion forgot something and had to run back downstairs we came in last of the group instead of first as we were and sat alone on the back of the girl's side because the guys was all filled up, ha. Oh, and on Thursday we had to walk off campus down to the BYU Health Center because my companion needed to pick up medication because he got a virus the first day. So it was pretty crazy being off campus, and feeling like an actual missionary. It becomes so common seeing all the nametags and stuff here, so you obviously don't feel special, ya know. But being even a hundred feet away from that it feels like you get different looks, which is a really good feeling. Makes you feel rare, ya know? Oh- my companions really good too haha. I definitely got lucky because there are some loooonies in here. This one kid talks like a bad actor at all times.. it's very strange. And just a lot of weirdos. Um, my zone leaders are way cool, ones from New Zealand, talks like Brit en Jermaine. Um, don't have much time left. We only get 30 minutes here, and can only write home once a week. Well we can write home whenever technically but they ask us only on P-Day, so that's what it'll be. Best way to describe the MTC though is days are long, weeks are short. During the day you feel like you've been up for 48 hours, but when you look back it doesn't feel so long. I'm still getting into it , so it still feels like I've been here for years but that'll change soon I know. Oh! I saw Erik and Cody already. Erik is just a couple floors above me so I seen him some nights, which is really good. But all in all it definitely hasn't been bad here. Not nearly as hard as people were saying it was, but everyone has different experiences. You get hardly any personal study time, only about an hour a day if you can manage that but I managed to finish First Nephi by Saturday which I was happy about. I like marking up the scriptures. Alright well I'm about out of time, so just keep sending me dear elders and I'll send you guys another letter by mail today.

Love ya guys, and tell everyone to write me

-Austin

(I'm not going to call myself Elder White through email just yet.) (I hear it enough during the day, I like to remember I have a first name)