MTC Week Eight

Hello all,

Well, this has been quite an eventful week. We had Christmas on Friday, meaning we all got our flight plans, so we celebrated with lots of candy and a secret Santa thing. Just about everyone in my district got a package that day (Elder McKean got 3!) in addition to our flight plans, so there was plenty to celebrate, and to celebrate with. It even snowed, sort of. 

My flight plans tell me I'm leaving the MTC on the 29th at 4:50 AM. I'll catch a flight to Toronto at the SLC Airport at 10:00 AM to arrive in Toronto at 3:51 PM local time. I'll have an hour layover there and catch my flight to Montreal at 5:00 pm, to arrive in the mission field at 6:12 PM. I'm going to be totally alone for about 12 hours. It'll be a party.

Other than that, we had another member of the Seventy give a really good devotional on Tuesday. I'd tell you what he talked about, but it's 6:30 AM right now, so I forgot my notes. It was good though.

Oh yeah. I'm in the laundry room insanely early today because Elder Chan is going to be spending the whole day at Temple Square. He's leaving at 7:30 and won't get back until 5 PM, so this is the only time he has to do laundry today. It's early, but at least I'll have time to take a nap later. If any of you are in the Temple Square area and happen to see a large group of missionaries from outside the US, look out for an Asian one with a British accent. Be sure to give him a hard time.

This week we have in-field orientation every morning except Thursday. They're gonna orient us about how to work in the field, I guess. We'll see what that means.

For Thanksgiving, we have a small "continental breakfast," and a "sack dinner," but supposedly a proper Thanksgiving meal for lunch. We'll see how that goes. I hope it's better than the rest of the food. My bowels can't take this much longer.  We also have two General Authority devotionals and a service project. That should be fun.

This week I met three Elders from Francophone Countries and got to have French conversations with all three. One was from DR Congo, one from Haiti, and the other from Tahiti. It was awesome and it felt really good to speak a language I'm actually OK at. The Elder from Tahiti is here learning English in preparation to head to Montreal. 

Anyway, that's the news from me this week. I hope I lightened your day. I'm gonna go eat breakfast now.

Happy Thanksgiving all,

Elder Hadden

Mormonspeak:

Seventy - the Quorum of the Seventy:  Members of Quorums of the Seventy are often referred to simply as “Seventies.” Seventies are called to serve as special witnesses of Christ, proclaim the gospel, and build up the Church throughout the world. They work under the direction of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

Temple Square - A 10-acre complex in the center of Salt Lake City which includes, among other things, the Salt Lake Temple, the Tabernacle, two Visitor Centers, and an Assembly Hall.