Our Week at the MTC

Monday - As we are preparing to leave today, I thought it good to summarize what this past week has been like.  Each day was inspiring, educational, emotionally draining, and exhausting.  We have worked with wonderful young people who have stretched us to our limits and have taught us many principles of the work we are embarking on.  Each day we also had devotionals, family home evening, and video presentations by the apostles.

This is a review of things we did in classes each day.

Everything we did all week as to assist us in "Becoming As He Is."

The MTC complex is amazing.  Beautiful landscaping, grand and functional buildings, and every technology to assist missionaries to be successful.  Probably like no other place on
earth!

The church has invested in beautiful artwork that is inspiring and thought provoking.  Every building, including the residence halls, have wonderful pieces.  Really sets the spirit of the purpose of the MTC.

Each couple was assigned to another couple known as "our others."  We were fortunate to be assigned to Elder and Sister Barton from the St. George area.  They spent several years in the Elko area and knew a Stake President Egbert from Elko.  Almost everyone we had a conversation with started with "Are you related to the Egberts in. . . "  And these places were all over the United States, and the people in question were good people.  A great heritage!.  The Bartons were called to run the 12 step addiction program on the Navajo Indian Reservation in Farmington, New Mexico.  We grew to love them as if they were long lost friends.

We don’t understand how there can be complaints about the MTC dining.  Then, we were only there for a week, not 6-9 weeks like many of the young people.  The food was more than plentiful, lots of choices, and quite tasty.  Ice cream bars were available at every meal along with the famous BYU Dairy chocolate milk.  It was always a race to get in line - we heard estimates of about 8,000 missionaries there this summer - peak missionary season.  It drops off to around 1,800 in the winter.

It was fun running into some Elders that we knew (or knew their family).  Elder Zach Hubert was the first, Merl’s nephew;

 

followed by Elder Phippen (grandson of Merl’s cousin, Mary Phippen);

Elder Hunter Hughs, from Colorado Springs and a good friend of Brian's family; and Pres Tom Chandler, previous Stake President in Filer and a construction associate of Merl.  Great place to meet great people!

After breakfast we finished packing all our belongings and weighed each one, adjusting and swapping to keep under 50 pounds each.  We loaded a cart and Merl pushed it up the outside incline to the front of the Administrative office (they don’t like suitcases hauled through the building – and there are several sections of stairs). 

It was hot that day, and it was a real workout!  I turned in our keys, and we had a personal driver take us to the airport to catch our flight.  We had 12 missionaries (going to Norway, Slavakia, Czeck Republic, and Portugal.  We sat next to Elder Dube, a member of the seventy and in the area presidency of Eastern Africa. Expected a safe trip with all this precious cargo.  We didn’t sleep much during the 10 hour flight and arrived in Amsterdam at 8:00 a.m.  We lost six hours in time zone changes.  

The Amsterdam airport was place in a beautiful agricultural area.  After landing, we taxied for a long time to get to the terminal. . . we thought we might run out of gas.  I purchased a trinket to indicate we had been there.  Almost everyone speaks English in the country now (sad they are losing their native Dutch language).  All the missionaries split up and went to their separate flights.  We had a three hour layover and then a three hour flight to Lisbon (losing another hour).  We met a couple on the plane who approached us – they were also headed to Lisbon to visit her brother and sister-in-law, Elder and Sister Layton.  They are serving in the southern part of Portugal.

As we stepped off the airplane, we knew it was all getting real!  We had a conversation with an older couple who were also waiting for their ride.  They live 20 miles outside of Lisbon and spoke no English. It was fun to start using the language again, even though we have much to learn.  After a short wait in the baggage area, we were met by Pres. and Sister Fillmore.  Tradition in the mission is to purchase a Pastel de Belem (baked pastry with custard filling) from the airport Pastelaria for all new arrivals. Amazing!












Our first night in Portugal was spent in a downtown hotel to get showered and rested up for the day tomorrow.  We Walked around the streets in the evening and went to bed.   They tell us that Portugal is suffering an “onda calor” (heat wave).  We believe it!