Week One: Settling In

Brendan's MTC district.  He is in the back row on the far right--wearing his only suit and one of only three shirts.  Hopefully the airport finds his suitcase soon...

          August 26, 2013

Preparation Day (P-Day) has arrived!! I just got back from the temple which was really refreshing and helped me ground myself. The past few days have been pretty insane what with getting adjusted to the new schedule, learning a brand new vocabulary at breakneck pace and teaching our first investigator (for those of you counting at home, that's 2 days after I got here). It's got my head spinning quite a bit. 

Brendan's bulletin board back in his residence hall.

The fireside was really good yesterday but it wasn't the mission president who spoke. We had a guy from the church offices come who oversees missionary work and advertising, etc.. He was really good! There were a lot of good laughs intermixed with serious calls to action which is always what you want for a crowd of 19-21 year olds. After that, we watched a taped fireside that Elder Bednar gave last Christmas called "Character of Christ". That was the most beautiful talk I have ever hear--I kid you not. It was almost an hour long but I was just fixed the whole time on what he was saying. It was so powerful. It was mainly talking about a quote by Elder Maxwell. It said "There would have been no atoning sacrifice without the character of Christ." Elder Bednar went on to talk about the character of Christ was that he turned outward with love, compassion and service, when all of us would have turned inward in selfishness. He said that by following the example of Christ's character, we can become converted to the gospel. He emphasized the difference between having a testimony and being truly converted. A testimony is having a knowledge or belief in things. Being converted is when you live your life according to what you believe in a stay true to those beliefs.

The food at the MTC is a-ok. It doesn't have the TLC that Mom's cooking has, but it suffices. The ice cream is great and the chocolate milk has been treating me well too:) 

Anyway, about my district. We've got 7 elders and 4 sisters. 6 of the elders and 2 of the sisters are going to Taiwan Taizhong with me. The other two sisters are going to visitors centers in California Mandarin speaking and one of the elders is going to Edmonton, Canada mandarin speaking. My companion is Elder C. He's from Florida and he went to Air Force Academy for a year before coming here. He wants to go into aeronautical engineering when he comes home and become a pilot. He's a pretty funny guy. He has really dry humor and has a lot of funny things he says, my favorite of which being "done-zo" because my pole vaulting coach used to say that all the time. He really wants to learn the language though and I think we're going to get along fine. We share our residence with Elder W. and Elder R. Elder W. is 20 so he's the oldest of the bunch and he's our District Leader. He's really outspoken and funny and he's really easy to get along with. He can be kind of goofy at times though. Elder R. is more straight-cut and he's kind of gullible which I'm sad to say we take advantage of at times. Luckily he's a good sport about it and we all joke with one another so it ends up being ok. The other three elders in our district room next door to us. Their names are Elder B., Elder D., and Elder R.  Elder B. is really laid-back. He likes to ride motorcycles and I guess he used to street race back in Oaklahoma where he's from. He got in a really bad wreck a few months before he came out when he was going 70 on the highway and a truck came up from behind him going 135 and rear-ended him on his bike. He says he shouldn't have lived and that's what spurred him to go on a mission. Elder D. is the musical theater type. He and Elder R. actually went to the same school in Bountiful so that's a fun fact. We have really similar interests but he's really eccentric and I'm not really at all so it's kind of an odd relationship we have. Elder R. is the one I know least about. I need to talk to him more. I just know that he's pretty quiet. He's nice though. And then the sisters. There's Sister T. and Sister W. and they're a companionship and then there's Sister F. and Sister G. and they're a companionship. Sister T. and Sister W. are going to the visitors centers. Sister T. is really quiet but she's really nice and she knows Chinese pretty well so she's a big help in class. Sister W. is more outspoken and she's also really nice. Sister F. is a med student at BYU-I. She wants to be a pediatrician in the future. Sister G. went to the Y and that's about all I know. The whole sister-elder rules are pretty weird for me and a couple of the other elders. It was really funny the other day because we were playing kickball as a zone and Elder W. was about to give Sister W. a high 5 on her way back from scoring a run and they both remembered you aren't allowed to do that at the same moment and pulled back their hands and it was really awkward. Anyway, fun times. I'll send some pictures later today. My camera's back at the residence. Talk to you in a bit!

Love,

Elder Smith 

The Young Women in our home ward already sent a care package, including these sweet stickers.  Some of Brendan's district put them to good use.

Brendan's companion was sent this package of jelly beans, so they have developed a tradition of trying a new one each night and guessing what flavor it is.

Brendan's companion paying close attention in class.  :)

Walking up to the Provo Temple.

Day One: MTC Arrival and Misadventures

August 21, 2013

Dear Family,

So first day was a success!  It was pretty crazy and my head's still spinning, but it was pretty great.  I got here, put my luggage in my residence, and then went straight to language study.  My teacher, Ge lao shi, spoke only in Chinese, which was okay for me, but I bet a couple of other people in my class were freaking out a bit.  Actually, a lot of them already knew a lot of Chinese which was cool!

After that, we got introduced to the MTC presidency and then went straight to dinner.  They had the ice cream bar today, but I was too full from my Chicken Cordon Bleu to eat it. :)  I did have some BYU Creamery chocolate milk.  Yum.

Anyway, after that we went back to the residence for a bit to unpack and that's when it got crazy.  I unpacked my first two suitcases.  No problem!  But when I opened up the last one, the big black one, I didn't find all of my shirts and pants and socks and shoes.  I found a hair straightener, dorritos and ladies underwear.

I had picked up the wrong bag at the airport!

Aaaaaaaah!

Anyway, long story short, I talked to the front desk and they're basically just going to call the airport and see what they can do.  So as of now, I have 2 white shirts and one pair of slacks that I have to last until P-Day on Monday.  Wish me luck!  I'll tell you then if anything happens with my luggage or if I need you guys to send me new clothes (heaven forbid).

Tonight we had a big teaching workshop though, where they get people to pretend to be people investigating the church, and we watched 2 older missionaries teach them for a while.  Then people in the audience get to ask the "investigators" questions and teach them.  The first two investigators didn't go so well because people weren't listening to what other people had to say and they were being too complicated.

The third guy was a really cool experience, though.  He had a son that had died when he was only 3 days old and a wife who had died.  Someone told him about how his son would be in the presence of Christ and that he'd see him and his wife again.  He said that made his heart feel like melty butter.  This reminded me of what Dad was telling me about his investigator that felt the spirit but they didn't say anything so I raised my hand and asked him if he had any idea what he was feeling.  He said, "I don't know, but it sure does feel good!"  I then asked him if he knew what the Holy Ghost was.  He said, "Yeah!  The Holy Trinity, you know? The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost."  (He had a Catholic background).  I didn't want to distract him from the issue at hand by bringing up the separation of Diety, so I went forward and told him that we believe the Holy Ghost is a Spirit sent by God to provide us with comfort and to testify to use of things that are true.  I then told him that what he was feeling was the Holy Ghost testifying to him that what the Elders and Sisters were telling him was true.  He said he felt like a million bucks.  Anyway, that was an awesome experience.  I'm so excited to be able to teach things like that to real investigators.

I love you guys and I already miss you.  Talk to you more on Monday.

Love you!!!

Elder Brendan James Smith

A Mother's Gift

Sending a child on a mission has been a singularly difficult experience.  I've been culturally prepared for this eventuality my whole life, but it doesn't make the act of saying good-bye much easier.  I blogged about some of my difficulties here.

My emotions have been on a wild roller coaster for the last few months.  It probably doesn't help that I am also due for a mid-life crisis right about now.  However, I keep coming back to a Biblical story that has been bringing me solace and perspective--that of Hannah and Samuel.

Hannah was a woman who desperately wanted a child.  Her recorded story begins in the temple.  She had come to pour out her heart in prayer.  In her grief, she was praying so fervently and acting so erratically that the head priest, Eli, thought she was drunk.  He came over to remonstrate her, and she explained that she was just incredibly sorrowful and praying for a son.  She told Eli that if the Lord gave her the desire of her heart, that she would give her child to be a priest in the temple.  She went home, and the Lord blessed her with a son.  After she weaned him (and I hope for her sake that extended breastfeeding was the norm back then :) ), she kept her word and gave her son, Samuel, to the care of Eli.  Samuel grew up to became a priest and a prophet.

I've always found this story to be both inspirational and terribly sad.  Hannah's faith is tremendous.  It is amazing to me that her desire to be a mother was so strong that she was willing to only have Samuel for a short while, and then give him to God at great sacrifice to herself.  I can only imagine how that must have felt to walk away from the temple, leaving your precious son behind to be raised by others, hoping that everything would be okay.

For me, letting my son go on a mission has felt something like Hannah giving Samuel to Eli to be in God's service.  Obviously, there are some major differences.  I have been blessed to raise my son for 18 years.  He will come back to me in two years.  This story gives me the perspective that I, in fact, am a wimp.  I don't even begin to approach the faith and self-sacrifice of a Hannah.

On the other hand, I do feel like I relate to what she experienced.  I am giving my son to the care of others so that he can serve the God that he loves, hoping that everything will be okay.  It's impossible not to be a little sad, and impossible not to worry a little.  However, I do believe that what he is doing is a good thing, and that he is going to be all right.  As his letters have come trickling in, I am excited to hear of his adventures--the people he is meeting, the things he is learning and the heart-level experiences that he is having.  So despite the sting of loss and good-bye, there are good things in store for our family, and for Brendan.

Stay tuned.