July 30, 2013

I got to have another "missionary texting" session with Justin today - probably the last one we will have.  He got his travel itinerary and will fly out of Salt Lake on Sunday (Aug. 4th).  He leaves the MTC at 4:30 AM and flies out at 8:30 AM.  He will arrive in Johannesburg South Africa at 5:10 PM on Monday.  They are eight hours ahead of us so that would be 9:10 AM  our time on Monday.  That's 28 hours and 40 minutes from the time he leaves the MTC!!  From Johannesburg he isn't sure how they get to Maputo but he thinks it is a 12 hour bus ride.  I hope they get to spend the night in Johannesburg and get some rest first!  There will be 15 missionaries leaving the MTC and traveling to Maputo together. 

They got a chance to meet the instructor who is native to Mozambique.  His name is Imao Belchoir.  Imao means brother.  He really enjoyed getting to hear him talk!  He says that he speaks very fast and that the African accents is kind of hard to pick up because their teachers have Brazilian accents.  But he loves the African accent!  Here is what he said about Imao Belchoir:  "He said he grew up with no electricity and just completely dirt poor and had nothing like most families there. And then some missionaries came and taught him the gospel and showed him purpose in life. He said they don't know he went on to serve a mission and went on to teach at the MTC now. He said he is forever grateful to those missionaries because they changed more than just his life and they don't even know what they did. So he told us every time we see a young african boy, think of where he could end up one day and think of him when that happens because we don't know how many lives we can affect with just one young african."

Things are winding down at the MTC and he said the time will fly by.  Tomorrow he gets to host and be an escort for incoming missionaries.  There are 7 entering from Lovell so maybe he will see a familiar face or two!  Ont Thursday they have infield orientation ( I didn't think to ask him what that is and I don't know!  Maybe a former missionary can enlighten me.)  Friday they get to skype with people from Brazil and Saturday they pack.  He will be on the airplane before he has time to rest I think!

He feels like his language is improving all the time.  He has a much easier time understanding than he does speaking but he feels good about what he can do.  Justin is happy and loving his mission.  He is excited to get to Mozambique and meet the people that he loves already.  I can feel his spirit as we communicate and know that he has grown much and will continue to grow as he serves the Lord.

My whole district with our two teachers

 

The three of us going to mozambique with our teacher irmao chamberlain on the left and

 irmao taylor on the right. Brother chamberlain leaves for a trip this week and doesn't

get back till monday so we had to say goodbye to him yesterday :( the rest of the

 district gets to see him cause they all don't leave until wednesday

 



This is elder brock. He got here the week before us so we were together pretty

much the whole time and we were best friends from the start. He's going to

 BYUI too so we are gonna try and room together when we get back!