MTC week 4

I will be watching General Conference in a multi-purpose building here that houses all of our devotionals and such. Don't worry, I'll get a break in between all the sessions so I'll be able to walk still after it. I'm super excited though! Take good notes ;)Dad, your commentary of Nick and Jason was priceless, muchas gracias. XDDrew wrote me one email during the 2nd week and that's been it. It's ok though, I've written out 17 letters and 4 emails (including everything from today) in the past 4 weeks--I've kept busy :)Also for Dad: "Amo a vosotros" translates to "I love you guys", so it doesn't quite work when you send me letters ;) Your bank of options consist of "te amamos", "amamos a tu" (if you want "we love you"), "te amo", or "amo a tu" (if you want "I love you").The October Ensign is chock-full of missionary type articles! :D Definitely read through all of it, but I have some pages to point out. Mom MUST read pg. 22 (especially MUST read 27). You'll soon see why ;) pg 16 talks about being a member missionary. You should totally hold a FHE with the kids teaching missionary lessons and/or answering questions an investigator would have. Pg 76 talks about Preach My Gospel (Predicad Mi Evangelio if you want Spanish). Pg 28 talks about this new artbook that the church has put out. Which brings me to another topic. I bought this artbook and it's fantastic and I'd recommend it for you guys. I can buy anything here and I get a 40% off discount on anything here--literally anything. I got the Spanish primary songbook for like 5 bucks. The artbook was like 3-4 bucks. I get $6/week on my little card here that I can use in addition to my own change (haven't had to use yet). So if there's anything you want me to look for, let me know and I can send it back home.I was in a meeting with the Argentine consul yesterday and he answered a lot of questions about Argentina for us. It's actually a requirement for our visas that he meet with us. My visa hasn't come through yet, but it's looking like it's going to come very easily, so I'm getting excited!I have a few quoteables I more-or-less came up with here: "Don't serve your mission (live your life?) looking in the rear-view mirror or else you'll crash. Focus on the road ahead of you so you can end up where you want to go." Neat, huh? My other one is "Take care of the garden that the Lord has given you stewardship over and the garden will bear fruit to support and sustain you." They've definitely applied to me so far while I've been here.As far as my Spanish goes, I (theoretically) know the 2 past, present, present perfect (to have done something), present progressive (to be doing something), future (will do something), and conditional (would do something) tenses as well as command form. I'll be teaching the first missionary lesson in Spanish starting this week--Hopefully I'll get it down! Just a bunch of vocab to tackle.Keep working hard, everyone! ¡Recuerden orar siempre!Os Amo,Elder Powell

MTC week 3

Hola Todos!
This week's responses:
I could definitely hear the BYU game from where I was--especially when we got touchdowns and otherwise good plays. A bunch of the elders were moaning about missing it, but I was ok ;)The yellow fever shot was just fine--no issues. I paid it off with my debit card. I got the insurance reimbursement form sent to you. Don't know if you can use it, but just in case.The zucchini bread and cucumber made it just fine and were both quite delicious--thanks!I have a few requests: if you can find it, send my pitch pipe; I need a larger travel towel (it only overlaps by about 2 inches, I just dealt with it at first, but I'm thinking I'll want a bigger one now); and I also could use a line of authority from Dad.Not much has happened out of the usual this week. It got noticeably colder a couple days ago, which has been quite nice for me. I couldn't help it--I've started singing with the MTC choir! Our zone got a new district a week ago and they're headed to Nicaragua, Spain, and Panama.Do you guys remember a Steward family from Alabama? An Elder Steward walked up and started to talk with me randomly the other day. He randomly pulled out the fact that I used to live in Alabama. I was shocked and floored! I asked how he knew that, and he was like "Oh I used to go to cub scouts with you and stuff like that." hahaha, I was amazed that he remembered! He's lived in Alabama since and he's headed off to the Chili, Concepción South mission.Mi español es bien. I´m able to say things in the present, preterite (one of the 2 past tenses), future, conditional (ex. I would ______), and present progressive (to be ____-ing) tenses now. I still need to get comfortable using it in daily language. It's coming though! Irregulars make it fun--that's for sure! Here's a fun one I discovered the other day: In English, we have "to go ___", "I go ___", and "I am going ____". In Spanish, it's "ir ___", "yo/estoy voy ___" and "estoy yendo ____"!Thanks for all the updates from home. It's always nice to hear how things are going.Amo a vosotros!Elder Powell

MTC week 2

Sounds like you guys are having a great time though.
So my turn to talk. I had a fantastic experience at the MTC Referral Center on Friday. If you've ever seen those pass-along cards or a tv commercial from the church, there's a phone number that is on/in it. That number leads right to the referral center. It was a little scary at first, especially because I'm terrible at phone calls, but I got the hang of it really fast. I've already given out my first Book of Mormon to a real investigator of the church and I had only been here for 1 and a half weeks! It was great!The work is not slowing down, that's for sure. Every minute is still scheduled out and there's barely time to sit around. If I've learned everything up to what we've been taught, I can always review and practice more or go learn something different. But I love it here!Yo sé que el Evangelio restaurado es verdadero. Sé que José Smith fue un profeta. Testifico que Jesucristo es nuestro Salvador y que nos ama. Sé que Dios es nuestro Padre Celestial. Las familias puede ser juntos para siempre (and I'm out of time!!!)Amo a ustedes!!!-Elder Powell-

MTC week 1

So now this blog is the "mission diaries". I'll post Jeff's letter's here for all to be inspired.

Hola Familia!I have 30 minutes to type this so sorry for mistakes.Phew, the first week has been super intense! The MTC is just ramming my head with info like no other! It's day 6 now (P-day!!!) and they already have me singing, praying, bearing testimony, practicing street contacts, and getting to know people en español! I'm actually doing really with it though so I'm happy. After the first week things start to become routine and less stressful so I´m doing well. It only took a few days to run into a ton of my friends! I saw Elder Hawkins on the first day actually! I still don't have a picture (and I'll have to send the eventual picture as a paper copy because of complications), but we're working on it.I´m the district leader over my district of 6 élderes y 4 hermanas. We´re all headed to the Argentina, Salta mission, which is a rarity apparently to all be headed to the same place at the same time. I´m excited though! It just means that we´ll grow even closer together and the plane ride down will be fun! My companion, Elder Dibb, is from Paul, Idaho (you'll have to look it up, it's southern) and is a great guy. He's a tall guy and makes me feel rather short, but we're doing well. Our unity continues to grow every day and I'm sure we'll get teaching together down pretty well here in a couple weeks. Our whole district is great! We all have a great sense of humor and love working with each other.As for my address, letters and packages can be sent to:Elder Jeffrey PowellMTC Mailbox # 311ARG-SAL 11022005 N. 900 E.Provo, UT 84604Can I get one of you to go on my facebook and put this address in my "About Me" section as well as send it in a message to everyone in my mission group (Drew should know/be able to figure out what I mean). I would highly encourage the usage of www.dearelder.com however (Include that on facebook as well). It's fast and easy. My mailbox # is 311, my approx. departure date is November 2nd, and my mission code is ARG-SAL. Notice all of these are found in the above address.Felíz Cumpleaños Jason!!!Hope things are going well at home! If you respond to this email address, I won´t be able to read it until next Tuesday btw, so dearelder will probably work best. jeff.r.powell.MAS@MyLDSMail.net is my email address though and I'll be able to use it on P-days. Let me know what email address(es) I should be writing to!Mom, they gave me a set of Spanish scriptures for free here :P and to top it off, the church just recently authorized and began distributing their own copy of the Bible (with footnotes and the pictures and such), which is now in my possession. I may be sending some Spanish scriptures back home in a few weeks. Drew will put them to use, I'm sure. If not, give them to Brandon ;)Yo amo a ustedes! (I love you guys!) Hope to hear from you soon!LoveÉlder PowellP.S. I've seen some crazy name badges down here! I'm definitely glad mine is in the much simpler Spanish language!