Week 6

My life is crazy. haha I´m glad to be out of the mtc but at the same time miss it so much already.  Coming here has definitely shown me how much of a softy I am. I am in the La Vega zone in an area called Coniña. It is pretty poor but seems cool so far. These keyboards are weird and the computer is in spanish so it is telling me everyword is misspelled so just know i´m not going to capitalize anything and some stuff might be spelled wrong. My trainer aka my dad is named Elder Tucker. He is from Idaho and has been out for about 13 months. he seems pretty cool so far and he speaks english and spanish well so thats a plus. It is going to be hard for me for at least a few weeks. I learned a lot in the mtc but right now it feels like I know nothing useful haha but I know I just need to keep studying and get some practice. It is super hot here!!  It was about a 2:30 drive to the presidents house in santiago and then 50 minutes here. I’ve got a lot to learn over the next few weeks but I´m not too worried I just need to be patient. I have only been here for 6 weeks and for the rest of my life I will be so much more grateful for all that we have. It is truly insane to compare the things we have.  The second time we went on splits in santo domingo I was in the favelas and the families I taught each had 3-5 people living in a tin and concrete house as big as 1/2 of my bedroom at home. It is crazy, but they are awesome!  Love you all very much and be happy always!

Elder Mifflin 

Week 5

Splits were pretty crazy this week!  I went with a kid from Honduras named Elder Soriano. He has been out for 21 months and so was a really good missionary but barely spoke any English haha.  It was hard to communicate at first but got better throughout the day. So, lets just say you would not have liked being were I was haha!   The area I was in looked like the favelas in Rio De Janerio. Basically just concrete shells of buildings all built on top of each other. The streets here also remind me of Mario Kart.  There are no rules whatsoever and everyone goes ham!  There was also a lot of garbage and litter everywhere so that was kinda sad for me being nature boy. We had to ride in a tiny little taxi and we managed to fit 7 people in there, so it was nice and comfortable!  I had some street food at the end which I’m sure you don't appreciate haha but don’t worry I made sure that it was good first. I had a chicken and cheese empanada. It was so good!  I leave on Tuesday morning at 6:30 am to go into the field and my P days will be on Wednesday now.  I'm really excited to finally get out into the field, it’s definitely going to be hard for the first while but I think I will be able to learn quickly.   Conference is coming up soon and I might not be able to watch it in English, so I have some homework for you and the fam. I want you guys to all pick your favorite talk from the weekend and send me the basic gist of it and all that. I also want to give you guys the homework of reading the Book of Mormon every single day.   Read at least like 5 pages and always have a scripture marker with you when you read.  It is crazy how much you can learn from that book!  I have definitely learned a lot of new things from it over the last 5 weeks here.  I have been totally healthy and awesome. I miss you guys and love you all a lot. I hope all is well for you!

Elder Mifflin

Week 4

   We went to the University nearby this week to do contacting. It was really hot but it was pretty good practice. We were able to give out a few Books of Mormon and talk to some people about the church.  I still have a lot of room for improvement with the language and my teaching skills but I am making good progress.  We are going on splits tomorrow with the field missionaries, which I'm really excited for. I've heard splits are kinda crazy but it should be a good learning experience. I'm about to learn the real meaning of sweat haha The MTC is getting to be pretty boring and I am really excited to finally be out in the field. I love you all and hope that you are all doing well.  I miss you all a lot and am looking forward to seeing you again. It's weird to think I've been gone for 4 weeks already but that means we only have 100 weeks left till we can see each other!

Elder Mifflin

Week 3

    The native people speak so fast and combine all the words together so that makes it really hard to understand them, but I am getting to the point where I can say what I want in Spanish (for the most part)   I have yet to lose to another Elder in ping pong here.  The MTC  manager  is really good and my only competition. We always have pizza on Sundays and my district made it this last week and I am the greatest pizza maker alive. I made the best pizza i have ever eaten. It had pineapple, bacon, sweet peppers, tomatoes, onions and a couple other things haha I am just over half way done with the MTC.  We leave for the field early on the morning of the 22nd.  I hope you are all doing well and I love you all. Enjoy the dry air of Utah!

Elder Mifflin

Week 2

   Well yesterday was the two week mark for me! I still have a 102 weeks to try and learn Spanish so that's good. It's hard to be patient with the language because I hate not being able to communicate with people, but I am improving. So some news from me, those tweezers that I brought are absolutely terrible. It is not possible to pull out a hair with those things so I'm still trying to figure out how to keep myself from getting a unibrow. I'm still trying to keep my body healthy but my comp and fellow Elders  just watch me run or lift but never really join me. Whenever I run here I am literally soaked in my own sweat within just a few minutes. It makes my clothes smell really bad and because it is so humid they dont dry out for at least 2 or 3 days. The weights they have are few  but the grind never stops so I use what I can. My watch died the other day, I had a feeling I should get a new battery before I left but never got around to it. I'm sure I will be able to find a place to get a battery once I'm in the field.   We went to the park last night to try and talk to people about the gospel but everyone that walked by wouldn't  make eye contact with us. After about an hour, we were finally able to start talking to these 3 guys but as our Spanish is still very limited,  we couldn't say much to them. Fortunately, after we had been struggling for a minute one of the guys started speaking in English and we were  able to teach them some things about the church. Two of the guys didn't seem to care at all but the other one seemed pretty interested and asked a lot of questions so we gave him a Book of Mormon. We are noobs though and didn't ask him for his contact info so we will never know if he even keeps it.  I am generally enjoying my time here but I miss you all a lot and also miss my mountains very much too. 

Love you and the rest of the family! Hope all goes well for you.

Elder Mifflin