A very short P day email with lots and lots of spelling, capitalization, and punctuation errors

hello!

Ok well my room is not in the same building as the gym. it is the one right across from the gym enterince 17M is the building name. i will have to send some clips of me speaking spanish. And yes i feel very settled in at the MTC and i have walked the same routes 100s of times. I have not had to speak in sacrament yet but i did give a prayer in spanish. My MTC branch is now 18people big but tomorrow we are getting a new district of 11 so we are getting more. And no those are not my snacks, they are the snacks of the elder who desk is connected to mine. The store sells lots of stuff but at a small selection. church books, bathroom stuff, snacks, paper pencils envolops and what not. Thats cool that elder w___ gets to learn a new language. it will be crazy to see how fast he picks it up. how is everything at home.

[Mother's note: It seems to me that with the increase in Spanish language ability comes the decrease of facility with the English language.  Seriously, "envolops?"]

Pictures!

So this past week has been pretty great. Last Tuesday during devotional I got to hear from Bro Don Clark of the 70. He talked about loving the people you teach and not letting anyone elses actions determine my mission for me. I am really excited to go to Mexico and meet the families that I am going to teach and love. I also got to do sealings in the Provo Temple. It was really cool. Never done sealings before.

So because as a missionary there isn't a whole lot of communication to the outside world, falso rumors spread fast. Someone tried to convince some people that Lady Gaga had died and because no one could just flip out their phone and get on the internet to prove it wrong, a lot of people started to believe it was true.

Through out this week my companion and I have been teaching this guy who speaks little english, about the Gospel. We think we did a pretty good job. Well as it turns out, that guy we were trying to teach "Francisco" is our new teacher. Harmano Mead (Mead rhymes with feed) and yes he speaks great english. He grew up in Utah and went on a mission to Chile. All the teachers working here go to either BYU or UVU. THey are all really cool, but Hermano Mead has a way of getting us all excited to learn. He also has a lot of funny mission stories.

On Sunday I got to give the closing pray in Sacrament meeting, in spanish. My branch pres name is Pres Claybaugh and he is a pretty great guy. He gave a priesthood lesson about the power and importance of the Book of Mormon.

Later on Sunday we had a fireside and Pres Brown (MTC pres) talked about being a successful missionary. It was really good My favorite part of the fireside though is when all the missionarys sing Called to Serve.

 Yesterday I ran into Brother and Sister Kay in the MTC cafe. They are doing a couples mission in Texas. It was fun seeing and talking with them. There also seems to be a lot of problems with getting missioaryes their visa into Mexico. Everyone I know is getting reassigned to a state side mission until visas go through. Luckily I still have a while for all that to clear up. I really hope I don't have any visa trouble. Well that's all I'm going to write today.

EJ and his companion

EJ and and Elder G who is from our ward, and assigned to serve in Singapore

heading to the temple

breakfast

in class

laundry/computer facility

Really short email

[Mother's explanation first: I sent him an email with a list of 5 questions:

1. Do you study out of Spanish scriptures?

2. Did you get Spanish scriptures?

3. Did you get a Spanish Preach My Gospel?
4. Do you have to try to speak Spanish with your district even when you're not in class?

5. Do you get to go outside ever?]

 

Elder Jimmy's answer in a very short email he sent on P day:

Yes to all those question except the first. I still dont know quite a lot of spanish so reading the scriptures is still hard. Instead i study from the english ones and if i find a verse to use in a talk or a lesson then i just look it up in the spanish one and read it. So for sacrament meeting i said the prayer in spanish. I was a bit nervous. So i ran into Bro and Sis Kay (the older couple) here at the mtc. they are going to texas.

Well got to go, Love you.

One week under his missionary belt

2-14-12
Hola familia

So this past week has been great. The first few days were pretty tough and slow but now that Sunday has gone by time is going by a lot faster and I'm enjoying it here.

1. My roommate's name is Elder Bryce
2. He's from Mesa AZ
3. My first day took forever but now that I have a regular schedule it's a lot better.
4. I would like you to send me my shower brush (the one that was in the downstairs shower) or by a new one at Walmart cause that one isn't very good any more. Wooden, long handle, bristle brush.
5. I can say some simple things in Spanish and I can pray and bear testimony in Spanish.

So I've run into Ethan, Erik, Jace Saunders, and Rissa's adopted brother. They are all having a great time here. Rissa's brother is going to Provo UT. I am all moved in btw. I have taken a few pics and I will send them when I take some more. So mail here is like gold to everyone. One of the best times of the day is when we get mail.

I'm slowly learning Spanish. I can pray and bear testimony in Spanish. We (me & E. Bryce) are teaching this "investigator" Fransisco. We have to teach him in Spanish cause he knows no english. The first lesson was only 3 days into the MTC and as of know [now] we have taught him three times. It's tough because I only understand bits and pieces of what he says and I barely know how to answer back.

So on to another topic. I have the loudest alarm clock in the room and it wakes everyone up. Every Sunday I have to prepare a talk in Spanish because the speakers are choosen during Sacrament announcements. 8 in my district. 4 of us going to Tijuana and 4 going to Culiacan (cool-y-a-con) Mexico. The Culiacan mission takes the bottom of the Baja Paninsula and across the Gulf on the mainland. There are about 2088 missionaries at the MTC ~1500 of which are going Spanish speaking. There are about 50 or so languages being taught here.

So far I have gotten those 2 dear elders from home, a letter from Katie, and I got a package from the Greenhalghs saying thanks for helping Peter with his project.

So what's going on at home? Oh and do you think you could download all my pictures from my laptop onto a flashdrive or something and send it to me? I didn't bring any pics from home and I can just use the machine here to print off pictures. Idk if it has to be on a SD card or if I can use a flashdrive. OK well it's time for me to go.

Love, Elder James Evans

First Day

2/9/12 (in the morning)

Dear mi familia,
So the MTC is pretty cool. Missionary life is definitely different. I'm not used to having to have someone with me everywhere I go. I can't just run somewhere, grab something, and come back. I need him to come with me. My companion is Elder Bryce. He doesn't talk much, knows less Spanish then me [Sara's note: I will not be editing for grammar and spelling if I can help it just because I don't want to insert myself into his letters], and he lived in AZ. The food here is alright, so far at least. I don't think I will have to worry too much about overeating.

12:00 noon
OK, just had my immunization records looked at and at first they said I need a flu shot so they sent me in a room to get it. Then I looked over my records and found that I did have one already so I showed them and didn't have to get the shot but I still got juice and cookies so I didn't mind the mess up. I also had gym and a class where we went over how we should feel toward everyone and want to invite them to come to Christ. Oh and for gym I only get 50 minutes but that's fine. I'll just spend it running/jogging. Going to go have lunch soon but I'm not hungry so I think I will just have some juice or a fruit or see if they serve veggies here.

2:05
So I ran into Jace Saunders! He's been here for 2 weeks and is loving it. He's going to Tialand. I have still yet to run into Ethan or Erik. Well I think I'm going to just send this letter off now.

PS I need to work on my signature for "Elder Evans"

[Sara's note: I believe "Tialand" is Jimmy-spelling of "Thailand"]

MTC address

So you want to write a letter to EJ, but don't know the correct magic words to write on the outside of the envelope so that the letter will apparate into his hands?

Fear not! I have the magic words!  They will only last for 2 months, though so use them NOW before they expire.

Elder James Warner Evans IV
MTC Mailbox # 262
MEX-TIJ 0410
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793