"Things Elder Carter Didn't Expect"

Hello again from the land of the rising sun.

Ok ready for some random assortment of things? Good because I can:t make these cohesive.

1. There is this huge family in our ward the Saito family. Basically the most amazing parents in the world! They invited us to FHE on Monday which was a blast. They are always giving us food and helping with lessons and everything. The sad part is though that the family has such a hard time. A lot of the kids have apostasized. Divorced (I don:t know how because she is the most amazing person I swear). I may bring them home. (sorry).

So this week was filled with a lot more of our getting out and talking to members but mostly the less actives. Let me tell you. I hate old records. I think out of 10 or so LAs (less actives) we tried to visit, only 1 of them still lived there. Our area book needs some work. Not horrible but kinda outdated. A lot of housing (knocking doors) this week too. Still though. The people are never home and then when they do get home they eat (which they aren:t thrilled when you interrupt) then go to sleep at like 8. Kinda cuts into our dendo (proselytizing) time. Also this week we had 2 appointments with actual investigators. One we found housing and the other was an investigator the Fukata and Cannon choro (Elders) were sick of so they handed to us. They both cancelled. Wonderful. Another interesting thing I learned this week. These Japanese people are horribly nice but they also really have a hard time expressing what they are thinking or really saying anything to us.

"Introduce our selves
Have you seen us before
No
We are here to share this message....
Silence
Have you ever thought about the purpose of life
Not really
Well this book contains the truth
Ok
Can we come visit again to share more
Eh.
What is holding you back
Nothing really."

Sigh. Not much of an exaggeration there. It will take some getting used to to figure out how to really talk to them. But at least they are ok with us talking with them (Except the man that told us he has been talked to by missionaries everyday for 61 years (If that was actually true the judgement bar could be a very scary place for him)). Anyway. This week we went and did service at this nonmembers house (not actually sure if she was a member but she drank coffee). It wasn:t very hard. Cleaning out this shed. She is rich though. Biggest house I have seen in Japan. Also when we went back to finish yesterday after we were done she took us out to eat at this super expensive place. Something like $40 a person. This is also where I learned that Japanese people LOVE fatty meat. There is more fat then meat on these pieces I swear. Another thing I didn:t expect to have to get used to.

Moving on. We had a couple role plays with members this week which are good and I think it will really help when we have real investigators. After our mission meeting with the ward mission leader on Saturday Shinno choro and I had a mogi (role play ) with him and then half way though he stops us and goes on for the next 40 minutes about how we need to change what we do and (without actually knowing this is what he was saying) go against PMG, our new New Missionary Program, and President Rasmussen. Ha. He had good intentions and Shinno choro got the brunt of it. Probably won:t mogi with him again though.

Another random thing. Whenever I introduce myself to members here they always say something along the lines of, *do you know Jimmy Carter* or *Are you related to Jimmy Carter?* I first thought it was a joke, nope, they are serious. Kinda hilarious. Just roll with it now. Lets see. So apparently my power as a foreigner isn:t as powerful as I thought. A lot of people don:t like americans apparently. One older lady told us she wasn:t going to have a *gaijin* (foreigner) come into her house. Or I will be introducing myself and I will say *I:m from america* then they just get thins look on their face and close the door. Ha. Oh well. If they have a problem with that they probably aren:t ready to make a whole lot of changes in their life.

Also something I didn:t understand before is how widespread buddhism is in their lives. They are *buddhist* but they don:t actually practice it. We were talking to one lady on the street yesterday and she said she was buddhist and we complemented her on being a faithful person (I find it strange that we do that but whatever, softens peoples hearts) and she tells us, *Well I:m Japanese, there is nothing I can do about it* Huh? You are talking to a fellow Japanese person who is not buddhist. You can do something about it. Sigh. Oh well. Lets see what else. Today is kinda a strange pday (again) we are taking a bus at 4:30 back to Sendai because tomorrow we are doing another service assignment like last week. Which brings me to another thing I didn:t expect (So this letter is become *Things Elder Carter Didn:t Expect About MIssions* sorry). Between travelling places, service, study time, ward activities, etc. There is a lot less proselyting in a mission than expected. Kinda interesting.

Partly the reason they put Shinno Choro and I here is because before the earthquake our zone was completely different and we are the only area left of that zone (although next transfer they are putting a senior couple in a more radiated area (Interesting yes)) so we are kinda like travelling missionaries for this old zone if people need us to go places we do.
Oh yeah I forgot to say. On Friday we went to Nigata for specialized training with my district from President Rasmussen which was all him pounding in our heads that we aren:t using the Book of Mormon enough in our proselyting.

On sunday because Fukata and Cannon choro had to go to Iwaki for a member, when one of there investigators came to church we took care of him. It was his first Church and Sacrament was good then we get to sunday school and what is the lesson on. The Second Coming. Doh! Poor guy was trying so hard to understand but was so confused. After we wanted to help him understand a little so we kinda went over it again and over the Plan of Salvation. He only had like 10 minutes so all I did in the lesson was testify at the end but it was kinda sorta terrifying to realize this was a real person really investigating the church.

So hopefully this letter doesn:t sound too negative. I am happy. It is frustrating but that is to be expected, especially as I:m trying to figure out this language. We have 3 scheduled lessons with investigators we found coming up this week and also the two that cancelled last week we will try again with so hopefully we can start getting some lessons under my belt. The work is moving forward. no matter how slowly it feels it is moving forward.

Love you all. Hope all is well with you. Talk to you next week.

30 Minutes in the Boonies

So I:m just going to build off of your email because I don:t have much time because people are waiting behind me so here we go and I:m sorry if things dont get answered or you feel jipped.

So yesterday we didn:t email because it was a holiday here and in japan. Also we are going to see how emails are going to work for the next little while because apparently the government doesn:t like people emailing on their library computers here so they found out about myldsmail.net and blocked it so we are at the college that doesn:t have that many computers and we are trying to figure it out so we will see in the future how emailing works. Hence, this is probably going to be short and not full of information. So this last week has been fun but tiring, also super weird from a normal week. We had members drive us to Koriyama to watch conference on saturday and sunday (they show it a week late here) so that was fun. They had it in english in the attic of the church (I just forgot what church was in English, thats a good sign right?) so that was awesome. One of the members for some reason watched it with me and Elder Cannon the other foreigner in my apartment. What a wonderful conference. Cool experience. Between sessions Shinno choro wanted to street contact for like 30 minutes. I thought it was a waste of time because this area is 2 hours away from where we live, missionaries dont proselyte there, and its 30 minutes and we are kinda in the boonies, whatever though. He is my trainer I must obey him. So we walk like 50 feet down the road we talk to one college student and 3 minutes later I:m sitting across from him in the church teaching an overview of the first lesson. What?! Ha. I don:t think he was actually super interested but it was fun nevertheless although I still didn:t even say much at all to him because the whole language barrier. Nevertheless we left him with the information of the branch president there and all that and that was that. I don:t know if I told you this but Shinno choro and I are white washing here, aka he is new to this area too so we have no where to start from. I feel like a politician at times. We bike an hour up this huge hill to talk to one member and say, *if you need anything call us* and knocking tons of doors and talking to everyone on the street. Kinda nuts and feels like we are just beating our heads against the wall at times. However we do have two lessons scheduled this week so that shall be fun. Oh and the people here are a little more not so nice as the sendai people. Not mean to Americas standards but they don:t have a problem yelling at us. Also they go to sleep at like 8 so that kinda ruins dendo (proselyting) time for us. Moving on. I:m not entirely sure what kinda coat I need so sending a picture or something would be cool because I:m sort of completely confused about it.

Oh, yesterday I lived through my first earthquake. Pretty cool. Actually it was super erie and we were in a role play and half way through the earthquake (because it doesn:t really phase these people) Shinno choro turns to me and says, *Wait, have you ever been in an earthquake?* Ha. Kinda funny, not very big at all but interesting.

So as you probably saw from my bank account kinda got a big hit yesterday of my electronic dictionary. Your nerd son has a new computer! Actually its super frustrating to use and I:m a tad disappointed with its ease of use but oh well, I shall learn, also I hope I didn:t waste my money with the one I bought, there was actually a lot cheaper one but It worried me.

Final nonquestion thing. Japanese kids are the CUTEST!!!! Ok so little Atreyu beats them but man do they get close. I don:t know what it is about them. Man!


Love you. Hope all is well at home. I shall pray that Apple can stay on the straight and narrow without good old steve. Until next week (lets hope)

First day of service

So much for this black hole I:m suppose to fall in (just so you know for the next two years I will only be using `:` in place of apostrophes because that is how their keyboard is set up here). Anyway. Yeah so Shinno choro didn:t get a chance to email on Monday which would normally be his p-day and there was some things we had to get done here, so we got the assistants to ok us having another p-day today. Anyway! Wow this is an adventure!

So Monday night as I said we had our mogi with the member and that was interesting. He lived in Hawaii for a while so he is really good at english so when I gave him a weird look he would say it in English. Anyway. Sendai is SO big and we are in the outskirts! Holy cow. I won:t lie there are times I have never felt so alone. But I got through with that. We had my first really japanese dinner which I:m not sure what it was, other than rice I:m not sure of anything I ate so far. Not actually bad though. God has blessed my taste buds.

Um the next morning we woke early and got on a bus to go do service. It was nice seeing so many other gaijins (foreigners) until they opened their mouths and sounded like japanese people. Someday I shall be there....I hope. Anyway. It was few hour drive to who knows where somewhere near the coast. I just have to say, this country is BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!! You have no idea. My goodness. I love not being in the city here. Rice fields, rolling green hills, the bomb! Anyway, we got this guy that is a volunteer that helps run all the service activities (something I didn:t know, at least our activities of Helping Hands the church doesn:t plan. We just give labor to random people that others figure out). Anyway, not quite as hard hitting as some other the stories I have heard of previous service by some of the missionaries that have been hear since before the tsunami. But it was nice to pull weeds and pick up debris from what used to be this man:s house (something super cool is that they seem to always have someone there that it directly affects to kinda help run what they want to see what happens). So we finished there, went to another area did some more work right on the coast which was again beautiful but super depressing because this time we were surrounded by stacked up cars and all that jazz. That pretty much filled up the day. It was nice to be there nice to see some missionary work in action.

We got back with about an hour before we were suppose to be home so Shinno choro decided (as he should have) that we needed to do my first dendo (proselyting) so we walked out the door and started knocking doors. I have never been so close to puking in my life and all I had to do was stand there and smile (literally the words from Shinno choro:s mouth). Anyway. We stopped a few people on the street and it was amazing. All Shinno choro said was, Do you have a second? And they are so super gracious and stop and are actually super interested in what you have to say even if they aren:t interested in the gospel.

Also something we almost push more than getting peoples contact information for teaching them is inviting them to ekiawa (english class). It:s interesting how much that is being pushed. Not to say all the doors answered we good. One man wouldn:t open the door so we talked to him through the door and pushed flyers through his maildrop. Another older man open his door and he was pretty ticked, I don:t know quite what he said but he seemed to be bugged that it was so late and he couldn:t walk very good and we made him come to the door. I just wanted to say sorry and walk off but good old trainer of mine stuck with it and I literally saw this man:s heart change in a matter of two minutes of talking. By the end he was expressing his worry for us to be out late and told us not to stand so close to doors or we would get stabbed (kind of a little much I think) and when we left he wanted to make sure we got safely out of the complex. These people! I tell you. I love americans but man we are kinda huge jerks compared to these people! Anyway.

This morning we got on a bus and came to Aizu for the first time. The apartment is......quaint? Definitely a missionary apartment. Then we went and applied for my 'gaijin kado' (foreigner registration). Now email. Maybe after this go to get a coat. Maybe that will come next week but don:t worry about ordering me a coat. Also we need to go get me a electronic dictionary sometime because I need all the help I can get. They already bought my bike for me so I:m not sure how the whole paying back thing works. Its kinda weird. When you transfer here they ship you stuff (two luggage and bike) to your new area so right now I:m living out of my backpack until all that stuff shows up and I didn:t really preapare for that so yeah, kinda living on the edge right now.

Anyway. I'm good. I won:t lie though. This is the hardest mental\emotional thing I have done in my life by a long shot. Not being able to understand the majority of what people are saying. Not knowing what you would say even if you knew how to say it. Not knowing anyone. Not being able to understand you companion 50-60% of the time. Unfamiliar people, food, environment, living constantly confused. Scared to death. I hope all this passes soon. Anyway, think I:m almost out of time. I:m helping teach the eikiwa tonight (have no idea what that means or how to do as with everything I have been doing since I left the MTC). Then tomorrow is our first real day of dendo (probably should learn/translate that word on the blog because I:m going to use it a lot I feel) then the weekend will be filled with general conference so not a whole lot of dendo then and I:m not sure how that is going to work either. I wake up at 6:30, go to bed at 10:30 and what I do in between I have no idea until I:m doing it. Oh and yes we are doing the 12 week infield training here, haven:t actually started but yeah we will be doing it. Um. Yep. Lots to say but that shall do. Love you. Oh and tell mandy that my companion is 23, loves americans, especially mormons, and says for his language study he would like to practice writing her letters........he:s my trainer, I have to let him do whatever he wants. ;-)

I arrived!

My goodness it hass been a long few days but oh has it been worth it. So quick run of things. As you would have expected since I am writing this email now, I did eventually make it to this place. The flights went well. Its funny to see all of the random members on my flights and in LAX that would run me down seeing my name tag and talk to me. I`ll be perfectly honest, I was kinda surprised with the flight over from LAX to Tokyo. It wasn`t that bad. I slept for a few hours but not a whole lot. Studied some (personal and language study). All that good stuff. Lets see. Landing and getting out of the airport was possibly the most terrifying thing of my life (well I thought). However I was not detained by customs or any of that and it actually almost felt like there was no security at all. After wandering Narita for about 30 minutes I finally found my bus and was off to the airport. You truly learn the bare minimum with these people of how to talk. However all went there well. Anyway. It was pretty lonely but super nice and I felt super weird being alone. Woke up the next morning went to the domestic terminal which had no english speakers it seemed. Got on this tiny plane. Finally built up the courage to talk to the person next to me on the plane (happened to be the one american) and he snorted, looked at my nametag, and then went back to his newspaper! Yep, I`m on a mission. Ha. Anyway. Landed and go to get my luggage and I see them! President Rasmussen, his wife, and the assistants to the president. I`ve never been so excited to see people in suits in my life! We took a picture there.

Talked about some of the devastation and then took about a 30 minute ride back to the Homebu (mission home). It was kinda funny. Instead of him telling me to speak japanese he was having his assistant practice his English on me. It was a pretty fun trip ending up with the assistants (1 nihonjin and 1 raised by nihonjin) convincing the president to try nato (fermented soybeans) which means I got to try them. Oh joy. It actually wasn't bad. We had dinner with all these people and my new doryo! I think you may have been sent a picture of him. He is a native. His English is good. Not perfect but very good. He is basically one of the coolest Elders I have ever met. He is always so happy and telling a joke but also is really into the work (well it seems that way at least we haven:t really done anything yet). Anyway. Some fun stuff.

Gotta keep it short because we are biking to our first appointment a mogi (roll play with a member) in a few minutes! Talk about baptism by fire! Tomorrow we do service in the morning and then head to my area. The area is named Aizuwakamatsu. Famous for ramen (noodles (also my doryo is a self proclaimed expert of ramen so that is even cooler!)) Anyway, our p-days are Mondays so probably won:t hear from me until then but yeah. I'm alive. This place is crazy but I'm super excited. Love you all and peace out.

Elder Carter

Leaving on a Jet Plane (for real)

So what a week! Feels like my last email to you was a month ago but alas it was not. It has gone quite different from what I expected it to go. I really was more bummed than anything last week but I figured I have been at the MTC for 12 weeks a few more weeks wouldn't bug me it would just be a waste of time. So Monday comes rolling around and I go to breakfast with my boys from my district and then everything got set in motion by the zone leaders. There was a lot of running around getting things switched, no one knew what was going on, the zone leaders (been zone leaders for all of a week) were basically just making it up as they go which after all this is said and done I missed saying goodbye to the people in my residence hall which kinda bugs me a lot but oh well. Alas (I really like that word today for some reason) everything got switched.

I was to room with one of our Kohai that was suppose to leave with my group but because he is not a U.S. citizen his visa paperwork was more complicated than they expected. However we also have another kohai that pretty much only speaks Korean and (some) Japanese so they didn't want me to be companions with them so I broke up a tri-panionship in one of the kohai districts. So (drum roll) Elder Zambarippa has been my companion for the last few days. He's a pretty big (read well built) elder, from Texas (and he makes sure you know it), and well actually a lot like Elder Clayton to be honest at times except a little more loud and.........he's just one of those kids people kind of ignore because he always has some kind of weird comment. A little sad but how it goes.

So yeah got put into a new district. I was a little bummed because I was kinda hoping I would get Whetto/Smith Shimai as my teacher again but didn't work out that way but I do visit her every once in awhile to say hi. The senseis have been awesome support the last few days. (Random Sidenote: Instead of saying goodbye to me when I end conversations with people a lot of people have been saying, "Well I hope I never see you again" kinda sad but I find it funny and their intentions are good). Anyway, the new district has two shimai (sisters) which is a new experience, and a New Zealander! Ha. He's pretty fun to mess with but yeah good stuff. Definitely a lot different than my previous district but they have been extremely nice to me. Something I didn't expect is how much I have learned in the last 6 weeks apparently. I got into that class and I felt kinda super smart. I really didn't think I had learned that much since the kohai got here. Whenever the senseis ask questions and no one answers they just turn to me and ask me now (granted if I didn't know these things I would be a failure). Also is fun to act like a sensei with them when I don't want the class to hear stuff I'm saying to the sensei (not that its very secretive) we just talk in Japanese with each other. Anyway. Good stuff.

So now about this whole hearing thing. Not sure what to think about it. Currently I'm more annoyed by the medicine than the actual hearing loss to be honest. Everything felt fine and dandy until I started taking the medicine but when I told the doc he just kinda nodded with the, "Well that is expected" look on his face and its not quite as bad now either because of the decreased dosage or possibly because I think a lot of the not feeling good healthwise was stress related and my stress level I think has dropped significantly since Wednesday night. But as you said mom that Uncle Scott said, brains are pretty amazing little things. I really can't notice it at all until my right ear is blocked or something is close and quiet to my left ear. Which brings me to your thought father. I have thought a lot about Christ as he ministered to the people and healed all sorts of crazy stuff and how hearing would be such an easy thing for him and as his representative you would think he would be all over helping me physically so that I can focus on the spiritual aspects of this work.

It is actually freakish how many injured people are in the MTC, spending a bunch of time in the health clinic you see all sorts of crazy stuff. Yes there is a lot of 19 year old boys doing stupid stuff and getting themselves hurt but also a lot like me, randomly get sick or have something go wrong with them. A lot of pondering on the "Why?" (hopefully this isn't bad, don't want to be questioning God's ways but I am always interested in what I'm suppose to get from it.) And to be honest that is about as far as I have got into figuring it all out. I don't know, I don't know why this happened, I don't know how its going to really affect my future, I don't know what the future of my hearing holds, but to steal the jist of a scripture shared by a Sister Carter, "I know God loves his children but I don't understand all things"

All this being said don't worry about me. Kinda took me off guard when I called you Wednesday night and you weren't all giddy excited ha, hadn't really thought that you would already know (although Dr. Robbins did say he would call). My train of thought went something along the lines of, "Why is she not happy? Oh yeah I still can't hear.....that kinda does stink doesn't it?" I guess the happy news just kinda blew the bad news out of mind.

Anyway, I will try to follow your rules and advice with airports really good. President Bird said the Narita airport I won't have to use a lick of Japanese to get through so that is comforting. I got my phone card, and I will send the package today. The coat does worry me too but not much I can do about that at this point so yeah.

Not that this means anything to you but I figure this will be fun, here is part of my testimony in Japanese.

私輪この居会話真実だとしています。いえすきりすとがわたしたちのあがないぬしっと救い主だとしています。ジョセフスミス輪神様の預言者だったとしています。この巨魁によって私たちが幸せにあることができるとしています。いえすきりすとのみんあによっておあかしします。

Ok so that took more time then I thought, I promise my testimony is longer than that. Love you guys, excited to talk with you (again ) on saturday morning. Until then.

Kyle's Medical Update

Here is a little bit of an explanation on Kyle's medical status (before reading Kyle's latest letter). He will not be leaving for Japan as planned on Monday (tomorrow). He has lost 40% of the hearing in his left ear. It happened suddenly about 2 weeks ago. The diagnosis is Sudden Sensioneural Hearing Loss. I talked to the Dr. on Wednesday and he said that there is a 50/50 chance that the loss will be permanent. Right now Kyle is on a 7 day treatment of Prednisone. He will go back to the Dr. on Wednesday next week to be re-evaluated. If there is improvement, he will be cleared to leave for Japan as soon as they can arrange it. I have no clue how long that arrangement would take. If there is no improvement, the doctor will either decide to put him on another 7 days of prednisone, or assume the hearing is lost, and clear him for Japan. If at his 7 day evaluation things look worse, the doctor will schedule him for an MRI to see if there is some tumor or growth causing the problems. This would probably delay him a while. But the doctor assured me that this is only a 1% chance and didn't seem to think that would happen.

So things are up in the air right now. Kyle was very sad and disappointed on Wednesday, because he was on fire and ready to go with his district to Japan and get started! So that was hard for him to swallow. But as you can see from his letter, he has accepted it, and is doing fine. It will be hard to see his buddies leave tomorrow, but hopefully he won't be too far behind them.

We will be fasting for him on Tuesday if any of you would like to join us.

Thanks for you support and love,
Steph

No matter how long and hard the road

Hey Peeps.

Well this letter was suppose to be much more exciting but as you are fully aware not really. So hopefully that won't be what this whole email is about but we shall see.

Something kinda random and cool this week is guess who came to our Tuesday devotional to speak? Richard G. Scott! Apostle #3! These little Kohai are getting spoiled! Ohwell we get the benefit of their luckiness So that was kind of cool. He talked all about the special Book of Mormon issue of the Ensign. It was like just sitting at the feet of an apostle and having a scripture study with him! It was pretty intense and cool.

I think the BBC was last Saturday but if I have talked about this before oh well. It was pretty chillaxed. They came in with cameras for the 10 minutes. Interviewed our current district president (Henderson Choro) and previous district president (Beckstrand Choro). Then we had a sub for it so that was funny because (although this probably will take more explaining then I will give it to make sense) our other teacher wrote the "text book" (More like pamplet) that we learn a lot of language from and is really the only thing we learn in class from. Anyway he is super proud of it calling it "The best language resource ever" and on resumes he says he wrote the "Main textbook for the largest private language institution in the world" Kinda decietful. Anyway while the cameras are on her (our sub) she goes and rips into every problem that was on the page (ok rips into is wrong but she points them all out because of course they are mistakes and she doesn't want us to make them (oh and she did this in Japanese so probably no one will understand that that is what she is doing)) Anyway I thought it was funny, probably isn't.

Well I guess I can get to the "fun" stuff. So as you know my Wednesday was not the funnest thing in the world. Starting out going to the Audiologist at 8:30 and probably not until 2 or 3 finally finishing everything. The audiologist was interesting. It was alaso interesting just to be out in the world trying to avoid watching TV and listening to real music. Even saw one of my senseis working there because she is going to nursing school. Went through this crazy sound both test which I kind of failed but I won't lie apparently I understood 88% percent of what she said into my left ear and 98% in my right so I actually thought that was pretty good even though in real life it isn't that way. And then more machines stuck into my ears which actually one of them vindicated me because without having to ask me anthing it said there was something messed up. I won't lie I was starting to think it was all in my head but the machine doesn't lie (still don't know what that machine was testing though) Then the next machine I was praying would of failed (I didn't actually understand its purpose until after) but basically said behind my ears was dry therefore probably the SSNL (I think that is what it is called). Came back and went to get my next appointment. They scheduled it for Monday at which time I told her I was suppose to leave Monday so she got it for an hour or two later but then got this look in her eyes and pulled out this special pad of paper that said "Missionary Phone Pass" and handed it to me with the reassuring comment, "Your probably going to need this" Which I won't lie it is quite the coveted thing in this place. While I was waiting at the doctors office one of the outside doctors called and you could tell he wanted to talk to the missionary and got the wonderful response of, "He's a missionary, he isn't allowed to use this phone" Anyway, get to this doctor sit FOREVER!!!! Although he did have Ensign magazines so I could read something. Then he comes in, we talk missions for maybe 5 minutes seeing as he went to Sapporo then he looks in my ears (for about the 50th time by someone) and then just turns to me and says, "Well there isn't much we can do about this like draining it because there is no liquid. Normally I would put you on these drugs and have you come back in a week but you are suppose to leave so...........well actually I'm going to suggest you date gets pushed back and you come back in a week" I had entertained this thought because it was so close to the end but still I thought it was more of a nightmare. Anyway the next few hours were between getting drugs, talking to MTC doctors about the official stance of the church and them sending me (I didn't really like that doctor, he was kinda a jerk telling me to have patience because after 45 minutes of waiting in a room he still hadn't come to visit. And when he finally did come in and he ask me what the coctor said and I told him he said, "Well I doubt that" then after talking to the doctor told me to stop being a downer (I thought I was doing fine). Anyway, then to the MTC Distcit Presdent get get all my stuff handled (which is kinda nice because there are lot of people to contact). Then calling you guys which was super weird to hear your voice mom. Also you are probably sick of all these kids on missions. Also, I was doing perfecting fine until you had to go and say it was a bummer. ;-) I guess it was good to hear your voices still even under crappy circumstances. And then going back to my district and sharing the news. Most my zone doesn't even know and probably never will (well except the Kohai). Sidenote: Elder Clayton is the bomb for dealing with me all of that day, we missed so super cool things that both of us wanted to go to and he just had to be there because he was my companion. Anyway, that is the experience of Elder Carter's view.

So where does that put me. Well as you would suspect there has been a lot of thinking over the last few days about why I am here. Also I can testify that Satan really loves to attack God's missionaries. Its been hard but there are a few thoughts that have stuck with me. 1. The name of Dad's favorite talk: No matter how long and hard the road, not sure if the content actually applies but I haven't read it for quite some time but just seems fitting. The road is still leading to the same place that being a mission and really that is what matters. 2. Mom's little saying, "This too shall pass" easy to see how this fits. 3. Elder Clayton upon me finishing my call with you shard D&C 121:7 with me that this was just a "small moment" and the Lord was till there. 4. The thought, "No one owes me a mission" If I needed to be out there God would make me a way to be out there. He is aware of me and this is his work so I will do all I can to prepare my body and spirit even better in the coming week or so to do his work. Anyway, the story took more time then expected so I'm kinda out of time today. Maybe I will write you a letter also but I'm not sure what it would include. Today is a whole day of p-day for packing yesterday we had our second to last pep talk all day about missionary work.

Thanks for the doughnuts
Hope your trip went well
I will try to talk to my Branch President about a blessing.

Love you all. Please don't worry about me, I am fine.