The Chronicles of Narnia

Hey Everyone,

First off, HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVE!  Only one more year till you're unleashed on the girls of Roseburg ;)  Spanish is coming along great I'm still just barely grazing its surface but I'm beginning to get the gist of what others are saying. 

There won't be a photo of the mile record.  They don't place a new record until it has stood for a week and the Saturday after I ran another missionary clocked 5:01.  I know I can beat it if I actually paced, but I don't really have the desire to.  When I focus on beating a mark it takes all my focus for several days, and that's not what I should be focusing on at the moment.  There are more important things to do.  Also, thanks mom for the package, the whole district got to enjoy it.

Alright, now on to the week.  First off, I was able to hear from Bro. Christianson (a Harvard professor of business) on Sunday.  He had suffered a stroke a year ago so his speech was stuttered and slow, but his stories were fantastic and the spirit was definitely present.  Tuesday we listened to Elder Alfonzo (member of the 70) speak.  He's from Mexico City, so the accent was pretty cool.  His wife bore her testimony completely in Spanish.  They had an interpreter translate beside her but the cool thing was my district and I could understand a fair amount of what she said before it was translated.  We felt cool.  By the way dad, I sang in the choir for that devotional.  Practice was during our temple walk time but the walk was canceled so I decided to do it.

I have a couple coincidences this week.  The first councilor to the branch president returned this week, Bro. Macdonald.  Turns out that seven months ago he had been the mission president for the Eugene, OR mission.  When I walked in to have an interview with him he immediately exclaimed, "Roseburg, OR" and we proceeded to talk about that for a fair amount of time.  Also, a new tutor visited our class this week.  His name tag read, 'Bro. Harker".  So that in itself was spooky, but to make it worse he had served his mission Spanish speaking in Calgary, AB!



The district with Bro & Sis Macdonald

One of my teachers, the one who role played my first investigator, is now acting as a new progressive investigator.  I'm loving the opportunity to just teach.  Being put on the spot helps me grasp the language faster.  This new character that my teacher is playing is a 15 yr old boy who loves soccer, so it’s been great being able to relate gospel stories with him.  Unfortunately the sisters in my district aren’t doing too well, they find it frustrating to try and connect with a teenage boy.  Also, this week we began our first visits to what’s called the TRC.  It’s where companions get to talk with volunteers from the area who are native speakers and just get to know them and teach them a brief lesson.  It's SO stinking fun!  My favorite volunteer from this week was a grandma from Salt Lake named Maria.  She was so sweet and cracked tons of jokes. 

I now feel obligated to talk about Narnia.  There’s a tradition here to try and hide knick knacks in whatever secret places you can find and call them Narnia holes.  The common ones are behind plates on the walls and in the ceiling (when the ceiling has the squares that can be lifted aside).  We've begun one in our room, packets of fun dip in the wall.  We did find the mother of all Narnias.  Two elders from our district, Howard and Long, have their own room with the removable ceiling.  If you stand on one of the bunks and look into their ceiling there are hundreds of small bottles of water, robots made from random boxes and cans, signatures, and photos of old companionships.  So now I can say I’ve been to Narnia.  I'm out of time, love y’all

Elder Harker