July 13th email

So everyone that reads the blog knows officially... I don't ever go to the blog but it's nice to have you forward their comments to me! (I will forward any comments made on the blog to Brit and as you see she enjoys them) We got a warning today in email from the president because lots of people are breaking the email rule, going to other cites and such so we might lose the ability to email... pray for obedience in this mission so all the Americans will still get to email their families :) For now however, here is my weekly email again. (only having met Jodi’s husband once Wendy and I couldn’t remember who the Sparks were until Brit helped us out) You know Jodi Sparks (Hansen) from the rental house on Antelope ward. I think the last time you saw her was at a concert at the High School right after they got engaged. (Wendy and I went to Great Harvest Saturday morning prior to hiking the Bonneville trail above Ogden and told Brit about it) Great Harvest Bread sounds wonderful. They didn't have scones at the great harvest in Provo -- it was sad. Sharing a car and being roommates would be great (minus having no money for those high gas prices) but Savanna will need to decide to go to Provo before that idea will really work :) Try subliminal message maybe to help her make that decision, haha. I finally sent off a letter so you should be getting more pictures. There are some included that I only have one copy of because someone else took the picture so make sure to save them for me :) Who knows what will happen with me and school -- work first I suppose so hopefully I find a good job :) Good luck with your school and work plans for now. Maybe I'll just write a book and make tons of money off it (like we've plannedsince I was five or something) and then we can both live off that while we pursue our true dreams and help people along the way. The problem with me writing a book is it would be the type that would be rejected by my own and become a classic long after I die :) I think that's just my style, not really a pop culture person - fast and flashy etc. teehee. So, hopefully my problem with the card can be resolved because in my new area there aren't really stores that accept a card so I need the ATM to work. I will send you the numbers this week, I finally remembered to write them down...so you can try to activate it or whatever the problem is. Shawn's question will take more writing and thinking -- about the culture and what they do every day and what they really care about. I am excited to learn their language better so as to understand that very thing. It's amazing how much culture really is within a language and here every small area of every city has its own "language" the dialects are hundreds and I wonder how anyone everunderstand what's going on. Something I found interesting though... we ride jeeps everywhere and you all sit on the benches, packed in and everyone passes their money forward and the driver passes the change back etc. and you say "Bayad Po" first and sometimes where you're going or how many you are paying for. Then you say "Paki-abot" and everyone passes...that means please pass then as you pass others money you say "Bayad Daw" and Daw is a word thatmeans "That's what was said, that's what they said, it was said" then to stop you say "Para na po!" Para is really a Spanish word that means For and they use it the same in Tagalog except on the jeep it means to stop. All right, so this is something you pick up and begin to mimic etc. and the other day I saw a group of little girls playing "jeep" and one was the driver and the others were saying "Bayad po' Salamat (thank you) para na! etc. it was so intriguing to me because I realized I was learning just like them, but as children it was a game until when they get older it becomes what they due, culture passes on and they will forever pass the money that way and stop the jeep that way because the children see their parents do it and they play at it until one day they grow up and they do it too... Anyway that's a thought for the day. I still haven't read your other email so I'm going to move on to that now. Love, Brit

Hey - I just realized there aren't actually two emails but you just sent the one twice so I guess I'll write some more here. Actually -- I don't know what else to write at this point so just I love you and am trying to do my very best. I recently read Mosiah 3 again -- it is an amazing chapter on the atonement. It's funny to me how my studies always tend to get me really anxious to do more study! I love to find more and read and hear different ideas on a topic and relate one thing to another. One speaker at the MTC gave a talk on the atonement and he said "the burden of the scriptures is the atonement" and as I read through the Book of Mormon again that statement becomes more and more true -- it will take a lifetime and then some to come to understand it fully but I love to study and apply that topic to my life and help others do so also. This was definitely the mission for me though because I get to teach people very simply and suddenly the beautiful simplicity of the doctrine has been brought to me -- I like to concentrate on the complexities of things but I've learned to notice and teach the basics and realized how personal deeper study benefits us -- it's still necessary to continue our personal growth but it's something you must do entirely on your own and choose to do so. I think we're leaving now so I guess I'll end now - bye! Love, Brit