The First Few Days in Fresno

Hello Family,

 

First off, mom, its a rule that we can only email our families, so if you can pass this along to everyone so no one gets mad at me, that would be great. Second, 1814 N echo Avenue Fresno,California 93704 is my mail address, it goes to the mission home then we go and pick it up because we live in this thing that we call the bat cave. Its a house that is in the back yard of a members house and we have to drive in through the alley and go through a gate that we control with remote haha, its pretty ghetto looking outside, but the inside isn't bad at all. When you walk in there is one room, smaller than our family room, and then 1 bathroom and 1 bedroom. the kitchen is part of that first room. All we have in the house is 3 tables for studys, 3 chairs, an ironing board, our 3 mattresses just laying on the ground, a fridge a stove a sink a microwave, a mini bar table kind of thing and a storage shelf for food. oh and there is 2 closets, one for our close, and the other for the materials we need. So anywayyyyyyyyyyy....

 

The first day was pretty awesome. We got off the plane and met president Gelwix, he is actually not the actor, he's the real coach from the team in the movie forever strong. He is extremely nice, him and his assistants gave us hugs and he said, " You better get used to hugs, cuz this is a hugging mission." It was pretty funny, then after that we went to the mission office which turns out is also my chapel and my area... And when we got there we had lunch, ham and cheese sandwiches granola bars and chips. They were all hot from the car because its almost like az here, not as hot but close to it. Then about 12 elders came in the room and just started talking to us, and ate with us. We soon found out that it was a trap! Elder Martinez was talking to me and as soon as I finished eating he said, "Are you ready to tract?" So we went to the office got some pass along cards, some books of mormon and went to work. We got out of the car and the first house we passed a lady started talking to us... but, she was crazy. We gave her a pass along card and she said that she loves Jesus so much, and if we could give her about 40 more cards she would paste them on her table so she could always be thinking about Jesus, and if we could get her more she would put them on the outside of her house hahahah. So that was funny, and after that Elder Martinez said, I get the feeling that you are going to have a strange mission. Exactly what I want to hear my first day :)

 

So we went around for a while and all the people here in Fresno are very friendly and welcoming. Not one person turned us down to talk to them and we gave away 2 book of mormons. Luckily none of the people spoke spanish so I got away easy :). After that we went to the office again and we talked with everyone in the office about all the rules and guidelines and all that stuff. Then we went over to the Presidents house for dinner, I can't even remember what I had just cuz I was so excited to finally eat real food, I think it was chicken or something. But anyway his wife is super crazy about table ettiquite(sp?) so before we ate we went over all the rules of properly eating meals. It's difficult to do it the right way... :). So then after dinner we had a talk about all the Mission rules that the President has set for us. The most difficult ones for me are No Caffeine!!!!!! and no pink or paisley ties... I litterally have about 8 ties out of the 30 that i can wear.... its ridiculous haha. So that night we stayed the night at the Assistants house and there is 3 rooms, 1 room for the companionship and 1 is the living room with 5 bunk beds and the other is a bedroom with 4 bunkbeds. it looks pretty goofy in there. Ohhh and another mission rule is, all missionaries have to have a part in their hair.! Yayy!!!

 

So the next day we had o find our parts and all that (I have to shorten my stories cuz im running out of time) So we found our parts which was hard, i had to gel my hair 4 times! it gets easier every day though. Then we went to the office, had some driving training for those companions who are staying here. then we met our trainers. since I could leave at any time I get the privelage of having two trainers! One is Elder Corrasco, he is from riverside california, fluent in spanish and didn't have to go to the MTC he just drove 4.5 hours to fresno haha. the other is elder scoffern from Idaho. They are really nice and I love them both! So that day we were supposed to have a dinner appointment but they forgot, so there are 2 other elders in our area and they just had to pick up their dinner and the lady had extra, so my first meal was... Mole! I don't even know what it is, chicken with something...

 

So that is the story of my first two days. there isnt really a ton going on other than that. I'll have to write a letter home telling more cuz I'm out of time! I love you guys and can't wait to hear from you!

 

Love'

Elder Johnson!

I'm just emailing you to let you know that I have arrived in Fresno, and although it is super hot just like home, I'm super excited to be here. The airplane was super cramped and when we got to Fresno the president and his assistants were waiting at the terminal for us and they all hugged us. He told us that we better get used to hugs. then we got to the mission home and we met a few of the elders in the mission... then we talked and ate lunch and went and grabbed some book of mormons and pass along cards and started tracting. We talked to a lot of people, gave out 3 book of mormons and committed someone to baptism. It was incredible. Now I'm just letting you know I'm here and I'm excited. I love you guys a lot and I will let you know inormation as soon as i can. Love you a lot! 

 

Anyways I love you and can't wait to get to work and have stories for you. Oh also the people are really willing to talk. We had someone come up and ask us about Christ, it was awesome! I love you guys! Gotta go!

Change in Plans

Wednesday was a very crazy day for me at work.  The students are anxious for summer to begin, there is end of the year paperwork and procedures that need to be done, and I feel like I get a handle on things just in time for more to be handed to me.  Wednesday afternoon I was finishing up some paperwork for a parent when a storm came in.  The power glitched and wiped out everything I had just typed.  I signed back on, got started again, this time saving every other sentence I typed...the power glitched yet again.  The paperwork I was working on should have only taken 15-20 min...it ended up taking about an hour.  In the meantime I received a text from Devin with a picture attached.  The picture showed one of our trees, it had fallen down in the storm.  Luckily no damage was done to either our house or our neighbors.  As I left work with paperwork bundled in my arms trying to protect it from the pouring rain my sandal decided to break.  Then as I got in my truck to head home I realized that I had left my window cracked because the forecast said we wouldn't get any rain.  Can this day get any worse?  As I walk in the house the phone rings...I can't find it...I think to myself, "oh well if it was important they will call back".  I headed to my bedroom to charge my phone, change my clothes and breathe for a minute when my cell phone starts to ring...as I look to see who is calling it says 801-422-000 Provo Utah.  I have family that lives in Utah but the only person I know in Provo is my missionary son Elder Johnson.  Why would he be calling?  I picked up my phone and cautiously answered, "hello".  The voice on the side said, "mom"...at this point I am not sure what is going on.  Thinking to myself is everything okay, is something wrong, is he hurt or sick?  What is up?  Then he says, "I am being relocated my visa hasn't come in yet".  A sigh of relief came.  He proceeded to tell me that he only had 5 minutes to talk and to gather the family...well the family only consisted of me, Devin and McKenna at the time.  The boys and Natalie were gone.  We found out that he was being sent to Fresno California until his visa comes.  So his plans changed.  He now leaves on Wednesday May 16th and will be heading to California. 

Ironically we spent a week in the San Francisco/Santa Cruz area last summer.  Fresno is about 2 hours east of where we were at.

As soon as we have his mailing address for Fresno we will post it.

Elder Johnson is ready to be heading out of the MTC.  I think it comes with mixed emotions as he is very anxious to get to Argentina, but at the same time he is just anxious to be out and experience the real part of his mission.

My not so great day turned into a great night.  I was happy to talk to my son if it was only for 5 minutes.  I look forward to speaking with him for longer on Wednesday.

Week 8

This is it! My final week here in the MTC! I got my travel plans, and hopefully my visa will come in some time this week. My travel plans are like this... I leave Salt Lake City at 12:30 pm on the 14th then I arive at dallas texas at 4:05 pm. Then at 7:35 pm I leave Dallas texas with a 10 hour flight to Argentina arriving at 7:55. T there is a 2 hour difference from here to argentina so it won;t be too bad. I really wont know anything for sure until this friday when I know if I have my visa or not. so anyway...

 

other than that my week has gone by pretty fast, we didn't have a general authority this week, but all the devotionals were still really awesome!. I love hearing all the speakers and some of them are just so funny, and their mission stories are so inspiring. that is the biggest thing I'm going to miss is the devotionals, also all the dear elders that I have been receiving! It's going to stink to not be able to get any mail from you guyss well I can get mail but a whole two or three weeks, and it may not even all be there haha. but that will still be an interesting thing. I reallly just can not wait to get to argentina. I got my first email from my mission president today and it is getting me so excited. He has a challenge going on for reading the book of mormon in spanish by the end of june. I hope I can do it, but its going to be hard since I caj't fully understand everything I read haha.

 

So the best thing that happened this week was that me and my companion got chosen for a how to begin teaching tutorialal and what happens is that on the first day we will be demonstrating the beginning of a lesson for about 30 of the new missionaries. I'm super nervous, but I can't wait! We had our training thing for it yesterday, and one thing that stuck out to me was how President Johansen told us that we should learn on our missions that we love God more than we love ourselves. I also think that is a very important thing to have with our investigators. It is really important for our investigators to know that we love them too, and if we can get to a point where we love them more than we love ourselves, I don't think there will be any lack of trust between us, and the spirit will be able to testify so much to them, and baptism should be an easy decision for them from there.

 

So that pretty much somes up my week. Like I've said in the past, the MTC is super repetitive. I cannot wait to get out of here. I want to see how good my spanish is, and most importantly teach the gospel.

 

I love you all so much! Thank you for all your support and prayers, they all mean a lot to me! I'll be in touch again soon!

 

Love,

Elder Johnson