The Adventure!

July 22, 2013

This week has been dubbed "The adventure!" because, of how it went.

Monday last, we found a driving range $2 for a bucket of balls with free clubs we could use. That's exciting. I'm also planning on buying some authentic mocasins today!

Tuesday: There's an older couple we've befriended. They took us out to breakfast on Tuesday, showed us a few things to do around Cobalt. Then, we took the 100 Kilometer drive north to Kirkland Lake. Met our host family. (They lived in their house, but they owned three spare apartments above their store that they let us stay in. This is important later.) Met with a lot of members who struggle to come to church because of the distance. Went home. At home, had a phone call with the District leader, mentioned in passing where we were. He told us that we should probably get that approved.... Crap. We just assumed it would be okay because our first night here we stayed with a member.

Wednesday: visited a lot of other members. Went to visit Ralph in Larder Lake. (Ralph has been investigating the church since January, is getting baptized on Saturday. We figured since the branch has been working with him for so long we'd just let them finish him off) On the way there we stopped in a town called Dobie to visit a member. She wasn't home, so we decided to try to tract the whole town in two hours since we had time to kill. We weren't able to because people stopped us to talk to us. Plus, they want us to come back so they can hear what we're preaching.

On the way home we saw a BLACK BEAR! Running off into the forest! Way cool, still gotta see a moose, but we have some good leads on where to go for that.

Because there was no one in the apartment we were staying in except us, we got it approved so we can go up there basically whenever we want. We are now the only missionaries with two apartments! haha.

Thursday, more member visits. Pretty boring

Friday: Tracted here local. Caught Three birds (the finger not the animal) and two F#$% off's. Bad day.

Saturday: Went to a town called Elk Lake, tracted about 1/3 of it. Massive headache. (Those have been happening a lot since I got here...) Then we went home to visit a less active named Shannon, who is close to coming back. Her non-member brother Matt and his less active friend Darby. They all said they would come. They all didn't.

Sunday, worked in cobalt. Another headache. Went to shannons to borrow some ibu. Didn't mention church. It's easier to catch flies with a cake than a club.

That's my life. Hope all ya'll's is doing well!

Love,

Elder T

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The Convent, or "Get thee to a Nunnery!"

July 15

So, it turns out, we live in what used to be a convent. At least, that's what the members tell us. 

 

I mean, it makes sense. It's right next door to a catholic cathedral. Anyways.

 

This week has been rough, not as bad as it has been in the past, but it feels like there's a weight pulling me back all the time... I miss you all, I miss home, there's so little people and so little to do here that you get a lot of time to just think, it's not good for me... Saturday we walked across a bridge a couple of times and I was very tempted to jump over and into the water. Just to try to escape for a minute. Good thing I have a brain and know that it wouldn't help, and it would just create more problems than I wanted to deal with.

 

So, This next week is "The adventure!" (that's what we're calling our week long road trip to the outskirts.) I'm really hoping that we can get something good out of it, not as much as I'm hoping we don't spend Wednesday night in a car lol. (We won't).

 

So, in Canada, there are a lot of moose. This week, we had quite a bit of moose meat. 

 

That is moose hamburger, we had it with spaghetti.

 

Also, you may recall that we found an awesome yard sale and got all of our furniture for 20$ well. Turns out that the mission ordered our stuff before we even got here. But we didn't know. So, if anyone knows someone who needs a kitchen table or dresser, I got one. Jokes.

 

 

 

Also, we got bunk beds! and three mattresses each. Don't worry, we only use two of them, the first night, I jumped up and hit my face on the bottom of the top bunk, so that ended that.

 

Other than that, not a lot has happened. Here's hoping we have more stories next week, I think we will.

 

Love you all!

 

Love,

Elder T

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Hippie Week

July 29

So, this week was fun. Just kinda one of those, let the stress go and just work weeks.

Had interviews with mission president. Talked about what our next step here is, basically it sounds like missionaries here are going to be like 6 weeks on 6 weeks off. so, we were told not to waste any time. No pressure right?

dad always says that I'm a better worker when it is something that I'm excited about. Well, there's a few towns about 100 k's to the north of here. Really, if I think about it. Next to no missionary work has been done up there. Maybe like 20 days total. So, Elder Jones and I have decided that we are going to start a branch up there.

Step one, is to start what's called a group which is really just a step below a branch. There's around 20 members that already live up there. (including the one that was baptized on Saturday) So, really we just have to get them to come. Once we get that rolling, we can spend a lot more time up there, there's a lot of prepared people, bring them to the group, then they can be baptized. Then the group can become a branch!

The reason this is so exciting for me is because the branch president told us that Elder Ballard prophesied that there would be a stake center here in Temiskaming. No pressure right? So, that put some fire under our feet and we want to get this thing rolling. Maybe, we won't be here for the stake center, but we can definitely do a good job getting this place ready for a second branch. 

Also, we had a baptism on Saturday, not sure I mentioned that, this guy has been being taught since January, his wife was inactive for like 30 years and then just up and decided to come back to church. So he came with her. Elder Jones and I got a freebie. lol.

Really, this week was just kind of getting back into the groove and getting ready for an awesome future. There's a quote in Preach My Gospel that says "nothing happens in missionary work until you find someone to teach" Truth be spoken. So, We're working on finding people to teach and doing a pretty good job at it too.

I love you all and hope you are doing okay!

Love,

Elder Whiting

P.S. This week we realized that the land on the other side of our lake is Quebec. I could literally swim there from here... Or just drive about 20 K's. Love Ya'll.

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Summer Cottages

July 29:

  As far as the announcements, nothing has changed. Waiting for orders from Salt Lake. Getting out of bed is easy. Staying awake during morning prayers can be tricky if I take too long. Usually I'll say a quick one right as I wake up, then say a longer one before studies when I've got some momentum. Smiling is easy with elder Jones. Our personalities match so well, it's scary.

I had a nice chat with president Scott on Friday. I asked him what he thought I needed to do to improve. Basically he said let everything from home go, but family. It's okay and healthy to think about family, just don't dwell outside of that. Something about not having a summer cottage in Babylon. Which is hard because this lake is super smooth and huge and no one is ever out there so it would be perfect for wake-boarding. (so when we all come up to visit here someday, it might be a good idea to bring a boat ;))

There's a talk called "the consecrated missionary" that has been on my mind a lot lately. I want to be better than I am. And I'm using every tool I can find to get there. I also think about President Packer's piece on teaching by the spirit. 

Just another day of work....

So, this week we had a baptism... Two actually! Alexey Orlov and Maurina Orlova. They are a Russian couple. One of the more recent converts in the ward brought them. After coming to church for almost two months, they finally agreed to take the lessons. We taught them everything in like a week. Just met every morning for a week and they were baptized yesterday. It was kind of surreal. Like it was a baptism, so it was way cool, but it just didn't feel like I could claim them as mine. Which you know, I can't because it's all the spirit, still, it's a strange feeling...

 

Next sunday, we are going to baptize a lady named Hoda. She is of Iranian descent which makes it really tricky. The Iranian government is so crazy, if they find out that you have converted from islam to christianity, they will find your relatives in Iran and torture\kill them. Even if you're no longer a citizen of Iran. so with Hoda, we have to be very careful. She technically lives around 30-40 K's away from the chapel, so she takes a bus to a member's house (same member who gave us Alex and Marina, Brother Rizi, who is also Iranian) and he drives her to church. We have met with her twice and taught her everything she needs in order to be baptized. All we have to do is interview her, and because of her situation, President Scott has to do the interview. we've been talking to him a lot on the phone lately to figure things out with her. (when I say we I mean I, since I'm in charge of the phone.) We extended the invitation at the end of the first lesson, she accepted. Then we told her that we thought she could be baptized on the 30th of June and she flipped! She was freaking out! She said "I had already decided that I wanted to be baptized and I was trying to think what day I wanted to do it on. My birthday is July 1st and so for some reason the 30th popped into my mind." She took it as an answer to a prayer, and so, so did we. How's that for a cool mission story?

 

Funny story, a few days ago, we were out contacting maybe 1\2 K from home, it was getting close to quitting time, President called, so I stepped aside to talk to him, then after a while I looked at the time and we had 6 minutes to get home. So, we ran and I had a conversation with president Scott while running to be home on time. Fun life eh?

 

Transfers are at the end of this week, so we participated in a mission tradition and bought "Kinder surprise eggs" basically a chocolate egg with a small toy inside, you're supposed to interpret from the toy what the transfer holds in store for you. I picked a "Cars" egg and got Doc Hudson. Elder Binford thinks that that means that I will be put with an Elder who is on his last transfer, I disagree. I don't know what I think my toy means, but I get the feeling that I'm leaving Aurora...

Only time will tell.

 

This last week was awesome as far as food goes. I think I told you about eating Galupsi (Stuffed Cabbage Leaf) basically meatloaf wrapped in cabbage with a yummy sauce. Then on Monday night we had a nice pork Goulage. (as opposed to the hedgehog goulage in sherlock holmes) loved that.

 

We had Zone Conference on Wednesday, I think Elder Binford and I are growing on President's good side. He loves us. It was such a good conference and I learned so much. I'll have to mail my study journal home so you all can look at all of the learning I've been doing. So awesome...

 

Our area has exploded in the 3 months we've been here. Going from next to nothing, to having 10 investigators who we are teaching, 4 of those are moving toward a baptisimal date, they will probably all be baptized. We've done some good work, I think. Makes me not want to leave so I can see the fruits of our labors...

 

I love you all and hope you are doing well. Stay tough and power through the bad, There's nothing but gold at the end of the rainbow, but you have to climb up the one side before you can get down the other. (Just made that one up)

 

Love you,

Love,

Elder T

Looking Forward to the Future!

Recently, I have been wondering about how well I am really recieving personal revelation. I was concerned that because I wasn't having strong feelings or hearing voices that I wasn't doing a good job listening. I realized that the spirit speaks by a "still small voice" sometimes, I think that it's me thinking something, but now, I'm not so sure... The point is, for me, i think that wether it's the spirit saying it to me, or me saying it to me as long as it's in line with God's will, it doesn't matter who it came from. But if the thought gives me a bad feeling or even just slight ehhh, maybe not. Then not to do it. It seems simple, "still small voice" but that's the beauty of the gospel. It's simple.

 

So, this sunday Elder Binford and I will be baptizing a Russian couple named Alex and Marina. They have been prepared so well that Elder Binford jokes that a donkey could teach them. haha. Our first lesson with them was last thursday and they have recieved all of the necessary lessons. All that We're waiting on, is time. They had us over for dinner and fed us Galupsi. Which is not how you spell it, that's how the russian name of it sounds that I can't really spell because I don't speak Russian. It means stuffed cabbage leaf. Maybe one of the weirdest things that I've eaten so far.

 

Also, we are teaching a lady named Hoda, she will be baptized on the 30th. She is persian so that is tricky. If they convert from islam to Christianity, it means big trouble for family back in Iran and possibly for her. So, we can only teach her on sundays when she comes to church so we will be teaching her basically everything but the restoration next sunday. More on her when I know more about the situation. It's a good story.

 

Other than that, We're just doing work. I hope all is well with all of you, and I'm sorry but time is dwindling so I have to go.

 

Love you all Talk to you Soon!

 

Love, Elder T

Shoulder to the wheel, especially when you don't want to!

You may remember my dream from last week telling me to read my Patriarchal blessing. I'm glad I did.

 

We met a man named Joe. He was on the phone but wanted to talk so he invited us in. when he got off, he told us that almost an hour before, he had been with his lawyer and signed a stack of papers which would save him from 2.8 million dollars of debt (an aquaintance who was the head of a bank broke company policy to save his hide, another miracle) as well as keep a nasty guy who kept threatening him away. We were there for literally two hours while he told us stories about his life, we talked for maybe 15 min to tell him a story about nephi in 1 ne 3:7. Everything else was all him. Told us we were an answer to a prayer. He just needed to talk and vent. Awesome guy, I really want to go back and check on him.

 

Also, there is a Russian couple who have been coming to church for the past 5 weeks. The member who brought them finally let us teach them. Alex and Maurina are scheduled to be Newmarket South's (my area's) first baptism on june 23rd. That's exciting eh?

 

Saturday night, after dinner, we were headed out to tract a neighborhood. On the way there and when we got there, I had just an aweful feeling that something was not right. Whether it be with what we were doing or maybe something bad had happened back home... I didn't know, something just felt wrong and made me want to sit on a bench so I could think about it and pray a little. which Elder Binford was more than willing to let me do, but I'm stubborn and figured that I could pray between houses so I could keep working. We ended up talking to a lady who was "spiritual" but didn't believe in organized religion or in a need for a savior. If Elder Binford didn't like to talk so much, I would have exploded at her. she was frankly.... Dumb. Kept telling us to come back in 20 years when we've matured so we can have an open mind and talk sensibly. Talking to her definitely did no good other than to strengthen my testimony in a need for a savior and a love for Him.

 

Sunday came, bad feeling was still there, accompanied with a thought that had been there as long as the feeling had. "My mission will end soon and unexpectedly." I was able to get enough control over the thought to put my head down and get to work and as the day wore on, I talked about it to Elder Binford as well as Ali Kazazzy. They are such great friends. Definitely a blessing. They helped my force the feelings and thoughts away by convincing myself that someone *ahem ahem* was messing with me.

 

So, that is basically our week. We did a lot of teaching, but that's most of the spectacular stuff.

 

My mission area is so cool. Toronto really is a melting pot for all cultures. We've met people from every mission that any friend or relative has ever served with. Polynesians, Indian, Iranian, Iraqui, Russian, Brazillian, Californian, Arizonan. And then some... 

 

I love you all and hope that everyone is well and that someone really was just messing with me.

 

Love, 

Elder T 

Short week, but it was filled with shawarma!

Yes, it's true. I finally partook of the fruit of the shawarma tree of life. Elder Rowley says it's not as good as the Shawarma you can get in Toronto, but I have experienced that cultural phenome. I hope you're proud Matt.

 

Also, it has come to my attention that you children had a small competition as to whom I love the most being measured by number of paragraphs I wrote to you. You may have noticed that you all recieved equal amounts of paragraphs. So ha! I win.

 

It's only been four days since I last wrote, I can't say that too crazy much has happened.... Picked up two new investigators, did work. That's the life...

 

John is from columbia. His parents are members, but have fallen less active. He is the only one in his family who speaks any english. That's thanks to his wife. She was born and raised in Toronto, but her family is from portugal, so she speaks portugese. they both love what we teach and are very prepared. We hope to continue having powerful spirit there every time we teach. He is very in tune with the spirit and learn a lot from it, as well as us.

 

Make sure that Uncle John and aunt Michelle know that they've been in my thoughts and prayers. It wasn't hard to hear about what happened there. Canada almost seems more interested in what goes on in the states than they do here. Not a lot happens here ha.

 

Not a lot happened in four days, but I think I will close with this thought...

 

Every day is a step in a new direction. It's which direction you pick that counts. "....as for me and my house, we will serve the lord!"

 

Also, I learned that you can use fasts to make yourself better too. Not just fasting for others. Ammon and his brothers fasted and prayed to grow more bold and powerful, so I've been focusing fasts on myself a little bit more and I've seen a difference. Just something I wanted to pass on. It may be hard, but it's worth it!

 

Love you all much! I promise I'll have more stories next week!

 

Love,

Elder T

Party with Phillippino's

I thought I would lead off this week with a dream that I had last night.

 

I had just arrived in Canada. All of our gear was loaded onto this bus which would take us to our areas. We got onto a dirt road, which eventually led up to a REALLY steep hill. The bus driver made us all get out while he tried to climb it. He tried, didn't get up very far, started to try again when a police man came up behind us and started yelling at the bus driver to take the path that led up at an angle which the bus hadn't noticed, (nor had I) until it was pointed out. Apparently, the policeman was a mormon because he was talking to mission pres. like a friend. Then, they started talking about patriarchal blessings. The police man turned to me, looked me in the eyes and said, "missionaries should read their patriarchal blessings every week" Okay big, scary, police man. I get the point.

 

Big birthday shout out to Christian Anthony Silva! The coolest cat-fish I know! If you get a big white package in the mail that says "Elder Silva" we'll call that my bday present to you k? k.

 

This week we almost hit standards! (Standards are mission wide goals that we strive toward reaching every week.) If we could have gotten people to come to church we would have, oh well, try again.

 

Highlights:

 

There is a family in the ward who were baptized just under two years ago. Four weeks ago, they brought some friends of theirs to church. Those friends have come every week since them but the family, (The Rizzi's) wouldn't let us teach them until they got more comfortable. Sunday, we got the green light! Future looks bright for us. Especially because June is a big month for missionaries and we are looking to break a mission record for most baptisms in a single month. So, every companionship wants to contribute, in fact our zone leaders made us make a commitment that we would participate in "the harvest"

 

Highlight number two, a member has a significant other, who wants her to marry him, she won't give in unless he learns about the church, then they will reevaluate. So, lucky us, we get to teach him about the church. He's a rough guy, it could get hairy. Good thing we're not the real teachers eh?

 

We went to a less active phillipino lady's for lunch on Saturday. She was having a party with a lot of phillipino friends for her boyfriend's birthday. (He and Elder binford and I were the only white people there for a long time) Basically, the food was really good! They had all kinds of different things that they cooked on the barbeque that I think were chicken and beef but you never know with different cultures. I doubt it was crazy like dog or something, but it was still fun! I also think there might have been some squid in another dish that we had. My favorite though, was the Tilapia. They had fried it. Not fillet. This thing still had scales and bones and eyeballs and lips. You just picked the meat off of it. So tasty. So much fun. Which leads me to ask, where/when exactly did uncle Mike serve? I mentioned that he had, and they all went berserk asking me and I was embarrassed not to know wo now I have to repent.

 

I love you all!

Only 21 more fast sundays!

 

Love,

Elder T

Transfer Week!

* Apparently I forgot to post this letter last week. Here it is! *

I'm not sure how many weeks I've been out, but it is transfer #1. Since I'm still being trained it's unlikely anything will change here in Aurora.

 

Big shout out to Grannie Annie and Papa Todd. Happy mothers day to all! It was really special being able to Skype with mom on mom's day.

 

So, tuesday... Couple of lessons during the day, exchanges that night.

 

Wednesday I got to work with Elder Anderson from Orangeville. Like any exchange day it was magical. Had three and a half appointments, picked up two new investigators (Darryl and Caleb) then slept like rocks.

 

Darryl is an interesting man. Had a stepfather named Al who meant worlds to him. Al died in a car accident. Whether due to this or if it was before this, I don't know, but Darryl contracted bi-polar disorder. He also has delusions that he is Jesus. Literally. Despite the meds he takes, he still has that thought. He knows it's not true, but part of him thinks, what if? We're using that to feed a natural desire to be like Christ and be baptized etc. He accepted the invitation to be baptized so we're excited about that.

 

Caleb is an Obese man who practised reformed Judaism. Whatever that means. He said something like he still eats kosher and stuff. Made it sound more modern and stuff.

 

Thursday we had meetings and interviews with president Scott. Meetings were about having faith and they gave a metaphor for how to extend baptismal invitation. Treat baptism like a chocolate bar. Teach them about the chocolate bar to make them want it. Then we were supposed to practise. As the Sister was practising on me I had a thought to use an example from Lehi's dream, not two seconds later, she referred to Lehi's dream.... color me erked. After an interview with president Scott, where we discussed water and whether we aren't allowed to go in water because of a mission rumor involving Satan and whether or not he has dominion over water. We concluded that it says not to in the handbook and so I will be obedient and it doesn't really matter why other than it's obedient. He said that that was a sacrifise I was going to have to put on the altar and I would be blessed for it. We also talked about how it was super hard for Abraham to sacrifise Isaac because Abraham's father was the one who volunteered Abraham to be sacrificed by the wicked priest of Elknah. It tore him.

 

Friday, it was pouring, but we still managed to get a few phone numbers, schedule an appointment and pick up a new investigator Pete. (people here hate rain. Hate talking in it.)

 

Pete, is a conspiracy theorist \ musician. He boycotts big "monopolies" like walmart mcDonalds etc... He has a website with a cure for cancer. He thinks pharmacutical companies are nickle and dimeing us. Keeping us just alive enough to stay sick and buy more drugs. He also has beef with banks. Complicated guy eh? He accepted our invitation to be baptized once he learns more and decides it's the right thing for him. So, we'll tolerate his idiosyncracies (spell check?) i suppose.

 

Saturday we spent most of the day doing service around the church building. Most of what I worked on was uprooting a massive tree stump. there's still another to do. Later that Day, Elder Binford and I got a little tired and miscommunicated and had a little row about it. Which basically means we sulked off, got our heads put on straight silently, then talked it out. We did a good job, i think.

 

Sunday, we got to call home, and that took up most of the day. Only other exciting news is that a family in the ward brought a non-member family and they might let us teach them next week! so there you have it.

 

I love you all and promise to keep up the good work if you will!

Talk to you soon!

Love,

Elder T

Earthquakes, Tornados, Daylight... Wild Weather in Canada

Some of you may have noticed that this week's letter did not come on it's normal monday. This is because Monday was a Canadian national holiday so all the stores were closed so President decided to bump P day to Wednesday, today. sorry I'm late.

 

This week's adventures mostly include stories of homesickness... but that's boring and over. Let's talk about fun stuff, eh?

 

Matthew and Mark have done lovely jobs keeping me up to date on various sporting activities across the world. BUT they FAILED let me say it again FAILED to keep me updated on MY sport. For those who don't know, there have been unconfirmed reports that Michael Phelps will return to the lanes and go for a threepeat in Rio de Janero in 2016! Matt, Mark. Repent Ye! Thus saith thine elder brother! If ye love me, Keep me updated on these things!!!... that is all. I know you would've gotten around to it. I was just excited and had to share my excitement. Love you two. Hope that made you laugh because that was all it was intended to do.

 

Last week was crazy. We picked up four new investigators! One lady we're particularly excited about is called Lucy.

 

Lucy only has about two years left to live. Max. She had stomach cancer so bad that her entire stomach had to be removed. She is catholic but I'm told that she is very promising. (I haven't met her yet, first meet was while I was away on exchanges.) She accepted a date to be baptized June 16. Odds are she'll hit it. Call me an optimist.

 

Other than that, I don't remember a whole lot.. It's been too long...

 

Hillary requested a funny story. Here it goes...

 

I don't remember which day it was, but there was an earthquake here last week.

 

We were sitting having personal study time and I was bouncing my knee. Like I always do when I sit. The floor started shaking, so Elder Binford kind of half-told me to quit bouncing my leg or the man downstairs would get upset with us. So I stopped... But the floor didn't. It wasn't big enough to do much more than make the clocks on the walls shake or rattle some dishes. But it was definitely an earthquake. Apparently they're fairly common up here. Either way. We panicked. We were like, "that was just a foreshock, we gotta get downstairs and find an open field! Hug the walls hug the walls!" we looked like proper fools haha.

 

Apparently Tornados are fairly common up here too. We almost had one yesterday. Lots of rain, really dark. Lightning. Hail. Temperature drops... Close, but no cigar. Maybe next time.

 

Maybe one of my less favorite parts about canada is how long the sun is up. It gets light at around 3:45 am and doesn't get dark until 9:30. So every morning we wake with the sun, go back to sleep, panick that we over slept, then fall back asleet again. I usually have more than just one morning prayer.

 

Played Hockey for the first time on saturday. Got stomped by a 12 year old. He's crazy good though...

 

Other than that, I don't know what to tell you. Enjoy the pictures.

 

I love you all and hope that all is well down south!

 

Love,

T the Elder.

*Note: He was not able to include any pictures. He will send his SD card home and i will post some later*

Address and Email

If you would like to know, here is Elder Whiting's physical address:

Elder Trent Whiting

14 Wellington #310

Aurora, ON

L4G 1H5

He is also allowed email from family and friends:

twhiting@myldsmail.net

Todays letter sponsored by the letter B for Bold

Family and friends,

Firstly, a word about my companion. He played soccer in california. Was really good. His team beat LA Galaxy's academy team. He could play at a few different college schools, but he wants the Y. He was a missionary before he was a missionary. Back in Fresno Cali, there was a missionary who went home, they needed a replacement, so for a few weeks, Elder Binford got to work as a Fresno Missionary. Spent a lot of time with Larry Gelwix. Color me green and call me jealous. That's most of what I know about him, because that's most of what he talks about. He's a good guy.

Also, Persians have it rough. There are quite a few here and some of the stories that they tell make me shudder. That's all I'll say about that, maybe some other time.

On tuesday we had Zone conference. Basically a ton of meetings about how to be better missionary's. Learned a lot. The best part was that I got to see Elder Karl! Elder Karl was supposed to be my MTC companion, but there was a difficulty in another companionship and we didn't get the pleasure. But luckily at the MTC, your companionship is basically your district. You go everywhere with each other, and he and I hit it off like Babe Ruth and a baseball bat. So we had an emotional reunion. (He's an emotional guy) Nice long chat. Turns out our MTC district leader had to go home for health reasons... Sad stuff. But that is all from Zone Conference.

The rest of the week was basically just work. We stopped by a potential investigator we had run into while I was away on exchanges, she agreed to listen to us again so that makes her investigator number 3! This is our problem, so many potentials, but so few are convenient enough to run into again.

A big thing that I learned this week was how to be Bold. We were talking to a lady outside of her house when a bigger fellow walked by, turned, looked at us and said, "are you guys the mormons?" "yes sir, we are" "awe, that's terrible" He then proceeded to rip on us saying, "I'm not trying to de-convert you or whatever" "yeah right" (that's what I thought) "but I actually kind of am" (humph, there it is). He kept insisting on us giving him proof, we said the bible and BOM are our proof, "unfortunately that is invalid" he spoke like a computer, but was pretty thick i'm sorry to say. So, I got bold, bore my testimony, gave him a mormon.org card told him he could get a copy of the book of mormon on there and if he ever wanted to talk, we would be around. Said our good day sir's and bid adieu.

Later that night I looked up Bold in Preach My Gospel. It gave a reference to Alma, talking about after Alma and the sons of Mosiah had served missions. They were reunited and Alma was super happy because they were still bretheren in the lord. It then goes on to talk about how the sons of Mosiah had converted many through the spirit because of the boldness of their words. I figure, if it works for them, why not me.

So, we went to visit a less active lady and were trying to set up a time where we could come back and visit. She kept dodging our suggestions and I decided that the only reason we wanted another visit was so we could get her to come to church. Which is interesting because during dinner we had listened to a talk by Elder Bednar called something like, "and none shall offend them" He talks about how he sould bring less actives back to church. He was super bold when he did it. So I was inspired. So as we were trying to set up another time to meet with this lady, I said, "Or you could come to church and we'll see you there." To which she agreed. She didn't come to church, but I was bold.

Since all of these experiences, I have noticed myself being more bold with my testimony, not quite for my teachings but we'll get there. It's payed off so far!

That's most of what I wanted to talk about. Just know that I love you all, Canada is deceptively warm. (I thought it would be rather cool since we're north-ish) and I will see you all in about 22 fast sundays! :)

Love,
Elder T

this is week four... I think.

So, I may not know how many weeks I've been out. But I know It's been 32 days! I think...

 

First things first, Happy Birthday tomorrow to Matthew! 15 is a good age to be. Don't waste it!

Next, Happy Birthday in two days to Hillary the Graduate with a job! Don't stress kiddo, it only makes things harder.

 

 

So, this week was a little bit shorter because on Tuesday I was smitten with a terrible cough. We decided that it would be detrimental to our efforts if people thought that we didn't care enough to keep our germs to ourselves thank you very much.

 

Also, I believe I mentioned that We would be having dinner with a certain person who in my opinion is completely awesome. This did not happen because he had to be away on business. What a champ.

 

Basically the whole week was spent trying to find people to teach. We did teach a lesson to our Irish investigator: George. That's about it.

 

Some of our finding efforts turned us to people who had met with the missionaries in the past but were taking a break for a while. Chris was one of those people. We had an interesting discussion about the three degrees of heaven on his doorstep and encouraged him to read D & C 76 if he wanted answers. Knowing full well that it would only raise more questions than it will answer. He is an interesting character. He likes reading the Koran and Bible and comparing them for fun.

 

Earlier we had stopped by Chris' next door neighbor, whose parents are members. We think he will want to talk to us. As soon as he heals up enough, maybe next weekend. Stay tuned for the story of John.

 

Now we get to the part of the story that I really want to talk about.

 

We were at a dinner last night out in the middle of nowhere. Except unlike in Utah, the middle of nowhere is in the middle of a forest. With massive hills that our TIWI yells at us for a lot. (TIWI is a box in our car that yells at us when we drive naughty. He especially doesn't like it when we go too fast. Which is hard not to do when you are driving down hills that would be better suited at a ski resort.) Such a beautiful place I live in. I would seriously consider living somewhere very similar when I am old and wealthy. VERY WEALTHY. These houses and properties are rediculous.

 

Anyways, we stopped by a former who lived on the other side of a particularly large hill. She's not been home very often when we try to stop by, but we use her as an excuse to drive these hills.

 

Last night, she was home. She is a devout Catholic, like she goes to DAILY Mass. We had a half hour discussion with her about what she believes will happen in the last days. She referenced a lot of people on the internet who supposedly predicted things like the last pope being german and then his retirement and this lady has other predictions which sound an aweful lot like some things that we believe will happen. I.E. The great and abominable church and so forth.

 

I tell you this to tell you that she is an interesting lady who wants to know what our take is. We mentioned the D & C and she asked for a copy, so we have a return visit with her... Sort of...

 

The reason I tell you this story is so that I can exhort Matt and Mark to get patriarchal blessings. Everything it says in there pertains to this life.

To everyone else, read yours. They will help you, even if you didn't know you needed help.

 

Mine helped me yesterday.

 

I was having some questions and doubts and even though I didn't look at it, it gave me some advice for what I should do when in those situations. So i did, and all my doubts went away.

 

A big thing that I learned from this experience is to BE PATIENT. What's sad is that this is the second time that I've learned this lesson on my mission. Things don't happen right when you want them to all the time. Do your best, the Lord will take care of the rest. Keep your chin up. Do work!

 

I love and miss you all! Don't look foreward to the days, minutes, hours, weeks, months, years to come. Look foreward to the moments that take your breath away!

 

These words of wisdom are funded in part by

The Elder T

Love you all:

T Whiting, the Elder.

T's Canadian Newsletter

Family, friends, hello.

 

This week's edition of T's canadian newsletter features a happier tale than last weeks.

 

First, in response to recent demands, here are some weird facts about canada:

Milk comes in bags

you pronounce bags as if you were to say baegs, like baegle.

color is colour, favorite is favourite, and similar misspellings are common

they really do say eh. But it's not weird because it's similar to how i say yeah? or right?. as in: we're headed to the park yeah? you wanted the blue ball right?

The new currency they released is indestructable... mostly, waterproof, tearproof, fire proof. I think they mostly have it for big bills.

They accept american currency, but most places just count it as canadian currency, which means you lose something like three cents on the dollar.

I currently reside in a town called Aurora. Which is probably an hour northeast of downtown Toronto.

 

Now, if that satisfies everybody, we'll get along with the meat.

 

I mentioned that life is getting better. It is. We have our own apartment which means we don't have to drive 20 kilometers to get to our area. and a lot of the time we can walk to whatever we want. We still have to drive quite a bit, which makes it nice that we have a car.

 

The week was fairly standard not a lot happened. We met some cool people on the street. Some pretty good potentials. Things really took off, however, when we went on exchanges on friday with the district leaders.

 

Before I go there, I want to mention a family that we taught on thursday night. They are from Brazil. The wife is a member, the husband is not. Wife is called Eve, Husband is named Fabio. Their children are too young to be baptized. We went in thinking that we would be targeting the message toward the husband. It went well, he was rather receptive, sort-of quiet. They told us that they love having the missionaries over because of the respect they have for what we are doing. (she has two brothers who served and a nephew who is currently serving) The real surprise came when we invited them to church. Instead of Fabio rejecting us, Eve

did. She said that she had been raised in the church, but that she had realized that she didn't have a testimony. She felt like a hipocrite, here she was, a primary president, teaching children stories that she didn't believe. She had to stop. She tried to find her testimony, but grew tired and gave up. She agreed to let us help her try to find it. And Fabio agreed too. They said we could meet with them again in two weeks. That brings our official investigator tally up to one!

 

So, Friday, I was sent to a town called Orangeville with the Elder who is serving as our district leader. He had a lesson planned for a lady called Renee whom they had ran into on the street. She didn't like being catholic because of the lack of childrens programs. The important part of the story is that at the end of the lesson, I was trusted with the responsibility of inviting her to be baptized! After some things were explained and she had some questions answered, she said yes! She is scheduled to be dunked on May 12 ish. I think. After that we went on some visits around to ward members and came back to Newmarket so that he could officiate a baptismal interview for an investigator who belongs to the sisters north of us.

 

Upon returning, we learned that our companions had done some heavy lifting in Aurora. They got about 13 phone numbers from people on the street. Coordinated about 5 return appointments. They literally did more work in one afternoon tha either of us had seen in a week. So, we have around 5 appointments on tuesday, plus whatever we come up with after that! The district leader has only been out for nine months and between the three other Elders in the district, he has more experience than all of us combined. He calls it "Exchange Magic"

 

So, Saturday Elder Binford and I set off to meet with our forst appointment. An 81 year old man named George who is from Ireland. He used to meet with missionaries, but took a break when they switched from Elders to Sisters. At least one person likes us better. He likes joking about God zapping people with lightning for misbehaving. After a fun lesson with him, we scheduled a return appointment for this wednesday.

 

After meeting with George, we went a couple of doors down to knock on the door of a man named Shane who also used to meet with the missionaries. The intel we had on him said that he had a weird fascination with thinking that God and Jesus and Angels were Aliens... Yes Aliens. So naturally this spiked my interest and made me really excited to meet him. Even though our intel also said that he had turned to the internet and found some anti-material. (Anti, Antied: missionary slang for things that pull people away.) The particular anti material referenced a conference talk by I think it was Russel M Nelson back in 97 where he talks about the Urim and Thummim. This info was connected with the rumors that Joseph Smith was a gold rusher (once upon a time, Smith did work for a man who was digging trying to find a silver mine, Joseph convinced the man to give up. You can find that story in Joseph Smith History verse 56. He says this is where the rumors were started). These two stories were merged into the story that Joseph Smith would tell people that he could find gold with his magic hat and rock, they would pay him to find gold, he would take their money, and run. Shane called him a con-artist. He also found some stuff to do with the priesthood and blacks. He wouldn't listen to us.

 

After that made my day even more though. We went to meet with a man named Chris who sometimes liked discussing gospel with the missionaries in his driveway. He told us we were welcome to continue that practice saturday afternoons. He's not the cool story though.

 

The cool story is his next door neighbor who we knocked on his door. His name is John. His parents are members, he is not. While we talked to him you could see his eyes light up. He invited us back, tuesday afternoon. After arguing with a man like Shane, this was just what I needed to get back into the swing of things.

 

I think my favorite part about this week was teching lessons. Especially Renee, George, and John. They all had the light in their eyes that says they felt the spirit. I have high hopes that all three of them will get dunked.

 

So, there you have it. Plus a few pictures. I'm really looking foreward to tuesday. We get to have dinner at the home of the FLIPPING PRESIDENT OF NIKE CANADA! Second coolest guy ever. (there are some awesome people in our ward including a guy who is recieving the medal of canada, or something like that. It's basically the highest civillion honor a canadian can get. Comperable to being knighted. He's a non-member husband to a member though.) Tuesday is going to rock. If we play our cards right, we can hit the standards of excelence. (a set of mission wide goals that only 9% hit all of them.) All this after only our second week here!

 

I love you all. I will talk to you soon.

 

Love,

Elder T

Week 2 ... ish

Family, Friends... Hello.

 

This is e'mail number two, even though I have been out for what I thought was four weeks but is really only not quite three.... Yikes.

 

Canada has been very wet so far. Not like Utah where it will fluxuate from extreme to extreme. It's pretty consistant. So wet, I had to go and get myself a rain jacket. We found a nice post-winter sale and found a very sweet snowboarding jacket that was almost conservative enough for a mission. It was warm, waterproof, dark, solid color. The only problem was that the inside of the hood was orange.... It wasn't crazy expensive either... Would have definitely been worthy of the money they were asking for it because it would have lasted me like 10 years or so... but the orange killed that idea... So I stuck with a light waterproof rain jacket that will keep me dry, but not super warm. I figure that's okay because april is supposed to be wet but warm here. and it is! about 19 degrees C today. big step up from the 4 we've had the past few days.

 

It's crazy diverse out here, I've met people from ugo-slavia, Iran, Jamaica, Taiwan... Lots of Nationalities. Our mission has the most languages of any mission in the world. Korean, Portugues, Spanish, French, English, Farsee (Iran, Iraq, Egypt, middle eastern language), and Mandarin... maybe there was another... idk. But it is the only mission in the world with missionaries who speak Farsee. The language is so rare amongst missionaries that there isn't a program for them to learn it at the MTC. So, they just go for their traditional language then they show up here and Surprise! Guess what??!? You're speaking Farsee! kind of cool.

 

I Arrived in Canada at about 2:00 your time, which would really be around noon, my time. For my first time flying I have to say I enjoyed it a lot more than I had expected. I thought that It would be a lot more jarring than it was. The thing that impressed me the most was the sheer speed we were traveling just before take-off. Add that with a little turbulence to wake you up at 3 am, and my grin was bigger than the cheschire cat's.

 

After a lot of monotonous meetings and dinners and interviews, i finally got to meet my companion Tuesday afternoon... His name is Elder Binford, from Fresno California. He was saying that we were going to not necessarily hide how old I really am, but maybe not broadcast it. He was trying to relieve some of the tension that can be created when a senior companior or a trainer, of which he claims both titles but he doesn't hold that over me since he has only been out for three months.

 

Unbeknown to him however. Being younger makes me more popular! The ward loves me! There are a couple of boys who are prepping for missions who bore their testimonies on sunday of how inspiring it was for them to have a missionary in the ward who was younger than them. (That's right boys, keep stroking my ego).

 

Our area is called the NewMarket south area. We are responsible for the southern half of our ward boundaries. There is a sister missionary companionship who are responsible for the north area in the ward. Sister Green has been out for three months and sister Lang Came up the same day as me.

 

Because we are in a brand new area, we don't have an appartment... yet... We are staying with this old geezer who reminds me of Gpa Todd. Only because he knows how much he can get away with. So he does. You have to second guess every word out of his mouth and he harrasses store clerks with as much sympathy as Papa Todd. He says he's allowed to because he's old. "you can do whatever you want when you're old" He tells us he won't cook for us but then he makes a two-course breakfast. He's fantastic. We love him and he loves us even more. He tells us to call him mom because that's his job right now, to look after us. So naturally that makes us doubly tidy so he doesn't have to. I could go on and on.

 

NewMarket South is brand new. It used to just be NewMarket but for whatever reason they split it into two, gave the sister's the north and us the south. It's kind of nice having just one bishop to worry about as compared to the dozens the Grantsville missionaries doubtless have to coordinate with.

 

On the downside is the fact that all the investigators that NewMarket had before it split live on the north side. So, we on the south have literally nothing to go off of. Just some couple year old past investigator slips that we check up on every day so we have something to do. Everything else we do is street contacting and tracting. Neither of which are very effective. Except for the first day.

 

The first day, Tuesday, We didn't know what exactly our area was, so we just went out and got cooking. The first guy to answer was a man from ugo-slavia (spell check) who chatted with us for around 40 min on  his doorstep. He seemed really receptive. Looked up Mormon.org on his phone and started watching a video by Elder Holland, accepted a BOM, even scheduled a return appointment. Come to find out, once we figured out what our area is, he wasn't in our area. Have a freebie, sisters... We have met a few people who we then had to turn over to the sisters. They have more work than they can handle. It's almost like a sick joke. Two baptisms coming up..... Call me jelly...

 

The second fella we talked to that I want to tell you about met us a couple of days later on Friday. We just happened to bump into him and his girlfriend in the parking lot as we headed to go check up on someone else (she ended up having moved) we struggled with him for about a half hour or so, gave him a BOM and a card before he let us go. I say struggled because he was really fidgety. And wouldn't sit still long enough to let us finish our thought before he was asking some other question. Come to find out on Saturday he was high. We saw him walking down the street, so naturally, we chased him. He kept looking over his shoulder at us and fidgeted with his pocket as he was walking away. When we caught up to him and he finally recognized us he confessed that he had his knife out and was fixing to defend himself until he recognized us when we got about ten yards away from him. That's when he said, "yeah that chat we had yesterday was fresh eh? Yeah, I was baked as **** though... **** I'm high right now too eh?" I don't think We're gonna hear much from him, but you know... I hope so. That'd be a cool story for posterity.

 

I hope everyone is well and doing great. I love this new rule that we can e-mail anybody. It makes it easier to keep in touch.

 

I love you all. Even you sorely lost and confused bloggers who are probably looking for information on Italian Basketball star Trent Whiting. I wish you well in your search.

 

Love

Elder T

 

 

Elder Whiting's Address

Apparently the address we had listed for Trent is not really valid. A new physical address will be posted soon. in the meantime you can email him at:

twhiting@myldsmail.net

Pictures from Toronto

Elder Whiting in Toronto

Elder Whiting and Elder Binford

Elder Whiting with President and Sister Scott

Elder Whiting with his zone

April 8, 2013

Got a phone call from Elder Whiting. He has safely landed in Toronto! I will post an address when I get one.

-Mom

Big hello to anyone who is reading this from the MTC!

 

Since I got here wednesday this is the first break that I've had. It has really been 120 mph the whole way. In the week + day that I've been here I have taught something like 6+ lessons to "investigators." I use the quotes because one of the investigators is an alter ego that my teacher personifies and we teach him, and I'm sure that the other people my companion and I have taughtare already members who are re-living their conversion story. this one guy we have met with twice, last night being the second time we met with him and we got him to commit to be baptized! Kind of cool. My companion and I were pretty excited about that.

 

My Companion's name is Elder Sam Kennedy, he is going to Las Vegas west, and originally he wasn't supposed to be my companion. There was an Elder who didn't show up for whatever reason so instead of having three companionships, our district is A companionship (as in one) and a trio. Elder Kennedy is from newcastle England. It can be really hard to understand him sometimes but I think that it would have been worse if I hadn't seen so many episodes of Top Gear. He is absolutely hilarious, he has a one-liner for almost every situation and his British sense of humor is so different from ours that I wonder if he is slightly crazy...... but I doubt it.

 

The trio in our district is made up of a nerd (he embrases the stereotype, so it's ok that I call him that. he told me so.) a spaz (he resents that term but it fits him so he can deal. His mental state of mind is up and down like a yoyo. But he always gets really energetic at night when he's had his can of root beer.....) and a high school football star from Calgary Alberta. (he was supposed to be my companion, we get along really well. Whenever we have gym we go on a split so that the two of us can work out.) Together we combine to make a beautiful band of misfits whose weaknesses are outweight by our combined strengths, and that's how it should be.

 

So, last thursday (the second day in the MTC) Elder Kennedy and I were asked to be Zone leaders. Which really kind of works like a Monty Python skit. We take it in turns to make executive decisions for the week which have to be approved at a by-weekly meeting etc...... No, really all we have to do since we'll only be here for a week is to make the new missionaries feel welcome. If it weren't conference weekend, we would have to attend a barrage of meetings taking up almost all day of our so-called day of rest on sunday. here, P-day pretty much takes that title. But since there is conference, the new missionaries will have to deal with all the meetings. best of luck to them.

 

I really am here at the MTC right at the best time possible. I'm only here for less than two weeks, but I'm here for easter sunday, and conference sunday. So in the shortest amount of time possible, I am here for two of the most looked foreward to religous weekends of the year.

 

Last week was easter sunday, so we had a special sacrament meeting where a General Authority would come and speak to us. we got to hear from presiding bishop Coseeh. (spell check? he's french, cut me some slack eh?) we even got a note telling us that he might come and visit our branch's testimony meeting. He didn't but it didn't stop me from hoping he would until after the meeting was over. Testimony meeting is a cool thing. It opens a door into the hearts of your companions that you usually don't get to look through and you learn something to help you love them even more.

 

Tuesday night we had a devotional by an area president of the 70 named Ringwood, who is over the korea area. He spoke about enduring to the end. Which was much needed because our district had been struggling with that. Particularly one of the sisters who broke her foot playing basketball in gym last friday...... She had just found out that tuesday that she will have to stay in the MTC for another few weeks before reporting to Las Vegas west with her fellow sisters. Us elders got to give her a blessing of comfort that night, and she picked me to be the voice. That was cool, my first priesthood blessing.

 

One last cool experience I had is actually kind of embarrasing. I was having a bit of trouble adjusting to the new schedule and the amount of work that we were doing and it was being expressed by my struggles dozing during class (this is also true of just about everyone in our district). I never actually fell asleep, but we would often have to pause during class and stand up and stretch etc... One day was particulary bad, when one of my teachers, brother Johnson had an idea. We are assigned to choose a christlike attribute to work on while on our missions. He asked if I had picked one yet and when I told him I hadn't, he suggested I work on my diligence. Which didn't seem like a problem for me until I researched it in Preach My Gospel and it mentioned that be being diligent we gain more energy. That sold me. I have been working on it ever since and even just a few days after begining this journey, I have improved by leaps and bounds.

 

I really can't express how much else has happened because my journal is being embossed right now so I can't look back, but I think that might be all... Or as much as I can express because being here is quite literally like drinking through a fire hose. Way more knowlege and experiences than you can take in and express. If there's one thing that I think I will remember forever, it's that God is a God of peace and happiness and joy, therefore, we can't feel the spirit when we are upset. This seems like a no-brainer, but the epiphany I had, was that when I had tried to feel the spirit previously, I took it too seriously, i think. I think I would try to put myself in a bad mood on purpose because the spirit was supposed to be a serious thing and you have to be very serious to feel it. Which is true, you can't be silly about it. But you do have to be happy, as I've found that answers come to mind more readily when I am happy and in a good mood. There's your spiritual thought.

 

I love you all and miss you! See you in 23 fast sundays! or something like 100 ish letters.

 

-Elder T

Elder Priest and Elder Whiting

MTC

Goodbye U.S.A., hello Canada! If any of you want to write me a letter, you can send it to this address:
Elder Trent Whiting
MTC Mailbox # 54
CAN-TOR 0408
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793
Please do, I would love to keep in touch!

-Trent the Elder.