January 19, 2012

hey mom!
man i'm so pumped to be almost leaving this place! as much as i love the mtc, i'm ready to leave haha. well so maybe my spanish isn't quite ready, but me personally is ready. i'm a little worried about a plane and all the security and stuff, like not afraid to fly, but just getting to the plane smoothly through security and everything. i've never done it before so i don't know what to expect! but here's the plans for the flight. we're at the travel office here and probably leave as close to 6 in the morning on monday as we can. then our flight leaves at 9:47 here, and we get to atlanta at 3:27. then we have a 2 hour lay-over, and leave atlanta at 5:55 and get to panama at 10:02 monday night. so if i count right, it's just short of 11 hours of flying total, which doesn't seem too bad, but i'm not really sure what a long flight is so we'll see how it goes :) as far as calling, i'm not a hundred percent sure i can call from salt lake, but i'm sure i can call in atlanta at least, so if you want to kinda see if i'll call at like 8 or 8:30 you can, but i'm not sure if they let you. and i can't promise a time in atlanta, but i will for sure between the lay-over, probably just the house phone. and i can actually buy phone cards here, i'm not sure how much, but i'll just get one to last for enough time, and i think they only last like 90 days after they're activated, so i'll get an hour or something, i don't know. i think i'm pretty well good though, i've been able to survive here and haven't really needed anything extra, so i can't think of something else i need, so i think i'm about ready!

bad news with elder clarke though. so we went in to the doctor on monday? ok actually a little thing with that. so we have gym at 2:15, so we were dressed and like walking out the door when they called us over the intercom and said we had to go to the doctor right now. so i was not very happy, because i live to go to gym haha, plus i had to say happy birthday to trev, and i'm sure karissa's mad that i missed her birthday, but i don't really think about the day here so you'll have to forgive me! but yeah whatever, so we had to get dressed and leave, and we were at the doctor for like 2 hours, and said there was still crap in there, so they set up a cat scan for tuesday, so we had to go do that on tuesday, and then wednesday we had to go set up an appointment for more surgery cause it wasn't what they expected, and i don't know if they've told him or me a definite answer what it is, but anyway, in like 3 hours we have to go to the doctor for surgery, and it's a 1 1/2 to 3 hour surgery, so it should be fun for me right? i'll just kinda chill and read stuff, which isn't too bad i guess. i've been reading jesus the christ, and that book just blows my mind! it's such a cool book! so i'll get some good study time in at least, on my p-day, when i should be doing nothing...haha but yeah he's gonna get delayed at least 2 weeks, which is a bummer for him, he's ready to leave too.

but things are good here. just ready to leave. a kind of weird thing is happening though. so we have fake investigators right? and we teach them everyday basically like it is in the field. but sometimes we get subs or something so we kinda just teach them once and never see them again, which i guess will probably happen a lot too. but as we're trying to get to know these "investigators," i start to feel sorry for them and really want to help them, like one of our last ones he was pretending to be this like 60 year old guy who doesn't talk to his kids anymore and feels like he can't be forgiven of the sins he's commited in the past, and the whole time i just wanted to help! and it's weird since they're not real, but everyone says you get as much out of the little teaching experiences as you put in, so i try to make it as real as possible, and it does help. so i'm pumped to get out in the field and have it all be real. i'm a little worried with the spanish, but we've had a ton of stories of just like it doesn't really matter that you can say everything you want, as long as the Spirit's there and you're just happy, people will feel that and want to know more, so i'm trying to do that since i can't communicate. and there's this quote in pmg that says something to the effect of we don't just teach so people understand, we teach so that no one can misunderstand, and i like that. it applies since i have to keep everything simple since i don't know any complicated words, so i'll just need to keep with that. but i'm pumped and can't wait to go!

so with trev, he wants to see me after gym time? but not during? cause i thought we were planning on me coming during my gym time. i guess right after would work, but i can't go too long, so if you get this maybe email again real quick so i can check again probably tomorrow and make sure.

but i think other than that i'm good to go. i do think i get to email friday and saturday, so we'll see how that goes. but yeah things are good, just need to pack and get out of this place! :) so i guess i'll talk to you on monday!

much love,

elder paskett