Elder Ryan Bird

Here is a picture of the baptism we had last Saturday. Then here are pictures from our Christmas party that we had. I have a lot more, but it is only enough to make a good...support to the blog. Man, I look forward to the day when I present all my photos to the family when I return home. Then I can tell stories about every single one of them. But...enjoy.

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,

First off, I hope you didn't panic that I didn't write on Monday. We got a call Sunday night that Preparation day was moved to today. Which is awesome cause that means my birthday is pday. I can't believe that I am no longer a teenager. There was a joke I heard once about when God was making the earth, he gave several animals a specific job an a certain amount of life time to do that job. All the animals said that it was too much time to do that job and asked if they could give up some of their years to live. Then, man being greedy, asked God if he could have all of the combined years of all the animals. I hope you've heard this joke before, but I am now entering the age given to man (according to the joke) that was given by the horse. From age 20 to 55ish is time to be working all day baking in the sun. This joke would probably be funnier if I actually could remember the details exactly. I can't remember who I heard it from.

Anyway, just want to say I was extremely glad that I was able to call you guys. I can't believe its almost been a week since that happened. One thing I mentioned to Elder Smith was that our phone call was crystal clear. You guys sound exactly how I remember each of you.

Well, this past week we had 2 baptisms. However, I didn't approve of one. However it wasn't my decision to make. We had one planned for last Saturday, but she works in the afternoon, so we had her baptism at 11ish in the morning. She shows up for her interview with her cousin, Katerine, and Elder Rojas figures how that Elder George and I have taught both of them all the lessons. However, neither Elder George nor I believed Katerine to be ready. 10 minutes after meeting Katerine, Elder Rojas decides that he wants to baptize her. I only went along with it because the assistants interviewed her and said she could be baptized. Is it bad to baptize someone knowing you don't want to do it? I guess I have to ask President about that. Anyway, this girl Katerine is about 12/13ish years old and is a crazy nut. I thought it was hilarious when we went to Hermana Carmen's house for lunch one day, and she just tore Elder Rojas apart. She was saying that Katerine isn't an obedient child. But Elder Rojas, being Dominican, tries to prove that he is right and that no one else's opinion matters. (Don't know if I said it yet, but Elder Rojas is my new Dominican companion).

Anyway...that was an interesting story. But, this week I got a letter from the Petersen family. I absolutely LOVED their letter. Each member of their family wrote something. I think I can now understand how a parent can love each child the most. Each entry from the members of the Petersen family are all my favorites in their own special way. I also received a package from Grandma Bird. I got these most excellent elf hats that I plan on wearing to my birthday celebration that we may have today. I plan on making the brownies that you sent mix for. I love them =D

One final thing that I've decided to share. One of the best ways that I can learn about myself is through my dreams. They let me know how I really am as a character and as a person. Seeing as how I've been sick the past few days, I had a dream last night that I was actually sent home from the mission because of it (it isn't nearly that serious). The thing that I learned about myself is that I was devastated having to go home. I had the meeting with President Ellsworth to have my official release and he said the infamous line, "You can now remove your plaque." At least from this I can tell that being here on the mission is something I want to do. Its definitely hard, tiring, and very trying (full of trials), but I have learned so much out here. As much as I can't wait to be home, I have work to do here before that happens.

Anyway, that's the report I have for this week. Hopefully I can get pictures sent today.

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,

Glad to hear that things are going well back in the Bird house. But
first things first...the phone call. Elder Smith is from Texas and
will call his family first since he is in a later time zone. He will
call at 2:00 our time and we´ve decided that we´ll talk for 2 hours
since we neither have any guidelines nor are we really allowed to
leave the house. One Christmas eve we have to tell our assistants what
we´ll be doing and get it approved. But, OUR phone call should happen
around 4:00 DR time which is 12:00 (noon) your time. I will give you
the phone number to call and then we can start. BTW, I don´t know the
country code for the Dominican Republic. Also, if you say that I
should have guidelines from our leaders, Neyba has practically been
abandoned. We don´t hear much from President nor our zone leaders who
are 2 of his assistants.

Anyway, glad to hear you had an awesome Christmas party. I´m glad to
hear that Donna enjoyed it. We had our christmas party last saturday
and I hope to send some photos of it. I was able to take a video of a
dance that some primary age girls did and it is absolutely cute. I´ll
have to send photos of the highlights. But, at this party I never
thought I would enjoy the taste of an apple so much. It really makes
me count my blessings.

Let me know how the Bird and McConnell get together goes. Those always
are fun adventures.

Well, I guess its time for my report. A ton happened this past week.
Let me just say last week was a BAD week for Elder George to get
transferred and basically have me guiding Elder Smith around. We had
some very BAD numbers, but Elder Smith and I are going to try
improving this week. We addressed certain issues to do better.
Although, if we can´t leave the house for 2 days straight (at least 1
of them we probably won´t leaves, unless to visit members, but I´ll
talk to my authorities to get the inside scoop). We had a planned
baptism last week and it has been very hard to contact her after she
learned that Elder George left. She didn´t show up for her baptism nor
church yesterday. So I´m going to try and find her today with Elder
Smith.

I´m trying to remember if I said it last week, but I did a
confirmation last week which was rather...fun. It was a great
experience though.

Well, I got some new pants last week. Elder George and I hired a
tailor to make pants for us. I´m actually wearing them right now. They
´re brown and I like them =D I´ll probably send a picture of them.

Well, to boost my morale of Neyba, Elder Hernandez got a call sometime
today or last night that both of the other missionaries are being
special transferred too. So, in this one transfer, I´m the only
survivor. In reality, I´m betting that this will be my last transfer
too. President will probably white-wash the area. But we'll see what
happens.

Well, glad to hear that all is going well with the bird family. Can´t
wait to call you this week and hope you all have a Merry Christmas.

Love,

-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,

This is a picture from Hermana Johnson.

Love,
-Elder Bird

4981 Elders Bird, Hernandez and Marte in Neyba.jpg

Hey Mom,
Just before I forget, the only details I know so far about a phone
call is that we will call you and we can have you call us back. We´ll
probably borrow some phones from members. But we´ll see. I´ll have to
ask the zone leaders for advice on what to do tomorrow.

What would you say if I told you those lizards were Iguanas? They´re
HUGE! I am not sure if they were wild or not seeing as how they were
all grouped together near the ¨human buildings¨, but I can´t say that
I know for sure. But here in Neyba, we don´t have a ton of wildlife
cause Neyba is more town than wildlife. Although, I was in Duverge
yesterday and that area is very pretty and is half and half. They have
a river going through the town.

We have a stove in our apartment, but we have an oven in the church.
So, I plan on using your cake mix around the time of my birthday. And I
´m confused as to why you´re sending me another package ¨since [I´ve]
received packages from other people.¨ Not that I´m complaining, but...

I still keep forgetting how close to Christmas we are. Just today, an
Elder said that its 11 days til Christmas. That´s so nuts. I´ll be
sure to have my final calling plans by next Monday so that you know.

That´s cool that Jared is taking Italian. After the mission I´ve been
thinking of taking a different language at BYU just...just cause.
There have been several languages that I´ve considered. Because I live
so close to Haiti, I´ve had a desire to learn a little French.
But...who knows?

Well, I was thinking about you´re little excerpt on Zion´s ¨one heart
and one mind¨. A little bit of Zion exists in the DR. I hate to say
it, but I´d say that its definitely lacking here in Neyba. For the
most part, everyone is set on their own mind and does whatever they
feel like. There certainly are a few exceptions.

Well, all my things of interest happen over the weekend and they
always happen SO fast. I can definitely say that I didn´t see this
weekend coming. Friday we went to Vicente Noble for interviews with
Presidente Almonte. One thing I love about him, no matter how
discouraged you feel he can always boost your morale. Not to say that
I was discouraged at this time, but that I certainly had a gung-ho
attitude after speaking with him. It was also here that I had my
birthday celebrated with my zone. Hermana Almonte brought a few cakes
(when there were only 2, or maybe 3, birthdays that we were
celebrating) and they were sooooo good. So our Vicente Noble trip was
fun.

Saturday we had another baptism, Youvenaris (pronounced Jo-van-air-
ees, hope that helps). I performed the baptism and Elder George talked
me into doing the confirmation on Sunday. That was a nutty experience.
We have another baptism planned for this Saturday in which I´ll
probably do both again.

Well, time for the thing that I definitely didn´t see coming. We had a
special transfer in which Elder George was shipped out to Ocoa. As for
the part where I said that Neyba here isn´t of one heart and one mind,
a bunch of members called President Almonte and told him a couple of
twisted...lies or truths? In his interview on Friday, Elder George
talked to President about this and got things settled. President knows
that they´re not true, but we got a call from the assistants Saturday
night that Elder George was to go. Which was weird cause President
said that he was going to stay another transfer. In talking with a few
people, it sounds like someone else called President on Saturday. I´ll
probably get all the details from the assistants when I see them
sometime this week. Any time they talk about Elder George, they make
it seem like he did something bad when from what I can tell...he didn
´t. But...Neyba just has problems with starting rumors, which Elder
George and various other Elders have addressed. In my letter to the
President today, I called for the calvary. Some members want President
to come and straighten several things out with some of the members.
So, we´ll see what happens.

My new companion is Elder Smith. He was in my MTC group in Santo
Domingo. So, he´s been out in the mission just as long as I have. I
believe that I am senior companion (although haven´t been told
explicitly) but I now have the responsibility to show him the area. We
don´t have a district leader called yet, but its very likely going to
be me (according to other Elders I´ve spoken to). So haven´t even been
out 2 transfers and I´m already a candidate to be a district leader.
This is just NUTS! Not to mention that Elder Smith and I still have a
lot of work to do with our Spanish. However, I guess President has
more confidence in us than we do. But, we´ll definitely work hard.

Well, that´s all I got for now. I hope things are going well back home
and that you guys have an awesome Christmas.

Love,
-Elder Bird

Cait asked for more pictures, so more pictures I will send. Don´t
worry, we didn´t take the boat.

Hey Mom,
Glad to hear that the spotlight about me went well. And which of my
many scriptures did you share? If you shared the 2 Nephi 1 scripture,
my mission is probably complete in this world since now we now to rise
from the dust. If not, I´m sure my other scriptures I shared were
awesome as well. And, Sis. Evans probably shouldn´t get her hopes up
too much since I only remember the alphabet and a few words/signs in
sign language. Although, I have remembered a ton of words just by
listening to the member in our branch speak to her and by listening to
the ¨muda¨ (deaf girl). One of these days, I´ll be able to form a
sentence without making stuff up.

Anyway, once again I thank the Relief Society for the package I
received. Turns out, I received the card from them yesterday. Sis.
Bessey wrote on the card that they forgot to send it with the package.
It had a quote from President Thomas S. Monson about being thankful.
Let me just say I can confirm what she wrote about how much more
thankful I am for blessings now that I´m on a mission. This week I´ll
be having an interview with President Almonte to see if I can arrange
to somehow send a letter to reply. And hopefully see if I can manage
to send letters to my dear friends who have been waiting a reply from
me. Don´t worry! I´m still trying.

So far we haven´t gotten in trouble for going to Haiti. Seeing as how
1) it didn´t go there intentionally, and 2) Our zone leaders, who are
the Assistants to the President, were there with us. So, if we get in
trouble, we´ll get reprimanded as a zone. I have plans to send more
pictures from my trip. And keep in mind, we didn´t cross the border.
So we were still in the DR, we can just see Haiti.

I´m glad to hear that you enjoyed the Christmas Devotional. I found
out about it at church yesterday and was really excited to see it. We
thought it started at 7ish (I don´t know why they thought that seeing
as how we´re in the DR). So we got to our chapel at 6:30 to set up.
Turns out it didn´t start until 9:00 for us. We didn´t even get to
watch all of Elder Ucktdorf´s talk. Not to mention that it was in
Spanish and didn´t really get it anyway. But its all good.

Although, we finally got the November issue of the Liahona which has
conference talks. So I´m excited about that. Ironically, I got December
´s issue in November, and November´s issue in December. Who woulda
thought that?

Well, just a fun story that happened. Here in the DR, you can ride a
normal guagua which is a small bus of about, 8 rows of benches (more
or less). There are also the personally owned guaguas which are
equivalent to a typical van. We took one of these privately owned
guaguas to visit a member who hasn´t gone in a while. So, here´s what
made this ride an adventure. I was sitting on a bench seat which was
directly behind the passenger seat. Typically, these smaller guaguas
will drive with the door open, in this was the case. So, I was sitting
next to an open door as we were going about 40 mph on a road. I told
Elder George, ¨If we take a sharp turn to the left, I will go flying
out the door.¨ Then, we made a stop at a gas station where Elder
George told me that the van was running on propane. Just a few
cultural differences.

This woman that we went to go visit we actually met in the super-
market here. We started talking to her and found out her situation.
This was weeks ago when it happened, but we didn´t visit her til this
past week. She and her husband are both members (let alone, strong
members) who just have a difficult time getting to church. Her husband
appears to be a spaniard and talks much clearer than dominicans, but
he was born here in Neyba. They attended church this last Sunday with
their kids and have plans to move closer to the chapel. They´re an
awesome couple and certainly would help out our branch a ton.

Anyway, that´s all I got for now. I hope things continue to go well
for you. Although I have to say that you should take care of yourself.
I have to admit that if you were truly ¨knocked out for a day and a
half,¨ I would say that that is excitement (not positive excitement).
Have fun, take care, and keep doing what you´re doing.

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,
I´m low on time so I´ll send only the important ones.

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,
First off, I would like to apologize for not writing yesterday. As you will come to find out...I was ¨preoccupied¨. Fun story though, but first I'd like to respond to your email first before giving my report.

I can't believe its already December. I'll definitely let Elder George know about the situation you described to me about calling here. It sounds like he did something similar and suggests doing that. As for my physical health, I'm sure that I'm pretty messed up, but I still function 100% somehow. There have been a few differences that I've noticed. But after addressing Jared and Elder George, I wouldn't be worried about it. Not to mention today in Zone Conference, Presidente Almonte gave all of us a water bottle that has a filter on it. Apparently a ton of missionaries got amoebas from drinking bad water (don't worry, we're in good health here in Neyba, Elder George says this was the first time he hasn't gotten sick in 17 months).

I don't have any advice on what to do about the package question you had. All I have, is to trust Elder and Hermana Johnson to take care of it. And speaking of packages, I actually got one this week. Mom, since I can't write letters, can I personally have you thank Sis. Bessey for the box she sent? The two things I was most ecstatic about, The Proclamation of the Family in Spanish and the Testaments DVD. I could not utter any words when I saw these. I was going to buy some DVD's the next time I was at the temple in Santo Domingo in the distribution center. Then, the Provo MTC gave me a proclamation in English, but not in Spanish. Now I have one to use for a lesson in the near future.

Star Trek is out on DVD now? That brings great joy to my heart. If Toby, Chris, or Dad buy it on BluRay, I'm definitely having a legit movie night (popcorn and everything) wherever it may be.

Feel free to give Dave and Clint my regards and my permission to dominate Bob thursday nights. I still think about playing volleyball. I even had a less active member invite me to play in a league that he plays in. But I respectfully declined (who would have thought).

Well, now for my report. I might as well start with the fun stuff from yesterday. So, today was zone conference in Azuas and yesterday we had zone meeting here in Neyba. Afterwards, we decided to go to ¨Lago Enriquillo¨ which should be that huge lake you mentioned to me from Google Maps. I'll send some pictures on our adventure. We were in a guagua (small bus) and making a lot of fun stops. Then, when it was about 2ish, we thought we were done for the day and were sleeping on what we thought was our drive back. We pull up ¨somewhere¨ and I knew exactly where it was. We drove all the way to the border. It was INTENSE! I've got some pretty awesome pictures of the border and there was a kid who kept following our group once he saw that we had cameras. He bugged me a ton. But we went all the way there (unintentionally) and came back. We then had a thanksgiving dinner which consisted of yuca, platanos, and turkey. For all of you spanish speakers, you know that platano means banana. However, the banana you all should be familiar with is called ¨guineo¨ here. A platano is a banana, but it is more similar to a potato. Its hard to explain, but that's how it is. You can mash them, make fries out of them, etc. Personally, I don't like them a whole lot, but I'll eat them.

We have two new Elders here who are Elders Hernandez and Marte. They are both Dominicans and are both on their last transfer. They are ¨viajantes¨ who try and reactivate inactive members and strengthen the branch here. That is going to be a huge help here.

One fun thing that could be fun sharing next Sunday in church is probably my new favorite scripture. The reference is 2nd Nephi 1:21. This is when Lehi is giving a huge ¨boche¨ or reprimand to Laman and Lemuel. Then he says in verse 21 ¨Rise up from the dust, my sons, and be men.¨ How epic is that? If I ever am in charge of a young men activity, that will be the theme. Truly awesome.

Last week and today I ate at a restaurant called ¨Pica Pollo¨ which is a chain of chinese restaurants. Today I told Elder George that I was so happy to see an asian man today. Its weird that he's speaking spanish, but it is nice to have some diversity. The food is so good there.

Anyway, I hope that you have some good stuff to share with the ward. Let them know that I love them and thank them for all they do and that they have done for me. There is a phrase that comes to mind saying something like ¨It takes a community to raise a child.¨ I can't remember where I heard that, but that certainly has played a big part in my life. I'm thankful for all of my leaders, teachers, and friends, both church and school, who have impacted my life one way or another.

Yo sé esta iglesia es la iglesia verdadera y la obra misional progresará. Thanks for all your love, support, and prayers.

Love,
-Elder Bird
PS. I got a letter from Cait also, and I love it so much. I'm going to ask President Almonte about the letter issue so that I can let me friends know I love them.

Baptism photos =D

-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,
Just thought I´d start of saying that I got your package yesterday.
Hermana Johnson told me the process she has to go through to get my
package. Then both Elder and Hermana Johnson were telling me about how
Dominicans love to go through packages to see what´s in there. They
said they got there to pick it up before they opened up my package.
So, I have everything you sent :) Might I also say that I enjoyed the
contents of the package, specifically the pictures and everything else
was a close second.

Funny story about the pictures. I opened them up and started looking
through them and I was showing Elder Conway and Elder Báez these
photos. So they were seeing them for the first time as I was. I came
across the picture of Alisha and Toby and exclaimed, ¨Whoa! My sister
´s hot!¨ Love ya Alisha! As you can probably tell, I like that picture
too. Then I can´t believe what happened to the big room. It took me
quite a while to figure out that the bed was turned. I was like ¨There
should be a window right here¨ at the head of the bed. But then I
figured out that the window is now at the side of the bed. So, Good
job Kara with that. And while we´re on the subject of newly painted
walls, since when did we get a red wall??? Was that picture of Kara´s
Halloween Costume near our front door? I just might scream when I come
home. lol.

Well, just a quick shout out to Stephanie that I got her DearElder.
However, I am still without any means of responding. So I will just
say Good luck with the play, and I can tell you that very stupid
people still exist in this world. And I´m not going to say where in
the world, I will just say so.

Then I got a postcard from Shelby while she was in Florida. So I
scored on mail this week and am very, very, very...(etc)... thankful
for all that you guys send me and do for me.

With that being said, I can now give a report of my past week. I
visited the hospitol here for the first time (don´t worry, I wasn´t
the patient). A joven/teenager got sick and we visited her. If I ever
get sick, I´m just going to try better methods of health centers
like...the bathroom. The place just smelled like disease as I told
Elder George. I felt healthier walking out. But I guess that´s all
that Neyba has to work with. Elder George did say that if someone gets
sick, we at least ship them off to the capital (Santo Domingo) where
there´s better (not best) treatment.

Last Monday we had an activities with the Jovens and we made tacos
(Elder George´s idea). They were really good. I finally had something
spicy here. A member brought some salsa that added a nice kick to the
taco. I had the time of my life showing off my tolerance for spice. No
one else could handle the sauce, but I would just dump a ton on each
taco.

Last week Neyba had its election. So I hope all the annoying political
trucks will leave. For those of you who haven´t been to the Dominican
Republic (probably all of you), I´ll give a rundown of how Dominican
Politics work. You´re a politician if you can post a ton of pictures
of yourself everywhere and pay a couple guys to drive a big truck with
your face and name while blasted popular music. Oh, and the DR has a
situation similar to that of Cam´s experience in Argentina. What I
understand, Argentine candidates buy votes. In the DR, citizens sell
their vote. Same concept, different perspective though.

On Saturday I got to make ¨bollitos/boyitos¨. We went to a member´s
house who helps her grandma make these things that we buy every night
for dinner. We cut some yuca up, boiled it, cut it, and mashed it to
prepare the food for the night. At night, the grandma deep fries them
and they are SOOO good. So, when I return, I´d love to make these
sometime. However, I´d prefer to have them mashed already.

Well, I almost went an entire transfer without getting a haircut.
Transfers are this week and I got a haircut on Saturday. I can´t
believe it´s already been a transfer. Both Elder Conway and Báez got
shipped out today and two new Elders will come tomorrow.

Well, I think that´s all I got for now. I´m glad to hear that things
are going well and that you made it safely to Grandma´s. I hope you
have a great thanksgiving and let me know all about the fun things you
do there.

Love,
-Elder Bird
Quote I thought up(I think):¨Goals are made to be broken, not met.¨
Sounds cool to me.

Hey Mom,

Just want to start this letter by giving a last ¨HOO-RAH!¨ to Elder
Groesbeck who will be reporting this week. God speed and work hard in
the MTC. Then one other matter of business. It would appear that Neyba
doesn´t have a mailing system (or we haven´t located it yet) and we
actually can´t send letters via pouch for some reason. So I have two
written letters sitting on my desk that can´t be sent. Know that I
still love you Kevin!

Wow, Thanksgiving is coming up so soon. Before you know it, I´ll be
calling home on Christmas day. I don´t know if my Spanish will be
ready by then to show off. But Elder George and I have been talking
about our plans of how we´re going to call. What should I do? Should I
get a calling card, or what hast my brethren done in the past to call
home from their missions?

We live in a branch. The branch President is Elder Johnson who is a
married missionary couple. I´m not sure what the technical term for
that is. Elder Johnson knows spanish well and Hermana Johnson is
learning. I love them both. Our branch is a size of about 30ish that
actually show up and I carry the keys to the church. So, the branch
relies heavily on the missionaries. The missionaries give a talk once
a month, I believe we speak on the 2nd Sunday of the month. I can´t
remember, but I just remember speaking my first week and two weeks ago.

Well, thanks for congratulating me on my first baptism. Just thought I
´d let you know we had another one this past Saturday. Last week we
learned that there was actually a young man with the priesthood in our
branch (we don´t have a lot of young men in our branch) and we had a
goal to have him perform the baptism. But that plan fell through and I
was Plan B. So I got more pictures I´ll end up sending. She is
actually the cousin of Jessica who I baptized last week. So my first
baptisms were cousins =D

Sounds like you had quite the adventure helping Chris move. How did
that go for you? Does he have a nice place?

Well, before I forget. We´ve actually been having some rain lately.
Last week after our super-baptism it actually began to rain (which I
didn´t think was coincidental =P). It ended up raining pretty hard
later in the night. We´ve been having a couple periods of rain, but
nothing quite like last weekend. Although I do get a kick out of
watching flooded gutters running down the hill. Can´t say we get that
back in San Diego.

I do have a few stories to mention. We were at someone´s house and
Elder George and I helped a woman with her english homework. She
pulled out the lyrics to the song, ¨We are the World¨ which is the
song that we had at my 5th grade graduation eons ago. I started
singing it in English and she said, ¨Ah, you like this song?¨ I then
replied ¨No, but I know it¨ I can´t believe the American influence in
the media in these countries. The people here know a ton about the US
and its celebrities. Even the music that the political trucks blast
here have a few american songs. I heard ¨We like to Party¨ the other
day.

I had my first ¨Food of Interest¨ this past week. For those of you who
are weak of stomach, feel free to pass this paragraph. You´ve been
fairly warned =D Anyway, we were eating at the same place we have
lunch (Hermana Carmen´s house) and she´s recently been making
something with the same idea as fried rice. You have rice and a bunch
of stuff thrown in. I tried this new meat that I´d never had before
and asked Elder George what it was. He then told me it was Chicken
Intestines. Yum! It reminded me of the chicken heart that Chris got me
to try at Tucanos. It has a similar taste, but is still quite
different. It was good, but not something I would eat a lot of.

Alright, you can all start reading this paragraph now. In the CCM I
would brag (for lack of a better word) to my district about how I hadn
´t prayed in english since the 3rd day in the MTC in Provo. I did that
to encourage them to progress with their Spanish. My record is now
broken. Elder George were at a member´s house nicknamed ¨Hijo¨ who is
a returned missionary from many years ago. He speaks good english and
I have yet to find out where he learned it. We then finished up our
discussion/lesson thing and we asked if we could leave with a word of
prayer. He then said yes but said I had to give it in English. It was
actually more difficult than you would have thought. I know understand
how Jared had a difficult time giving a prayer in English in his Zone
Conference.

Then one final thing I have written down to write home. I was reading
in the Book of Mormon and found something interesting. The reference
is 1 Nephi 18:17-18. Nephi´s parents were so grieved from Laman and
Lemuel that they got really sick and almost died from their grief. I
just hope that I won´t do like-wise to my parents. Just a fun little
thing I read this week about how we are burdened physically by these
things.

Anyway, hope things are still going well back home. Take care and work
hard!

Love,
-Elder Bird

Here are some pictures of the area of Neyba, our district, and the
baptism.

Hey Mom,
Chris is moving THIS week?!?! Wow that is so crazy. I wish him the
best and wish you a safe and enjoyable trip. I was thinking about your
story about driving in LA. I only have a few words of comfort (of
course, the story happened a long time ago so these words of comfort
won´t really complete any purpose), at least you didn´t have to drive
through Santo Domingo traffic. I have no problem driving through LA,
but I am scared straight out of my pants just being a passenger in
Santo Domingo. I don´t want to have to be an assistant that drives
through that crazy chaos.

One other thing that I thought about was my first talk here in Neyba
was on faith. Although, I have given a talk within the last 6 years
and it only needed to be 5 minutes or so. The catch though was that it
was in Spanish ;) And while we´re on the topic of talks, I gave
another one this past Sunday on a couple Christ-like attributes. I got
up there with my talk which was the notebook Stephen gave me. I was
looking for it, but gave up after it took a little too long for my
comfort. So I gave my first talk without any notes.

I hope the fashion show pulls through for you. From what I´ve heard
from other young women, those activities are quite awesome. Best of
luck to you with that. And tell President Ellsworth that I say ¨hi¨ =D

Who will be going to gramma´s house for thanksgiving? Is it just the 3
birds in San Diego, Jared, and Chris? Will there also be any extended
family attending?

Well, time for my weekly report. I would like to give a shoutout to G-
Matt before he leaves. I wish him the best and best of luck. Use the 9
weeks in the MTC to the fullest and pray that you´ll have a hard-
working district and companion. If you´re in an intermediate group
like I was, chances will be in your favor, but not guaranteed.

Well, one story I failed to tell last week. Did you guys just hit day
light savings time? Cause my alarm clock from Gramma Bird is an atomic
clock that currently syncs with the east coast. It changed time on me,
so I didn´t wake up til 7ish, but it wasn´t my fault. I tried changing
it, but it just keeps syncing. So I have the alarm set for an hour
earlier so I´ll wake up on time.

Last Tuesday we had our temple trip to Santo Domingo. I happened to
see two of my CCM teachers there, Hermanas Pichardo and Parra. I didn
´t talk to either of them seeing as how they were busy. But it was an
awesome trip. Afterwards we went to the mission home. I now believe
Elder George when he said President Almonte is a multi-millionaire. He
lives in a home nice for the US and he actually has a piano. I had an
interview with President Almonte to see how things are going. Then we
had lunch from Hermana Almonte. I think that while I´ve been on the
mission, I´ve been able to tolerate foods that I´ve despised before. I
will actually eat peppers and I´ve eaten a ton of cabbage here. In
salads in the US, you first think of lettuce. Here, it's white cabbage.

Well, last Saturday was our ¨Super-baptism¨ activity. We had two
baptisms in which I was able to baptize our investigator Jessica. She
was actually the first person I had a lesson with. That was a fun
experience. After the baptisms we watched the Testiments in Spanish.
There are two things I would like to say about this experience. The
Spanish in this was clear and easy to understand, which is completely
opposite to Dominican Spanish. I was actually able to understand most
of it. Which also shows that I´ve been progressing here because we
watched it in the last week in the CCM and I didn´t understand a lot
of it. After the movie we had a barbeque with a lot of hot dogs. It
was a very successful activity.

That was all the exciting things that happened this week. Mom, you
asked for more general authority things, so I´ll tell you the one that
happened this last week. I was walking home at night with Elder George
and other members of the church and it was somewhat hard to see at
night. It is quite common to see two motorcycles racing each other on
the main roads here...especially at night. Two of them passed us and
it made me think about how they were traveling too fast for their
headlamps to show them where they are going. I thought of a phrase,
¨Don´t travel faster than you can see.¨ where the light is our
knowledge or guidance. If our light isn´t bright enough, we won´t see
some of the obstacles in the street. I then wrote down an explanation
in my journal that explains how this phrase still works even with the
phrase with faith that you don´t have to see to have a knowledge. I can
´t remember the exact wording, so I´d have to look that up again.

Anyway, hope everything is going well at home. I have my camera with
me so I´ll send some pictures home.

Love always,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,

I would like to wish a late Happy Halloween to everyone and I hope
that was fun. What did everyone dress up as? (everyone includes Kara
and any extended family/friends you may feel like sharing). I
certainly can´t believe that its November already. I don´t know if I
´ve shared this yet, but Christmas decorations have been up for a
couple weeks. I imagine that I´ll see more houses with decorations
coming up. I can´t believe that Chris is moving already. I do remember
his situation and I wish him the best with what goes on with him in
Arizona.

I have not yet thought of something you could send me in the package.
Certainly things may change in the near future.

Well, this week I would like to share a lot of cultural things in the
land where schools have the appearance of a federal prison, which also
includes some stories from this past week. This past week Elder George
and I got to help a little kid chase down his little pig. I guess I
should´ve spent more time on the Forrester´s farm cause I don´t know
how to grab pigs. It didn´t take too long, but it was waaaay fun.

We see all kinds of animals everywhere. I think I mentioned that
Roosters (gallos in spanish) are my least favorite, but goats (chivos)
are my favorite. First off, goats are all over town and goats love to
come onto church grounds to eat the grass here. So after church
meetings we´ll get to chase them out. But we have to be careful to
make sure they don´t cause an accident. We´ll be teaching a lesson
somewhere and some animal will just pass by us. Specifically this past
week we had a handful of sheep within 10 feet of us while we were
teaching.

Every single dog or cat here is highly likely to be a stray. Dogs are
treated very poorly here...its pretty sad. Parents teach their kids to
throw rocks at them (most of the time for no reason whatsoever). Most
dogs will be sleeping in the road. So at night if you see a dark spot
in the road, don´t step on it.

Ah, time for the irony. Last week I mentioned that it never rains
here. The day of and the day after we had a light drizzle. It still
wasn´t anything, but it was just the irony that I loved. A ton of dark
clouds moved in and I thought we were going to get pelted with rain.
But...I have yet to see an actual storm.

So, yesterday we left for church and we found out that our gate was
locked. We were locked inside of our apartment complex and our
landlady doesn´t live in the complex. This is a pretty big gate, so
jumping this gate was out of the question. We have a smaller gate to
jump and we took that. Since then we have gotten the key, so hopefully
that won´t happen again.

Last week for district meeting I received a specific assignment from 2
of the President´s Assistants that I need to start teaching more. At
first, I understood this as a reprimand. After talking to Elder George
about it, he said that he hasn´t seen president give an assignment
like that this early. He believes that Presidente Almonte has some
plans for either myself or for those who arrived in the same group as
me. I´ll keep you posted with that. I´ll actually be going to Santo
Domingo tomorrow for a temple trip. I´ll also be having an interview
with Presidente, so I´ll probably let you know whatever things I can
tell you.

I think those are all the little things I have written down. So I´ll
probably share more with you guys next week. Hope everything is going
well at home and that all of you are doing awesome in your respective
activities, callings, and aspirations. Take care and do well!

Love always,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,
Before I forget, I sent the postcard as soon as I could after we went
to the store in the CCM. So, around the 3rd to 4th week in the CCM was
when I sent it.

This past week I got my first physical ¨carta¨ or letter from my
awesome friend Kevin =D It took 10 days to get here but its all good.
Kevin, when I figure out how in the word the mailing system works here
I´ll get a letter sent to you. I can receive letters through Pouch,
but we´re not allowed to send letters through pouch for some reason.
So the letter may arrive in 3 years.

I have been quite confused as to the spelling of ¨Neyba¨ or ¨Neiba¨ I
have seen it both ways in this country and it seems like no one can
decide on the spelling of it. On our mission map its listed as ¨Neyba¨
so I will probably refer to that spelling while I am here. But at
least we are talking about the same place. I am not aware of any lake
nearby, but that may be because I´m not focused on the landscape here.
The town is surrounded by a lot of green...plantlife, I am not quite
sure what it is. I hope they´re trees. I´ll have to get a picture to
you guys when I can.

Elder George is from Riverside, CA and Elder Espinal is from Santo
Domingo. Elder Espinal and Elder Sandoval were pretty close to my
height which is exceedingly rare seeing as how 99% of other dominicans
come up to my shoulder or lower. I have seen a couple others who are
about my height, but I don´t think I´ve seen any that are actually
taller than me. Although I could be mistaken.

I certainly remember Bro. Waddell. He was my baseball coach a couple
times in little league remember? So, was he just called to be a
mission president? Or has he been the mission president for the past 3
years and I haven´t realized it? I agree with Sis. Waddell´s counsel
to do the little chores in your life so that you do them without
thinking about it. A little cleaning a day will make big cleaning much
easier later.

What kinds of things would I like in a package? I actually don´t
really know. I really LOVED the candy that Sis. Hansen sent me while I
was in the MTC. I´m not really sure since I haven´t been here for very
long. We pay an Hermana to cook lunch for us everyday, which is the
big meal of the day in latino culture here. I would just have to say
for now, send whatever you feel like sending since I don´t know what
to really ask for.

Well, now time for the weekly report. We actually moved today. We´re
still in the process of moving since the assistants didn´t show up
today with a truck we could use. We ended up paying a guy with a truck
to help us move big stuff over (refrigerator, beds, etc) and we´re
going to finish up tomorrow. I kinda feel bad about moving cause we´re
moving from a good place to leave to a GREAT place to live. The
problems that my companions had with where we were currently living is
our land lady. She isn´t a nice person and is quite lazy as I have
seen for myself today and this past week. Last week we didn´t have
water for at least 4 days in a row and I found out that it was only
cause she was too lazy to fill our giant water...tub thing on our
roof. I ended up climbing up there and had a hose thrown to me and we
got water. Then we ran out again just in time for us to leave. The
other place we´re moving to is more reliable with water. So you won´t
have to worry so much about that.

Every monday is Family Home Evening (Noche de Hogar en español) and I
had my first one last week. We were at a member´s house and we had all
of the youth there which consisted of 4 young women and 1 young man.
Elder George and I had the lesson and I taught something that I swear
you would hear from a general authority. I thought the 4 steps or keys
on how to learn.

1) Listen/Escuchar
2) Ask Questions/Preguntar
3) Understand/Comprender/Endenter
4) Practice/Apply Practicar/Aplicar

It was pretty tight. That was something that just came right on the
spot. Although, I´m sure that we know it wasn´t me who came up with
that ;)

We have been having some progressing investigators, but each one has a
specific challenge. The deaf girl we are teaching goes to a Deaf
School that another church provides and won´t allow her to get
baptized, although she wants to. I guess that´s why I have Elder
George and Presidente Almonte to counsel me.

I had my first zone conference last week. Presidente and Hermana
Almonte said that I have really good Spanish for being this far in the
mission (is this word spelled right? ever since the mission I don´t
know how to spell it in english anymore...lol). I´ve been noticing a
ton of Dominicans have been saying that I speak well, but I can´t
understand them at all...lol. That will come with time just as you
have counseled me. Most Dominicans are patient and understanding of
me...except for the young man I mentioned before. Elder George told me
that the young men in this area...aren´t very good people. Which I
agree with. They´re not terrible people but...only one goes to church
and he...I´m trying to think of words I´m allowed to say as a
missionary that still describe him. So I´ll just leave it at that.

Well, things have been going well here and hope things continue to go
well for you at home. I´m glad Kara has stepped up to take my position
as the random...person? of the house. Take care, have fun, and love
you all!

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Dad,
You are certainly right with how I feel about Spanish. However, it´s
pretty common knowledge that I speak it well (seeing as how many
latinos have told me how well I speak). But it is also common
knowledge that most of the time, I won´t have any idea what they are
saying to me. But during lessons, I understand 80-90% of what is said.
The MTC did a good job of teaching us how to teach in Spanish, but we
have no idea how to live in a foreign country. I guess that´s what
trainers are for, eh?

I was just thinking about how I still have zoo pictures on my camera
from Chelsea´s last visit. It is funny to show my companions because
it has pictures of the dinosaur....world or thing or mountain.
Whatever it may be.

Actually my companion said that here in Neyba we don´t get a whole lot
of rain...which has been true so far. We are next to a mountain range
and I have seen a few storms in the mountains. But we haven´t had
anything this past week. He said that all the rain occurs in Santo
Domingo. So...we´ll see how things go with the weather. Well, thanks
for your email and I hope things will keep being awesome for you guys!

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey mom,

Just a heads up, the keyboard here is really odd, so I will avoid
using certain characters so that I do not have to type them. The ´
symbol is the worst, as you can see, I am avoiding using it.

Anyway, sounds like things have been going awesome at home. I am sorry
I was not able to call, but hopefully there will be another
opportunity. I may have to ask my companion, Elder George (american
from Riverside, CA), if we can call in transition.

I certainly have to agree with you that you had 3 sweet experiences
this summer. It was incredible to me that all three of those things
happened. I still cannot believe that I am in the mission field.

Speaking of which, I am sure you are dying to know where I am and how
I am. I am currently in Neyba which is the furthest west Zone in the
mission. Not the furthest from the capital, but we are the furthest
west =D. The Elders in my apartment are Elders George (comp), Conway
from Arizona (near Mesa), and Baéz from Santiago, Dominican Republic.
They are all really cool guys and we all get along very well. Elder
Baéz reported the day after I reported, but he has been in the field
longer than I have because he only needed to be in the MTC for 3 weeks.

Speaking of the MTC, we were finally able to take pictures on the last
day and now I finally have an opportunity to send them. But I will
have to see when I can get around to it seeing as how I have tons to
send. Before I forget, I realized that Elder Espinal looks exactly
like President Obama, so I cannot wait for you guys to see that
picture when I send it.

Neyba is really beautiful and has treated me well for the first week.
Elder George says that its weird that we have not seen any odd things
happen this week, such as random people running through the street
with limited clothes. I am sure you got the point. But I do have other
stories that are certainly different from any home I have lived in.
Every morning I do not neet an alarm clock because our neighbors have
roosters. When I come home, I never want to live near any roosters.
Their cock-a-doodle-doo sounds so ugly. I cannot believe that it is
natural for them to make a sound like that. It is not like the typical
rooster noise you see in movies, cause those don´t bring any kind of
fear or annoyance. Yesterday was the first time the water went out of
our apartment and still has not come back. So today I took my 2nd and
3rd bucket shower with water that is just sitting out near those
roosters whom I despise so much. I hope that water isn´t used by anyone.

Well, the latinos here say that I speak Spanish very well, but I
cannot understand any of them. Which I figured would happen. But the
funny thing is that there will be times when I understand 90% of what
is said, and there are times when I don´t have a clue of what is being
said. It goes on and off, so hopefully I will be able to work with that.

Elder George and I have several investigators. The one closest to
being baptised is Jessica who was the first person I taught. She
apparently has been making baptismal dates for weeks but they have
been getting delayed. I hope that we can help her progress.

On Saturday Elder George and I taught a deaf girl who is around 12
years old. We had a member with us who knew sign language, Elisa, and
was apparently good friends with her. I noticed that some of the signs
she was doing were some of the signs I learned from Sis. Havertz when
we had sign language class eons ago. I ended up being able to say a
few things to her in sign language and I showed her that I knew the
alphabet. It was such a great experience for us and she is progressing
really fast. We are going to visit her again today.

Well, I believe that is all I have for now, so feel free to reply to
this email cause I may not check myLDSmail often. I hope things are
going well for you guys!

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,
I'll try and answer your questions from last week and this week seeing
as how I didn't get the chance to read your's last week. I haven't
read yours for this week, so we'll see how this goes.

Hermana Hendricks is the mission president's wife (president of the
MTC). She reminds me of all the wonderful things my mother has done
for me when I was a young warthog. Makes excellent cookies, always is
wondering how I'm doing, and knows what I need to do to take care of
myself. Of course she isn't quite like my wonderful mother, but she
reminds me of her.

The MTC here has about 65ish missionaries (Elderes y Hermanas). We
have about 5-8 Hermanas (only one american) and the rest are half
American Elders and half Latino Elders (from various countries, but
mostly Dominican Republic). We have missionaries going to all 3
missions in the DR and a couple in Puerto Rico. This MTC actually
covers many more missions, including Elder Risenmay's mission in the
West Indies. Speaking of which, his mission president's wife looks
exactly like Sarah Palin. So we call her Hermana Palin when we look at
her picture on the wall.

Congratz on your calling. Sounds like you're going to be even busier.
I definitely remember the name "Sis. Mortensen" and I'm pretty sure
that I have a face in my mind. Although I can't really describe any
activities that I've had with her to confirm that we're talking about
the same person.

Kara did tell me about her Young Women project. I told her should
could do it on one condition, she has to send me pictures of the room
when she's done. I guess I can live with the room being blue and
purple. I also wonder if I have yet expressed my sorrow for not having
put all my stuff away in my room. It has grieved me several times in
both MTC's and hope that I can receive your forgiveness.

I believe that some of my friends are reading my blog although I am
not 100% sure seeing as how I can only write letters to them and they
can only DearElder me or write letters. So to all my friends, 100
thanks for reading this =D

Now starting your email from this week =D

We learned that we'll be leaving next Tuesday, Oct 13th for the
mission field. Which is nuts for me. You are correct when you said
that I don't feel 100% ready, but that's just the way its supposed to
be. This past week I've had many comments from teachers and President
Hendricks that my Spanish is great and has improved much. Hermano
Eduardo said that Elder Bentz and I are ready for the field, I just
hope my Spanish is ready for the field.

I absolutely loved conference and am sad to hear about your little
"trial" with conference. As much as I loved conference, my favorite
talk was in Priesthood session. The first speaker was Elder M. Russell
Ballard and spoke about the relationship between father and son. This
talk reminded me of how awesome dad and I are and how thankful I am to
have awesome parents.

Sunday night we had a fireside where we shared our "insights" from
conference in Spanish (we watched in English, but shared in Spanish,
so I had to translate my notes). One thing that was great was when I
went up to speak, we could've heard a pin drop in that room. Not a
soul spoke and everyone was listening. During, I felt a fire burning
in my face. Although I don't know if that was the Holy Ghost or just
me being nervous in front of everyone. Either way, it was a fun
experience and makes a great story. Elders Sandoval and Espinal told
me that my Spanish was great and I received such comments from other
Elders after the fireside.

One other thing, I got a haircut last Thursday. I don't think any of
my friends would recognize me cause I didn't recognize myself in the
mirror. Although, I wouldn't recognize the back of my hand if I found
it hidden somewhere, like my pocket.

Anyway, glad to hear things are going well at home. Love you all,
friends and family!

Love,

-Elder Bird

Hey Dad,
I haven't gotten an email from mom yet. So you'll get my planned email
for the week.

Good luck with your marathon tomorrow and tell Blake that I wish him
luck as well, but not too much luck ;) But you can wish him a happy
birthday. Speaking of which, it was President Hendrick's birthday
yesterday so we had cake yesterday. It was good and pretty similar to
what we have in the states.

Glad to hear that you had a great temple experience. I certainly enjoy
going to the temple here in Santo Domingo every week. It sounds like
I'll actually continue going to the temple often when I get shipped
out in two weeks (HOLY COW!).

We'll be watching general conference here at the MTC this weekend. I
have to ask Elder Farnesworth for the schedule since it totally messes
up a missionary's schedule.

Well, glad to hear that everything is going well for you. Here's what
I have written down to tell you guys. Its not much since this past
week hasn't been too much.

Our latinos arrived last Thursday and Elder Bentz and I are sharing a
room with Elders Sandoval and Espinal. So get this, Elder Sandoval
knows Chris Collard and was actually at his house for a period of
time. Its a small world after all, eh? They're both awesome. Elder
Sandoval speaks really good english and Elder Espinal is crazy. It's
awesome!

This past Sunday Elder Bentz and I had the opportunity to bless the
Sacrament in Spanish. It was a good experience and it wasn't
difficult. Speaking of which, today in the temple I had a portion done
in Spanish because the temple worker only spoke Spanish. And last week
Elder Bentz and I had an assignment to do initiatories. There were a
few workers who only spoke Spanish, so that was a fun experience =D

Well, I've been debating with myself if I want to tell this story. So
I guess I will anyway, but not tell all the details. Before going on
the mission, Cam told me that I would have girls proclaim their love
for me because I'm american. I had that kind of experience at the
university. Elder Bentz and I have nicknamed her mi "Esposa Futura"
because she asked me if I would be coming back after my mission. Of
course she asked me several other things and we had to kindly explain
my situation to her. I hope that doesn't worry any of you back home.

Well, that's all I have written for this week. I hope things continue
to go well at home and hope you guys have the times of your lives =D

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hope things are going well back home. This week I was thinking about
what I wanted to write this week. I have a few shoutouts I would love
for my friends to read:

Dealy- My Spanish has been improving a ton here.
Jared and Abe: THANKS so much for all the Spanish preparation you have
given me.
Stephen- Just like my district in Provo, all the missionaries in my
district here in Santo Domingo are jealous of the notebook you gave
me. Its absolutely perfect for what a missionary needs.
Kevin- I have been thinking about moving to Alaska for my zombie plan
and I have concluded that it doesn't work as well as we would hope to.
Zombies don't have body heat so they can't freeze.

Anyway, hope that brings a few chuckles. We haven't had any real big
experiences since our first visit to USD. I find that I'm speaking
better but I'm not able to understand them any better. I haven't had
any people randomly come up to us and want to speak english. A few
other Elders have had that happen to them. Oh, this past week we were
talking with another man who was preaching repentance and he started
talking to us. We gave him a pamphlet and seemed really interested. I
don't think he was part of any organized church. But if he knows as
much about the bible as he says he did, he'll probably find some
interest.

The food here is GREAT! RICE AND BEANS! We also have various meat
mostly chicken and beef. We have a few American entrees every once in
a while. Last night we had spaghetti. We've also had hamburgers and
hot dogs. But those are rare occasions. Once a week we get ice cream
which is way good. Also, once a week, Hermana Hendricks will make
cookies for us. They are most delicious.

Speaking of food, I would love Sis. Hansen to know how much I loved
the Red Vines which I finished off this past week. I can't remember if
I told you the story about the package she sent me. It arrived the day
before we left from Provo and I only got it because Elder Grant felt
inspired to look in our mailbox even though we weren't supposed to.
But because of that, I was able to receive it =D

For the past 3 weeks there have only been gringo missionaries, except
one Elder from some Island Country that doesn't have more that 500,000
citizens. He reminds me of Jared's Chilean companions. But he speaks
English fluently, but his native language is Dutch and he's learning
Spanish. I wish I was multi-lingual like that. Today we received a ton
of Latinos and they will be here for 3 weeks. Elder Bentz and I will
find out who will be moving into our room. The Latinos are actually
currently in the room 5 seconds from here. They're having their
introduction meeting. I imagine the ratio will now be bumped up to
50/50.

I extend my congratulations to the Romney family for their newest
member. I was actually just thinking about Chelsea this last week and
wondering if she had her baby or not. I remember Kara went and helped
Chelsea out during summer. But I had no recolection if they had their
baby or not. I do remember that Chelsea wanted to name her Ruby. I
just hope she doesn't name another girl Crystal. That would make any
Pokemon fan who knows their Pokemon games laugh. As pretty as those
names are, they're versions of gameboy games.

Another reunion would be great for you guys. If you go, dad will HAVE
to take Jared on that hike we did. In fact, we should fly me out for
the day just so I can do it again. But seeing as how that isn't a
possibility, I'll wait at least two years to do that again. But
hopefully Jared will receive my enthusiasm about that hike.

Its incredible for me to believe how small our mutual has gotten. I
remember when I was 12 we would fill up the entire Young Women's Room
with youth and now we hardly have any. I hope you have fun in your
calling.

Well, this past week I spoke in church (Spanish of course =D). I spoke
on baptism. Afterwards, Hermana Hendricks came up and spoke with me
(during lunch or dinner) and said that she can see that I'll be a
great missionary. Reminds me of my experience when I spoke with the
Temple President in San Diego. I'm sure that's something that Dad
remembers.

This past week there were two things that happened that were crazy
awesome. We went to a store this past week to buy things we needed (or
wanted in the case of most missionaries). It was just really fun to go
to this giant store and look around. I was really tempted to buy a
machete for 300 pesos (roughly 10 dollars). But that isn't going to
happen...yet O:-). On the drive over to the store, there was a thought
that came to mind while we were on the road.

"Siento en mi corazón, que vamos a morir."
"I feel in my heart that we are going to die."

I don't know how people drive on these streets, but they do. lol.
Anyway, this week at the university, we saw some clouds moving it
rather rapidly. When it was about time for us to leave, it starts
raining cats and dogs. The rain started pounding us (note that these
were huge droplets of rain) and we had to find shelter as soon as we
could. A nearby vendor in the street invited us under his umbrella
while our district leader went to find our teacher that was
accompanying us. We had a nice conversation with him, he lived in New
Jersey for a while and then lived here. I don't know why we didn't ask
if he spoke any English, although I think he did.

Anyway, that was fun. We walked home and arrived completely drenched.
But we live for adventures, no?

Love,
-Elder Bird

Hey Mom,
Glad to hear that you'll recognize my face anywhere, cause I certainly
wouldn't recognize my face anywhere.

Last week I sent you two pictures I thought that were the two I wanted
to send at the time. I can't find my camera cable right now, but we're
going to try and see if Elder's Bentz's adapter will work with my
memory card so that I can send you more pictures. He's currently using
it.

Anyway, I may be an example, but I certainly don't think I'm a shining
example. I probably could be a little better, but I don't think its
something that I should need to do in the first place (I hope that
makes sense). We are 8 in our district. Elders: Bentz, Bird,
Farnesworth (not the same as in Provo), Pettyjohn, Lund, Hampton,
Eskildsen, and Sanders. Dad, I was talking to Elder Eskildsen during
our service project at the temple just 20 minutes ago who is from
Washington. He is from the Mattawa area. He lives in a place that
starts with a "C" or C sound of some kind. He said that Othello and
Mattawa are his rival schools.

Today was my second session in the Santo Domingo Temple. So we do more
that just looking around and weeding there ;). I feel a little spoiled
that the sessions are in English, but the majority who attend at that
time are Americans.

Well, time to talk about Elder Bird's health for the past week. My
headache last Thursday probably came because I wasn't drinking enough
water. I started drinking tons and it slowly went away. However, after
the headache, tons of things came. All minor things until a few days
ago. I went to bed not being able to pop my right ear and thinking
that it was weird. At some time during the night before I fell asleep
I started to get pain in my ear and ended up only getting 4 hours of
sleep that night. I got an ear infection and had it looked at a few
days ago. It hasn't hurt since that night, but it definitely feels
weird. The MTC doctor told me what I needed since he didn't have it at
the time and President and Hermana Hendricks got some eardrops for me.
I've been taking it for 2-3 days and my ear feels fine. The doctor
checked it today and says it looks much better, but still not 100%.
Maybe I'm just getting all these illnesses now just so that I'll be
immune/resistant to them in the mission field.

Well, now that I've answered all your questions, lets see if I
remember all the things I did this past week.

Monday night/Tuesday morning was the event of my ear infection. I
remember being worried that I wouldn't be able to go to the University
to teach people. But I was able to go since I didn't have any pain. We
ended up teaching this one girl for practically the whole hour. We
found out that she was a member. She gave us some good advice on
teaching. She is from San Cristobol which is in my mission and she
wants me to tell her family "Hi" (technically Hola!) when I get there.
The Latinos here love to talk to Americans/Gringos. Many of them love
to practice their English. I LOVE it! I guess its only Latino
teenagers that I can say that.

Well, that's all that I can think of for now. I hope all is going well
at home, and everyone. I usually write an outline of what I want to
write home, but I forgot to do that this week so my letter is a little
disorganized. But all is well....

Ciao!
Love,
-Elder Bird
PS. I can relate to Jared as I am now used to being called Elder "Beard"
PSS Looks like gym is coming up so pictures may not come now, but
probably later.

Greetings from the DR!

Sorry that I missed you with my second call. But it was for a good
cause. Dad gave me a brief description of what you were up to. I was
very sad to hear what happened. I hope Tayrn's recover goes well.

The weather is definitely in the low 90's, but we don't spend enough
time outside to figure out what "widespread dust" is. We're inside
most of the day.

Well, time to tell some DR stories.

We got here late last Thursday, which meant that we had to wait a full
week to write you. The night we got here we found the van we needed to
go in and it wouldn't start. So we had 10 missionaries push start this
car and we were able to get out of the airport. I believe the natives
when they say that there's practically no Traffic Laws here. I'm just
going to say it was an adventure driving home. The few times we've
been outside in traffic, not a moment goes by without hearing some
kind of horn.

We got to our room and I met my companion, Elder Bentz, from Los
Angeles. The other companionship in our room were Puerto Ricans. They
were here for 3 months cause of visa problems with Mexico, but they
were finally able to leave last Monday.

My district here doesn't compare to my district in Provo. I'm the only
one who was in intermediate Spanish (I'm fine with that) but my
district here isn't very disciplined or diligent. We go off topic
quite a bit and they apparently can't take a hint from several of our
teachers expression frustration. My teachers are excellent, but
there's only so much that they can do. The nice thing is that my
teachers realize that I know more Spanish than everyone else, so they
turn to me if they're confused with something that the other Elders
are saying. They all speak really good English though, so that doesn't
happen much.

On Tuesdays we go to the University of Santo Domingo and hand out
church stuff (it varies). Elder Bentz and I placed a Book of Mormon
and that made our day. We had a pretty good experience that day since
we had 3 nice "encounters" for lack of a better word.

A story about one of those encounters, we finished our discussion with
the two girls who accepted the Book of Mormon and we were walking
along the huge library. Kinda hard to explain how, but there was a car
in our way on the sidewalk and I tell Elder Bentz to wait. 10 seconds
later there was a native who asked us if we had an English Book of
Mormon that we could give him. We just gave him the numbers to the
Santo Domingo Missions and said that they would be able to get one for
him...somehow.

Today (P-day) we went back to the University to do some service. There
was this girl who called me "Juanito". I'm not sure why, but I think
its either cause I look like a celebrity named Juanito or (probably
this one) I finally got my hair cut today and its super short. You
probably won't recognize me.

We went to the Santo Domingo Temple this morning and it is very
beautiful.

Well, that's all I have for now. I don't want you to worry but I
actually have a massive headache right now that I want to take care
of. I'll try and get you some pictures since we can actually do that
here =D

Love,

-Elder Bird

Buenos Dias!

I made it here to the Dominican MTC and it's awesome. I'll have more
details later. Sadly to say, P-day is Wednesday/Thursday. One of them
I can't remember xD So it'll be a while.

Love,
Elder Bird

Ryan sent us a few photos from the Provo MTC.



Ryan in front of the Provo Temple.


Ryan's companion, Elder McMahan, and Hermana Keller, who is a solo missionary. Ryan and Elder McMahan were assigned to escort her around.


Ryan's district


The missionaries going to Ryan's mission, Dominican Republic Santo Domingo West.

This week was quite a week for me. I'll try and say what needs to be
said. So, to start off with the two biggest things of news. Elder
McMahan went home yesterday. He had some stuff that he needs to take
care of and will return in what sounds like 6 months. He'll come to
our mission, but I was devastated. I was looking forward to going with
him to the DR. But I guess we'll have different times to go.

But, to hopefully brighten things up a bit. Last Tuesday we had Elder
Richard G. Scott of the Quorum of the 12 Apostles for our weekly
devotional. Two things that I think you would really appreciate. As an
apostle of the Lord, he exercised his authority to give us two
blessings, one of the Gift of Tongues and a blessing of Protection.
There are some requirements to these blessings, but you can count on
the word of an Apostle.

I did obtain a phone card and here's probably what's going to happen.
Our longest break is in Dallas Texas and that's only an hour and a
half. So I'll probably have a 45 minute window to call home, but the
phone call can only be 15 minutes or so. I'll probably call between
12:10 and 1:15 Texas time. Which should be 10 or 11 CA time.

There is an Elder on our floor that was on the BYU volleyball team.
Chris, he was one of the two red shirt guys who can pound the
volleyball harder that most guys on the team. He's Elder Seymour and
he's leaving today for his mission.

I'm glad that you got my pictures. Hopefully there will be a better
method of sending them in the Dominican MTC so that I can send
pictures often. Hermana Keller is really short, but Elder McMahan and
I are the 2nd and 3rd tallest in our group. And not to mention we are
on a sloped hill, so she could be standing downhill from us. I haven't
had a haircut yet. When I decided I needed a hair cut, I saw that
appointments are full until I leave. So I'll have to cut it in the DR
MTC.

Oh, time for spiritual comment time. So, you remember how Elder Scott
gave a blessing of the Gift of Tongues? Tuesday is our P-day which
means we can do several things including going to the Provo Temple. In
the temple I gave a prayer asking for one thing in particular. This
was inspired by Jared but I prayed for the Gift of Tongues/
Interpretation of Tongues. Keep in mind, I haven't said a prayer in
English since the 3rd day here, so I thought it was weird praying in
Spanish in the temple. Anyway, Elder Scott started the devotional with
that blessing. God truly answers prayers. I feel honored mine was
answered through an Apostle. The Blessing of Protection came in the
middle of his talk.

Well, I'm glad to hear that Kara is doing well and that she's praying
for me. I feel special....She's got quite the school schedule. I'm so
happy for her.

Spanish is coming along. Its mostly stuff I knew from High School. But
the thing that's new for me is religious vocabulary. I found that when
we memorized the Articles of Faith in Spanish, that helped immensely
here. In fact, for the first couple days I started memorizing more. I
had the first 5 memorized the first week here at the MTC, don't know
if I still do.

Anyway, that's all I have for now.
Ciao,

-Elder Bird

I'm glad to hear Matt has his papers in. Send me a DearElder when you
know where he's going. I'm totally stoked that he has them in =D

We recieved our Itineraries this past week and we'll leave September
3rd. Is that a thursday? And I'm the travel leader for our group. I'm
pretty stoked for that.

A funny thing that happened this last week was that our district was
practicing contacting. This companionship was practicing in front of
the whole district and they indroduce themselves. "Hello I'm Elder
Lorimer and this is my companion..." and Elder Palmer says with the
most perfect imitation ever "I'm Batman!" It was hilarious. I couldn't
stop laughing for the next hour.

Well, I attended the Oquirrh Mountain dedication the past Sunday. I
don't know if they let you see it in San Diego. Is that something you
would like to sew onto my hankerchief? Doesn't matter to me, just as
long as I've been to it.

Well, I wrote down in my notes that I would write about a spiritual
experience that I had here. Sunday night is "Movie Night" where they
have several different movies that you can see. I went and saw the
Joseph Smith Movie which is the same one that they show in Salt Lake
City somewhere. Anyway, at the end of the movie I just felt the spirit
so strong and excellent. I think LDS Movies make it easy for me to
feel the Spirit. Anyway, it made me think of why I (Elder Bird) am
serving a mission. Although it isn't the same as the purpose in Preach
My Gospel, I gotta take steps in order to get there. My desire to
serve a mission is to bring joy and happiness to others and to have
others feel that same Spirit that I felt. It felt really great.

Anyway, that's all that I've written down that happened this last week
for me. It seems like I've been here forever. I can't remember the
outside world very well. Anyway, hope everyone is doing well and hope
to write you next week.

-Elder Bird

PS. I LOOOOOOOOOVE DearElder.com messages =D