August 28, 2014 - Last P-Day in the MTC!!

I can't believe it, but it's here: the last P-Day of the MTC. I'm so happy and sad at the same time. I've grown really close to a lot of the zone, the Albanians especially. They all think I'm cool, smart, AND humble - no joke, I have the goodbye-journal entries to prove it. It's gonna be so weird leaving them, and so weird going to the place that speaks the language I've been learning!

So, with 250 minutes of telephone conversation on a card that expires in a year... How in the world am I going to use all of that? I love you all, but with how much I can talk to you, that's a LOT! I'm glad though to not have to worry about that now, so thanks. :) It's so cool that the day I am traveling in the "can-call-you-in-the-same-time-zone" area, you'll all be home cuz' of Labor Day! I hadn't even thought of that! I think that I'll only call you in Chicago, but since we are now reporting to the travel office at 5:30 AM, and then heading off to the airport, I think there might be time to call you in both locations of Utah and Illinois... what do you think? I'll probably just call in Illinois, but if I have 250 minutes, I may as well use it up when I can! I'll take your advice, whatever you say.

I think it will be quite a while until I get to email you next, because of the Monday-P-Day that they have there, but I will make sure to take lots of pictures to make up for the wait! I'll get some in the airports, too, with the places that I am, like London and Helsinki.

Really, there's not much left to say here. The consecration week went over well, with quite a few funny episodes on my part. For example, the thing I best remember is that I forgot how to say something in English. We were walking back from getting our haircuts on Tuesday, and I was talking in English to my companion about how I was hoping people would still want to play sand volleyball. I said something like, "It's a bit nippy outside, and I don't know how many of them would be fine, although I think they'd be okay with the... the..." I couldn't remember for the LIFE of me what the English word I was trying to say was, but I wanted to say "kylmä" really bad right there. So, since I was carrying my dictionary (because we did that all week), I looked up the word while my companion waited for me to say the last crucial word: COLD. I can't believe that I forgot the English word "cold". I felt really smart and dumb for a while after that...

Well, if you can think of some more questions to send me, I'll take 'em! I'll be back on around 3 or so, so see you then! I've uploaded the new pictures today as well, so I'll try to send some with specific captions this time. I hope you made do with the last set! :)

Love y'all,

Vanhin David Milligan

P.S. The recipe for the Rootbeer - Milk floats:

I just wrote the recipe for Whitney Christensen, but I used the MTC cups as my reference... I only know the right ratio for their glasses! :( Well, the one thing I can say is that it's not that much milk. So, first add in the Root Beer to the amount you want. The amount of Milk will depend on this. I think it's a safe guess that if you fill up your glass a little under 3/4 of the way with LIQUID (the fizz will go much higher than that, don't worry, you need to go quick while the fizz is still there for the best combination), the amount of Milk you use should be filling up the cup to where when the creamy fizz that results comes, it goes up to the brim without overflowing. The fizz is probably some of the best part of all of this. When in doubt, use less milk then you think you should. It goes a long way. That's all I can say!

P.P.S. We got to do our In-field Orientation today, and I got to see the blond Elder from the District! Elder Christiansen, maybe? Anyway, he's the one with the squarish face that taught Jynx, the older woman that was interested in learning religion to get her closer to Christ. He was a fun guy, and crazy story: When they were about to do the last section, which was like a "Play" of our first Sunday onward wherever we are serving, the two people, JC Hamilton and the Blond District Dude, came up to me and Vanhin Wilson and asked if they could have our nametags, to make it look legit (since the Instructor/Development nametags are white). Bro. Hamilton gave us both of his nametags in return (which means I wielded the authority of an Instructor for about 2 hours), and got pictures of me with my new authority and of the two in our nametags! It was fun.

(This next section kept turning black, so I apologize, you get BRIGHT YELLOW!)

This week's questions:

What food are you looking forward to trying in Finland? (Have you heard any food rumors at the MTC?)

I am looking forward to the bread that they have there! Apparently, they have a really tasty kind of bread which I totally forget the name of now. I just LOVE bread, though, so that's probably why.

Do you have a favorite Finnish phrase, yet?

It's either "Totta Kai" (Of course) or "Ei mitaan" (It's nothing). (this keyboard doesn't do the 2 dots over letters, so I put them under...)

 

Can you read Finnish now? Is it easier than speaking it?

Yes, and I LOVE it. Reading Finnish is way easier than speaking it, because they've already plotted out the cases for you!

Can you say "Preach My Gospel" in Finnish, yet?

Yup! I just can't write it, cuz of the lack of dotted letters... the only word without them is "Evankeliumi", or "Gospel".

Who has/have been your favorite Elder(s) you have met at the MTC?

Hmm, that Elder probably would be Elder Griffiths, the Albanian. He and his companion just got made Zone Leaders for our upcoming absence, so that's also fun. The reason why is that he smiles a ton, has a great sense of humor, AND I was the one who Hosted him when he came to the MTC! It was such a coincidence, but I'm happy to be the one that welcomed him to his mission.

If that Elder wasn't in your district, who is your favorite in your district?

It's a tie between Vanhin Hastings and Vanhin Bailey... They're both really intelligent, and I feel like I can have good, uplifting conversations with them! Vanhin Hastings shares a lot of my interests, like Legend of Zelda and Smash Bros, and Vanhin Bailey LOVES movies, and so it has been fun bouncing off ideas of what certain movies were trying to depict metaphorically. Yeah, deep stuff.

If neither of them are in your zone!, who is your favorite in your zone?

Umm, they're both in my zone... And I don't know, like, ANYONE outside my zone... So I'm gonna skip this... :)

With 10 people in your district, you can make a perfect human pyramid. Have you done this, yet? Will you do it for me?

I will see what I can do, and get a picture if possible. Which reminds me, the Mustache pictures need to be sent on Monday of Finland, sorry! I haven't gotten any but my own yet...

Why was the Elder on the mattress on top of the furniture? (from the picture a few weeks ago)

He wanted to do his Ultimate Sudoku puzzles in peace... I didn't question it, and he shared a few of them with me! They're pretty fun, I took pics of a few. They operate like normal Sudoku, but the numbers inside the dotted boxes must total to the number in the box given. It's easier and harder, for different reasons... I wouldn't mind quickly getting a Sudoku book for the plane flight, I should look for that in the airport!

Are you ready to go bicycling in the snow?

I am ready for SNOW, not sure about the whole "biking" bit... It has already started going into the 40s as the Highs in Finland. That's fun.

Have you had a chance to cycle in/at the MTC?

They have the cycling machines, but it's not the same... So yes, but I'm not sure if it helps or not...

Have you learned anything new this week?

When you want to get emails from everyone in the zone, just pass around a journal and ask for them to write goodbyes in it. EVERYONE gave me a paragraph or two and their emails. It was fun to add so many to the contacts list!

What have you studied in Preach My Gospel this week?

I reread a lot of the "Christlike Attributes" chapter, focusing on what I should do as a missionary to develop them. It has been pretty insightful.

How do you feel about finally heading out into the mission field?

YEEEEEEHHAAAAAAWWW!!! SO EXCITED TO FINNALLY GO! :)

And now for the pictures. This time with real captions!

 Our districts are all about the wordplay. Guess what this is? 

Hellslinky. *Facepalm*

 

MOM! Did you know the MTC sells our favorite candy??? 

I just found out today, and decided to indulge a little.

These are the various Book of Mormon languages in our zone! They are Hungarian, Albanian, Finnish, and Estonian. I'm not sure if they're in that order or not, the attachment doesn't let me see the pic up close...

 With the new Finns having joined us, we old Finns have had to move to a new classroom. Which actually isn't a classroom. All 10 of us. It's a little cramped.

A pic of the majority of our zone! A few weren't there, because they were in interviews and stuff, but this is the majority of us.

 

Okay, the combination of these 3 show the progression of my emotions regarding the breaking of my 1st pointer. Don't worry - I now have 3 others. People have gifted me with them as a "good-bye" gift!

Missionaries at the MTC don't understand that the reason they ask us to put spoons in the bin is because they don't want a hole in the trash bags! There's a rumor that they just wash and reuse them, so everyone throws them away, and disobeys the instructions...

DO YOU REALIZE I WILL HAVE TO TAKE APART THIS BEAUTIFUL THING?!? That will be heart-wrenching! I'll take the rubberbands with me to Finland, and hope for another thing to string up.

I found out how to take Fish-eye lensed pics. 

Vanhin Bailey turned into a test subject for this one...