Friday, December 21, 2012

Merry Christmas!!


Hey everyone!

Merry Christmas! Feliz Natal!

okay I gotta answer dads questions since I forgot last time. my bad. shoot. I forgot them so ill try to do them from memory. so we learn from ourselves. like for real. Once a day we have language instruction for an hour and its basically a joke. We practice conjicating one word and using it in a sentence. we are going sooo slow. so basically you have to teach your self. we use the computer for a program called TALL( technology assisted language learning) or something like taht. It teaches us everything we want to know. It has all the lessons on there and everything. I mostly use it for vocab. but the thing that is good about it is that it has native speakers on it so the pronounciation and the accent is perfect. well ,actually it stinks because people in portugal slur everything together. It literally sounds like they’re drunk! shoot sorry dad that’s all the questions I remember. Mom as for you question no elder dredge didn’t freak out about in n out. Technically its not breaking any rules so I had a pretty good case if he tried to fight me on it. haha jk but sometimes I think I should be a lawyer. but actually everyone we pretty excited that I convinced the driver to take us to in n out. Oh and yes I basically was the leader when we went to New york because they’re all like oh no what do we do. its kinda funny. its like common sense to me.... Yeah I see Megan skousen at gym time a lot. and yeah i saw matt! haha it was awesome I found him in the choir and we like had a telepathic conversation. it was sweet. Matt if you didnt understand i said i love you man! Oh Austin we had our first district come into our zone that is going to Curitiba! haha theyre cool i guess. so now i have a total of 68 missionaries in my zone. Its pretty tiring. But im proud to say i know every single one of their names! yeah its true, miracles happen when you’re on a mission. K oh my gosh the basketball games at home sound amazing! Dad thanks for doing my yelling for me. Oh man I miss that. Such FUN!

Hey mike, remember when you said that the seats at the mtc were hard? well yeah they were. Until yesterday! we got brand new desks and chairs and theyre all padded :) I’m happy with them.

Mom and dad it sounds like you had quite the interesting time the other night at a party ;) Fun fun hahaha.

Well I hope everyones last day of school went well! hopefully not too stressful.

Oh will you PLEASE send me a picture of the House all light up as well as the tree?? i want to see them really bad. Also thank you for the Christmas package! i didnt open any of the presents,i promise. And thank you also to the Turleys, sharps, Stokers and Burtons for the packages and letters! I loved them thank you so much. Austin I cant believe you’re coming in soon! I’m sad I’ll miss you.

Megan. I’m so sorry about your wisdom teeth! ouch!! that stinks so bad. Get better okay?! cause you gotta open your mission call and tell me where you’re going!

Darin when you get your call i REALLY want you to learn portuguese. then we can talk to each other and no one will know what we are saying ahahah! ps. dad i can understand spanish pretty darn good now. but the spanish people cant really understand me ahah! its sooo fun. and im probably the 2nd best white guy with the language in my class. actually im the best out of anyone who didnt already speak spanish before. people who spoke spanish before and pick it up so quickly its frustrating. same with italian. aha i can understand that too.

So everyone, President Brown called a meeting last night... and well. Today's the day. Im so grateful  to be on a mission right now. as for the rest of you. Well, i hope your living right! See ya in the Celestial Kingdom! ......................................................................................................
...........
Haha jk the world didnt end today..yet.

But now i wanted to share with everyone an awesome experiece i had this week teaching an investigator. So she hasnt believed in christ or anything and we just started teaching her trying to find a way we could apply the gospel to her life. anyway this last time we asked her if she had been reading the book of mormon and she said ya a little bit. and we asked her if she had prayed about it. and she feels really awkward with praying and shes embarassed. anyway she said no. and I just got this feeling and so I just bore my testimony that if she prayed with faith and real intent, wanting to really know, then God would tell her it was true. she said okay. and then i had another feeling and so i was like you know what lets do it right now. lets put what i just said to the test. ( i was praying to myself like Heavenly father this better work!) so we all got down on our knees and she offered one of the most beautiful portuguese prayers ever. and after she was done, holy cow the spirit was sooo strong. i almost started to get emotional. So i asked her how she felt and she could feel the spirit and she told us what it was like. and we let her work it out her self and realize that it was the spirit. anyway she ended up commiting to baptism and coming to church. Wow though it was just so awesome. i mean the spirit was sooo soo strong i felt like i could touch it or something!
Guys its really true. God is really there and He hears us. and Will answer us. We just have to have faith and real intent. None of this halfway stuff. all in.
anyway i hope you all have a Wonderful and Merry Christmas. Remember the Savior and His atonement. Yes it is his birth, But his atonement is truly amazing.
I love you all soo soo much and miss you like crazy but im not gonna lie, its pretty wonderful to be a missionary. Its only fun when you really get down to work and realize what your actually doing. In the book of mormon its says that the sons of mosiah  trembled at the very thought of even one soul not being saved into the kingdom of heaven. Find it. its good stuff. Its an amazing feeling to love someone so much that all you care about is their salvation. But its even more amazing to love mutiple people like that. Charity. Have it and your life will be AMAZING!
Love you all,
Elder Tingey 

Friday, December 14, 2012

I'm the King of New York!! December 14, 2012


December 14, 2012
Subject:  I’m the King of New York!!

Whats up familia!!!!

Tudo Bem?!

So i know you all want to know about new york but ill get to that at the end. so, funny story first. there are air fresheners in the bathrooms here (awesome idea) and they spray like every 5 min. anyway there is one right above the urinal, and so i was doing my thing ya know and then all of the sudden this thing squirts me in the eye! I freaked out it was really funny haha.

Oh k so cool check this out! We got knew Elders this week and Elder Saxton is in my zone! Like Saxton from the Ranch! sooooo flippen cool! ill take a picture with him on sunday but haha i thought it was awesome. Oh my Gosh PAIGE!!! you got your call! i cant belive it! Phillipines! so awesome! im soooooo excited for you and so proud. You're awesome! But CHATO!!! (its our portuguese word for shoot or dang it, its so fun to say ;) ) Im so upset that youre coming into the mtc 2 FLIPPEN days before i leave! chato! but its fine i guess.... I told sister Braithwaite (presidents wife, who is sooo cool and reminds me of grandma stoker) about it and shes like oh man that is so cruel!  I love the Braithwaites they are awesome. Tessa, wow i cant believe you had cannon on 1212121212! You held him in till the last second huh? yeah you know it. We all know you just wanted to be on the news! haha jk.

Oh mom the nerf this is behind my bed. like in between the wall and my bed. check all around the sides too. Elder Mcgettigan is dying he keeps asking me did you mom send you that hoop yet?! haha! oh btw babes he wrote you a lettter today :):) hahahaha. Oh but we have a christmas tree and light so dont send any. however they dont really decorate the mtc that much. i guess so we stay focused and not homesick. its weird christmas is in like 10 days...
Hannha! i wrote you a letter today but i just wanted to say i love you!

Elder Chatwin, yeah i know him! he was here in the mtc and left last week. hes a stud and i bet he's tearin it up in Angola right now! im so jealous of him, already out there! but i only have 4 more weeks. Oh i leave Jan 14 btw. go to dallas, have a 4 hour layover there. then fly to london and have freaking 12 hour layover there! and i dont think we can leave the airport... bust oh well. then its like another 10 hours untill Luanda.

Everyone Thank you for the Christmas cards theyre awesome! Roberts, GandG stoker, and Turleys shout out to you! oh Mom, Holy cow i am sooooo impressed with our christmas card this year! it rocks! sooo good. its Quality as elder o'malley would say. As for gifts for the elders in my zone.... just a picture of christ. There's 57 right now but we'll be getting more before christmas!

Well We had an Elder in my district go home on thursday. it was really sad, and broke my heart. i just love him so much and it was so sad to see him go. were all going to keep writing him and encouraging him though. however i think it made our district take everything more seriously which is what needs to happen.

Darin! You are such a boss! gettin the shoutout from Coach ernst! thats what im takin about! I hope you had a good birthday. it sounded amazing. Marissa, Holy cow girl. You be lookin mighty fine at winter formal!! ooooooo baby!
Babes, Youre just the best. i love you so much. Keep being happy and always smile.

Mom wanted to know some of my zl responsibilities so heres a super short list and is not all of them.
Welcome the new missionaries
Show them EVERYTHING about the mtc
make rounds to all the missionaries dorms each night
meet with all the DL's every week
Meet with the presidency like 2 or 3 times a week. sometimes more
Love and uplift all the Elders!

Okay now the NY trip. Baller!
soo we drove to the airport which was so awesome just to see the outside world! we had the coolest driver who told us about what was going on in the world and about his wife. he reminded me of zander from college. but then we got to the airport and had some mcdonalds fries... HEAVEN. k not really but at the time they were. anyway. Flew on the red eye to new york. I got a whole row to my self it was awesome. then we got there at 3 in the morning utah time. freaking hardly any sleep. went to the manhatten temple where an elder jones (sr. elder) met us. he's from phoenix and used to be in the temple presidency. and we had breakfast right next to the temple whcih that was celestial kingdom status. soo good. then right before we left the temple i ran into the nyny North mission president and introduced my self to him and told him to tell Elder kerr hi for me. they were having transfers like the next day so i wonder if he really did. if you find anything out report back please. k then we took the subway to the consulate. while doing that there was this black lady who was a little crazy.. Priase the lord you know? that kind of thing. but ya gotta love her!  then we went through grand central station and that was cool. Just seeing the outside world and being in it but being a missionary was awesome! luanda is going to be so sick! k then we got to the consulate, did our thing (finger prints basically) the whole thing took like 20 min. haha a whole trip for 20 min it was kinda funny. then we had our driver take us back to the airport. our driver was awesome though. he was from mali africa and was so tight. i started asking about his life and he was married had 5 kids and one grandkid. theyve lived in queens for 25 years . his oldest son had died like 3  months ago. Im telling you this guy was a golden investigator! so by that time we were at the airport and so long story short i gave him a BoM with mormon.org written inside, challenged him to read it and all that jazz and through mormon.org he could get in touch with the missionaries. IT WAAS SO AWESOME!! I just like already love him and i want to teach him! but i cant. oh well. maybe one day ill find out if he ever joined.
Then we got to the airport ate some more good food. Darin i saw on the tv that Blake Griffen had some SICK dunks on the lakers. wow. so awesome. then we got on the plane and came home! oh ps i was the only one who placed the book of mormon ;) like a boss missionary. k then on the way home i smoozed our driver into taking us to in n out! how cool is that! it was soo good. such a good trip. then came back here met the new missionarys went to the temple this morning and taht was my week!

Thank you to everyone for the letters this week. they were awesome and helped so much. I love you all to death!

Love Elder Tingey

P.S. Megan im so excited to see where you go on your mission! oh and xan im so pumped for you! Paige, Xan and Megan, you are all going to be great missionaries!

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Dec. 7, 2012


Dec. 7, 2012
Ola,
So this week was alright. the time seems to be going by faster so that’s good. but good news! we got our travel planes to go to New York on Tuesday! heck ya! im way excited to get out of here even if it is just for a day. but we fly out Tuesday night on a red eye and we’re in New York on Wed. and we go to the Angolan consolate and then fly back Wed night I think.

k wow Paige put here papers in already?! what the heck! why did no one tell me?! geez losers tell me stuff. but that’s actually super awesome and excited! Megan im so excited for you to get your call! I can’t wait to here where everyone is going! PORTUGESE speaking come on!

Dad, k your letters are awesome! I love hearing about everything! It’s so exciting and I wish I was there with you! And to answer your question, no we don’t have culture classes here which is a huge bummer. we just rely on teachers who have served there. Which for me is no one. but some have had companions from Angola. I’m sure it will be very interesting over there. Grandma Stoker thanks for the candy cane stuff and the awesome junk food! It seriously was awesome! Thank you for the note, but seriously enough with the little notes telling me you love me, just write me an actual long letter telling me about what is going on in your life! Grandpa Stoker I enjoyed your Dear Elder thank you.

K so listen to this. missionaries here have a bad habit of trying to be super spiritual and righteous and they want to show it and prove it. so this is what they do. They stand up during the singing. whether its in sacrament meeting or devotional or a fireside. oh its so innappropirate and they even speacifically say don’t stand up during a song unless told to do so. it ticks me off if you can’t tell.

Oh hey btw is my plaque up yet? if so take a pic and send it to me. and if not well Bishop Kempton better be gettin on it otherwise im gonna write him! So this no music thing at the mtc litterally kills me. Literally. somebody send me a pocket sized english hymn book so I can sing to my self and know all the words. Please! I’m dying. Also I’m going to send my ipod home. I need you to LOAD IT UP with good stuff. Rob gardner stuff too please. I love that stuff.
I’ll send my memory card home soon. but only if you promise to take all the pictures off and send it right back IMMEDIATELY.

Alright I guess I’ve complained enough.  here is some cool things. did you know that harry potter, is basically portuguese? All the spells are portugese and Voldemort - it’s a place in portugal called valley of death. anyway. Oh I want some brown ties for christmas please :).

So I’m really blessed in my life although I haven’t really acknowledged it right now but I really am. So much family and friends who love me. I was talking to elder O'malley the other day. (British guy) and he was telling me about his life. (oh yeah he’s the new district leader that replaced me). but no one in his family are active except for his dad and one older brother. and I think he has like 7 siblings and his mother died when he was 15, and his dad has gone blind. (oh his mom was active before she died). it just amazed me. The trials people go through and still come on there missions, now thats faith. Honestly, I love all of you, but there is no way I’d still be out here if I didn’t know and have my own witness that the gospel is true. While I’ve been here at the mtc my testimony of Joseph Smith has grown sooooo much. I really want to meet him in the after life. He is just amazing. Just him alone and ALL the horrible things he went through and never denied the gospel and also always gave his full effort to establishing the church for the last time on the earth is just so powerful. He truly was an amazing man. Watch Joseph Smith the prophet of the restoration. If you don’t cry at the end of  that... well then im sorry for you. Joseph Smith really Saw God the Father and Jesus Christ. and restored this gospel here on the earth for the Final time. I know it with all my Heart.

I love you all. Please write me.

Elder Tingey