MTC Week 5

This week was probably the fast week so far. We get so absorbed in the work and our studies that time just seems to fly by!

We had a new Elder, Elder Dales, join our district this week. He was in a Kiribati district before us, but because of a double hernia and surgery. He served as a missionary in the Provo mission until he was well enough to go to Kiribati. We're now the 2nd largest Kiribati district this year with 13 missionaries, the 1st being 14. The previous district only had 6.

No Apostles from the Quorum of the Twelve this week for devotionals, but they were still pretty good. On Sunday we had President Mehr, a district president of the MTC, who spoke about the healing power of the Atonement. On Tuesday we had L. Whitney Clayton in the Presidency of the Seventy talk about the truthfulness of the church, and how it either is true, or it isn't - there's no middle ground.

I do have some news about singing in General Conference. They're having the missionaries sing in the Saturday Afternoon session. I wasn't selected to sing, but four others in my district were, which is pretty cool. There is still a small chance I could get in, though. If a missionary misses even one practice, they aren't allowed to sing anymore and an alternate takes his/her place. Practice this morning was at 7:15am, so I feel like they might be trying to weed out anyone that isn't as committed to singing. Here's hoping I'm one of the alternates.

We also had our first Skype TRC yesterday. It was an awesome experience. We got to Skype call a real member from Kiribati and teach her a 30-minute lesson. We had a really hard time understanding her, though, considering this was our first time hearing the language from a native. She also had trouble understanding us at times, but it was awesome nonetheless.

Kam rabwa! I tangiringkami ngai! Thank you all! I love you all!

Elder Schoeny

 I drew a picture on the whiteboard of Baymax saying 

'Does it hurt when I touch it?' in Kiribati

 Some elders in my district printed out some pictures of Brother Farley, one of my teachers, and put several memes of him throughout the room. He's a very outdoorsy guy. Brother Farley laughed so hard he had to walk out of the room.

A picture of the Provo Temple from the back, which looks a lot better than the front