July in the Provo Mission Training Center

This is part of David's email to us this week!  Frank had asked him a few questions which he answered throughout the letter.

On learning Italian: Yes, we do Speak Your Language (SYL). Not 100 per cent of the time, but if we know the word in Italian we're supposed to say it in Italian.  And we look stuff up all the time.  I used "Duo Lingo" at home; the mascot was an owl.

I got your letter from the reunion.  That was nice.  Cool that everyone could get together.  And I got Mom's package (cinnamon rolls and some things for him and his district, in Italian).  Thanks Mom!  The way it worked out, I opened it in the classroom with my district after the devotional.  It was sort of like a birthday present, and then there were rings for everyone, and Article of Faith cards in Italian for everyone, and there was much rejoicing!  I didn't realize the large box had cinnamon rolls until I got back to the dorm though so I'll bring those in to class on Thursday.

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but people in the district are like family here.  I can't access external drives (like for photos) here, but we're taking a group picture and I'll send it snail mail to you.  We spend 6 hours a day together classroom time, and another couple of hours together for meals and during language study, and at the end of language study we have family prayer to close out the day.

Here is my district; 3 Elders including me ("Anziano"), and 4 sisters ("Sorella"):
*Anziano Blazzard, from Las Vegas, NV, District Leader.  Has 3 older siblings, likes making up beats, graduated HS my year, has been working at a grocery store for the past year.
*Anziano Keller, from Menden, UT, has 3 older sisters, very good at pronouncing scriptures, just graduated from HS
*Sorella Friedbaum from Provo, UT, has 4 siblings, went to BYU at Heritage last year
*Sorella Russell, from St. Louis, MO, some older, some younger siblings, super energetic
*Sorella Maples, from Westhaven, UT, 7th of 10 children, looking at BYU next year
*Sorella Palmer, from Australia, older and younger siblings.  Has scuba training, going to U of U when she gets back

They're pretty cool. And our zone (the people learning Italian and Romanian) is pretty cool too; usually there is a cluster of Italians at a mealtime table, or mixed Italian-Romanian cluster.

I miss you guys but I keep busy over here.  We're going to the temple for the first time today, since it's been closed for maintenance the last 2 weeks.  Looking forward to that.

Sincerely,
Anziano Whitesell