Skyler's first letter: Week 1

January 19th 2012


Hi Everyone!


My first week here has been crazy! its been non-stop everyday! i miss everyone so much but i'm starting to adjust.


The plane ride over here sucked pretty bad. not gunna lie. i met up with about six other elders at the salt lake airport who were flying to atlanta with me. it was nice to know i wouldnt be alone. i sat next to elder Sutton o nthe plane. Real nice guy! I was reminded of how bad i hate flying though. i'll defiantly stick to driving. When we got to atlanta we met up with twenty other elders and about eight sisters. i defiantly wasn't expecting that! We had a whole troop of missionaries! The flight from atlanta to manchester is what really killed me though. eight hour flight all the way through the night and i didnt sleep at all!


We when finnaly got to tthe mtc the fed us some dinner and let us relax and kick back a bit. the real fun didnt start till the next morning though! haha


To all my friends waiting to go to the mtc. BUCKLE UP! haha. get ready for a lot of intense study! i have been out of my comfort zone literally the entire time i've been here


We were assigned companions the following day. My companions name is elder Bahr. He's From cedar city. he actually played college soccor for a year before he came out here. he's a pretty cool guy. no complaints. the real challnege is learning how to teach with a companion. all out teachers are playing roles of investigators the baptized on the missions and each companionship has to teach them. it's the hardest thing ever! i never gave much thought about how i would teach everything i knew before i came out here. its tough trying to plan a lesson with a compannion. i feel like i know exaclty what i want to say and teach but a lot of time he'll have different ideas. haha and i'm real stubborn so you know i dont like that! the first lesson was tough but we've been learning a lot everyday! i'm just trying to take advantage of the three weeks i'm here.


I love how small the classes are here. there's probably only fourty missionaries here total. the england mtc teaches missionaries going to Manchester, Leeds, Ireland/Scotland, Birmingham, London, and london south missions. they also will sometimes have german missionaries being tought english here but there isn,t any with us. the mission president and his wife are really nice. His wife is President Hinckley's Daughter! she looks and acts just like him.


The food here is pretty good....to good. i'll honestly be fat when i get home! i'm going to need to hit the gym REAL hard. haha


a lot of interesting things have happened since i've been here. it's only been a week but it feels like a month because our days are so jam packed. i literally collapse into bed every night!


One morning when i was doing my personal study, the fire alarm decided to go off. i've honestly never heard anything so loud! Scarred the crap outta me! we had to evacuate the building while some security guy was screaming at us to get out! A few elders ran out in there underwear! ( one of them in just a towell) it was hilarious. we had to stand outside for about an hour before the let us back in!


The weather here is a bit deppresing. It rains everyday. i've honestly seen the sun once. thats probably why everything is so green though. feels like im in a jungle! Its crazy how different this place really is!


Tuesdays are me P Days here so today has been super relaxing. We all got to go to the preston temple which is right next door. it's beein pretty nice


Well i gotta go! Got some laundry to do! haha( i have no idea how i'm actually going to do it)


Love And miss you all!


Love Elder Ford




ps. i've attached some pics. one of them is of my companion elder bahr. another of us is all the missionaries arriving at the manchester airport. the rest are pretty self explanitory. also. please forward this to everyone. i left my address book upstairs. LOVE YOU!