November 24, 2009 letter

Dear Family,

Sorry there wasn't any post this last Tuesday. We only get thirty minutes on the computer and I was typing my email when it logged me off with one minute left! So I logged back in and I still only had that one minute, but the the entire email was gone. So I have to write it all by hand, send it home and ask my poor father to type it up.

So this last week, Heavenly Father decided to show me what a great sense of humor He has. Last time, I told you that I was staying healthy. Well, the next day I woke up with a very bad sore throat. This sore throat has been harrassing me for the entire week. I wake up every day to a different situation with it. Recently, it's moved up into my tonsils and has hung out there for a few days. It hurts really badly to yawn. I went to the clinic about it and the nurse there said that I didn't have swine flu, but she felt like she should see if there was something else wrong. So she checked my temperature and my ears and a few other things. Then she checked by throat. Whe she looked at it, she said, "Wow, that's an impressively red throat!" Not like I couldn't feel it. Anyway, she gave me some salt and cups to clean my throat out with. It's actually been helping. I nearly lost my voice completely a few times this week though.

Anyway, another fun little thing that's happened this week is that we taught in the TRC in Czech. First, I need to tell you that we always have this one native Czech woman names Kajě come in. She's from Brno which is in Eastern Czech Republic, otherwise called Moravia; Western Czech is called Bohemia. People in Bohemia generally speak slower and people in Moravia speak faster. So by the transitive property, Kajě speaks fast and it is very true. Now back to the story. We had planned out our lesson, had divided up the lesson so that Starší Jones wouldn't end up speaking because Starší Horvath and I are too uncomfortable with the language and would just stay quiet. Anyway, we began the lesson and it was going well and then it came to my part of the lesson. So I began and while I was talking about prophets, Kajě asked a question. It basically flew right over my head, so I said, "Prosin?" ("Excuse me?") She said the question a little slower. This happened again and again about five times until I understood the question. I kept getting tripped up over the word, "všechno" in one of its forms meaning "all/everything." Gah! So I finally got it and answered her question. Her question was, "Can all of us return to be in the presense of God?" Simple enough question, but not when you don't understand the vocabulary. So I got out of my portion of the lesson with minor bumps and scrapes. Kajě was nice enough to correct my case endings about every ten seconds. She also decided to throw about two more questions at me, but they went much better.

Not much else happened this week. Just teaching our teachers a lot in czech. Yesterday, we had a lesson (lekce, if you want to know it in Czech) or schůzka (the Czech word for appointment) to Brother Cardon, and my brain had just about turned out for the night or something because my Czech was terrible. Anyway, I guess I have room for improvement.

I hope you have a wonderful (úžasný) Thanksgiving. Pray for all the missionaries because they don't get to have a day off for Thanksgiving. However, I know that every one of them is extremely thankful to be serving the Lord at this time in "their" section of the world.

I love you all very much and wish you all a wonderful Thanksgiving.
Starší Monk

I am scared :(

Dear Family,

This last week I had the "half way point" day where I realized that the MTC time is going to end. It was a frightening realization. To think that I'm going to be out there speaking to people in a language that I'm going to have absolutely no fluency in... That's terrifying. By the way, if i get some of my "i"s and "y"s backwards, it's because I've been writing Czech too long. There are some consonants that can't be followed by an "i" so they use the "y." Little grammar lesson for you.

So this week I have to write like the wind. I only have twenty-eight minutes left and I have a lot to say. Well... there's alot that's bouncing around in my head. First off, thank you to everyone who wrote me - I received ALL of the letters yesterday. I'm not sure how that happened, but I guess the MTC was doing something weird. Seriously, I didn't get mail all week (even though we checked every day) and then yesterday... BAM! Mail galore. Anyway, thank you. It took me thirty minutes to read all of it, and that's not only because I'm slow at reading.

Let me get a few little things said before I dive into the big stuff: Ricky, my loving "Dear John" brother. I must say I found that letter quite disturbing, even for you, but on the other hand, a lot of the missionaries here got a kick out of learning that I have a brother who's weird enough to write something like that. Also, a few guys read it and thought that it was a real Dear John and one was like, "I'm so sorry. I can't see why the other Elders are laughing." That was until he got to the end and saw it was from a guy. Bahaha.

Next, Daddy: yes my companions are sick. Starsi Horvath has been coughing since he came to the MTC and hasn't stopped since. However I think it's just because of the dry weather. At one point, he was legitimately sick though, but that only lasted about two days and those two days were spent mostly in the dorm so he could sleep it off. Starsi Jones is feeling quite under the weather. These past few days he's had a really nasty head cold and hasn't quite been himself. I'm sure that he'll get over it in the next few days. As for me, I'm as healthy as ever. Except for the fact that the other day in gym, while playing four square (which is AWESOME-ly competitive), I twisted my ankle. So I've been hobbling around for the past three days or so. Today it feels much better. The only thing about it is that it's got this really annoying achey feeling all up my calf (probably mispelled; I meant the muscle in the leg if you can't figure it out). That's about it with me health-wise.

Next thing, Mommy: I hope you enjoyed your birthday card. I spent a whole ten to twenty minutes writing it (which is an awful long time to spend writing a letter here at the MTC).

Next, Michelley: I'll write you as soon as I can. Don't think I've forgotten you :-). But tell your disturbing brother that I'm debating whether to write him back or not. *rubs chin*

Now time for the fun stuff. This past week we've been doing SYL as much as we can every day. SYL stands for "Speak Your Language." You get to make a really nifty post-it note that sticks to your name tag that basically says that you can't speak English. Mine said, "Dnes je Česká Den!" which means "today is Czech day!" or another one was "Nemluvím anglicky; mluvím česky." which means "I do not speak English; I speak Czech." Anyway, those are super fun, but I find that if I don't do it 100% all day, then I stop about the first time that I do speak English. Also this last week, we started teaching the lessons in Czech which I must say is Super-Hard. Yes, it is Capitalized and Hyphenated. Oh my word! I never thought that my brain would explode as badly as it did. Thinking about where the lesson's going, thinking about the investigator's needs, thinking about pertinent scriptures to use, thinking about GRAMMAR! GAH. The pain is rushing back to me. Actually, I just stuttered like an idiot and slowly put sentences together. I think it would take me an average of ten to fifteen seconds to put a sentence like, "God is our father." together. Then our teacher decided to be mean to me and said that he didn't understand the verse that I gave him. Uh oh... It was the one in Abraham 3 where God is talking to Abraham, telling him that his seed will be blessed through the gospel and priesthood. That was interesting trying to answer those. Eventually we got past that and (oh by the way, I forgot to tell you that this was from our first teaching experience; sorry for the aside) we started talking about something else. At the end we got him to let us come back again next week, but he asked where we would meet. I was sure that I'd be able to answer a simple question like that. So I said, "Is it here good?" which basically means, "Is here fine?" I said, in Czech, "To je tam, dobře?" He looked at me like I was crazy; I had no idea why. There was no possible way that I could have screwed up such a simple sentence. So, thinking that I was right, I kept saying it. He kept looking confused and asked me, "Yes, where?" and so I said it again. Finally he figured out what I was trying to say and told me that it was fine to me, "here." In Czech he told me that what I was saying was, "It is there, good?" So it was no wonder that he was asking where. Hooray for my first language mistake where no one understands me. I'm sure it'll happen plenty more.

Now, a little more serious topic. Our companionship has been having a little bit of trouble this last week. As we've gone about out studies and classes, I've sensed that there was some tension and I didn't know how to resolve it. It seemed that Starsi Horvath didn't like me very much and wasn't willing to tell me that he can't stand me. So I thought that I'd just deal with it. Then the day that we had our first lesson in Czech, in our companionship study before the lesson, we were trying to plan out the lesson in Czech. I was at the board writing down sentences in Czech and saw that Starsi Horvath wasn't participating. So I asked him what we could say for the topic we were on. He said that whatever we said was fine. I kept after him and he said, "I don't care." I kept after him and gave him a sentence and tried to have him translate it. He told me, "slovník" which is "dictionary" in Czech. Basically, this was the fight, quite mild for any fight I've ever seen, but way more than any missionaries should be having. Our teacher came back in and stopped us and said that we needed to take a walk. We didn't really talk on the walk, but Brother Cardon tried to say things that were aside from the problem to get us to talk. He was pointing out how the name for November in Czech literally comes out to "leaf fall." Anyway, when we got back to the classroom, he spoke for a little while and then told us that we needed to have a companionship inventory. That's where we all just say what's on our mind and don't have any bad feelings toward anyone. We also talk about what we can do better and what others can do better. It turned out that Starsi Horvath was just feeling overwhelmed and it was nothing that I was doing. Anyway, that was the end of that and we all came away feeling much much better. (We talked for nearly an hour and a half).

Phew... we've had a little more butting heads, but we've resolved them with companionship inventories and I must say, we all feel amazing when we come out of them. I know that I do.

Hmm... there's a missionary here from the Czech Republic who's going to be serving in Wisconsin. He's really awesome. His name is Elder Kraus. This guy is massive. Probably two or two and a half feet across. However, he's a little bit shorter than I am-- like five inches shorter. Anyway, he's awesome but we don't get to see him very often or for very long. Whenever I see him I say, "dobrý den!" and he says "čao!" Kind of a funny exchange, but that's about all the time we have to talk together. "Dobrý den" means "good day," and "čao" means (take a wild guess) "ciao." It's even pronounced the same.

In the TRC, a place we go on Thursdays of every week and interact with volunteers who speak Czech, we have a language section which starting this week is the entire thing-- both contacting and lesson. Every single week we've been there, we've had a native Czech sister who's name is Kaya. She's awesome, but her English isn't very good and it's really hard to understand her because she talks so fast. So I guess I know what I'm getting into (a little bit).

Anyway, my time is up, keep writing to me: it really boosts my spirits. Starsi Horvath loved all the letters he got from all of you yesterday.

Love you all and pray for you always,
Starsi Monk

MTC Pictures

Elder Andrew Monk, Elder Kevin Jones
and Elder Janos Horvath at the MTC

Elder Andrew Monk at the MTC

Elder Horvath and Elder Jones

Elder Kevin J. Jones

Elder Janos Horvath

Provo Temple spire and Squaw Peak

What week is this?

Dear Family,

This week has flown by quicker than any of the others have and it's spinning my head like crazy. I looked at Starsi Jones yesterday night and said something that I should have realized sooner: "Ya know, this mission is going to be amazing." The reason that I said that was because at the RC yesterday (which is our scheduled time) I had an amazing experience. I only had two interactions in the entire hour and a half that I was there, but they were both amazing.

The first that I want to tell you about was a man who called in and said he wanted to have one of our free books. I looked at the computer screen and saw that he was talking about the Book of Mormon. He seemed to be in a hurry so I took his information as he pushed it onto me, but something strange was in his voice. It seemed that he wanted to know more, and there was a sincerety to it. So I took all of his information, but I wished that there was more that I could do. I knew of course, that I couldn't because of the situation he was in. He really was in a hurry and he even told me that a few times. So, I took it and had his book sent. I know that this book is going to change his life, just like the millions of other people who have read it with a humble heart trying to know the truth of God.

Then the other interaction was a man who chatted in. I don't remember his name, but I remember calling him Brother Bond. He was very friendly I was very willing to try and help him along. He asked me how he could get in contact with some missionaries in his area, so I was imediately stirred with curiosity as to why he wanted to meet with them. I asked about and found out that he was an inactive member and hadn't been to church in about eight years. He had gotten mixed up in alcohol and tobacco and had been an addict (to what, I don't know). He told me about how he wanted to clean up his life, how he wanted to come back to church, how he wanted to have a spouse that wouldn't cheat on him. The biggest one that hit me was that he said he wanted to come back to church and feel the same way he did when he was growing up. It seemed to me that he wanted to be happy, and I know that the only way that he could be happy is through the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. By the end of the conversation I could just sense the gratitude that this man had for me and for what I was doing for him. I just wished that there was more that I could do. I felt so helpless in this entire thing, but I also knew that what I did, no matter how insignificant it seemed to me, was going to change his life. At the end he thanked me for my kindness and the way that I helped him, but I knew that it was not me who was helping him, it was the Lord who told him that he needed to come onto mormon.org and talk to someone about how he could come back to the happiness he once knew.

I know that the Lord is always in our lives but the problem is, we are sometimes walking throught the dark and we cannot see Him there. We just have to reach out our hand and grasp His. I know that the simple leap of faith this man made was stretching his hand and trying to find the Lord's. I know that the missionaries will be able to help him find the Lord and the happiness that he once knew. I know that he will be blessed.

I'm sorry that I am writing a small letter this week, but I am very limited on time today. All of you are in my prayers and I thank you all for your support.

I love you all very much,
Starsi Monk

PS- I thank my ward very much for what they have done about my mission fund. However, now I am endebted to all of them. The Lord has a funny way of blessing you and then once you repay Him for those blessings, He blesses you even more for repaying Him. I feel that He's done this so now I am over my head in debt to my family and to my ward! Oh no! I know that these are blessings from our loving Heavenly Father and I thank Him for them. I also thank our ward members very much. I know that this will be a blessing to me and to my family.

October 29 Letter to Family

Dear Mom, Dad, Ricky and Michelle

I know that all is well at home, but I want you to know that the Lord is in all things. So don't worry about the dark future.

Daddy asked that I would share a little about how MTC life is. So I thought I'd do that while I'm trying to think of other things to say.

I wake up at six in the morning, which I think my body is finally getting used to, and get ready for the day ahead. Up until last night, I've been waking up probably around two to six times a night. Last night, however, I slept all night. We have breakfast at seven, lunch at eleven-thirty and dinner at four-thirty. Then we get home between nine and nine-thirty. We get ready for bed and have lights out at ten-thirty. That's about everything that is the same from day to day.

On Friday mornings, once we get to the classroom at seven-thirty, we spend an hour planning our next week. We have a big calendar that we plan out every minute of every day. A few of the things that we can schedule are personal study (a time where we can study the scriptures on our own), companionship study (we discuss what we studied in personal study and/or prepare the lessons we're going to teach that day, scripture study (where the teacher chooses a question or comment that they heard commonly on their mission and we try to find a scriptural answer for it; this past week we did, "Why do I need to go to church to be saved?" and "God died during the war," meaning tthat a god wouldn't allow something that bad to happen, grammar studies, language study (where you get to study the language on your own), MDT (missionary decided time- get to choose to do something alone or with your companions; Elder Horvath wants to use some every week to play piano), TE (we get to to to a teacher that we sign up for in advance to either practice teaching or try to learn a certain concept or principle), and RC (referral center- a place where you go to take phone calls from people who call in to get free resources from the church, where people's chats from http://www.mormon.org/ go, and where calls are made to people to see if they got the item that they requested.

I think that the RC is my favorite place right now because it is the most like real mission work. This last week, we had an hour and a half. Starsi Jones and I had only done calls to see if people got their items before this and we decided to try chats. Starsi Horvath doesn't feel comfortable with his English enough to try it yet, but I think he'll try this coming week. Anyway, Starsi Jones and I both got about eleven or twelve chats in that time period and about four for each of us actually had interest in the church and its beliefs, or had concerns that they wanted help with.

Two women that I received in chat really stand out in my mind right now. One was a very nice woman named Edna who had a question about where we're going after this life. We talked for a long time about the Plan of Salvation and the Book of Mormon. She was confused about the Book of Mormon but was receptive and I think she finally saw it as a complement to the Bible.

The other woman, whose name I did not get, opened a message with me and I started the conversation. However, I did not get an answer back. At the two-minute marker, I asked my teacher if I should hang up. He told me to say, "hello?" or something. So I did and waited for a moment longer. After three and a half minutes of waiting after she had initiated the conversation, I received a block of text instead of a "hello." It basically outlined that she's married and has two kids, if I remember are two boys of the ages of twenty and twenty-two, and that she loves her family. It then changed tones and talked about how she recently found a friend of hers from back in high school on Facebook, and then the last line that I can't forget, "I don't want to cheat on my family."

At that moment, I realized that I was talking to real people with real problems, but I was also thinking, "I'm not qualified to answer this plea for help." Then the Lord opened my mind and my heard and told me that I am to go and speak to all people despite their backgrounds. I then knew that I had to help this woman in the way I could: through the gospel. I told her that she should read "A Proclamation to the World," after I sent her the link on http://www.mormon.org/. Then I continued to tell her that she knows what to do, but that she should ask the Lord for what to say. She begged for me to pray for her, and that night I did, and I got the overwhelming feeling that I had helped this woman and that she had done the right thing.

The RC is an amazing place, but when I get to the field it's going to be even more real, wonderful and fantastic. I can't even begin to imagine the wonderful work in which I am enlisted.

Vím, že Bůh žije. Vím, že Ježíš Kristus miluje my. Já vím, skrze Ježíše Krista, moje rodina může být spolu navždy. Vím, že Joseph Smith je prorok znovuzrizeni. A vím, že Ježíš Kristus je náš Spasitel.

That roughly comes out to: I know that God lives. I know Jesus Christ loves us. I know that through Jesus Christ my family can be together forever. I know Joseph Smith is the prophet of the restoration. And I know Jesus Christ is our Savior.

I love you all so much and my love for you has only grown exponentially since I've been here.

I pray for you all and love each one of you,
Starsi Monk

PS- my companions' names are Kevin Jones and Janos Horvath. Pronounced like "Yawn-oh-sh Hoar-vah-t."

PSS- I know that Starsi Horvath loves getting mail just as much as Starsi Jones and me. He even loved the one from you, Dad. He got it and said, "My first one!" very excitedly. His family members are not members of the church with the exception of his little brother who is sixteen. The rest of his family are atheist. I encourage any of you to write to him. I know he'll love it and it'll give him that little boost of spirit.

MTC Week Three! Can you believe it?

Dear Family,

I cannot even begin to imagine how this week flew by so quickly. It feels like just a few days ago when I last had P-day (preparation day; the day when I can do personal mail, email, laundry and other such things.) I can't really say that there was anything super significant about this week. Just alot more learning and I must say, I'm grateful for it.

This last week, our companionship really made some progress. My companionship consists of three members including me, which happens to be the entire Czech group for this transfer (9 weeks). Starsi Horvath has been having a hard time feeling like he could fit in with Starsi Jones and me because we're both American, we both speak fluent English, and just the fact that he is having a hard time coping with being in a strange land for the first time. Despite this, this last week he's really been opening up to us.

He's been sick for a while now, but doesn't show enough symptoms for the clinic to really do anything. They just keep giving him cough syrup, ibuprofen (spelling?) and nasal decongestant. They gave him one Z-pack which is an antibiotic and that seemed to help a little bit, but they never tested him to see what he had. They'd rather have us keep running in there every day to tell them that there IS something wrong. Oh well, I guess it's the same in the world as well.

Well, back to Starsi Horvath's opening up. I think because he doesn't speak English as his first language, and has only been taking it for three years seriously, I think he has to focus very hard to always understand what everyone's saying. I must say though, he speaks quite well. It's just that you'll find him zoning out alot more than he should. He even takes naps during personal study time, MDT time, and other times when he should be studying. I think that he doesn't understand how important the MTC is. He'd rather be out doing missionary work, but doesn't want to invest into doing the preparation. We'll have to show him that preparation is important somehow.

Another thing that he seems to have difficulty with is using scriptures from the Book of Mormon. I can understand this to an extent because he did only join the church three years ago, but he doesn't seem to want to use the Book of Mormon to teach. He uses scriptures, but they're almost always from the book of Matthew or Mark. Those aren't the easiest books to understand all the time, especially when quoting Jesus Christ.

Anyway, concerning this, Starsi Jones and I have spoken many many times about what we should do. We don't want to tell him flat out because that could be more destructive than constructive and we're realizing that telling him indirectly isn't working. So one day I prayed about what we should do and I received the answer that we should tell him the next day. I was quite blown away by this answer, but I thought that if the Lord told me to, I should do it. Anyway, next day came and we went through the entire day but I didn't see a clear opening to tell him. That night, I said my prayer to go to bed and then as Starsi Jones and I were about to crawl into bed, Starsi Horvath asked us if we could talk for a little while. He started off by talking about how he loves having us as companions and how much he is learning from us. He also went on to ask us about what he could do better.

The Lord is so mindful of us and knows how we need to be helped. I know that Starsi Horvath was feeling the Spirit when he asked us to sit and talk for a while. I also know that the Lord understood that I was looking for the opportune time to talk, but also realized that I was too timid to speak, so He had Starsi Horvath start the conversation.

I cannot begin to list all the blessings the Lord has given me while I've been here and how He has blessed my companionship.

I'd like to thank Bishop Larson and Sister Saunders for their kind letters that I received yesterday. Bishop Larson, I know that I can always look toward you for kind words of encouragement. I'll be sure to write you when I manage to find some time. Sister Saunders, I thank you so much for the missionary newsletter that you sent me and that I could read of the good that the other missionaries from our ward are doing. It strengthens my testimony to know that I might be able to be as good as those elders in just a few short weeks.

As for my family, I can't believe that you sent me that picture of me when I was in the CougarEat. I am appalled! Haha, you know I'm joking. I showed it to Starsi Horvath and Jones right when I got it and they both found it quite amusing. Also thank you for the USB SD card converter. The computer recognizes that there is a new device plugged into the computer, but I can't access it because of the computer restrictions. Oh well. I guess you really will have to wait for me to send you an entire card of pictures.

Yesterday my companions and I realized that we've almost been here three weeks and that means we're one third done with the MTC. That, to be honest, scared me a little bit because I don't feel like I've really learned enough Czech. I'm probably going to end up going to the field barely knowing anything. But that's all right. Nearly all the talks we've had here at the MTC are about missionaries who have gone to the field barely knowing their language, or only knowing a few sentences, and still baptizing people. I know that the Lord will bless me as I strive to learn as much as I can.

I guess I lied when I said that I don't really know any Czech. I've started praying only in Czech, and I must say that it's really cool once you can start putting your own thoughts into it instead of short phrases that you've memorized. The teachers here are great because after your prayer, they know that you had a hard time with it and that you know that there was a lot wrong with it, but they just tell you one little thing that'll make it better like, "Starsi Monk, when you want to make 'Starsi Horvath' fourth case (accusitive/direct object), you need to make it 'Starsihu Horvathu.'"

I'm a little scared of tomorrow because we're going to try and teach the first lesson in Czech. I really hope that you can acquire the gift of tongues over night, otherwise, I'm going to not say much. I'll probably add in a "tesi me" every now and then which means "it is pleasing to me." The English equivelant is "oh, cool." Starsi Jones is really the one who holds up conversations for us.

Anyway, my time is coming to an end. I'd like to leave a short testimony in Czech for you all, but I can't type in Czech fast enough.

I love you all and I look forward to hearing from all of you,
Starsi Monk

PS - I'm sure that Starsi Horvath would love to get mail from any of you if you'd like to send him some. He's not really getting any mail because he's outside his home country and his family (besides his younger brother) aren't members. He was excited to get a letter from my dad, and knowing my dad, it probably didn't say much. So I know that anything you write to him, he'll enjoy.

Our address is:
Starsi Monk (or Starsi Horvath)
MTC Mailbox #88
CZE-PRA 1214
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604