On The Edge

"Come to the edge," he said.

"No, we'll fall."

"Come to the edge," he said.

"NO! we'll fall."

"COME TO THE EDGE!"

So we came to the edge...and were pushed,

then we flew.

         (Old French Poem as quoted by Elder Holland)

We've begun our journey and we are walking up to the edge. We made it to the MTC (missionary training center) and are ready to fly. Hopefully we won't need to be pushed. West Africa here we come!

No one leaves the MTC without a picture in front of the world map!

Finished the first week of training without any bumps or bruises. Actually we've thoroughly enjoyed this first week. We've met a lot of amazing people. Our group has about 30 couples and we are amazed at the diverse places that everyone is being sent to. There are few couples staying in the states. Four going to Africa (2 in South Africa, 1 in the Congo, and us in the Africa West Area.) Other places include Russia, Berma (no proselyting missionaries there yet), Honduras, Brazil, Mongolia, Siberia, Korea, and several sets for some reason on their way to London.

This is our district. (The three young elders were our teachers.)

 South Africa, Honduras, West Africa, and Brazil

Apparently we are fairly young to be going on a SENIOR mission. We found this out the hard way when we were stopped in the hall and chastised for being "to close" and without our companions. (Who knew it was frowned upon to hold hands with the young looking sister missionaries!) They must be getting use to us now as we held hands all day today and didn't even get a comment. I even snuck in a kiss...course I waited until the hall was empty.

We are learning French albeit slowly. We hope as time goes on,  this will improve dramatically. Hope to be ready before we have to tour in the French missions. We have time to walk around the temple grounds in the evenings and will spend the day tommorow in the temple.

Messing around in front of the Provo temple.

Over all, a pleasant way to start the mission.

... Elder Fife

We got our missionary name tags the first morning.  It was pretty awesome to pull them out of the bag and see ‘Sister Fife’ (me!) on a missionary name tag.  I promptly pinned it on and viola I looked like an official missionary!  I’m not real sure I feel like one yet though.  I was doing my homework that night (yes!  They gave us homework the first day!)  reading in Preach My Gospel and it said that as a missionary, I am an authorized representative of Jesus Christ.  Wow~  not just a representative of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints but of Jesus Christ.

I think I had better start shaping up a bit more!   We have been so busy getting the house ready to go these last four months and gathering all the ‘things’ that we would need for the next 18 months and packing and seeing family and the list goes on, that I feel I have kinda slacked on my spiritual preparation.  I’m mostly there, but not quite ready.   Not quite as ready as my bags are anyway!  So I really wanted to take these next two weeks and just let the world slide into the background for once and let my Savior take center stage.  I am so ready for that.

Surprisingly, one of the greatest places in the MTC is the cafeteria!  For one, the food is amazing.  We are finding that we are eating every time we turn around and not just a little bit!  We are going to have to start going to the gym if we aren’t more careful.   Or maybe we’ll just quit worrying about it and enjoy it~  because once we get to Africa I think the food situation will probably take a sharp decline!  (I’m not so excited to try cane rat)  It’s also the only time we really get to hang out with the ‘juniors’.  There are A LOT of them and they are all so impressive in their white shirts and ties.  At dinner one night, one sister commented that of all the hundreds and hundreds of people there that they were all smiling and happy.  And it was so true, smiles and laughter everywhere.  This is a place of joy and I am sooo happy to be here!  We even ran into a few familiar faces from home in the cafeteria! 

Missionaries in the cafeteria.

We have seen Jonathon Bahr and Danny Anderson, it was so fun to see my youth from back home!  It really is a small world sometimes. I gave Danny a big hug after which he said “I don’t think you can do that anymore Sister Fife”  which is probably true-  no more hugs, how sad!  (Both looked great moms!  Heathy and very happy J)

I am really missing my kids.  They ask us to focus on the things here and try to leave our home life at home.  But I'm having a few withdrawal symptoms!  Hopefully it will get better as we go along.  Probably by the time we get to Africa life will be so busy I won't have all this time to miss them. I love you guys!  You are in my prayers all the time. 

                                                                                                                                       .....Sister Fife