Orange Juice

Okay so hmm let us start with the orange juice....

There is a word of wisdom here at the MTC. What is that word of wisdom? DON'T DRINK THE ORANGE JUICE. Apparently it really cleans you out. Both ways.

Elder Caldwell, my current district leader, made a deal with his companion: next person to forget something from home has to pound 9 cups of orange juice. Nine. Cups.

He forgot something and had to pound nine cups....

He gave me the down low on how that went for him...

Turns out, he was in the bathroom more than class. Oh yeah, it's real.

Sooo I walk in to evening class a touch late, and one of the sisters (Sister Dahl-- the tall blonde one) boldly states to me "I bet you couldn't keep quiet for even one night."

"Oh?"

"Yeup. I will bet you five glasses of orange juice."

"Make it six FULL GLASSES and you have a deal."

She hesitated a little bit.

"Oh come on you know I'm going to lose anyway; what do you have to lose? What's the matter? You were so confident a couple seconds ago!"

"Okay but you cannot say ONE WORD. Not ONE WORD or you lose."

"Deal."

.....

two days later at breakfast she found herself pounding 6 glasses of orange juice.

Justice.

Sweet, sweet justice. Hehe, no pun intended.

She was in a sick nasty state for the rest of the day.

Elder Caldwell gave me grief for making her go through with the deal. (Nobody had said anything about it that whole morning-- she was not planning on going through with it so I said something and reminded her of the challenge)

"You are a bad man Elder."

"Oh? Why is that?"

"You are making her go through with it."

"Is it a bad thing to hold people accountable?"

"No, but she is a Sister."

Oh that ticked me off.

"Hmm. That doesn't make sense to me. See, if I said one hint of a word-- which some of you tried so hard to make me do that night-- you would have not let me forget one second about the Orange Juice challenge I had to complete. Not one second."

That shut them up.

Hm what else happened this week...

Oh yeah! Sister Shipp's branch president!
Wooo... that guy is a stickler.

So I go up to him Thursday night at dinner (by the way, this guy was more intimidating than Maryann's father. My goodness) and I say "President Blah blah blah?"

"Yes? Sit down. What is your name?"

I flash my name tag and his wife starts laughing outloud "Oh it's Elder VALENTINE! We know ALLLLL about YOU!"

.... I had mixed feelings on how that comment should be received!

So I start talking : "President, I am aware that you told Sister Shipp to limit any contact with me-- she respects you so much and has made a grand effort to follow your advice. As you are aware, she leaves this Monday. May I say goodbye to her for five minutes at dinner sunday night? I will bring my companion and do it in public."

"Elder, I will give you not ONE SECOND over a minute. And I want someone besides your companion there."

"Okay. That is fine-- would you want to be that person? You can come watch us if you want."

"I'll talk to Sister Shipp about it."

"Alright sounds good see you around!"

"Did Sister Shipp tell you what I told her?:

"Hmm what was that?"

"I told her to make sure to write you every week and then send the letters to you as she is leaving the MTC!"

"Ahh yes thank you so much."

Okay so he didn't turn out to be COMPLETELY against me. Not completely. Mostly though.
oh yeah, I never got that minute by the way. (But I made up for it in other ways and said my goodbyes to her-- she left this morning).

Oh yeah.

I totally cried in front of the District that night.

Man card? GONE.

Dignity? GONE.

Okay not really but yeah. They took pictures of me because they thought it was funny. I thought it was funny too! I was laughing and crying at the same time! Elder Johnson dragged me into another room and I had a good sincere 2 and a half minute cry. Then I got my man on and walked back into the room.

I am officially half way through my MTC experience! 98 WEEKS LEFT IN MY MISSION! Oh my goodness that makes it sound like it is already over!

"Almost over what a bummer!" -Tony Horton

Haha. Well, we got a new teacher this week! He looks like a taller version of Joe! (forgot his last name... Hertz? Hert? Don't feel offended if you are reading this, Joe... I stink at names)

OH NAMES! You think it is hard memorizing peoples names? TRY MEMORIZING THEIR CHINESE NAMES! THEY ALL SOUND THE SAME! ZHUAN, ZHUANG, LI, SUN, WEI, so on and so forth. I swear, there are only like ten surnames and everyone uses them.

Well, there are the stories for the week.

Till next time, my friends.

ZAI JIAN!

 

 

Yeah so my companion is super not sensitive and isn't touchy feely whatsoever.
He literally jumps as if someone shoved a cattle prod up his rear if you touch him or even HUG HIM!

So last night he asked me if there was anything he could do for me...

My request?

Give me a hug.

Oh yes, I used this moment to my advantage.

So here is a picture of me getting a hug from him-- something I would never dream of accomplishing