We do not doubt our mothers knew it! (Week 7)

Sent on Tue, Nov 14, 2017

Hello everybody!

I am now only two weeks away from going to Vietnam! While I am a little nervous about going, I am also really excited. By the way, I will just say this now so the reader does not try to scroll ahead for this information, but I do not yet have my Vietnamese name. While our teachers did select them several weeks ago, they are not going to tell us them until the name tags have been made, and unfortunately Vietnamese name tags are always printed last. I don't know if that is because of alphabetical order, or because of the accent marks that need to be printed, but I know several other districts got their name tags the last few days, so I am really hopeful that it will come this week. On the bright side though, the Vietnamese name tags are the coolest, because with most languages you get your name directly translated into your mission language, but in Vietnamese you get an entirely new name to use for it! Hopefully I can tell you mine next week.

Something really cool that happened this last week was that we got to hear from President Nelson on Tuesday! He talked to us about being living epistles of the Lord, and about how we should represent the Lord on our missions. Also, on a related note, I don't know why but on that night one of the elders in my district was trying to tell me Watson is a first name (I don't know why he thought that) and tried to give me the example of Dr. Watson from Sherlock Holmes because Sherlock always calls him Watson, to which I replied "Do you mean Dr. John Watson". He still disagreed that Watson was a last name. Then during the devotional, we learned that Sister Nelson's maiden name is Watson. Apparently her name is Wendy Watson Nelson. After the devotional, I asked the elder if he still thought Watson wasn't a last name and he still denied it and said it was a first name. You can't convince everyone I guess.

I am also getting better at the language. We are almost done learning the content in our grammar book. I seem to understand it pretty well, and I think Mandarin helped me with understanding grammar in other languages than English. Recently, we have been learning the passive voice in Vietnamese. It is kind of odd, but can apparently be useful. I am also doing better with the vocabulary and the tones. I still don't feel entirely ready to be immersed in it in Vietnam, but I know it will help me a lot and that I will grow so much faster when I am fully immersed.

I am now in Helaman in my Book of Mormon studies. I finally finished Alma! That book is really quite long, but it has a lot of great stuff in it, especially about missionary work. It is one thing reading it normally, but I really got a lot out of it this time actually being a missionary reading about Alma and the sons of Mosiah on their missions. I especially like reading about the Lamanites who Ammon converts who then become the Anti Nephi Lehis and then the people of Ammon. That is quite a mouthful to say. Anyways, it is a great conversion story of a people who did not know about Christ. And it is also cool to read about their children, the stripling warriors who fight with Helaman as their commander. In particular, I happen to like the well known verses in Alma 56: 47-48 which says, "Now they never had fought, yet they did not fear death; and they did think more upon the liberty of their fathers than they did upon their lives; yea, they had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, God would deliver them. And they rehearsed unto me the words of their mother, saying: We do not doubt our mothers knew it." Yes, this is a shout out to my mother, who was always there to support me in everything, including getting ready for my mission. And I would also like to mention my dad as well, who also always supported me, just the verse I picked happened to be about mothers. Both of my parents are really great, and I am glad to know they support my decision to serve the Lord on my mission.

Well, I think that is about it for this week. I am continuing to enjoy my mission so far! I really feel I am growing a lot here, and I am glad to be on the errand of the Lord.

I will write again next week!

Elder Watson

P.S. Here are some more photos. The first one is the package I got from my grandparents. I especially liked how my grandmother decided to cut out a picture of Mario from a cardboard box to put in it. The second photo is me looking out at the distance with Moses. The third one is me sleeping in Liberty Jail with Joseph Smith and the others put in there. The fourth photo is of me being one of the guards when Esther approached the king to save her people. I will send more photos of the MTC next week. I only have two more weeks to get photos here, and then the photos will be of Vietnam! Until next week!