New Start Date

In case you are wondering what happens after a senior couple opens their call letter, here is what has gone on so far:

• We received a phone call about a week later from a senior couple in Salt Lake City who are over the senior couple welfare missionary assignments.  It was nice to talk to someone who knew we had received our call!  They had us verify our start date - June 23rd.  They had a little discussion back and forth about that date - seems that is during the time reserved for mission president training, not senior couple training.  So they looked into it and got back to us a little later.  A computer glitch was discovered - and we were asked if we wanted to be reassigned several weeks later or earlier.  We opted for earlier of course!  Our new start date is May 26th - Memorial Day.  It will be a very memorable day for us!!!

• A box is on the way from Salt Lake City with materials and other information in it for our mission.  We are looking forward to it!

• We received an email from the executive secretary of the Asian Area.  Seems we are for sure on "the grid" now - they know we are coming!  He confirmed we'd be speaking English for our mission, but if we wanted to take advantage of the church's pre-mission tutoring for seniors we could, learning either Cantonese or Mandarin.  We opted for Mandarin, since we have already learned a bit over the years.

• A phone call to the Language Training center (as found in our packet) got us signed up for the online tutoring - which will begin this coming Friday.  We get one hour a week of Skype tutoring, along with downloaded materials for homework, both in written and audio files.  Can't wait to start!

• There is on-line Pre-MTC training you "get" to do on your missionary portal - so we've been busy doing each of the required items - watch certain episodes of The District, teach certain parts of Preach My Gospel, get our required immunizations, read the Missionary Handbook, etc. 

• We are required to make sure our Tdap, MMR, Hepatitis A & B immunizations are all done, as well as the flu, meningitis, pneumonia, and possibly shingles.  Nothing outlandish!

It's an exciting time - the real work will begin soon!  We will be doing a variety of assignments while on our mission - we are told we may be invited to also work in the Hong Kong temple as part of our assignment. So excited!