Jordan's Mission Apartments


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Sunday, March 30, 2008

Chelsie and friend come over for dinner!


This week Chelsie met a friend of Elder Palfreyman. Chelsie and Alyssa went out for lunch this week and Chelsi brought her over for dinner today. It's a Small World After All!


Monday, March 24, 2008

Jordan writes early-Zone Conferences

hello family!

sorry that i'm throwing a wrench in the works by writing on monday. it's zone conference this week so pday has been moved to today. tomorrow is the actually training, but we have an all day pday today. for the activity we're going to Batu Caves. i'm way pumped because there's supposed to be tons of monkeys! don't worry, i'll take a lot of pictures.

so zone conference is a bit crazy, but this is how it works; we got here this morning (here being the PJ house [PJ being short for petaling jaya, which is about 15 minutes from klang {give or take}]) so far it's been really cool. we started off the day with a role play where we had to teach the assistants lesson one in ten minutes. there was a list of five concerns that they gave us to prepare for. during the lesson, we had to figure out what concern they had, address it, at teach the whole first lesson in ten minutes. it was really good and they gave us a lot of good feedback. we also got to have interviews with president skelton. mine was pretty funny. he started off by saying (in a hilarious brittish accent), "elder troxel, i have something for you..." he then whipped out three letters from chelsie and began to rebuke me for all the writing on the envelopes. so chels, try and put all the pictures on the inside of the letter, not on the outside. it really wasn't all that bad, he just said that i should pass that advice on because a lot of people see these letters, especially if the go through singapore. but i did get four letters today, so i'm pretty pumped about that. the rest of the interview was short, but it was really good. president skelton is a wise man.

anywho, this last week has been pretty crazy... just like every other week. one of our investigators has a real problem with the word of wisdom and it's starting to really put a lot of strain his family. we came over to his house one time this week and he was drunk out of his mind. (PS-drunk people wreak, so don't drink) we tried to talk some sense into him, but it's pretty hard when people are not all there. he's really realizing now that this is not the way to live and that he needs the gospel to help bring his family back together. hopefully this will be a big turning point for him.

we also had my first exchanges this week. elder palfreyman went with elder clark (the district leader) and i went with elder maynes who of course is elder clark's companion. it was really fun. elder maynes is fluent in malay so he helped me out a lot and showed me some good ways to study effectively.

WEEKLY REVELATION: don't leave clothes in the washer for 5 days or they get moldy.

people here in malaysia are really nice... well, most people anyway. there was one time this week when it was pouring rain and i didn't have an umbrella (yes, so far on my mission i've lost 2 umbrellas) so this way nice chinese lady ran out of her house into the pouring rain to give me her umbrella. i tried to say no, but she forced it into my hand. you'd be surprised at how strong these little old chinese women are. it was so nice of her. unfortunately for us, she didn't speak any english and barely any malay, so we couldn't teach her.i'm getting extremely tan.

i need to find a scale to find out how light i am now. everyone keeps telling me i'm looking a lot skinnier than i did when i came here so i'm probably down in the 170's. i don't know how though, we eat a TON.

anywho, i'm sorry i skrewed things up by writing on monday, but i'm looking forward to hearing from you next wednesday! i love you all! be safe.

love,Elder Troxel

PS- tell TJ and Michael to write me more and Scott to write me less. just kidding, everybody has seriously been slacking. i expect at least a note from each of you next week. you have 10 days.

Note from Dad: the following are pictures that Jordan sent to Chelsie, she was kind enough to come over to our house on her birthday and share these pictures. Happy Birthday Chelsie!

Jordan standing in front of the Singapore Chappel


Kuldeep, Jordan, and Rahul new Malaysian friends


A view of the Petronas Towers from the KL apartment


Being soaked after a rain storm, yeah I've lost two umbrellas


Why is there toilet paper next to my cooking? What is that smell!

Ok, how about some McDonald's, Elder Palfreyman says thank you!

If you eat at McDonald's... In Malaysia we are under cover missionaries, no name badges

Friday, March 21, 2008

Letter from Pres and Sis Skelton

Today we received a letter from Jordan's Mission President and his wife, telling us of his safe arrival and giving instructions for mailings and sending packages. The letter states that letters and packages may be mailed directly to the missionary's apartments. Pres. Skelton also restates the need to list only the missionaries given name and not to include the title "Elder" on letters or packages. Pres. Skelton also included a picture of the three of them together while Jordan was in the mission home. Pres. Skelton encouraged regular positive communications (weekly) and to avoid too many letters beyond weekly as it may become distracting. Jordan has not complained of being too distracted yet, so I think we are all safe!

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Still Very Hot!

hello family!

this week has been really good. we've been working really hard and it's been awesome. we've been doing a lot of contacting lately because we really need to increase the teaching pool and get more investigators. our total number of new investigators for last week was 28! that is astronomically high. it feels like we're on the verge of an explosion here. We set some long term goals this morning for the next three months. We prayed about it and the numbers were pretty high, but if that's the number of the people that the Lord has been preparing then all we have to do is find them. But the work is going really well =)

yeah... about your clubs dad... i forgot to take them out of rittmanic's trunk before i left, so you may want to do that before he leaves on wednesday. my bad. the tv is gorgeous though. i was looking at the pictures and realized that i was drooling all over the keyboard. keep it in pristine condition for a couple of years because i plan on making good use of it in feb 2010.

there are a few addresses that i would very much appreciate if you could send me: Healey's, Cusick's (both their home and andrew's mission address), Frost's mission address, and Rittmanic's mission address. if you could get those to me eventually i would be very grateful.

it is still very rainy here. and when it's not raining, it's excruciatingly hot. i'll try and paint a picture of how nappy sweaty it is for you... so they keep the chapel pretty well air conditioned (by pretty well i mean it's only 1 million degrees in there instead of the 5 billion degrees outside), but they have these really uncomfortable plastic chairs that do not ventilate the rear end well at all, especially when you sit in them for over an hour. after sacrament meeting on sunday i stood up and turned around to grab my bag, and what did i find in my chair? there was a standing puddle of sweat in my chair! needless to say, i pretended that it wasn't me and booked it out of there before anyone noticed. now i know how TJ felt in Guatamala (feel free to send this paragraph to the healeys for the newsletter. i'm sure everyone will enjoy it)(just kidding, it's really gross.) .i learned the word for "fart" in malay the other day. it's ketut (keh-toot). how awesome is that?

PLEASE send me some packages with delicious goodies in them! i could kill someone for a twinkie! powdered jelly filled doughnuts will also be accepted, along with beef jerky and other delectable morsels. packages are supposed to go to the mission office i think, but mail you can send straight to my place. speaking of my place, i checked out the blog and that is my building! how on earth did you find those pictures? we live in the blue one so that's even the one i live in! yep, the 17th floor is a long way up, but thankfully we do have elevators. these condos are actually pretty nice... pretty nice when compared to other ones in malaysia. when compared to anywhere else they are disgusting. but i like them. i haven't gotten any diseases or anything yet, so i'm good.

so, crazy thing about asian culture. many people have moles on their face, and apparently it is like a sign of wisdom or beauty or something when you grow out your mole hair. it's so nappy! i really have to fight back my gag reflex sometimes. the moles i don't mind, but the hair is just too much. with some people it gets up to one or two inches! so gross. i hope you're reading this at sunday dinner...

well that's pretty much it. i love you all and pray for you every day! be good! stay safe.

love, elder troxel

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Ridzuan Condos-Space is Available!

With a little web search, I was able to find a sales ad from Malaysia with pictures of the condos where Jordan is staying. The pictures are not the best, but they will do until Jordan sends pictures home. They will look better with him standing out front. Mail can be sent directly to his apartment at this address:




Jordan Troxel (do not use the title "Elder")
No. RC1-1709 Blk A Pangsapuri
Ridzuan Condos
Jalan PJS 10/11 Bandar Sri Subang
H6000 Subang Jaya Selangor
West Malaysia

Mail can also be sent to the mission home, but we are not sure how often he will have the mail forwarded. The mission home address is:


Jordan Troxel (do not use the title "Elder")
253 Bukit Tmah Road
Singapore 259069
Singapore

I know that he will appreciate any emails (eldertroxel@myldsmail.net), letters or packages you are able to send. He is not always able to reply personally but he will put things in his emails that we will publish here. I am just guessing but from Jordan's address it appears that he is staying tower one, it looks like there are three towers, (RC1 stand for Ridzuan Condos 1) and his apartment number is 1709 (possibly the 17th floor), there are at least 27 floors from the pictures. The street that the condos face is Jalan PJS 10/11. I haven't deciphered the rest of the address, but it's a start.



Friday, March 14, 2008

Jordan's New Address in Subang

Chelsie came over to Whitney's waffle party and brought a letter from Jordan that she had just received. Jordan listed his new address in Subang and also included was one of his business cards. We appreciate her being willing to shared letters and things.



Jordan's addresses are listed above. Feel free to continue using his email eldertroxel@myldsmail.net for regular communications, but if you want to send something the Subang address will be the quickest. Addresses will change as transfers occur.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

watch out for the small green ones...

hey everybody!

so my first week in klang has been crazy! this transfer has really thrown things off as far as investigators go. when we talked to the sisters, the gave us a huge list of all the people that they'd been teaching. when we got here though we couldn't find hardly anybody on their list. so, we've started from scratch. we've done a ton of contacting in the last few days and have had a lot of success. we set two baptismal dates last night and are hoping to set at least one more tonight, but with any luck we will set three more tonight.

we're staying at the ridzuan condos in Subang. subang isn't actually in klang, but it's really close. i like it a lot better than KL because everything is so close. there is a monsterous mall called the sunway pyramid about a half mile from our apartment that has EVERYTHING. it's really nice.

as far as restrictions on teaching go, the only people we can't teach are muslims. it is illegal here. that is by far the biggest hinderance to the work considering 55%of the population is muslim. it's really a shame too because most of the islamic people we talk to seem really interested in what we're teaching, but we can't teach them. it's poopy. we do teach a lot of hindus and budists though. i love hindus! overall i'd say they are the most receptive. we have also been teaching a lot of nepalis lately. one of the recent converts is from there and he just keeps refering everybody he knows. it's actually some of his friends that we are going to commit to baptism tonight.

it rains a ton here! it has rained at least once every day. the rain here is different too. it doesn't just rain... it's like somebody turns on a firehose in the sky. we get soaked every day. i took some funny pictures of us sopping wet. oh yeah, pictures. i can't upload pictures to the computer because we have to go to a ciber cafe to email, but i will send my card home pretty soon because it's almost full. there's a lot of good pictures and videos on it.

the food here is delicious. unfortunately, the members don't feed us at all. but that's good i guess because that means we get to eat whatever we want. there are some delictilbe dishes that i want you to try when you come to pick me up =) the best one is called tandoori chicken with naan. oh man! i would eat that for every meal if i could... oh wait, we pretty much do. i tried something new yesterday at district developement meeting that i think dad would really like. it was called butter chicken rice. it looked really good, so i got it. there were these small green things in there that looked like green beans, which i hate but i decided to suck it up and eat them anyway. WOW. they weren't green beans. i think they might have been dynamite actually. i have never had anything so spicy in my life. i thought i liked spicy food, but not anymore. i couldn't even finish. my eyes were watering, i was sweating profusely, and it was like i had mount vesuvius erupting in my mouth. i tried to play it cool and order a strawberry shake, but i couldn't feel my tongue. i stuffed a napkin in my mouth while nobody was looking just to try and put out the flame. oh man, it was rough. but i think dad would really enjoy it.

i found out this week that CAL and Burkley are the same school! anywho, things are going great and we're starting to really have a ton of success here. i can't remember anything else that i wanted to tell you... WHY ON EARTH COULDN'T WE GET THE TV BEFORE I LEFT????!!!!!!!!!! geez.

i love you all. tell everybody to write me because i don't get any mail ever. oh yeah, and tell chelsie that i'm not allowed to email her back, but she can keep emailing me... and writing letters. be safe! keep me updated on things that go on.

love,
Elder Troxel

Note From Dad: If you do a Google Earth search, use "Sunway Pyramid, Subang, Malaysia" you will be able to see the area that Jordan is frequenting. He stated that they live a couple of blocks from the mall which is one of the four points of interest that Google Earth brings up. Isn't technology great!

Note from Scott: The above map is centered on the mall that Jordan mentioned and there is a blue arrow that signifies the Condo complex that he mentioned was their residence. You can zoom in for a pretty detailed look. I actually think I saw Jordan standing on the balcony of the apartment...I could be imagining that though. I can't wait to go and actually see this place. If no one else goes, I'm going to go and pick him up (and enjoy that awesome waterpark).

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Jordan is assigned to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, but wait...

crazy first week!
From: Jordan Troxel (eldertroxel@myldsmail.net)
Sent:Tue 3/04/08 9:27PM (Provo Time) 3/05/08 12:27PM (Singapore Time)
To: marktrox@msn.com


well, as you can see from the subject, this has been a crazy week. crazy, but freakin awesome! i'll start from the plane ride...so the plane ride was long, but i slept 11 of the 14 hours, so it wasn't all that bad. that's it for the plane ride.

when we got here, we met the senior office couple and the assistants to the president. they then took us back to the house so we could get unpacked and all that jazz. after that, they took us to get lunch as some pakistani place. we had some crazy shaved ice desert with corn and beans in it. apparently the natives love it... i downed it, but it was all i could do to keep it down. the APs thought it was pretty funny.

anywho, we stayed in singapore until for a couple days doing orientations and training and things and flew out to our new areas on friday. i was assigned to Kuala Lumpur (which i'm pretty sure is the biggest city in malaysia). My companion's name is elder palfreyman from laguna beach, CA. he is such a studd and he is extremely smart. he did a year at berkeley before he came in. not only is he very bright, but he can match me stride for stride in movie quoting! some might say he even surpasses me! needless to say, we get along great and we work really well together. he's only been out for about seven months so we're both pretty new. he's the district leader. there are only four elders in our district, and the other two our zone leaders (who also happen to be our roommates). they are hilarious! but they're really disciplined too. one of them (elder houston) fought in iraq for a year and a half before serving a mission, and the other (elder daines) went to the naval accademy. pretty dang awesome if you ask me.

now we can get down to the nitty gritty. We've been having a lot of success here in KL. the first night i was here we set two baptismal dates and we set another one on saturday! there are a ton of investigators who will have a baptism date very soon.with all this success, it's really pretty sad that we can't see it through... wait, what? yes, you heard me right. EMERGENCY TRANSFER!!! just when i was starting to get comfortable, elder palfreyman and i got news that we are being transfered to Khlang. for the sake of mom's nerves, i won't tell you why, but just know that the it's not safe in that area anymore for sisters, so they are taking them out of there. i'm really excited though. i think i broke the record for the fastest transfer ever. 5 days! but hopefully elder palfreyman and i can really do some good in a struggling area. it won't be easy, but we both are really hard workers. anywho, i'll send you my new address in my email next week, but for now just keep sending things to the mission office (if you send anything). i love you all! i'm doing fantastic! i pray for you everyday.

Love,elder troxel

ps-the blog rocks, i checked it out. keep it up.
pss- tell chelsie i'm sending her a letter in the morning, so she should expect one in a couple of weeks. love you chels =)

Notes from Dad: It apprears that you can google earth both Kuala Lumpur and Khlang, Malaysia. They are both north of Singapore in West Malaysia. Khlang apprears to be on some islands just west of Kuala Lumpur. There is a lot of detail when looking at Kuala Lumpur but not in the Khlang area.

Mission Field Pictures