dear family,
it's zone conference today and tomorrow, so that's why you're getting this email today. the reason i titled this email "molten chocolate cake" is because that was the desert i just had at chili's and i really can't get it off my mind. Oh man! it was delicious!
so i can't remember if i told you about this investigator we have named william... but to make a long story short, he's as golden as they get. he's american from montana and has been searching for the truth his whole life and not been able to find it... until now. right off the bat he knew the book of mormon was true and he started to talk to us about baptism before we even mentioned it. his only concern is that he has a few military tattoos and that it will effect whether or not he can be baptized. amazing. but unfortunately, this week was not a good one for him. we met with him on friday (awesome lesson), he came to our baptism (for a man named Bhakta who is also amazing) on saturday night, and was planning on coming to church on sunday. we got a call from him at about 11:30 saturday night and he told us that his wife had called him and told him that she wants a divorce and that she's suing him for custody of their child. wow. not only that, but there's so many other things that are being thrown in his path right now to keep him from joining the church, but he still wants to be baptized. i love that guy.
so this week definitely wasn't as successful as last week. in fact, our numbers were horrible! we only had 3 member present lessons all week, and only two investigators at sacrament meeting (william never showed up, but it's understandable). the whole morning yesterday was spent getting mattresses from the PJ elder's apartment to ours because we are housing all the elders from the ipoh zone for the next couple of nights (10 other elders). it's been crazy! i've learned that missionary work is never not crazy though. if it ever gets to be not crazy, you're not working hard enough.
WEEKLY REVELATION: if you find a stray baby kitten, don't take it seventeen floors up the elevator with you... it will just follow you and sit outside the door of your apartment for days meowing loudly. it really gets old after awhile. we did name him jappetto though, which i thought was a pretty sweet name for a cat. he finally bailed, but he comes back and visits us every now and again.
man, that molten chocolate cake was delicious! i love food! i'm afraid my metabolism just can't keep up though and the link between my stomach and my brain that tells you when you are full must have somehow been severed because i am NEVER full! i literally could eat a horse i think. it's a good thing we ride bikes and walk a ton. it helps to slow down the fattening, but it definitely doesn't stop it.
so chelsie told me in her email that three girls from my graduating class are engaged already! what the heck?! how does that even happen?! they're too young. i'm putting my foot down on any more engagements/marriages. that is too weird.
i got a hilarious letter from nick morley a couple days ago. i've heard from rittmanic, beau, andrew, and jackson. everybody is doing well. andrew almost has a year under his belt! nick and beau are both over the six month mark! AH! where does the time go? i'm coming up on four months! a couple more months and i won't even be green anymore. i wish i had jake frost's email address at least.
i had a really good interview with president skelton this morning. he said some things though that lead me to believe that i may not being staying here in klang much longer though. he didn't say much, and i don't know if he even meant to hint at anything, because they were very subtle hints if he did, but it made me raise my eyebrows... watch me stay here for seven months now. i wouldn't mind, i love this place.
thanks to my handy work, our bikes have been salvaged. we without a doubt have the worst bikes in the mission. they're so fun though! i'm getting into downhill mountain biking when i get home. i have a blast on those things. it took some innovation, but we have two bikes that are semi-ridable. both of them broke a few weeks back, but there's a spare bike that the sisters had been using for parts that we fixed up so we started using that one and took the working parts from the other broken one to fix the third one. neither one is quality, but they get you places and are fun to jump off of things... only small things though, they couldn't take much more than that.
well, that's pretty much it. life goes on, being a missionary is still epic and i don't think it will ever stop being that way. i love you all. tell everyone hello for me.
elder troxel
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
I'm an Uncle X2!!!
dear family,
geez louise! you did have a crazy week! why does scott always have to have crazy close calls like that. i mean, honestly, take a chill pill man, you're giving me indigestion. just kidding, this stomach is solid as a rock. oh man! you're a dad again scott! how's mandy doing? she's been in my prayers. now it's up to kimberly! good luck girl. =)
so, i got a hilarious letter from elder owen (jackson) this past week. he has had some crazy stuff happen to him! he told me about how he was exercising one morning about three months ago and fell and broke his leg in three spots. knowing jackson though, it must've been something pretty extreme... he tried to pass it off like there was nothing wrong, but that's pretty hard to do with a tri-broken leg. they sent him to LA to have surgery on it, but fortunately they didn't release him. he served in a threesome in LA for a month and a half or so until he had healed. it is a really cool story because they ended up meeting and baptizing a family while he was there. he even got to do one of the baptisms. he did have to put a plastic bag over his cast though. he's back in albania now and has just been called to be a zone leader. it's funny because he's really young for how long he's been out, and his companion is 27. it doesn't surprise me at all though.
i had the craziest epiphany last night! ariel and elder palfreyman are destined to be eternal companions! they're pretty much like the same person almost. tell ariel that she needs to write to him. she's not married yet, is she??? i got news yesterday from chelsie's letter that katie crawley is engaged! AH! the first of many. it's weird because i cuddled with her... twice! oh man, she's too young to get married. keep me updated on all the people you hear about though. i've started a list in my journal called, "another one bites the dust."
we had a sweet experience this last week. last wednesday we went to chili's with a member. we had to go all the way out to KLCC (Kuala Lumpur City Center) which is about a 30minute-1 hour bus ride depending on traffic. chili's was delicious, but we were running a little bit late so we decided to take a taxi. we ended up sitting in the taxi for an hour because of traffic, and decided to get off at KL central to take the train. i got to teach the taxi driver a sweet lesson though. we got there and waited about 5 minutes for the train, but it was too packed for anyone to get on (it is any amazing thing to see a train packed that tight, but it is almost a daily occurrence here), so we had to wait for the next one. we were already ten minutes late for an appointment and the train wasn't going to come for another 15 minutes. i wasn't a very happy camper, but at that moment i got a reassuring prompting that there was a reason we missed that train. a few seconds later an american guy walked up to us and i recognized him as this one guy we briefly met at a bus stop while i was in KL. he's from montana originally, but married an east malaysian girl who works for the UN. they moved from KL to our area shortly after we did. i talked to him the whole train ride home. we set up a return appointment and met him a few days later. turns out he's read almost all of the book of mormon before and he's been fasting to be able to find answers to a lot of the questions he has. WOW. the guy is amazing. HE asked US how much more he would have to learn before he could be baptized. our return appointment lasted two and a half hours and we were in a McDonalds! we're taking a member family to his house tomorrow and we'll hopefully be able to set a baptism date for him. AWESOME!!! i love this job!
we've got two baptisms coming up this weekend for a couple of nepali guys named deb and bhakta. they're such studs.the work is really starting to pick up again. we had 26 new investigators last week, and we'll follow-up on them this week and weed out the ones who aren't serious. we've got 5 people on date this week, two of which are being baptized this weekend, and we're hoping to set dates for william (the american) and another indian family that i haven't told you about yet (i don't think), so i'll do that now:this family is really incredible. we fasted last sunday to be able to find a family that has been prepared for us to teach and baptize. well, we found them. we were out contacting and tracted into two kids; Moses (15) and his little brother Andrew (12). their parents weren't home, so we just taught them and their friend the restoration and set up a time to come back and teach their whole family. oh yeah, they too have been taught by missionaries before, but the kids were fairly young and are much more interested now. we've taught them a few times and told them to pray as a family to know if they should be baptized again (their catholic), but this time in a non-apostate way (i didn't say it in that exact way). we're feeling really good about it.
WEEKLY REVELATION: finding an american style sitting down toilet is a rare thing here. no, no; here they have a much greater invention: the squatter. enough said. public bathrooms are definitely not up to par... elder palfreyman found that out the hard way... let's just say that not many have toilet paper and that is a fact that is often discovered when it's too late.that's pretty much all the news i have for this week. i'm going to go grab some wendy's right now! hooray! tell everyone i love them. and michael's letter was bust a gut funny. thanks for writing, i really enjoy the letters.
stay safe
elder troxel
Jordan's new niece, Aubrey Maurine Troxel 7lbs, 3oz, 20 inches long
Scott, just 6 days after open heart surgery, holding his new daughter Aubrey "One miracle looking at another!"
geez louise! you did have a crazy week! why does scott always have to have crazy close calls like that. i mean, honestly, take a chill pill man, you're giving me indigestion. just kidding, this stomach is solid as a rock. oh man! you're a dad again scott! how's mandy doing? she's been in my prayers. now it's up to kimberly! good luck girl. =)
so, i got a hilarious letter from elder owen (jackson) this past week. he has had some crazy stuff happen to him! he told me about how he was exercising one morning about three months ago and fell and broke his leg in three spots. knowing jackson though, it must've been something pretty extreme... he tried to pass it off like there was nothing wrong, but that's pretty hard to do with a tri-broken leg. they sent him to LA to have surgery on it, but fortunately they didn't release him. he served in a threesome in LA for a month and a half or so until he had healed. it is a really cool story because they ended up meeting and baptizing a family while he was there. he even got to do one of the baptisms. he did have to put a plastic bag over his cast though. he's back in albania now and has just been called to be a zone leader. it's funny because he's really young for how long he's been out, and his companion is 27. it doesn't surprise me at all though.
i had the craziest epiphany last night! ariel and elder palfreyman are destined to be eternal companions! they're pretty much like the same person almost. tell ariel that she needs to write to him. she's not married yet, is she??? i got news yesterday from chelsie's letter that katie crawley is engaged! AH! the first of many. it's weird because i cuddled with her... twice! oh man, she's too young to get married. keep me updated on all the people you hear about though. i've started a list in my journal called, "another one bites the dust."
we had a sweet experience this last week. last wednesday we went to chili's with a member. we had to go all the way out to KLCC (Kuala Lumpur City Center) which is about a 30minute-1 hour bus ride depending on traffic. chili's was delicious, but we were running a little bit late so we decided to take a taxi. we ended up sitting in the taxi for an hour because of traffic, and decided to get off at KL central to take the train. i got to teach the taxi driver a sweet lesson though. we got there and waited about 5 minutes for the train, but it was too packed for anyone to get on (it is any amazing thing to see a train packed that tight, but it is almost a daily occurrence here), so we had to wait for the next one. we were already ten minutes late for an appointment and the train wasn't going to come for another 15 minutes. i wasn't a very happy camper, but at that moment i got a reassuring prompting that there was a reason we missed that train. a few seconds later an american guy walked up to us and i recognized him as this one guy we briefly met at a bus stop while i was in KL. he's from montana originally, but married an east malaysian girl who works for the UN. they moved from KL to our area shortly after we did. i talked to him the whole train ride home. we set up a return appointment and met him a few days later. turns out he's read almost all of the book of mormon before and he's been fasting to be able to find answers to a lot of the questions he has. WOW. the guy is amazing. HE asked US how much more he would have to learn before he could be baptized. our return appointment lasted two and a half hours and we were in a McDonalds! we're taking a member family to his house tomorrow and we'll hopefully be able to set a baptism date for him. AWESOME!!! i love this job!
we've got two baptisms coming up this weekend for a couple of nepali guys named deb and bhakta. they're such studs.the work is really starting to pick up again. we had 26 new investigators last week, and we'll follow-up on them this week and weed out the ones who aren't serious. we've got 5 people on date this week, two of which are being baptized this weekend, and we're hoping to set dates for william (the american) and another indian family that i haven't told you about yet (i don't think), so i'll do that now:this family is really incredible. we fasted last sunday to be able to find a family that has been prepared for us to teach and baptize. well, we found them. we were out contacting and tracted into two kids; Moses (15) and his little brother Andrew (12). their parents weren't home, so we just taught them and their friend the restoration and set up a time to come back and teach their whole family. oh yeah, they too have been taught by missionaries before, but the kids were fairly young and are much more interested now. we've taught them a few times and told them to pray as a family to know if they should be baptized again (their catholic), but this time in a non-apostate way (i didn't say it in that exact way). we're feeling really good about it.
WEEKLY REVELATION: finding an american style sitting down toilet is a rare thing here. no, no; here they have a much greater invention: the squatter. enough said. public bathrooms are definitely not up to par... elder palfreyman found that out the hard way... let's just say that not many have toilet paper and that is a fact that is often discovered when it's too late.that's pretty much all the news i have for this week. i'm going to go grab some wendy's right now! hooray! tell everyone i love them. and michael's letter was bust a gut funny. thanks for writing, i really enjoy the letters.
stay safe
elder troxel
Jordan's new niece, Aubrey Maurine Troxel 7lbs, 3oz, 20 inches long
Scott, just 6 days after open heart surgery, holding his new daughter Aubrey "One miracle looking at another!"
Short Email from a Senior Couple Working with Jordan
Dear Troxel family,
Just a few lines to let you know that your son is well, happy and brings honour to your name. We have the privilege of working with your son here in Malaysia and you can be assured that he is settling in well and has a fine trainer in Elder Palfreyman. You have no need to worry about him - his appetite is huge and he is staying fit and spiritual and the members love him. If you have any concerns do not hesitate to contact us
Elder & Sister Hector
Just a few lines to let you know that your son is well, happy and brings honour to your name. We have the privilege of working with your son here in Malaysia and you can be assured that he is settling in well and has a fine trainer in Elder Palfreyman. You have no need to worry about him - his appetite is huge and he is staying fit and spiritual and the members love him. If you have any concerns do not hesitate to contact us
Elder & Sister Hector
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Prayers for Scott
dear family,
well... i got a fairly scary call from president skelton this morning. he told me what he knew about scott's surgery and that everything will be fine. he also said that you will be calling the appartment sometime. i can't remember when exactly he said because i wasn't really paying very close attention after that, so i will just have to be on my toes i guess. i will pray hard for him. no worries, everything will be fine. tell him and mandy that i love them.
anywho, i pretty much told you everything during the call, but we've had some cool stuff happen since then. after the call on monday, we went out contacting. we'd been knocking these flats for hours when we knocked on a door of some Myanmar refugees. and by some, i mean 15! there was fifteen of them in this little apartment and they said that there is sometimes upwards of 30! none of them spoke very good english, but they told us that they had a friend who spoke english really well and that they would call him and asked us if we could come back later that night. we came back later and taught them all the restoration with a translator and they all committed to coming to church and to english class tonight. we had already found 2 new investigators earlier that day, so we ended up with 17 new investigators on monday. that's more than we had all last week! the only problem is that the book of mormon isn't printed in Chin, which is the language they read. i don't know how we'll get around that one, but we'll find a way. the guy they called to translate is a studd and he's fairly well educated, so hopefully he can just translate it while he reads aloud or something.
today a member is treating us to chili's. i'm so excited. we also need to get our bikes fixed, buy groceries, and write some letters. sorry this one is so short, but i pretty much told you everything over the phone. in speaking of the phone call, it was awesome. thanks to everyone for being there, or at least being in contact. it's really strange being on a mission. it's like i'm on a completely different planet, so it's nice to know that i have people back home that still remember and care about me. sometimes we as missionaries forget. we're a long ways away and we just have to deal with it that most people don't like us. but "sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven." i love being a missionary so much! i love and pray for you all. scott will especially be in our prayers the next few days. everything will be fine. no worries.
elder troxel
well... i got a fairly scary call from president skelton this morning. he told me what he knew about scott's surgery and that everything will be fine. he also said that you will be calling the appartment sometime. i can't remember when exactly he said because i wasn't really paying very close attention after that, so i will just have to be on my toes i guess. i will pray hard for him. no worries, everything will be fine. tell him and mandy that i love them.
anywho, i pretty much told you everything during the call, but we've had some cool stuff happen since then. after the call on monday, we went out contacting. we'd been knocking these flats for hours when we knocked on a door of some Myanmar refugees. and by some, i mean 15! there was fifteen of them in this little apartment and they said that there is sometimes upwards of 30! none of them spoke very good english, but they told us that they had a friend who spoke english really well and that they would call him and asked us if we could come back later that night. we came back later and taught them all the restoration with a translator and they all committed to coming to church and to english class tonight. we had already found 2 new investigators earlier that day, so we ended up with 17 new investigators on monday. that's more than we had all last week! the only problem is that the book of mormon isn't printed in Chin, which is the language they read. i don't know how we'll get around that one, but we'll find a way. the guy they called to translate is a studd and he's fairly well educated, so hopefully he can just translate it while he reads aloud or something.
today a member is treating us to chili's. i'm so excited. we also need to get our bikes fixed, buy groceries, and write some letters. sorry this one is so short, but i pretty much told you everything over the phone. in speaking of the phone call, it was awesome. thanks to everyone for being there, or at least being in contact. it's really strange being on a mission. it's like i'm on a completely different planet, so it's nice to know that i have people back home that still remember and care about me. sometimes we as missionaries forget. we're a long ways away and we just have to deal with it that most people don't like us. but "sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven." i love being a missionary so much! i love and pray for you all. scott will especially be in our prayers the next few days. everything will be fine. no worries.
elder troxel
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
I Can Almost Smell Them Too ;>(
dear family,
first of all, i didn't really appreciate the whole "i smell waffles cooking" thing. was that really necessary? secondly, i love being a missionary. i'm in singapore right now on my first visa run. i'm with elder clark (one of our zone leaders in KL), elder Jugant (zone leader in KK), and elder named IForgothisname. it's pretty cool. singapore is beautiful. it's so clean! it makes me realize how dirty malaysia is.
so about this call on sunday... i'm going to have to call on monday morning here (sunday evening there) because if i were to call in the morning there, i'd be up really late. in the missionary hand book, it says conversations with family should not go more than 30-40 minutes, but president skelton has apparently said we can talk for about an hour. it's totally fine if chelsie comes over. hopefully everybody can be there. if they can work their schedules around it that would be really nice.
we had a baptism on saturday for a man named Ram. he's such a studd. he pretty much just fell into our laps too. he lives in port klang, which is about two hours on the train (not counting the time it takes to take a bus to the train station, wait for the train, and then walk to the church) from the church in PJ. He just decided one day that he wanted to come to church and that's when we met him. he's come for the past 8 weeks, including one time when he was deathly ill. he was helping to teach the gospel principles class to the other nepali men before he was even a member. the guy is a rock. another one of our recent converts, gopal, who helps us three or four nights a week, baptized him. it was so awesome. i got to confirm him. so during my training, i got to baptize AND confirm someone. that's really cool. i've been so blessed.
in speaking of training... i'm finished! all that really means though is that i don't get an hour and a half of personal study anymore. only an hour, which is a real bummer. but there are a ton of missionaries going home in the near future, which means i could be a trainer pretty soon. elder clark told elder palfreyman that i should tell president skelton in my next weekly report letter that i'm ready to train if he needs me too. elder palfreyman didn't really think that was a great idea. he really likes the work we're doing in klang together, but i think i need to have more responsibility so i can learn more how to do things for myself. when you're with your trainer, you're pretty much just along for the ride. i don't want to leave klang, but i really feel like i'm ready to train and that i probably will get a chance in the next couple of months.
the work is still a little bit slower than we would like it to be. we've been working really hard though. we've been fasting and praying to find a family this week that will progress all the way towards baptism. on monday we tracted into some good ones and hopefully they will progress and come to church. we'll see. we have six people on date for baptism right now, the next ones being on the 24th. i sent some pictures to chelsie of the guys who will be baptized on that day. their names are Deb and Bhakta, both from nepal. they're such studds. and they keep their commitments, which is excellent. if everything goes as planned, there should be six baptisms from our district on that day- two from our area and four from the PJ1 area. that would be so amazing. i hope it works out.
i weighed myself today and i was pretty surprised. 177. i've actually lost wieght. all that means though is that i've lost 15 pounds of muscle and gained 5 solid pounds of fat. i eat a TON. the food here is so delicious, i can't help myself. i love it. i am getting a bit of a gut, but at least my pants will fit better.
i'll try and draw out about 150ish US dollars today so i can have it for emergency funds. that's somewhere in between 400 and 500 RM (ringit malaysia). that will be enough to last my whole mission probably.
Malay is coming along slowly but surely. i've never learned a language before, so it's different for me. i don't hardly ever have to speak it though. 90% of people speak english is west malaysia, so i don't need to worry about it unless i go to east malaysia where NOBODY speaks english. i think i'll stay in west malaysia for the majority of my mission though.
nothing extremely crazy happened this week and i didn't do anything really stupid, so there's no weekly revelation this time. hopefully next week though =)
anywho, be safe. i love you all.
elder troxel
first of all, i didn't really appreciate the whole "i smell waffles cooking" thing. was that really necessary? secondly, i love being a missionary. i'm in singapore right now on my first visa run. i'm with elder clark (one of our zone leaders in KL), elder Jugant (zone leader in KK), and elder named IForgothisname. it's pretty cool. singapore is beautiful. it's so clean! it makes me realize how dirty malaysia is.
so about this call on sunday... i'm going to have to call on monday morning here (sunday evening there) because if i were to call in the morning there, i'd be up really late. in the missionary hand book, it says conversations with family should not go more than 30-40 minutes, but president skelton has apparently said we can talk for about an hour. it's totally fine if chelsie comes over. hopefully everybody can be there. if they can work their schedules around it that would be really nice.
we had a baptism on saturday for a man named Ram. he's such a studd. he pretty much just fell into our laps too. he lives in port klang, which is about two hours on the train (not counting the time it takes to take a bus to the train station, wait for the train, and then walk to the church) from the church in PJ. He just decided one day that he wanted to come to church and that's when we met him. he's come for the past 8 weeks, including one time when he was deathly ill. he was helping to teach the gospel principles class to the other nepali men before he was even a member. the guy is a rock. another one of our recent converts, gopal, who helps us three or four nights a week, baptized him. it was so awesome. i got to confirm him. so during my training, i got to baptize AND confirm someone. that's really cool. i've been so blessed.
in speaking of training... i'm finished! all that really means though is that i don't get an hour and a half of personal study anymore. only an hour, which is a real bummer. but there are a ton of missionaries going home in the near future, which means i could be a trainer pretty soon. elder clark told elder palfreyman that i should tell president skelton in my next weekly report letter that i'm ready to train if he needs me too. elder palfreyman didn't really think that was a great idea. he really likes the work we're doing in klang together, but i think i need to have more responsibility so i can learn more how to do things for myself. when you're with your trainer, you're pretty much just along for the ride. i don't want to leave klang, but i really feel like i'm ready to train and that i probably will get a chance in the next couple of months.
the work is still a little bit slower than we would like it to be. we've been working really hard though. we've been fasting and praying to find a family this week that will progress all the way towards baptism. on monday we tracted into some good ones and hopefully they will progress and come to church. we'll see. we have six people on date for baptism right now, the next ones being on the 24th. i sent some pictures to chelsie of the guys who will be baptized on that day. their names are Deb and Bhakta, both from nepal. they're such studds. and they keep their commitments, which is excellent. if everything goes as planned, there should be six baptisms from our district on that day- two from our area and four from the PJ1 area. that would be so amazing. i hope it works out.
i weighed myself today and i was pretty surprised. 177. i've actually lost wieght. all that means though is that i've lost 15 pounds of muscle and gained 5 solid pounds of fat. i eat a TON. the food here is so delicious, i can't help myself. i love it. i am getting a bit of a gut, but at least my pants will fit better.
i'll try and draw out about 150ish US dollars today so i can have it for emergency funds. that's somewhere in between 400 and 500 RM (ringit malaysia). that will be enough to last my whole mission probably.
Malay is coming along slowly but surely. i've never learned a language before, so it's different for me. i don't hardly ever have to speak it though. 90% of people speak english is west malaysia, so i don't need to worry about it unless i go to east malaysia where NOBODY speaks english. i think i'll stay in west malaysia for the majority of my mission though.
nothing extremely crazy happened this week and i didn't do anything really stupid, so there's no weekly revelation this time. hopefully next week though =)
anywho, be safe. i love you all.
elder troxel
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