Why do Malaysian names all sound the same?!

dear family,

so i hit eight months in a couple weeks. is that not crazy to you? wow, time flies. nick morley is over the hump now, as is andrew, and jacob frost is past 18 months. i wish i could make it go slower.

i can't believe the cougs! that's so crazy. 14th! why couldn't they do that last year?!! if they win a national championship while i'm gone, i think i'll kill someone. good to hear also that craig is still tearing it up. that kid is a monster. keep me updated on kevin's mission call. my guess is Singapore.

so we had an interesting experience this week that definitely would qualify for a:

WEEKLY REVELATION: so, elder kartchner is on his first visa run right now, but he had to bus there so we needed to go buy bus tickets on monday. since i've never had to bus, i have no idea where to buy them, so he called the zone leaders to find out where we needed to go. he's still not familiar with all of the names of places here, so when Elder Richards told him he needed to go to "Puduraya," what he heard was "Putra Raya." there is no place called "Putra Raya", but there is a place that is on the outskirts of Selangor (the state in which we reside) called "Putra Jaya." so, we took the three hour trip to Putra Jaya only to find once we got there that we were in completely the wrong place. what a fiasco. however, i did meet a really cool kid who lived most of his life in baltimore, and was able to teach him and get his number. it's interesting how people just happen to fall into your path... if there's one thing i've learned on my mission, it's that there are no coincidences in missionary work.

well, we got some poopy news this week. the father of the family we baptized a few weeks back lost his job and started drinking and smoking again. ARGH! this experiece has been the biggest roller coaster ever. his family went from being completely dysfunctional, to being amazing, and now it's back to the former. the branch has really stepped in though. we only have time to go there maybe once a week, but there has been somebody from the branch there everyday to help out.

we've got another baptism coming up this saturday, and then it'll be two weeks before we have another one because we'll be watching conference on the 11th and 12th (that's assuming the DVD's get here by then, but that's what the branch is planning on). i'm so excited for general conference! it's going to be amazing.

i'm so glad we have time to study in the mornings. i only wish we had more time. i had no idea how little i knew until i came on my mission. there is so much to know. i've been studying about the second coming a lot lately. EPIC! as is the book of mormon. there is so much in there, i don't know how it all fits on those pages. i love it.

anywho, the work here continues. we're teaching some amazing people.well, i love you all. tell TJ to stop being a sissy. only 17?(stitches) pish posh. just kidding, that's pretty nappy.

elder troxel

Pulled Pork ;(

dear family,

first of all dad, when you update me on how teams perform, you should tell me who it is that is getting their butts handed to them. i thought it was the cougs that got beat 59-0. i almost soiled myself. and then i read on and found out that they won! then i did soil myself. that's so sweet to hear that mike is getting playing time. i'm happy for him. he's a stud. if you see him tell him congrats from me.

it's also good to hear that mom's knee infection dealio wasn't a big deal. i'm always on the edge of my seat when i read stuff like that. but just hang in there mum, you'll be good to go in a couple months... until the next one happens. my knees are bad news too. we do a lot of sitting on the ground cross-legged here, and i can't go more than about five minutes before i have to extend my legs. stupid football. just kidding. i love it.

this week has been, as always, complete chaos. what mom used to say is completely correct, "if the church wasn't true, the missionaries would have screwed it up a long time ago." it's always amazing to see how when things fall through, heavenly father will always put you where you need to be to meet who you need to meet (if you're obedient).

we also got transfer news!!!!!!! i'm still not being effected =( just kidding, i love this area and we're doing excellent work here. i would be very unhappy if i had to leave now. since my last email, we've set at least 4 baptism dates. it's hard to remember them all, but i think that's it. our next one is a week from saturday, then we've got 4 or 5 set for the 4th, one for the 11th, 4 for the 18th, and 1 on the 25th. it'll be an interesting month.

the food here is so delicious! i don't know what i'm gunna do when i have to leave (just kidding, i do. i'll lose weight). i'll make you some indian food when i get back. is there any indian food places in provo?so update me on what's going on with The Office. oh, and in your next package could you send me a calendar? i really need one.

i'm not surprised to hear that Dan blew out his knee. the mtc is much more dangerous than people think. i saw a few people break bones and blow out knees while i was there.anywho, we're off to a lunch appointment. i love you all.

elder troxel

You Shot the Invisible Swordsman!

dear family,

everything is going great here. it was good to hear that the cougs stole a victory. that defense needs to shape up though. defense wins championships. but don't worry cougs, i get back in 17 months...

so you asked for more details about why elder taiamony got stopped and put in the slammer. well, mostly just because he's from new zealand. malaysians are extremely racist against really anyone who isn't malaysian or white. if your skin is darker, it's really hard for people here. that, and he had about a billion stamps in his passport from all the visa runs he's been on. the malaysian government is absolutely ridiculous.

but we had an amazing week! it was actually a really hard and frustrating week, but any week that ends with four baptisms is a good one. we spent most of the latter end of the week trying to put things together for their interviews and baptisms. it was crazy. but they made it, and it was nothing short of phenomenal. we had the service right after church on sunday, so almost the entire branch stayed to see it. i baptized the father (Silvan), and then his wife (Kamala), son and daughter (Deva and Thenmoli) were baptized by Elder Hector, Elder Kartchner, and this guy in the branch named KC who helped us teach them a lot. it was so amazing.

zone conference so far has been fun. we're going to carl's JR after this. we've moved from Chili's to Carl's now. both are sangat sedap (very delicious). so we'll be doing that after this, and then we'll go to the other elder's apartment and watch the best two years. it's an all day p-day, but we scheduled an appointment tonight so we can feel like we're being productive. should be fun. my interview with president skelton was good. he basically just told me to be ready for more leadership positions in the future. we'll see.

i don't know what that wonderful looking something was in the picture of Elder Cusick and the other missionary, but i want one. that seems to be my problem these days, i have an unquenchable sweet tooth. i've been running a lot lately, trying to burn off my ginormous love handles. slowly but surely... at least that's what i keep telling myself. it will be nice to get back into a gym.

so chels is in jerusalem now. wow. that would be amazing, but i can see how being there would be a bit distracting from the studies. just stay focused girl. and don't worry about shortening your letters; whatever you have to do to stay on top of your studies.

so elder kartchner finished his training. yippee. all that that means is that we only get an hour of personal study instead of 90 minutes.

things are really cookin here though. hopefully we can keep it up. hopefully i can stay here for longer. i'd love to stay here my whole mission, but it's not likely.

tell everybody i love them and i pray for you all setiap hari (daily).

love,

elder troxel

NOTE FROM DAD: The "wonderful looking something" was a picture of a some kind of french pastry that Elder Cusick sent home. I forwarded several pictures onto Jordan because I knew he would appreciate them. Here is the picture he was talking about!!

NOTE FROM SCOTT:
I had three heart attacks just looking at this picture...Thanks!

I Hate Technology

dear family,

well, once again my attempts to conquer technology have been thwarted. i had all but finished my email, and was trying to use this new device that elder kartchner bought to attach some pictures, when this message popped up and said that the internet explorer had experience some sort of error, and all of my unsaved work was lost =(

so, here we go for round two. thanks a bunch for the pictures of jackson. i think he looks more like Kimberly than Tj though.

good to hear that Timp is carrying on the tradition. hearing about the BYU games is trunking me out of my mind! but keep updating me. i want to hear how they are doing.

this week has been good. we had a crazy bad rainstorm this week, the first really bad one of the season. i don't exactly know what a monsoon is, but i think it might have been one. we could only see a few feet in front of us because it was raining so hard. and cars here love to splash you when you walk on the side of the street... especially the buses.

i'm still alive, so no worries there. we had a baptism last week and we should have 4 more on sunday. things are going really well. there's been some crazy changes in our district and zone. elder Taiamoni, one of the zone leaders (from new zealand) went on a visa run and couldn't get back into malaysia. when he got to the airport, they put him in jail for a day or two, and then sent him back to singapore and singapore only gave him 14 days. so their trying to get him a workers permit, otherwise he'll have to transfer missions. this is a crazy mission! so that means that we only have one zone leader. elder maynes from my district got transferred so now elder richards (the lone zone leader) is with elder pace, who has only been in his area for about a week. crazy stuff. but no changes for us luckily.

zone conference is monday and tuesday, so you'll need to get your emails off early. anywho, carl's JR is calling my name, and i hate this stupid computer... so everybody take care and be safe. '

elder troxel

ps, PLEASE send me a list of everyone's birthdays!

It's Baptism Season

dear family,

wow, tomorrow i will be an uncle again! i'm pumped for that. i'll be praying especially hard for kimberly the next couple days. child birth must really schmell.

good to hear that mom is such a trooper. i guess it's just in the blood. hang in there mom. know that you're also in my prayers and i would give you my knees if i could.

i can't believe it's football season without me! what is going on in this world?! but round these parts it's baptism season! in the next two weeks we should have 6 baptisms, and in the next month we should have about 10. i'm so excited. we're having a baptism on saturday for this awesome nigerian guy named bright. he's so solid. the way we met him was really cool too. we had just gotten out of an appointment late and needed to grab a taxi because we were supposed to meet a member. we spent probably ten minutes trying to grab a taxi, but traffic was all but completely stopped, so we decided to hoof it. needless to say, i wasn't the happiest of campers, first of all because we were late, second of all it was blisteringly hot, and third of all the walk is about 30 minutes to get where we needed to go. but as we started to walk down this long road, i saw a guy off in the distance walking towards us and i had a strong impression that this is why we hadn't been able to grab a taxi. we stopped him and got his number and the rest is history. he lives with no one, but TWO pastors... and they are the most ridiculous pastors i've ever met. but bright knows it's true, and he's so solid that the two pastors have since moved out of his apartment because they couldn't convince him that the book of mormon wasn't true. what a stud. he's only 21, so we're going to see what we can do to get him on a mission.

next sunday we'll have a baptism for a man named silvan, his wife kamala, and they're son and daughter, deva and thamoli. we met this family my first week in this area, and after dropping us twice, they are finally ready to get baptized. i can't even describe how flabbergasted i am at the change in this family. when we met them it was a completely disfunctional family. now they're so happy! i now know what it means in the book of mormon when it talks about people like Ammon being overcome with joy, even to exhausting their strength. that's how i feel when i see this family. the gospel changes people.

well, we're getting back into the rainy season here. it's rained every day this week... which means we've gotton soaked at least once every day. most days two or three times. umbrellas do absolutely no good, so i don't even carry one anymore.so i had been really wanting to buy a portable DVD player. a lot of missionaries have them and they are really nice because some people here don't have DVD players or TV's, so we can't watch any of the church videos. those are really nice because they have them in their native languages. so i bought i really nice one. i took out some money while i was in singapore for it, so that's where that money went. i'll take some pictures of it and send them to you. don't worry, i am EXTREMELY careful with it. after all, i cost me a bloody arm and a leg =).

i continue to pray for you all everyday. be safe, aight?

love,
elder troxel

Stupid Malaysian Taxi Drivers

dear family,

i'm glad to hear that mom is slowly but surely improving. don't worry mom, surgery is really fun. i loved it when they put me under. it really was quite refreshing when i woke up. i'm UBER-excited for tj and kimberly's baby. he's going to be such a stud. too bad i won't get to see him until he's almost two.

so i weighed myself again on sunday... and i am FAT! 194! goodness gracious! it's really out of hand. so i've started running every morning instead of just three days a week. it's a little bit harder being the senior companion because i never have time to work out at night like before, i only get the mornings. but the food here is fantastic... and packed with MSG. there's a lot of things that malaysia chooses not to follow; for instance, copyright laws. you can copy anything you want here, no questions asked. i made a sweet mini version of preach my gospel. i don't know why, but we're allowed to copy any church materials we want. cool beans. also, they choose not to follow the food guidelines put out by the FDA. everything here is filled to the brim with MSG. it's delicious, but not healthy in the least. and it's not like you can get away from it either. EVERYTHING you buy here has it. they use it as a substitute to salt or something.

WEEKLY REVELATION: taxi drivers are not very smart. it is against the law here for taxi drivers not to use the meter, but hardly any of them use it. they sit outside all of the big flats and they charge you up the wazoo to go anywhere. i finally got fed up yesterday and decided to test one of them =) i told him where i needed to go, and he wanted 12RM to go there (bologna! it wouldn't have been more than 5 if he used the meter). i asked him why he didn't just use the meter, and he made up some bull-poop story about how the government came and took the meters out of all the taxi's that were there. so i said, "ok kawan (friend), i'll write down the numbers of all of these taxis (there was probably 5 there and all the drivers were sitting together), and i will call and ask if they really did take out the meters. all the other drivers looked at him like, "great job, ya moron." he just went quite for a few seconds, and when i pulled out my planner and pretended to write down all of their numbers, he flipped. it was really funny and he looked like a complete idiot. he tried to threaten me, but he just made himself look like even more stupid. we still had to get a different taxi though, so it didn't really do any good, but i was satisfied.

the work here is still amazing. we had 30 new investigators last week! and we had 21 member present lessons! it was amazing. we've got two baptisms a week from saturday, and then the week after that we've got 4. heavenly father is really blessing this area. i'm just glad i get to be a part of it.

elder kartchner is doing really well. he's growing as a missionary (and in girth, but that's what he gets for being my companion). we're so busy right now and i love it! so many people are making drastic changes in their lives and following the gospel. it's incredible. i read an article the other day in one of the ensigns by neil something anderson. you should look it up, it's called "it's true isn't it? then what else matters?" i gave a talk about it in church on sunday.

anywho, everything here is just peachy. time is flying by! i can't believe it's already p-day again. but i love you all and pray for you every day. stay safe. tell kimberly good luck with the baby!

love,
elder troxel

Phone Tag

dear family,

thanks for the wonderful emails. beau's letter was bust-a-gut funny. he's awesome. if you could email me his address, that would be fantastic.

so this week sounds like it was a fun one. too bad the plays weren't up to snuff. don't worry though, i've been shooting some sweet videos on my camera that will make up for the lack of acting in cedar city. how are kirt and michelle doing? what's drew up to? if you would be kind enough to pass me his address, i would like to write to him. dad said something interesting in his part of the email. he said something about provo not being in the same region next year... what's up with that? are they finally demolishing that heck hole of a school? it's about time.

sorry i didn't have very much time to email last week. the other elders were rushing me... and i guess i kinda really wanted to go play too =) it was a blast. we went to this beach and rented tandem bikes to ride over to carls JR which was about a mile away.

WEEKLY REVELATION: don't rent tandem bikes. i was with elder griffin. he weighs about 210 and i'm above 190 now =( anywho, the bike wasn't made for that much mass. it was pretty bad. the back handle bars broke clean off! they weren't very high quality to begin with though, so it wasn't really our fault.

there was two packages waiting for me in singapore. i was very excited to get the two SD cards back, but even more so for all that jerky and candy! is there any left? nope. none. i am fat.

anywho, when i got back to subang, i found that our phone bill hadn't been paid, so our phones were turned off... and they were like that for the whole week! the guy who takes care of the bills sure took his dear sweet time. it makes it very difficult to do effective missionary work without phones, but we managed. we spent about a total of 20RM on the payphone for the week though. fortunately, they were turned back on this morning, so things are back to normal.

things are still rolling here. we had a baptism for another nepali brother named Deshbandhu. he's such a stud. elder kartchner got to perform the baptism. it was awesome. it was really good for me to be able to perform a baptism during my training, so i wanted him to be able to have that chance also. we've got A LOT coming up in the next month, including a family that we've been working with since my first week in this area. i'm excited.

don't worry dad, i'll still be at the BYU games with you in spirit. keep me updated on how they do, along with how timpview does. it's crazy that school is already starting. summer is almost over already! oh wait, it's always summer here =( i can't tell you how much i miss snow. anywho, i think that's everything. if i forgot to answer any important questions, as them again next week.

i love you all,
elder troxel