This is All I Frigging Think About (2).

::// Please Note: The contents of this blog have been very limitedly edited to ensure that my brother Reed will get off of my proverbial case. By way of information, the modifier is no longer misplaced.

Duh, my mission!


As you can see, that big blue blob up there is Argentina. The parts (that's right, parts...with an "s" at the end) in orange are the boundaries of my mission. I'll serve in northern Buenos Aires and surrounding areas--the smaller orange section towards the north--and in the provinces Santa Cruz and Tierra del Fuego--the larger section in the deep, deep south. Tierra del Fuego, the part floating off the mainland, according to Wikipedia has an annual average temperature of 5.3ºC--COLD.

Down in the south, I might run into the endings of the Andes Mountains. Hopefully, with both of my areas having borders on the ocean, I'll be able to see the Atlantic from the Southern Hemisphere. I will not, like I was stupidly thinking originally, be able to see the Pacific (which is a life goal). Maybe I'll see the Strait of Magellan. That would be cool.

I report to the Missionary Training Center (MTC) in Provo, Utah on December 12. I'll be there for two months learning Spanish and how to be a missionary, so I won't actually get to Argentina until February of next year. According to a friend of mine, who just left the MTC a week or two ago, the MTC is like the movie Groundhog Day; you do the same exact thing every day. For two months.

Some guys in my ward (a "ward" is a Mormon congregation) Andrew and Taylor Blain are going to be in the MTC in late January, so I'll probably run into them. And my second cousin (isn't that what you call your first cousin's children? Or is it "first cousin once removed"?) Bryan will be in the MTC a week after I get there. He won't be speaking a foreign language, though, so he'll leave after only a couple weeks. And my buddy Steven will get to the MTC about a month before I do. It will be neat to see all of those guys. Just for information's sake, Andrew is going to Monterrey, Mexico; Taylor is going to Arequipa, Peru; Bryan is going to Charleston, West Virginia; and Steven is going to Hong Kong. Good stuff.

My sister Marlena served a mission in Anaheim, California and spoke Spanish. She tells me Argentine Spanish, called Castellano, is super different from anything Mexican. So I'm thinking that although I've had some Spanish training, it will all be for naught when I actually get down there. But who knows.

At any rate, I am more excited now than I have ever been in my life. And "excitement" is an emotion that comes in huge quantities with me. I have never felt so determined that what I'm doing is right and good. I have never felt so happy. I am overwhelmingly stoked to work hard, to struggle with whatever obstacles I've got coming, to learn so much about myself, God, and others. I am confident that it will be the greatest experience of my life.

Argentina. Man. How awesome is that?