I want to see if I can even sit in one of the Ferrari's. But we'll need to wear church clothes and I'll remember to bring my camera. I always forget it. But so far I haven't really needed it. We're going to the Queens mall today. I've only seen it and it's huge. At least just the one side I saw. I hear there's a bigger one in New Jersey. I wish I could go to the temple as much as the ward does. We're having a chili cook off around Halloween as well as trunk or treat. But the missionaries get to be the judges for the chili! haha I love chili, and Brother Danner (have I mentioned him yet?) he says his chili was made especially for the missionaries.

Oh we had a DA a few nights ago and the sister ordered stuffed pizzas. and they were HUGE!!! like one slice was about a pound or so. Ginormous piece. I couldn't finish one. I know I don't finish much anyway. But I don't eat a lot now. Oh also, I keep buying nutella, well it's a knock off brand, 2 dollars cheaper, but tastes 2 dollars cheaper too. but it's all good.

I love apples, you know, so I've bought a ton so far. Also there's these New Zeland apples called sonya, and they taste amazing! like the sugar is cane sugar. Like if jones made an apple cider, there it is, in an apple! and I love rome apples, they're crispy and juicy. ok so this other lady gave us a bunch of fruit, pears, and a peach each. Elder King has never had a real peach in his life until like last month, so I figured he hasn't had peaches and cream, so we go get the cream and I show him how, and we have it. He loves it and I'm wondering why there aren't any peaches in Arizona, when they are in Utah... well Elder Monestine hasn't had a peach either so he had some as well. It was weird cuz I've grown up eating that and they've never had it until now. But Monestine grew up in Florida, even though there's the peach state right next door.. weird..

Lets see... so idk if I said this, but I got sick on the way over here, like a cold. Then I gave it to everyone else in the pad.. oh and Johnson and Monestine moved out Saturday, so now it's 4 of us. A lot better. More space to move. I can see the carpet. (cuz Monestine had his suit cases on the floor earlier)

Oh I asked mom to send me a CD or two, you don't have to send the Keane one. Just the Ink soundtrack one. Cuz that's all just music and no lyrics.

There's a guy in my zone who I went to school with. Elder Weber. He went to ALA but I think he's older than me. I knew he looked familiar. I have another family here now, the Schoenbecks, we go there every week for FHE and they're really nice, they have two kids, Sierrah and Allen. The dad works for theaters installing projectors and other things. He says that they have a closed captioning option now, like they are glasses that work like the 3D ones, but have the subtitles in them.. crazy!!! He also tests new software for xbox. Like now they're testing for full internet ability. Like the ps3 has. I guess. pretty cool I guess. I just like netflix as is.

Oh, how's my room look, or both rooms? The storage room and the other. Like you know if you wanna move the xbox, it can't move very far cuz of the cable running into the ceiling. and I bet Sierra has hooked the wii up to my tv by now anyways. and can use my xbox.

Well it's time to go. Love yall- elder peck

September 18, 2012

Ok, so I pretty much got kicked off yesterday. But I'm here again to include some stuff I forgot to say. I think I forgot to say I'm living in Bay Shore. Which is like more than an hour from Brooklyn or Queens. You know where the mission home is? I live like almost an hour away. It's good cuz I wanted to be out on the island.

My companion doesn't know cars, and you know I love cars. Like a Porsche drove by and he said is that a Ferrari? oh my lanta.. OH but me and monestine and black and meza went to the Ferrari Maserati dealership yesterday, and lemme tell ya... I saw my 599, which was amazing! and the new FF, which is the ferrari four, the first four seater. and the maseratis were amazing too. super nice cars, all of them.

Well, because we're out on the island, we have a car, and we can listen to music in it, and I was wondering if you could be so nice as to burn me a couple CDs of music that I'm sure are ok. I want my Ink soundtrack, it's just music, no words, and is really nice to listen to. And the Hopes and Fears album of Keane. I've thought a lot about this and I think it is okay. So if you could, that would be awesome.

We only listen to the same few songs over and over and over again and again.. but when I was with the other elders, we listened to Disney songs and Tarzan songs, which were awesome. Plus music is the only thing I can count on to keep me sane. And so far it's not doing so well.

Please send the music. I'm going crazy!! love ya. -elder peck

First e-mail from New York

to Dad:

My comp is elder king, he's from arizona. Right now I'm on splits with another. In our pad there's 6 total, meza and black (he's not black) johnson and monestine (he's black) then king and peck.

I just moved from a church computer to the library and the backspace key is tiny! ok, so... ya it's pday and so far it's been good. we did laundry and now we're doing more email, and later is a zone activity where we're gonna play volley ball or dodge ball. ok so something i was hoping for here was to see nice cars, and lemme tell ya.. holy crap! i saw 4 maseratis today, besides the ferrari maserati store down the road.. and i see camaros and corvettes everywhere i'm bored of them now... really nice mercedes and bmws in the city. a few nice rolls royces. like the old old ones. it's pretty cool here.

Oh a few days ago we got two new investigators! we were tracting a street and we weren't having good luck, then King was like, ok last house. I go up and say my stuff, the lady was nice and let us in! and her husband woke up a while later, (we were there almost an hour) he's cool, he's got lung cancer, and i guess they both smoke, but the house didn't stink, which was good.

I'll talk to you later, i gotta see my other emails, oh and i'm emailing brian but it's been more than a month since he responded. -elder peck

to Mom:

Oh yeah the plane ride was cool, i got sick though, landing was not fun... we flew over Manhattan and i saw freedom tower and the empire state bld.. i told you some in the letter from the mission home. wow these keyboards are horrible. small keys and the p doesn't work too well.

I got a cold for the first week making it hard . but i'm a bit better now, i got a cough left, i gave the sickness to monestine haha.

I'm hanging out with black, mesa, and monestine. and sometimes we run into the spanish sisters pagan and reid. they're cool too. the sisters in my district are smedley and spalvena < she's from latvia. they're both cool too. so far i've eaten at taco bell once. and at a ward family twice, and another once, the first is the Danners, and the other was the Urbans. the urbans take care of the missionary DAs. so they make sure we get something to eat. brother Danner was a chef at a resturant so he's really good. we had shrimp stuff the first night, and last night we had fish stuff.

Anyway, i gotta go. love ya - elder peck

September 5, 2012

to Dad:

ya his name is pronounced eye zit. one lady called him eezaat, it was funny. that was at the first trc. oh and i guess my district will write home and have their parents invite us as freinds on FB, so if anyone like merrill or izatt, or mousley.. idk who for sure. kinda funny today at the temple in the initiatory waiting line, there was a big hawaiian dude who's back hurt and i had to stand on his back to try to pop it, he's got a thick back. i couldn't get anything, then when i sat back down i told my friends that that doesn't happen everyday. haha.

also, i LOVE playing volley ball, the other day i was playing and i got smashed in the face by the ball, TWICE! ahah by the same guy too, it was elder merrill, he was trying to save the ball after i hit it and it went straight into my face. ha the second time i went and sat down cuz i was laughing so hard, and everyone thought i was hurt. but i was fine. then at "home" elder mousley said my nose was a bit red, and i thought it was just a bruise, but turns out my nose guard thing on my glasses cut me and i was bloody. but just a bit. i'm fine. it was fun. also earlier i cut myself trying to open a bottle. fun times.

i'll just call when i get to the airport, which might be around 4 in the morn. idk. cuz if we have to be out of here by 3, idk when i'll call.. i didn't really want to so i don't have to go through all that stuff, i'd just write you from NY. anyways- see ya-

elder peck.

to Mom:

well i leave monday morning, so i won't get it if it doesn't come on saturday. anything you send. also, i can't remember if i told you i saw geoff at the temple. and got some pics with him. and i was thinking idk if i want to send home my sd card cuz there's really nothing much on it. but i guess i should anyway. oh haha something funny this morning- on the wall outside our room someone posted red letters saying " the chamber of secret has been open" ya i know they missed some letters, but the idea was great. i took a pic as well. as for the pics on the card, i have stories behind them, so i'll try to remember to write them to correspond with each picture. it's hard when so much goes on here.

i really don't know if i have my mission home address here with me. i'll have to look through everything.

i have 4 friends here now, plus 4 other kids i kinda know from school or what not. like institute and high school. but the real friends are Kenna McKay-Korea, Emily Spencer-Russia, Geoff Parsons-Cali, and Janna Weaver-Baltics.

there's a sister perkins here that i swear i've seen her before, she's more like an islander person, but i don't know what island she's from, or whatever.. but she asked if we (from spanish) know her brother sam. and i knew a sam perkins, but not hers.. but anyway i was with her in lunch line and she was in her "speak your language" week, which is hungarian. and she wanted more gravy on her food, and i had to try to translate for her to the lunch lady, and that was fun but hard, i was guessing plate, cuz she was pointing to the plate, and i guessed chicken and corn and i couldn't figure it out. but then after the lunch lady was like, what language was she speaking, but i said i can't remember. but it was funny.

I got some more french names in initiatory today, three from france, one from netherlands (born in 1760 too!) and one from arizona.. i don't know why they have one easy name and 5 hard names, like francois victor jean sauce, and oh i can't remember the fist name of the netherlands guy, but last name was gervink.

well i've said i'll can think of, to both mum and dad. so i guess the next time i talk to you will be in the early early morning of monday. haha -

elder peck.  

Letter of August 31, 2012

Family-

Thanks for the pictures and food, and ties – BUT! I meant garment briefs, not real undies. Everyone thought it was funny, but I still wore one for gym and it was good.

We got our flight plans today and I gotta be at the MTC Travel Office at 3AM!! Oh well.

Also, we had another TRC referral and it was AWESOME! We totally invited the spirit and everyone was crying. The investigator – I mean referral girl – was crying and kinda funny. She said she was a manager for a hair salon, so I asked her which one, and (because she was faking it) couldn't think of a name. So after her going “Ummm” and looking around, I aksed if it was Great Clips – and she said “Ya, that one.” But it was just what I needed today, especially after getting in trouble by our teacher. He just though we could do better in role playing, like also in how we teach. It wasn't cool.

I also bore my testimony about getting blessings and how many and how great they are here. I didn't say what to her, but I'll tell you – learning more about the gospel, all my new friends, feeling the spirit way more often, also teaching with the spirit – that's awesome.

But there's another investigator who is like talking to a brick wall. He mumbles and doesn't open up. If it wasn't for Elder Izatt we wouldn't get anywhere. We both paired up with Mousley and Reusch.

G-ma Judy sent me the coolest shirt. It was a Bigfoot with “Believe” under it. And Elder Izatt (my comp) sent her a letter and 5 bucks for one. Ha Ha.

Oh, I SAW EMILY! It was cool. Elder Izatt kinda hoped I would jump up and down screeching (like a girl) but I just talked to her like it hasn't been a week or more. But I was walking to the bookstore and she was eating by the building. She kinda freaked out, but it wasn't crazy or anything. I'll give her the picture next time I see her and she'll give me her address.

I also wrote my institute teacher tonight.

Elder Peck

PS Write in Dear Elder more cuz I get that everyday. And also send me a new journal, not blue. I already have blue.

LYB