Week Negative 1: Get me out of here.

Haha that's pretty much the only thought in my head right about now. My schedule from now on is pretty exciting, though: tomorrow (Thursday) is my last day working at the temple (it's been a fantastic experience, by the way), Friday we're driving down to Utah and I'm spending that whole day and Saturday with Jessica, Saturday being General Conference, Sunday is when Jessica is opening her mission call, then we'll come home and probably have dinner with the Hancey's and then I'll have my last pre-mission interview and we'll top off the night with Oliver's Patriarchal Blessing. Monday will be my last day as a non-missionary because I'm being set apart that night! Tuesday will be a finish-up-packing day and Wednesday will be the day I enter the MTC, at 12:45 PM. Woohoo. It's been fun to watch my timer on the missionary portal drop down day by day but honestly I just want to get into the MTC already. I imagine I'll feel the same as I near the end of my time in the Missionary Training Center, like, send me to Finland already my guys! Oh well, c'est la vie. Am I allowed to speak French? I guess no one can stop me. Ha! Anyway, next time this blog'll be updated will be when I'm a full-fledged missionary.

See you on the other side!

Veli (for the last time) Hancock

Week Negative 2.5: Life update.

Today I found a big letter that had been sent to me from the mission office in Espoo... in July! Oh well, at least I found it before I left. It had a bunch of papers about mission guidelines and stuff, so nice to have in my possession, I suppose. I filled out my visa application today, which started being available on the 15th of September. That was exciting! I went to Provo this weekend and it's started to cool down! I love it, there was even a bit of snow on the Wasatch. I leave in seventeen days! At this point I just feel sick of waiting but it's nice to have the date come up. Fun fact, my mission call was mailed out four months ago yesterday. Woohoo. Uh, Finnish is nice. I don't feel like I'm going to have to learn a whole ton in the MTC so maybe I'll ask if they can teach me some Swedish if I get bored. Swedish is an official language along with Finnish in Finland, and Lähetysjohtaja Aura told me in the letter that they do use some Swedish. Anyway. I might post on this blog one or two more times before I leave, but really, there's not much to say other than I can't wait to go.

Hyvä sunnuntai, jokainen!

Veli Hancock
(not Vanhin quite yet)

Week Negative 4: Less than a month left.

Yesterday was my one-month-before-leaving mark. The 138 days before I leave that I had when I got my call have turned into 29! It's both flown and gone slower than molasses. I know that the time that I'll leave is when I'm meant to, and I still have a few things I need to do in this month that I couldn't have done earlier. I'm certain of that, and I've seen it unfolding, but I'm still pretty impatient to leave sometimes!

Finnish is going well. It comes to my mind easily and I can say a lot of things now, but at this point I'm worried that I'm teaching myself to think the wrong way or something since I'm teaching myself and not learning through the MTC. Oh well. I don't suppose I need to give another example of Finnish because translate will probably screw it up if you care enough to throw what I'm saying through it. If you want Finnish just go look up Mormonin Kirja MAP Kirkko and just read that. Just read the Book of Mormon in general haha! What it says is way better than anything I could ever tell you.

If you're preparing to serve a mission or if you're back or even if you don't plan on serving a mission, if you want a taste of what missionary life is like go check out the episodes of The District! They're great. I like The District 2 better because it's newer and they made more of an effort to put in the challenges of missionary life but they're both good. Elder Murray cracks me up. I wish I could be a blue chair too, man.

I went and looked at the outside of the MTC a couple weeks ago with Jessica and it looked great! We also checked out the Provo temple and it's super pretty. They let us go through whilst we're in the MTC so I'm pretty stoked for that.

The Church is true! Kirkko on totta! I couldn't help but slip some Finnish in haha. That's life. I hope each one of you can find that out for yourselves. The five months of waiting have been hard but it's given my faith in Jesus Christ the opportunity to grow significantly.

Veli Hancock