Elder Tenney sent a brief email today (meaning this must be his Preparation Day) saying he forgot to tell us that the rules for his email use at the MTC in Brazil are that he can only send and receive email to his immediate family while there. He said that may change when he gets to his mission field in Manaus. This email implied that he may have sent another email right before, but we didn't get it if he did...
But...the postman was our friend today and brought our first real handwritten letter from our missionary, written on the back of a form with his new address at the MTC and instructing him to use the back of that form to write a letter to his parents. Elder Tenney said "my adventure down here was stress filled to the max. I'll give it full justice after I finally get some sleep here. It's about 2:30 pm by the way, and I'm going off 3 hours of sleep." So....we really, really want to know what the stresses were...guess we'll have to wait till the next email or letter.
His first companion is from Heber, Arizona. He went into the CTM with 4 other elders going to Manaus, and was very excited that one of them is "a red head named Elder Larson, and looks just like Elder Larsen back home! Not really, but still, he looks kinda like him. So far there are 4 elders from the U.S. in my room (counting me) and we may have a couple Brazilians too if we are lucky!"
About the food: (a very important topic for missionaries and for moms to know) "The CTM (Center for Training Missionaries) has some of the most excellent food ever. Four meals a day, and I will/would be very fat after awhile, except I'm on the top floor (7th) and that is a lot of stairs."
He sounds happy and excited and well-fed....just what we wanted to hear.
