Violin tunes for all to hear & heading out to Puerto Rico next Tuesday

So it wasn't that crazy of a week. I haven't really left the MTC much,
besides for a service project. I get to go on splits tomorrow though,
so that's going to be pretty cool. I do have a good story on the
service project. We were walking picking up trash at this one place, I
have no idea what it was. Anyways, somebody in my district stepped on
a manhole cover and it just fell through. Luckily he caught himself
with his arms, but he almost fell into the sewer. He got a little cut
up but it was still hilarious. Another cool thing was one of the new
missionaries brought a violin. We heard him through the door when we
were in our rooms getting ready for bed, and we reached our latter
over to knock on his door because we weren't supposed to leave our
rooms at the time. Anyways, he opened his door and started playing. I
have never heard anyone play the violin this good ever. He started
going ham and our entire floor opened their doors and started getting
super hype. Anyways that was super cool. I also learned mandals
probably aren't the best basketball shoes in the rain. We were playing
outside when it was pouring again and I was running to go get the
basketball and tried to stop but totally slipped and slammed my knee
into the wall. I probably should have brought some band aids also
because I had to get a little creative so I didn't get any blood on my
pants. I'll still probably wear my mandals out in the rain though
cause I don't want to get my shoes soaked.

Brian & MTC district at DR Temple

Next time I write I'm going to be out in Puerto Rico. This is my last
week of the MTC. I'm gonna miss all the people and friends I've made
out here, but I don't think I'm gonna miss the classes all day too
much. They have definitely helped with my spanish though. I think it
was this morning that I read a chapter of my Spanish scriptures fairly
slowly, but I understood everything that I was reading. Now I just
need to figure out how to pick up what people are saying when they
talk. They cut a bunch of stuff out of their words and speak super
fast. I'm pretty sure they don't even use S's when they speak.
Hopefully Puerto Rican's speak a little bit slower. We also got to go
to the temple today. It's gonna be my last time to be able to go their
for two years cause they don't have any out in Puerto Rico. That was
probably my spiritual highlight for the week.

Near death experience driving in cabs in Dominican Republic

Well it was definitely a crazy week. I don't even remember everything
that went on but I'll try to hit the major things. We went to a
different place to teach last Friday. It didn't go quite so well. We
were talking to some people we found sitting down and apparently all
of them knew English perfectly well. We were just stumbling through
the first lesson in terrible Spanish. It got all the way to the end,
and then one of them asked if we spoke English. I don't know why they
didn't say anything sooner. Anyways that lesson didn't go so well
because then they proceeded to buy some prescription marijuana while
we were teaching them. We figured we should move on to some different
people when they started smoking it in front of us. My companion and i
figured we would head somewhere less crowded so we headed down the
streets. We found this guy sitting on a fence with his back to the
street that was way interested. We started teaching him and while we
are teaching a completely tinted out car slowly rolls up to us and
honks twice. They started to roll down the window but the guy on the
fence turned around and whistled at the car and they rolled it back up
and drove off. That was pretty scary though cause I had no idea what
was going to go down.

The next awesome thing was going on splits. We just went out
yesterday, and it was insane. They have a total culture difference
here. My companion was from Guatemala and spoke barely any English at
all. Anyways we took the metro downtown into the city. Then we just
started walking across the streets. I almost got hit like twenty
times. Then we got into a taxi. There was six of us in this little
tiny car with no seat belts, and the drivers don't care about
anything. I'm not even quite sure if there are lanes on the road.
Anyways though, you just pay them twenty five pesos and get out
whenever. Then we just started teaching. You don't knock on doors
here. You just yell "Saludos" or something and they'll come open it.
And everybody talks to you. Even if they don't want to, they'll talk
to you for like ten minutes. We talked to so many people that were way
interested. I wish  I had time to write more but we taught a bunch
more people. Then when we were heading back I picked up a street
churro which tasted super good and was only like 30 pesos. We got in
another taxi again, and remember what I said about my last taxi being
scary. That was nothing. The second one was crazy. We had seven people
in this one which I guess is the max cause if you have any more the
police will get you. Which is surprising cause you can pretty much do
whatever else you want on the roads and the cops don't care. Anyways
though, I had my elbow like an inch out of the window cause I was
totally squished, and my companion immediately pulled it in. I'm
pretty sure we bumped a couple other cars on our way back. We were
driving in oncoming traffic for a bit. I was legitimately surprised we
didn't get in a major accident. That was a fun day though.

I don't really have time to talk about the rest so I'll just summarize
in a couple sentences. Our top bunk bed broke and fell onto the bottom
bunk. We had a member of the 70 come and speak to us. We balled up in
our mandals while it was pouring rain. My companion had to sleep on
the floor for a different reason then the bunk bed breaking. That's
some of the major parts of my week but it is way fun out here.

Cramming as many people in taxi