Elder and Sister Ripple at the MTC

Hola--We arrived at The MTC in Provo Saturday evening to a balmy 70 degrees. We discovered in our furry of preparations to leave our house that we left our power cord to our laptop behind. Pete did pack an almost empty tube of toothpaste , a sliver of soap in his kit and 4 pairs of swim goggles but no power cord. With help of other couples we are settling in and have a borrowed power cord plugged into our computer! We were assigned to Branch 59 this morning for Sacrament meeting. In a room with about 50 people less than half were obvious Northamericans , as young missionaries struggled with English as they blessed the Sacrament and bore their testimonies. Many had come to the MTC from their homelands of Korea , China, Brazil, Japan etc many not knowing a word of English when they arrived. We were assigned to this branch because our last name begins with an R. We are all humbled as we struggle with a new language and customs. As we met for a Mission Conference, voices of 1000 plus missionaries filled the centre. It is an uplifting experience for us all as we are taken out of the world for these few weeks to be surrounded by the spirit in this place.