Kalamazoo to Palmer

We spent 10 hours in the car each day on Sunday and Monday to make our way to the 4pm orientation here in Palmer Lake, CO. Though exhausting we enjoyed the drive, listening to music, stories on disk, talking or just sitting in silence as we left Kalamazoo 3 pm on Sunday after speaking at First Baptist in Bellevue. We stopped at about midnight in Lincoln, NE. The next morning we were up and out the door by 7:30 in order to arrive in Plamer Lake on time.

As happened onto the prairie/foot hills (if that's what they are called), I was stunned by the wide open spaces. Then as we drove through Denver and headed South toward Palmer Lake we just sort of gawked at the mountains. The small road that leads from the highway to the MTI office is like a roller coaster. Marge was driving. Thankfully. The kids wooped it up and laughed as we topped several hills. I just closed my eyes and turned my head.

Today is the first full day of training and classes. I frankly feel overwelmed. We are surrounded by individuals and couples from different mission agencies bound for countries all over the world. Each of them excited about successfully communicating Christ to the language/cultures in which they will reside. Most of our day today was occupied with phonetics training. We are learning to identify (hear) and reproduce the basic sounds of language. Recognizing the sounds of our langague and other non English sounds. Each day we will be drilled on how to identify and reproduce basic linquistic sounds. This will prepare us for identifying the unique sounds of a language and reproduce them.

We are also learning techniques for learning language.

Believe it or not, it's tiring work, but we still plan on hiking on the trail that is behind the training center. I couldn't have asked for a more beautiful location to receive training. I almost feel a little guilty. I always thought missionaries were supposed to suffer, but sitting in the midst of these mountains is a glorious experience.