Mark your calanders!

Mark your calendars so you can be at Sky Harbor Airport to welcome Jordan home. He will arrive:

Tuesday June 15th
, 2010
at 5:30 pm

on British Airways to Phoenix.

Everyone is invited to welcome him off the plane!

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Tuesday June 24, 2008

Hey family from your letters it sounds like you are all doing great. I am glad Ian and alyssa had a good time at swim camp worked hard and made some friends, that would be cool if they got to meet up with them next year and do it again. I got pictures of Ian Alyssa Kamille Nick and Jake bowling thats fun that they were all able to meet up and go bowling together, haha sounds like ian was close to having a perfect game.

In the new district in our zone there is a friend of mine from home Jacob Brimhall which is cool, he was in mine and nicks efy group our last year and he also swam butterfly for gilbert it was nice to be able to talk to him. An old room mate of mine from summer semester is in the MTC right now Mike Collard he is headed off to north carolina it was fun to talk for a little bit about last summer.

So Brother Ruda who is the head instructer of like our floor of language classes is from the Czech republic and he was telling us all about the Christmas Traditions the Czechs have, Christmas is 3 days over there and it is non stop eating and hanging out with family and lots of traditions, he says everybody goes to Christmas Eve mass, Catholics mormons protestants just because its tradition he says he took the missionaries with him a couple of times, the christmas season starts off december 8th which is like angels and devils day and there are people dressed up as either angels or devils running around, it was really cool to learn more about where we were going and got us pretty excited to get over there.

Grandma J was asking a little bit about how they teach us, we are in the class room for probably about 12 hours a day learning as part of that we have an hour of personal study, an hour of companionship study and then an hour of language study where we can do whatever we want with the language. The rest of the time we usually have teachers who are teaching us different language principles and stuff from PMG (Preach My Gospel) which is cool. Our first week was 50% language 50% gospel and every week we increase the language i think for our last 2 weeks it is like 80% language and 20% gospel.

So i played some soccer this week for the first time which was pretty fun it has definitely been awhile since i have played but i figure since im going to europe i should catch up on it. The Czechs are crazy about Futbol and Hockey and I guess for the size of their country they actually have a pretty good soccer team.

Thank you all for the many packages and letters and i did recieve the camera chip back you are awesome I am very lucky to have such good family and friends. I was in the RC yesterday and the sweetest little girl called up, Tashia was her name and she was from the south. She is 10 years old and called in for a free bible, I asked her why she was calling and she said she wanted her and her dad to have a bible so they could learn more about Jesus together and she had the cutest little southern accent it was a really good experience. The mission presidents are all here we actually did a teaching demonstration for one set yesterday.

It sounds like Jenni and Mason are having a good time down in southern Texas assisting the 4th years and hanging out at the beach as well thanks for the current events you two. It sounds like it has been very hot down in Arizona that will be nice for Grandma and Alyssa to go up to the Cabin and get out of the heat. Something they told us in Gym was that 4 square is one of the most injury prone activities at the MTC which i thought was pretty funny they get pretty intense out there.

I was reading in Jesus the Christ this week and found something that I thought was pretty good and would recommend people to read, it is on page 247 and is entitled Pleasure Vs Happiness and it does a really good job of differentiating between the two. Your talk was really good dad i enjoyed it I'm sure the Youth all liked it as well it was a really good analogy about our life plan.

This last week in the TRC we were able to talk to people about how school and work were going and what they liked to do for fun and hobbies slowly but surely we keep on learning more. We have a great district and all get along great and help each other out. Something that is funny is how things translate over into czech and its good we have teachers here to help us out the other day i said ja jsem horko which the direct translation means i am hot but in czech it means i am gay haha good thing i found that one out, what you are supposed to say is i have myself hot, another funny one is that the song Jesus Savior Pilot Me, In Czech it is Jesus Steer My Boat. I am almost out of time i will be sending letters out to you and I'm going to send a camera chip and try and tell you who is in what picture, i hope you all have a great week and i love you all very much, remember the Church is True and always do what is right.
Love
Jordan

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Tuesday June 17, 2008

Hey family and friends just got back from the temple it was a great experience amazing every time plus the omlet and hashbrowns afterwards are awesome :). Thanks to everybody for all the treats the cookies from mom and grandma ruth and the bread from grandma jacque and the cinnomon rolls from Kamille although you are trying your hardest to fatten me up I am glad to say i have only gained 2 1/2 pounds. The scale was fixed in the gym yesterday so my whole district was weighing each other haha one of the elders had gained 11 pounds in 3 weeks thats on pace for 33 pounds for the mtc. ALmost all of my basketball friends left this morning for canada they were the other district that came in to our branch the same day as us we took a bunch of pictures last night and ill either send them today or next week.

That is a cool job for Alyssa helping out with Ann I'm sure it is much appreciated and Alyssa can make a little spending money. That is great Ian is working a lot of hours at the pool, its a great job for the money and you cant beat it for the effort it requires, a lot of the elders here worked on farms or construction before they came here and it brings me memories of me working for Steve that one summer, the hardest job i have ever had by far. Sounds like the hells gate trip was a success for you thats crazy that you have done it 6 times Dad and that it has been 2 years since i last did it, it seems like i was just there on the first one 5 years ago sitting under the tree in the desert area with every body wondering what was gonna happen while you were off finding helping.

The TRC was a great success last week, we were able to do our part in Czech really well and our lesson went great. On Sunday my companion and I were asked to give talks at the cafeteria workers sacrament meeting and were assigned the topic of obedience. The talks went really well I wasn't nearly as nervous as I usually get. I was reading through an old ensign in class the other day and came across an article I recommend to everybody, It was called "The Danger of Hidden Wedges" i think? It was by president Monson and something everybody needs to always keep in mind. A great analogy was given by one of my teachers that maybe kamille could use at her next EFY which her last one sounded like it went great and we can all apply in our lives, it is on testimony. In Israel there are two seas the Sea of Galilee which has very pure water and the Dead Sea which has the saltiest water in the world i think. The reason the sea of Galilee is so pure is because it has a source of water coming in and a source of water coming out, where as the dead sea only has a source of water coming in and none coming out. We can apply this to us, we all have knowledge and experiences of the gospel coming into us all the time just like the two seas, but we need to have an exit as well and we can do this by bearing our testimony and sharing our knowledge of the gospel so we stay pure like the sea of Galilee and don't become spiritually impure like how the dead seas water is impure.

So the mission presidents are coming here this next week i think and we all have to make sure it is spick and span here for them and the General Authorities that will be meeting with them, its away with the short sleeve dress shirts and out with the suits which is gonna be pretty hot. Sorry i missed sending a fathers day card last Tuesday dad I have a late one coming today. It weird that Ian and Alyssa are just like 1/2 a mile away from me right now, the MTC is like its own little world I have been here for three weeks and haven't even seen BYU once which is like 200 yards away but it is all good here I like it.

What are you up to this week mom and dad with the house all to yourselves? Sounds like it is an exciting basketball finals but i don't really find myself missing sports at all here it just doesn't seem that important but it is nice hearing you talk about it. My cough is doing better hopefully it continues to improve, we had a good fireside on Tuesday about how to become better missionaries it was really good then after wards they show 4 different church movies in different locations that is nice to watch. Thank you all for the letters and packages i love them and read them every night, thats the nice thing about the MTC we get mail every day :) keep up the good work I love you all very much, be good and do what you are supposed to, ill be writing letters to send out so be expecting those.

Love
Jordan

Friday, June 13, 2008

Jordan sent home some pictures and we thought you would all like to see he is alive and well! Remember you can just click on the picture to enlarge it.




This is Jordan's companion, Elder Moat


He has a very exciting wardrobe!


Jordan and Elder Moat in front of the Provo Temple


Thursday, June 12, 2008

Week 2

June 10, 2008

Hello Family I hope all is well with you guys. Ill start out answering some questions people have, my p-day is tuesday and that is the only day i can write mail or email, however we get the mail everyday but sunday and i can read it at night so keep up the good work on sending the letters its always great to hear from you guys and you do an awesome job of it. Thank you for the cookies mom they are awesome i am being kind of selfish and keepin them to my self and i have one every night.Can you guys contact kamille and make sure she got the letter i sent last week to her, she told me on friday that she hadn't gotten in yet in a dear elder letter.

So every week hear we have an appointment on thursday at a place called the trc which is kind of like the weekly test for our language and teaching skills. We set our goals for the week to accomplish what we need to do there, we did good at our last one we were able to introduce ourselves say we were missionarys from the church and ask them if they want to hear about our message all in czech and then we taught them in english it was pretty sweet, this week in the trc for language we are concentrating on learning about how to ask about peoples familes and where they are from. Come to find out I guess Czech is the 3rd hardest language in the world behind finnish and cantonese? And that it used to be a 12 week program but the head instructer who is a convert from the Czech republic got it changed to nine weeks because he said we would only learn more by being actually there but we are all doing great its hard but fun to learn a new language i wish i wouldn't of quit on spanish after two years. The head instructor is a cool guy he is like 29 and converted 12 years ago and served a mission in san diego and is going to BYU for nursing now. Haha he always has to answer his phone in class because he gets all these calls from the church headquarters and has been called a couple of times from President Uctdorf.

We had a great fireside for all of us going to Europe to motivate us, because there are quite a few people who say you are only going there to plant seeds and not convert any body and the guy said a really cool quote about this, he says it does not say the field is brown already for planting it says its white all ready for harvesting it was very motivating. Can you make up a line of authority card and send it to me please dad? And the number you are looking for i believe alyssa is 2073 let me know if it works out. A question about those brown shoes of mine do i need to use some like water repellant or protectore spray on them? I know i dont need to on my black ones because they are gortex and it would ruin them.

I read the book Our Search For Happiness this week and i highly recommend it too all people to read member and non member alike, I also read Our Heritage which is a great book about our history and I enjoyed it. Our district is getting along great, come to find out one of the missionaries in my district played division two basketball in North Carolina and played against Duke and NC and his team went on to win the national championship haha so i dont really play basketball with him we have a good group of us who never played in high school and we just play for fun i like it because its not super competitive and everybody has a good time. My companion wants to know where you got my speakers for the ipod because they are really compact and easy to store and is thinking about getting some.

that sounds like a pretty funny story about grandma hitting the branches she wanted cut off with a broom then ian would cut them down. I hope this email is flowing a little bit better for you mom? I tried to take notes on what to say but it just kind of jumbles together. Jenni and Masons trip sounded amazing let them know im writing them a letter.

Oh and thank you guys for not emailing me i only have 30 minutes on here so its good you are sending them to dear elder that way i can read them the day off :) you guys are so awesome and supportive. Are Ian and alyssa excited for swim camp this next week? Oh and i took some pictures on sunday and ill be putting them in the letter to send to you guys. I haven't seen President Baldwin I always keep an eye out when did he report here and how long are they here for?

Tell everybody who asked about me that I am doing great and I am grateful for their concerns :) I love and miss you all very much but I know I am doing the right thing. Vim ze Jezis Kristus je nas spasitel a vykupitel, a vim ze joseph smith videl boha a Jezise Krista a vim ze cirkve jezise krista pravdiva all that is from memory no notes :) have a good week and i look forward to hearing from you more.

Love
Jordan AKA starsi Hatch

Thursday, June 5, 2008

June 3rd, 2008

Jordan's first week in the MTC:

Hey family how is it going? The rules are I am only allowed to email to family so you will have to forward this on to everyone else. So the first full day was like the longest day of my life at the MTC we had about 8 hours of language study plus meetings and orientations, but it has gotten much better since then. The language learning is going well I am doing pretty well with learning the vocab the grammar is giving me a little bit of trouble though, haha I had to relearn in English what the subject, direct object and indirect object of a sentence is so we could do some stuff in Czech with it. It feels great to learn a new language it is frustrating at times but I like it. At times I am jealous of the English speaking missionaries because they get to be out teaching to the people a lot sooner than us. This last week we have been spending a lot of time practicing teaching the first lesson which is good, it makes it a lot easier when you have a companion to flow with. I never realised how much information Preach my gospel has besides the lessons to help you with the teaching process. You guys should definetly like switch off every home evening and have somebody just teach one point of a lesson in preach my gospel in their own words. So on saturday i was able to say my first prayer in Czech with out any notes which was really cool, right now I am working on bearing a simple testimony in Czech. The food is pretty good here I can see why alot of people gain weight but I only get one serving I hold back from getting seconds :) my companion was quite the wrestler in high school so he does a good job of keeping me in shape. Every night we do pull ups since there is a pull up bar on our floor and we have started doing push ups too. Gym is pretty fun we play basketball and it is quite the cardio work out which is good for me. Another good thing for keeping me in shape is that we live on the 4th floor of our residence hall and our classroom is on the 3rd floor so there is definitely a lot of climbing stairs. I was definitely homesick the first couple of days but it has gotten better its nice with how busy they keep us during the day you dont have much time for it. This last Sunday we had a mission conference which is kind of like a stake conference which was good and then afterward we had a fast and testimony meeting with my branch which was good. There were a lot of good testimony's from some older elders and sisters who had changed their lives around and came. We have had firesides galore and they are all really uplifting and get you ready to work. I have seen both Mac and James, Mac left yesterday for Detroit and since James is here for 12 weeks we leave the same day of July 28th. A good quote I heard I cant remember from who is "we leave our families for two years so others can be with theirs for eternity". We have a good group of us learning Czech we all work hard and get along well. This morning we had the opportunity to go to the Provo Temple which we get to do every P day, it was awesome i wish we got to go more but once a week is still well. Afterward we hit up the temple cafeteria for breakfast which was very good I think it is something we will do every time. Thank you all for all the many letters and packages I love them all they help so much in staying strong you guys are awesome I love you all and I have written some letters ill send later today. Keep on being good and let me know what all is going on.
Love
Jordan AKA STARSI HATCH

Elder Hatch arrives at the Provo MTC

On Wednesday May 28, 2008 we took Elder Jordan Hatch to the MTC in Provo, UT.




We were able to have lunch at J-dogs (the best hot dog in Provo) with his roommate and longtime friend Nick Gould before taking him to the MTC. Florence (Mom) was able to put his missionary badge on him for the first time.



Click HERE to view more photos from the MTC.
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His address until July 28, 2008 is as follows:

ELDER JORDAN GREGORY HATCH
MTC Mailbox # 99
CZE-PRA 0728
2005 N. 900 E.
Provo, UT 84604-1793