Utahkin to me?

Apologies for the lack of photo's today! Im writing this on the bus and dont have the cable to connect my camera!

I went to Salt Lake City for a weekend... and ended up staying almost 2 weeks! This happened for a few reasons. After a pretty terrible bus journey (it took 3 goes to get through the Rocky mountains, making us 15 hours late) I was feeling pretty ill and not looking forward to further trips. So I ended up looking for a cheap flight, which required an extra weeks stay. If we're being honest (and we usually are on this blog) though, I was having too much fun, and staying with great people so I kinda didnt want to leave!

I'm sure you dont want to hear me harp on about that stuff though, so onto the sights! Utah is famous for being home to the Mormons (or LDS Church). I was staying with my dad's friends Dave and Jan, who gave me a fair idea of all sides of the church, and took me to the temple they have in Salt Lake. Its a great place! All the original stuff was built with materials from the mountains overlooking the city. We went inside a room that used to serve as a meeting place, and everything had been painted to look like oak. Except it wasnt! It was really pretty amazing the level of skill that went into it.

My stay here marked the first time Ive ever been to the centre for a major religion. As a rookie, I of course made a mistake, one that the parents are yet to learn of (suprise Mam!). We were having a look around the centre and got talking to some missionaries (who were, naturally, very friendly). After a tour around some of the sights they mentioned it was possible to get a free Book of Mormon sent to my house. I was quite happy for this to happen, and filled out the form. The missionaries then gladly advised me that I could get the book when they sent some missionaries round to my house. Pretty sneaky, no? Having said that, I really dont mind - everyone in the mormon church is so friendly!

I also had the pleasure of attending a Republican caucus meeting. Those guys are pissed! I was quite interested to go along to this though, for a lot of people back home the Republicans get portrayed as the corporate supporting, red-neck based angry peoople. The anger part is definitely true, but otherwise its families standing up for what they genuinely believe in. Im not going to get into politics (as I thought it best not to at the meeting) but it seems to me that nearly everyone wants to do the right thing. I think the challenge is getting everyone to respect others opinions, understand how things work and also to try and understand why leaders make unpopular decisions. Perhaps then there would be less death threats...