Oriental Boys

The four of us: Bate, Miller, Lay and me; Brom

This is Axel again. This is getting to be a habit! I just got a post from my good friend and old mission comp, Paul Miller and I realized that we are just passing our 20^th year anniversary of going into the MTC. I was called to the Washington, DC South Mission, Vietnamese speaking. I thought I would write a post about the three guys I served my mission with. It will be long, so you are forewarned. My friends' names are Buddy Joe Bate, Jeff Lay and Paul Miller. I am going to talk about them in alphabetical order because there is no other way to sort them, but before I do I also want to mention Mike Morgan, our MTC teacher.

Mike Morgan (Anh Khai)

We had three teachers and only one was funny and actually had a testimony. It was Mike. He always taught us the best lessons and always gave us the truth about what the mission would be like.

I remember during my time at the MTC I was having a hard time because honestly I didn’t know if the church even was true. I questioned why I was there when times were tough. I remember Mike taking some time just for me and reading through my Patriarchal Blessing and pointing out that the best part about it was that I would find out that Jesus Christ was my Savior and that I would know that the teachings were true. I had never read it in that light before and it gave me hope. And he was right. That has been the cornerstone to my life since then.

After the mission Mike was always there for any of us four. He was always good to us and he even sold me the wedding ring on Terah’s finger at a great deal. I still keep in contact with him to this day. Unfortunately I still haven't dug out all our old pictures from the last move so I don't have a picture of him.

Buddy Joe Bate (Anh Tung)

Bate, Bill (a member) and me

Bate was is the MTC with me and he was companions of Jeff Lay. Jeff and Bud got along really well from day one. His Vietnamese name was Tung but mostly we just called him Bate.

Bate was hilarious. He ALWAYS had some funny way of commenting on what was happening in our lives out there. I don’t know where he got his gift of putting people at ease, but he had it. The members loved him and the missionaries all wanted to be companions with him. Being a missionary is lots of things, but between the highs and lows, it is mostly just boring. Tracking, visiting people, doing meetings. Like I say it is mostly just boring. So having someone like Bate as a comp was a real treat. You were always guaranteed a laugh and you knew your time with him was going to be easy.. You also knew that all the members would want to see you and that it would be easy to get referrals out of them to teach people. And that made those two or three months we were companions together breeze by.

Jeff, Buddy Joe and me at the 4th celebration. Paul is probably taking the picture

While the four of us were out there, we decided to make a video kind of making fun of what it was like to be a missionary and especially an missionary working with the refugees. I wish you could see the finished product. It was hilarious, and most of the best parts came from seeing Bate do crazy things.

When we got back from our missions he married a girl who was one of the really strong members out there who always had something nice to say to us missionaries. Kelly and Bud made a great couple then and still do 20 years later. During college Jeff and I got to see him a lot, though not as much as we would have liked. Still to this date I get emails from him and when we get a house in Utah, Bate will be the only guy I trust to give me good information on where and how to buy.

Jeff Lay (Anh Tri)

Me and Jeff with some kids. Jeff is shooting our movie.

The funny thing about Jeff and I was we were never companions. I think everyone of us four were, but Lay and I never were. But even though we were never companions we always talked on Pdays and throughout the week. He was always an easy guy to talk to and I could always trust he would listen and give me great advice. He was also well loved by the members out there and had some really stellar baptisms out there because he was so good with them. The kids adored him and he would use that to our advantage. All the little tykes would run up to him at the playgrounds and he would spend a lot of time with them playing. He was also the tech guy who did all the editing of our moving, Oriental Boys and made it turn out so well.

Jeff, me and Paul hunting bunnies after the mission in Utah

After our mission Jeff and I made up for never being companions. We moved in together at BYU and basically not only were roomies, but became best friends. We pretty much hung out 24:7 and as we like all the same things whatever he wanted to do always sounded like a great idea to me and vice versa. He took me up to Montana and got me introduced to hunting elk with bows. It was always the highlight of my year to go up there and hunt. Honestly the hunting was just the frosting on the cake. The best part was hanging out with his awesome family who always made me feel like one of the family. It was a real refuge from school to go there and get pampered by his mom, or go out with his dad and brothers to hunt. I became good friends with Jeff’s brother Ryan who was also at BYU and with Kenny and Russy as well.

We cruised girls together too. It is always easy to go after the fairer sex when you are doing so with a best friend because you can compliment each other. I must admit we even dated a few of the same girls and it should come as no surprise. If you liked one of us, you probably were going to get along great with the other.

When I went away to Jerusalem Jeff met an awesome girl named Celina and they got married. I went to their wedding and was best man. I honestly was pretty stunned he got her to marry him. I mean, I love the guy, but he really married up. They have a beautiful daughter named Ester who is way too smart for her age.

During my courting of Terah I spent many a night at Jeff’s house bleeding about how much I wanted to marry Terah and both of them just listened and calming me down so I didn’t propose on the second date. They were there with me when Terah went on her mission and of course there when I got married. One of the biggest downsides to me living overseas is I can’t hang out with Jeff. I don’t make friends easily and when I do, I have them for life regardless of the time span in between when I see them.

Paul Miller (Anh Truong)

The thing about Paul is he is always so serious....

Paul was my first companion in the MTC and we were paired up with another Vietnamese guy I totally forget his name. Paul was the DL and his Vietnamese was the best in the group.

When we got to the field my friendship with Paul continued to grow. We would talk about our new companions and about the members and having lived together for two months we knew each other better than anyone else out there.

Our missions progressed and after we had become more of the 'older' missionaries we were put back together as companions. We were comps for four more months in the field. That meant that over ¼ of my mission I was companions with him. And it was great. I can honestly say there aren’t many people out there who know me better or who I know better than Paul for all the time we spent together.

Miller and Bate making food at a member party

It was great to go around teaching with him and I actually have him to thank for my pursuit of other languages. You see, by then his Vietnamese was so good I really felt like if we were with a Vietnamese family he really should do all the talking so at least they could understand us. So I started learning Cambodian just so I could have my own domain. I am not sure how well I did, but it got me thinking that learning languages on my own was possible. .

After our missions we kept in contact and he eventually came back to Washington DC to work and wound up marrying a girl all of us missionaries loved; Vandy. Vandy came from a very strong member family, had about 10 cousins we would always play with and I was so happy to hear my friend had married such a great girl and that Vandy had married such a great husband. It was win win. One of my biggest regrets in life was I didn't have the cash to make it to their wedding.

Because Paul and Vandy lived in AZ, I didn’t get a chance to see him much, but then Terah and I went to Croatia. After Croatia I had heard about Thunderbird in AZ before, but I had no way to ever make it there to start the school. But I knew I had an ace in the hole, and that was Paul and Vandy.

I called him up and he insisted that Terah and I come live with him and his family. I really had no money or options so his offer really saved us. Paul and Vandy made us feel totally at ease living in their home. He showed me around, took time off work to get me up to speed in the city and he even had his mom loan us one of her cars until we bought one. When we finally bought a house, Jeff and Celina picked up our few bits of furniture from my mom's house in Utah, and brought it all the way down to AZ and Paul helped us move in.

Terah and I both finished into grad schools (Terah got her Masters in Communications and I got an MBA from ASU and I also got an MIM from Thunderbird) and we spent many more days and nights hanging out with the Millers. We left when I got a job with ALICO. None of it would have been possible had not Paul and Vandy helped us out when we needed it. There are those times in your life you don’t know what to do, and luckily I had Paul there to offer a hand to help me out of a tough situation. I will never forget that.

I loved my mission and I hope you can see the biggest reasons why. I was really blessed to have rock solid guys who were always there for me, listened to me when I needed to complain, put up with me when I got in a bad mood and always set a great example for me both during and after our missions.

20 years have flown by. We are all balder, fatter and I don’t think playing hoops again on P-day will ever happen again. But I know the love we have for each other is still as bright and strong as it was back when Milli Vanilli were still cool and there was no such thing as the Internet.

There are those people you know that when you die you will make sure your heavenly house is one the same street as theirs. I know we will be kicking back listening to Bate crack jokes, Paul talk about our time in AZ and Jeff and I tell stories about college and Mike laughing along with us all. I don’t want much more out of heaven than being with my wife, kids, family and these guys.