Sunday, November 30, 2014

By the Way, I'm Going to Mexico!

Did you know that? I'm going to Mexico. That's just loco. Luckily I'm super good at suppressing my feelings so I'm cruising along like a sailboat while my companions are a train wreck. 

This week has been a week full of "lasts". LAST TUESDAY IN AMERICA. LAST WEDNESDAY IN AMERICA. LAST THURSDAY IN AMERICA. So on and so forth. I'm it still hasn't hit me that I'm leaving. My Spanish is.... fine. Heh. Heh. No it's not. But I'll learn. The other day our teacher, Hermana Hearne, let us teach a class lesson to her in English! I think she just wanted to be reassured that, yes, we are capable of teaching. Trying to do it in Spanish, not good. This is how it goes: "I know that God to give we things that to receive bless the gospel please I don't to know what I am to say" Anyway, I think she was a little worried about us. So we gave "Areseli" a lesson about tithing. And at the end she started crying and was pretty much speechless for a good minute. She said that she had never seen anything like that in all her years of teaching and that we are going to be powerful missionaries. Then she kept crying and said "The Spirit, man!" Talk about a confidence boost. 

Oh my goodness. I have to tell you about my dream. So in my dream it was the day that I was supposed to leave for Mexico. I woke up (in my dream) and it was light outside! So I look at the clock and it was 11 am. WHAT. My companions LEFT me! So did my district! So I started sobbing and wailing in panic and my parents show up (completely normal) and comfort me a little but then pushed me on my merry way to go eat breakfast. The whole time I'm thinking HowamIgoingtogettoMexicoI'mgoingtodie. So I walk into the cafeteria, and lo and behold, I see an Elder from my district, Elder Nay! So I ran over to him and went "ELDER NAY THEY LEFT YOU TOO WHAT HAPPENED?!" Apparently he had been with the airport with them but when he bent down to tie his shoe, they left him. I asked him if we could travel to Mexico together but he said that he didn't know if that was appropriate and that he would have to do some personal study and prayer about it. Such a missionary. Long story short, I ended up in Mexico somehow and Hermana Valerio and Hermana Dalton were still my companions. So as we were getting ready for bed I asked them why they had left me. Hermana Valerio said "Well it looked like you were having such a good night's rest so I figured I would let you sleep. Then we forgot to wake you up and left." I started yelling at the both of them and went to bed fuming. Then I actually woke up, into real life and I thought that the whole thing was real. Let's just say we did not have a very pleasant morning. I forgave them eventually. 

I'm just not going to go to bed the night before so I will be sure to be awake. Good plan. 

I think I'm actually going to miss the MTC... I'm going to miss my district horribly and I don't know what I'm going to do without them! We've grown together so much over the past 6 weeks. Yesterday Elder Vaughn, who didn't know a lick about Spanish, gave me a whole lesson in Spanish yesterday. I was so proud! And then Hermana Dalton, who ALWAYS brings in notes to our lessons, didn't bring any yesterday. It's been a good time. I have an undying love for cardigans and shoes with velcro. I ate a cheese burger today and tried to savor it. Elder Daines won't let me take a picture of him, but I am still trying. Elder Nay screams out "!HELADO!" every time a teacher leaves the room. Helado means ice cream. I will never understand him. And I'm still crossing my fingers that Hermana Valerio won't forget to wake me up. Even though I'm the one with an alarm clock. 

I've got to go pack! (Yay happy day) I love you all so so so much. These next 17 months are going to fly by. Like lightspeed. Speaking of lightspeed, Elder Nay and I have frequent Star Wars geek outs. One time we had a mock lightsaber battle. 

Moving on. 

I love you. I hope you know that. I am so grateful to be on this mission and I can't imagine being anywhere else. No matter how hard it is, this is the best thing I have ever done in my life. I love my Savior and I can't wait to go teach about him in broken Spanish. God be with you until we meet again!
                                        Our classroom light switch, courtesy of the elders in our district.
                                                                           A shadow picture.
                    Elder Morrill was transferred to the Sacramento, CA mission.  A sad day in our district.
 My friend Shaeli has been at the MTC with me for the past 6 weeks! I love her.

You Can Sleep When You're Dead

My alarm clock doesn't glow so for the last few days in order to see what time it is in the mornings, I've been leaning halfway off my bed so I can try to see the time by the light that comes out from under the door. Well this morning I remembered that there is a button that makes it light up. I KNEW THAT. I knew that just 4 days ago and then all of the sudden I'm almost throwing out my back to see what time it is. Sheesh.
That's my story for the week. Here's a quote from yesterday:
"If the Mo-Tab sings it, we can sing it."
Here's another:
"For all you know I could be kissing her!"
I won't put that one into context so it will be more confusing and gasp worthy for you. 

This week has been pretty easy as far as the MTC goes. We sang "Praise to the Man" in the MTC choir and I was hoping that a member of the 12 would come to the devotional we sang it at so we could blow his socks off. But one didn't come so we blew the socks off of the 2nd counselor of the Presiding Bishopric. 

Today is my 31 day mark! I feel like I've been here for a year. I feel like I'm going to be here for the rest of my life, struggling with Spanish, and eating hamburgers. I ate a hamburger yesterday, by the way. It was... burgerish. Anyway, today we got our flight itinerary! I haven't seen it yet but I hear we're leaving at 3:30 in the morning, going to Salt Lake, that flight leaves at 7:20, we fly to Atlanta, Georgia, have a layover, fly to Mexico City, have a layover, then we're flying to Saltillo! This is crazy. This coming week is my LAST WEEK. WHAT. I'm not ready at all, but that's okay because there ain't no way I'm not going. 

Oh! An elder from my district was reassigned to Sacramento, California English speaking due to health problems. We seriously got about 5 minutes to say goodbye to him and then he was taken to a new classroom, moved bedrooms, and got a new name tag. I almost cried. He can't just leave! We see him around a lot and it's always like "OH MY GOOSSSHHHH!!! HELLO!!!!" I saw him today in the laundry room and he was wearing his Spanish name tag. He said he likes that one better because it has the robot sticker that I gave to everyone in our district. So I gave him another robot sticker to put on the back of his English one so he doesn't face the wrath of the name tag police. If those exist. 

Life is good! Sleep is rare! I just realized I have to start packing! NO!
Maybe I'll have a more exciting week next week. Wait, what am I saying? MISSIONARY WORK IS ALWAYS EXCITING!! Actually it is. Yesterday one of our investigators told us that he smokes marijuana. And before we understood what he said (our Spanish is bad) we were smiling and nodding and saying "Si!" and then it clicked and we went "WAIT NONONONONONO THAT'S NOT WHAT WE MEANT." Then when I was asking him if he had read The Book of Mormon I accidentally said (In Spanish) "How do you read?" He thought it was hilarious and said, in Spanish, "Word by word, line by line, page by page." I greatly appreciated his sarcasm. 
There, was that more exciting? Anywho. I love you all. Even if you do get more sleep than me. But I guess I can overlook that. I'm feeling charitable today. 

Have a wonderful week! Don't do anything dumb!
                                                           I was Elder Soubie for a little while.
 Me with Hermana Dalton, Hermana Valerio, Elder Eves and Elder What's his name, in front of the Provo Temple.
All of the Hermanas in my MTC Zone.  They are always happy and it's really disconcerting.

Monday, November 10, 2014

Day 24

Day 24. Today on the menu was the choice of a chicken burger, a beef burger, a bacon burger, a veggie burger, and a burger. I ate the fruit burger.
Day 25. Today I ate a burger.
Day 26. Considering changing my last name to "Burger"
Day 27. New on the menu: The Burger Burger. 

Those were my thoughts today. Goodbye.

Just kidding... but really. They have more variety than that with the food, don't worry. I've never consumed so many burgers in my life. Or chocolate milk. Gotta eat, right? Life at the MTC is great and frustrating. Contradictory, right? I'm pretty sure I've said that in every single one of my emails. Bear with me. Currently on the sickness scale I have a cough that won't go away. I cough all night and then in the morning my abs are sore. I pretty much just consider that my workout so I skip gym and take a nap to make up for the sleep I lost while coughing. I figure that counts. 

Nothing really wild happened this week. Oh! Hermana Dalton was sick at the beginning of the week and Hermana Valerio and I were trying to figure out a way so that we could both go to class. Long story short, we called the front desk, they told us to go to some office, we went to that office, they sent us to another office, from that office we went to another office, and from that office we ended up meeting with the MTC President.... Yeah.... I don't exactly know how we got that high up, but we did. And it was awesome. OH! And on that exact same day, my companions and I were walking with some elders from our district, Elder Eves and Elder Morrill, and I was telling a story. We were just about to walk into the lunch room when I was ending the story and I said something that tickled Elder Eves' funny bone. He literally collapsed on the floor in laughter and scrunched up into the fetal position! Elder Morrill ran into the bathroom in embarrassment and I was dying from laughter. One of the senior couples thought Elder Eves was in mortal danger and asked if he needed a doctor. He calmed down after about 5 minutes. It was wild. 

It's getting cold here and I don't like it. Hermana Dalton is always hot and I'm always cold. THIS DOESN'T WORK. But then when she was sick she was cold and I was hot. Hermana Valerio doesn't care. I didn't bring enough cardigans. Oh the horror. 

My Spanish is muy bueno. Jokes. I'm pro at Spanglish. We're not allowed to speak English in the classroom and whenever we do say something in English our teacher says ?Que? Which means "What?" It's very frustrating and causes some un-Christlike thoughts. But I'm learning. This MONTH I will be in Mexico. We don't say that out loud around Hermana Valerio because she freaks out. 

Life is good. I love you all. The MTC is something. Have a great week!

P.S. Dear Elders are my life blood. Thank you for sending them!
Hermana Dalton taking my temperature.  I have been sick since I arrived here at the Provo MTC October 15th.

My district in front of the Provo, Utah Temple.  I'm the one who looks like she's going on a mission to Antarctica.

I'm celebrating our MTC half-way mark with my companions, Hermana Valerio and Hermana Dalton.  We are drinking sparkling cider, and feeling like sinners.  But, if it came with the DearElder.com care package, it must be okay.

Sunday, November 2, 2014

It's All Just...One...Long Day!

BEFORE YOU READ THIS EMAIL READ THIS PART THAT IS IN ALL CAPS. THIS TUESDAY AT 7 OUR DEVOTIONAL WILL BE BROADCAST INTERNATIONALLY. I WILL BE IN THE CHOIR IF THEY EVEN HAVE A CHOIR. WATCH IT. READ THE EMAIL NOW. 

HOLA.
I feel like I've been here for an eternity. All the days mesh together, yesterday felt like five days ago, and I can't remember what I ate this morning. But hey, I'm on my third week! That's so crazy. I don't even know what to think of that. This week has been a rough, rough week. Well actually for me it's been pretty okay, but when your companions are having a rough week, you just kind of assume that your week has been rough as well. But it's P-day and we are happy happy happy! We went to the temple today and did sealings. There were a bunch of cute old couples there that kept patting our hands and saying how proud they were of us. Then we went and threw some fall leaves around on the way back to the MTC. Sundays are interesting.
​You would think that you would have so much free time on Sundays... nope. Sacrament meeting feels so short! Relief Society is held in the gym with all the sisters at the MTC, then the sisters hang around until Priesthood is over and then I don't even remember what the heck we do after that because my brain as turned to mush. But eventually we have a Sunday devotional! Those are always good. I can't remember who spoke. But even BETTER was Tuesday. Hna Valerio and I dragged Hna Dalton to MTC choir practice on Sunday so we could practice the song that was going to be sung in the Tuesday devotional. We sang "Lead Kindly Light" which is one of my favorite songs EVER. When I found out we were singing it I almost went "SHUT UP." Like in Princess Diaries. But I didn't because I'm a missionary now. We're not allowed to say "guys" here. Greatest struggle of my life right now. Anyway, on Tuesday during the devotional we sang "Lead Kindly Light" to Rosemary Wixom, the General Primary President! If I was to give a talk in General Conference, I would have given her exact talk. It was about coming unto Christ and "What think ye of Christ?" My pen was flying as I took notes. I know that I had more things to say, but I can't remember. My companions are great, my district is great, my teachers are great, and I'm learning more Spanish every single day! I'm not sick anymore, which is fantastic. 
I just remembered some of the embarrassing things I've said while teaching in Spanish. I will list them.
"After baptism, we clean." (Investigator thought I meant we clean the church)
"I want many sins." (I mixed up the words. But I conjugated it correctly, so there.)
"David........................" (I didn't say anything for a long amount of time because I forgot my words)

It's been interesting. Beware, the cafeteria food here will make you cry. I have never eaten so much in my life. I am so tired. I can't even think. 

I won't lie, the MTC is hard. But in order to be Christ's representatives, we have to experience just a little of He went through. I have grown so much since I've been here, although sometimes I don't realize that. Even though most days I can barely even lift my pen to take notes, I know that my weaknesses will be made strong through Jesus Christ. I'm here on this mission because this gospel makes me happy and I am willing to answer the Lord's call to preach it. That knowledge is what keeps me going!

I love you all. Every single one of you. 

Have a great week!
                                                                              The obligatory picture with the map.
My district.