Our first Email from Sister Earl
Oi!
Oi!
You know what is completely crazy?? Tomorrow all the new missionaries come in with their scared faces and little dork dots. (stickers on the name tags that indicate they are new) That happens tomorrow!! I do not even feel like I have been here that long.... :D Its insane.
So the MTC is a very organized and crazy place. There are waaaaay too many people here since most of us are waiting for Visas. They ended up making a whole seperate branch for the people who came this week and last week. It is the 69 branch and we are zone F. It seems like only a select few have gotten their visas and most people are getting reassigned after the 6 week training. I have heard of reassignments to Boston, Florida, DC... mainly places with big airports to fly out as soon as the visa comes. I honestly would be cool with getting my Visa now or after a reassignment. That just means I get to help people eveywhere and share more of what I know to be true. :) No matter where I go the message is the same and is for ALL people.
The food is fine. Not really great and not really terrible. (Yes mom, Austins statement was completely true) We had some potatoes the other day that were really good... I enjoy the cracked wheat oatmeal in the morning... uhhh we had Dominos Pizza one day!! That was exciting. Although my favorite is Wednesday and Sunday nights when they bring out the BYU creamery ice cream. I think since being away from BYU I have been going through a bit of withdrawls. haha That ice cream can make anything better. :) The weirest thing about meals is they all tend to blend together in my head. I have a hard time remembering which meals I have already eaten during the day. I know it sounds like I am going crazy, but think about it......Every day I sit in a classroom as Portuguese and our Missionary Purpose is thrown at me. The day goes by slow and the week flies. The progress I am making is incredible but I still don't believe how fast it has flown.
As for companions I actually have two. Sister Lillian and Sister Davis. They are both awesome sisters, but we are all very different. Coordinating our ideas for lessons and whatnot takes a little bit of time, but we love each other and greatly enjoy being companions. I know I was put with them for a reason and I am grateful for them. Sister Peterson and Sister Parks are in our dorm room as well and they are both super funny and great to be around. We all have a hard time with our personal quiet time right before bed because we all love to talk and joke around together. Don't worry though, we are getting better at it. :)
We gave our first lesson in Portuguese on Friday. Can you believe that?! Friday! haah I was so excited and nervous at the same time. We talked about Jesus Christ and pretty much had our entire lesson written out so we read it to him. Joao is his name. We felt so completely prepared and ready. We practiced pronunciation and everything. I even tried to memorize some of my sentences so I could really connect with him......Anyway, after that first lesson I was completely overwhelmed. It went ok, but I had the hardest time understanding what in the world he was talking about. We wanted to ask questions and communicate, but that is hard with the language barrier. Anyway to make it short that first lesson went nothing like we wanted it to and we were a little crushed. I had done so well up to this point about not getting overwhelmed at all the information, but that night with the lesson and the fact that I got 3 letters from home and just lost it. haah I was feeling very overwhelmed. The language isn't really easy and being around people you don't really know all that well every second is sorta difficult and being completely obedient isn't exactly natural. As much as I wanted to just trust God and not get upset my little human capacity was overthrown. Our entire room had a great long talk that night and I bawled for an hour and a half. I don't think I have ever been pushed this hard in anything. I takes so much of my concentration just to remember to say Sister Earl when someone asks me for my name. haha! But seriously! Luckily God loves me. He knows exactly what I need. That night He sent one of the wifes of the Branch Presidency over to our dorm room. Right when we were near the end of our companion chat she knocked on the door. She came in and talked to us and bore of testiony of just why were are there and how special we are to Him. I felt like she was sent over just for me that night. I had a long prayer of gratitude and praise after that visit. Never again will I doubt for a second that my Heavenly Father is right here with me. (our second lesson on Saturday was better, thank goodness. Not perfect, but better.)
Lets see, my district is awesome. I remember Sister Jones saying something about being so close to her district after a week and I thought, " there is no way! Its only been a couple days!" But let me tell you she was completely right. I feel like I have known these Elders and Sisters my entire life. There are wonderful examples to me and I can't imagine the MTC without them!!
Oh, I have seen Sister Jones and Sister Moberg multiple times and we get to talk about random things. Sister Moberg and I are actually on the same dorm floor in 5M. It is sorta funny because that building is actually for Elders, but there are so many sisters here that they needed to make more room in the top of an Elders building!! The MTC is about 44% sisters now... btw. :) The good thing about that is on Wednesday when I was taking my suuuper heavy bags all the way up 4 flights of stairs all these Elders came out and did it for me! :) It was super nice of them.
Anyway life is good here. I am learning, growing, and being stretched everyday. I know this is where I am suppose to be and I am so grateful for this opportunity!
I love getting real mail because I can read it throughout the week so thank you all so much!! Emails I can only check on Tuesdays and I found out that anyone can email me. So do it!! Email me and use dearelder.com!! I love to hear from everyone.
my email mckayla.earl@myldsmail.net
Thanks for all the love and support!
Love
Sister Earl
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