I finally made it to my second P-Day! I'm glad that you guys are all doing well and haven't gone insane, even though I'm not there to cook for you, or color your hair, or anything else. If you want my stand on language immersion programs, I am ALL for them! Being immersed in French at the MTC has probably been the best thing that has happened to me. Just because it has made trying to learn French that much easier. When you are constantly speaking it and trying to figure out how to say things and what other people are saying you just learn so much faster! And to answer your question, yes, as far as I know I will be going to Barbados by myself.
This week has been CRAZY! So on Sunday, it was already insane because church in the MTC is so different from church outside the MTC just because we are trying to keep a holy spirit and reverence here, so we pretty much do church things all day long. This spirit is strong here all the time, but especially on Sundays. However, on Sunday our STL's (Sister Training Leaders) got released, every missionary who was going to Canada and the one Sister who was going to Arizona speaking French all got released because they left on Tuesday, and our Branch President, President Newell, got released because his four years of service in the MTC were up. So within my first week I got companions that I had never met, a teacher I had never met, roommates I had never met, I changed branch presidents 3 days into my mission, and STL's. It was a lot to take in all at once, but we are finally adjusting. On Monday, it was what they consider to be a "normal" day at the MTC, so we woke up, had breakfast, studied for 3-4 hours, had lunch, went to class for 3 hours, had dinner, went to class for another 3 hours, and then bed. However, Tuesday was a "normal" day, until our new STL's, whom I love (their names are Soeur Andreason and Soeur Peteresen) came in and told me that on Thursday I was getting a new companion and that I needed to move rooms. Of course I was sad because I love my companions, and we got so close in such a short amount of time, but all is well. So I'm just going to skip Wednesday for a minute and then come back to it. Because yesterday (Thursday), my new companion came in. Her name is Hermana Black because she was called Spanish speaking to Montreal, Canada, but she already speaks fluent Spanish so she is going to learn French in the MTC. It is a really weird situation because she is in a different district than me, so we spend 90% of the time together, but then she goes to classes and district meetings with her district and I go with mine. So we are companions most of the time, but the rest of the time she is a solo missionary and I'm companions with my first companionship. It's all really confusing and we don't really know how it's going to work out because she just got here last night, but the Lord will work it out and whatever needs to happen will.
So anyways, back to the 4th of July! It was great! We kinda forgot that it was the 4th of July because it was almost just like every other day. However we did all wear red, white, and blue and we got our curfew pushed back to 11, so that we could all sit in our classroom buildings and watch the fireworks from the Stadium of Fire. Side note: the MTC has the best view of the fireworks! So we pretty much just chilled and we watched a video about religious freedom and then got to watch the fireworks. It was a lot of fun!
Also, we finished teaching our first "investigator" this week. She's not actually an investigator, she's a teacher here and she said that for only having a week in the MTC our French is progressing well, and she thinks we will be great missionaries. However, I'm not exactly sure how great our French is actually coming. I definitely feel like my French is better than when I came in and I will catch myself thinking and writing words in French, but when it comes to actually speaking and trying to form complete sentences I am so lost and in short I kinda suck at it. The missionaries in our zone have a saying for when we are so overwhelmed with the French language that we can barely understand it and our brains are just kinda done with trying to figure it out, and it's called being "French Fried" and I have seriously felt that this week. However, I know the Lord will provide and whenever He needs me to speak French He will provide a way. The scriptures say over and over again that if you will open your mouth the Lord will put words into it and the Holy Ghost will guide you with what to say. I can't wait for that day!!
I love the MTC and all of the great people that I have met here and all of the amazing things that I have gotten the opportunity to learn! It seems so crazy to me that I will be leaving in a few weeks (August 6th)! I love you all so much and I'm so grateful for all of the prayers and love y'all (we aren't allowed to say "you guys" in the MTC) have sent me. If you have any questions just ask! You can email me throughout the week and I can read them, I just can't respond until Friday so as you think of things you need to tell me or forgot then you can just email me! Love you!
Love,
Soeur Connery
P.S. My schedule for the most part is always the same, so I'll just break it down for you.
6:30am- wake up and get ready
7:30am- breakfast
8:00am-11:00am- study and plan
11:00am- exercise
12:00pm- get ready for lunch and classes
12:30pm-1:30pm- lunch
1:30pm-4:30- class
4:30pm-6:00pm- dinner and preparation for class
6:00pm-9:00pm- class
9:00pm-10:30pm- get ready for bed
10:30pm- lights out
and then I do the same thing with maybe a few tweaks the next day!
Our 4th of July outfits! These were my roommates before my new companion got here. Left to right: moi, Soeur Warner, Soeur Todd, Soeur Southwick, Soeur Begay, et Soeur Anderson
Left to right: Elder Pead, Elder Downs, Elder Clouse, Elder Huckstep, Elder Dainelson, moi, Soeur Southwick, et Soeur Begay
Love all of the pictures!!
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