Tuesday, April 9, 2013

First letter from the MTC 09 April 2013

Hola mi familia,

Well, I only get 30 min. to write emails, so using dearelder.com works great. I didn't get your Dearelder till yesterday. I think that is because of general conference weekend. Wow! General Conference was so good. Everyone here at the MTC gave a little cheer whenever they would mention missionaries, or the MTC. So anyway, I have been learning so much Spanish. I have learned to pray in Spanish. Wow I don't even know where to begin. I guess I will start at the beginning. After you dropped me off I went and got all my stuff and a sister showed me to my room. After that I went and got to see my class. I am in that classroom seriously all day. All I do all day is sit in the classroom and eat. We do get 30 min to exercise 5 days a week so that is nice. :) Anyway, back to the first day. I went to my class, did a little tutorial in a computer lab, and then I met my companion and district.

My companion is Hermana Roundy, she is from Bountiful, Utah. I absolutely love her. There are 10 of us total in the district. We have all learned, at least, a little bit of Spanish. There are 6 hermanas and 4 elders. Three of the hermanas, including me, are going to Costa Rica; the other 3 hermanas are going to Chicago. 3 of the elders are going to different missions in Mexico, and one elder is going to Honduras. I Love my district. We seriously clicked right away. That is sometimes a bad thing though as we get distracted easily. I feel like they are my family away from home. It is crazy that I have only known them for a week. I can't believe how much Spanish I have learned over the last little bit. There is still so much that I have to learn though and that is really frustrating. We have an investigator already! His name is Patricio. He is from Peru. He is studying here at the Y but his family is still in Peru. We have had 2 lessons with him so far. They have been ok. Not knowing the language is a huge hindrance. I want to, so much, share with him what I know to be true, but I struggle trying to find the words.

Conference this weekend was amazing it was also nice to make it to the weekend in the MTC. The first couple of days here were hard, especially Thursday I believe it was, but Thursday night was a lot better. That was when we met our branch president and I found out that my branch president’s wife is Sister Jones!! We had an amazing meeting where we found out why everyone decided to come on a mission. Everyone has different reasons.

I have run into so many people I know, let me see if I can remember them all, I have run into Elder Alex Jenkinson (cousin from Georgia) twice, Addie (from nursing class), Elder Sam Cassani, I see Sister Jenna Smoot (neighbor) almost every day in random spots. I ran in to Sister Rylie Sprauge (my old roommate), I have run into people from junior high, and oh I ran into Elder Spinder (neighbor). I have run into other people as well, but I don't remember all of them.

The first couple of days at the MTC have been hard, I have learned that I am fairly patient with other people, but I am not very patient with myself. I want to just know everything, but I know that isn't possible. I think the hardest times I have had while being here have just been when I have been frustrated with myself and trying to learn the language. Fortunately, everyone in my district does their best to lift everyone else up. Oh and guess what... All 6 of us hermanas share the same room, it is cozy. But we all fit in here, oh, and you should be proud of me, I have managed not to be a slob, the room is very clean and my desk in my room is clean. I am busy all day long and go to bed exhausted. The food here isn't that great, sometimes the food will be fairly good. 4 people in my district have gotten sick in the course of this last week; fortunately most of them have only been for like a day. I know now and understand what people mean by days seem like weeks and weeks seem like days. Well, I will try and get some photos to you, but it will be hard because most of the computers don't have the capacity and we only have 30 min. I love you all! Well I am out of time. Sorry I wasn't able to type very much and being a slow typer isn't good when you only have so much time to write. Letters and dearelder.com are definitely the best way to go. Love you.

Hermana Jenkinson

 

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