Easter in the MTC

This week we hit our one month mark at the MTC! It's so crazy to think we've already been here that long. By the end of this month we'll actually be in Hong Kong, that's insane. Our Cantonese is getting better, it's still very bad, but getting less bad. Sometimes our teacher corrects us on some grammar and we all look at her like we have no idea what she's talking about (because we don't) and she goes AYAYAYA.

Both of our pretend investigators are doing good! I love teaching them. It still makes me so sad when they ask why they need Jesus, even though I know they're not real. Why doesn't the whole world understand that they need Jesus? Ugh.

Easter Sunday was amazing. M Russell Ballard came to speak to us.  He was awesome. He told a story about a dream his grandfather had about seeing Jesus. In the dream the man didn't know that the man was Jesus he just knew that He filled him with so much love that he fell to his feet, and it wasn't until he was at his feet that he saw the nail prints and knew the man was Jesus. All day my heart was so full of gratitude for our Savior. At choir on Sunday we practiced the song Praise to the Man, then we sang it at the devotional on Tuesday. Before I left I read that little book about Nancy Tracy and in it she talked about how much she loved Joseph Smith. I thought about her as we sang and it made me happy to know that she was with me. Another thing I've been thinking about this week is my little brothers and how grateful I am for them:) I think my brothers are stupid enough that they laugh at literally everything. They taught me (maybe this is a bad thing actually) that it doesn't matter what the situation is, you can always find a way to laugh at it. Life is so happy and I'm very thankful that those weird boys with huge eyes helped me to see that. When things get stressful here, I remember the teasing and jokes and their hilarious laughter and it helps me every time. Anyways, I'm sorry again that I never really remember anything that happened in the week by PDAY, and that every email is kind of the same. I hope all is well for you, love you! :) 

Chopsticks may equal starvation

Another week at the MTC! Honestly it was kind of the same as all the other weeks.  Sorry guys, this could be a pattern for another month or so.

 Our lessons with our two investigators are going really good! It's so weird how much we're able to understand them now.  My companions are awesome. It's really nice when in lessons I'm not sure what the investigator said, but one of them do so they can answer or vice versa. My comp Sister Hugo can come up with a scripture for anything the investigator asks, and it's so great. We work really well together. 

This week our teacher gave us a lesson on the eating culture in Hong Kong. She gave us chopsticks and we have been practicing using them at meals. I am insanely bad at using chopsticks PS it's very embarrassing. Food falling out of your mouth is not beautiful.  She showed us pictures of a bunch of different kinds of foods and told us about the culture over there. It made me so excited! Our teacher said that food is like the main culture in Hong Kong. All they do is eat because for so long they were so poor and starving so now eating is like a really special thing to them. It sounds like the food is really good! Nothing to weird from what she showed us. Mostly noodles, rice, meat, lots of fish so sad, soups, and these bread balls from the bakeries she said are really good. Also apparently they drink their water hot. Like they actually boil it and drink it super hot, never cold. They think it's healthier that way. 

We got to teach TRC volunteers again on Saturday. I was way less nervous this time. The volunteers we had were so nice, they helped us whenever we didn't know a word. I love that we can have a nice spiritual conversation with someone even though our language is so broken. 

 There is something so sacred and so special about faith. About creating a deep relationship with someone you can only see in your head and feel in your heart. Even though the road to being close to Jesus is sometimes so hard, every part of the journey makes the end point that much more precious. I thought about all the times I prayed and didn't get an answer. All the times I was frustrated with not knowing all I wanted to know. All the times I wondered if He was even there. Then I thought about the other side and the moments where I felt him so present and I could not deny that He is there. I know God loves me, I know He adores me. I know he is so constant in my life. Even though I wish with all my heart He would just come down and teach his children for me so I couldn't mess it up, I would never rob those people of what we have. I want them to have all these moments so that they can know God entirely with their whole hearts and have that meaningful relationship with Him. He is so so good and wonderful and so is this gospel. I'm so grateful to be here at the MTC. Everyone here are the nicest people in the world. I love my family, I hope you know that. I hope your lives are fun and exciting and great and centered around basketball obviously. LOVE YOU. 

Here to Invite

Hi family! Uh I kind of feel like all my weeks are the same here so sorry if this is groundhogs day happening over again.Cantonese is still so hard, but it amazes me how much we are learning. Actually it amazes me how much we are learning in class and then I get to lessons and change my mind haha. We had our first TRC lessons on Saturday and I really liked them. Except the volunteers there talked soooo fast. I didn't really know what they said. Anytime the investigators say something we don't understand we just say "We know that when you pray you will know the truth." Very effective. I'm curious how this would work in normal life when someone is just talking to you at Walmart or something and you dont understand.  Someone test this for me and let me now how it works. 
 Cantonese is funny. You know how when people make fun of Chinese they say like ching chong tin tong? THAT'S REAL! Like chingcho is a word and so is tintong. Sometimes when we sing hymns I have to try not to laugh because it sounds so funny to my ears.
 One of our teachers is pretending to be an investigator named Walter and Walter feels no emotions because he never smiles. Except one time I said accidentally I didn't know who Jesus was( if you say one tone wrong the whole sentence is mixed up and means something opposite what you mean it to say) and HE WOULDN'T LET IT GO. He brought it up so many times, but at least it made him laugh. I really like teaching lessons even though it's hard to understand what they are saying, it lets us practice talking in all Cantonese. This week our adorable teacher Lau Ji Miuh was demonstrating a lesson for us on one of the elders in my district. It made me feel  stressed out to watch her because she was so good at it. I thought about how inadequate I am to be dealing with real people and their real problems and real sorrows. But last night we had a devotional where the speaker said that all we are to do is to invite people to come unto Christ. That made me think about how even though I probably can't go where people are and relate to them all the way and even understand them all the way, there is someone who can. Jesus has been where they are and has no problem or fear going to their level to pull them up. I'm so grateful that he is letting me help him on this mission. I'm excited to get to Hong Kong...but we have a while until then. :)  Wow what a great life. 

Rare cat sightings confirmed

This week has been great! Days at the MTC are weird because they feel so long. This week we finished teaching our investigator Afish, and then she became our teacher, which was embarrassing because we did some pretty embarrassing stuff while we taught her. Her real name is Sister Lau and she is so nice and cute, we love her! She's from Hong Kong and so she speaks so fast it's so hard to understand her, but she also uses more English than Bro Johnson. We got two new investigators who are both of our teachers pretending to be other people. Both of those lessons were hard because again we understand like two words in every sentence they said. But we did our best and I think they went okay. 

 Last week Sister Parker went home because she felt like she needed to get married to her boyfriend, so Sister Viazzo joined me and Sister Hugo's companionship. I was really happy because I really like Sister Viazzo and also we laugh at one more persons jokes.  I will miss Sister Parker.  She was brave.

 

Our district is so much fun. We're working hard at the language, and I can see the improvement. We also talked a lot about Hong Kong culture and history stuff with Sister Lau this week, it made me excited to get there. ALSO I asked Bro Johnson how many cats he saw on his mission and he said he probably saw three his whole mission. So I think I can handle that. I feel like a million pounds has been lifted from me over this and someone needs to confirm to Paul that cats are not the national animal.  Thank you.  They will be the worst three days (cat sightings) of my life, but that's not too bad right? 

Everyday I feel so grateful to be here. I heard one of the workers here saying she hates this MTC because she thinks they baby the missionaries...which is probably true haha...but I'm okay with it. God has been so good to me. Whenever I get stressed about Cantonese or anything else I feel him calming me down and telling me everything will be OK. I love Him and I love the gospel and I love being a missionary and I LOVE YOU. I hope your week was good too family, I love you so much! 

I love the MTC

I've been at the MTC for a week! Can you even believe it? I actually can because it feels like it's been 17 years. But in a good way...:) My first two days were like CRAZY. I had no idea what my teacher was saying ever and struggled to adjust. But after that I just started loving it. Sunday was so much fun. It was a nice to hear people speaking english for a change. Also the talks the missionary's gave in church were awesome. On Sunday we got to go on a temple walk and also a devotional, and those were way fun. I LOVE my district! So our branch is made up of mostly mandarin speakers (which means church is in English YAY) and there are only two districts of cantonese speakers in the whole MTC, and we're all going to Hong Kong. The sisters in my district all share a room. There are three companionships, me and my comp Sis Hugo and then two others. I love the other girls. We have a lot of fun together and they are so sweet. We talk allllllll the time and laugh alllllll the time which is kind of bad because we should probably be studying more... but we're working on it. There is one companionship of elders in our district and they are the best. I know we got really lucky because the elders in the other district are great but a little annoying (am I allowed to say that now that I'm a missionary?) Our district leader is a convert to the church and he use to work in the Navy. His comp is Elder Chapman and he is the funniest person I have ever met. They keep us entertained for sure. Our teachers name is Brother Johnson (we call him by his chinese name but I definitely cannot spell in canto) he is the most positive person on the planet. We are all so bad at speaking but he just smiles and gives us thumbs up all the time. The only english words I have ever heard him say are subject and verb. He talks in canto all the time and is so patient in trying to get us to understand him (and it takes us forever to understand him). We actually have already taught three lessons to our fake investigator Afish. (PS I felt very in the know because everyone in my district thought the investigators were real except I knew Elsie and so I knew they weren't. But she told me not to tell anyone so I didn't.) Afish is the cutest little tiny girl. Our first couple of lessons were so shaky because I literally didn't catch one word she said to us. But our third lesson went way better because instead of writing out a script my comp and I just had word banks and tried harder to make the lesson about her. When our teacher was helping us with the lesson he told us to just listen to the Singling (Holy Ghost). I told him that I can't hear the Holy Ghost in Cantonese. But then he went off on a very long cantonese speech on how the Holy Ghost speaks all languages. And I really have come to realize that. It's touched my heart that someone who I can barely understand and who can barely understand me can talk to the same God and feel the same love and peace from Him. I'm so glad I get to be a missionary. I'm so glad I get to teach people how to talk to God. And even though cantonese is HARD (no sympathy Max and Marie spanish is easy) I know God is helping me learn it. We can now pray and give our very simple testimonies in cantonese. It's pretty fun, and I hope I can keep learning quickly. Sorry this email was forever long and kind of boring. I love you guys so much!!!

And shes off............

A few last pics before going to the MTC.  We will miss you Emma!