Dear Family,
I really do
appreciate the long message but I´m going to have to read it later
because I´m short on time. So I might not respond to some of your
questions but don´t worry, I have plenty to relate to you all!
First of all, please forgive my grammar because I´m using a Spanish keyboard and also I´ve been speaking Español a lot lately.
Okay,
So when I landed in Atlanta I had about twenty minutes to rush over to
the gate, but when I got there, it was amazing to see this group of
about 15 young, well dressed people sitting in a circle and I was
welcomed very warmly. The flight to Buenos Aires, however, was an
extremely lengthy one and I hardly slept at all, but that turned out to
be a blessing because I have experienced zero effects from the time
change.
The first day here felt rushed, and that
night i woke up in a horrible pain (you know, the kind that makes me
vomit if I can´t take pain medicine in time?) and so i got out of bed at
about one in the morning and had to go find the medicine in my bag. It
took about an hour before the pain subsided enough to lay in my bed,
and i spent much of that time singing "I need thee every hour" very
quietly. i´m not sure why I have been blessed with this trial, but I
know it will only help me to more fully rely on the Lord.
The
language is amazing. They say that everything you learn in highschool
you completely cover on day one, but I must have payed more attention in
my Spanish class because the two years that I took in highschool
continue to bless me and help me understand the grammar. A lot of
people seem to think I´m already fluent, but i´m not, but I pray every
day for el don de lenguas. By day two we were praying in Español and we
had our first meeting with an invesitagtor--all in Español!
Mis
compañeras are Hermana Chamberlain and Hermana Cooper. We are the only
girls in a trio from our arrival group, but we share a room with
another trio of girls who have been here for two weeks longer than us,
as well as a companionship of latinas, who are positively hilarious.
The
weather was SO hot and humid the first few days! It was sort of
miserable for me, but I know I have to get used to it. Unfortunately,
the air conditioning in our district´s classroom is broken. We found
this out on a very hot day. We were listened to Hermano Abad teach us
when I started to become aware of little sprinkles of water hitting me.
It gets so humid that the water taken out of the air over flows in this
container and we had to empty about every hour because we needed the
cool air even though it was broken. Eventually, we just couldn´t use the
air conditioning any more and whenever someone walked by our
classroom´s open door they became clearly taken aback and proceeded to
tell us that our room was a sauna. Perhaps we just need a little more
preparation for the heat in our missions than some of the other
missionaries do. :)
For some reason, every since
we first got here, "come thou fount" has been stuck in everyone´s head.
It´s funny because that hymn is not even in the hymn book anymore, but
when one person hums it, we´re all doomed to be humming it subconscously
all day. But it´s a great hymn, so es bueno.
We
had a teacher who was really funny; most of the teachers don´t know
English very well, and whenever Hermano Vargas talked about prayer, he
said "pray." Like, "Who wants to say the pray?" I thought it was kinda
sweet, because he always has this big smile on his face.
A
continutation of the weather report--The last few days have been
perfecto. It stormed the other day and when I went out in the rain, it
felt like home. The night before, when the storm began, I was brushing
my teeth before bed and the power went out after some lightening hit
somewhere near us! We were all in the dark for a good five minutes
before i heard a man´s voice call from down the stairs (the men aren´t
allowed to use the Heramanas stairs--it´s sorta like Hogwarts that way)
and he asked if we were all right. After we replied that everyone was
fine, they got the lights working again. I´ll let you guys find the
spiritual connection in that story yourselves, haha ;) the power has
gone out twice more since, but only for brief moments.
My
district´s chore is to clean the stairs. There are nine people in my
district so, the boys take turns cleaning the boys´ stairs, but since we
are the only Hermanas in the district, every morning we get up early to
clean the girls staircase. Also, something strange--one day i ate a
hard piece of bread and cut the roof of my mouth and it started
bleeding. How weird is that??
But anyway, more
spiritually, Me encanta el CCM! I feel like everyone should come to the
MTC, because how could anyone not spend a few days here and not realize
how true the church is?? I feel the Spirit tesitify of everything that
is said here, and I just feel like this is where I belong. I love to
study the gospel and the language. Before we talk to investigators, we
prepare beforehand, but my goal is to never read my notes. I´ve only
had to peek once so far, but I strive to say everything from my heart.
Because the message of this gospel means everything to me, and I want
others to see how much it means to me so that they understand that it
can mean that much to them as well.
I saw Stephen
singing in this devotional we watched the other day and i thought it was
live but i guess it was from two weeks ago. It was a great devotional
and Elder Ballard gave an amazingly helpful talk!
Oh
yeah! Every time we use the staircase to go to the third floor, we
touch la cabeza de Nefi to get el don de lenguas. It´s a cute little
tradition, haha. I´ll try to send a picture of the statue.
Anyway,
I love you all! Soon I´ll get to go to the temple that´s about a 100
feet away from our building! Our session is in a few hours and it´s all
going to be in Español! Crazy!
All my love,
Hermana Autery
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| Paige and her companions. |
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