Well friends and
family... the MTC is truly amazing!!
I love being here. It
is a lot of work, and quite challenging sometimes but I do love it!
I guess I should start
at the beginning!!! I said goodbye to my brothers at home, mom at
security, and my dad at his gate (right next to mine) and then I was officially
by myself. Except four other missionaries were flying with me! One of which was
Sister Hansen (Marissa Hansen) whom I was friends with at Kuna the year she
lived there and she was also the friend that got me to join the tennis team! We
flew out together and it was grand. Also one of the missionaries, Elder Merrill
was her friend from her other high school, and he is in my district, so that
was cool to meet him and then see him every day since! It was great to see my
roommates and family in Provo and then my cousin Jess dropped me off at the curb!
My Kasama's are great!
Yes that was plural. I have two companions (Kasama) instead of one! Sister
Waldrom is from Phoenix and I absolutely love her. I think we would have been
friends at BYU before this had we met. We get along so well and really enjoy
being together. I love her personality, and her enthusiasm. She is so
dedicated and excited about the gospel and being a missionary. We get to
spend so much time together and I don’t think I am ever going to get sick of
it! It is great! We can talk about anything and I really enjoy it! Her favorite
Tagalog phrase is Kitakits! Which means see you later. I love it too!
My other kasama
is Sister Mafi. She is sooo cool! She is from Tonga and I think I hear her
speak Tongan more than English when we are with our zone. She is really
nice though and I love being with her as well. She is the only person in our
district not going to the San Pablo mission. She is going to the Manila
mission. She was originally sent to the Philippines MTC so I feel blessed to
have her with us. She has the greatest funniest personality and I love when it
comes out! The only trouble with her being from Tonga is that she has more
appointments to go to than any other person in our district, and so we miss
more valuable class time. Every minute here is scheduled to a T and there is literaly
not a moment where we even have time to think about the outside world or anything
except Tagalog or “Preach my Gospel” until ten at night or until today! We can
look out our classroom door and see the Y on the mountain perfectly. I'm glad
we can see beauty out our window, but sometimes it reminds us that we are in
Provo and that’s a little weird. Four of us in the district went to BYU before
this so it feels weird to us to see something so normal to our normal day at BYU
while feeling like we are living in a different world. But we do get to see
friends who work at the MTC and that is nice!!
I guess it is also
cool to tell you that May 22, 2013 is a famous day now. It is the first day in
the history of the world that there are more girls than boys at the MTC!!!
Isn't that cool! There are seven girls in my district and only four elders! I
love love love love love the sisters in my district though. We are becoming
fast friends and most of them like to run with me!!! I ran a mile the first
second I could at my first gym time because I have so much energy I want to get
out. I mean, all the work I do right now is mental work... all day long....
sometimes it just gets to the point that I just want to get up and jump around!
I am not used to sitting all day long and I want to sooo badly! That might
be the hardest thing... sitting all day. Maybe that is why I like meals so
much! It is a break from the classroom that is my new home... A spider crawled
on me today though, and I freaked out a little. I also am sick of every single
one of us having to say our name and where we are from every single time we get
a new teacher (whether at a workshop or the fact that our real teacher is out
of town and we have subs) I have it memorized where everyone is from, and want
to spend my time getting to the good stuff! I think our name, where we are
from, and sorry are the only three things we are truly confident in.
We had a wonderful
meeting with another district that came in the same day as us and our branch presidency.
It was amazing! I love them already! We went around and introduced ourselves
and our family and said why we are going on a mission. I am surrounded by
angels. I really am. It is humbling. One of the counselors in the bishopric was
companions with someone from my home ward in Kuna. I can't remember the counselors
name at the moment though so it doesn't do much good I guess. But don't worry
mom I will tell you his name later, I am sure you are going crazy wondering and
he was companions with Brother Fisher. I think Brad Fisher (Bernie's son,
that's Brad right?) We are told to prepare a talk in as much tagalog as
possible every Sunday, not knowing if we will speak or not!!! It is going to be
interesting. I don't mind giving talks, but in Tagalog? AHHHHHHH!!!!!!
We taught our first
lesson with an investigator last night in all Tagalog. It was horrible! We
don't even know sentence structure yet and we were trying to talk. It was great
until he asked us a question we didn't completely understand or know how to
answer. We had a great bonding with our
district laughing about how bad we were all doing! We teach another lesson
tonight, but I doubt it will be much better because it is P-day and we have no
language instruction beforehand. But I’ll let you know how it goes!!! I don't
even know what to say right now cause there is just too much to say.
My favorite time of
the day is mealtime. Even though I have to eat weird gluten free food that
usually tastes good. And even though they only have my favorite cereal in the
off-brand which contains wheat instead of the real brand I am surviving. But I
love it because it is when I see people I know and love! I see someone new
every meal that I know from either Kuna, Indiana, or good ole BYU!!!! And I
love it! I see Elder Josh Winger every meal because our zones eat next to each
other and I love it! I also got to see Sister Kaylyn Johnston and it was grand!
I have seen sooo many people I don't want to write them all. But I will note
that I saw Sister Hannah Christensen within five minutes of being at the MTC
and I was attacked with a hug and it was sooooo awesome to see her since I
didn't get to see her before she left! I just love being here, I really do. All
I want right now though is really a grammar lesson! We haven’t had one yet and
it is killing me! I want to form a sentence but I can't! Because even looking
up the meaning of one word won't help me cause I don't understand sentence
structure yet!!!! I already love the tagalog language though! I really do!
Learning Tagalog is so much work and I am getting so worn out by the end of the
day. It is work work work with no pause or slow pace! My kasama Sister Waldrom
said this morning that she doesn’t think they give us enough sleep, and I could
agree! One more hour in the morning or at night would be perfect!!!!!
I am out of time
so this will be all for today, but I am grateful to be here where I feel
the spirit so strong everyday and everywhere! I just love it! I have attached a
picture of the girls in my district and my kasamas we took last night! I feel
like this email gives my feelings about the MTC, loving my companions, and what
it is like to learn Tagalog, no justice but It's what I've got.
Until next Saturday,
Sister Hellewell
