21 July 2009
Buon Giorno!
I think Mom may just be driving home today, so I guess we'll see how everything goes. This is a really annoying email program, it's like BYU's old one that they discontinued last December because it was awful and nobody used it.
So, the MTC is great. I really enjoy it and I've been learning a lot. I have two companions. Sorella Miller is 23 and graduated in political science at BYU Idaho. She was going to go to a grad school in DC but instead she decided to serve a mission. Sorella Jenkins is 22 and is a history education major at BYU Idaho, she hasn't graduated yet. They're both amazing, and I'm learning a lot from them. We're rooming with a solo sister, Sorella Williams, who is 21 and a violin performance major at Utah State.
So far, Italian classes are cake. Really, they're a decent review I guess, but the other people in my district have no exposure (one of the anziani took 101 I guess, but I don't think they got toooo far). So I've just kind of been hanging out. My teacher, Fratello Fife, gave me an assignment on Saturday to learn as much of the Joseph Smith/first vision story as I could and to be able to tell it to him on Manday (yesterday). So, I did it, I read it and wqrote it down and read it out loud and said it out loud and then yesterday afternoon I told him the story and evidently that went really well. My tenses and congiugazioni (i don't know how to spell that in English) were almost perfect, I used a transitive past for an intransitive verb but that's about it. So last night the other teacher, Sorella Jones, pulled me out and gave me the option of staying in the MTC for the full 9 weeks with the rest of my district, or leaving in two weeks for Italy with Sorella Williams' district. So, I've been praying about it. I feel pretty decent about it, and I guess if I'm not supposed to go then the visa won't go through that fast, right? I just know that language-wise, I'm pretty good. I already knew how to pray and such, and I really just need to learn the lessons so I can be able to teach. That's a big just though. I'm not quite sure what to do but I need to decide by today or tomorrow so they can get working on it and switch me to a more accelerated program. It's kind of nerve-wracking but I guess everything will work out. If you have advice, please don't hesitate to give it. DearElder will probably work the best because I'll get it most quickly.
We taught for the first time yesterday. It went fairly well. We need to work on asking good get to know you questions, but I think we did all right. We didn't get through the entire first lesson, but we taught him about Joseph Smith because the guy wqas kind of like him--going from church to church because he likes God, but he doesn't like the way that all the churches bash each other. (he was a volunteer pretending to be an investigator) (I think it was in the TRC, I can't remember all the letter things).
I really enjoy my district, although we need to work on planning better because our anziani get REALLY distracted by the end of the night and MDT when we don't have a plan.
Sunday we had a great fireside on prayer, kinda made me just want to go home and pray but we watched The Testaments after which was fun. It's really hilarious to watch with a bunch of missionaries though, because people kiss and everyone starts laughing or gasping or something.
Anyway, I'm liking it here, I'm learning a lot. We only pray in Italian now, and it's amazing how much praying improves your language. Actually, it's amazing how much praying in a different language helps me to focus on what I'm saying. It's really neat. But my pray vocabulary has grown a lot, I've learned how to express concerns and everything, not just scripted like some who are just learning. At the end I sometimes switch to English, just because I'm better at expressing EVERYTHING, even if some things I have sufficient Italian to pray for.
Anyway, I love the language, I love the gospel, and I love the Lord. It's really an amazing place to be.
I love you!
Sorella Eliza Stevenson
I think Mom may just be driving home today, so I guess we'll see how everything goes. This is a really annoying email program, it's like BYU's old one that they discontinued last December because it was awful and nobody used it.
So, the MTC is great. I really enjoy it and I've been learning a lot. I have two companions. Sorella Miller is 23 and graduated in political science at BYU Idaho. She was going to go to a grad school in DC but instead she decided to serve a mission. Sorella Jenkins is 22 and is a history education major at BYU Idaho, she hasn't graduated yet. They're both amazing, and I'm learning a lot from them. We're rooming with a solo sister, Sorella Williams, who is 21 and a violin performance major at Utah State.
So far, Italian classes are cake. Really, they're a decent review I guess, but the other people in my district have no exposure (one of the anziani took 101 I guess, but I don't think they got toooo far). So I've just kind of been hanging out. My teacher, Fratello Fife, gave me an assignment on Saturday to learn as much of the Joseph Smith/first vision story as I could and to be able to tell it to him on Manday (yesterday). So, I did it, I read it and wqrote it down and read it out loud and said it out loud and then yesterday afternoon I told him the story and evidently that went really well. My tenses and congiugazioni (i don't know how to spell that in English) were almost perfect, I used a transitive past for an intransitive verb but that's about it. So last night the other teacher, Sorella Jones, pulled me out and gave me the option of staying in the MTC for the full 9 weeks with the rest of my district, or leaving in two weeks for Italy with Sorella Williams' district. So, I've been praying about it. I feel pretty decent about it, and I guess if I'm not supposed to go then the visa won't go through that fast, right? I just know that language-wise, I'm pretty good. I already knew how to pray and such, and I really just need to learn the lessons so I can be able to teach. That's a big just though. I'm not quite sure what to do but I need to decide by today or tomorrow so they can get working on it and switch me to a more accelerated program. It's kind of nerve-wracking but I guess everything will work out. If you have advice, please don't hesitate to give it. DearElder will probably work the best because I'll get it most quickly.
We taught for the first time yesterday. It went fairly well. We need to work on asking good get to know you questions, but I think we did all right. We didn't get through the entire first lesson, but we taught him about Joseph Smith because the guy wqas kind of like him--going from church to church because he likes God, but he doesn't like the way that all the churches bash each other. (he was a volunteer pretending to be an investigator) (I think it was in the TRC, I can't remember all the letter things).
I really enjoy my district, although we need to work on planning better because our anziani get REALLY distracted by the end of the night and MDT when we don't have a plan.
Sunday we had a great fireside on prayer, kinda made me just want to go home and pray but we watched The Testaments after which was fun. It's really hilarious to watch with a bunch of missionaries though, because people kiss and everyone starts laughing or gasping or something.
Anyway, I'm liking it here, I'm learning a lot. We only pray in Italian now, and it's amazing how much praying improves your language. Actually, it's amazing how much praying in a different language helps me to focus on what I'm saying. It's really neat. But my pray vocabulary has grown a lot, I've learned how to express concerns and everything, not just scripted like some who are just learning. At the end I sometimes switch to English, just because I'm better at expressing EVERYTHING, even if some things I have sufficient Italian to pray for.
Anyway, I love the language, I love the gospel, and I love the Lord. It's really an amazing place to be.
I love you!
Sorella Eliza Stevenson
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