21st of June, Two Thousand and Thirteen

Hi guys. So first off HAPPY BIRTHDAYYY!!!!!!!! AND HAPPY LATE FATHERS DAY DADDY-OH!!!!!!!

Sorry I didn't get to email you guys till now. little did I know, the two week advanced language schedule is by far the most exhausting schedule. They have it all worked out so that we only get one p-day. [Preparation Day-Day off]. Today is my first p-day and I leave next Tuesday at 4:30am. So the next time I get to email you guys could be almost another two weeks depending on when the pday in my mission is. The advanced language schedule is also the only one where it is physically impossible to get 8 hours of sleep every night because we have breakfast at 6:30 and we are not allowed to go to bed until 10:30, so instead of having to get up at 6:30 we have to get up earlier in order to be at breakfast then. It is kind of ridiculously exhausting. Especially when you are in a room of 5 girls so naturally there is at least one girl who needs more than an hour to get ready so usually the first person's alarm goes off at like 5:15 and then none I can't sleep at all after that because I can't sleep when there is any noise and she is in there getting ready. I am getting sick, I need to sleep haha, but with our schedule that is impossible. But I guess that's reasonable because we have do all of the learning of everything we need to know in two weeks instead of 6. I tried to take one today right when our free time started but my roommates kept coming in and out so I didn't actually sleep at all and it was miserable haha. oh well.

My companion is really cool. Her name is Ilse Gomez. She is from Vista California and she is going to San Jose California haha. Well, at least she is a more positive person than I because I don't think I would have been happy about that at all but she seems really excited. Oh yeah, did I mention I'm the only white girl in my district? [An assigned learning group] There's like, one other in my zone [a larger group composed of a few districts] except I think she left today so I think it's just me now. So you know how Hispanic people talk like really really fast in spanish? Well, that's what my companion does haha. 24/7. In either language. And honestly about 60% of the time even in English I have no idea what she's saying and just smile and say yea or si depending on what language she's speaking. It is constant haha. Had I been listening the whole time I'd probably know every detail of her entire existence by now haha. But she is really really nice and has a really strong testimony and is always really happy so that's good.

Oh, so, one of my old friends from efy [Especially for Youth - a youth camp] is in my zone. He's one of the only ones from efy who ever actually kept in contact with so that's been really fun. His name is Franco Firpo. He's a fun kid. He was super excited to see me. I also just know a ton of people here, my roommate is always like "you are so popular!", most of them are dance people. Although, also one of my study abroad friends teaches here and sydnee's roommate also teaches here and I have run into both of them.

So you know how everyone talks about the food at the MTC cafeteria and how good it is and how they gain weight and stuff? Well, I see how that could happen when I see what other people eat, they have like 4 cookies on their plate and disgusting fatty food and chocolate milk and stuff. But honestly, the best part is the fresh pineapple. They always have fresh pineapple. If there were a limit to how much pineapple I could I eat here I would have far surpassed it by like the second day. Every meal, breakfast, lunch and dinner I get a nice big bowl of fresh pineapple and devour it. The other food is really good too but that is by far the best part.

So my district is really cool. Only they are definitely a bunch of 18 year old boys haha. It's fun, just a little off topic sometimes. It is interesting because there's that rule change that allows 18 year old boys,  I think I am the only one in my district who has ever lived away from home. So because of this they feel the need to socialize a lot, I think because they need to feel like they have a family here. Which is fine, only that I am also trying to learn all this stuff they already know in another language and I can't pay any attention to studying when they are being crazy haha. But they already know this stuff in Spanish so it's not a big deal to them. So me and my companion have to like schedule time where we are in a room with everyone during study time so that she can socialize and then time where we go somewhere else so that I can study. It works, it would be nicer if I could just focus somewhere where there is noise though but it just doesn't work for me.

So here is a cool nice spiritual story from yesterday so that you guys know it is also all spiritual and awesome here in that way. We have to teach our teachers lessons who pretend to be investigators, and one of our teachers, Hermano Ramsey, pretends to be an investigator named Claudio. And he told us a little about Claudio and how he had grown up in the church but then got involved in drugs as a young teen and stuff and that he was married for a while but now divorced and has a 5 year old son. But then he told us that Claudio is a real person, and that it is his brother. Everyone dreads teaching him though because he is really impersonal and hard to crack because of his history. So anyways, we decided to teach our first lesson on the plan of salvation, and that went well and everything, that was a couple days ago. But then we were going to teach him again yesterday and we had a whole lesson planned on the Restoration and we had adapted it to the points we thought he would need and stuff. And then beforehand while the first companionship was teaching we were in the classroom with everyone else and they were loud and I said to my companion that I thought we should go somewhere quieter to get ready. So we went to a quiet classroom and I said that I felt like we should take this really seriously, because it is a real person, and who knows, even though we are not actually teaching Hermano Ramsey's brother, maybe we can still make a miracle for him by our faith. So we reviewed our lesson and prayed and went in. Well we greeted him and everything and he said he was doing well and then we started the lesson. Well Hermana Gomez we had planned to start it, and while she was saying her beginning bit I just felt like we should throw the entire lesson out the window and talk about Christ on the garden of Mount of Olives, and how alone he was, how his apostles fell asleep every time he left, and how all Christ wanted was to not be alone while he was suffering for all the sins and the pains of the entire world, but that he had to be. And that he did that so that we would never have to feel that alone, and so he knows exactly how Claudio is feeling and wants to help him. Hermana Gomez was great, while I was talking about this she found a scripture about Job that wasn't in our lesson plan at all either. After which Claudio said that he wasn't righteous or a prophet or anything like that like Job was, and so I asked him about his son, and how if when his son Dillion makes a mistake does he love him any less? Which of course he said of course not, and so we testified that it is exactly the same with his heavenly father. Well, by the end our teacher was crying, and so who knows if anything we said will actually help his brother, but I think we may have at least touched his heart. And he told us stuff about "himself" or his brother during the lesson about how he had thought about suicide and all that stuff and I know that just that being his brother that must have been really hard for him to share. We left him some stuff in the book of mormon and just testified to him that we knew he would feel god's love if he read that. and he said he would, and that he'd come to church with us on sunday. So that was cool.

Oh, also, if Daniel or any of his family reads this, you can tell him that the joke I learned from him about what the difference between cows and argentines was my district's favorite when we got into a joke telling battle haha. The gringa wins. Score. :) that's all.

Cheers! Love you guys,

-Marie