Kori's Alpine Stories: 2 April 2013- Week #2

*** Just a quick note from Mom-
I got a call from the MTC today, Kori will be leaving with her travel group for Germany on 30 April-

Guten Morgen!

Meine Mitarbeiterin und Ich woke up super early this morning so that we could get our laundry done! The laundry room is crazyyyyy all the time, we went at 6:00 am and still had to look for an open washer.

Our roommates left early this morning for the mission field, which was super exciting! They are going to Costa Rica! I'm super excited for them. It was kinda fun having Spanish-speaking roommates. One of the things that I love about the MTC is that people can carry on a conversation in multiple languages and everyone understands relatively fine! "Guten Morgen Schwesters!" "Hola Hermanas!" "Wie Gehts?" "Bien, bien, gracias!" Happens all the time..

So Monday was our last day teaching our "investigator", and then he came into the class to give us a review of how we did. But he came in and introduced ourselves as our 3rd teacher that we thought had been AWOL for the past two weeks. I guess that your teachers are your investigators in the MTC. Everyone in the class knew that but me! They said that they didn't want to "spoil the surprise," but I felt like the 16 year old kid who still believed in Santa Claus because nobody wanted to "spoil the surprise" lol. So we started teaching our new "investigators" this week, which is going ok I guess. There's one untersucher that doesn't know anything about God, so me and Sister Regnier are having to start completely from scratch with him! The other is a Catholic Priest, so that'll be a hard thing to convert him too.

The language is getting better and better each day! There are words that I hardly say in English anymore, I only say prayers auf Deutsch, my English spelling is going down the drain, and I find myself capitalizing all of my nouns. No offense to the English language or anything, but I think I like German much better! The hymns auf Deutsch are mostly the same, but with a few translation differences, and they are just so much more beautiful auf Deutsch than in Englisch! Especially "Families can be together forever." Sehr shon. And I learn so much about the English language through German. The Germans like to put little words together to form more complex words, so I learn a lot about the meaning of words in English when I learn German. It's amazing. And my companion and I have stopped writing scripts for our lessons. We just write down a few key words we don't want to forget, say a prayer before we go in to teach unser untersuchers, and then let the Spirit guide us! It's amazing that it's only week 2 and we are already teaching 30 minute lessons auf Deutsch. I really think that everyone should learn German, Elder Uchtdorf said that Deutsch is the language we spoke in the pre-existence ;P

Just to clear up the email thing, missionaries CAN write emails to friends, but not while in the MTC. So for the next 4 weeks, family only. But we can write emails up to an hour now, but we are supposed to be considerate to people waiting for a computer. And we can read letters every day of the week, but we can only respond on our P-days. But honestly, getting letters is way more fun for missionaries! Dearelder is one of the best things, and it's free while I'm in the MTC *hint hint*

So I realized that this past Sunday was my last fast and testimony meeting in English for the next 18 months. That's kind of an intimidating thought!

On Friday, I was kind of going through the motions that every missionary does. The whole "I'm so inadequate, I'll never learn the language, everyone is progressing more than me, why don't I feel the Spirit all the time, blah blah blah..." and it was amazing how much of a difference that attitude had on my day. I was crankier, moodier, and surprisingly, I couldn't understand a word that my teacher was saying in class. I guess that's when it hit me how much I really do have the Spirit in my life. The Spirit helps me feel love towards my companion and my district, it helps give me strength and confidence, and it helps me understand and speak the language. As missionaries, many of us get frustrated because we don't think we feel the Spirit, when the reality is that it's with us all the time. We don't really notice it when it's there, but we sure notice it when it's gone. I'm glad to say that I am back to normal, and not letting the adversary put such thoughts into my heart anymore!

And my companion and I just found out that we are the only Sisters going to the Alpine mission in the MTC right now! And the MTC doesn't get more german speakers until we all leave, so for 6 weeks there will be only be 2 new Sisters in that mission-us! Kinda cool to think that we were called specifically to the time and area that we were.

Got to go to the temple again today. It gets cooler and cooler every time! It's crazy to see how my attitude, desires, and perspectives have changed ever since I entered the MTC. Life is good.

I love you all so much and hope all is well!

-Sister Peterson