Saturday, July 27, 2013

(10) PDAAAYYYYY!

IT'S PDAY! I AM SO EXCITED I GET TO TELL YOU EVERYTHING!! I oh gosh. there is so much to tell you guys and i only have an hour! I have this huge list of things that i've been writing all week so hopefully i wont forget anything!  Ok so I arrived at the MTC last wednesday and met my first companion, Sister Ray! She is so fab. She just turned 19 like a month ago so she is just a small baby child but she is really awesome. and like she knows everybody here, like im pretty sure her whole freshman byu ward is here at the mtc. every 5 steps we take she is stopping to say hi to someone. im totally not jelly.... hahah no but seriously im not. I've actually gotten to see a bunch of people which is so awesome. I see ethan all the time of course and Stephan subbed for my class last weekend so that was pretty great. and i saw aunt rosa too!  
     Ok so um i freaking LOVE IT HERE. seriously, i love it so much. like that was the very last thing i ever expected to happen but it's so so so true! seriously, it was the 2nd night here and i was just laying in my bed crying (yes you read that right, me crying. i do it all the time here apparently... whatever.) cuz this is literally the best desicion i have every made in my life. ever. I am so stinking happy here all the time and everything i was worried would happen/wouldnt happen isn't even a problem at all in any way and i have seriously never been happier. everybody should go on a mission! seriously everybody do it. you would not regret a second of it. and i mean everybody, if you aren't mormon, get mormon so you can go on a mission. hahahah
     Alright so what do my days here at the mtc look like?? Basically sister ray and i get up at 615 every morning, shower, get ready, and then head down to breakfast.  after breakfast we have personal study time which we use to read the BOM. Our branch president challenged us to read the whole thing in the 6 weeks that we are here which translates to roughly about 15 pages a day, and it is awesome! and then we usually have a 3 hour block of class time in which we are bombarded with portugues and then we have lunch and then usually TALL, which is like online lang. study stuff ( it always, always puts me to sleep. seriously it is so hard staying awake when all you are doing is just staring at a screen of foreign words) and then we usually have either gym time or another 3 hour block of class. and then we have planning time at 9, getting ready for bed, writing in journals, and then bedtime at 1030. rinse and repeat. that's my day structure. and it's actually pretty awesome, even if the days always seem like they are lasting for years.  Sundays are a little different. we dont have any classtime just church meetings and devotionals and such.  for relief society all the sisters go an hour early and get to watch music and the spoken word (ehh... its ok). this past sunday they had that one chick from youtube who plays the violin and jumps around and stuff... lindsey sterling...i think... and um im not gonna lie, she looked a little ridiculous. hahah i dont really get it... hahah yeah but then after music and the spoken word we have actual relief society which is actually just someone coming to speak to us ( i dont really remember who is was this week... but im sure it was good. hahah) and then after relief socitey this week we had a new sisters meeting where basically they told us all the things we could and couldnt wear/can and cant do. it was a little ridiculous. and by a little i mean a lot. they taught us how to sit down. like sit. in a chair. they taught us that. seriously. oh and also how to breathe (for stress... which was basically just deep breaths... the secret is revealed!!) and how not to look like lesbians (well not so much in those words but yes exactly that. hahahah). oh and we dont have to wear makeup if we dont want to but we should. hahah oh and we aren't supposed to move while we are sitting since it is too distracting...
     But yeah other than that nonsense it has been wonderful here! I LOVE MY DISTRICT. they are kind of the best people in the whole world (other than all of you guys of course :] ) They are just so much fun and i just dont even have the words fo it they are so wonderful! on our second day (last thursday) we ended up all teaching ourselves how to pray in portugues and it was kind of perfect! we felt so awesome! hahaha so there are 14 missionaries in our district (usually there is only 12, but we are the bomb.com so booyahh) 6 sisters, and 8 elders.  Sister Ray and I are the only sisters going to Sao Paulo Sul, the other 4, Sister Doman/Jackman (yes like Hugh... I dont think they are related) and Sister Hancock/Tucker, are going to Sao Paulo Interlagos. But they are our roommates and they are so great. sister d/j are literally the sweetest people i have ever met in my entire life. like just picture the kindest sweetest most loving people you can imagine and that is them. Sister Doman dreams about kittens for goodness sake! and sister h/t are awesome as well. they are the tall beautiful ones who have boyfriends waiting for them and i should hate them right? but they are so great and goofy. And then there are the elders! they are just fantastic. Remember how i told you there was an elder merkley in a meeting momma? well turns out he is in my district. hahah i will find out if they are related, dont worry. So it's elder merkley/bernard, and then elder oakes/larson (the only elders not going to sao paulo sul), and then dew/starr, and moralles/hoeft. elder starr reminds me of every guy friend i have ever had in my life all rolled up into a ginger so yeah he's pretty fab. but my fave (are we allowed faves?? whatever... haha) is elder hoeft. and let me tell you why. on monday we all played volleyball together as a district (yes i played volleyball and it was fun. shhhhush) and i wore my 'it's a monday' shirt. and guess who knew exactly what it was from?? that's right. Elder Hoeft. he knows olan. HE KNOWS OLAN! BOOM BOOYAHH YESSSSUUUSS. we may or may not quote every olan rogers video all the time and it is perfect. (if you are reading this and dont know who olan rogers is go, go now and look him up. youtube. now.) we also may or maynot have danger legs-ed our way through volleyball yesturday and it was fab. abby, show momma what danger legs is.
     Oh goodness! I almost forgot about Arisvan! So friday, as in 2 days after we got here, we taught Arisvan... in portugues. AND IT WAS AWESOME. well, that's prob a little bit of an exaggeration we basically just read portugues off paper but we did it! i thought i was going to be sick before but seriously we got in there and i was not nervous at all and it was wonderful. we've taught 3 lessons since then and it happens everytime. im a mess and then i completely forget about all of that as soon as arisvan opens the door and its wonderful. oh and stephen, while he was subbing out class, made us promise not to use notes for our 2nd lesson and we totally didnt and it totally worked! we were able to remember everything we wanted to say and even understand him a little bit and it was just been wonderful.
    Ok so i dont have much time left, the computers in this lab keep freezing and everyone keeps freaking out each time and praying that they start working again soon hahah but i do still have just a few more things to say, um like... oh! DEAR ELDER! DEARELDERDEARELDERDEARELDER! dear elder is kind of the most fanstatic creation in the history of creation. everybody should use it! momma, make sure everybody knows about it cuz it is fab. i didn't get it before. basically you type me up a letter on dear elder and send it andi get it later that day. it is so wonderful! cuz uh i've literally used up all my email time typing up this one email and i feel horrible cuz i have so many other emails that i dont have time to get to now, but if you use dear elder i can just hand write you back! so if i dont respond to your emails this week hopefully next week!
   Ok uhhh other stories... um someone explained to me what rice is like my 3rd day... like just this random guy saw that my name was rice and was all like 'oh man! i love rice! it's like those little grains that can be brown or white and taste great with everything!'... it took me a second to realize what had just happened... hahahah oh! and elder bullough's mom dear eldered me! it was so sweet! ummm harrison, they have scooby doo fruit snacks in the vending machines on my residence floor and i totally ate some in memory of new years./you really really should write me boy boy. abby, that's a supernatural quote, uh duh, i just cant remember when/who/where.... hahahah momma/dad/grammy, thank you for all the dear elders! i love them and they make my day everyday! Rebekah thank you so much for the packages! the greenie package was so awesome! i was totally gonna put up a picture of it/just more pictures in general but i am out of time... next week. for sure next week.
    I love you all and miss you like crazy! can't wait to talk to you guys next week! =]
 
Love,
Sister Rice
 
p.s.- sorry if nothing in this letter made sense... i was just trying to get it all down... hahaha

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Family Pictures!

     We somehow surprising managed to squeeze in time to take family pictures this morning before church!  Cutting it kinda close with only two days left till I leave, but that's ok. My friend Alicia took them for us and I think they turned out great!  Here's just a few:






Friday, July 5, 2013

Provo MTC

     So it's official. I am going to the Provo MTC instead of the one in Brazil.  My visa has not come through yet, so as of right now that's the plan. The plan can change at anytime though really. I've heard of people getting their visas 4 days before they were supposed to report, and of people who end up getting temporally reassigned somewhere in the states after their time in Provo. Really anything can happen.  But I'm not too worried. It'll all work out. I'll keep y'all up to date for sure though. =]