Week one at the MTC!

 Hello Friends and Family!

This has probably been the busiest and most spiritual week of my life!  In my written letter home I said, “so much is going on here, it’s crazy!  I am always going going going…”

The first thing we did when we arrived at the MTC was meet our companions.  My companion, Sister Maughan, is from Montana.  She's so great and the more I get to know her and her strengths, I see why we were pared together.  There are four sisters, including me, and four elder, in my district.  There are two districts going to Thailand.  Ironically, there are two Sister Petersons, but we’re in separate districts.  Sister Her and Sister Carter are the other sisters in my district.  I actually met Sister Carter's grandparents when I was in California visiting Ann’s (roommate who got married this summer) In-laws.  “Small world.”  Most of us girls are twenty one, which I'm happy about because I was worried I would be old here.  J  Sister Carter is the only one in my district who is 19 but she’s so amazing, you would never notice an age difference.

For the first three days, my teachers only spoke Thai, part of a full immersion method or something.  At first it was stressful, especially since we taught our first lesson in Thai on day three.  Now that they speak English and Thai, I can look back and say it made me a better speaker.  J

We started teaching a progressing investigator (who's actually an actor) on day three.  Since it was all in Thai, I was soooo nervous! My companion and I taught “Som Bad,” our investigator, about God and his love for us. I was worried the spirit wouldn't be there because we were basically incapable of understanding his responses, but I definitely felt it helping me know what to say and remember the words I had been taught.

After our first lesson I was definitely discouraged I couldn't understand anything he said.  When we talked to two of the elders in my district, they told us they forgot how to pray, in the middle of their prayer.   They opened in the name of Heavenly Father and immediately closed the prayer, in the name of Jesus Christ.  J  That made me feel better.

Lesson two went ok.... ten times better.  We taught Som Bad how to pray, which is ironic because I learned to pray in Thai some 24 hours previously.  We asked him to give the closing prayer to our lesson.  He didn't want to but then we told him we would help him.  He agreed.  He looked really shocked when we asked him to pray but he actually did.  When you remember that he is an actor, it’s really funny, no one else in our district asked him to pray.  LOL  He was probably caught off guard.  He made us tell him what to say word for word, but sometimes he would say more than what we asked him.  He really does know how to pray in Thai.  By the end of the prayer, he was having a hard time not laughing at himself.

On Monday, we taught our third lesson.  My companion and I were probably a little cocky after how well our second lesson went, but we were quickly humbled when we told Som Bad that we were prophets and spent the rest of the lesson clearing that up.  It was really hard because we couldn't understand 3/4ths of what he was saying. 

LOL  But once again, the Elders came to the rescue of my self esteem.  How?  Because one companionship in the other district tried to explain baptism to there investigator, but instead of saying you go under the water and come out clean, they said you die under the water and come out a ghost.  J LOL  Needless to say, he declined the invitation to be baptized. 

Despite the disaster of our lesson, my companion and I did give him a Book of Mormon and asked him to read and pray about it.  Cross you fingers that he does.  Sometimes these actors like to be difficult and prepare us for non-golden Investigators.  :-(

 

Much more to follow…Pictures with names and labels are in the works.