February 27, 2013

New Address




Sister Marisa Andrews
Virginia Richmond Mission
9327 Midlothian Turnpike Ste 1B
Richmond, VA 23235



Hermana Andrews doesn't have her visa yet and so
 until then she will be sharing the gospel in Virginia!

Adios MTC!


Hola!
So it's saturday night...and we are in the laundry room having fiesta sabado. This is the life.
Technically not even Pday....but i wanted to send a little email. So a few quick things...

We had in-field training. It's where they tell you everything they don't tell you the first 6 weeks in class.
I will tell you more about the reassignment when i call, but basically our visas are not here yet. And pretty sure they just need to get us outta here so more people can come. One elder in our district is going to Columbia, and the rest of us are going to Washington DC south, Richmond VA, North Carolina, and Carlsbad. There are a TON of people reassigned, supposed to go to Brazil and Argentina. Our visas could get here in a day, or weeks. Who knows. We are hoping to get to fly to Argentina together though.

A teacher here went to Argentina on her mish. And said almost every sister gained at least 15 lbs. Whoa i am a little concerned. So i will be working on not coming home a fatty. :)

Dad asked about the spanish. Well, it's coming. It is so hard. Is there a pig-latin mission?!.... I can understand the teachers, and have basic conversations, testify, and the grammer makes sense on paper. But actually using all the subjunctive and other stuff when talking is another story.But i'm working on the spanish, and let's just hope when I walk off the airplane in 18 months i am fluent:)

Today was last day of classes! The MTC is a great place, and I know i will never be surrounded by so many missions again. But the time has come to move on, and I am SO EXCITED!
(p.s. my dinner tonight consisted of cereal - don't worry mom, i had the kind with fiber - , pineapple, some tatertots)
Mom, i got the packages today. Thank you so much!

La iglesia is verdadero! We had a testimony meeting today, and it was fabulous. Lots of great experiences this week. Things are not always easy, but the work is real. The gospel is true. I am realizing the importance of teaching the Atonement of Christ as the center of everything. Nothing is more powerful and meaningful than Christ's Atonement.
Well I am out of time...like usual....but i will talk to you in 2 days!!
Love you all!
-hermana andrews

February 18, 2013

Hola familia y amigos!
 
I am on week 5 here!

Thanks for the valentine stuff! :)
For valentines day me and Hna Mueller made the loveliest little cards for everyone in our district. They said things like 'roses are red, violets are blue, if you were a zit, i would pick you.' classy, huh.
 
I week ago i got a little sick...pretty much felt like a bus ran me over. But i got over it. Probably cause we sit and marinate in each others germs all day.
 
There are still little spanish voices that talk to me every night when I try to go to sleep. But don't worry, it's not a mental illness. Sometimes I just wish they would shut up and stop congegating words.
 
Dad wondered about our schedule. There's not a lot of exciting things, and every day feels like the rest! But it is good. Today we went to the temple, it was SOO busy. Guess that's what the holiday does. Each day is a little different, but we wake up, sometimes have gym, study and breakfast, more study or class, lunch, language, class or study, sometimes afternoon gym, dinner, and either class or study at night. We have 2 teachers. Classes are 3 hours long with a teacher. During class we learn a language principle, teach investigators (which is the teacher), and study some gospel or teaching principle. I need to be an MTC teacher.....not sure how that's going to fit into my plan...but I want to come back and teach here!! :) Each night we have planning, and then go back to residencies. I don't know how, but sitting all day is EXHAUSTING. Seriously. It's very mentally exhausting...but good. I learn SO much.
 
As for visas, we still have not heard!! No news is good news, but we will probably go to the travel office to find out. This should be our last week!!!!!! If visas will be here within 2 weeks, then we just stay here, otherwise we are reassned. I doubt we will be reassigned.

Now that I am on a misison, and see the results of even being in the MTC, I see the importance of serving misisons, specifically for young men. I didn't even realize to what extent misisons are necessary as we were in Honduras. It is SUCH a blessing to help those boys get on missions. There is no substitute for the testimony grown and learning that takes place as a missionary. I guess we will have to go back and help every single boy in honduras be able to serve a mission... :)
 
I love you all! I love the opportunity i have right now to learn and share the gospel! THere is nothing more important i could be doing at this time.
Have a fabulous week!
And I will have to let you know if i get travel plans....
 
love, hermana Andrews

February 13, 2013

To write a letter:

The MTC Address (Until Feb. 26th):
Sister Marisa Nicole Andrews
MTC Mailbox # 170
ARG-ROS 0226
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793

To send letters for FREE:
Dearelder.com
If before Feb. 26th, select 'Provo MTC'
Letters are sent  daily while she is in the MTC

week 4

Que hace un pez?.....
nada!
 
Hahahaha spanish humor. Our investigator told us the joke in a lesson. I have been going through laffy taffy joke withdrawls...
But hello!
I hope you all had a good week! I have about a million things to say....so we will see how much I have time for.  And if it makes sense...haha
First of all, this week was quite the week. It started out SO good.

Last night I watched one of the best talks I have ever heard. No joke. It's Character of Christ, by Elder Bednar. It was given at the MTC, so I don't know if there is a way to access a copy of it. But it has literally changed my perspective on my life (sounds cheesey and cliche, I know...), what it means to become like christ, and my purpose as a missionary. I wish every missionary could see it before they leave. And that every member of the church could see it. He talked about turning out to others in love, that nothing, especially a mission, is about us. We need to have more than a testimony. And as we teach others, it is about so much more than baptism, baptism is only the first step. Our conversion has to be to the Lord - not to our parents, friends, bishop, companion, or anyone else. I loved it, if you couldn't tell:)
 
Big news....We met with the Argentine Consul! So on Tuesday we had a meeting for all misisonaries going to Argentina. (There are a few that have been here since October awaiting visas). It is very difficult to get a visa there. We had to do fingerprints and sign stuff. It was VERY intense, as if your visa is processed and there is any error, including a fingerprint that is smeared or you sign outside of the box, your visa is denied, there are no second chances, and you are permanetely reassigned. On Wednesday the guy ( I was imagining some ornery old man with a cane...) but he was very nice, came. I guess it was cheaper than flying us all to California to fill out paperwork. Some people had to redo fingerprints, and we signed papers in front of him. The best part was he spoke all about Argentina and answered questions. It was so interesting, and makes me SOO excited! :) Ironic though that they focus so much on being a "friendly, welcoming" country, but are not fond of the US. And even less fond of our church. But whatever. Argentina is very italian, the food is going to be the best, there shouldn't be any spiders TOO big in rosario. Basically, Rosario has the best of everything. And Resistencia gets the worst of everything. Haha. Oh and Mom, they gave us a waterbottle filter the first day here to take. We don't know the status of visas though....there's a chance we will be here longer, I am honestly expecting an extra week. If everything was on time we could get travel plans this week...but who knows. Prayers would be appreciated, that things will work out how they are supposed to.  

 
Just to let you know, I have only had 1 BYU mint brownie here. One. But....they do have edible chocolate chip cookies. Actually, they are so good.
 
I have played the piano in sacrament. There are several people, but I'm sure I will in argentina.
 I look in my closet every day and am already sick of my clothes. haha. Good thing there's no boys to impress:) Mom, I will send you an email about other things I need before I leave. But those Born shoes are the best! I love them. SO comfortable. I will need some hot sauce to take, cause i hear it's not a item in argentina. And I am eating all the peanut butter now while availalbe.
 
Just so you are aware about letters, this is how it works. We get mail after lunch and dinner every day. (including dear elders). Except any dear elders you send after friday night, I don't get until Monday night. And mail doesn't come saturday night or sunday.
 
Thank you for all your love!
I love being a missionary right now! I have been leraning SO much about teaching. We do not become perfect like Christ, we become perfect in Christ. The spanish is coming....there's no way I would be able to speak as much as I do in only 3 weeks, without the help of my Heavenly Father.
Thank you for keeping me updated with everything, I love some connection to the real world!
TIme is up (of course...)
But love you!
-Hermana Andrews

February 4, 2013

Hello everyone!
I can't belive I am saying this....but time really is flying by at the MTC. The first week I wanted to die. But now it's good. It must be because it was groundhog day, an elders b-day, sunday....we celebrate anything. haha.
 
 I do see sterling! So the day you came, I wanted so bad to take a walk outside around that time, haha, and see you all!!! But, I had other things. Some elders went missing, so I gladly volunteered to walk around to find them. We were walking in the main building, and I ran right into Sterling! He had just dropped off his luggage and walked inside! We hugged, and I even gave him a kiss on the cheek:) Our meals overlap, so I do see him daily. Weird to see him as a little elder!

Big news....The Argentine consul (?spelling?) is coming this week! YAY! We have two meetings for visas.....Hopefully it's good news and we get our visas!!!!! 
 
 There is a SERIOUS bathroom issue here though....The building with our classroom has 1 bathroom on each floor for girls. Like 1 toilet. (And we always know what sisters are new, because they both walk in the door, and then you see 1 sister walk out when they realize it's only 1 toilet. haha) There is constantly a line, so going to the bathroom is quite time consuming. So I may need you to deliver a porta potty....
 
THis week we went to the TRC. Stands for something... maybe training resource center?...But it's where volunteers come, and we teach them. I loved it, because they are real people and we just have a conversation with them. We talked with the sweetest little old couple. I adore all the old people. And old missionaries.
 
I am realizing and being reminded every day the absolute importance of the spirit. The spirit will not be impeded by my inability to speak spanish. We cannot explain everything perfectly, but the scriptures and holy ghost can. The holy ghost is so so so important, because only through the holy ghost will people know the gospel of Jesus Christ is true.
Look up "earnest" in the bible dictionary. It talks about the holy ghost, and something I never knew. I love it. 
 
Today we went to the temple, lovely as usual:)

 
Dude, I have been here almost 3 weeks! Whoa. The spanish is...coming. I watched a mormon message in spanish, and just wanted to cry. Haha. It's so different listening to my white teacher speak, and some fluent foreign person go asdlf;jaksldfj;aklsdjfsadjjfjk. So wish me luck. I do understand most of what is said in our discussions when we teach, and in class. But it's totally different speaking it.
 
I hope you are doing well! I love hearing about home! I love you all! Thank you for the prayers, they are much needed. Have a fabulous week!
love, hermana andrews
 

January 28

HAPPY BIRTHDAY STERLING!!!!! AND YOU COME TO THE MTC THIS WEEK!!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOHHHOO:)
 
Yes, I sure did have to give a talk. As we were walking to sacrament, I had this little thought. But I thought whatever, and wanted to prove that it was my own thought. haha oops. They announce the names right when we go up. Anddd...I had taught district mtg (sunday school) just earlier. So the talk was awful. My excuse is I have had 1 week of spanish in my life. We were all pretty sure some elders would be speaking, as this was (supposed to ) be their last week. Good think I was obedient and prepared a talk! Glad that's over with. Even though in another 3 months I will be laughing about it. 
 
 So about this week...Thanks so much for letters!!! I love getting them. Thank you thank you everyone! The dear elders are like texts...but I can't respond.
 
Ok so there's a bunch of random things, forgive the bad organizational format. You get what you get. :)
Mom, you would be proud. I have been eating my grapefruit and raisin bran for breakfast. Sterling, you will love the food. Especially sunday/wednesday BYU ice cream days. It is ridiculous how many packages the boys get here....I don't need any, cause some days one elder in our district will get 3 or 4 packages with food! They are so generous and give us so much junk food. :) Except we never even have time to eat, except at meals anyways! Oh and for gym....We usually get 40 minutes of gym per day. Except sunday and p-day and a morning that we are not scheduled for gym. There is a track, 10 xs around is a lap.
 
 Everyone here has been sick. Like it's a plague. There is no handshaking, and we use more handsanatizer than the amount of food we eat. But I have been so blessed to not get sick. Good thing I ate dirt and cookie dough when i was little to build up my immune system. It has pretty muched been passed around every district.
 
So we teach 'investigators'. The spanish has been hard, and one day the teacher said I need to teach the lesson, because it was my companion  that would talk most of the time. So, I taught almost an entire lesson myself. It was by no means fantastic, but I made it through it. We taught her a few more times, and have a baptisimal date:) But now that investigator is our teacher. And this week we have 2 new investigators. The investigators are all played by a teacher, and the investigator story is a real person from their own mission.
 
A little about what Sundays are like. So busy. THe girls go to music and the spoken word, and then Relief society. Then we have district mtg, lunch, sacrament, walk to the temple (it was soo warm yesterday, what is up with the snow??!), choir, study, devotional, and movies. Sunday nights you watch movies or talks. Yesterday we went to Joseph SMith movie. What I'm saying is, no nap time. They are really good, but it's just go go go here.
 
Ok here's the spiritual part, what I learned this week:) Everything we do should have a purpose. Everything. When we read our scriptures, we need to have a purpose, for example a question in mind. As we learn the language, we do it with a purpose, or specific phrases or things we need to know to teach a specific lesson. When we have a purpose we accomplish more. Everything CHrist did, said, and taught was purpose driven.
 
Love you all, thank you for all your prayers, love, and support!
Thanks for keeping me updated about everything!
Love, hermana andrews