So this has been a super crazy 10 days! They say the days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days here, and they weren't kidding. I can hardly remember the beginning of the week so I brought my journal to help jog my memory haha. I'll try to collect more story like things so these will be a bit more fun in the future. :)

 

My first day at the MTC was a bit crazy! Well first, I departed from Medford way early and said some final fairwells (bless you all for getting there so early), then I was picked up by the wonderful Ryan and Maren and met quite a few great people in the Cougareat before heading in. Once I received my badge with that little orange/red/whatever dot, I couldn't walk two steps without someone shouting "WELCOME TO THE MTC!" in my face. I almost expected everyone to break into song and dance, people were just so enthusiastic and it felt a bit weird haha. My 30 minutes of sleep probably didn't help either! But I went in with a smile on my face and purpose in my step, even though I was pretty much lost 90% of the time. It was all good though. My companion missed her flight from Jersey so she didn't get in until 10:00pm last Wednesday! She's already fluent in Spanish so she really didn't even need the first day's class haha.

 

Speaking of my companion, Sister Hernandez is wonderful! She and I get along super well and even begin "spiralling" at the same time after dinner. The first few days was just made up of a lot of laughing because we're absolutely hilarious. My district is also fantastic! There's 12 of us -- 6 Sisters and 6 Elders. We're all headed to the same mission and waiting on our v's (our branch president forbids the word "visa" around here). We've got a lot of jokesters so it's a bunch of laughs, but the cool thing is that everyone wants to work hard and do all we can to learn the lingua! We 6 Sisters all live in the same dorm and have started a quote wall because honestly, the MTC makes you go a little crazy. And the results of that crazy are hilarious.

 

Sister H and I began teaching Carlos, our first "investigator," last Friday, and we finished our fifth lesson with him this Wednesday. The whole lesson thing was a huge learning curve for us, but by the end we were able to go in with just a few scriptures and a topic and speak by the Spirit. My Portugues is still way choppy but I was at least able to get a message across enough for him to agree to be baptized! :) Carlos ended up becoming our second teacher so he now knows all of our language faults haha. It's crazy though -- he's from Brazil but he lived in Jax Beach for a while! He went to Nease and Ponte Vedra but swam at Bolles. It still blows my mind how the one teacher I got has been to Jacksonville and knows about Bolles! Also swam there for a time, that's pretty impressive. Who'da thought. (His name is Jason Rodrigues if any of you Jax kids were curious.)

 

Honestly though, the MTC is a huge emotional and spiritual rollercoaster. I've had the highest highs and the lowest lows here, all in these past 10 days. It's mostly highs though. :) At times I'm super disappointed in myself for some dumb reason, but then something happens -- like when the chior director quoted Star Trek ("she's givin it all she's got, captain!") -- that brings my spirits right back up.

 

Also my English has already started to disappear so for future reference, there will be gramatical and spelling errors from here on out. :)

 

I'm super grateful for all of the letters I've gotten! Sorry if my replies were short, the first week is crazy busy. But for future reference, my email is alexis.kaegi@myldsmail.net and you can mail me things for free through DearElder (and I get them on the same day you send it!). I'm box #30 and I leave August 27th to the BRA-SPIN (Brazil Sao Paulo Interlagos) mission!

 

Lots of love to you all! Talk to you next Friday,

 

Sister Kaegi

 

PS: This is my favorite word in Portugues so far: "diligentimente." If you tried saying it without knowing Portuguese, you're probably wrong. :)

PSS: I forgot to say this!

First 30 Minutes of MTC and I see this kid. (30 Minutes of sleep = I don't even care about sweat stains haha)

Me and my companion at our room door.

Connor and I with our companions

My District ... all the sisters are going to Sao Paulo Interlagos!