Hola!
I wasn't sure I would even write any emails until I got out to San Diego, since the online MTC is a bit more of a gradual lifestyle change than the regular MTC likely is. I wasn't sure I'd have anything to write home about haha! So I'll keep this first email short.
On May 26th, I began the online Missionary Training Center, where I am being trained on how to invite others to come unto Christ, as well as learn the Spanish language. On July 6th or 7th I will complete my training and fly out to San Diego, California. It is there that I will spend the next two years!
The first couple of days of classes were very exhausting mentally. My teachers started out speaking about 50% English, 50% Spanish. Listening to that much Spanish for 6-7 hours a day really wore me down at first haha. At this point though, I'm much more used to it, and I can usually understand what they are saying! Now my teachers talk exclusively in Spanish, except for the times my teacher will ask a question and be met with blank stares from the whole class. Then, she will translate it to English.
I had a pretty good basic understanding of Spanish, which has helped a ton. I remembered a lot more than I thought I would from Spanish class in High School (Shoutout to Mrs. Imaz!). But I've also learned a ton the last few weeks, and can now say decent prayers in Spanish without opening my eyes to look at my notes. I still have a long way to go before I will feel completely confident in speaking Spanish, but it's been very eye-opening to see how fast I am learning.
A normal day for me consists of 2 three-hour classes with my District of 11 other Elders y Hermanas, occasionally a one-hour workshop (with all the districts in the MTC, so about 200 missionaries total), one-hour of companion study, one-hour of language study, and one-hour of personal scripture study. All of these take place over Zoom.
Here's a funny story from the workshop on Monday:
One of my good buddies from high school, Jacob Ballard, started his MTC on the same day that I did (I'm sure a lot of you know Jacob haha). So we see each other on zoom every week during the MTC-wide workshops. Usually we just make funny/dumb comments in the chat to each other after one of us speaks in the workshop. But on Monday, I saw Elder Ballard with this (picture 1) sign in the background of his room. I thought it was hilarious, so I sent a message into the chat telling him to pose. I took a screenshot, then thought it would be funny to set it as my background. He saw it, and did the same thing. We did it back and forth a few times, picture 2 is the final product haha.
That’s about all I got for now. Nothing too crazy exciting just yet, but I’m sure once I get to the field I’ll have more interesting things to write about.
Pictures:
Pic 1 and 2: Elder Ballard and I in the workshop
Pic 3: Oakley and I had dinner with our sister Jenna
Pic 4: My district
Pic 5: Pickleball!
