Ola Amigos!
So Friday is what they call "in field day" it's basically where they pump
you up to do missionary work. It's 13 hours of meetings and it's a LOOONG day.
So pretty early on in the day I connected with an Elder who was deaf. He had a
cochlear implant and we talked for a while about how strange it was for him to
be able to hear. He was going to Australia on his mission. He's English
speaking. He's deaf. Needless to say, speaking with him is a little harder
because his words are very robotic. Anyways, we signed a lot of the day-it was
so strange to be pulling out the sign language after 9 weeks of straight up
Portuguese! During the lunch break I was signing with him and my friend, Sister
Sa Gari (from Brazil) came up and started talking to me in Portuguese. So i
started translating her Portuguese and his signs for a few minutes-very weird
experience. After dinner I even was chatting with him before the class and the
teacher began speaking quietly. He couldn't hear so he asked me to translate for
him. I was VERY nervous but he understood the main points of the message and
said I was did just fine. Except at one point, I am sitting in between him and
his companion...and his companion doesn't sign...or speak Portuguese and I
couldn't remember the sign for angel so I turn to the companion and I'm all
"como se dez" and he's like wha??? hahaha wrong languages. Apparently my sign
box is the same box my Portuguese is kept in. At least for now.
Along those lines, my angel of the week is my deaf friend. I can't remember
his name for some reason so he's "my deaf friend". Last night he asked me what I
was most nervous about in the field. I told him I was very nervous that I would
forget all the Portuguese I knew in Arizona. He just shook his head and said in
his robotic voice "Sister Sackley, I am deaf. I will never speak better English
than I do now. People will always have a hard time understanding what I am
saying. In a few months, you will speak perfect Brazilian Portuguese. God has
reasons for me going to Australia. He would not set me up to fail. There are
reasons you are going to Arizona and then Brazil, you've just now got to find
those reasons, I know the Lord knows what he's doing". Needless to say, it was a
tearful moment and right after he volunteered to say the prayer. In his robotic
voice he gave a beautiful prayer and sat back down. His confidence and boldness
inspired me, that's for sure!
Dear Logan and Garrett and any other boy who has yet to go on a mission and
is reading this letter: Be. Chivalrous. To. All. Women. I can
not even begin to tell you what a difference it makes in the Elders that have
and don't have this quality. It doesn't matter who she is or how weird she is or
how weird she looks or how weird she smells. Open the door for her. Or at least
give her the same respect you would give your mothers. Thankfully I have been
blessed with very good Elders, but I have seen others here and I know what goes
on for others. Just be nice okay? That's all. Treat her like how you'd want your
future wife to be treated.
Alright this is weird I have 13 minutes left and nothing else to say! So I
guess I have this: To all of my single lady friends who are questioning a
mission in the slightest: go.
I can't really say how hard the last 6 months of waiting were. it felt like
the day to go would never come, and at the same time it came so incredibly fast.
Advice i would give though? They are hard months. hard and confusing months. So
i will say for sure that if you are questioning it at all, go to the Lord. And
then remember that Satan will try everything he can to get you to not go.
EVERYTHING. So realize that when everything is falling through and your
testimony is on the rocks that is Satan. And that you should just acknowledge it
for what it is.
Mission work is HARD work. Nothing
about it is easy. It's meant to be stressful and it's meant to be frustrating. I
think that's the best part about it. You are always going to be tired. But even
in the past 2 months I have been here, I have noticed serious changes in my
life. I have realized that the Lord knows me a whole lot better than I know me.
And that the people I have met here and the things that have happened, were
always meant to happen. There is no where else in the world I would rather be
tonight than in this computer lab with the German elders. (side story: they're
from Germany and they're all "speak English to us sister!")
No but for real. Go on a mission, I was so nervous about how weird some of
the sisters might be here at the MTC or how naive I would think the elders
were...and you know what? If you are looking for the weird sisters, you will
find them. if you think the elders are naive, they will be naive. But if you
come here and realize how many sisters are in the same boat as you? How many of
them had the same problems, the same doubts, the same fears you would realize
you were meant to be here all along. And you know what, the elders have their
moments. And so do I. And it's great to pretend you're 19 again. Because when
you start hearing them bear their testimonies, it doesn't matter how old they
are. they've got the same name tag on that you do.
Alright I am getting off my soap box. Tomorrow is my last night here! It's
a strange feeling to be honest, i am packing my stuff (please pray it all fits:
warning to anyone going foreign speaking: they give you about 25 pounds worth of
books....yep). And I am going to miss my little Mozambique/Angola elders so bad!
Ah they are the best and it's so weird to be leaving them. I feel like we've all
known each other for years at this point. Also, please pray for Sister P.
She will be a solo Sister and I'll be honest, her elders have not been as
amazing as mine have. Pray that she makes it!
I leave the MTC at around 5am...there are A TON of us leaving then, so
hopefully we leave on time. My flight leaves at 8:20am. So I will check in as
soon as I can and then call...maybe like 6:30am my time? We will see. Pray all
goes well!
eu te amo!
Sister Mad
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