Ola min ha Familia!
So I just finished my first official day as a full time missionary! Crazy. I absolutely love it here. A part of me hopes I stay haha. My companion and I are literally soul sisters. She is a little older than me and is from Orem. She loves to run and so we go running together! She is going to Natal. I'm living with 6 other sisters and everyone is so nice but for real, I lucked out with my comp because she is just amazing. She actually took a semester of Portuguese so she's ahead of me but helps me so much!
Tomorrow is our first time teaching a full lesson to an investigator in Portuguese and I'm super nervous! But, I can already pray and say a lot more in Portuguese than I thought. Oh my gosh, so the first time we had "People & Purpose" which is where 80+ missionaries speak/teach an investigator. A couple missionary literally taught false things and the lesson ended in yelling. Sister Brown and I were dying laughing!
Everyone here is so nice! My sister training leaders are the best and have shown me so much. It's kind of weird because my comp and I got here the same day sooo... we still don't know where a lot is. But we will figure it out!
So get this! Elder Markham and Elder Hammond are companions and in my district as well as Elder Waters! We all have so much fun together - I love it!
Ok, so some rumors I should share: My carry on can't be more than 10lbs. Not for my flight to Brazil but from Brazil to Manaus. Oh, and 3 Elders are going to Manaus from my district.
My P-day is Tuesday! I don't get very much time to email.
So another thing: Sister Brown has her visa but there wasn't a companion for her in Brazil so they told her she needed to wait here until a sister gets her visa and can travel down with her!! She almost started crying when I told her I have 4 dots {on the consulate website each step the visa process goes through is marked with a "dot"}. She said it took 8 days after those dots before she got her visa in hand. So if all goes well we will be headed down together! What a blessing - hopefully we don't get split up. Could someone just check my dots again and email me before Tuesday?
Oh, and another rumor is that even if you have the dots...they can go back to just processing :( - That would be so sad!
Sister Brown got some nasty blisters on her feet the first day so I got to help her! We literally packed SO well. Except we forgot hangers hahaha. But, there is a store here where I can buy everything! I might be sending a little bit more home because of the pound limit.
I loved all the sweet notes you guys made for me. I stuck them around our whole dorm and the girls love them too.
We have zero free time here so this was all I could write in 15 minutes! I love you all so much - thank you for being the best family in the galaxy. Hopefully I will have more time to write once I'm in the field but for now it's cram time! :) This place is seriously so powerful and I have never felt closer to my Savior. I haven't cried since you dropped me off. I am well taken care of so don't worry for a minute. Love you all and I will email on Tuesday!
Love,
Sis. Arbuckle
P.S. The food is gross so I'm starving all the time.
So I just finished my first official day as a full time missionary! Crazy. I absolutely love it here. A part of me hopes I stay haha. My companion and I are literally soul sisters. She is a little older than me and is from Orem. She loves to run and so we go running together! She is going to Natal. I'm living with 6 other sisters and everyone is so nice but for real, I lucked out with my comp because she is just amazing. She actually took a semester of Portuguese so she's ahead of me but helps me so much!
Tomorrow is our first time teaching a full lesson to an investigator in Portuguese and I'm super nervous! But, I can already pray and say a lot more in Portuguese than I thought. Oh my gosh, so the first time we had "People & Purpose" which is where 80+ missionaries speak/teach an investigator. A couple missionary literally taught false things and the lesson ended in yelling. Sister Brown and I were dying laughing!
Everyone here is so nice! My sister training leaders are the best and have shown me so much. It's kind of weird because my comp and I got here the same day sooo... we still don't know where a lot is. But we will figure it out!
So get this! Elder Markham and Elder Hammond are companions and in my district as well as Elder Waters! We all have so much fun together - I love it!
Ok, so some rumors I should share: My carry on can't be more than 10lbs. Not for my flight to Brazil but from Brazil to Manaus. Oh, and 3 Elders are going to Manaus from my district.
My P-day is Tuesday! I don't get very much time to email.
So another thing: Sister Brown has her visa but there wasn't a companion for her in Brazil so they told her she needed to wait here until a sister gets her visa and can travel down with her!! She almost started crying when I told her I have 4 dots {on the consulate website each step the visa process goes through is marked with a "dot"}. She said it took 8 days after those dots before she got her visa in hand. So if all goes well we will be headed down together! What a blessing - hopefully we don't get split up. Could someone just check my dots again and email me before Tuesday?
Oh, and another rumor is that even if you have the dots...they can go back to just processing :( - That would be so sad!
Sister Brown got some nasty blisters on her feet the first day so I got to help her! We literally packed SO well. Except we forgot hangers hahaha. But, there is a store here where I can buy everything! I might be sending a little bit more home because of the pound limit.
I loved all the sweet notes you guys made for me. I stuck them around our whole dorm and the girls love them too.
We have zero free time here so this was all I could write in 15 minutes! I love you all so much - thank you for being the best family in the galaxy. Hopefully I will have more time to write once I'm in the field but for now it's cram time! :) This place is seriously so powerful and I have never felt closer to my Savior. I haven't cried since you dropped me off. I am well taken care of so don't worry for a minute. Love you all and I will email on Tuesday!
Love,
Sis. Arbuckle
P.S. The food is gross so I'm starving all the time.