Week 4 of Miriam's Mission (MTC Continued)

I made this picture for Miriam! This is her on the first day of Kindergarten. She has always been a little unsettled with big changes... and that first day of school was huge! She woke up excited to go but when she got to school and saw so many unfamiliar faces, we watched the nervousness begin to set in. Then they gave her a tour of the little bathroom in the classroom, she'd never had to use an automatic toilet before. It flushed louder than a jumbo jet taking off and she cried big frightened tears. Shortly after that, the teacher showed her the table for coloring but she just couldn't get her mind off new strange place with the screaming toilet (she called it "The Witch"- because the pipes made a high pitch squealing sound at the end of the super loud flush). 😂

This picture came to my mind when I thought of the changes she'll face going out into the field with a brand-new companion, experiencing the real part of her mission. She's excited but also nervous. 

We didn't get Miriam's regular email on Friday but she surprised us today with one. 👇💓 They treated today like her P-day because tonight is her last night in the Brazil MTC. We also got to facetime with her over Messenger for about an hour and a half. This missionary mom is feeling so happy today!! 

"The time has come, and I am now at the end of my MTC experience. It's somehow both flown by and felt like an eternity. I told my companion that I need to have a long talk with The Man Who Controls Time, because I'm sensing some gargantuan consistency issues here.

I don't feel at all prepared to go out into the field tomorrow, but I'm ready. I feel like I'm at a wall with learning Portuguese, so the field is where I'll have to learn it.

Again, there's not much to talk about since MTC is pretty much the same day in and day out. But I've met some awesome people here. 

My companion, Sister Stott, is fantastic. She's just as weird as I am; we had several interpretative dance parties to the youth music in the gospel library. We also had a fake fight the other night because I threatened to not invite her to my birthday party and to unfriend her on Facebook since we were getting ready for bed at the same time and ran into each other in the bathroom. One of the other girls in our district walked by our room and heard us yelling at each other. Needless to say that she was very confused.

One of my roommates, Sister Miller, is just as fantastic. She's a cowgirl and just as patriotic as I am. On top of that, she loves scary things and was absolutely dying of joy when I showed her a picture of the ventriloquist dummy in my closet. We've both agreed that when we're back from our missions, we need to hangout and watch come R. L. Stein Haunting Hour together 

I also met a companionship of a Brazilian sister, Sister (Or Hermana) De Angelo and Portuguese sister, Hermana Silva, at the beginning of this week. They're so kind and have been helping Sister Stott and I with our Portuguese, and they wanted to have a farewell party with us tonight. 

Now a little story about them.

So I lugged a full on winter coat down here just in case the weather got too cold. But after experiencing the weather here and having several people tell me that Piracicaba is even warmer, I regretted bringing it.

So today, while packing, I was trying to figure out what to do with it. Now, Hermana De Angelo is serving her mission in Argentina, which gets a lot colder. I brought the coat to her room and asked her if she had a winter coat for Argentina and, if not,  if she wanted mine. As it turns out, she didn't have one. She was so grateful for it (as a bonus, it was in her favorite color, too).

As obnoxious as my coat was to bring down here, I'm grateful that I did and that I was able to give it to someone who was really going to need it.

I'm excited to see what other stuff I can pawn off while I'm here 

Well, that's all for now. 

By the time I send my next email, it will be from the field.

Tchau!"

Week 4 of Miriam's Mission (MTC)

 I work five days a week at the dental lab in Provo and I'm usually very strict about being on my phone during work hours. Never in my life have I had social media apps on my phone because I don't like getting disturbed by all the notifications. In fact, even when I'm home, I keep everything on silent so much that I'm a very hard person to get a hold of. 

After Miriam left for Brazil, I soon realized that Facebook Messenger is the main way missionaries communicate with family - so naturally I have the Messenger App now to talk with Miriam. She's four hours a head of us and often the middle part of her day falls into my morning shift where she messages the most. Her notifications have a specific sound so I know it's her. In those moments, I'll break my policy to quickly glance at my phone. I'll gladly welcome interruptions from her any time of day!!! How did missionary moms ever survive without this amazing way of communicating??!! 

Sometimes she'll message me right when she gets up at 6am (which is 2am for me). The other morning I was awakened to one of those early texts from her saying, "IT'S GrounNd HoG DAY!" I had to hold my laugh in so as not to wake Joseph. That's her sense of humor kicking in over the monotony of day-in and day-out exact-same study routines in the MTC.  When she can joke like that, I feel like she'll be alright! 

Speaking of routines, she sent some photos of her in one of them. :) She didn't email this week but sent lots of pictures.

Happy.                                                                      Serious.

Happy....                                                                      Serious.... real serious!

Miriam finishes the MTC on Tues. Feb. 28th and leaves to her first area. 

Miriam with her MTC district. The man in the center with the white tag is Irmão Deivyd, one of their instructors. The missionaries loved him! He was very easy-going and had a fun attitude. 

The man in the center with the white tag of this picture is Irmão Zarza, one of their instructors. She said this instructor seemed like he hated his job. He never smiled in class and always seemed so gloomy. One morning, he slunked into class, put his back against the wall and slid down to the floor putting his face in his hands. This was typical of him. Every morning when the missionaries asked how he was doing, his answer was always, "Sad." He never said why, just seemed miserable all the time. He looks happy in this picture but maybe his smile is a little forced. Not sure what he was going through but I feel bad for the guy!

This is the missionaries last trip to the Sao Paulo Temple. When Miriam arrives in Piracicaba she'll be two hours away and I don't think they'll have that opportunity then. In the MTC they went every Friday for P-Day and they'd do Initiatories, Endowment, and Sealings all in one day.

There was a patron in the foreground and these are cropped-in/ zoomed-in photos showing the missionaries trying to photo bomb! 😂    Can you find Miriam in the one on the right?

Week 3 of Miriam's Mission (MTC)

Friday's are Miriam's P-Days while she is in the training center in Brazil. We spoke with her for an hour last on Friday and she said that there is a part of her that will be so glad to leave the MTC because it seriously looks like a hospital/prison with big white square tiles covering everything.  She says the classes all day long are draining too. They start early in the morning and go until 9pm every day. She says it's SO hard to stay focused and motivated to study for that many hours on end. I don't blame her!!!

As anxious as she is to leave the training center, it's the other part of her intimidation - going out into the field in 9 days is scary! Because, she knows that's when she'll be on her own with a new companion (crossing her fingers she's easy to get along with). And she will really be pushed into learning Portuguese and have to adjust to an entirely different culture, a new world that she's been somewhat sheltered from in the MTC. 

This past week, she and her companion were assigned to give a lesson 100% in Portuguese, no English at all. She said she was so horribly embarrassed by how terrible they did, by how terrible their Portuguese was. 

BUT the next time they had to teach, her companion had the idea to start with a prayer. Miriam said it made all the difference in the world. It also strengthened her faith in that principle. It was a little miracle!

Since it was Miriam's P-Day Friday, she wrote a general email too. (Which I always LOVE to get.) Here's her letter! 👇👇

-Alicia

02-17-2023

This past week came and went without much incident, but I'll find some things to share.

On Sunday, there was a decent thunder storm passing through between dinner and a devotional. Naturally, my companion and I decided to go run around outside in the rain. It started as just us, but soon there was motley crew of nine girls running around, shouting, laughing, and kicking disgusting muddy water at each other. A good solid 20+ elders were standing around just watching. The next day, a Brazilian-American friend of ours came up to us and told us that her Brazilian district had been watching us play in the rain and had been super confused by why we were so excited.

On valentine's day, my district all wore pink/red in our outfits and did a "photo-shoot". I thought it was pretty slick. Pictures are below.

Also, on a sidenote: we went to the temple again today, but since my district and another district we went with had already been, we waited while the new group did the tour. We decided to wait in the kids area because there were more couches. Pretty soon, all the elders turned back I to little boys and were huddled around a coloring station coloring Pictures of book of Mormon heroes and making jabs at each other's work. I snagged a picture.

Overall, a pretty average week.

I hope everything is going well for you guys. Let me know of any updates you have!

Week 2 of Miriam's Mission in Brazil (MTC)

 We were able to FaceTime Miriam on Friday for almost an hour. She seems to be doing so much better. Her spirit seems lighter and she is more herself. She shared her first email out to all our family and friends.

It was such relief to visit with for the first time, to hear in her voice and see in her eyes that she is adjusting, that her faith is growing stronger. I'm so proud of her! 

She has been asking me to send her downloads of some of her favorite Christian and instrumental songs. Whenever she does, I drop everything to meet that request because it makes me so happy to send her whatever kind of motivation I can.

She told us that she will be going out into the field on February 28th. The whole entire missionary program is a modern-day miracle. It's amazing to me that these missionaries can spend a month and a half to two months learning a language and then just dive in.

I'll copy-paste her letter below.👇👇

Well, I'm on day 26 of my mission, and day 10 of Brazil MTC. There's kind of a lot to talk about, so we'll see how much I can squeeze into this email.

Today (Feb 10th) we went to the São Paulo temple to do an Initiatory, endowment, and sealing to parents. Last night I prayed that I would be able to understand at least the endowment when we went through. We got there, and they entire ordinance was in English. So, technically, it was an answered prayer XD. It was a really sweet experience, though. I don't know when the last time any of you went to the temple, but they've changed the video for the endowment again. They've changed, added, and removed details, so I recommend going again.

In terms of companions and my district, I'm having a good time. All the girls get along really well, though they talk a little too much about their love lives for my taste, and my companion isn't quite as punctual as I am, but I can't complain. The girls are really nice and we all mesh well. One of the elders in my district (Elder McElderry) is really loud and his companion (Elder Fawcett) is a lot quieter. I can't tell if Elder Fawcett actually enjoys his companion's company or not...

 The food is pretty good. Often I don't know what I'm eating, but there have only been a few things that I don't particulary enjoy. Everything else is quite tasty to me. They serve Pão De Queijo every single morning, and beans and rice are served for lunch and dinner. On Thursdays we get ice cream after lunch and pizza for dinner. The only thing I wish they had more of was fresh fruits and vegetables.

They also give us vending machine money here. It's called Grancoffee. All the missionaries have an app on their phones that's loaded up with R$12 every single day. The snacks are really good, and the vending machine is stupid smart XD. You know that awful feeling when you buy something from a vending machine, the thing spins, and then your snack never falls and you lose your money? Well, not a problem here. If your snack doesn't come out the first time, Grancoffee waits for a second, then sends it's little net back up to fetch it a second time. If you never get your snack, it refunds you automatically.

[I don't really know how to describe the city, so I'll just have to send pictures at some point.]

Some funny stories:

Yesterday (Feb 9), our evening teacher, Irmão Deivyd, had us practice teaching our companions in Portuguese. We were supposed to pretend to stop someone in the street and give them a brief overview of the Book of Mormon and try and set an appointment. Once we were finished, he had us all get up, and he led us outside to a gate that overlooked a sidewalk. He turned to us and proceeded to inform us that we were to stop the people walking by and try and place a Book of Mormon. We panicked, of course. I, personally, wasn't super nervous, but I was laughing so hard. A few of the girls were feeling nauseous (this keyboard doesn't have spell check, so sorry for any and all typos). Finally, our teacher told us that he was just messing with us, and that we were going to practice with  our companions again; he just wanted to leave the classroom.

Elder Fawcett did actually try to talk to someone, though. A random guy was walking by and Elder Fawcett just went "Oi! Você gosta de futebol?? (Hi! Do you like soccer?) The guy responded with, "No." And Elder Fawcett just went, "Oh." They ended up having a little conversation though. It was hilarious.

Also yesterday, my companion and I (Sister Stott) were studying out in one of the gardens. Once we had finished, she started to put her shoes on, then she flipped out, kind of shouting, kind of not, "There's a caterpillar in my shoe!" Then, out plopped a three inch long, fat, fuzzy caterpillar. We named him Herbie.

On the 3rd, all the new missionaries had to go to the police station for passport stuff, or something. I don't really know why we were there. But, after breakfast that day, we new missionaries gathered together to get on a bus bound for the police station. However, before we even left, one of the Elders (Elder Stevenson) got pulled aside and led back inside the MTC because he didn't turn his passport in on the first day. It was wild, because I didn't see him for two days after that (not because anything happened to him, of course, but because I just didn't notice him. It was just funny because it felt like a freaky dystopian movie). At the police station, when we reached the front of a very long line, we noticed that our guide/interpreter was gone. We couldn't find her anywhere, so we just went onward into the police station and handed our passports and document to the Brazilian government workers who spoke no English and hoped for the best. Very exciting. 

We also have "choir practice on Sundays and, maybe, Wednesdays. We sing various hymns in English, Portuguese, and Spanish, and sometimes Japanese in French (my favorite).

Speaking of French, there's an Elder here -  whose name I can't remember - from the Congo, I belive. His native language is French, so he is actually completely alone because no one else except an instructor or two speak any French. So, he sits by himself and doesn't really talk to anyone because he can't. It's sad. But I did have a little conversation with him in my super broken French. It was all I could do, but he seemed happy to converse in a language he understood anyway.

In terms of seeing how Heavenly Father is looking out for me, I have one other story.

Some of you are aware of my horrible hair destroying habit, but that night it turned out to be a blessing. During the welcome devotional on I think the 1st, one of the members of the MTC presidecy's wives (Sister Beck) noticed me out of all the new missionaries because I was messing with my hair, and she sent her husband to come get me after the devotional because one of her kids has really bad anxiety and a similar habit, and she wanted to see if I was doing alright. If I'm being honest, the first two days of MTC were really hard, so I wasn't really okay when she asked, and I opened up to her. She's been looking out for me ever since, asking me how I've sleep or just how I'm doing in general.

I probably forgot about a lot of stuff. There's always more I could talk about, but I think I'll call it good here.

Love you all lots and hope you're having fun in North America.

Tchau!

Sister Miriam Rawlins

Week 1 of Miriam's Mission (MTC)

 We got a phone call from our Stake President Wednesday evening, February 1st. Miriam had arrived at the Brazil MTC early in the morning the day before. My heart sank as he read the letter from the MTC President to him. They contacted us out of concern because she had broken down crying several times in less than two days. It was severe enough that they asked if she suffered from clinical depression. Joseph and I reassured them that she has never been diagnosed with anything like that, her nature is very cheerful and fun. She's a very happy girl. 

I told them that I simply think she's trying to take everything all in, she's overwhelmed, tired from adjusting to the time difference and losing an entire night of sleep on Monday, she's in a foreign land,  and surrounded by a sea of unfamiliar faces. I think she just needs to build some friendships so she doesn't feel so alone, she needs time to adjust to all of the massive changes, and she needs food pretty regularly because her blood-sugar gets low very easy.... And I'm sure she is missing home.

Even though I know she'll get through this, it is so hard to know she's hurting. I think of her constantly... trust me, CONSTANTLY!! I'm sure the rest of the family is tired of me announcing clock updates of the current time in Brazil. 😏 I haven't been able to get any messages from her since her first phone call telling us she arrived. I didn't think it would be this hard waiting to hear from her for a full week - How on earth did moms ever do this when we didn't have internet and the policy was missionaries could only call twice a year???!!! What a blessing things have changed in that way!

Today, I'm so grateful I got a short message from her asking for a couple downloads from her Christian Music playlist. In order to do this, I had to purchase the mp3's off of Amazon Music and email them two at a time. I got carried away and sent almost all the songs off her playlist. I think I've spent over 3 hours doing it. But it made me feel good, like I could do something to help her be comforted.