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!