Hello/Bonjour/Iorana Everyone/Tout le monde/Tatou!!
Another Week in Paradise...
No, I am not in Tahiti yet, but it doesn't mean I cannot just love the MTC right now. It is really an amazing place, so many things to learn and young people dedicated to doing what is right. It is pretty sweet. It is weird it would be that way because we are here 11 weeks which is super long, but I don't think I could have learned to love this place in just 2 or 6 weeks. Tuahine Arbuckle and I will talk to other missionaries and they are always so sad for us to "have to be here that long," but we just tell them, "oh we love it!" I can't think of any other place where this many young people are this focused on one purpose. It is miraculous. This week in one of our district devotionals our leader, Brother Markham said, "It will be what you make it to be." And if you rely on God it will be a miracle what happens. I loved this quote and have been thinking about that all week, boy is that true with ANYTHING. I have been here for 6 weeks and that is the running theme for this week. With that said don't worry, I am having a great time. I am just writing this because it is true. I am so grateful to get a full MTC experience. God knew I was a slow learner and would need lots of time to really soak in the goodness of this place.
One of my favorite parts of the MTC is the choir. Like 800 missionaries join to sing a hymn and learn it in two practices. The director always gives like a mini devotional in the midst of the practice and what he said this week got me thinking, "why do I do the things I do?" As a missionary, I wear a name tag with my name and Christ's name on it. The director also said, "who's name are you accentuating, is it yours or Christ's?" I really don't know what else to write about this, besides the fact that it got me thinking. Christ gave the glory to the Father, am I doing that?
This week we continued to learn French. It is nice and easier for me to understand. I also am learning to push myself harder with speaking the language.
Tuahine Arbuckle and I had a skype lesson appointment in Tahiti on Thursday night to practice speaking Tahitian. It was fun. We literally understood like nothing and our teacher was watching us from behind and thought we were hilarious. I just kept saying "aita vau ite" which is "I don't know." The lady was awesome and laughed with us. Come to find out at the end she was asking, "Will I speak with you again?" and we said yes, and then she said "when?" and we just replied, "no." Oh boy! And then she was asking our names at the very end and we again replied, "I don't know." I felt like the missionary from The Best Two Years, who says, "this isn't the language they taught me at the MTC!"
Friday was full of surprises. Tuahine Arbuckle and I taught a lesson to our "investigator" who would never commit to a baptismal date and she FINALLY did. I wasn't expecting that, but it happened. It was our last lesson with her, though. Earlier that day I was praying for help to love that day because I was starting to loose it, but it was amazing how God answered my prayer by that and many other events. I'll share two more. I never get packages. I got one that day. It was really weird, but it happened. It came from Sister Giles. I had never met this lady before, but I guess her daughter stayed the night at our house because her daughter is serving a mission in GA. It was way crazy how that happened. In it were some super cute Halloween goodie bags. wow. I can't believe that holiday is happening this week, cool. Have a Happy Halloween! I would love to see pictures of the celebration. Ok, last thing for the miracle day. Our gold tag, Alan, came out and told us he was a member. We didn't even ask. It was awesome because I secretly wanted to get to the point where a gold tag had to come out, and it happened. My day was made beyond made.
One of the best things that happened this week was a classroom upgrade. We moved to a whole new building and it is like going from a motel 8 to a Marriott Marquis, soooo gooooddd! I now have access to a full-length mirror. We have white boards instead of chalk boards. A better window, better artwork, a bigger space, and it just looks friendlier. This change is great because Tuahine Arbuckle and I want to just start new and change and recommit because of it. I love it. That whole move took place yesterday and our district just had so much fun leading up to it. we put all our desks in a circle to read Preach My Gospel and teachers put the teacher's chair in the middle. It was so funny.
Funny language story time. Saturday we were in out lesson in French with John (really our teacher Brother Honey) and we always end up laughing during these lessons, because of one reason or the other, but it can be distracting, so we have been making goals not to laugh during the lessons (the struggle is sooo real). We had just taught a lesson in Tahitian so it was all fresh on my mind. Also during the French lessons, everyone else in the lessons (including myself) has to be very patient with me to when I speak French. I was trying to bear testimony of Jesus Christ, but I could not think of the French work for Jesus Christ (it is Jesus-Christ), the only thing that came to my mind was it in Tahitian (Iesu Mesia). So I thought really hard and after some time I thought I had come up with the word and said, "Iesu Christ." I didn't even catch it until I looked at Tuahine Arbuckle and she just said, "Iesu???" Then I broke our goal and just laughed. Ohh well.
Ok so then, the same lesson, I could not think of the word for heaven, so I just said, "Pere in heaven." I didn't catch that one either until Brother Honey told us after the lesson. Fun Times.
The last paragraph is some answers to questions I have got. Lessons have ups and downs, sometimes you feel it afterward and sometimes not as much, but we learn little by little or as Nephi explains, "line upon line, precept upon precept; here a little, there a little" (2 Nephi 28:30). I am so excited to go to Tahiti, but I don't want that to be a distraction from me her, right now at the MTC, so I try not to think about it a ton. Teachers sometimes tell stories about Tahiti, usually about the people and never negative or horror stories, because they don't want to freak us out. Travel information will come around November 24 or 10 days prior to departure.
Best of luck to everyone this week.
Love,
Tuahine/Soeur Campbell
In their old classroom, they put their desks in a circle around their teacher
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