The Other Side of the World: First Week

Hello Family!

So, I made my list of things to tell you all and it may be a little disorganized as I write to you, but this way I can write everything I want to.

The first item on the list is that I ran into 4 people I knew on the first day! Crazy right? The next day I ran into 4 more... so far I've seen about 12. My Kasama (companion) tells everyone that I'm popular. :) I think it's just from living in Utah all my life and then attend BYU-I. That's where all the missionaries come from!

Speaking of that though, our MTC president told us that this new batch of missionaries had the most international missionaries that there has ever been. There are missionaries from 32 countries! Can you believe it? Along with that, 895 missionaries entered the same day that I did. The church is becoming a powerhouse and it's so exciting to be a part of it.

Next on the list is the shower! It's not as bad as a bucket, but I keep forgetting my shower shoes which is just a little gross. The first time I took a shower I forgot my towel. I was showering at 5 in the morning so there wasn't anyone to call out to. I just had to dry off on my clothes. Gross!

So my companion, Sister Gaspar De Alba and I are already best friends. We have so much in common! She has 4 boys and 3 girls in her family, we both went to BYU-I majoring in Integrated Art Studio with an emphasis in Photography- the list goes on forever!

She makes me laugh all the time and we are always on the same page as one another. Good thing, right?

When I first saw her name, Kristina Rebecca Gaspar De Alba, I thought I had 2 companions! What a crazy long name!

Learning the language has been a lot of fun! It's hard work and you literally speak it/ learn it all day long. Our teacher only teaches us in Tagalog. Sometimes that can be a problem, like yesterday. She gave us an assignment to teach a new investigator, Ramir. We had to prepare a lesson all in Tagalog for him. Then she spoke to us for a long time in Tagalog that no one understood! When she was finished she asked if we understood. We all said "opo"(yes) because we were hoping our Kasamas could explain it later. Well it turns out she was giving us all instruction as to where to meet Ramir and explaining that we wouldn't have class during the next block. When the next block came around we waited for 1 1/2 hours before someone explained where we were supposed to be. (Don't worry though, it was constructive waiting). ;) So we went to teach poor Ramir really late! When it was our turn, we did pretty okay with the language and our lesson but then we asked him a question (really bad idea) and he went off for 2 minutes in tagalog. When he was done, my Kasama and I turned to one another like, "What?!" and then she asked, "Can we still pray with you?"

He said, "Opo! Opo!" Like, haven't you been listening to me? It was really funny and a little bad for a new investigator, but oh well. Hopefully we can do better with our next lesson which is on Monday.

After our 12 hour study/ class we are so exhausted that we literally do just collapse into our beds. Whew! You were right Tatay! (Father)

The classrooms are really cold and my Kasama and I sit right next to the vent. We have come up with a way to make use of our "freezer" and we stick our water bottles on it so that we always have cool, refreshing water. Haha. Yesterday I forgot my name tag and didn't have it for the first hour. Whoops. An Elder called me out on it and I found it attached to my shirt in my laundry. :)

Okay. So Gym. I love Gym and was looking forward to playing a sport like basketball or soccer but you have to stay with your Kasama so I did weight-training with her instead. It turned out to be really fun though and I felt really good yesterday. If nothing else, I'm going to loose ten pounds instead of gain them because of the food and exercise, which I am totally okay with. I get to go to the temple soon and I'm really excited!

I should probably end my email now.

Mahal Kita, pamilya! (I love you, family!)

-Sister Beaumont

First P-day! (Left to right,back to front: Elder Matina, Elder Crager, Elder Jenkins, Elder Johnston, Sister Seastrand, Sister Gaspar De Alba, Sister Williams, Sister Beaumont, Sister Martinez, Sister Burt, Elder Salisbury, Elder Burbidge)