sea2swe: Tennyson's Week 2 in the MTC (With LOTS of Pictures!)

Hallå friends and family! This week was way different from the first week and it's been pretty nice getting into the groove of things, never having to check the schedule now cause we have it memorized haha it's the exact same most days. I feel a lot more comfortable and settled in now and it feels more like home. The challenge of that has been that the excitement and nerves from going out on a mission have died down. I got a cold on saturday and also started to struggle with progressing in the language as fast as I had in the first week and so motivating myself to stay focused and work hard was really tough combined with the sickness. I started feeling better on tuesday and it's pretty much gone now and I've really been working to stay motivated and still work hard so I feel great now, I think I've made it past that little wall. And the beauty of it is, everything doesn't seem as bad now as it did before I was sick cause studying and learning all day is a whole lot worse when you're sniffling every 10 seconds and your head hurts haha.

Our district and especially my companions and I have become so close and it's crazy it's only been 2 weeks but I guess that's what happens when you spend 24/7 with the same people. I love them and for all those people that are coming out on missions soon, don't think the MTC is this serious, solemn place where everyone walks around in suits and skirts and studies all day. Haha to keep ourselves sane we definitely find ways to have a lot of fun. There's these things called Narnia Holes which are pretty much the vents in our rooms and people leave stuff behind, we found some nerf guns so we've had some pretty intense battles with the people in our halls. It's hilarious the stuff that can entertain you when you don't have any technology around, makes for some mycket bra times.

Our teachers have really had us focus on setting and keeping goals this past week. I've definitely seen the power of that and how it's the best way to help us reach our potential, and that's coming from the biggest procrastinator in the world haha the MTC definitely targets and helps you with your weaknesses. So on our fourth lesson teaching our "investigator" Isabel we tentatively committed her to baptism, and after four 30-40 minute lessons and really becoming invested in her even though it was roleplay, we were so happy. We were clicking our heels and felt toppen as we walked out of there! If we felt like that with a roleplay investigator, I can't even imagine how I'll feel with a real investigator out in Sweden. I love the Swedes already and I don't even know them! Also, crazy, Isabel is actually one of our teacher's now haha so that's pretty cool, her name is Sister Faux, she got back from her mission in July. Even crazier, my companion Äldste Richards, the one that went through the MTC two years ago, was in her group 2 years ago in the MTC and they remember eachother, whaaat!!

This past sunday was fast sunday (first sunday of every month) and it's so underbar to think that my next fast sunday will be in Sweden! The Italian's that we play foursquare with left on tuesday morning so the Swedes and the Nordes are taking over the square now haha if you know me well, foursquare is like the new foosball or bowling, at least in the MTC. We taught our new investigator on monday since we're done teaching Isabel, our investigator is our teacher but it still felt real. Her name is Lovisa, she's from Uganda but is a student in Sweden, we taught her about the Restoration of the gospel. We didn't come in with anything written down and just tried to speak from our own Swedish and it kinda worked haha Lovisa's not as nice and doesn't smile as much as Isabel but it'll definitely be more like the people we teach in the field so it's a good learning experience.

I'm just starting to really realize how much I love the MTC and I love my mission and I love Sweden already, it really is true what my dad told me, it's one big adventure. It's pretty obvious now how Swedish is harder than Spanish and I take back what I said last week haha there's not many hard rules in Swedish, you just have to memorize alot of stuff. Like each word is either an "en" or an "ett" word, and so if you want to say a church, it's en kyrka. If you want to say the church, it's kyrkan. Just church is kyrka. The reason kyrka is an "en" word is because it sounds right, there is no reason haha each word could be one or the other. Some other fun with Swedish, "att dopas" is to do drugs, "att döpas" is to be baptized. Also, a fun word if you want to practice Swedish is sjuti-sju, it means 77 and you pronounce it "hootea hoo". I hope everyone had a great week, got a little rough in the middle but I'm doing better than ever now!

Med Kärlek,

Äldste Hainsworth