June 30th, 2015 - One Month Santiago MTC

Hola Familia!!!

I can't believe it has already been 1 month!!! That's crazy!!! It is flying by. This was by far the best week yet on the mission. I feel like so much happened!

Last pday was a blast. Hna. K and I have the same skirt and shoes so we decided to match on pday, Hna. Jacobson joined in too. We just did the usual, the grocery store and the post office and food and just walked around Santiago. The post office lady scares me to death. I have been twice and she reminds me of the slug lady in monsters inc and she wears these big purple glasses and wont slow down when i ask her to speak slower. I'm surprised I haven't had a heart attack in there yet. Also we got to go to the temple and I think it was the most spiritual session I have ever done. I loved it and it is so cool to just be in a room full of missionaries!!!

The Copa America is still going on here and on Wednesday Chile beat Uruguay. Sorry dad but Chile es el mejor pais en el mundo. that probably wan't good Spanish but whatever. The Uruguay bus drove by our window Wednesday afternoon and was surrounded by a police escort and all the Chileans were just screaming. It was cool to watch them drive by. Chile also beat Peru yesterday so they are in the finals on Saturday!!! We are trying to convince Preisdente to let us watch!!! He's a softie so we can do it. Viva Chile!!!

Hermana Jacobson has a tendency to run away from Hermana K and I and she had her hood on running to exercise the other day and there are no speed limits here and she ran into the road and literally almost got hit by a car. It scared me to death. Also Hermana K ran into a biker on the bike path. He skidded and almost fell off his bike and he started yelling at her. I couldn't stop laughing.

On Wednesday our teacher, Hno Huerta had his birthday so we threw a little party for him and we had everyone sing in the cafeteria and stuff. He loved it!

The Dolls also had their anniversary this week so our district had everyone sing at breakfast and then we gave them a card and 39 pesos for 39 years. 39 pesos is like a few cents. Maybe not even a cent but it was fun.

We got a new teacher 2 weeks ago and he is the coolest person I have ever met. his name is Hno Pino. He makes class so much fun but also teaches the best Book of Mormon lessons and gives the best feedback. The other day he taught us how to beat-box and then yesterday he brought his ukulele and we were singing all the american pop songs. He played Blank Space and All About That Bass and I thought about you Jilly Bean!!! He also turned down playing for the Chilean national soccer team to serve his mission. Our district loves him and hopefully we get to keep him for our last 2 weeks. 

We had a prank war with district 9 this week and it was so much fun. They left today for the field so we were sad to see them go. They were the missionaries I was closest to here. 

The past few days we have had locals join us for soccer in the morning. This cute little boy Nels played with us on Friday and it was so fun. Today we got 2 girls to join. they were 14 and 15 and were skipping school haha. I don't blame them...to be honest I would probably love to skip out of being in the classroom here at times. I am tired of starring at white walls. 

On Friday night I woke myself up because I was sleep talking and I was teaching a lesson!! That was super weird. I don't remember what language it was in but we can just pretend Spanish. 

Hermana Doll thinks my name is Hermana Feldman so my comps and I are always laughing about that. Also I have a serious laughing problem. The other day the 3 latinas were practicing teaching us and all 6 of us were in this tiny room. My comps and I were squished on this mini couch and during the opening prayer I lost it. I felt so bad because then Hna K started laughing and the latinas couldn't understand that we weren't laughing at them. I should probably work on that. 

Sunday was wonderful as usual. We watched 2 devotionals by Elder Holland. I gave the prayer in sacrament meeting and Hna K gave a talk. She killed it. She even shared an experience she hadn't written down and she did so great. I was so proud of her because she has had a little bit of a harder time with Spanish. It is so cool to see The Lord working on us as missionaries and I really see it in her with the language. Sunday night the mission president from Rancagua came and talked to us. They shared more like the logistics of serving in Chile which was really nice. 

We get a new set of investigators this week so hopefully we can continue to improve. 

Just wanted to share a quick thought with you before I have to go! In Alma when the Anti Nephi Lehis buried their weapons they took a knee before the Lamanites came to kill them. As a district we talked about the importance of always being examples and burying our various weapons, Whatever they might be. I would just encourage all of you to find one thing you can improve on whether it be a bad habit or whatever and bury it!!! Then be an example to those around you!

Love you all so much!!!

Hermana Feldman

June 23rd - Week 3 Santiago MTC

Hello Everyone,

First of all Happy Fathers Day Dad. Hope your Sunday was great and I thought about you all day. This week was pretty uneventful but it flew by so that was good. The CCM schedule is hard for me. It's the same thing everyday which gets pretty boring. 

Last pday was fun. We went and got empanadas which were pretty good and just walked around Santiago. We found this cute little bakery and I got a pan chocolate. I thought of you Dad. The pastries and bread here are so good. Like honestly, I don't know why France gets all the attention. 

We got a new transfer of missionaries in this week and it was 5 districts!!! There are about 85 missionaries here now...They are all super nice but I miss the quaintness of the CCM. Also Luke Worthington got here this week so that's kinda cool. He is literally huge and his head almost touches the ceilings here. But...considering of the mission there will be no buckets...BYU friends better have appreciated that one. No I'm kidding but it has been fun to kinda get to know him.

Some highlights from this week-

My comps and I go talk to people out by the temple everyday which is fun. It's always a confidence booster to recognize I know some Spanish and the people are so friendly and willing to help me learn.

Elder Clark bought soy sauce because the food is so bland so we were taking soy sauce shots all week with our district and all our teachers. That provided a little bit of entertainment. 

My comps and I were walking back to the hospedaje one day and there is construction going on at the chapel. Shake it off was playing on the radio so obviously we stopped and had a little dance party on the soccer court next to the chapel. I miss music....

Hermana Kleinman ironed a hole in her skirt this week. We were all dying it was so funny. My comps and I are always laughing which I really love. 

Also we continue to buy strawberries from the lady outside the gate as a district and we all sit in the common room and eat them together at night. It is really fun and fresh food tastes so good!!!

Nothing else really happened but i'm excited for pday and the temple today. My comps and I are matching so I will send a picture of that next week.

Quick spiritual thought. I was reading in D&C 138 which is all about the spirit world and verses 47 and 48 talk about family history work. I know that is something we have been focusing on in church and as a family. It talks about how we promised our ancestors that we would help them through doing family history work. I loved that and it made me want to be better!!! So challenge to the fam...Try to find a name and then get all the temple work done for that person!!! When I get home I will do it too!

Love you all and hope you have a fantastic week!!!

CHAO

Hermana Freedman

June 16th - Week 2 Santiago MTC

Hola!!!

This week has been so much better and I am learning to love and appreciate the CCM.

I was so saddened to hear about the Openshaws and looked up to all of them so much. They were great examples and I'm grateful I had the opportunity to rub shoulders with them. They will be missed but I have faith that everything will work out. They are in my prayers.

Hopefully this week's email will be more organized. Last week I made the mistake of not writing down things that had happened throughout the week. It is fun to hear about everything going on at home and I'm so glad everyone is doing so well.

P-day last week was great. This is the only mtc where you get to leave the campus ever haha. We just went to this department store Paris because one of my comps needed some stuff and then we just went to Liders, it's like Walmart, and bought snacks so that we didn't have to keep eating the food. I'm getting used to the food though and its been much better this week. We also got to go to the temple last week and it was beautiful. I needed it and it really helped me feel prepared for the week ahead. It was weird hearing it in Spanish though, even though I had English headsets on. 

Some other things about Santiago. The mountains are INCREDIBLE. Huge and some of the prettiest mountains I've ever seen. It is freezing here, and I definitely packed for Antofagasta winters not Santiago ones so I'll probably just run to the store this pday or next and grab tights or something. It gets light so late here. We start exercising at 8 and the sun is just barely starting to come up. Maybe thats normal but I don't really remember how it is at home. Home kinda feels fake sometimes which is an odd feeling.  Our bedroom looks out on the tallest building in South America. It's just a giant glass building and I think its a mall. This one is for Jilly. David Archuleta stayed in the hospedaje here in the ccm and one of the elders in my district sleeps in his bed. Elder Archuleta signed the bed hahaha and wrote the scripture about the song of the righteous is a prayer unto me. We bought fresh strawberries as a district from a woman outside the gates the other day and they were so good. Blew the ccm cafeteria food out of the water and I don't even think it is strawberry season down here. Also the Copa de America is going on in Santiago right now so game nights the streets get so loud. We all want to watch the games so badly. I don't even know how the game against Mexico went last night but hopefully chile won!!!

This week I really have focused on becoming more unified with my companions. It is so hard for me to be with the same people 24 7 just because I love being alone but they don't make it too hard. We have gotten a lot closer this week and have so much fun together.

We finished teaching our first set of investigators this week and it was a good experience. The language is coming and that feels so good!!! Andres, our hardest investigator has just been killing us but in our lesson yesterday we decided to go in with a different approach. Not to brag, and I'm very aware that I'm still an awful missionary, but I slayed it. I was actually speaking Spanish and asking good questions and I was really able to feel the spirit. Our other investigators I'm convinced were there just to boost our confidence which felt good but too easy. I kinda like the feeling of realizing what I need to work on. It's more like real life when they are hard and I like that. 

Sundays here are my favorite and this Sunday was awesome. All the missionaries have to write a talk on an assigned topic and Presidente Doll randomly calls people up. I basically copied mine out of preach my gospel because they have to be in Spanish but I didn't get called so that was good. It is fun watching the provo devotionals too. This Sunday the mission president from Santiago east, President and Hermana Wright, came and spoke. It was exactly what I needed. He reminded me of you dad and he even served in Uruguay!!! I just wanted to share a little thought from the devotional this week. 

We discussed how the atonement has the ability to strengthen us. Ether 12:27 tells us that the Lord gives us weakness so we can grow. We should view weakness as a challenge and opportunity to do better. I could keep talking because it was so great but i'm running out of time!!! 

I love you all and hope everything at home is going well. I love being a missionary and there is no place I would rather be!!!

Love,

Hermana Freedman

June 9th, Week Two - Chile MTC

Hey everybody,

before i start writing i just want to apologize because the keyboards here are weird so excuse the lack of punctuation...The CCM is awesome. Not what I expected but then again I dont know if i was expecting anything. We got here on WEdnesday morning and had like an hour and a half to unpack and unwind before we started classes. I am living here at the CCM with half the group that came and the other are in Al Cantara. it is a house the church owns that is about 10 minutes drive from here. It was previously a swiss embassy and Ive heard it is beautiful. Everything is antique and they have a maid that does everything for them. But its probably good I dont live there because my companions and I are a little forgetful...I totally forgot my tag the other day. rookie mistake. I have 2 companions, Hna Kleinman and Hna Jacobson. Both are from ARizona and they are the nicest girls. WE get along super well and I already love them so much. We definitely need to learn to work together though because during our lessons we all 3 teach like our own lessons all simultaneously. Its awful haha but I just have to laugh. We will get there. 

I love my district.  It is us 3 sisters and 6 elders. Our distric leader Elder Heaps played football at AMerican fork and when he found out 

i went to timpview he couln't stop talking about britain covey. he randomly brings him up all the time. its like this weird obsession with him. 

There are 49 missionaries here at the CCM, al cantara included. President and hermana doll are the nicest and hermana doll feels like a mom to me. Thats one thing i love about it here is I know everybody!!! Except the latinos because I can\t talk to them but the spanish is coming. There aren't that many latinos here though. I think 2 districs out of 6. something like that. normally there are more. 

My spanish is awful but i have faith that it will come and i enjoy learning. It has been hard for me to adjust to the way they teach here because i am so used to the way i learn at school. that has been hard for me but i know it will get better over time. 

The food here is terrible and i have been sick all week...for breakfast they have bread and manjar *dulce de leche* and ham and cheese and then cereal with yogurt. I always just have cerela and yogurt except when they have the liquid yogiry i don't eat it. it is nasty. 

Lunch and dinner are the same. Its bread and then you get to choose rice pasta or potatoes with usually uncooked meat and lots of time like cream sauces. They always have fruit which is my favorite thing and then a *salad bar*. but by salsad bar i mean usually greenish brown lettuce with vegetable oil and cold cauliflower. stuff like that. one day they had beets so that was yummy. i am having to be careful with the food but really in don't even want to eat it because it makes me feel so sick. my stomach is bubbling all day. I also had to get a flu shot and i got a really bad cold after that but it's ok. 

I have 1 hour to email on p day and it flys by. AFtre our hour we get to leave the ccm campus and walk around santiago and go to the store and stuff. There is a boundary but apparently there is plenty to do. This is the only mtc where you can leave the campus. Then later we go to the temple which is dirrectly infront of the hospedaje where i live. 

Every morning we get to go to the park to exercise. I love it. Its about a 5 minute walk from the ccm and there is a small park that has workout machines, where you lift your own body weight and stuff and then the larger park is like 3 minutes past and there is a basketball court and soccer goals and stuff. most of the missionaries play soccer but my companions and i have run aroudnt he park everyday. Im so glad they run!!! We go super slow but im not going to complain. 

I made the mistake of not writing stuff down throughout the week to tell you and my mind is going 200 miles an hour right now so sorry im probably forgetting to tell you some stuff. 

Funny story for the week. We were in class yesterday learning the difference between ser and estar which both mean to be. AT one point one of our teachers *we have like 7 total* said como estan. i yelled really loud *estamos buenos* all the teachers started laughing and they explained that i had just said *we are sexy/hot* then my companion hermana kleinman got super red and was like *thats why all the latinos laugh when i say that* i got a kick out of that. 

by the way mom. Hermana doll told me to tell you that she knows cathy anderson. I have no clue who that is but ill trust you know what im talking aout.

I love sundays here and they are probably my favorite day. WE watch the devotionals in provo on tape delay and it was fun looking for friends. I also bore my testimony in spanglish in sacrament meeting. I definitely made up some spanish words but I think i got my point across alrigtht. 

WE already have 2 investigators andres and paloma. Except we don't actually konw that andres is andres because we went the whole lesson withouth asking his name....oh well. 

My spanish is so awful and the chlileans speak so fast. My companions and i try to go talk to the ones visitng the temple every once in a while and i never know what is going on. 

hna jacobson did duolingo before she came and holy cow she is like fluent! shouldve listened to you dad. 

I can't think of anything else to really tell you but im sure i forgot so much stuff. I hope i answered all your questions. Thje ccm is great and i love being a missionary. I think the biggest thing that has stuck out to me this week is the concept of love. Never before in my life have I felt so much love. I am amazed at how the gospel inspires me to love everyone im around even if i haven't  ever talked to them before. I also have felt so much love from everyone here and i have definitely felt the love from home. I know that as we show love to those around us we really can make a difference and invite others to come unto christ. 

Cant wait to write you all next week! And sorry i don't have pictures. I left my camera on in my bag so it was dead when i took it out today. we are only allowed to take pictures on p day. also there is no slot for an sd card so i need to figure that out. 

Love you all!

Hermana Freedman

June 3rd We Arrived

Hola Familia!

I just arrived at the CCM and I love it here. I don¨¨t understand anything and I have no clue how to use this keyboard but its all good. The flight was good I sat next to this Korean man who didn{t speak English. ALso I filled my water bottle in Atlanta and woke up 8 hours into the flight and my bag was soaked and my water bottle was empty. I just had to laugh about it. The customs official didn{t look too impressed though when I handed him my wet documnet. I have to go. Love you!

Hermana Freedman

This picture was taken just as Catie left the gate in SLC. Since we were flying to Norfolk 2 hours later, we were able to see her all the way to the gate.

One of the sweetest things ever, a brother and former companion of mine from Uruguay, Daniel Aguilar sent these flowers to Catie the day before she left.  The gospel is a wonderful thing.