MTC Week 6: Dave Cubed

Hi y'all! I don't have much to say since I saw you all, so let's see if I can muster the motivation to write a meaningful email.

Our evening music devotional WAS David Archuleta. :) So we got 3 Daves on Christmas: Pres. David Martino (MTC President), Elder David Bednar, and David Archuleta. All three were great. And after the David Archuleta concert, he shook each of our hands, which was a really nice thing to do.

I know, as missionaries, we're supposed to be constantly serving others, but this Christmas, many people went out of their way to serve us missionaries at the MTC and make sure we had a special day, so I'm really grateful to them.

Oh, also, that thing I said, which means "I am pleased that you are pleased" in Polish is "Czeszę się, że ty się czeszysz."

We've all hit 6 weeks! Slowly but surely, we're making our way through the MTC. Our mint stack is also growing slowly but surely. I think we're up to 25 now.

So I mentioned during Skype that I'd tell y'all about Brother Nilsson AKA "Donald Trump." He is seriously one of the coolest people I have met. Ever. I'm not sure what all he does at the MTC, but a few days ago, he came and talked to our district (and the Bulgarians). He explained how there's a good, better, and best as far as obedience goes. A good, obedient missionary tries to keep the rules. A better one actually keeps the rules. But the best missionary is the one who doesn't even have to worry about being obedient, because he/she just naturally is. At this point, a missionary can really be an instrument in God's hands, because he/she can focus on following promptings of the Spirit a lot better. He told us a couple of stories about some missionary work he has done.

1. Bro. Nilsson was on a short flight from somewhere to Provo, and he was really looking forward to just sitting back and relaxing. However, he felt a prompting to sit down by a girl and say, "Did you know Jesus came to America?" So he did, and he talked about the scripture where Christ talks about His other sheep. The girl replied that that scripture had haunted her for many years and she had always wondered what it meant. She got baptized a couple weeks later.

2. Bro. Nilsson was in charge of Spanish wards in Orem. One Sunday, he noticed a family in the parking lot wearing street clothes, and he felt prompted to go to them and say "You're supposed to come with me." So he did. He found out they were living in their car. They got baptized too. But the cool thing about this family is that they had lived in California or something before coming to Utah. Both the father and mother woke up in the middle of the night having dreamed the same exact thing: that they needed to quit their jobs, sell everything they had, and move to Utah. So they did, and while they were driving along I-15, they saw an exit sign for Orem, which in Spanish is close to "Orer" or "to pray." So they took that exit and ended up in the parking lot that Sunday. And Brother Nilsson, because he followed that prompting, was able to lead them the rest of the way to Church.

Those are just a couple of the stories he told us, but they all had the same theme: if we are "best" missionaries, the promptings of the Holy Ghost become our law to obey. Brother Nilsson has lived his life following this law, and as a result he has had some pretty phenomenal experiences where he was an instrument in bringing people to the Gospel.

I love you all!

Love,

Siostra Eberting


Pictures:
-When I came back from class one night these reindeer were behaving in an inappropriate manner.  Credits to Sis. Carroll.
-Sis. Webber and I put bows in our hair.
-Thanks for the bows on the packages, we got lots of compliments on them.
-An activity for class: Find as many names of Christ as we could.
-Thanks for all the presents!
-Skype
-Christmas Picture

MTC Week 5: Health Clinics And Flip Phones

We hit a couple of milestones this week that we're really proud of. First, we hit one month on Friday (not that anybody's keeping track). And then, on Tuesday, we hit HALFWAY!!!!!!!! 

It's funny to meet people and have a conversation something like this:

"Hi, what's your name? I'm Sister Eberting."

"I'm Sister So-and-so. Where are you headed?"

"Poland. How about you?"

"I'm going to (insert English mission). How long are you here?"

"10 weeks."

*eyes bulge*

We still have plenty to do here, though. :) And I still love the MTC, so I should be good for a while. I've heard from plenty of returned missionaries, though, that the MTC is like the pre-earthly existence for them once they've been in Poland long enough, and they don't really remember it.

People this week: Sister Webber hails from Orange County, California. She loves Disneyland, and one of the things I love about her is that she thinks my jokes are funny, even when no one else laughs. She has an identical twin who is also here at the MTC right now, going to the mission right next door to us (Germany Berlin). We're still working on convincing them to trade places for a day before Sister Webber #2 leaves the MTC on Dec. 31. She did a year at UVU studying Elementary Education, which fits her personality so well.

Sister Einfeldt is one of our teachers. And I love her SO MUCH!! I could talk about her for a long time. She has a fiery passion for Poland and missionary work in Poland, and she loves all her missionaries like they're her own children. She treats us like equals and really listens to us. And, what's super exciting is that in May, she and her husband are coming to Poland for internships, and they're going to visit all the cities which have missionaries. So we will get to see her again after the MTC!

One thing I've definitely noticed about teaching people is that we do a lot better when we're not focused on ourselves or the things we want to say next. Rather, really listening to the people we teach is extremely important. If I lose focus even for a split second, I miss half of what they say. So that is definitely something Sister Eberting will be working on for the next 18 months. For example, last Wednesday one of our TRCs was a big failure. We both just left if feeling kind of heavy and depressed. We realized it was a failure partly because we didn't really invite the Spirit into our lesson, and we were more focused on the things we were saying than listening. In stark contrast to that was our lesson on Friday with Mariola (AKA Sister Barney, our teacher). We both tried to listen, and the lesson went so much better. That experience reminded me of Doctrine and Covenants 42:11 "And the Spirit shall be given unto you by the prayer of faith; and if ye receive not the   Spirit ye shall not teach."

On Friday Sis. Berrett and I went to the Health Clinic again because she was having an allergic reaction to the antibiotic she was taking. So we're pretty much regular customers there now. She says she goes pretty regularly to her doctor back home, so I guess things are pretty normal here too. ;)

Our whole district has started reading our copies of the Book of Mormon in Polish, and I am definitely learning a ton from it. It takes about a half hour to get through 10 verses, but it's really good.

On Monday, we had to say goodbye to 4 different groups. Definitely the hardest goodbye was to our Finnish District. I might have even cried a tiny bit, and I still cry inside every time I see a picture of them. So good for them for being in Finland now, but we all really miss them.

With the various districts leaving on Monday, our district and the Bulgarian district are now the oldest in our zone for the next 5 weeks. And Sister Berrett and I got assigned to be the new STLs (Sister Training Leaders)! So we're going to try to take good care of our zone, like the old Finns and the old Poles did to us. One of the perks of this is that we get a phone. A flip phone that can only call the information desk and mostly receives junk calls. And we also got to welcome our new Finnish district last night and help them work through all of their emotional trauma. Our district in general is going to try really hard to connect with others in our zone. We will be their mamas and papas.

Thank you all for the letters and packages and prayers! I love this gospel. It brings me happiness every day, and it can bring each of you happiness and lasting peace if you sincerely try to live it. But, I guess I'm preaching to the choir here. ;) I'm so grateful for this time I have to serve as a representative of Jesus Christ, and I'm so grateful I get to teach others about Him.

Love you all! See you in a few days!

-- 

Siostra Eberting

Pictures:

-Decorating our classroom Christmas tree 

-Sister Mittens, the MTC cat

-Us stalking Sister Pickett (one of our teachers)

-Us with some Oklahoma-headed missionaries the night before they left

-Us and SISTER EINFELDT!!!!!

-We all got Poland shirts

-Thank you SO much for the bread! It made our district's night. It's the tastiest thing I've eaten since I've gotten here.

-Sister Carroll looking at pictures of the Finns while we all cry inside.

-Our beloved flag

-Sister Lueck and Sister Berrett always plan matching outfits.

-Our zone on our temple walk

-Group at the temple: Us and the Finns the day before they left
Back row L to R: Elders Robbins, Lebarone, Harlow, Chugg, Kimball, Vawdrey, Hall, Ormsby, Cheal, Olschewski: Front row: Sisters Carroll, me, Webber, Lueck, Broderick, Allen, Emmett, McCammon, Godfrey

-Find the two sister Webbers

-Find them again. Sister Broderick pictured front

-Us and our mints. We have a pretty good stack going for us. We're trying to beat the last Polish district.

MTC Week 4: I Get Evicted

Cześć moja rodzina! Well, things are pretty much a routine at this point, so I guess this is all I have to write this week. Hope you all had a wonderful week.

Actually, that was a żart. A few things happened this week, not the least of which is that we had our classroom room check ('cause we're supposed to keep it clean), and we didn't pass, because our desks and the whiteboard weren't clean. If we were English speakers, our desks would probably be clean, but when they teach you Polish, they give you more books than you have room for. And maybe they didn't like our tower of empty mint containers (we're trying to beat the old Polish district). So, basically, we got the notice that they were kicking us out of our beautiful classroom in T3 and into a first floor classroom in T4 so they could keep a better eye on us. So we moved. And just to show that we aren't going to change our ways, we put some orange peels on our new windowsill. (Actually, they kicked all the missionaries out of T3. And the orange peels are kind of a Polish tradition during Christmastime).

Last Friday I got to see Sister Warner again, helping set up for a Christmas party. And Sister Berrett and I got to hug Sister Martino, who is basically famous in the MTC because President Martino is the MTC president.

Since the old Poles are long gone, we've been making new friends with the Finnish District, which, sadly, is also leaving us next week. However, they've had quite a week that our district lived vicariously through them. On Friday, they got their travel plans, so of course they got super excited to go to Finland. On Saturday, they found out that their visas had been denied (all but 1), and they were all reassigned to stateside missions. Then, on Tuesday, they got emails saying the decisions were reversed and they were going to Finland after all. So that was a miracle for them. But talk about drama.

Sunday was wonderful. During district council, we remembered that Brother Packer (one of the counselors in our branch) told us that if we smiled until 10 'o clock, the rest of the day would be great. We remembered that at about 9:45, so we grinned our cheesy (and rather pained at the end) grins for 15 minutes straight. And then we couldn't stop smiling.

AND THEN, the Sunday devotional was the BYU Men's Chorus. Ah, that was so good. Definitely my favorite devotional so far. Y'all should go to one of their concerts some time. And it was fun to see a couple people I knew (Jacob Stirling and Michael Sorenson).

Here's a Polish Christmas tradition I'm excited for: a couple days before Christmas Eve, Polish people buy a large live fish (a carp or herring). And they're planning on eating it for dinner on Christmas Eve (or Christmas, can't remember), but they want it to be alive until they eat it. So they let it swim around in their bathtub until they eat it.

Last Tuesday, we folks in the MTC choir got to sing "Praise to the Man" for the devotional. That was super powerful. I love reading the Book of Mormon, but I don't always remember the sacrifices that prophets had to make to write it, and later, the sacrifices Joseph Smith made to translate it. I love the Book of Mormon. It teaches me about Jesus Christ and helps me be a better person. It is a powerful book because God is the author of it.

Thank you all for your support and prayers! I love you all!

Love,

Siostra Eberting


Pictures:

-Our Polish flag in our room

-Sister Lueck bought Sis. Berrett and Webber ice cream but there was no spoon.

MTC Week 3: Disney Songs And Polish Cases

So, to begin: our district. Sister Carroll, a member of said district, hails from Boise, Idaho. She reminds me a lot of one of my roommates last year (shout-out to the one and only CLARA WILSON!!!) which is wonderful. She'll burst into song randomly, and although I haven't heard her sing jazz yet, it's probably coming. Last Thursday she and I became companions for a while so we could exercise, and we really enjoyed playing "Guess the Disney song" while we ran. And we sang all of the songs in Annie. And some from Thumbelina too, except I couldn't really remember those. She also plays the violin pretty well, so we're going to try to put a musical number together today.

Sister Emmett is from Tooele, Utah (did I spell that right?). She has Polish heritage, and she has dreamed her whole life of going to Poland on her mission. She is really sweet and really quiet. Our district was talking yesterday about how we probably all got called to Poland because we talk way too much in English--except for her. She's going to be the one who listens really well and knows exactly what the people need.

The Polish is coming, if very slowly :) We have this thing called Basic Core, which is 3 pages of words and phrases, mostly about the Gospel. We were supposed to have it all learned by December 1st, but that was a very lofty goal. My goal now is to have it learned by next P-day. We've started learning the cases of Polish (there are 7 in all), which make a lot of sense. And when we think about all the cases we have to learn, we don't cry even one little bit, because the Finnish district has 15 cases. It is very relieving to finally learn some grammar, because it helps me start to make sense of all the phrases we memorize.

It snowed here too! I'll attach pictures or send them later.

On Tuesday Sis. Carroll was on her iPad. Suddenly she exclaimed "The camera app! It's gone!" So of course we all had to check our iPads to see if our camera apps had disappeared. Luckily my camera app was still there, but over the next half hour, it disappeared, along with 3 or 4 other apps, until basically, only the Gospel Library app was left. Same with everyone else. Apparently someone has ultimate power over our iPads. Rumor has it that the reason the apps disappeared was because some missionaries were abusing the power that is AirDrop. That's the sad thing: if one person grossly abuses a privilege, everyone can lose it. BUT BUT BUT, I guess they decided to trust us in the end, because that night everything appeared again.

Our district has started this thing called a gasp circle, credits of Sis. Lueck. Before every TRC, we stand in a circle, and take turns gasping (pretty self explanatory, even if it doesn't make sense to anyone other than our district).

I have a new favorite hymn: #41, "Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise." Here is my favorite line from verse 2: 

"Ye heralds, sound the golden trump

To earth's remotest bound.

Go spread the news from POLE to POLE

In all the nations round"

I am seriously so excited to go share this wonderful news we have with the Poles. We have something that they really need: the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. It can change people's lives if they let it. More specifically, it can change our lives. I've already seen myself become a happier and more peaceful person by trying 24/7 to live the Gospel for these last 3 weeks. But, fun fact: you don't have to be a missionary to live the Gospel!!!! An easy way to live the Gospel is to participate in the Church's #lighttheworld campaign. Another way is to really participate in ministering to others. One thing that I've definitely started to realize, since coming here, is the large amount of missionary work there is to do at home.

Thank you for the wonderful packages. :) I'll send a picture of the tree a little later (it's so cute!). I love you all, and I can't wait to see you all on Christmas!

Love,

Siostra Eberting

MTC Week 2: Naps And Baths

I suppose that since I've told you all how great our district is, you may want to know who these terrific characters, in fact, are. So here are two:

My companion, Sister Berrett, is from Pocatello, Idaho. Yes, she likes potatoes, no, she does not like the potatoes at the cafeteria. Except sometimes she eats them anyway. And she has openly proclaimed herself as a proponent of taking antibiotics, especially after having had a sinus infection for 15 days at the MTC. Poor girl, she's had a rough start to the MTC, but we went to the health center again a couple days ago, and she finally convinced the doctor to give her something. The doctor also told her to sleep whenever she needs to, which I was kind of excited about, but then we both remembered we're also trying to learn Polish.

Sister Lueck, from Las Vegas, loves Pocatello, Idaho, even more than life itself. I suppose she holds Pocatello so close to her heart because it is the city where Sister Berrett used to live. While we're walking around outside, she'll often yell "POCATELLO!!" desperately hoping she'll meet another person who used to live in Pocatello. She also used to be a lifeguard at Cowabunga Bay in Las Vegas, and she's got her little lifeguard schpeel down to a science. You'd have to meet her to understand :) She's wonderful.

This week was phenomenal. But first I want to tell you about a couple dreams I had. First, about a week ago, I dreamed that Sister Lueck was telling me I needed to take a bath because I hadn't bathed in five days and I stunk. It was hilarious because Sis. Lueck is the nicest sister ever and wouldn't say I stunk even if I did. But I will have you all know that I have a good sense of hygeine, and I bathe regularly per the White Handbook.

The next night I dreamed I was in Costco with the whole fam, and we were all getting samples. Including one that was a little cup of Cheerios with Gatorade poured on them. Then some Costco worker lady, clearly angry we were taking so many samples, started asking me about Dad. She asked me how many dependents he had, and whether they really were all that dependent. I saw right through her, though. She was accusing Dad of evading taxes! So I told her she'd have to talk to dad to get that information. I was so proud of myself for seeing through her plot.

I guess I couldn't truly say I'd gone to the MTC without getting a sickness of some sort. Well, I woke up on Saturday without my voice, or rather, the voice of one of our little ribbety green friends, the frogs. At first I was afraid to use this new voice which had been given to me. But then I remembered that people are nice at the MTC and won't make fun of you even if you suddenly become really good at accidentally yodeling. Meaning, your voice cracks, and that's the only thing it does. So I had a lot of fun the next few days exploring the parameters of this new voice. I shared a video for your entertainment (not your pity. I thought it was hilarious. I never really felt super sick except for the not-being-able-to-talk part).

With both Sister Berrett and me sick, we became the zombie companionship of our zone. So much so, I suppose, that on Sunday, one of the branch presidency members took a look at both of us, and told us we didn't look good. And then I tried to say "I feel fine," in my croaking voice and that sealed the deal. He basically ordered both of us back to our rooms for a nap. We also got priesthood blessings, too, which helped.

Things are looking up, though, because Sis. Berrett has her antibiotics, and I have my medicine (water), and we're both starting to feel a lot better.

I'm sure you are wondering about the Polish. It is really cool. 2 weeks here at the MTC, and I know more than I ever learned of Mandarin or Spanish. That's not saying a lot though, a fact that was illustrated by our FIRST TRC yesterday!!!!

Me: *fumbles her notes* "Jestesmy misjzonarkami Kosciola Jezusa Chrystusa Swietych w Dniach Ostatnich."

Sis. Berrett: "Mamy przeslanie o nadzieje."

TRC volunteer: "lj;lkfajd adlkfjoae eiajpoijsav  akjdsafkj;dskfj eapoiew a fdj fjadk apepa fa djf;a  asdkfal;sdjfa s f ad aoueuo pp gap gd afphp dfi ajpfdpfjajdjfpoajaposajfkda dajfj a sa a a aefsdfa" *continues for five minutes in this way*

Me and sister Berrett: *blankly stare back at volunteer*

That's probably what it will be like for the next few weeks, and again when I get to Poland. But it's really cool to be able to express *some* of the feelings of my heart in Polish. I love this language, which is good, because I'd be learning it either way ;)

Love you all!

Love,

Siostra Eberting

Pictures:

-Left to right: Sisters Emett (Tooele), Carroll (Boise), Me, Berrett (Pocatello), Elder Olschewski (West Valley), Cheal (Heber), Sisters Lueck (Las Vegas), and Webber (somewhere in CA by Disneyland where the sun is always shining and it's warm).

-After today's temple trip.

Week 1 In The MTC: Old Poles, Apostles, Etc.

Hi y'all! At this point, I'm sure many of you are wondering if I'm still alive. Well, I am pleased to say that I am alive and doing well! SOOO much has happened this week though. Hopefully I'll have time to tell you all a little bit about it.

1. The Old Poles

So technically our whole district came a week early (since they didn't want to separate people the day before Thanksgiving). This has two ramifications: one, we stay in the MTC an extra week (*halfhearted attempt at a cheer*), and two, we overlapped five days with the old Polish district (*enthusiastic cheer*). Man, they loved us a lot right when we arrived, and we hadn't even met each other yet. It was so fun to have twelve older brothers and sisters for a few days. They passed on a lot of traditions that the teachers aren't too happy about, like saying "czesc" about everything. "Czesc" means hello, but we all have been using it to say "That was SO czescy" and "I feel czesc right now." Also, saying "czesc" to everyone we pass. I'm a little sick of it, but I think the whole MTC knows "czesc" now.

Anyway, the old Poles left us on Monday morning. Some of the sisters will probably train us, and we'll all get to see each other for zone conferences. We all miss them, though :)

2. The outside world

My companion has had this cough going on for a while, so on Monday we went to the health clinic, which sent us *gasp* across the street to the BYU health center. It was very worldly. There was a TV playing commercials and game shows, and people weren't wearing church clothes. I read my Polish Book of Mormon, though, so that was okay. In all reality, though, it really did feel much different from the MTC. Less peaceful.

3. A Spooky Halloween

This Wednesday, I guess someone crashed into a power line or something like that, because the power went out throughout the MTC for about 4 hours in the evening. I'm sure the cafeteria had a lot of fun with that. It began to get dark, and spooky shadows kept jumping out at us. But since the security at the MTC is so tight, I was pretty sure ghosts wouldn't be able to get in, so I wasn't too scared.

4. Thanksgiving

Drumroll please........we got Elder Uchtdorf! I thought he was perfect for Thanksgiving, since he has given a few talks on gratitude. He and Sister Uchtdorf spoke about gratitude (what a surprise, right?). Afterwards, they started shaking missionaries' hands. My companion and I were sitting up on the tippy top of the choir stands, as far from the center aisle as possible, with a deep chasm to my left where I could see a sliver of basketball court. We were pretty sure he wouldn't make it up to us. But he kept going, shaking hand after hand after hand. And he got to the top of the elders' side and reached across the chasm to shake my hand! So. Cool.

After that, we ate Thanksgiving lunch, which was edible. Then we went to the garage where you dropped me off and assembled food kits for the food bank. 350,000 total meals, I believe. I got really good at putting "Best by" stickers on."

After that, we watched "The Other Side of Heaven." Aliah, I remember you mentioned doing that once, and thinking it wasn't missionary appropriate, but I guess they decided it was. :) And let me tell you, there's nothing quite like watching the kissing scene with 1,500 missionaries cheering them on. Haha, that was great. And apparently, they're making a sequel???????

They turned the Christmas lights on after the evening devotional, which in my opinion should've waited, because it was still Thanksgiving. But I heard y'all already got a Christmas tree, so you probably would support the Christmas lights decision here.

Polish is coming along as well as it could. Obviously, it's a lot of work, but we're praying in Polish now, and we have our first TRC on Wednesday. Let me just say, though, the gift of tongues is real, and prayers really do help. I love our teachers, I love my companion, and I love our district. I can tell we're all going to get really tight. I already feel like I've grown so much. And of course I miss you all, but I know this is where I am supposed to be, and I am really happy. My testimony has already grown a lot, and I'm beginning to see how much God loves all of His children. Thank you so much for the packages, and the letters, and the emails! Seriously, you all are the best family ever. I love you all!

Love,

Siostra Eberting