Hola!
You know it's bad when your mission president emails everyone and says that we should be tracting from 8-1, and then studying from 1-4 or however long your studies usually take. Saying that August in Louisiana is hot and humid is a huge understatement! I still love it though and I've just accepted that my makeup will inevitably melt and my hair will undoubtedly curl! :)
With the schedule thing, we actually still follow a normal schedule because we have a car, so we don't have to worry about getting heat stroke on bikes. On a normal day, we wake up at 6:30, work out in our apartment until 7 (it's way too hot even that early to run outside... maybe in January), then get ready for the day/eat breakfast until 8 (my favorite things for breakfast are either grits or a fruit smoothie), then personal study for an hour, companionship study for an hour, an hour of 12 week (the missionary training program), then a half hour of language study. Sometimes those four things blend into each other a little bit, but basically we just study for about 3-4 hours every morning. Then we usually just straighten things up around the apartment a little bit, and then we leave. On a typical day, we'll pick one or two areas to focus on (we need to conserve miles because we only get a certain amount every month). We have a plan of people to visit, and we go visit them. A lot of times they're not there, so we usually have back up plans too. When those fall through, we go contacting. Sisters don't typically tract here, so we go to parks or just walk around neighborhoods and talk to people. That's pretty much how the rest of the day goes until we come home around 9/9:30, after which we plan, get ready for bed, and sleep! Sometimes we have set appointments so we work around those, but yeah that's basically it.
We get fed a lot, and I mean A LOT here. In Hispanic culture they won't let you leave without giving you something. There have been days where everyone wants to feed us, and they usually give us food to take to the elders too (the elders have a smaller area than us and don't see as many of the people) so when they're not looking, we put food from our plates into the bowls for the elders. :) The good thing is, it's usually super healthy and fresh food, and it's all super delicious! My favorite is tamales! Everyone makes them a little bit different and I love trying them at different people's houses. So far, Guatemalan tamales are my favorite.
You know it's bad when your mission president emails everyone and says that we should be tracting from 8-1, and then studying from 1-4 or however long your studies usually take. Saying that August in Louisiana is hot and humid is a huge understatement! I still love it though and I've just accepted that my makeup will inevitably melt and my hair will undoubtedly curl! :)
With the schedule thing, we actually still follow a normal schedule because we have a car, so we don't have to worry about getting heat stroke on bikes. On a normal day, we wake up at 6:30, work out in our apartment until 7 (it's way too hot even that early to run outside... maybe in January), then get ready for the day/eat breakfast until 8 (my favorite things for breakfast are either grits or a fruit smoothie), then personal study for an hour, companionship study for an hour, an hour of 12 week (the missionary training program), then a half hour of language study. Sometimes those four things blend into each other a little bit, but basically we just study for about 3-4 hours every morning. Then we usually just straighten things up around the apartment a little bit, and then we leave. On a typical day, we'll pick one or two areas to focus on (we need to conserve miles because we only get a certain amount every month). We have a plan of people to visit, and we go visit them. A lot of times they're not there, so we usually have back up plans too. When those fall through, we go contacting. Sisters don't typically tract here, so we go to parks or just walk around neighborhoods and talk to people. That's pretty much how the rest of the day goes until we come home around 9/9:30, after which we plan, get ready for bed, and sleep! Sometimes we have set appointments so we work around those, but yeah that's basically it.
We get fed a lot, and I mean A LOT here. In Hispanic culture they won't let you leave without giving you something. There have been days where everyone wants to feed us, and they usually give us food to take to the elders too (the elders have a smaller area than us and don't see as many of the people) so when they're not looking, we put food from our plates into the bowls for the elders. :) The good thing is, it's usually super healthy and fresh food, and it's all super delicious! My favorite is tamales! Everyone makes them a little bit different and I love trying them at different people's houses. So far, Guatemalan tamales are my favorite.
Being here in Kenner has strengthened my love for relief society! Our relief society president, Hermana Guerrero, should be president someday. She just gets things done, and she literally knows EVERYONE! Whenever we go through area books or old ward lists, and we find someone we don't know, we ask her. Also, her counselors are the cutest things ever and they also just know and love everyone. We had a ward activity on Saturday night for mothers and daughters and it was super fun. We invited all of our investigators and less actives, and we got one potential investigator to come. No one else did, but one is enough to keep us going! She's the mother of an RM in our ward who is like our best friend here (her name is Souami), and we got to know her really well that night, and she invited us over tonight for gumbo and crawfish, so I'm pretty pumped about that! The members here are all just amazing and faithful and they're just genuinely kind. I just love them.
The epitome of how awesome our ward is was at the funeral and viewing for the little girl who drowned last week. I didn't really want to go, but a ton of people from the ward were going and they asked the missionaries to sing God Be With You, and they asked me to accompany the primary singing Families Can Be Together Forever. The funeral was a whole rollercoaster of things. So first off, it was in a different church (not sure what kind, some kind of Christian) because the mom of the little girl isn't a member, but her aunt (the one she was living with) was. Our bishop was half in charge and then their pastor was also half in charge. For the LDS stuff, the bishop said a prayer, we sang, the primary sang, there were a couple other musical numbers, and the bishop talked. He did a great job and talked very sweetly and simply about God's plan and His love. Then it was weird because the other pastor got up and gave this rant about how the Bible is the only correct book and how anybody who thinks we need more than the Bible is a sinner and somehow he connected that all to the girl. You could definitely say there were a bunch of uncomfortable members, and some even more uncomfortable missionaries in the room. I'm kind of used to people saying stuff like that, it was just sad that he would try to have this earth shattering sermon at a little girl's funeral. Save it for Sunday bud! Anyways, it was just kind of weird, but the church is true and I love The Book of Mormon!! :) After the service though, it was so devastating because they had everyone get up and walk by the casket one last time (this was all open casket) and then wait outside while the family said a prayer and closed the casket. I think it will take me my whole life to forget the image and the sound of an absolutely hysterically sobbing mother walking out of a church behind a little pink coffin. Not my favorite.
One thing that is my favorite though is the primary! The kids are so sweet, and so far they're the only ones that really remember my name!! There is nothing better than running into one of the kids in our ward and having them just light up and run up to me screaming, "Sister Sorensen!!!!" and giving me a big hug. That's enough to turn any day around, no matter how many people don't follow through on commitments. I got to do music time for primary on Sunday and it was so fun! I love the kids so much and also I love music so it's just perfect for me!
One thing that is my favorite though is the primary! The kids are so sweet, and so far they're the only ones that really remember my name!! There is nothing better than running into one of the kids in our ward and having them just light up and run up to me screaming, "Sister Sorensen!!!!" and giving me a big hug. That's enough to turn any day around, no matter how many people don't follow through on commitments. I got to do music time for primary on Sunday and it was so fun! I love the kids so much and also I love music so it's just perfect for me!
Speaking of music, my curse of not being able to say no lives on because somehow I got roped into teaching piano every week while Sister Whitney teaches English! I played a solo in church on Sunday, and apparently it fired up a bunch of people who want to learn how to play, so yeah I agreed. It will be good though because a bunch of our inactives want to take lessons, so it will be a good opportunity to get them in the church and get them around more members. Now I just need to figure out how to teach piano to 5 people at a time (I'll teach 4 half hour lessons every week, with 3-5 people at each lesson) in Spanish, with zero music or technique books. I need Kaye!! It should be fun though and it will give me something to work on.
Alrighty I think that's all this week. The work keeps going forward slowly but surely. This week, try to say hi to more people or at least smile at more people. Especially all of you youth going back to school! Being a missionary has made me realize how much a smile or a "hey how are y'all doing" can make my day! It doesn't matter if you know them or not, just smile and honestly ask how they're doing. Everyone likes to be acknowledged and noticed. Try every day to just be a little kinder and a little more aware of the needs of people around you, it really will make a difference. That's a promise! :)
Madres
I love you all so much! Have a great first week back at school!
XOXO,
Hermana Sorensen
Alrighty I think that's all this week. The work keeps going forward slowly but surely. This week, try to say hi to more people or at least smile at more people. Especially all of you youth going back to school! Being a missionary has made me realize how much a smile or a "hey how are y'all doing" can make my day! It doesn't matter if you know them or not, just smile and honestly ask how they're doing. Everyone likes to be acknowledged and noticed. Try every day to just be a little kinder and a little more aware of the needs of people around you, it really will make a difference. That's a promise! :)
Madres
I love you all so much! Have a great first week back at school!
XOXO,
Hermana Sorensen