The Crazy Daily Schedule and Being Tired for Two Years

Hi mom!
The daily schedule is like this: missionaries have to get up by 6:30, but my companion and I get up by 6:00 every day since we have a lot to do. Then we take showers. The shower temperature is so much better before everyone uses the showers. It is the worst feeling to get up in the morning. I think that that won't change. I notice that I feel better after I get in the shower and I am a little more awake. at 6:50 we have (Chante-Priye) which is when the district sings a hymn and prays every morning. We do our prayers in Haitian Creole. If there is anything extra we want to pray for that we can't say yet, we switch to English. At 7:00 we need to be in the classroom. The MTC is like a small campus. There are ninteen buildings.

From 7:00 to 7:45, we have personal study time, when the teacher is not there. at 7:45 we have breakfast, then we have class from 8:15 until 11:00. We have gym time from 11:10 until 12:00. At 12:30, we have lunch. Our district has made a goal to only speak in Haitian Creole for lunch. We can say a lot already. At 1:15 until 5:30 we have class time. Then at 5:30 we have dinner. From 6:15 until 9:00, we have more class time. From 9:00 to 9:30, we have daily planning, then we go back to our apartment. We have (Chante-Priye) (sing and pray) again at 10:00 and then we have quiet time at 10:15. At 10:30 lights go out. The schedule is not exactly like that every day, but that is the way it usually is.

Things change when there are devotionals, service day, TRC (the place were people come in and act as investigators and help us with language learning and teaching. We do the lessons in English for now though.) TA's (teaching appointments, where we go and teach a teacher as a progressing investigator. We have two people: Brother Payne (acting as Pita, an investigator he used to have) and Brother Karrati (Scott). We have to do teaching records, so that we can remember who they are, and so that we can teach to their needs.). There is a day when we spend an hour doing service at the MTC. The MTC used to have Janitors doing all the work at one point, but now the MTC uses almost all missionaries to do the cleaning. They have part-time janitors who can keep track of cleaning assignments and who can show us what we need to do.) There are devotionals on Tuesday. I love the devotionals! They are very good. I have learned so much from them.

We also have zone teaching, where we teach people from our zone, which is made up of three districts. The fijians are in our zone, and so are the samoans. The samoans are very wild. They had a dance party at night when some missionaries from the Haitian group were leaving. Elder Newsom and Elder Fuluvaka were from the group before us, but they were held in the MTC for a week or two extra. I only knew them a week, but it felt like I had spent so much time with them. They were very helpful in showing us how to teach and how to be a better missionary. He is the funniest guy! They will be very good missionaries.

I learned that I will be tired for the next two years. I am so tired all of the time. I was so used to taking naps before my mission. I need to get used to just working and forgetting about how tired I am. I read in the scriptures this week about how the sons of Mosiah had afflictions, thirst, hunger, and fatigue while they were on their missions. I realize that I will definately feel that way.

I have still been having a hard time. Teaching is the thing that is really stressing me out though. I don't have much time, so I will write more in my handwritten letter. I get in the robotic mode when I teach, where I just explain the doctrine, and ramble on because I am nervous, and because I am not comfortable with telling people about personal experiences. I know what I am teaching is true, and I know what I am talking about, but it is so hard to explain to people. I also get hard questions, which are difficult to explain, and I have been struggling with that. I realize that I need to be patient and wait for God to help me out. He won't let me fail, but he will let me struggle.

Tell people to write me! Whitlock, Andersons, everyone you know. I want to hear from them sometime. I only have 40 seconds. Bye!