Hallo mijn familie!!!
How are you all??? I hope you are having a great time up in Utah. I'm sorry that the downhill biking wasn't what you hoped it would be, but I hope you had fun anyways. I'm glad that Tyson enjoyed EFY, it really is an awesome experience. The MTC kind of feels like a big EFY, except that it's not in English, and the Elders and Sisters aren't allowed to touch, much less spend the whole week flirting, but the spiritual side is mostly the same. This week has been crazy! They say that the days are weeks and the weeks are days here, and that is definitely true! I get to the end of every day and feel like it has lasted an eternity, but at the same time it feels like my first day was yesterday. I'll warn you right now that this is probably going to be a long email, because everything feels new and cool and significant. Next week I'll probably have nothing to say except "same old same old."
First, business: I'm supposed to tell you that DearElder.com will let you type a letter that they will print and deliver me the same day, (and it's free!) so if you want to make your missionary's day, you can send me letters, so I don't have to wait till P-day to hear anything from you. Also, if you could please use that to send me Evie's address, that would be great, because I forgot it. And if you're planning on sending me stuff from home, if you could throw in a few family pictures, I forgot some and it would be greatly appreciated. I think that's all!
So, first day: They rushed me through a bunch of different stations and then dropped me off in a classroom where they started speaking to me in Dutch. (My teachers aren't allowed to speak English, so you're kind of forced to learn fast.) That was a little intimidating, because they were trying to tell me to do stuff, and all I could think was "No habloespanol!" They were very kind and patient though, and I was surprised at how much I could understand by context and hand gestures and the Spirit. Within the hour, I could at least get the gist of everything they said, and it's a lot better know that I know actual vocabulary. It was crazy though, because my first day, I saw like six people that I knew from school, and a girl who stood up to say the prayer was going to Lubbock for her mission, and it turns out that I have actually met my companion before (more on that later), so I felt very at home, instead feeling like I was in this weird place with 2400 strangers! That was a huge blessing. We also got to sing a bunch of hymns at orientation that night, and singing hymns about being called to the Lord's work with hundreds of other missionaries is an incredibly powerful experience. The Spirit was so strong, and I felt like, "Hey, we're all in this together, I can do this!"
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| Zuster Cluff and Baker |
So, my companion. Her name is Zuster Baker, and she is from Arizona. She spent the last year at Boise State though, and when my roommates and I went up to Idaho, we met up with a girl from our ward who was visiting Boise at the same time, and she brought some friends we didn't know with her, and one of them was Zuster Baker! Crazy world. But she is a mascot, she is very friendly and funny, and we get along pretty well. She is like twice my size, and she grabs the stuff for me from the top shelves in the laundry room, so we're a good team! She is headed to the Trinidad, Port of Spain mission, assigned to serve in the Suriname region. Actually, a girl didn't show up, so they had to move some things around, and I ended up in the Suriname district. There are three Dutch districts: 2 going to my mission, and 1 to Suriname, and I am the only black sheep in my district going to the Netherlands, but alles goede! I like my district a lot, and we have a lot of fun trying to learn Dutch together, so I'm glad (although I might be singing a different tune when I have to say good bye to them all in 6 weeks). My zone is amazing. Right now, it consists of Hungarian and Dutch missionaries, and all of the Huns were so great about making all of us newbie Dutch feel welcome. We've made lots of friends and had a lot of fun together!
So the second day was mostly studies, but we also taught our first investigator, named Gijs. Luckily, he is a golden investigator (they go easy on the foreign speaking missionaries since we don't know what anyone's saying). It is a little intimidating to teach in Dutch, because you're not always sure what you're saying, and even less so what he is saying, but the Spirit was there anyways, so all went well. We taught him again the next day, which was a little harder because he asked questions that we didn't anticipate, so we had to completely improv, but I think we got our point across, even if it was in broken Dutch. I've now learned to pray and testify in Dutch, and I know a fair amount of vocabulary, but I definitely have a lot to learn. The gutteral sounds aren't as bad as I expected, but by the end of the day, my throat is pretty sore, because my weak American throat is not used to the "g's" that the Dutch think should be put in every single word. Really though, the gift of tongues is real. It takes a lot more faith than I realized to open your mouth even when you don't know what you're saying, but I am learning so much faster than I would be able to on my own. (Although part of that is the fact that I would never study 10 hours a day on my own).
Sunday was definitely the highlight of my week. Everyone says that if you can make to Sunday, you've made it through the hardest part (at least of the MTC). I don't know if that's true, but I did make it to Sunday! Church was interesting, because everyone has to prepare a talk on the topic of the week, and then you find out if you're speaking when they announce the speakers, so as my companion said, it's kind of like an LDS Hunger Games kind of thing. Plus, your prepared talk has to be in your mission language, so we got to hear Hungarian talks that I didn't understand a word of, but it was fun to just listen and feel the Spirit. That night, our whole zone almost decided to join the choir, but apparently 1500 other missionaries had the same thought, so I got to sing in the biggest choir I have ever seen. It was incredible to hear that many missionaries all singing together. Then it was time for devotional. Usually on Sunday nights, you go to devotional and then pick a "movie" to go watch (and by movie, I mean general authority address, or church history film, or stuff like that). Everyone told the newbies to watch Character of Christ because it is life changing, but the mission president decided that since so many of the missionaries were new this week, we should watch it for devotional. If you have not watched Character of Christ by David A. Bednar, you absoultely should, and if you've seen it, you should watch it again because it is incredible. I learned a lot, but the main thing I learned is that when the natural man would look inward and focus on himself, Christ looks outward. He gave a lot of examples of how, especially in times of adversity, Christ turns outward in love and service. Especially as a missionary, I really need to focus on that. Then, the lights came on and the closing hymn started playing. All of a sudden, everyone started standing, and I thought we were just standing for the hymn, but then the music stopped and the mission president got up and announced that David A. Bednar and his wife had dropped by for a surprise visit (apparently they do that 1-2 times a year), and he was going to speak to us. He then held a question and answer session that was absolutely incredible. Weights I didn't even realize I'd been carrying were suddenly lifted. One of the main things I learned was that when I am constantly worrying about if I'm doing good enough, or have the Spirit with me always, or am communicating effectively in the language, I am turning inward. It may not be selfish, but it is self-centered, so instead of worrying if I am doing things right, I need to just focus on serving those around me and turning outward in the character of Christ. The other thing I loved was that he said, "It is a miracle that anyone joins the church with 18 or 19 year old men and women as the forefront of teaching the doctrine of Christ." People are not going to join or not join the church because of something that I say. They will join because of the Spirit that they feel and the fact that what we teach is truth. If they don't join, that is because they are children of God who have been endowed with agency. I am giving myself too much credit if I think that it has anything to do with me. My job is to become someone that carries the Spirit, so that others can feel it when I teach. That was a relief, because it relived a lot of my worries about not really being able to communicate well in Dutch. All in all, it was an incredible experience (and Dad, you should be jealous because I got to see your favorite person, and he was in typical frank and direct Bednar character last night).
Anyways, this is the Lord's work. I have felt that so strongly since being here. I am in the right place, and I am going to Belgium and the Netherlands for a reason. I'm grateful to be here even though I miss all of you. I pray for you every day. I promise I'll send a shorter email next week.
Lots of love, tot ziens!
-Zuster Cluff
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| Our District |
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