First Week!

My first day in the online MTC was pretty relaxed. I met my district and they are all amazing people, especially my companion Elder Sapien. I am super lucky to have him as a companion because he has the best Portuguese in our district by far and he is very helpful. On Thursday morning he spent an hour just going through pronunciation with me, so now I can actually read the words correctly, and because of that I have been able to learn so much more. I feel a little bad benefiting from all of his hard work, but he insists that teaching me helps him learn the language better as well.

It's also lucky because he's in Texas right now which is only an hour difference, so our schedules line up pretty well. We have class on Zoom from 12:30 to 3:00 and from 5:00 to 8:00 EST most days and everything else (Personal Study, Companion Study, Language Study, Exercise, and meals) is flexible since we have people in different time zones. He used to live in California which would have made it tough to find times to meet as a companionship. 

Then the second day they were like: okay, it's time to stop speaking your native language. You have a new mother language now. 

I was not quite ready for that, but I'm doing what I can. I think I am familiar with something like 150 words at the moment. I oscillate between feeling excited and terrified about Portuguese, but I'm excited about it most of the time. 

On Friday our power went out right when I was getting online for Estudio com Companheiro... luckily I watched my dad set up the generator just the week before, so I pulled it out and was starting it in my white shirt and tie... that was kinda fun.

Next Friday will be our first time teaching, so my district and I have a lot to learn this week. It'll be a good time.

Tchau!

Elder Smith