My life is a game of catch phrase

Well, it's official. I'm a real sister missionary; I have the awkward missionary shoe strap tan line to proove it.

Life is getting better here out in puerto barrios. We moved apartments saturday to this cleaner, more airy (wind is important people) apartment over a couple of streets. I was a little sad to say good bye to the neighbors talking parrots. they were so friendly, they would always say "buenos dias" or "hola". I think that's pretty legit if you ask me. but i wasn't so sad to say good bye to the pug dogs that bark and drool on us through the gate right next to our apt. door. We had a miricle of help moving our stuff. Seriously, no one here has cars, but somehow we got a hold of someone with a truck who we could pay 40 Q (like 5 bucks) for every trip to our new place. 3 or 4 men from the ward were there to help move all of our stuff. I am so grateful for them because carrying all of our stuff up 3 flights of stairs in the middle of the afternoon isn't what I would call prime. well, thanks to them we are now in a new and cleaner apartment. it is smaller, but I like the balcony as well. I'm getting more used to the humidity and heat so that's good news. 

some random stories:

last week, one night, we finished a nice lesson a bit late (but not too late, but it was time for us to go back to our apt.) we were leaving, and it was raining. a lot. but the part-member family let us use a couple of umbrellas and a big rain coat. well, we thought things wouldn`t be too bad, but a couple minutes later when we were walking in the street (they don't have side walks here) when the "river" was up to our knees, we just laughed. and laughed, and trugged along for the mile or so walk back to our apt. We got home and had issues with our shower (in the old apt.) so it turnes out I didn't get to shower until the next morning. life is life. I was just a little concerned with all of the dirt, and garbage, and who knows whatever that was stuck to my leg for a while in the street "river".

driving here is also an adventure. we don't drive, but we ride a lot, and walk in the streets a lot. Driving is pretty much a game of "chicken" and cutting people off is just how it is done here. and there is no such thing as "j-walking" or that is all they have here. aka, there are no rules for pedestrians! just good luck! 

the game of catch phrase and charades continues on! pretty much when I talk, or if my companion has a new word for me, we have to explain the one word we want to say with a bunch of other words that get the point across. and Charades....actions are universial, and they help. 

we have new investigators! we have a family that is super interested in the gospel, they are super humble and the dad asks a lot of simple, but sincere, questions. I love teaching people who want to know. 

We are also teaching Carlos. He is 19 years old and used to date a member girl. He is very humble about learning the gospel too. He is so sweet how he just wants to do what is right. He is very easy to teach. The other day we were going over 3rd nephi ch 11 with some highlight verses because he didn't get the time to read because he was helping this random dude fix his truck for free. Good guy. well. we were going over those scriptures and there is one where it talks about your desire to follow christ and be baptized, and pretty much after we read that HE asked US if he could be baptized! MILAGROS! (miracles) 

the miracles go on. Saturday night, when we were planning for sunday, we were setting "goals" for sunday and for lessons with a menos activos (less active aka inactive) and a recien conversos (recent coverts) and one of my companions trugged a long and declared in a very unhopeful, but our duty kinda voice "1 for menos activos (and said under her breathe "that would be a miracle"), and 1 for recien coversos (and again, that would be another miracle)". after she said that I replied, in a very hopeful and real voice, "why not!? why should there not be a miracle? I bet we could have one of each come to church tomorrow." well, to my companions suprise, the next day at church we had 1 recien converso and 1 menos activos show up for church. That was really neat to see happen. My companion admitted that is was a couple of little miracles. 

Also, in that same day at church one of our investigators with her little 4 year old son came to church again! (they really don't have much money to get to church, but they came!) So this lady, Clara, can't read (I wish I could help!) and neither can her 4 year old son (not a big suprise) well, she was super happy to see me there and I was super happy to see her. They sat in sacrament meeting, and then came to the next class too. This class is for missionaries and investigators/recent converts. it`s like a basics sort of class. My companion, hermana ramirez was teaching a lesson about prophets of old and prophets now. Cesar (the little boy) was bored, but he didn't want to go to the primary classes, so I whipped out the "liahona" we just recieved and gave it to him to look at pictures in the children's section and such. He would ask me "what's this?" and I would explain it. or I would ask him, pointing to a picture of christ, "who is this?" and so on. We were just wispering and I ended up explaining about the picture of george albert smith and how he was a prophet, but he is dead now, but we have a new prophet. I showed him pictures of the prophet and apostles, and the temple, and so on. He really like the pictures of the apostles (who knows why a 4 year old boy liked the pictures of 12 old guys in suits the best!?) well, He showed his mom some of the pictures, which was a bit distracting for her, but she really liked them too, because that is sort of her way of reading. She asked me some questions about the pictures and cesar explained a lot of the answers; how this guy is dead, he was a prophet, these are apostles, they help the prophet, this is the prophet, this is....and so on. after that, the class was ending, we said a closing prayer and then after clara raised her hand and said  "I would like to make a comment." I was really curious what she had to say, because she is ususally SUPER quiet, and I have heard her say hardly anything. but she raised her hand and spoke. She ended bearing her testimony of the gospel, this church, how much joy and happiness it brings to her life, and how...full...she feels when we are talking about it with her. She went on for like 3 minutes strait. It was SO COOL! The spirit was super strong and after, when me and my companions were in the bathroom, my companion was whiping away tears. It was so tender, and so special!

Other little miracles happen in my life. I am so grateful for them. I am so grateful to be an instrument for the Lord and His work.

Sometimes in lessons I get promptings to say something, or bear testimony, or share a scripture. Ususally I don't know what is being said at the time, or if it would be "appropriate" but I get up the guts and act with some faith and open my mouth. These moments always turn out to be really good and my companions keep encouraging me to keep it up because it is always so perfect, and fits in just right. I would consider this a little "gift of tounges" kind of moments. 

I had another oportunity to help bring a tender mercy to someones life yesterday. 

we had to take the 6 hour bus ride to the capitol yesterday for visa purposes. that's 12 hours in a bus to sign a piece of paper..cool story. there we met up with a lot of missionaries doing visa stuff too, of these missionaries included ALL of the missionaries from my dristrict in the CCM. It was soooo good to see them. Talking to them I feel like I have the best companions in the world. So we were there and then right before we left for our bus to go home, me and my companions stopped in the church office building for some technical stuff, but while we were there, we had the elders check for mail. My companion asked if they would check for packages too. As he was rummaging through the boxes of stuff he calls out, "does anyone know a pheobe evans?" and then I was like "yeah! yeah I do." Pheobe is hermana Bender's friend (Hermana Bender, from my ccm district) who we have all been expecting hermana bender to receive a package from the entire time we were at the ccm. Well, it turns out pheobe forgot to write hermana bender's name on the package. she had all of the other info, just forgot to write her name. I told the elder that I KNEW that it was for hermana bender and that she had been waiting for more than a month to get this package. I felt like this was a neat moment because hermana bender is having a bit of a hard time with her new companion (who doesn't speak english and doesn't quite follow the strict missionary life that we all should be) I wanted to help her, but didn't really know what I could do but just be there for her and pray for her. So this was pretty neat because I felt like I really actually helped. What are the chances we would be in the office, ask for packages, the elder call out "does anybody know a pheobe evans?" and to actually know that pheobe is hermana benders friend and that the package should be sent to her. there was like 6 people in the office in total. there are like only 3 or 4 people in the whole mission that would know that pheobe evans is hermana bender's friend. It was cool for me. 

Life is good. I'm happy to be here. I try to keep a smile on my face at all times because if I can't speak the langauge, at least I can share my apperance with a smile. I am so blessed to see the hand of the lord in my life and in the lives of others. 

Please keep emailing me, letters are like gold, I'll put my new address for the mission home ( I think it is the same) for mailing up next week. usually I write on mondays, yesterday we were in the capitol.

here are some pictures. mom, you should share the one with skylar rogers with his family. I'll get some new ones with my new companions soon. most of these are from the ccm, unless they look like they aren't, then they are from down the street right next to the ocean, and there should be one from my balcony view with a bunch of orange red roofs. 

Love you all!

Hermana Hutchins.

blessed be the wind, for the hermanas need any help they can get

So yeah. I`m in the field. I`m in puerto Barrios. there are 9 areas in the capitol, and 2 outside and far away from the capitol, I`m in the furthest area from the capitol, it was a 6 hour bus ride from the city with a couple of elders to get out here. We are right next to the ocean and it is super humid, and quite hot. I am grateful for the spurts of wind. my cold showers in the morning are not a problem. I am in a building right now with air conditioning, which might be the only building with AC.

Guatemala is a third world country for sure. dirt floors, dirty water, ants everywhere,  street dogs, busses crammed full with people, trash everywhere on the side of the unpaved roads, luchous ( can't spell in english anymore) trees and bushes, chickens in houses, mosquito bites, it`s gonna be great. I think it is quite interesting that people will have a cell phone, but have a dirt floor in their house. houses are made of cement or random wood slabs, tin roofs and they usually have a light bulb or two in the house. 

I would have to say my "culture shock" has not been too bad though. I kind of expected it to be like this...kinda. I just know to take things as they come and love it. "come what may and love it" I had a mini melt down session one time, but it was okay. I just got stressed when my companions said I would probably be in this area for 6 months. as I said, it is hot and humid, and I know my happiness depends a lot upon the weather and my ability to communicate with people. and since we are the only sisters in this area, and one of my companions will be going home next transfer, and my trainer will probably get moved after training me for the 12 week training program, it probably means I will have to train in this area too, and teach someone where to go (we have the biggest area) know all of the investigators, and so on, so yeah, it was a bit of a stressful thought, but I'm okay. it will be okay. 

It was a little sad to say goodbye to my ccm district. I loved those people so much. I learned a lot from them. To follow up on past stories, I can do a pull-up (our 6 week program was a success) we had our half-court lightning game and the three of us who have been practicing did really well. The other two sisters were 1st and 2nd place. I was proud. I took on the nick name "docta hutch" from hermana Fitzgerald. it didn`t have a specific reason (her friend, hunter hutchins, got the nickname docta hutch and he is going to go to med school or something) idk, but I kind of liked it. It would be sweet to actually be a doctor. I think I drew a total of 22 pictures of christ in the ccm, really neat experience. So there is a little sum up of some ccm stuff. 

so I have so much to say, but no time to say it. 

I miss vegetables. everything we eat has to be peeled or cooked. sister cacool cooks our lunches and dinners and does our laundry. she is awesome, she`s a little guatemala woman who knows how to work and has a heart of gold.  pretty much our grandma.

we greet all of the women here with a kiss on the cheek/air by the cheek. I really like that closeness and friendliness people have here. In america people can be ridiculous. People will walk around campus, see one of their old roommates and not even make eye-contact, whereas here, a stranger will come up to you, give you a hug, kiss on the cheek, pat your hand or something and take pictures with you and still not even know your name. I really like that about the people. 

kids here are stinkin' adorable too! I love how much faith children have. I committed a 10 year old girl to baptism on my first day out in the field. I have actually commited 3 people to baptism just this week. So that was pretty exciting. 

I am in a trio! and I love it. My companions are just great. one, hermana Ramirez is from new york city and is half-nicaraguan. She only has been in the field for about 4 months, but she is my official trainer. she is really good at spanish, but is not perfect. she is super fun to be with and is a great friend. I am so grateful to have someone that knows english so that I can get filled in on things when I really need it. But we don't speak english very much at all, usually just a bit in the evenings. She looks VERY similar to my good friend Rachelle Larsen, so that`s kinda cool. Sometimes it makes me miss my friends, but at the same time, it is also comforting, strange, but that's just my life. 

My other companion, Hermana Ceballos is from Mexico, and she only has about 5 or 6 weeks left for her mission. she is a really great teacher of the gospel and knows just where to go. She is nice and fun. People love her here. She reminds me a lot of Jane, my sister, and is very positive. I am so grateful for my amazing companions. 

The language is coming and my companions help me learn more and more every day. I don`t say much when we are in a meeting with people because I don`t understand much unless we are talking about gospel topics. I think it is funny when people will ask my companions, "does she speak?" I can understand that phrase, my companions always say that I can, I usually reply with a  "un pocito" ( a little bit) 

I stick out just as I suspected. since my american companion is half niceraguan, she only sticks out because she has beautiful big eyes and long eye lashes, but me, being the 5 foot 9 ish white girl with debatably blonde hair that I have, I do attract attention. and whistles, and little phrases in broken english "hey baby, how are you doin?" yeah. it`s fine though. I don`t feel too weird. I just have to be careful not to hit my head on things like power lines and roof tops hanging over the edge. I think I`ve only hit my head on something 3 times the first day. success!

I have a new batch of bugbites :) but I`m still alive! I had one really sketchy one that was about 4 inches in diameter and in a bulls-eye formation, which is a sign of lymes disease (thanks elise bowen for letting me sit in  on your infectious disease class one day last year) well yeah, that was scary, because you can go blind and die from lymes disease, I called the old mission nurse (the new one is my mtc companion, but she is not the official one yet) she said put some medicine on it. I'm fine! I'm not blind or dead! 

riding the busses is cool. There aren`t a lot of cars. mostly just busses, taxis, and motocycles. We ride in the busses ( 15 passenger vans) most of the time because it is cheaper than taking a taxi. it`s not unusual to have 22 people in a 15 passenger van. It`s really cool how it works though. usually there is a boy preteenager who hangs out the side and yells wherever they are going to and helps people get in and out and exchange the money and such. they need to have loud voices and are very quick with they money exchanging. It`s pretty neat what kids are allowed to do here. 

Sorry this is random, but we carry little rags around with us all of the time to whipe our sweat. my make up usually consists of mascara. going to the bathroom is a concern for me, for I never know the next time we will be at a place that has a restroom. you don`t put your toilet paper in the toilet, rather, in a trash bag next to it. My companions never seem to need to go to the restroom, apparently it's an aquired skill which I don`t have yet. Therefore, I am hesitant to drink water because I know it will go right through me, but I know I need water because it is SO hot here. oh 3rd world problems. 

Being here has made me so grateful for everything. I`m grateful for my eyes, for glasses, shoes (especially my crocs), my good teeth, clean water (when we buy it) showers, an apartment with a floor,money to live, relatively clean food, my watch, a good back pack, usually running water, my good companions, and the gospel especially. 

we have about a 7% active rate for the members here. there is apparantly some 1000 members in the branch, but only about 70 show up for church. some people don`t have the money to take a bus/taxi to church on sundays ( wich is like $1.50 there and back) There was like 6 or so adult men there. (Oh how I wish more men would get the desire to DO stuff.) I find it to be true in"the family, a proclamation to the world" it talks about how a country is only as strong as the homes in the country. That is how I feel about this place. There just seems to be way more women than men. The world needs good valiant men to be leaders, examples, providers, and protectors.  

spiritual moments come with teaching. I`ll be sitting there feeling like hellen keller because I can`t understand what is being said, and I can`t speak the language fluently (and with my "lymes disease" bite, maybe I won`t be able to see either ;), jk, I`ll be fine) well yeah, I feel like hellen keller, but I`ll get promptings to say something, and I don`t know what people are even talking about, but I`ll just jump in and say it with the best spanish I can, with as much power from the spirit that I can. Those moments are moments of acting in faith, but they are really neat, at least for me. 

I really enjoy lessons and being able to learn from my companions too, they bear great testimonies that uplift me too. 

I am very grateful for my good life, and I am very grateful for this amazing ac and internet right now. I am grateful for the gospel, I am learning more and growing stronger in my testimony. 

I love you all!

Hermana Hutchins

ps.

mom, what is jane`s new job. jane needs to write me an email about her new married life! send me pictures of the reception when you get them, I am so grateful for your good friends too, mom. I hope susan does well with school starting and all. I thought a lot about jane this weekend. I love my sister. and no I haven`t seen the new temple video, probably won`t get to either since the nearest temple is 6 hours away from me. susan, can you get wendy roberts mission email for me? emails are good, there is a computer lab place. letters would take a long time to get here. 

elise bowen (ps, you should write me an email.) and I know alexa shmeilie...or something like that.

not even a plate of rasins could ruin this week

Wendy- if you get this, let me know, I don`t know your email, so I`m just gonna guess. ps, I hope you are doing great!

This is my last email from the ccm, I`ll be in the field in a week, so I won`t be emailing in a week from now, and about dear elders, If you sent one this last sunday, it`ll get to me, but the next one will have to go to the field. I`m the east mission, but if it  doesn`t have that option, choose north. I`m assuming the mission home is still the same for the east that it used to be for the north because it`s the same mission president. that address is:

Start everything with HERMANA in the heading, it makes it go through customs without question, and no need for any jesus/vergin pictures on the outside of anything. so yeah....

Guatemala Guatemala City East Mission

avenida Reforma 8-60, zona 9, officína 505

Apartado Postal 921-A

01009 Guatemala City

Guatemala

letters are always fun

So the weird obsession with rasins (or the anti-obsession might be a better way to put it) with my district girls continues on. The other day we had a bunch of favorite foods like casi cafe rio and churros. it was declared a day that "not even a plate of rasins could ruin this day". The phrase is now used for many-a-good things. 

I accomplished a goal this week. ....make up a pun-joke in spanish that even the natives would laugh at... that was a good moment. Rasins are called pasas and after we asked the hispana about what raisins are called I said "¿que pasa?" witch ususally means what`s up or what`s going on, but with the joke it means, "what raisin?" yes it was on purpose, and yes, she did laugh. 10 points for griffindor! 

We have picked up some catch-phrases for our district of little things we laugh at.

The other day in relief society the teacher (who I think is a temple worker or something) gave this lesson. This lady has a love for the liahona, and I quote "Wow! how loaded it was! it was reaaaaaaaallllly good." and later in the lesson when she opened up the liahona, "lookie where I`m looking". yeah, she used to be an elementary school teacher. This stuff never gets old. 

one other ...a girl in my district said, "I feel like a woman!"...someone other girl in my district who is on that time of the month, " I hate that feeling."   consequently, we all had a good laugh. 

I have special talents...particularly height. I still stand as the tallest woman at the mtc after our new batch of missionaries. (ps, mary Griffin from byu 82 is here, I was hoping I would know somebody new comming, so for all of those people who say that I ALWAYS know somebody, it still stands true, ALSO my old roommate jacky ayala may be coming to the CCM this week, which would be AWESOME. well, yeah, if jacky comes ( native to guatemala) I hope we get some time to talk in spanish. Over a year ago she would help teach me spanish and help practice reading the scriptures and pronounciation and all. It would be cool to talk with her because now I can speak fairly fluently (in gospel topics of course) and small talk conversations. It is neat to see the progress. 

okay, so yeah, I`m tall and the other day my teacher had me come up to write on the white board because she couldn`t reach the top. small services....or should I say, "tall services" ;)

This place is under construction, as I said before, and the other night at 10:45 ( 15 minutes after lights out) we all hear a rushing water sound ( which was weird because the water was off...again, without any warning from the construction workers.) yep, so rushing water, we all go out in the hall to check if things are alright to find a waterfall coming from the celing. A pipe upstairs must have broke, but they got it stopped pretty shortly there after, however, the hall and most of the bedrooms were flooded, some of the girls in the first room were kneeling to pray and then noticed the water leaking in through their door. Luckily our room was unaffected because ...I guess the floors aren`t level here or something, I don`t know, but I find it to be a blessing. we shoved an extra sheet under the door crack just to be safe. all is well in zion, except for the carpeted stairs and moldy celing tiles. sister Fitzgerald, in my district said the next day, "guys, if our hallway floods tonight, I`m slip-n-slidin`, I`m not kidding". that`s hermana fitzgerald for yeah. 

English is awful. ha. we were trying to figure out a spanish concept and my teacher was trying to find a good example in english....we couln`t find one. I decided that if we were to have an "irregulars" english sheet ( we have a little sheet of our common spanish irregulars) that the english "sheet" would have to be a book! swim...swam...swum???? who knows!

our teacher, when we do practice teaching to her, has a scarf and glasses she puts on and her name is magically laura. well, the other day she opened up a little bag with her markers and there was LAURA`s scarf!  ;) we were all "in shock" and said, "what did you do to laura!" in a distressed and exasperated voice. our teacher is like 4-11 on a good day, definately an investigator snatcher ;)

my other teacher has a dad and brothers with the names of jose josé and josué. wow, really?!

I got 4 half court shots in a row the other night...if anyone cares. I thought it was cool. and our "6-week pull-up plan" is coming along nicely. 

Rachelle larsen will appreciate this, if you turn a basic 4 generation blank geaneology chart on it`s side (so in the shape of a pyramid) and put an angel moroni on the top, it looks like a temple. Aren`t mormons cute?! we got that one in rs. 

well, really quick. we watched a video clip by elder holland and elder erying that I would entitle "salvation isn`t easy" but I think it`s called "the atonement and missionary work" look it up, it`s worth it! it was a great experience. I have been thinking, it seems like asking these people to change their lives and to give up a lot of things that they currently enjoy and to pay tithing, and keep the sabath day holy, and obey the word of wisdom...( and so on) well this talk made me realize that it`s okay because salvation isn`t easy. Who would think that this would be easy. If it wasn`t so hard, I wouldn`t think that it would be as worth it as it will be. I know that salvation is worth it. and perserverar hasta el fin ( perservering to the end) is worth it. I have a testimony of this gospel and that we have a prophet today and that he receives revelation for the world from our heavenly Father. I know that families can be together forever. I know that Heavenly Father has asked us to do some hard things right now, but that it is for our good and growth. we will realize that with charity we will want to be obedient.

gotta go. love ya! sister hutchins. ...wait, that`s my mom. Hermana Hutchins.

 

David ArchulettaVisits the CCM

So my birthday was great. All I could have ever dreamed my 20th birthday in the MTC would be. Plety of people were suprised I was only turning 20. I got sung to I think ....7 times. yes. Latinas know how to celebrate somebody. Sisters were coming up giving me hugs who I don´t think I´ve ever talked to before. I got two hostess cupcakes stacked on eachother with a used non-lit candle in the middle. My distict also made me a card and wrote little notes in it. My roommate made me a balloon squid/octopus thing, that was nice. And the Devotional movie was super good too. It was Elder Holland talking about missionary work and the improvment with pmg and other stuff. I really really liked that devotional.

 

I am almost done drawing pictures in my district´s book of mormon inside covers. Only one of my teachers left (good thing too, because my brown pen is almost out of ink)

 

There is a strange obsession with rasins in the food here. My district complains about this weird rasin feddish because they all hate raisins. I don´t have any problem with them in my rice, and banna bread, and stirfry and...yeah.

 

the girls in my district also have a strange obsesssion with ice cream. we can get an icecream after lunch and dinner (if they still have any) and they always look forward to the day the ice cream shipment comes. A girl yesterday said that she was more excited for choco-conos than emailing home. priorities.

 

also, we are so excited to go to walmart tomorrow. the things that make missionaries happy.I figure we will be very easy to please by the time we get home.

 

So deportes is always fun and exciting. The other day a girl in my district rolled/sprianed her ankle on a water drain. She is on crutches now and is doing alright. she is super independant and stubborn, but I can be too. Right after it happened I carred her up the stairs into her room. She couldn´t walk at all, she was secretly appreciative, she is just so sweet, and stubborn. I carry her bag around for her, I asked her today if she wouldn´t mind leaving the cinderblock at home next time, I have no idea what makes that bag SO heavy.

Also at deportes. one of the teachers challeneged all of the girls in my district to do a 3 minute plank (an exercise where you hold a position similar to a pushup) I haven´t done one of those since hs I think. He offered a giant chocolate bar if any of us could do it. All but me and one other girl did it. However, he also challenged us to "max out" on the leg lift machine. He couldn´t even do it (but he is guatemalan) I could do that 200lb lift easily. He was impressed, most of the other girls couldn´t even do it once. We all have different strengths.

Also at deportes. Since someone accidentally threw the volleyball over the fence...again. we kind of ended up talking with our teacher and chillin in the rain the other night. I asked deep spiritual questions like "what is a great contributing experience to your testimony" or "where/how do you feel the spirit expecially strongly?" and so on. so for every three people to answer my question, they would ask me a not-so-spiritual question like "what is your most embarassing moment?" Any of my friends would probably think my questions are just the "classic deb" kind of questions.

 

I got a 40 personal coaching study the other day. it was great. Hermana melgar (the one in the picture that is not attached to this file) is so great. I feel like we have been good friends for years. We talked a lot about the first week compared to this week and how far I´ve come. It is really neat to look back and see the growth.

 

last night for the sunday evening devotional we watched an old missionary devotional with elder ballard. But one of the special musical numbers was david archuletta singing "the spirit of God" It was funny to see all of the girls ooo and ahhh over him, on a movie devotional. it was quite hilarious actually to see those sister missionaries be soooo...ya know.

 

We watched, a couple of nights ago, a mormon message with elder holland talking about the book of mormon and the testimony people have of that great book. It was a really neat experience.

 

mom and grandma and grandpa, I know hermana Brown from Paige. ps.

 

since yesterday was fast and testimony meeting, I got up to bear my little spanish testimony. It was really good, I was nervous, but it was good. That meeting was nice, I could understand a lot of what was being said.

 

Susan thinks I sugar coat everything...so for susan....We sit in class a lot, plan lessons a lot, struggle with spanish a lot (solo español), we get bug bites a lot, we are tired a lot, computers don´t always work and there is never a keyboard with two good little lifty things in the back to make it tilt up ( a pet-peeve of mine). we go to the baño a lot. we pray a lot. so yeah. life of a missionary at the CCM.

 

The people around me are amazing. I just love them so much, I am sure going to miss them a bit when I get out into the field. The kids here are adorable, they are so polite too, I got a hug from a little boy the other day with the look on his face of "I´m only doing this because my mom wants me to" but it was adorable, he was probably 5 years old.

I am really growing into the CCM life, so i guess since I´m getting comfortable, it´s time for a change.

 

field here i come in 2 weeks!

 

"if ye love me, feed my sheep" It´s time to leave the old life behind and start a life of service in behalf of the lord. I am grateful for the blessings of the gospel in my life, I am excited to share the joy.

 

with much love, Hermana Hutchins

My First Baptism in Guatemala

entonces (so/ a filler word) one of my spiritual highlights of the week would have to go to my first baptism here in guatemala. It was so special to see him go into the waters of baptism and when his name was called out to start the ordinance, I felt the spirit rush in like nothing else, I started to tear up and remember, ´´this is why I´m here´´ which reminded me of when Nick got baptized and I fully decided to go on a mission. The whole experience was really great, I cherish that moment. ok, so maybe it wasn´t MY investigator, but I did get to see it and the story is true. We have our classes at the chapell behind the temple now because they are doing construction on the third floor of the CCM (and everywhere else it seems). so we were in class like normal, and then my companion asked if we could go to the bathroom, which is down the hall. as we walked we saw the young man preparing to enter the water for his baptism and I got to see the whole thing as my companion was in the restroom. Best bathroom trip ever!

I also seem to get emotional over coaching study. It´s when your teacher gives you feedback on your teaching, and you talk about what is going well and what is not etc. I was expressing my emotions of feeling frustraited not being able to share what I feel the spirit wants me to share because of the language barrier. She shared some more scriptures and I got my composure back together and I felt alright. She asked me to close with the prayer, and while I was praying (in spanish) I felt a feeling of comfort and peace and that I am trying and it´s okay. needless to say, I started choknig up again, but it was good tears of love this time instead of frustration. Ever since then things have been going much better. My attitude is all-over better and I don´t feel like I want to give up. My companion helps me a lot because she is a very accepting of difficult things kind of person. She is patient and encoraging. We balance eachother quite well with our strengths and weaknesses.

speaking of which, yesterday we were practicing teaching to other hispanic missionaries and instead of teaching two-on-two we taught one-on-one (which we did not plan for). It was so hard not having eachother as companions, we were still sitting near eachother though, and we occasionally caught eachother looking at the other for support, help, or the next thing  to say. We realized how great it is to be in a companionship.

Also, on sunday we have a meeting that is kind of like sunday school. we get together with one other district and some leader like the ccm president or something. and then two companionships are randomly chosen to teach the lessons (we know the topics ahead of time so we can prepare) however these lessons are no sweat because they are in English. usually. Since the new rotation of missionaires happened on wednesday, we are with a new group, which just happened to be latinos. My companion and I hadn´t taught yet, so we assumed since we were the last ones in our group to teach, we would for sure be going. The ccm president got up and called for hermana hutchins and hermana fitzgerald to give the first lesson. uhhhhh we aren´t even companions, AND we are going to teach this lesson in spanish that we had planned to give in english. well, they fixed the companionship thing but we still had to teach in spanish. that was special. because we had never taught a lesson on tithing in spanish before, so tithing and personal story words were at a minimum, but it worked out okay and everything went well.

At casa de CRE ( a little place we teach) me and my companion prepared a 15 minute lesson to ´´strengthen faith´´ as we were told to do. however, when we got there we were paired up with this very old and very sweet guatemalan woman who´s husband died 4 months ago. we thought that it would be fine and go like normal, untilllll...we asked ´´como esta?´´ which means ´´how are you´´....and let´s just say 15 minutes later I think we got in a couple sentences about our lesson. haha. I guessed she just needed someone to talk to. It was good, she left VERY happy. I guess we did our job.

My teaching ability in spanish is coming along well. Our lesson outlines are very simple which means a lot of the lesson is given off our minds and whatever we can think of. we have a lot less notes, read a lot less out of pamphlets and books, and are bearing testimony and asking and listening to questions better. It feels good to see improvement.

The drawing has not come to a stop, actually, it kind of picked up a notch. I drew 7 more pictures this week and 5 of which are very intense and took a couple hours or more to do. they are for people in my district now and everyone wants me to draw the pictures in the front inside cover of their book of mormons. kind of intense, but they have all turned out well. The other day hermana Fitzgerald asked me if my patriarchal blessing says anything about doing art. I responded that it does and that I am supposed to serve people with that gift and that I´ll come up with ways to help build faith in Christ (essentially). I thought that moment was really neat to see just how my life is unfolding. People are still boggled that I can draw like I do but that I´m majoring in food science. ...we´ll see.

My companion declaired me ´´jack of all trades´´ after me drawing pictures, leading sining and such, offering to fix a gilrs skirt wich needs some mending, and helping this girl figure out the rest of her balloon animal that her mom would usually make ( she is kinda like a clown that does balloon art or something) , but she forgot what else it needed and I commented on what it could be and she was so flabberghasted that I knew what to do and she asked how I knew. and I just said something like how I have skills of a ´´proffessional ´´without any training.

sorry for any misspelled words, spanish is taking over.

on sunday we have companion ´´splits´´ for a couple of hours with a latina. She was so sweet. we talked only in spanish and she ended up giving me a little picture of her temple in northern guatemala. she was adorable, I hope I get a trainer/ companion like her.

no worries about my 3 point basket ball abilities. I made 3 in 5 minutes the other day, 2 of which were in a row. so I guess I´m over that plateau. we also like to do a daily pull up as a 6 week work out plan in my district of girls. We are actually improving and now we can do a couple a day durring deportes.

another funny moment. we had a bit of downtime at the chapel and a girl in our district was playing hymns on the piano and me and one other girl was singing to the piano. after the first verse another girl in my district asked if I could sing it an octive lower ( which she really just wanted it a little bit lower which would need a key change in the piano) but I replied...uh, maybe, I´ll try. so I sang the whole song an octive lower just fine. It was funny, we all chuckled a bit.

I got 6 bug bites. wahoo. they aren´t too bad though, and I´m still alive.

´´forever red´´ is still very much so alive, it´s my nickname sometimes in my district, but only the girls called me that. I actually wore your red dress again on sunday (the forever red one) and then we had pictures taken again yesterday and my companion REALLY wanted me to wear it for the picture, oh, ps, when you get the picture, my companion is behind me and hermana bender is right next to me, we pretended hermana bender was the third tallest at the CCM to make it so she would be able to stand next to eachother in the picture, she is actually like the 5th tallest, but who really cares. I am officially the tallest woman at the CCM. You don´t have to be THAT tall around here to claim the faim of being the tallest. ok, so to clarify on the forever red thing: what makes it so funny is that we have no idea what he really meant by forever red, we just laugh now whenever it´s brought up. one of the new girls had this ´´great´´ idea that maybe he was referring to the bath and body works ´´forever red´´ line of perfume....for some reason, I really doubt that´s it. haha.

ahh no more time!

"Forever Red"

One day my companion, some other girls and I were talking about the ´´option of going home´´ (none of us were thinking about it, just we were talking about it) and I came up with the great comment that made everyone laugh, ´´you can´t. socially, I´s not an option´´ --sometimes we just laugh. also, coming home from the temple (which is tiny, and good thing i know what I need to say because the guy had a VERY thick spanish accent) and we stopped at the distribution center to get scriptures etc. as I was checking out, the lady, who is native, said in pretty impressively good english, ´´are you a swimmer? because you have very...strong shoulders´´ haha, yep, that´s my life. I told her I did other sports, but obviously my shoulders say ´´swimmer´´ haha. If you can´t tell in the picture, I´m the second tallest hermana at the CCM, which, by tomorrow I will be the tallest since the tallest one is leaving. oh, and another thing aobut height, when the tallest guy in my district gets on his knees, he is the same height as our hermana teacher. haha, it´s great. people are quite short, some aren´t too short though. The other day I was wearing my mom´s bright red dress with shoulderpads that she wore on her mission. A couple of hispano elders whenever they would walk past me and my companion, without any eye contact would say ´´forever. red´´ with a thick spanish accent. we still laugh. I have now gained some new nicknames of ´´forever. azul´´ , ´´forever. rim´´ (I just couldn´t make that half court shot, no  matter how many times i tried) and others of the such. The guys in my district have this thing with excitingly yelling random words. like DEPORTES! or DESAYUNO! (breakfast) MAPACHI! (raccoon) SOY DE UN CHAMPIN!  ( i am a native, ....which they aren´t) ´´ENTONCES!´´ (so) and others of the such...really?! this is what happens when you let 18 year olds on missions. but they are good. ...just a little immature at times. when we were showering after deportes, hermana fitzgerald was talking about a friend from BYU and I couldn´t tell what her name was that she was saying, the name was ´´kristin´´ and I was like ´´christine?´´  NO ´´christina?´´ NO ´´kiersten?´´ NOOOO!!!we´ve had some good laughs about that one.

 

We have a busy road about 100 ft outside of our bedroom window. and ALL night there are cars and alarms and who knows what making noise out there, we deal with it though, sirens are a usual.

yesterday, on sunday, I was studying the baptismal invitation during one of the videos and on my page where i have it written down i had drawn a picture of jesus being baptized (like the one on the cover of PMG) and this girl behind me noticed it, showed it to her companion, and they were all oooing and awwing over it, then the companion of the girl handed me her journal and asked me to draw her a picture. she chose this tiny picture out of the pmg with christ pulling up a girl from these rocks with a river, and him holding another child in his other arm. it was dark and small, and she wanted it big. I drew the pictures in brown pen, so there is no forgivness if i mess up. after I drew hers, other girls asked me to draw them pictures, I ended up drawing 8 pictures of jesus yesterday, some of which were in people´s journals and front pages of journals...no pressure, right? but through blessings, they all turned out well. super scary doing it all in pen. I was kinda a bit famous yesterday, even guys i have never talked to were like, ´´are you the one that draws?´´ and I was like ´´yeah...´´´and then they would ask me to draw them a picture. haha. people are so funny sometimes, but I´m glad i could make them happy. one girl was particularly grateful, i drew the picture of jesus and the women at the well in the front page of her journal, it turned out really well, and she is the sister is very nice and thankful for it.

 

overall, things are getting easer. not easer to do, but easier to handle. eventhough it feels like we are planning lessons all of the time and can´t even find the time to just read english scriptures or something. it´s intense, but it´s good.

 

we have this thing called ´´coaching study´´ that one of our teachers (who was also our investigator for the first week, she was disguised as a cook and everything, it´s a tatic, which takes a long time to explain) so coaching study is when they take us by companions into the hall and talk about teaching and what we are feeling and could improve on and give tips and encouragment etc. so this was our first night with our ´´investigator´´ as our teacher. she is SOOO cool and I love her a bunch. she also knows my old guatemalan roommates, jacky and jenni, from glenwood last summer. she shared a lot of tips and guided us. it was a spiritual highlight of the week. she testified and gave support. she talks super fast in spanish, but I actually understand most of it. I usually only miss one word in a sentense, but sometimes that can really leave ya hangin´.

 

another spiritual highlight was when I was preparing to teach our ´´investigator´´ about the atonement. I really do care about her, even though I know she is only acting. and I wanted her to get this lesson into her heart and have the spirit touch her. I prepared, and prayed, and prepared, and read, and prayed, I just wanted it so badly to go well because i know how the atonement is so important! The lesson went pretty well, however, my companion didn´t feel so hot about it, she didn´t prepare nearly as much as i did for this one. But she did notice how I really stepped into it. I was taking a chance and talking without looking at any notes ( all in spanish) and bearing my testimony to her of the importance of the atonment. It was special to me, if no one else. I tried to take what I got from coaching study and really tired to apply it.

 

and for another highlight: a couple of elders stopped by to show us an example of teaching and to bear their testimonies. I was walking up the stairs and thought ´´hey look! ít´s missionaries!!´´´and then I realized, oh yeah, we are at the CCM, we are all misisonaries. :D well, they ended up being missionaries who are just about to go home to north america. they are fluent now and they look like well used missionaries for sure. they showed their example, but talked way too quietly and fast, but then bore powerful testimonies in english. it was sooo nice and their testimonies had a lot of emotion and power and spirit. it was great.

 

I am sad to have the first batch leave tomorrow. the CCM will be almost empty for a day. i have gotten close to almost all of the nortes ( most of the hispanas have different schedules, and the language barrier and everything...we are friends, just not so tight) I know almost all of their names from memory, first and last, and some thing about them. they are all so incredible, and i know they will do great.

 

the weeks and days are finally speeding up a bit, i hear these next few weeks fly by. I´ve got to go, but love you all!

 

con amor, Hermana Hutchins.

First Week at the CCM

Well this week has been a rollercoaster for sure. (btw this keyboard is for spanish so all of my words are ¨spelt incorrectly¨and the space bar doesn¨t want to work, and I can¨t find an apostrophe.) I lived through the first day even though I was about to pass out because of the need of sleep. I calculated it to be about 38 hours with 1.5 hours of sleep, so I figure I had good reason to be that tired.

for way of answering some questions: I got my bag the afternoon of the second day, everything was in there, so nothing was lost, but I forgot to put my new contact solution in a plastic bag because it was still in a box. It ended up leaking, so my jeans were very much so wet when I took them out. Also, it¨s a good thing we put the pressure canned stuff in a bag, I think they all leaked out. 

There are about 150 people here at the CCM, and a little over half of them are hispanos. My district of 11 missionaries is composed of all norte americanos. My companion, hermana Medina, is from CA, graduated in nursing from BYU, I think she is 21, maybe 22 years old, she has red hair, she knows my friend Amanda Magneson from school because they did nursing together and graduated together. She is great and cares about me, I have nothing to complain about my companion, which is very nice. Almost all of the elderes in my districto are 18, I think one just turned 19. You can definately tell that they are 18. They don¨t learn quite as fast and have a hard time focusing for so long, but overall, they do okay. They are all very nice as well. To answer mom¨s question of weather I¨m making friends ultra fast like always, is yes! claro que si! By the second day I felt like I could talk to anyone, at least in english, and enjoy a meaningful conversation. Last night one of the girls in my district came up to me at night after all of our classes and lessons and asked if she could talk to me for a bit. She said that she missed talking to her mom and just needed someone she could vent to, this was not very unusual to me. I am glad though that people feel like they can trust me. 

For a run down on a typical day: wake up at 6:30, get ready until 7:15 personal study for an hour, go eat breakfast for 45 minutes, where we are expected to solo hablar en español. then we language study for an hour where we are usually working on class pre-work or memorizing assignments like "our purpose" and now we are working on "the first vision" all in spanish. we have some sort of grammar lesson for about an hour with our teacher and sometimes we get to watch little movie clips of general authorities speaking, which are usually in english, so that is really nice. We study in class more spanish grammar until it is time for luch (ps, the food is AMAZING) however, it does have the ability to make people sick. I have only been sick 1 day, and it wasn"t bad enough to keep me from going to class. Although, I think 3 or 4 of the people in our district have missed class at one point or another because they were sick. I think everyone gets digestive problems, but it"s pretty okay. so after luch is usually more class where we....study spanish! (big suprise, I know)  We"ll usually do some spanish activity that involves missionary work use. after dinner we plan lessons for our investegator (who may or may not be acting to be an investigator, but either way, we teach our best) only the second day we were allowed to teach in english, after that, every day since, we are expected to teach in spanish, which usually turns out to be Spanglish,  my companion and I work really hard to teach most of our lesson in spanish, I would say yesterday it was about 90% en espanol. It"s hard to be teaching a lesson, feel the spirit and want to say something, and not know HOW to say it. We just need to be patient and keep working. After each companionship takes a turn of teaching for 20 minutes each, we plan for the next day, go back to where our rooms are, get ready for bed, sing and pray as a hall (all in spanish) and write in our journals and get to bed by 10:30. The days are long but they are moving by faster. 

At the CCM, we are expected to learn super super fast, have everything memorized that we are asked to, and prepare ahead of time. it is so hard to do everything they want us to do as "homework" because we have no free time. However, we try our best and try hard to stay positive. By about the third day, I wasn"t feeling all-so-positive, I worked to get through it, but now things are looking more up. I am learning new words all of the time, and I do believe in the gifts of tongues and my calling as a missionary. for example, I tried memorizing "my purpose" in spanish before I came to the CCM. I worked on it for a few days, but I could NEVER get it down. I came here, they told us to memorize it by tomorrow, and I was able to. 

I have to throw in a HUGE THANKS for my 9th grade spanish class and teacher, Mr.Cluff. People are so impressed with my spanish when they hear that I only had two years of it in 9 and 10th grade. I am about at the same level as people who came in with 3 to 5 years of spanish, including a year or two in college. I can hardly believe how much spanish I was able to learn and continue to use from 9th grade. That class has made a huge difference with my spanish experience here. I am not fluent, for sure, but it gives me a bit of the upper hand. I also have to say that my companion that came with no spanish, is doing SO well. She is able to do a lot in the lessons for our investigator, alejandra, and she is able to bear testimony really well, which is harder for me in spanish. it takes me about 3 or 5 seconds per word to make sure I conjugated everything correctly.

All of the people here are so nice and press you really hard to speak at least spanglish. any word I do know in spanish, I try hard to always use it. Even today, I was talking to this teacher who sells stuff in spanglish, and a girl who has been here longer said, "he knows English, so you can just talk to him in english" but then I said, "well, I need to learn to speak in spanish, so I"ll say what I can in spanish" It"s all getting better, slowly, but surely. 

Sunday was great,and very well needed. We get to have lots of classes, and watch church movies too, most of which are in english! haha, a comment was made in our class when we were talking about learning to recognize the holy ghost, and  they said something like, "it doesn"t matter what language the spirit speaks to you in, as long as you hear it" or something like that. My wispered comment to my companion was "well, the spirit speaks to me in english" haha. so hopefully soon the spirit will start speaking to me in spanish, because it has been hard for me to really feel the spirit when everything is in spanish and I understand up to 50% of what is being said. slowly, but surely. 

for some spiritual experiences: while we were watching "mountain of the lord" ( which is a movie about the making of the SLC temple and all of the trials with that)  in english on sunday, I started to get a little emotional when they laid the first corner stone.REALLY? I thought, I get emotional about a rock being placed in the dirt, but I did. It was a really good movie, I enjoyed it very much. 

also, teaching alejandra last night went well. we were talkinig about the temple, and at one point, my companion was making a comment and I could really feel the spirit there, I looked over to here, and she was all teary-eyed. It was a great moment. 

I don"t know all that you want to know, and I"m running out of time. 

If you want me to get cool textile scripture covers  for 15$ , or really cheap ties, let me know. 

so they are coming in to kick us out now, time for the next people,

oh, today is my p day. we get to go to the temple today!

love ya! hermana hutchins.