Excerpt from email to family 10-29-2014

10-29-2014

I don’t do a mass email; I just have people look at the blog. I am SOOOO so happy that I came to this MTC. The Lord definitely knows what he’s doing in all things. I met a kid from Pocatello, he’s a newbie, and he went to the same HS as Trevor and knows his little sister Ashley! Kind of cool. Also a girl here went to the same HS as Aubrey from my HU soccer team. And there are currently 2 kids here from Montana. One is from Billings the other from Great falls.

 I play soccer every day!! I made a bicycle kick goal the other day. And everyone thought it was the coolest thing ever. One teacher told me last week his dream is to be able to play soccer with me, and yesterday he did! ....I still have a cool head and am not cocky, but to be honest all the Latinos love me since I play soccer. :)

I am DEFINITELY getting enough to eat. Probably too much! And one of the CCM (MTC) rules is to eat all your food. Sometimes it’s hard because we don’t dish it up ourselves, the people working in the Cafeteria do.

I have been healthy! Although I eat a lot of beets! But it’s all good. ;) But I feel great! I haven’t had a single head ache yet!

My comps are from Rexburg and North Salt Lake. Vanessa South and Jennesa Coleman. If you want you can look them up on FB. Ha-ha

Studying is WAY easier than at home! It’s weird. Of course all we do here is church stuff so it’s totally normal.

Tell grandma hello and I love her! :) 

Well love you guys!! :) Tell everyone hello

The days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days. (10-29-2014)

The days run together here. Its hard to remember what day’s things happened. I COULD look in my journal but I don’t really have time for that. ...but today, and maybe more emails, I’m going to use a series of subtitles and describe those things, not necessarily having anything to do with events. 

My Companions:

Everyone always says being in a trio is super hard. But what of us? We get along really well and haven’t had any problems. Hermana Coleman and Hermana South are the best that I could ask for. We get along so well that we have some odd things we do. 1. We have a handshake. 2. We have a quote wall in our room for all the funny/stupid/fantastic things we say. 3. There is a picture of a hand heading into the bathroom and it has a bunch of cartoon germs on it. We each picked one and named it. Mine is Calvin and the other 2 are Eli and Steven. 4. We beatbox/hum/sing (rap) together. We got some pretty cool rhythms going right now. ...We have a ton of fun. Don’t get me wrong though they are both spiritual examples to me and we study/teach a lot too. We always talk about how blessed we are to have this companionship. 

Food:

We’ve had carne and pollo saltado many times this week and it is the best! Also, the ice cream is way good here too... my vegetables of choice that they serve here? Definitely beets! I LOVE BEETS! None of the vegetables are raw they are always cooked. ...At home I didn’t like apples very much but here, they are quite good! Also, bananas at home make my mouth itch, but not here! :) 

Out and About:

Monday and Tuesday this week we got to go on a "field trip" and leave the CCM. Monday we went to Migrations (I have no idea what it was for and what we did there. Nobody said and nobody spoke English, whatever it was its helping us to be able to get our Visas to stay here I think) And Tuesday we went to Interpol (which was at the National Police Place or something). There we were finger printed and we gave them other papers, I don’t know what they were exactly. They also checked our teeth, which I guess was in case we die they use it to help identify our body. Crazy as all of the papers and stuff was and not really communicating well with people other than pointing and some Spanish words I feel really good like everything is well taken care of. 

Traffic:

People drive nuts here!! I would definitely never survive. I think that a huge reason why it’s not a driving mission. And there are bunch of super old, cobbled together crappy cars, but there are some sticking nice ones too! Like Mercedes, Porsche, a lot of Nissans etc... It’s just crazy to see the little 3 wheeled taxi car things (which are really motorcycles with bodies) driving next to nice sports cars. Also, they have traffic cops here. And what’s WEIRDER is ALLL of the ones I’ve seen, except one, have been women!! Common things you see in traffic; round abouts, HUGE speed bumps, and jam packed busses. And everyone here honks, a LOT... for not reason.

Common American Places I’ve seen

McDonalds, Subway, Burger King, Chilli’s, Hard Rock Care, Gold’s Gym, and a bunch of nice car dealerships. Also they have Pepsi here, but NO MOUNTAIN DEW! :O Pepsi, but no Pepsi products?! What the heck. But it’s good... I don’t need that anyway.

But out of ALL this week, there was one experience that was the absolute best! We (my district) were sitting in class one morning and we heard the voices of children. For a moment we got super confused because obviously there aren’t any kids at the CCM (MTC). So our teacher told us real quick that sometimes the primary kids from the nearby stake come to visit to kind ofish take a tour. So we got super excited and we rushed to the door. When we opened it, there was a huge line of Peruvian kids. The little girl directly next to the door as we opened it screamed while shaking her hands in the air with the biggest eyes of excitement. I literally felt famous for a second. So our district went out into the hall along the wall to say hello. They all then went to each one of us and shook our hands. Some of the little kids even gave us hugs. Then all the adults with them gave us hugs, did that whole side cheek kiss thing too. (That will be something to get used to) But they said 'Gracias' into our ears with the most gratitude I’ve heard. I will never forget how excited those kids were and how grateful they seemed. They were all so stinking cute too!! It makes me super excited to get out into the field and have a ward I go to and will get to know the members and kids there.

Its weird I’ve been here almost a month. It feels like hardly any time at all. Even though I’m tired all the time and having classes over and over all the time, I am definitely enjoying myself here :) Hope all is well wherever you all are! Feel free to email me (posted on this page) with any questions or anything. My time to write is short (only 1 hour) but I’ll do my best to reply! 

Love, Hermana Kiser 

Scripture for this week... We’ve been using this chapter in our lessons a lot lately... 

Ether 12:27 (Book of Mormon)

"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

Poco A Poco

 

Thats what all the teachers here say, "Poco a poco..." Little by little. Its true though, we are learning a lot but little by little.  Our maestra said its like watching your fingure nail grow. You cant see it growing if you consciously look at it, but if you arent focused on it then one day its just super long. One day we are just going to be able to hold a compoletely normal fluid conversation in spanish.

 

This week FLEW past! I cant beleive its already P-Day again! The newest group of missionaries got here last night. THere are about 20 North Americans and 60 Latinos (thats what I heard anyway). Its kind of odd though because the group that just left had 40 North Americans in it. Its also weird being considerered Intermedios instead of Principates, I feel like i just got here.

 

Things have gotten to be in a pretty regular shcedule now, so nothing SUPER exciting. Ive taught about 5-6 lessons in spanish, broken of course, but its coming along pretty well :)

 

The birds here are super nice! :) Ive seen blue, yellow and red ones, and mulitple hummingbirds, and there are a lot of morning doves everywhere. But the sounds here are so different there are so many there is always birds singing which I enjoy. The plants are also very different of course.  Its just weird to see palm tress and other tripical-ish plants ive never seen on a regular basis. Not complaining though!

 

There is a ton of construction all the time around (outside the MTC) that echoes off everything and its super loud sometimes. We study outside a lot so sometimes its gets pretty irritating. There are actually quite a few small mountains that jut up everywhere here so it echoes off that too. You cant see teh mountains all the time though because of A. the fog in the morning or B. the smog during the day.  Some people joke that on P-Days when we leave the walls of hte MTC that we breathe in straight cancer. Its really not THAT bad though, there are definitely way worse cities in the world!!

 

...So the rumors turned out to be true, I DO eat rice at least once everyday. I actually am not sick of it yet though, after 2 weaks!! I also have never eaten this much meat in my life! I, most of the time, at lunch and dinner either chicken of some kind or carne (meat). They dont sepcify the meat unless its chicken (pollo), so its just meat. And every morning we have fired or scrambled eggs a piece of cheese, a slice of deli ham, and a couple rolls. And they have THE. BEST. juice here!! Im pretty sure its because its the real deal.

 

My companions are still great. Im so very thankful they dont get on my nerves or anything because I have LITERALLY been around them 24/7 since I got here. And my district is still amazing. We had the BEST district meeting/testimony meeting on Sunday. They will all be fantastic missionaries.

 

So until today when we went out into the city after the Temple I didnt feel like I was in South America. But today, when we went to some stores I actually did feel like I was not in the US anymore. There were just so many people out and about and darting in between traffic and the shops have their different food/fruit and stuff! It was amazing. I think I will thrive here in the fact that I love just going out and getting after it. We went to a place today called Garajes, which is its nick name because it is litterally a building of garages that they roll up and have their teeny shops inside. I bought a couple Peruvian soccer jerseys there today. ALSO, the busses make it seem like Peru. They shove as many people as they can onto these busses and we are standing so close together we are about as close as pringles. Its nuts. But it is SO much fun. :D 

 

I can and I cant wait to get out into the field. I am enjoying learning here, but at the same time I miss the interactions with everyday people and I cant to get out and experience the Peruvian people and culture more.

 

Well, not a whole lot else to report. I love it here! Until next week! :)

 

Love, 

 

Hermana Kiser

 

P.S. WE GOT TO WATCH THE "MEET THE MORMONS" FILM!!!!! They had it as a surprise! We asked when we got here if wed be able to watch it an they said no. And then on Sunday we actually DID get to see it!! What a great movie (documentary). I highly  suggest it to anyone/everyone. :D ...quote from Hermana Gonzalez (MTC Presidents wife) "I am going to say the name of the movie we are going to watch. And you will not scream." Rotflol. It was great. :)

I'M FAMOUS

 

So I've literally played soccer everyday except for Sunday and today which is pday and dont have time to. I played the very first day i was here and suprised all the latinos so much! Now everyday they ask me if im playing and say champion everytime i walk bye. Really, just about every person in the MTC knows who I am and that ive played college soccer. its the absolute best to be playing here in Peru, its insane. it still hasnt hit me yet that im in south america, its just not real. 

 

The MTC (missionary training center) or CCM (in spanish) is great!! There are about 120 missionaries here. My companions are pretty great too, which is nice. And yes, I have 2. This is because the girl who was suppose to be my companion got engaged literally the day before coming out here. craziness! so im in a trio. My district is also the best. (A district is basically just a group of missionaries about 10 or so for classes etc. not very many people came into the MTC at the same time as me so all the people I flew in with on the plane are in my district. They are all North Americans of course we are all at basically the same place in our learning in classes. We will be one class together for the entire 6 weeks we are here. And there are 11 of us. 6 Elders and then 5 of us sisters. The guys in my district seriously are the best though. They are all very fun, kind and considerate, spiritual, and hard working guys. I am extremely impressed with them. And one is British!! so that always keeps it interesting with his accent and goofy sayings/phrases nobody else knows.

 

Adjusting to the missionary life has actually been way easier than I thought it was going to be. I havent had withdrawals from facebook or anything like that really yet. but i guess it has only been a week. So I share one room with the 4 other sisters in my district. we have bunkbeds. and I get up to shower at 5:30 in the morning. Which is about 30 minutes earlier than I have to but I hate the rush of it and like to just be able to get ready when not everyone else is around. I say its crazy because there are 3 showers and 3 bathroom stalls for about 24 girls. which are all the sister missinoaries here. it nuts. then we have breakfast at 7:00 which always consists of some kind of egg, fried or scrambled, a piece of cheese, a piece of ham, and some fruit and rolls. everyday. but i totally dont mind. and from about 7:45-9:30 its classes and studying all day except for 1 hr of Physical Activity time and 45 Minutes for lunch and dinner. Although I am adjusting, i still am tired basically all the time, but its completely fine! :) It will be my life of being tired for the next 18 months anyway.

 

Its crazy how fast we learn here. I just think about HS spanish and how long we took to learn somethings and here, its like MANY things in one day. I cant imagine how it is for people with zero spanish background. Ive been here a week and I can already pray, bear my testimony, approach people and ask about them, and today I am teaching my first lesson...ALL IN SPANISH.

 

So I guess its super rare for missionaries going to any of the Lima missions to come to the Lima MTC. They all generally go to the Mexico MTC. So I am literally the only sister missionary going anywhere here in Lima and there are only a couple Elders going to Lima missions. So im unique in that aspect here too.

 

Haha, one thing that is super funny, that im just going to have to go with the flow of is everyone calls me Hermana (sister) Kisser because they cant pronounce Kiser correctly. 

 

So as missionaries we have one Pday a week (Personal Day) which is today. It's our one day a week to EMAIL family and friends, wash our clothes and bedding, and not wear church clothes all day, and take pictures of any kind. The unfortunate thing though is that it ends at 3:45 :/ Oh well! Because one unique thing about the Peru MTC is that we get to go to the Temple once a week on our Pdays in the morning. Its pretty close so we just hop on a bus and go! But the evern CRAZIER thing is that we get to go shopping afterwards for 1.5-2 hours depending. We of course stay close-ish to the temple. But its weird because we literally leave the mtc, catch a bus for 50 cents (peruvian) WITH NO ADULTS OR LEADERS WHATSOEVER and just go to the temple and go about shopping after wherever we want. (within reason of course. we dont go anywhere dangerous or sketchy or where we shouldnt) Today we just went to the temple store (peruvian deseret book kinda, but super teeny) and this place called Totus. Its just a big grocery store. Kinda of like a mini walmart, but it was SUPER nice. But it was just weird to me to learn that we could leave the walls of the MTC at all, let alone go shop by ourselves!

 

So funny story. The toilets here are not up to par. I say this, because I flooded one! 0__O In the US it never would have. But I flushed it, then it went up a teeny then I thought it was going to go down, but it never did! So thank goodness there was a plunger there so I could plunge it. ...although I still had to clean up some water,  :/ unfortnately because of this me and my companions were a bit late to our sunday devotional.

 

Im not sure what all to write about! I feel like Ive written an awful lot, and congrats if you made it to the end and it all made sense. The keyboards here are weird because they are spanish keyboards so excuse the typos and the lack of punctuation. So much has happned this week and its been the longest week of my life, but not long at all at the same time, so its kind of odd to know what to write about what people would like to hear. But i think next weeks email will be more put together and consise and Ill tell you a bit more about how things work here and since Im in a schedule it wont be so hectic.

 

I hope everything is going well for all who read this! Life is great for me so far here in Peru!

 

Hermana, Kiser