Fun thing really quick that I didn't get to tell y'all last week. When we were walking back from the temple, I ran into Jessica from Nauvoo! You know, the one who played Jane Manning. It was so fun to see her and catch up a bit. I always love running into people from "the outside world" hahaha. It's always good to see them. Speaking of people from Nauvoo, Jacob Beasley is here at the MTC now. I believe he is going to Fiji and speaking Fijian. (Remember, his family is the one from England and Becca Beasley served in Thessaloniki, Greece?) It's been fun to see him around and also to see Maya and Tristan. Although, I don't seem to run into those 2 as much as I ran into Alec, Ryan, and Wes. But it's okay!!
This week was really good! Really long, but really good! I was blessed to have many good and exciting things happen this week! :)
On Friday, we had our 2nd Skype TRC with a member of the church from Poland named Agnieszka! (Yes, please try to say that name. I dare you!) ;) She was great and really nice! But she talked BARDZO SZYBKO!! Very quickly! And she would say a TON! Which was great! Even our teacher, Sister Einfeldt was like, "Whoa.. that is FAST!" Needless to say, she was very proud of us and how well we did with that and other technical difficulties we had with internet connection and such. But it all worked out! The biggest miracle of all was that I didn't feel like it was any different from any of our other lessons in the sense that I understood basically everything she was saying, or at least got the general idea of what she was saying. It has been incredible to see everything that I've been able to understand this week. Even though I've never spoken Polish with or taught someone who speaks so quickly, it was so good and comforting to know that I will be able to understand most of what they're saying when I get to Poland. (At least, I'll understand when they're talking about church things. Anything else and I'll be totally lost, but it's all good! I have time to learn!!)
Saturday was the most tragical day of all!!! *please imagine me saying this super dramatically as you read* (And yes, for those of you wondering.. tragical is indeed a real word. It means dreadful, calamitous, disastrous, or fatal. All of which are fitting for what I am about to tell you.) OUR MINTS WERE STOLEN!!! It started with half of them mysteriously disappearing.. We wrote a note that said "Thou shalt not steal! Please return our mints. Love, The Poles" and they responded by taking all the rest of our mints!!! All 35 containers were GONE!! We don't know who it was, but we are highly suspicious of the Russians....... There's kind of a rivalry between the Poles and the Russians. (I mean.. as much of a rivalry as you can have here at the MTC where we most certainly all love each other and never ever steal people's things... right?? Haha only kidding. We do love them, and some of the Russians have been really nice and even offered to donate mint containers to us haha.) It has been really interesting though because everyone passes by our classroom, so everyone sees the mint stack. Soooo, when it disappeared, we had random people coming by and asking about it. Turns out, everyone loved the mint stack and loved seeing it in the window everyday haha. Oh the simple, childlike joys we find as missionaries. XD We had many people we didn't know come by and drop off mint containers; both full and empty ones. Honestly it was crazy to see how many people loved that stack. Anyway, we're all good over here and now that we know for sure that everyone looks in our window as they pass, we've turned it into a good thing! We put a scripture or conference quote on this small whiteboard and we put it in the window and people always stop to read it! This is just a perfect example of how good can always come from a bad situation. (Even if it was a sort of silly example, the principle is still true!) :)
Our inspirational quote and our new beginnings...
We are Poland, we cannot be defeated, we will not be broken, we will rise again!!
Sunday, Sister Emett and I taught the Relief Society lesson again. (In case you haven't noticed... we do a lot of teaching around here. "To teach, and preach, and work as missionaries do..." Haha, yes, the song is very, VERY accurate and I'm sure I'll find that to be even more true in Poland!!) Anyway, we taught on Christlike Attributes. This was really cool for 2 reasons: 1. This was the lesson we had on our first Sunday here at the MTC, so we have now made it through the entire rotation of lessons. 2. As missionaries, we are always studying Christlike Attributes, so this was a fun one to teach. Some of the things we focused on (which I took from my personal study of the Book of Mormon) were the qualities of Moroni (in Alma 43 & 44) and how he showed Christlike attributes. One of the ones that stood out to me most was Moroni's faithfulness. In Alma 44:3, Moroni says "the Lord is with us" and also, "and now ye see that ye cannot destroy this our faith." I just loved that! Now, I've been studying Hope as my Christlike Attribute this week because last week the Polish was really hard and I wanted to be positive and hopeful about learning this difficult language. And it was really neat to see the example of Moroni in this. He had so much faith and hope, even when his army was greatly outnumbered and the task at hand seemed impossible. But he didn't lose that faith or hope and in the end, he triumphed! I am looking forward to my day of triumph (in the language) as well, but for now I just have faith and hope in Christ and His ability to help me!
Monday was pretty fun. We had the opportunity to host senior missionaries again! There was a Senior Missionary Couple coming today who will be serving in Poland! We waited ALL morning for them and had been yelling "cześć!!" at everyone who arrived to see if we got any responses. Finally.. FINALLY they came! We yelled, "Cześć!!!" and they yelled it back and asked how we were doing (in Polish)!! We were so excited! They are Elder and Sister Womack from Vancouver, Washington. (They don't know the Carroll's though. But Elder Womack did live in Tigard when he was younger.) Anyway, we love them and we're so happy that they'll be going to Poland with us!! Also, really fun thing today: Who remembers who Sister Neill F. Marriott is? If you don't, look her up! But she was the 2nd counselor in the General Young Women's Presidency. Anyway, she was released from that calling in April 2018 and now she and her husband are here at the MTC about to head out on a mission in Portugal! So that was way cool!
Funny story from Monday: So I got a letter in the mail from Greece!! I was very surprised to see that it was a letter from Elder Nicolis (aka Sister Debiasi's boyfriend)!! I was very concerned..... because it was addressed to me.... but no need to worry!! I flipped it over and on the back it said to "please give to Sister Debiasi!" Haha, I was so relieved... But I decided to play a little joke on her hehehehe.... We were all at lunch and I whipped out the letter and said, "Sister Debiasi! Guess who I got a letter from?!" (Don't worry, I know she's the kind of person who can take a joke like this. Otherwise I wouldn't have done it!) She saw it and was like, "WHAAATTT?! I haven't even gotten a letter from him!!" And she was trying to see if her District Leader had checked the mail for that day yet. And then I told her that it was a letter for her and he had just used my address since I've been here way longer, so he could get it sending sooner. And she was SOOOO EXCITED!!! She just ran over and gave me the biggest hug and we laughed and laughed. It was a lot of fun! :)
The letter that thankfully wasn't for me!!
Tuesday we were planning for our Skype TRC on Friday and I found a quote by Neill F. Marriott for us to use. I jokingly said to Sister Emett, "What if we ran into Sister Marriott and we were like, 'Oh.. hey! I just quoted you in my lesson yesterday!' How crazy would THAT be?!" Well.... you've probably guessed by now, but I did end up meeting Sister Neill F. Marriott. Not only did I meet her, but I sat next to her during choir practice AND the devotional Tuesday night! (Lucky for me, they tell everyone they have to sit in the same seats for the devotional as they did for choir practice.) :) But yes, I was able to talk to her and get to know her a bit. I LOVED having the opportunity to meet her! She is so, so sweet! She was so glad that I was a strong alto and could help her sing the song. And believe me, I was very glad for that too! Haha! She told me she loved singing with me and meeting me and that I was going to be a wonderful missionary. It was such a blessing to hear things like that from a previous General Authority. As we said goodbye, she gave me a big hug! I was so, SO grateful for the opportunity I had to meet her. :)
Note for just the family about that experience (because not everyone needs to hear this, because I don't want to come off as though I'm bragging): She said she felt so safe and secure sitting by me during choir and devotional, because I helped her sing. She loved that our family sings together and has all the parts. She told me that she could feel the sweet, strong spirit that I had and that I was going to be a wonderful missionary and bless many lives. She said she was so glad to meet me and sing with me. And Mom, she said to tell you that you've done a wonderful job with raising me.
Alrighty, Wednesday we had a really good class in the evening. One of our teachers, Sister Barney (she got married, so now it's Sister Theriault), decided that for class she would surprise us. And we had to teach a lesson all in Polish, with zero time to prepare. It's a good thing I have faith, right? Haha! But really, it wasn't so bad! I was so surprised to see that I was able to piece together sentences and phrases and have them actually kind of make sense. I feel like I say this every week, but really! It's always a miracle to me and I am so grateful! She also had us switch up roles. And she had me pretend to be the "interested person" who was being taught. (I think that this may have been because I was the only one really talking when we were teaching the first time. Sister Emett is really, really shy and Sister Tario makes her really nervous, so she clams up even more. I allow time and opportunities for her to speak, but she couldn't say anything, so I ended up talking and teaching the whole time. And thus, I became the "interested person".) So, I was able to practice Polish and being a person who didn't know anything about the church. That was a cool experience too! And then, to top it all off, we did a role play and pretended that there had just been this earthquake and we were in Poland. Basically, the scenario was that we were trapped in this place and a lady was with us. We were able to teach her about the power of prayer and what Jesus Christ can do for us in times of trial or times when we're afraid. We were also able to teach on how families can be together forever and that it doesn't end with this life. So basically, that class just forced us to speak Polish, but it was SO GOOD! Because it made me realize that I CAN speak Polish and I can get my message across when I really need to. The language is coming so much faster now. I feel like a made a big leap of progress this last week. Even just the last few days! It’s really exciting. And I know it’s just going to increase so much once I get out into the field. So I’m really excited to experience that!
I remember when I was in elementary school and how I wanted to be Secret Agent or an FBI Agent or something. Now I'm thinking maybe I should still do that... The Polish would likely come in handy... who knows?? ;)
Hope you all have a wonderful week! Remember Christ and try to serve others as He would if He were here. This church is true!!
Love you all!!
Siostra Shaylin Carroll
Polish District.
Snack time in the residence.
Sack Breakfast after Service Saturday.
FLORIDA KEEYYYYSSS.
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