Hello friends and family~

So... tomorrow marks 3 weeks in the MTC! Our Phii Thais left us yesterday. I'm so happy for them! They're going to do great. I'm looking forward to seeing them and possibly being in a companionship with some of them!

Our district has recently received a new member. The Elder companionship is now a threesome! Elder Hunt, one of our Phii Thais totally destroyed his knee while playing basketball a few weeks back, and now will be flying out to Thailand with us in 6 weeks. We're not sure if he'll be staying at the MTC until then or go home. It kind of sounds like he'll be going home to heal, but we'll see! Right now we're enjoying the neat little rectangle that we form at the table during meals. :O) Lesson to be learned: sports at the MTC take out more missionaries than any other reason! Every day I see SO MANY PEOPLE who have casts or splints! Not only that, but random illnesses are taking people, out, too. Already so many of the Phii Thais had to go home because of random disorders that popped up at the MTC. I think Satan is really working hard to keep us from teaching people about Christ. :O I sure hope I manage to make it out of the MTC alive! The chances look slimmer every day. 

Starting two days ago we started singing from the Thai hymn book at the beginning of classes. At first we were reading romanized versions (PS Thai songs are super easy because there are no tones), but now it's full blown SCRIPT. Script is interesting. You basically find the consonants and then scan all around them  to find vowels that are scattered about them. Sometimes consonants wear hats, sometimes pants, sometimes they have a three piece suit! On top of that, you have to remember if a consonant is high, middle, or low class, and if the vowel is short or long, and then notice if there is a tone marker. All of those combined make various tones and it's haaaaard! We have 'script cards' that tell us all those things. We call them the Urim and Thummim. :P

Thai is coming still. Tones are really killing me. If you want to say, 'I believe in Christ', "Sidtee chxua nay Phrayeesuu Khrid khaa" it will sound the exact same way when you say it 3 years from now. Tones are SO specific. I think I told you how some Phii Thais have said in discussions that they bought tigers instead of shirts, that Joseph Smith is evil, and give the investigator a relationship rather than an interview. WELL. Last week in a discussion with a new investigator I was trying to tell him that when you read the scriptures, God fills you with His love. Welllll, what I actually said because of tones was, "When you read the scriptures, God drinks until He dances." I was wondering why the investigator looked so confused!! I learned that day that you never ask a Thai person "khaw chay may khaa?" (do you understand?) because they will always say yes no matter what you say. haha!

My companionship with Sis Ng and Barton has really grown. We're really learning to lean on

each other and the Lord. At first we were trying so hard to plan every sentence out in a lesson, but we learned that you just can't do that! It's all about getting to know the person as an individual who has needs and concerns and who has been prepared by God to receive your message! You just have to go in and discern what they want/need to hear! We're still working on that, but we're finally starting to allow the Spirit to guide us. It's really hard. It's easy to think that it's all on us, that we have to do everything. I learn every day that I just have to rest on the Savior and He'll take me where He needs me. As long as I'm obedient, study hard and love my companions and the people I serve, I will be able to accomplish what I'm supposed to!

I've learned a lot of awesome words! I wanna share some. : )

Bobaboboa = crazy (SO fun to say)

phrabida bon sawan = Heavenly Father

pen pay DAY! = it's possible! (literally translated: is go can)

patiseed = deny/reject (we use this alot in four square)

chxa = believe

Thai is kinda like German. It's so literal. you just take a lot of words, stick them together and boom you have a new word! Savior is: Praphuuchuayhayrccd which literally translated is royal person who helps give salvation. Yup!

Love you all! Send me letters. : )

       Sister Zaugg

Sawadii kha krccbkhrua le phxuan khccn sidtee!! Hello my friends and family!!

So, even though I haven't quite been here for two weeks, it's still counted as 3 because of how the MTC works or something... Anyway, the second week was MUCH better than the first! We finally feel like we've been initiated into the MTC experience and kind of know what we're doing. A little bit. Last Wednesday was the BEST because all the new misisonaries came and some even asked us things like "where's the bathroom?"! We felt pretty cool, even though we didn't know how to answer most of them still. haha!

Recently we have discovered the ~*CHOIR*~. I knew that Aunt Wendy had really recommended it, but I've never liked choir so I hadn't really decided to go. However, our Phii Thais whom we cherish and follow around like puppies were all like, "GO TO CHOIR IT IS THE BEST THING AT THE MTC!!" So of course we went. And oh... my goodness... IT IS!! The choir director is hilarious. Not only are we singing in a huge choir with 800 other misisonaries all sharing our testimonies about the same thing, but we get like a little comedy hour AND he always has the best spiritual thoughts that really strengthen my own testimony! By the end I feel really light hearted and rested, but spiritually stronger. Plus, we got to sing in the giant sacrament meeting on Easter which was amazing.

Speaking of Easter, it was lovely! I hope your Easters were as fantastic as mine. We all had the sacrament at the same time! Which I guess has never been done before at the MTC. Sitting in the choir with all these other missionaries whose purpose is the same as mine, watching the pictures of Christ show on the big slideshow and reading the words of the song "The Lord is My Shepherd" just about did me in. It was so overwhelming. I just had this huge realization that Easter is the reason why we're missionaries! There have been so many devotionals lately about how even though we need to cater to investigators' personal needs and show how the Gospel helps them no matter the concern, that we must always remember that the one thing EVERYONE needs is to be freed from their sins and to live again. And that's what the Atonement is about!!! Christ took our sins upon Himself so that we can become better than what we are. He died for us so that we can live again with Him, God, and our families. What an amazing message! That is what we are sharing with the world. We are the Lord's Battalion in the 11th hour. It's amazing.

I learn so much about my purpose and Christ every day. Something I want to share is a message from David A. Bednar's talk, "The Character of Christ" which we watched after the devotional on Sunday. He tells us, "Just because you have a testimony doesn't mean you are converted unto the Lord. You are converted unto the Lord when you begin to take His characteristics upon yourself." How do you do that? What are the characteristics of Christ? Simply, it's turning out with love and compassion for our fellow man when the natural man in us would turn in. I would ask all of you the next time you're having a bad day and just want to complain about it and say, "look at me! wahh wahh!" Turn out and make it about someone else. Remember that even when Christ was dying on the cross, He still was more concerned about His mother, the thieves on the crosses next to Him, and the Romans.

Teaching is betterrr.... just not good. I'm happy to say that yesterday we gave our first lesson in Thai with NO NOTES!! We had dictionaries, but we only looked up two words the whole time. The only problem is that we haven't been very unified in our teaching. That's the hard part about trios, it's harder to be unified, and thus harder to teach with the spirit. We're working on it.

We're happy and excited for our Phii Thais who got their travel plans last week! They leave next Monday! We're going to miss them so much. : ( 

Recently Sister Barton and I have discovered four square. We love it!! We play with the Phii Thais, Cambodians, and Mongs. It can get pretty intense.

I love you all! And I love letters. : )

Sidtee ruu waa saadsanacag nii ben saadsanacag thii thee chin khaa. Sidtee ruu waa Phrayeesukhrid ben Phraphuuchuayhayrccd khccn raw. Prakhaw rag raw.

Talk to you next week! <3

Sister Zaugg

Sister Zaugg's First Letter Home

Saawatdii kha!

It's my second day at the MTC, but it feels like it's been weeks! It's go, go, go, all day long! I love it!

I am in District 30. There are 5 of us in my district (I'm in a trio). My companions' names are Sister Barton and Sister Ng. They are both really awesome and really different! I love them already.

I have been very busy. Learning Thai takes about 6 hours of my day. The tones are pretty hard. Today we learned how to say prayers in Thai. We're trying to memorize them by tonight so that we can say our prayers in Thai, since we share a room with a Cambodian trio and they say their prayers in Cambodian.

So, all of the Thai people already here are called Phii Thais (big Thais) and we are the Nxxy Thai (little Thais). They fawn over us like Aunts over chubby babies.

I'm super excited to learn more, and more, and more! We teach our first lesson tomorrow!

                                                                                  Love,

                                                                                       Sister Zaugg