May 21--Sundays in the MTC

Hello! I love you!

Well, it's Monday which means Preparation day and temple day!  Sis Azure and I
went to the temple today. And were asked to do sealings. It was neat to be able
to do those for a first time- Sisters and Elders can only be children. But it
still was awesome!

Funny, mom asked me about my Sundays because I was going to tell everyone about
Sunday's anyways! So here's her answer.

We wake up at 6:30- the only day we actually get to sleep till 6:30. And then
have a little bit of time to get ready and do companionship study. We get cereal
for breakfast. They don't have the cafeteria workers come in.

Then at 9:30 am, all the sisters in the MTC go to Relief Society. It starts out
with us being able to watch Music and the Spoken word. I don't think I'd ever
watched it before, but I really like it. It is fun to hear music. Then we have
someone teach us a lesson. Last week, it was Sister Barbara Thompson who is the
1st or 2nd counselor in the general relief society presidency. It is pretty
impressive to have such teachers. Did I tell everyone Sis Dew came and spoke to
us? I wrote Belinda since she is her favorite. Hearing her speak in real life I
understand why- she was awesome! Probably even better than Kory Kunz.

After Relief Society, we go back to our classroom and have sunday school which
is a district meeting. We each take a 3-5 minutes and teach a principle from
Preach My Gospel- it is pretty awesome! I LOVE PREACH MY GOSPEL. Everyone should
read it! And love it!

After that we have lunch. Every other Sunday, we have chicken cordon bleu. Which
is my favorite meal in the MTC. It is so good. I love Sunday lunch on those
days- bummer, next week is something else.

After lunch, we have about three hours to walk to the temple. We try to go and
just sit and meditate outside by the fountain. A lot of people want to take
pictures though. Sis Azure and I did find a quiet little hideaway behind the
temple on a little "nature" path. So we usually head back there.

This Sunday we only went to the temple for a little while and then went to the
RC. Has everyone checked out the new mormon.org? Well, it is pretty awesome. And
everyone should invite one friend to look at it. So we went to the call center
and took all the calls and the chats from mormon.org. The call center is
awesome! I love it. I have had so many Wendy Strong's call for their free
bibles. Most of them have committed to going to church once and I am sure they
would be just like Wendy. It gets me so pumped. I had a kinda sad chat this week
though. It lasted 45 minutes and went nowhere. I finally just had to end the
chat. I bore my testimony to him and he said that he felt good about it and
everything, but that it didn't mean it was real. He, also, said when he prayed
he felt good, but that didn't mean it was real. I didn't really know what else
to tell him. I shared a lot of scriptures with him. In the end, he said he would
pray and then chat again with someone else. I've been praying for him all day!

After that we have sacrament. EVERYTHING IS CHINESE. The sacrament prayers are
in Chinese. If they don't get the tones exactly right then they have to redo it
all. It is rather interesting. Everyone prepares a talk on an assigned subject
and then Pres Orton just calls to people from the congregation to come give
their talks in Chinese. It is rather intense... and there is usually a HUGE sigh
of relief from those not called on.

This week in church the three sisters and I in our zone sang a special musical
number. It was pretty awesome. We sang Joseph Smith's First Prayer to If you
Could Hie to Kolob. It was pretty and very powerful.

After church, we go to the MTC choir practice. It is fun. The song for this week
is awesome. It is called "Here am I." It is about the Lord calling on us and us
saying Here am I... take my hand... It is pretty and the alto part is so EASY to
sing- which is good for me!

After choir, we eat as fast as we can and run to the fireside. We try to always
sit on the floor and so far we have been successful. The firesides are awesome-
but not as good as Tuesday's devotionals.

After the firesides, there are four different movies playing like the
Testaments, the Joseph Smith movie, etc. We choose one to go to and watch it. It
is nice. I love being able to watch them. I watched the Testaments this week and
kept thinking about Carrie and how she wishes this is what they taught her in
Primary. Made me chuckle a few times. After the movie we literally sprint home-
so we make it in by 9:30 and don't break any rules!

Well, that is a rather lengthy explanation about Sunday's. And now my five
minute warning went off. Keep writing and e-mailing. I haven't gotten a package
yet, but I am so so excited to get one. I am the only one in my district to not
get one.

I LOVE YOU ALL! I KNOW THE CHURCH IS TRUE. I KNOW JOSEPH SMITH IS A PROPHET OF
GOD. I KNOW JESUS IS OUR SAVIOR AND REDEEMER!

Keep writing- much love.

Shao Jiemei.

p.s. I wrote letters today! So everyone will get a more specific letter too...
Lots of time today- just wish my thirty minutes wasn't up!