Bienvenido!

The following letter arrived today!:

Hola Familia!

I hope everything is going great for you. This letter probably won't be too long, my P-Day is usually Fridays but we don't get one this week so we have special permission to write a quick letter home so you don't worry.

Mom, I feel a little bad about not letting you take any pictures but don't worry I've already taken some.
Today has been absolutely crazy! After the nice Edlers picked me up curbside they dropped me with a host sister who excitedly showed me the ropes. I got my "Hermana Giossi" name tag - it feels pretty cool, not gonna lie! Please tell Elder Concha that I am in fact HERMANA! From there it was all a whirlwind. I went to class and met my teacher, she is from Spain so she has the lisp. My companion is Hermana Harris, she is super sweet and is going to El Salvador Santa Ana & Beliz Mission. Actually the other 2 sisters in my district are going there too, but I've met quite a few Elders going to my mission and a couple are in my district. Class was pretty fun and my teacher said I have a good accent - that's probably because all we had to say "How are you" "Where are you from" and "Where are you going" We'll see how the rest of this goes...

After class we had orientation, each member of the MTC Presidency & their wives addressed us. We also got some stats ( and I asked around about others) There are currently about 2000 of us living in this MTC. Each week 300-500 arrive. This week there were 88 new sisters (usually there are around 40) When it's your first day your tag has a bright orange sticker on it and EVERYONE.....and I mean EVERYONE welcomes you. It was like when I had the birthday pin at Disney, but worse.

Then there was dinner. The food was GREAT - maybe I enjoyed it so much because I was so hungry, I don't know.

We had this really cool teaching experience thing where we taught new "investigators" as a group of about 40. That was a really neat experience. Our teacher told us that as missionaries our purpose is to invite others to come unto Christ and we could teach great lessons but if we don't "invite" we have not done our job as missionaries. So No Pressure.

So far (with my one day of experience) I like it a lot. The most surreal part was in the orientation when hundreds of us were singing "Called To Serve" I am a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I represent Jesus Christ, the Savior of all mankind. I know that the church is true (and very organized :) ) and that this is where I am supposed to be right now. I love you so much!

Love,
Hermana Victoria Giossi

P.S. I'll be waiting for letters. I want to know what's going on at home!