22 October 2015

This is our teacher Siostra Blake. Yesterday was our last day with her, because she didn't think she could handle all the stress of working at the MTC. She made a big deal of the fact that it wasn't us, just the schedule. But yeah, she's awesome, and if you, Max, or Caity see her, tell her that she's one of the best people in the world. Because she is.

The mission home address, where you can send packages or letters until we know how well the mail system works is:

Elder Sam Liechty

Kościół Jezusa Chrystusa

ul. Wiertnicza 135, I piętro

02-952 Warszawa

Poland

Four days.

When we talked with the Polish people (which we did again yesterday), the first time it was pretty easy to understand her, she spoke slowly and clearly for us, and it was pretty easy to rozmawiać (converse) with them. But the second time, it was really bad connection, and his voice was really quiet, but we were still able to teach some stuff with him, also he had an accent that was tough to understand, and he spoke pretty quickly. But it was still amazing. I get butterflies in my stomach everytime I think about going there, and it's just going to be great!

Hopefully I'll be able to find some long lost family members in Poland and show them the gospel. What an amazing story that would be! But who knows, it might not. Whatever the Lord's will is. And I bought a calling card from here, which gives me about seven hours of calling time, so I think I'm pretty set. Will everyone be home? I'll be able to call sometime around 4-5:30 Chicago time. I can call Zach and Katie, too, if they can. Hopefully you'll see this and we can figure something out real quick. And I already have the set of books from Max,  so I'm set on the 14 hour plane ride. O jej... (Oh, dear). And snacks I'm fine with, too. Everyone's giving away everything so their suit cases aren't heavy.

AND MICE!? Ew. Destroy them all. Sometimes we have spiders, but they don't stand a chance against 20 intuitive missionaries.

I'm just so excited to be in Poland and actually start teaching real people!! It's gonna be crazy scary, but who cares. It's gonna be awesome! And I've already received proof that Polish people can at least understand me, so that's going to be fine. I just want to be there right now and not wait these days. Monday can't come soon enough. I'm going to take so many pictures there, you don't even know! There's so little to take here because every building is the same drab color of off yellow. But Poland is better than that.

I'm going to be sending letters to y'all today, but I don't know where everyone lives, so I'll just send them to you, mom, and you can figure it out from there. :D

Things are going to get rough, but we have God on our side. The most powerful being in existence, who can do literally everything, is at our side pushing us along. I don't think that we can fail.

Next time I send an email, I'll be in Poland.

Starszy Liechty

15 October 2015 - (Current address) OCT27 POL-WAR, 2005 N. 900 E. Unit 17, Provo, UT 84602

What the heck is Brother Iverson doing is trees! Adults get mad when I'm in trees! And I'm bendy
and not breakable! But of course, I'll pray for him.

And what's more than just seeing videos of people from Poland, yesterday, instead of doing the
usual TRC thing, which is just teaching people who know how to speak Polish here (usually RMs) 
we got to skype someone who lived in WARSAW!! Right before the skype call started, I got this 
feeling like "wait. This isreal. This person is like the people that I'll be teaching in two weeks" And 
I became CRAZY nervous and excited. And then she answered and it was like explosions and the most"WHOWOAHOWHAHAHHAUGHG
UGHGAHAH!" Kind of feeling that you can get. It was awesome. I need to
 be there right now Real fast- sometimes in class, when our teachers are doing something like 
teaching us how to plan our day or week, they'll do role plays, and bring up different people and 
they'll be like "Oh, I think that Susie's doing really good right now" and Susie is a pretty normal 
name, right? But then they say "Oh yeah, but Agnieszka is having some problems" And it's great 
because Polish names range from susie to agnieszka. AND DURING TRC WE TAUGHT AN 
AGNIESZKA!! It was perfect. What a good name.

And I do want the Harry Potter scarf . The coat is fantastic. Everyone in my zone is jealous
of how attractive I can now be. I can't wait for it to get really cold!! 

I'm actually only reading the BoM in english, Polish, too, but I'm not trying to finish it at the
MTC, that would be incredibly difficult. Where I am, I can only get through about one chapter 
a day. It turns out that our zone president lives in like, the fourth ward! So he was able to tell 
me about the presidency. His name is Wiseman,so, I don't know... do what you want with 
that information. And Brother Clark met the second councilor in my zone, President Redding. 
So neat.

And we're able to hear the BYU games from the MTC, and are usually able to tell how the
score is coming based on the cheers, which is nice.

We've had Elder Oaks come to speak with us, and he's been the only member of the 12. We
get a lot of the Seventy, and we've gotten the Presiding Bishop, and General Primary President, 
I think. But sometimes it's just someone like the general director of the MTC. The week has been 
a pretty normal one, we did get new people in our zone, but not many. I did realize, however, 
today while in the temple, just how many people are praying for the missionaries. My family, 
my friends, general authorities, my friends families (if I was close with them) and the thousands 
or millions of others that include missionaries in they're prayers. Like, everything I succeed at is 
because of those prayers. It's so hard to believe just how much help I'm getting right now.
So much.

No epiphanies yet, but I'll be praying for some. And we always do our service in the same
building, but we get to switch up what we do each time, but it's all pretty easy and boring.

11 days!!!!

LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!

Starszy Liechty

WAIT

One more thing- because Polish is an inflected language (meaning that the endings of words
change according to their relationship with other words in the sentence) You can write my name 
seven different ways. Usually. But because "Liechty" ends with a "Y" our last name is techniaclly 
and adjective, meaning that I can choose if I want to decline it like a noun or an adjective, so I can 
write my name 13 or so different ways in Polish!

Liechty

Liechtego

Liechte

Liechtemu

Liechtowi

Liechtem

Liechtym

Liechce

and a couple others that use accents that I can't write on this computer. But it's great!

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8 OCT 2015 - (Current Address) OCT27 POL-WAR, 2005 N. 900 E. Unit 17, Provo, UT 84602

HELLO!

My English, Polish is ruining. That's how we'd say it.

WE'RE GOING TO BE IN POLAND IN 19 DAYS!!!

POLAND

That's just crazy.

It certainly has gone fast. They have a saying that's been going around the MTC forever and it goes "Days are weeks and weeks are days". And that's very, very accurate. And I'm so excited. I don't even care if I can't understand a word of the language, but I just want to get out there! And I did get dad's package; we had a fiesta in our room. Anyway, in that other package, my other shoes would be really nice, because I just found out that the shoes I brought are much more worn out that I thought. The ones I'm thinking of are a darker blue, and are adidas, so they've got those three white stripes down the side. Max had a pair that were the exact same style, just a lighter blue. And as many scarves as you can spare. Because scarves are my favorite thing. I also might need another tube of that cortozone cream. However you spell it. No snacks, really, we have our fair share of food in our room. I don't think I need any other clothes.

OH! I just remembered. That whole US draft signing up deal. I didn't do it, I think. Also signing up to vote. All patriotic things that I neglected to do. Maybe. What do we do about that? And it's spelled "starszy" there's no "k" in it. Everyone needs to learn this because no one can do it yet. Please. (Obviously he is not making the Starsky and Hutch connection:)

I just really want to leave at this point. We saw some video that one of our teachers took while she was in Poland, talking to some converts, and I just fell in love with them as soon as I saw them. So basically Heavenly Father is helping me love the people I need to serve already, and It's great. I want to go to Poland. We're all going a little crazy, but we got some new people in our zone this last Wednesday, so now we can release some of that energy on them. It'll be fun.

All of us just watched all the sessions in the big building on campus where we watch all of our devotionals. No one actually said that we would've been singing during conference, so it was just a hope. A hope dashed by the cruel realities of this world. But the choir actually sounds really good, so all of us have stayed in it to sing and experience it. Also, after conference was over, the choir dropped about four hundred people, so I think they were also thinking they would sing in conference. It was a good conference, and the first one where I actually took notes, so it was probably the best conference for me so far. 

And I hope you had a really good time at the reunion. How many people were there? Were most of your friends there, or did you not recognize a lot of them? Also, what were they're responses if/when they found out you were Mormon? Because I imagine people would be a little weirded out by it. 

This week wasn't too exciting, but I did decide that I want to read the whole Księga Mormona (po angelsku) before I leave, so basically I need to read about 25 pages a day, and I need to use pretty much all of my free time to do it. But it feels really good, and what I once considered a chore is not even kind of a chore. It's awesome!

Adrian and Ola are just our teachers pretending to be real investigators from Poland. But they're hard on us. Ola, actually is pretty easy, but I imagine that she'll have trouble when we start teaching about the law of chastity or word of wisdom, but we've already commited her to baptism, which is always an amazing feeling, whereas Adrian is crazy tough to get through, but finally our companionship was able to have a lesson that was pretty much 100% inspired by the spirit, and he said he would be baptized. It was probably one of the most intense experiences ever, that lesson. But now he's asking us about harder, more realistic questions like "what do I need to do if I have problems in my family" or other things that adults have a hard time answering. But I guess he's just preparing us for everything that will come. 

We do have to pay at the temple (for breakfast), but it's all really cheap. I get huge breakfasts usually for less that 3 or 4 dollars. 

And the thing I'm most nervous about Poland probably is how will I be able to work as hard as I can always? Like, what if I slack off one day, and that would have been the day where we meet a person that would eventually become converted? Then that would be on my head, and that is not something that I want. So I guess I'll just always work hard, doesn't seem too difficult.

And what I really loved about Pres. Monson's testimony, wasn't so much the idea of millions of people on the edge of their seats, praying for a miracle (which, of course, is amazing), but more so the fact that President Monson was going to bear his testimony to the world no matter what. No matter what problems he had, or thing he had to push through, he would sacrifice anything and everything he had at that podium to tell the world what he knew was true, and what he knew everyone needed to hear. And that that should be an example to us all to bear testimony of Christ no matter what the circumstances should be, and that there is nothing more important than this gospel.

(This next part is from Kent's letter) "Conference was great! We all watched it in a big building where the gym usually is, and it probably was the most spiritual conference I've ever had. Probably because I was paying attention the whole time. And it's so impressive to me that you watched it when you were alone! I'm not sure if I would've had the willpower to watch it all. But at least everyone who could be was together on Sunday. I really liked one of the talks in the first session on Saturday, the one who's main message was the "What lack I yet?" thing we need to ask all the time. And to myself I also realized that when we ask that question, we need to realize that- since it's something that we're not already doing- we won't really want to do that thing. So when we want to figure out what it is that will make us better, we need to ask in total faith and humility and willingness to do what is asked. I liked it. And the one about moms was Elder Holland, and the one about women was President Neilson, I think. And those were fantastic ones, too. I love mom, and I hope you love her like nothing else, dad!"

I love you all SO MUCH

Especially you, mom. Can't wait for you to watch that talk. A good one for sure. Very good. Watch it. Holland. Now. Go. It's good.

-Starszy Liechty.

And you know that Polish is tough when the official translation of the missionary purpose has some words misspelled. (But really, most people born in Poland aren't fluent until they're 18 years old.)

Also, Sweater day Saturday is now a thing, and it's awesome. But I forgot that we were going to take a picture, so...

30 Sept 2015 - (Current address) OCT27 POL-WAR, 2005 N. 900 E. Unit 17, Provo, UT 84602

Hi family,

I really like Mr. Fox. He's cute.

And it turns out that if missionaries are singing in conference, It won't be any of us. Or they'll suprise us tomorrow, but that probs won't happen.

A typical day for me would start with screaming some sounds while the alarm wakes us all up, and then showering and wondering why it takes forever for everyone else to get ready. Then we go to breakfast which is usually pretty disappointing, so I just usually get a bagel or something, and then we go to class. Class in the morning will usually start with learning polish or teaching our "investigators" which are just our teachers. Currently we have two zainteserowanie (investigators) whose names are Adrian and Ola. Ola is crazy nice and really receptive to everything we teach, so we don't worry too much about her. But Adrian is tough. He doesn't really accept what we say, and he'll ask "why?" to literally everything we say. Which I suppose is good so we'll know how to answer questions in the field, but It's pretty frustrating now. 

And after we have classroom instruction, we go to eat lunch, check the mail, and go back to class for personal study. After personal study, we have companionship study, and after that, we have language study. That's when everyone messes around the most, but it's callmed down since the beginning. After all those studies, we go to the gym for an hour, then dinner, then check mail again because everyone doesn't know how to control their desires, and then go back for some more classroom instruction. And we study more language, and do CMS, which stands for Coaching Missionary Study. And that's where the teachers will meet with us individually, as companionships, or everyone at once to discuss whatever it is we need discussing on. Then we head back to our residencies and mess around, do awesome things like drink from the water fountain upside down, or have nerf battles, or dress up as star wars characters and have lightsaber fights, and then go to bed after fifteen minutes of quiet time, which are rarely actually quiet, which kind of bothers me. Then it starts over! for nine weeks.

P-days start with us going to temple, then we eat breakfast in the temple because it's a million times better than in the MTC, and after that we go to do laundry and emailing which is happening right now. after that we'll go to the gym for a good amount of time. Our whole district usually plays volleyball with some of the other people in our zone, and we're getting pretty good at it! Then if we have time, we'll take a nap, and then eat dinner, and then P-day ends, and we go back to class. Usually during this class on P-day, we'll do this thing called TRC, where returned missionaries or other people who know the language will come and we give them a lesson, but since no one knows polish, we only sometimes get people to teach. And after that, we go to bed.

I get along well with everyone in my district now, which is nice, but Starszy Haskett is pretty great. He's really funny, and we share the same sense of humor, and he's actually got a good spirit with him, which is nice. Starszy Mcmaster is also really awesome, and a very spiritual person, and those two are companions, so It's like the power companionship.

AND

you know how the guy at the bank was saying the the word for "to be" was pronounced like the B word? it is. completely. No accents to it or anything. Straight up saying the B word is how we say "to be" or just "be" it's wild. AND there's seven cases in polish which change the endings of words depending on how they're used, but that doesn't matter. What does matter is that one of them is used when you rename somehting with a noun, and you can tell it's being used when a form of "to be" is being used, so the way we are told to remember is shown in the picture. Just remember what "to be" sounds like in polish-

I can't think of any really crazy experiences, but what I did come to realize, is that we always worry about feeling the Spirit in our decisions, which is a good goal, but sometimes we think that a huge, obvious prompting from the spirit is the only voice we can trust, which isn't true. If we all keep the commandments, and remember and keep our covenants we've made with God, then the Spirit will be with us always, even when we don't notice it, and to trust ourselves really is actually trusting the Spirit. And that has definitely helped me here when doing all the things I need to do.

LOVE Y'ALL SO SO MUCH!!!!

Starszy Liechty

Look at this. The Polish flag is reflected in the tag. That's what I call art. (also, starszy McMaster took this one, so props to him)