Belgium by Christmas!!!

Before I went to work at the most magical place in the world...Target yesterday afternoon, I decided to go through the virtual tour of the MTC one more time since I'm just so excited that I only have 54 more days left! So, I was looking under the FAQ section and saw that they added a new one since the last time I checked. It was "IF you are fluent, or speak some of the language that you are assigned to learn please call this number." I took four years of French, granted it was over 3 years ago when I took my last class, but I had been refreshing quite a bit since I got my call and really had no idea what calling them would do anyway.

So I called the number and was transferred to an RM from Paris who was in charge of evaluating all those who had French experience. He started out by asking me just my history with french and then he said 'Okay, let's just talk in French.' My heart dropped and immediately I was sitting in Soeur Geddes' French class my freshman year of college where she would pound on my desk shout my french name at me "Vit Vit, Claudine Vit!!!" When I didn't answer the questions fast enough. I never did like the name Claudine anyway...and then I remembered Frere Taylor's class, two hours every single day, taught on a summer block and taught completely in French. Horrible memories of me staring at the chalk board for the entire 2 hours, hoping I would understand a word. I knew I wasn't at the same level as the other students, but I just wouldn't give up. He used to make me the score keeper when we'd play games because no one wanted me on my team since I would end up being the opposing teams MVP.

But putting my tortured French experience aside, I breathed deeply and prayed that I could hear the RM through the static of the phone. It was pretty difficult, because a lot of times in french, so many words sound the same and I hadn't spoken to anyone in french since junior year of college when I had a Home teacher who wanted to return to the Glory days of his miss. and just speak French to me...another story.

I was surprised at how much I remembered, and also embarrassed that I didn't have a higher vocabulary when it came to the church. We talked for about 15 minutes and then he said "Okay, are you ready for an evaluation?" He then explained that there is an accelerated track in the MTC for missionaries who speak well enough in their assigned foreign language, so instead of being in the MTC for 9 weeks, they'll only be in for 3...I held my breath!!!!!

He said that my accent was great!!! Yay! My accent was great! He then said that I need to work on my church vocab and verb tenses. He explained what the missionaries learned in the 9 week program and said that I would be at the top of the classes and very bored since I have already mastered the basics. I was still holding my breath when he said that he would leave the decision up to me, but that he would okay me to go through the accelerated track!!!!

Whew! It must have been the gift of tongues! If those other kids in Frere Taylor's class could see me now! They'd all want me on their team! So I told him that I definitely want to do the 3 week track and promised that I'd work on my vocab and verbs. So last night I made about 300 vocab cards and dusted off my book: 501 French Verbs. There is also an RM from Toulouse who I am going to solicit help from so I can perfect my conversation and maybe learn some of the discussion in French by the time I leave!

I'm so excited, and feel so blessed and grateful that I let myself be the weird one in high school and take French instead of the 'cool Spanish' classes! I'm going to be in the MTC for Thanksgiving and Belgium for Christmas!