Sister Allison Jones week 1

 Minnasan konnichiwa!

       It's been a humbling experience at the MTC so far this week. I was a little disappointed when I realized no one else in my district has studied Japanese before and that I'll be here for the full 9 weeks but I'm really grateful for my leaders here in the MTC. I'm especially grateful for my companion Fletcher-shimai, she's so sweet and it's been such a blessing so far to learn with her. She has red hair too and her Dad served in Kobe! I was reading in 2 Nephi for Come Follow Me and it was a good reminder to beware of pride. That's helped me a lot so far as I remember my calling as a representative of Jesus Christ, with my district, zone and in the classroom. I feel like I've learned a lot so far in the MTC and the days have been packed. We are starting Speak Your Language today so I'm only supposed to talk to Fletcher-shimai in Japanese from now on, hope that goes well

My MTC teachers have been a big help so far and Brother Sizilio was baptized in Nagoya! I love the sisters in my district and we have sisters from Australia and New Zealand as well! I'm the only one going to Nagoya, the rest of my district is going to Tokyo North, Fukuoka and Kobe. Our zone is made up of only brand new missionaries so on our second night in the MTC the branch had to be reorganized. Fetcher-shimai and I were called as Sister Training leaders, so we've been trusting in the Lord a lot these past few days as we try to support the shiami-tachi in our zone even though we have no experience. The MTC has been having some difficulty with technology lately so emails have been a little messed up, Fletcher-shimai got an email from the MTC president congratulating her on her call as Sister Training Leader, but mine was a little surprising. I guess the MTC thinks I'm an elder because the MTC president just congratulated me on becoming a District Leader. We also get to teach the relief society lesson tomorrow on Christ-like attributes! 

Hope you guys have a great week! 

P.s I forgot my coat in courtney's car and my p-day is Saturday so calling anytime before 12:30 my time is great, probably Skype is best or Google hangouts 

Aishitemasu!

Jones-shimai

Dan Eagle Project photos

Allison week 5 Morocco

That’s cool Tyler’s starting school and you got a cat! It’s crazy to think school starts in two weeks! 

It was a really good week. On Tuesday we went to a Moroccan orphanage to plant bushes and play with some of the kids there. 

We want lazer tagging as a group and had traditional Moroccan dance class. 

I’ve had a lot of fun spending time with my host family this week. Yesterday I went to the Medina on my own to pick up sprinkles, melting chocolate and Philadelphia cream cheese for the cake pops me and my host sister were making. I was surprised I was able to find it all. Shopping in the Medina as an American is a lot like a mix between a scavenger hunt, a corn maze and charades. I did get to practice my Arabic a lot asking shopkeepers where things were and trying to bargain. 

See you in a week!

Friends

Allison week 4 Morocco

It’s been a pretty busy week. We just got back from our trip to the Sahara Desert! It was awesome! We rode camels for about an hour out into the desert to get to camp and we slept out under the stars. I was surprised that I didn’t get too sunburned. The sand dunes were way taller than I was expecting. 

 

We also made stops to see monkeys, we talked to a random shepherd in the Atlas Mountains and looked at his sheep, and on the way back we went to Ifran which is supposed to be the Switzerland of Morocco. 

 

We got to go to a refugee center after school one day this week and we practiced English with the refugees there. The refugees me and another girl in my class named Hanan talked to were from Mali. They were super nice and it was really fun to help out in their class. They are going to school in Rabat and when I asked what they wanted to do when they got out of school, one said he wanted to be the foreign minister of Mali and the other said he wanted to be the president. 

It’s funny how tailored our Arabic skills are for the foreign service. The third vocabulary word we learned was United Nations.  After school one day they asked us to get in groups and write a story in Arabic. Our group wrote about a hungry dog named Bob who goes to the store to buy food. Bob the hungry dog also happens to work for the United Nations and is a translator specializing in the Middle East.

Atlantic meets Pacific, where clay mixed, Chefchauen

Allison week 3 in Morocco

It was a really great week. We just got back from a weekend trip to Tangier and Chefchauen. It was really pretty in both cities. We got to got to the straight of Gibraltar and we could see Spain on the other side. We had really cool tours of both cities. We went on a hike in the mountains near  Chefchauen. 

It’s been fun being here in Morocco during the World Cup. A lot of Moroccans were really excited that France won and in all of the shops and cafes we walked by in Chefchauen today, people were just watching the game. 

We took our midterm on Friday and it wasn’t too bad. I just hope I spelled everything right in the essay portion. 

We also got to go to an area outside Rabat where they make traditional Moroccan pottery. It was really cool to see the similarities between how they do pottery here and in my ceramics class at home. 

That’s too bad Dad doesn’t get to got to Utah for as long. I hope you guys have lots of fun! Have a great week!