Hola familia como están!
Oh man I can´t believe Spencer Harris is home already! Just shows to go ya that the misión passes way too fast. So sorry if this email has a lot of spanglish because the computer has automatic spell checker...this could be an interesting email. So that´s sweet about Ethan and Brennan, I live with a Mexican Elder from that same misión I think so if they want to know anything have them just ask me. So about skype this week, I will get on at 3:00 Paraguay time and I believe you guys are 2 hours behind me but maybe just check at 12:00 to be safe. If for whatever reason we miss I will have to come back to the cyber at 5:00 my time so that Elder Williamson can talk with his family because his dad Works until 5, but I really want to talk with Spencer before he leaves so we´re just going to try to work close to the cyber and come in twice. We will have 40 minutes to talk. Happy 21 year mark home mom! Gosh I really do not want to ever come home. It´s really a great time being on the misión because you can always be feeling good. That´s not to say that everyday is just perfect and that everything goes right on the misión, but for example last week was a bit tough, but because of all of that I was humbled by the Lord and was able to learn a lot of really cool things from the Scriptures. If you work hard and keep the rules then you don´t have regrets and you have the Spirit, what more could you really want? There are so many cool promises for missionaries too (like never being confounded before men... super awesome!) it´s just such a great time. I really can´t believe that in two days I hit 9 months in the misión! the time really just goes so fast, I still remember stepping off of the plane in Paraguay and everyone was only speaking Spanish. I remember in the Argentine airport we were having baggage problems and there were tons of Latin elders and for some reason I thought that they all spoke English so I asked one to translate, turns out they don´t all speak English. But it was fine because I was able to talk with the lady anyways and it all got straightened out. I also remember for some weird reason I don´t think I actually believed that Paraguayans don´t understand English at first because our first night President took us to this restaurant and after we ate he told us all that we could go get an ice cream and we had to tell them what flavor we wanted. I remember I went up and couldn´t think of how to say the flavor that I wanted so I just asked for it in English and the lady just looked at me really weird. Then one of the Assistants to the President that was with us told me dude you´re in Paraguay now, they don´t speak English. I remember that night I was super nervous that I was going to get a Latin trainer, I thought that would be impossible because the language just seemed like it was going to be so hard to master, so of course the Lord saw fit to assign me with a Latin trainer. That was probably one of the best things that could´ve happened to me because I was forced to use the language and I learned how to communicate and rely on the Lord. The Lord doesn´t set us up for failure, but He also doesn´t let us get away with not working hard. I studied and learned and realized that I actually knew more than I thought and that I don´t need to ever worry because the Lord takes care of His missionaries. If anyone is nervous about the language tell them it´s not necessary, the people will not understand you at first (most likely) but they´ll appreciate your efforts and feel the spirit anyway. Don´t worry about the practical things like being able to buy things in the grocery store because these things just work out. My first day I had no idea what to buy and I don´t think I understood how much money the cashier asked me for, but I was able to read the Price on the screen and gave her some money and she gave me a receipt and it all worked out nice. I used to be so afraid of not understanding people and of them not understanding me, and I´ll admit it is frustrating when you don´t know what´s going on and if the people keep telling you that they don´t understand you, but things always work out. I´ve never had to go hungry and I´ve managed to stay out of trouble so now I just have to work on improving my language everyday, but I don´t have to be afraid of talking with people. I can´t tell you how many contacts I did in my first área where I offered someone a card, they said some stuff that I have no idea what, I awkwardly smiled or laughed and offered the card again and told when and where the church was and left, and guess what, everything was okay. You just have to have faith, not fear, and the Lord will always deliver. Well that´s enough of my soapbox for the week.
So we had one investigator in church yesterday named Ruben. He´s a joven and he came with these other two young men (one is less active so it was awesome that he came back with a friend). We had taught Ruben before and had a super sweet lesson about the power of the scriptures so I was really glad to see him in church. I´ve probably said this before but it gets me every time because the Paraguayans are super funny, anytime they come to church they literally look like they want to kill themselves the whole time but the next day when you go and talk with them about church they just smile and tell you how much they loved it and how they want to come back next week. Also for some reason they have a really hard time smiling in pictures, they always look super down and depressed, they are a really funny people. Like I said it was a tough week last week but we still had some great success and we got permiso to baptize Diego! He just needs to come to church one more time and he´s ready for baptism. We also have been teaching this girl named Marta (I think I told you about her last week, we had a really cool contacting experience with her) and she is progressing awesomely. She couldn´t come to church because the whole family came into town to visit the step-dad in jail, but she told us that way in advance and she told us that she isn´t scheduling anything else for this Sunday because she wants to come to church and she is the first person I have ever heard say that.
Well I´ve got to be going now, there´s lots to do. I love you and I can´t wait to talk on Saturday! I´m going to send home some pics of our house and some service that I did. I got to do service on my división with my zone leader named Elder Haderly and it was awesome! He is almost exactly like one of my biggest heroes Elder Samuel Reber so needless to say we got along great, I had a great time and learned tons! It was kind of funny because he accidentally disturbed this huge nest of hornets and they attacked him, so the hermano that was there just set fire to the branch and burned those suckers down! See you on Saturday!
Con amor,
Elder Hulsey
