Received August 24, 2012
Hola Familia,
I can't believe it's P-day again already! It feels like I just barely got back into the swing of normal day stuff when they hit me with another P-day! It's okay though because I love P-day, other than that we have to wake up early for the temple. But the temple is a great place so it's all good. So to start out, My week has been awesome! Elder Jenson and I have been getting along so well, especially the more we get to know each other. So I realized that the English missionaries have it kinda rough. I think it would be so hard to have to teach the Gospel in English because it would be so hard to keep everything in simple terms for investigators. It's really easy for me to do that in Spanish because I don't know how to complicate it...yet. I'm sure I'll figure it out soon though. So Dad you asked me if I get excited to learn little things like new words, and I guess I do, but pretty much every word to me is new (or at least seems new). So I get really excited when someone is talking to me in Spanish and I can understand everything they say, not just get the main idea. So last Sunday was great, I love Sunday's here so much. I went to choir and i sat next to a stranger. Anytime I asked him something he would ask me to repeat myself, turns out the kid is deaf. i was touched so much by that because he's trying to give as much service to the Lord as possible, so he's singing in the choir, but he doesn't even get to enjoy the music. I thought that was so cool. Also On Sunday night I heard a talk by Elder Holland (We watched it like a movie, he didn't come to the MTC) called missions are forever and it was amazing. If you think he's in your face in conference, you should hear him talk to the missionaries! He said so many great things, it really motivated me to work hard. He had a quote in there that I love so much, "why should it be easy for us, it wasn't for him [Christ]" Isn't that awesome! Oh I just remembered Hermana Ayala from Guatemala came and taught our class on Monday. It was so cool. Her accent and the way she was so simple yet so deep in the faith reminded me so much of Grandma. So when she was telling us stuff I could hear Grandma telling it to me, it was a way cool experience. Elder Jenson and I started teaching a new way so the Spanish in our lessons is awful but the spirit is so strong. Our teacher said we've kinda got the way to teach down, so I'm excited about that. Oh yeah, I can't believe I forgot about this, on Tuesday we had Elder Neal L. Andersen from the 12 apostles come to the devotional. It was super bueno, I like his talk a lot. It was president Monson's birthday so he had all of the missionaries sing to him, it was funny. Then he told us the 10 things that President Monson would want us to know. he gave us a quote that I really liked, "Do your duty that is best, leave unto the Lord the rest". It's way cool getting to learn straight from the apostles like this. So for P.E. I've been a little nervous about getting injured, so I started trying other things and i realized I love volleyball. I think it's my favorite thing to do during gym. I also really enjoy playing soccer but i feel like most injuries here occur on the soccer field (I know a kid who's been here for 18 weeks now because he got injured playing soccer, but he thinks he'll get to leave in about two more weeks). But gym is so much fun.
So you guys got to meet Elder Spangler huh, that's awesome. i bet it was cool getting to hear about Boo from him. i also bet it was weird calling him by his first name. It's weird how fast you get used to not using first names. I just learned this one kid's first name and it surprised me how weird that was. I'm a little bit sad because the advanced district (The district of native Spanish speakers with the exception of one white kid whose just taken a lot of Spanish classes) is leaving this week. I love those elders so much, they're so friendly and helpful. Also my district leader leaves this week, I'm going to miss him a lot. We've been making plans for after our missions so hopefully we can follow through on those. It's crazy how much you can get to love people in such a short amount of time. I really liked the family pictures you guys sent me. My whole district thought it was funny how much we all look alike. But I'm going to show them to Ronaldo to help him feel the spirit, I think he'll like them. Also I'm going to send my pictures home this week, I'll try to take one with me and Elder Jenson only and with our name tags easily readable so that you can figure out which one is him. there's a lot of random stuff on the memory card too so you can delete everything that isn't from my mission. Also just put them all in a folder on the computer so I can have them later. there's so many funny things on the pictures that you guys could only understand if i could explain them to you, but i hope you enjoy them anyways.
Well there's not much more to say. I'm loving my time here in the MTC. There's no where else I'd rather be. I love recieving mail and packages, my whole district is so jealous of how many letters and packages I get, keep it up. I've learned so much about the gospel, it's so cool. I've also learned a lot of Spanish, including a lot of things not to say (like estoy bueno, i made that mistake a lot). So I love you guys and I'll keep praying that you will know how much i love you.
Con Amor
Elder Hulsey
P.S. I've been having the weirdest dreams lately. I keep dreaming that I come home like on a weekend pass, but i have to keep all of the missionary rules still. then I have to come back to the MTC, it's weird but kinda funny.
