Letters from Alexa

This is my mission shirt. Everyone going to Mexico has one. Love it

Hola Everyone!

First of all, thanks to all the friends and family that have sent me emails, letters, packages (thanks for the Pringles mom. The district loved that). You all are so amazing and it's nice to feel so supported. Unfortunately, this week, the Branch Presidency decided we can only write letters on Pdays now. We can't even write them in our free time before bed or our free time on Sundays. So I'm sorry, but you probably won't be getting many handwritten letters anymore family. :(

The temple today was incredible as always. Sadly, it's our last week. They are closing next week for the rest of the year. So I won't be able to go probably until I get home in 2015. After the temple, we had lunch at Brigham's Landing. It's a little area with a bunch of food places. IT was pretty good. And Jamba Juice gives missionaries half off. So that's sweet.

P.S. mom, I get your DearElders they day you send them now, just make sure that you put the right unit number on them. It's 871. I've got a few letters with 187 crossed out and 871 written in red. I think it takes longer to get them if they have to fix it. No se. But i know the last couple have been right and i've gotten them day of-except when Elder Sipple forgets to hand them out at night. haha

On Sunday, we had a devotional by Mary Ellen Edmunds. Holy Canoli that woman is hilarious. They film all the MTC devotionals, so you should see if you can find that one, because we were in stitches the entire time. Loved it. She forgot her talk when she first got up, so all the sudden she just said "Forgot my talk" and walked off camera. ahah I have some more quotes from that that I wrote down because they were so funny. haha

We're teaching two investigators now. Manuel (brother Humbert) and Sylvia (our new teacher/first investigator, Hermana Pullan). I like teaching Sylvia. She's sad because her mom passed away, but I think we can really help her. Manuel on the other hand....

Tuesday, Hermana J left for the Colombia MTC, so our companionships are all changed now. Her comp, Hna. R is now companions with Hna. E and Hna M and I are companions. It's way easier to have a two person companionship than 3. Three was hard...

Our first full day as a two person companionship

Because we are on the West Campus, and it's temporary, we don't have a gym. We have just been using a grassy area, the volleyball sand area, and the parking lot to play sports. But, they just finished building temporary Gym Bubbles (I forgot to take a picture, but I will this week) that we can now play in. There are 3. One has b-ball and 4 square, one has b-ball and futsol, and one has v-ball and futsol. Oh my goodness. I just have to tell you how funny gym time is. It's nice to get a bit of a work out and have fun. But mostly it's just hilarious. We aren't allowed to keep score, but that doesn't stop the elders from being competitive and "trash talking" eachother. Also, 4 square is a big thing! who knows why, but it's funny. The elders get super into it and almost always come away with bruises. Hna and I finally played for the first time on Tuesday because the volleyball bubble wasn't open yet. It's pretty intense.

This is what happens when we have to play volleyball in the snow before the Gym Bubbles are finished.

One of my favorite things here is that on Tuesday night devotionals, we ALWAYS sing Called To Serve. That is so cool. To be in a room with so many missionaries with such strong testimonies singing that song.

I got one more Elder Cstory for this week. Seriously, this kid is so funny. One day he was saying how when he gets in to teach investigators, he suddenly loses all the spanish that he knows and just can't talk. Hermana Muir said "Yo Tambien" (it means me too) but he thought she meant "Esta bien" (it's okay). So he got all upset and was like "NO! No tambien." It's not really that funny, but it was hilarious at the time.

Guess I'll tell you about our first time teaching Manuel. It was bad. Really bad. I wanted to cry and give up, I was so upset. We knew ahead of time that Manuel is an older gentleman who runs a shoe store and that he likes to study the bible. So we prepared a lesson on how the Book of Mormon and the Bible work together to give us the fulness of the truth. We did not expect him to be mean. It took us ten minutes to get in the door. We told him that his friend Hermana Cecilia had asked us to stop by because she knew he liked to learn about God. He very rudely told us he didn't know a Cecilia and kept asking us why we were there. Everytime we tried to explain, he cut us off and asked us a different question. Finally, we got in the door, I don't know how. But it didn't get any better. He fought back with every question or comment we had and was very rude (keep in mind, this is our teacher and knew how nervous we were about teaching him). By the time we left, I was almost in tears. Then, when he was out of character he told us "I could tell and investigators will be able to tell that you didn't really care if I was happy or not." I was so mad, not at Manuel, but at Brother Humbert. I know that we'll have to deal with that in the field, but I wasn't expecting it from my teacher. But on the bright side. I now know that I have to learn Charity for my investigators even when they're mean. I'm not mad or upset anymore. I've read a lot about Christ's love and Charity and I need to be like him. Brother Humbert is just trying to help.

Anyways. I think that's all that's new this week. Sorry I write so much.

Love you all. Thanks again

Hermana Alexa Nielsen