Cascos

¡Hola! ¿Cómo andan?

People always make fun of our helmets. The other day some guys walked past and said "Hola chicas, no se van a caer, pongarse cascos!" I didn´t understand them of course, but trusty Hna Jones filled me in later. Jaja...I think we look cool.

By the way people always love seeing pictures of all my family and friends. Whenever they ask where I´m from and I say Utah, they´re always like "ah, the fábrica"-which means factory. Because Utah is the factory of Mormons haha. And then they ask to see pictures and they always say "¡Que lindo!" Oh by the way McKenna, there is a 19 year old boy named Pipo that thinks you are pretttty cute. We´re trying to help him see the importance of going on a mission so I told him that you only like return missionaries haha. I love showing people pictures because there isn´t much I can talk about in Spanish but I can definitely talk about my family. In fact, I´m going to include a picture of me showing pictures to a man named Lorenzo that my companion sneakily took. He´s a less active member that I met yesterday and now we are tight. It was kind of weird because a few nights ago I kept waking up with a scripture in my head that I couldn´t get out and I don´t know why. When I woke up the next morning it was still there and I thought maybe there is someone I need to share it with. It was Matthew 28:11--"Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden...." When we gave our spiritual thought to Lorenzo and his wife Luciana I decided to share that scripture and I asked Lorenzo if he would read it. He said he would and my companion and Luciana just started laughing because he has never read when the missionaries were over before. He said how much he loved that scripture and if he could pick one out of the Bible, that is the one he would pick.

Oh by the way, could you send me a picture of my baptism day perchance? I feel like that would be good to show investigators who are thinking about baptism.

Speaking of baptism, we went to visit a family of a girl who has a baptismal date coming up. When we came, they were just leaving. To her baptism. In some other church....? It was weird! We were like oookay, and later on we happened across the place where she was getting baptized! It was in this small little building with all this loud music playing.....weird.

Last week we did a lot of traveling because Hna Jones had to go to leadership training. It made for some long days but it was good to hear from President Gulbrandsen.

La flia Baldi is continuing to progress. We read part of Alma 32 with them and how baptism is an act of faith. They are so great, they always have so many questions and are so curious to learn more. This Sunday, Pablo wasn´t able to go to church because he got called into work, so we had to move the baptismal date to October 2 since he has to attend church (or watch conference) three times before getting baptized. It was kind of disappointing because that day we had about eight investigators tell us they were going to go to church that week, but only two ended up going. We even went around to pick people up but no one answered their doors when we came. But, one of the investigators that came was one we weren´t even expecting to come at all, so that was good!

One of my new favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon is Alma 26. Have you ever noticed how much the Book of Mormon is about missionary work? It´s crazy! I am reading with new eyes now that I am here on the mission and am realizing just how important this work is and how much joy it can bring. I´ve been working on being fully invested in this work because right now I feel like I´m more in just survival mode.

Okay mom, let me answer your questions. Anyone can email me, but I can only email the family back. I prefer letters, but emails are also nice. Los dos! The colorful building is a school next to our apartment. There are so many cool old buildings. I want to take pictures of everything but there just isn´t the time! My area has a lot of really humble homes and there is trash everywhere, but yeah a lot of times I have to remind myself I´m in a foreign country. I´ll add some more pictures so you can get a better idea of what my area looks like. I use flia as an abbreviation for familia. Don´t worry, I have dodged the construction equipment thus far :) Haha I told my companion about that and she had a good laugh. We are hopefully getting my brakes fixed today! Oh and I bought an MP3 player so I can get music from other people. I should´ve just brought on of those in the first place like you said, instead of my ipod....

Sounds like you are all staying busy with your talks and all! I´m sure they are life changing. I can´t believe you are going to England! Please send me post cards. Dad, thanks for the BYU update. Ugh, I really probably would´ve cried if I watched that game haha. Hna Jones went to BYU so she has been getting updates from her family too. Let me know how the Utah game goes. GO COUGS!

Well familia, these emails are super long but I feel like there is so much to tell you! Thanks for everything, I love reading your emails every week. Keep on keepin´ on!

Love you!

Hna Hill