May 20, 2011

Hello! !Hola!

Wow! Thank you all so much for your letters. They really are a strength to me and I love hearing about everything that is going on out there. I was so excited to receive some letters from friends this week. It really makes a missionary’s day or week depending on how long he has been waiting for one.

So I was able to go out into the real world yesterday and this morning! It´s weird. ha ha. I was worried about being brainwashed here in the MTC but I realize that it feels more like being sanitized. Have you seen how many billboards there are on the side of the roads? It seems like everything is trying to get you do this or that every moment. Well, the reason that we got to go out into the outside world is that, as Mexican Missionaries, we had to go to the Consulado de Mexico en Salt Lake. We were so excited to go and be there but then it turned out to be just a building with a lot of Spanish posters and signs(which was exciting). It still looked pretty official but the novelty slowly wore off as we spent a couple hours there just sitting. The system in Mexico actually crashed yesterday so we had to come back this morning. This means we missed our weekly temple trip, sad day, but the good news is that I got my visa! Who knew that three little signatures would be the gateway into living in another country for 2 years! They didn't give me anything but I think the church just takes care of it for us.

So I got the box! Yeah! The cookies were gone within the hour with the help of the guys from my zone. ha ha. I got everything including my license and the pictures of the savior. The packing peanuts were even fun! Thank you so much for the pictures. They are in my room right now and I love to look at them.

Now with the spare time I would like to tell funny stories:

The Benson Theory

So my companion has the supernatural natural ability to summon our Mission President directly behind him. All he needs to do is say something mildly inappropriate or even just weird and POOF!, there is the Mission President. So the latest incident of this was last night in our residence hall. We had just gotten back for the day and he was fixing his bed with his back to the door. I quoted a favorite quote from Top Gear just as I saw President Hansen walk in the door, sadly, Elder Benson also appreciated this quote and louder repeated: Ï JUST SOILED MYSELF!!! as President Hansen was walking right behind him. This isn´t the first incident and most of the time President just shakes his head and keeps walking. ha ha.

So I ran out of time to tell more of the funny stories but I will try to send more next week,

Hasta Luego!

-Elder Curtis Hanson