Lets Start Transfer 2

So this last week wasnt too bad and it was also the end of my first transfer. Here~s a quick recap, i apologize that I dont have everything written down in order i didnt bring my planner.

 

tuesday

We had a wonderful district meeting and said goodbye to one of our zone leaders who is going home this week. I also recieved all the letters from them that i didnt have in the past. So looks like i just needed to wait a little bit longer. Thank you all so much for writing me and please continue to do so I really do need the lift that your letters give me.

 

Friday we had divisions and i was with elder shepherd and the zone leaders doing interviews in their area because elder adhans was with our district leader doing interviews in our area and another area, and me and elder shepherd went and found some more people to teach in our area by chance because we were trying to find an investigator to set up an appointment with him and a lady said that he wasnt home but that there were 3 men that we could teach that lived a couple doors down and so we went and set up an appointment for sunday with them and it was good.

 

saturday

We switched back companions and prepared for the baptism that we were going to have that night with Filipe a nine year old boy whose family had been less-active and also rayner a 16 year old who accepted the gospel very freely and knew that it was true. So we got ready and went to speak with Rayners parents to get their permission to baptize and Rayner came out and said that he didnt want to be baptized anymore because his mom had talked with him yesterday and didnt approve. It was sad and a little frustrating because he knows that its true but doesnt want to accept but everyone has their free-agency to choose. The good thing was that Filipe was baptized and i was the one who had the opportunity to perform the ordenance for him. We took a bunch of pictures but my computer is currently not letting me upload them so ill have to send them another time

 

oh and our lunch fell through and they gave us money and when we were walking to the restaurant we got a ride from a member of the stake presidency who offered to make us lunch and it was good! You should try grilling pineapple with cinnamon on it!

 

sunday

highlight of the day is when i got to sing Angels we have heard on high in portuguese with Filipe the 9 year old boy during sacrament meeting, it was really cool to be able to do this with him and i hope he remembers it. We also had 5-6 investigators come to church and also our investigator who was baptized last week receive the priesthood. Also we found out that no one in our district was being transfered except the zl who went home so we are getting a new ZL. 

 

Oh and i had a miracle with fast offerings, I didnt have money for them at the begining of teh month but wanted to pay them in november so i payed it $10 this sunday even though it meant i would have to use money from my reserve for buying water and then when i got home i found $15 that i had lost and i was able to have money to buy more fresh water! It was a miracle and god does bless us

 

But this was my week pretty much. I love you all and hope you had a great thanksgiving. In reality i didnt do anything for it because we didnt get the day as a Pday, but i thought of you all and hope that you had a great Thanksgiving, you only have to have one more without me and then im back,

 

I love you all so very much and i need and appreciate your prayers,

love your son/brother

Elder Eric Olsen

We Have Trials Before Miracles

So this last week has been a bit slow but it was still good, heres a quick recap

Monday:
We were tracting and we were invited to a family night where I ate too many of the hot dogs that they had for treat, but it was ok.

Tuesday:
District meeting was good and we had a rather slow day but the three lessons that we did teach were awesome. One of which we tried a new things where I asked for water because we were out and then gave a prayer with the man and found out that the sisters had taught him in the past which was interesting to know. We gave him a restoration pamphlet and challenged him to read it and then call us after he had.

Wenesday:
We had a zone conference all day which was awesome. I saw some of the elders from my district in provo and also sang with members of my zone. I dont remember what it was now but it was good. The president gave great talks, we got candy and got home late. But while we were there i shared my experience that I had had with silviano (the man who showed us the video on inferno for 40 minutes and said that gave us the articles on why we werent cristian) with the president and shared my feelings that i had had for it, and the president told me to go back and bear my testimony. At first I thought thats crazy because the man had just shown us those things but the next moment i realized the reason why and thought to myself (do i have the faith to do that which my president has asked me? ) but i realized it was the lord asking me through my president as I felt the spirit testify to me that i needed to do this. Im going tomorrow to go and speak with him and after we set up the appointment with him i was a little more stressed because he said that we just had differing opinions and was very polite.This whole time hes been really polite but it still has me a little scared. Im just thinking of it as alma when he was told to go back to the city of amalikiah or samuel when he was told to go back to zarahelma or abinadi when he was told to go back to king noahs people. If they could do it so can i. And im doing it with elder shepherd who is awesome. Hes the district leaders companion and has been out for one transfer longer than me. I know theres going to be a miracle in this situation, i can already feel it but i ask for you to pray for me as i go and do this tomorrow that the lord will put in my mouth the words that i am to say. My faith is increasing as i prepare to do this, and the president klein said for me to testify of the book of mormon and i might testify also about the plan of salvation, but i know that the spirit will put the words i need in my mouth and the reason why ive been able to learn portuguese a little bit quicker is for this moment.

Thursday:
I saw a cat that looked like diamond today and it was weird. It had two different colored eyes too but not the racoon tail. TOday wasnt as productive as i would like but it was still good.

Friday:
We taught a brother and sister this morning and i know that they were prepared for us and also that the lord is giving people now that he has prepared. We also watched together forever with some of our investigators who are preparing for marriage.

Saturday:
So we taught some good lessons today and the lord defineitly prepared people for us to teach. We taught a man named liver the restoration again because he took the discussions a year ago and then when we finished he asked about the resurrection and so we taught the plan of salvation as well. since the zone conference we have been challenging all of our investigators to baptism because if they wont commit then we shouldnt waste our time. But we now have 15 people with dates and the only hard part is getting them to keep the dates. We also taught a 10 year old boy who im singing in sacrament meeting with next week and i told him half of the story of nephi getting the brass plates and i thought back to the liken the scriptures movie that we watched coming home from idaho. It was funny.

Sunday:
We had a good number of investigators at church, 4 and 1 future investigator who someone had brought. We didnt do a ton because i found out that we are supposed to still have our study time after church that we regularly have, but we did teach a new investigator which was good.

Monday:
We cleaned our district leaders apartment because they talked about doing that at the zone confrence and i made pão de queijo which didnt turn out that good. But it was cool being all together. I saw a cool blowgun that the district leader bought from an indian market here and i think ill get one too if i ever go there.

oh and theyre already putting up christmas decorations here which i love and ive heard some portuguese christmas carols which have been really cool. Dont worry mom im not starving here we have plenty of food. Me and elder adhans have lots of cookies and dolce de leite that we eat. We share and so we dont have problems with that. And for the light bill i get reimbursed for this and i did end up sending one letter. There will definitely be more to come in the future.

Pray for me please and write lots and lots of letters and i promise that ill get back to you

love
Elder Olsen

Brazil 3 or 4 depending how you count

Ola! So i am now on week 3 or 4 depending on how you count because this is my 3rd p day but the begining of my fourth week. So im going to recap really quickly for you because a lot happened.

Monday: I sent off letters and then we deceided to visit a less active member who lives in the ward. His name is ariel and him and his wife and son live in a neighborhood in the forest. Their house reminded me of the us because it had a yard and wasnt attatched to anything other houses. But his son is studying to be a biologist and so their house is cool. They have a adolecent capybara which was cool to see. Its mother had been killed by poachers and so they brought it up and it lives in their yard. He told me some other cool stuff that youll have to wait for a letter from me to hear about so be on the watch.

Tuesday:
The trainers of me and elder walch and elder shepherd (another new american who has been out for one transfer more than me) all left for a leadership meeting that they had together and so that left the trainees (aka us) together for the day. So we went back to Elder Shepherds house and ate lunch and did some contacting which i wasnt performing my best in but its ok because im still learning. But we ended our night by visiting some members who had a cousin die the week before who i believe had down syndrome. I was able to share the story of one of my friends from school who had a sister die who had cerebral palsy and i think that it made them feel better. But we met up with our companions again at like 8 something because their bus was slow and then went home.

Wenesday:
Today wasnt the most productive that it could have been but it did have some cool parts. We went and talked to rafael the pastor who asked for a book of mormon, and i was able to speak with him about doctrines of the church and invite him to read 3rd nephi 11. It was awesome because im only on my third week in the field and was able to do that. But we also stopped by Ariels house again to talk with his son diego (the one studying to be a biologist). He had some cool kaydids that he had caught to study and i saw his collection of beetles and butterflys and it was way cool. He also brought out some pictures that he had taken in the forest and they were amazing, like something you would see in a book, but he doesnt want to sell them because its just a hobby. picture taking that is. When we went home he walked us by a pond to see if the caiman that lives there was there, and it wasnt. I dont think that i mentioned this but we get to their house by walking on a small path through the jungle and all the times that ive taken this path its been dark and i wont lie its pretty scary because we only have a cell phone flashlight to guide us but the last time we took it diego showed us the way and it was better because before i thought that there were jaguars and lots of snakes that lived in the area but he explained that there werent very many so i felt better. We started back for home when we recieved a call from a family in the ward and they asked for us to come and give blessings to them and so we did and we gave 5. I gave my first blessing in portuguese and it wasnt the best because i dont have the best grasp of the language still but it was still a good experience.

thursday
just a regular day we worked, but it wasnt very productive, but we did stop by at a ward activity and brought one of our investigators dennis, there.

friday
So today we kicked it into gear and contacted like crazy on our way to appointments and ended the day with 52 contacts which i felt was really good.

Saturday
So remember that family that we taught that i wanted for them to join the church? We went there again today and (we had gone there once before this week and just answered questions that the father had) were planning to teach an awesome lesson on the plan of salvation, and instead the father gave us papers saying that mormons werent christians and then played a video about inferno. It made me really sad to know that people chose not to believe and i just felt bad for the kids that were there. I prayed that the children would accept the gospel later in life and i got the impression that they would remember us for a long time and that they would accept. When the video ended we bore our testimonies and left. We would have left in the middle but we thought the video would be short and didnt want to be rude, looking back on it now we should have just left during the middle of it. But the lord blessed us because right after this we went to a less active family and talked with them and the father said that he wanted to have us baptize his son and then one of our investigators recognized that there was something different about us and he liked being around us because he could sense this and so it was really good.

sunday
We went to church and had to leave halfway through because we found out that we had a baptism for a member right after church and so we ran home grabbed my baptismal clothes then ran back. Right after church i got to baptize julho caesar da costa brito, and it was really cool. I thought that i would not remember the prayer or say something wrong because i started memorizing it during church but it was good. We had a great lunch at a members house and we recieve lunch from members everyday but pday and dont usually eat dinner since lunch is the biggest meal of the day here. In our priesthood lesson we were challenged to write a letter to our family using 15 words or less before we left them for 2 years and so youll be recieving mine soon.

im not sending letters this week because i have no money because we had to pay a huge electricity bill this month but expect letters next week. Im still homesick but its getting better and i have found much strength in the letter that you sent me dad,

I love you all and please pray for me because i need the help,

love
Elder Olsen

Happy Halloween!

So your halloween party sounds like it was super awesome and i would have loved to  be there, i hope that you took lots of pictures so that i can see it. Speaking of pictures i want to send you some of mine but the computer is being not the best so i ´ll try again later.

Oh and IM SO HAPPY FOR YOU JAMES THAT YOU DECIDED TO SERVE A MISSION!

I was suprised to hear of our new bishopric but i know that they´ll all excellent men and leaders and they   will do great . Also i didnt know you wer ethe  2nd counselor in the young mens presidency aaron, congrats! I just got to say im really grateful for all of the long emails that i got this week because they definitely helped me.

So for the lack of success of last week we had major successes this week. We have gone from having 2 investigators with baptismal dates to having 9 which has been amazing and i know that its only going to get better. But now for a run down of the week.

Monday: 

So it was pday and awesome. I went to go and send your letters off but when we got to the mail service we found out that it closes at 5 and so that wasn~t really cool. And we had an appointment in 20 minutes were really far from it and my blisters were hurting really bad (i]ve had several blisters btw and theyrve been healing but still hurt. The way that we were told to fix them in the mtc is by sticking a needle and thread through them and leaving a 1/4 inch of thread on either side of the blister and it works really well just so that you know) but we had family night with a family in the ward and none of our investigators were able to come and so it was just us and the family and for treat we had these little pastry rolls with jaixara in them which is caiman. They were really good and i throughly enjoyed them.

Tuesday:

We had our first district meeting today and i was introduced to a drink that a bunch of the missionaries like here called térere. Its mate (grass and herbs) with lime juice and it is ok but tastes alot like grass to me. I guess that i]ll like it more over time because aparently all of the americans do.We contacted 20 people again had a fairly productive day. 

 Wenesday:

Worked hard again and then when night came we tried having family night again and some more people came but still none of our investigators but it was ok. We ate the caiman rolls again and me and elder adhans bought açaí ice cream for people to eat but it wasn~t brought out and so now we have ice cream in our freezer which is rather nice to eat.

Thursday:

We had zone interviews today and so we took a bus to our zone leaders area and waited at their house for them to eat before going to the chapel because we werent sure where it was. While we were there one of the leaders from vegas showed me some of his mission pictures including ones where he got to baptize in the river. I hope that i get to do something like that. He explained to me that they have to splash the water as they walk to scare off the stingrays that are on the bottom of it so they dont get stung. I had a good interview with the president and he talked about being like laman and lemuel who had ups and downs in times of righteousness or being like nephi who was continually righteous and improving. I told him that i wanted to be like nephi and he said good. Also i got 8 letters which definitely amazing (btw andrew i dont think that was a lightbulb) I recieve packages about once a month when we have zone conference and interviews and im not sure when they arrive and the same goes for letters . But i got letters dating back to september and  conference and i think that the most recent was the one that you wrote me in the airport mom. But please do write me at least once a month and i promise you that i will get back to you. I am just a little backlogged right now but i will be writing for quite a while today

Friday:

We did lots of hard work today but the greatest experience i think was when we tracted into a family with many little children and were able to teach them. They were very humble and we taught them at they plywood table and on plywood benches. Their bed room was the same room and was a bunch of mattresses all put together. After teaching them and answering questions they said that they would call us once they read the book of mormon and that they werent interested in setting up a return appointment. I want them to call. I dont even know their names but more than anything else right now i want them to call us.  The parents are trying to raise their kids right and i know what a blessing the gospel will be in their lives. 

Saturday:

We worked hard all day. What more can i say?

Sunday:

We had five investigators come to church and it was good. Im learning more each day how dependent i am on the spirit and how much i need it my daily activities.  It started to sprinkle right after one of our lessons and so we went back to our apartment because elder adhans didnt have his umbrella and then it started pouring so it was a blessing to make it in.

im still homesick but not as bad because of an experience i had this week that ill write you about in a letter.

I love you all and please continue praying for me and i pray for you too daily,

love

Elder Eric Alan Olsen                                 

First Week in The Campo

So i~m out of the mtc finally and it feels rather weird to be out here in the field. I´m glad in someways that i~m  gone but i to be honest i miss it a little because its much harder in the field.

Last tuesday i flew into manaus with all the other missionaries and honestly it wasn~t that bad when i got off the plane, rather nice to be honest weather wise. it was humid but still... so i met the mission president and he~s really cool and i~m excited to work with him. we went to his house for lunch which is on the 10th floor of a building and i think it is the whole floor or at least half of it, and it was really shieky (as we say here in brasil for cool). Then we had interviews with him and he had a board with all the areas zones and missionaries faces on it and he told me to find my face, and so i did. My companions name is elder adhans and i would be serving in manauas in the east zone and in the acariquara ward, (which is in the ouro verde neighborhood if you want to see on google maps). Elder adhans has been out for five months and is from sao paulo.  I went into my apartment and then it hit me, i]m here in brasil for the next two years...

wednesday
woke up and took a cold shower because we dont have hot water and got to work.  Throughout the whole day we walked, and walked and walked. Most of our appointments fell through but we were able to give a message to one of our investigators and teach the plan of salvation to another. It really isnt that hot here right now and when i say that i mean its not about 40 degrees celcius since i had it confirmed to me that it does get that high. Apparently i came in at the begining of the colder rainy season so you wont hear me complaining about the heat for a while. It drizzled a little today but not too much. when i woke up and looked out of our balcony i saw the forest and its a really cool thing to see everymorning because even though i]m in the middle of a city of 2 + million people they still have bits of the rain forest in here.

thursday
Our lessons fell through again today but we were able to teach four boys that we found eating mangos and committed them to read the book of mormon. We visited a less active family before we came in and the father was telling us about how he saw a 3 meter long snake on the road by his house (he lives near the forest) and also a caiman. We had a nice rm give us 20 reais as we were walking and we used it to buy açaí which is different than i expected when its not cold. We also recieved 20 more from a lunch appointment that fell through which we used another day to buy a pizza.

friday
I had my first real storm here today. I was studying the book of mormon in portuguese underneath a tree when i felt a couple drops and so i pulled out my umbrella and elder adhans went back to studying under the tree then it started picking up and within 15 minutes me and elder adhans were stranded under a phone booth with my umbrella because he forgot his and there were rivers in the streets and most of it had at least 1/4 inch of water. we stayed there for 15 more minutes and then went and fought our way through the rain to our lunch appointment and then changed into dry clothes after lunch. We worked really hard today because our lessons kept falling through and did 20 contacts and set up appointments for us to go and teach. Near the end of the day we were walking and i felt guided by the spirit to go a certain way and that there was someone that we were supposed to meet. We kept walking and then visisted with a less active family and when we went out from the house a young man stopped us and said that he had had all of the missionary lessons and that we had a baptismal date but lost it because he relapsed with smoking and drinking and wanted to meet with us again. His name was jones and so we wrote down his address and will teach him tomorrow. It was amazing to be able to be guided to finding him and having a chance to talk with him. Also a man who is going to resole my companions shoes asked for a book of mormon and we will teach him soon

saturday
taught with a member for most of the day and got alot accomplished. Jones was home when we went to visit him but he didn~t want to talk with us and told the little kids who were at his house to say he was gone. It was very sad.

sunday: went to church with saulo and leilani two of our investigators who are awesome and then worked for the rest of the day.

monday: played futebol with the brasilians in our stake and they were all really good and i wasnt. Its rather intimidating especially since everyone plays. teenagers to old men and they~re all good too. We ate lunch with ayeton and his wife and saulo and leilani (all of which are investigators) ayeton and his wife jsut got married and will be baptized the 20th of november and saulo and leilani are going to get married and will be baptized the same day (they just commited) saulo and ayeton are brothers.

I could say that this week has been easy but i don~t want to lie. It has been tough, like really really tough, many appointments fell through i~m in a different culture and for the first time since i entered into the mtc i~m really homesick, and the only way that i combat this is through work. The language doesnt bother me since i know that itll all come through time and even though i dont always understand people i know that i will and this doesnt really worry me. For the first time two years really dawned on me for how long i]ll be gone for and i miss you all. letters would be nice and i~m not sure how often i recieve them i know at least once every three months but i really dont know. But i know that the lord has been helping me and that through him i]ll be able to do this. As it says in matthew the lord purges those branches that bear fruit so that they can bring forth more.

I love you all and your prayers really do help me.

love
Elder Eric Alan Olsen

BRAZIL!

Eric called home last Friday night telling us that we received  his Visa and he would be headed to Brazil on Tuesday! He is not in the Brazil MTC! (That is why there is no email for the week)

I Love The Lord

Another week has gone past again and I feel like they are going even faster than usual. But if you have written me recently (like with in the last month) you should be getting a letter soon and for everyone else I apologize I'm a little backlogged but they'll all come through pretty soon.

 

Dad: There's a letter for you and mom coming in this next week and it has the things that you want to know about

Mom: Thank you so much for the crumpets! I love them and also the pear from the tree, it was delicous

Andrew: Thanks for the "i-like-you" mouse I push him whenever I open up my drawer and he makes me laugh

 

So last week we were blessed by getting the opportuinity to hear from another apostle, Elder Ballard, and it was an amazing talk. He talked about how we need to excercise our faith in Jesus Christ and hwo when we get rejected that we need to focus on Christ's atonement and that will help us get over it and refocus on the reason why we are here. He shared a couple stories too and one of which was when he was in England after world war 2 for his mission and he had just gotten there and they were preaching to a crowd in Hyde park and he was chosen to go up and preach and there was like 500 something people there, and so he chose to speak on baptism and he said everything that he knew about baptism in about one and a half minutes and then that night he prayed and promised that that would never happen again, and that he would be more prepared and be ready to teach people and so he got up extra early and studied about the restoration and the reformation and the scriptures. All in all it was definitely a most excellent talk.

 

(I'm going to skip around on the days just to warn you)

 

This morning I was awoken at 5:30 by hearing people yelling in our hall, it turns out that one of the guys in my district got his visa and was leaving at 6:00 am and so he was rushing to get everything packed since they didn't tell him until 5:10 (where they announced it on the intercom for the floor, and I slept throught it, and was one of the few that did from what I hear) so he was rushed and didn't get to tell his parents and probably will at the airport. So if there is a week that you don't get an email from me that means that I got my visa at 5:30 in the morning and had to be gone by 6:00, and I'm letting you know now that I"m not going to call you when I'm at the airport for the reason that I feel that I would get distracted by having the opportunity to call. But that was really exciting.

 

This last week me and Elder Robinson have been on fire! Like it has been amazing how much success we have been granted with. I'm currently not using the book at all anymore in the lessons and am saying what I need to from the vocab that I know and have been learning. When we have been teaching the spirit has been in our lessons alot and so the words that we say are guided and we are able to be tools in touching the hearts of our investigators. All of them now have baptismal commitments which is amazing, especially because a week or two ago I wanted to drop one of them. Her name is Socorro and she hadn't been progressing, but she's read the book of mormon and knows that it's true and so I was super happy about that, but now we have another problem. She has a "esposo" who she isn't married to legally and so she can't be baptized because she's not living the law of chastity and she won't kick him out and she won't get married to him. Why she won't get married is a legitamite reason, it's because he drinks and smokes and she doesn't want a husband who does that, and so we have an appointment for this friday with her and we want her to bring him along and we will be teaching them about the Word of Wisdom (we were planning on teaching it that lesson anyways so it's going to be great), and she said that if he does stop those things that she will marry him and that would be most awesome but she doesn't think that he's going to because he does it even though he knows that it's bad. I went out of the lesson a little discouraged but after praying about it with elder robinson I know that everything is going to be alright and that it will all work out.

 

Oh and elder Robinson got his electronic part of his visa done today and so that's really exciting because that's one step closer for him being in Brazil. If you could call the travel office and find out an update on mine that would be awesome (the travel office is part of the mtc so look on their website or call the main line). They have information on how far along the visa is and so just put it in a dear elder and send whatever they tell you over. 

 

This last sunday we had a couple who served as mission presidents in the Sao Paulo east mission come and speak to us. They told us about miracles that happened while they were serving. One of which was that every transfer when the missionarires put their suitcases out in a field while they were waiting for their reassignments it didn't rain (and it rains hard down there, they shared a story and picture of how they started driving and it started raining and in a matter of blocks they were floating down the road in 4 feet of water and from the picture they showed us i would believe that isn't too far off from the truth, it was true), and then another time when they were driving on sunday and had forgotten to fill up the gas tank before and they had to get home and theri car was only going to go for 9 more miles, and so they said a prayer and their car went 22 miles before the 9 mile mark changed.

 

Thats all that I have time for today but I hope that you all are doing well and I love you,

 

Love

Elder Olsen

Onward to the 4th Week

So another week at the MTC has come and gone, and I wish that i had super exciting things to tell you about, like how someone from the first quorum of the 70 came and spoke to us at devotional. Or how I saw Will Harrison randomly at the temple this morning when I went there, Or the exciting time of me getting locked outside of my room for 20 minutes and a guy opened my door with a piece of paper, dental floss and a vaccum cleaner cord.

 

Or maybe I could tell you about how I now play intense games of soccer during Gym time where we have teams of 20 on 20 ( I counted at the end of a game and got 44), we it gets really fun and my team has a streak of winning 2 out of the last 3 games (we tied the last one 2-2). That would be a fun thing I guess I could tell you in my email.

 

Perhaps I could tell you about how me and Elder Robinson explained our purposes to two of our investigators who became much more interested since we had that discussion and started reading the Book of Mormon, or about our investigator who got "baptized" last sunday and our other one who will be this sunday. I suppose that would be of interest.

 

But in reality nothing extremely exciting has happened here at the MTC. Everyday is much like the day before and I feel like I'm getting the language down much better. Last night at our discussion I didn't read anything off my notes or out of a book except for one part of when we taught about the word of wisdom which I read out of a pamphet that we were giving them.

 

I still haven't gotten my visa, and I do hope that it'll come soon, but since they're moved the travel office to another building I don't feel like it'll come any faster because they're still adjusting to the new place ( they moved the mail room as well which I am a little disappointed at because now it's not right next door).

 

My old fhe sisters are here now which is cool to see them and i feel like recently there's been a wave of byu-idaho people because I'm seeing familiar faces now.

 

But if I get my visa I'll email you and tell you when I'm leaving, don't worry and I am so grateful for all the mail and the packages that i've recieved this last week. I'll answer them all I promise I'm a little swamped right now and hope to send them all off soon, like by friday, but I will get them to you. Celeste recently sent me over a photo album which I have been showing off to everyone and so if you want to have your picture for me to remember you by and to shown off to the elders in my district and eventually the Brazilians that I'll be serving send me a picture. I really do love them.

 

I apoliogize that this isn't really long, but anything that happens I'll be sure to let you know and I'll work on sending longer letters. If you want to help by sending me emails with specific questions that would be awesome. Also send all emails before 12:00 my time so that they get answered,

 

I love you all and am grateful for your prayers,

 

Elder Eric Olsen

 

 

p.s. I love letters so please continue sending them :)

Week #3

Highlight of my week: Elder Holland coming down last Tuesday and speaking to us in Devotional

 

it feels like every week when it comes time for tuesday there are rumors floating around that it's going to be a general authority that week and yet it hadn't been until this week and it was amazing. I was in the choir and sang and he said that it was the best he's heard of that rendition for the song, which was awesome. He was really passionate in his introduction and we had a Q&A session where he had the MTC President ask people questions previously expecting only like 3-4 and then he'd do a traveling mic with questions but it turned into 47 questions so there was no traveling mic but it was awesome. Before he started he gave a really good introduction about how he doesn't want us to turn our back on the work that we are doing now after our missions, and that there were those who had given their life's for the work  that the last of which had died 4 hours previous. No one had any information on what had happened until this sunday when at mission conference the MTC President told us that the person who had died's name is Sister Bentley and she had been killed in a car crash in up state new york (I think that she was in the Buffalo New York mission). She and her comp had been making a left turn when a car t-boned into them hitting the passenger side. It was a really passionate and I'm sending my notes over with a letter this week.

 

Other than that there's not anything that's been super different here. I still go to class for 6+ hours a day where I teach investigators and learn portuguese and the days pretty much all blend into one with all the repetitiveness of everything. I'm getting the language down better and can hold conversations in it now. Also this week I've been practicing street contacting and door knocking in Portuguese in my personal/langauge study time, and that has greatly increased my knowledge of the language and the application of it.

 

My companion elder Walch left this morning for the Brazilian CTM and so I'm now with Elder Robinson because his comp left too. Elder Robinson is from Layton Utah, goes to BYU provo and is funny. In some ways he reminds me of Patrick but is really different in most other ways. Oh and since we are companions we share the investigators that we both have and so we are now working on 4 investigators two of which have baptismal commitments and one of his is close and the other one of mine is not close.We now only have 20 minute lessons to teach in because of the fact that they are trying to get more classtime in for us so it's been different teaching much quicker and less in depth.

 

Thank you for the ordering me the shoes, and I should be getting my visa either tomorrow or next week if it is coming in on time. It really is random though because someone in the other district did his electronic and then the next day he got his visa.

 

I honestly can't really think of anything else to say because nothing too eventful has happened here. Keep on writing me because it makes my day, especially when i'm feeling a little frustrated or down which does happen.

 

I love you all and know that you're in my prayers,

 

Elder Olsen

Week 2: Days are Blending and I'm Gaining Weight

Hey so i'm already in week two here in the mtc and like the title says i've gained weight, which i'm not happy about, but here is brighter news

Dad: That is awesome that you're helping the missionaries teach someone! Let me know when he has read the book of mormon

Ben and Celeste: Thank you so very much for the cookies and notes I love getting mail!

Aaron and Karalee: Thank you for the Stroopwafels, I hope you got some too after all the work you must have done to make them and it's cool that you get you're own business cards.

Mom: Thank you for the pday clothes and the shot record information! It definitely brought peace to my mind having it

 

Ok so here's the recap of the week. So after our 5th lesson with Celio we were "transferred" and then the next day we got Celio as a teacher. (Mom the investigators I have at this point are all actors not real people but they are based off of people who they taught on their mission). His name is Brother Roberts and is really cool. He served in Belem which is the mission right next to mine and has the most awesome cases for his scriptures and for preach my gospel. One of his cases has jaguar fur, crocodile leather and anaconda skin on it. He said that he ate some interesting things in a city which is near Manaus, and told a story about a type of parasite which he got but you'll have to wait for Bens letter to find out about it. Speaking of which thank you for all the mail and i've sent letters yesterday and if you send me a letter you'll get one in return. Oh and I found out DearElder.com (which is run through the MTC btw) sends letters to the MTC for free so you should take advantage of that while i'm still here.

 

Back to investigators though, we got two more last night. The first one was Irma Socorro and she shut us down. Like me and Elder Walch went into the discussion before we were quite ready because someone else knocked on the door before we were both there and i didn't understand most anything of what she was saying and she didn't understand anything that we were saying to her so it was just one big misunderstanding but luckily we got a return appointment. Most of the elders were  extrememly dishearted after the first investigator because they had similar experiences. Our second one is a 40 year old who lives in Belem named Antonio, he has 4 kids and he is much nicer to us. We teach him again tomorrow morning for our return appointment and we were able to teach him about prayer before our lesson ended.

 

Elder Brown our district leader is sick with strept throat and so we're been taking turns watching him sleep at the residence hall and ironically he got sick right after we had a devotional on staying healthy.

 

So my Elder Walch has opened up more to me this week than last week which has been nice and he & anthother elder in out district also got their visas last wednesday and so they leaves for Sao Paulo next tuesday and i get a new companion. Luckily we haven't had any problems with our companionship wich is cool because other elders in our district have so i'm grateful.

 

I feel a little cut off from the world being here but one of the guys in my district, Elder King, lives an hour outside NYC and so I knew about the earth quake and had heard a little about the hurricane but not a ton.

 

Oh as senior companion I only really initaite companionship inventory, comp. prayer, and things like that.

 

Everyday I'm being taught or teaching investigators for 6 hours in a classroom and I also have a computer program that we practice with and personal study and so my days are packed. We got from 6:30-10:30 everyday and i am most grateful for all the sleep that i'm getting at night.

 

So earlier this week I met Elder McKinley and it was really cool because we were able to talk about all sorts of things and swap stories. I didn't know that he was from pleasanton which was interesting but tell sister mckinley that we met (he lives three doors down from me actually).

 

I am grateful for you're prayers and please continue to pray for me, because it really does help. Also pray that my visa will be able to come through even though I know that the lord will have me where he wants me to be.

 

I do the MTC choir for devotionals and both last week and this week people always rumor that there will be one of the first presidency coming or one of the 12 and apparently they haven't come for a while which means that they will soon hopefully.

 

My time will end soon, but if you ever want to get last minute letters in I check my email in the afternoon between 12-4 and i usually print off my emails in the morning.

 

I love you all and you're in my prayers,

 

-Elder Eric Alan Olsen

 

P.S. I really like mail so send it and send me the free DearElders while you can :)

Week #1 in the MTC

Hey Family!

 

The MTC is great, but it is also alot of work. Every day I get up at 6:30 and then go to bed at 10:30ish, I try hitting 10:30 but usually get somewhere between then and 10:45. Portuguese is going wonderful, on my first day I walked into my classroom and my teacher was only speaking Portuguese which was a little scary because I didn't understand most of it but I did understand somethings which was cool. I've learned so much quicker here than I would have anywhere else which is good because last friday we had our first investigator. His name is Celio and he's a 50 year old ex-pastor who lives in Belem. I was nervous thinking that I wouldn't be able to understand anything that he said and that we weren't going to be able to give a lesson for a full 45 minutes but it turned out awesome and  we hit just about 45 minutes. I definitely felt like I had the gift of tongues then because I wasn't able to speak as well before and then the words just flowed when it came time. I am super grateful that I was able to have a Spanish background because it has definitely helped me in learning portuguese because they are similar. We are just going through the lessons in order with Celio and last night he accepted the invitation to be baptized which was amazing because I know that it wasn't because of anything that me and my companion said and it was the Spirit.

 

Now to tell you about my companion. His name is Elder Walch and is from Tigard Oregon which is near Portland. He went to BYU and is a major runner guy. Like he was only one place away from making the BYU track team and stuff. But he's a really chill guy and knows a bunch of people here and is in the same ward as one of my EFY friends from there which was funny. I'm currently the senior companion btw and it's pretty cool.

 

My district is amazing. We have Elder Brown, Elder McIntire, Elder King, Elder Thurston, Elder Walch, Elder McGrath, Elder Robinson, Elder Clark, Elder Linfesty and myself. Last Sunday me and Elder Thurston sang the Spirit of God in Sacrament Meeting with two other sisters, because they needed a musical number and that was fun. And I did the electronic part of my visa today and so i will be getting it 2-3 weeks at the earliest, and my whole district are like me and are all visa waiters. The Elders in my district all joke around and say that I'm going to be translated and that I should take them with me as I go.

 

So far since I've been here I've seen a couple friends from up at BYU-Idaho and also Hermana Foster who is leaving for Peru tomorrow (Aaron and Karalee write her!), Elder Ostler and Elder Perry.

 

So unlike everyone else I don't especially enjoy the MTC food, which makes me just about the same as my district. I did for the first few days but now its lost its savor to my tongue I guess I don't like sugary fatty processed foods and yea...everyother meal tastes good but most of it is starting to not really have a rich taste anymore, but i am grateful and I do eat.

 

So I need you to send me my immunizations card and also my yellow fever card (I had it last in the Denali it may be in the center console), because they need those and yea...its muy importante. Also send me my Patriarchial blessing and some jeans and t shirts that I can use for pday clothes and service projects. Preferably my blue hollister one because I like it. I'll have a list of forgotten things that i'll be sure to send you via mail. Speaking of which I love mail. Handwritten letters are the best but typed are nice too. Since coming here I've recieved two postcards from Grandpa Olsen which I am most grateful for and also a DearElder letter from Aunt Melanie. (Dear Elder is an online website where you type it all out and they'll deliver it the same day or the next day and it costs as much as a stamp, I would recommend using it if you are forgetful and/or want a letter written back to you).

 

To whoever sent me cookies yesterday, thank you. I would say thank you specifically, however the cookies came anonymously and so I have no sure idea who sent them, so for whoever sent them please come forward and write me a letter letting me know it was you :).

 

The paper and pens that we got at walgreens before I went in has been an amazing help to me with journal writing and also with note taking.

 

I don't have Grandma's email address and so I would be most appreciative if you could send it over this week and also remember that the only address that I have is our home address and so if you want a letter then you have to write me (cough cough...charlotte billy aaron and karalee)

 

Remember to forward this email out to the list of people from Facebook! And also write on Facebook telling them to write me.

 

I am so grateful for the opporutity that I have to serve here and I'm greatful for all the blessings which I've been recieving here. The Spirit is strong and I've found that if I want to be able to learn I have to have the Spirit with me here.

 

I love you all and you're in my prayers,

 

Elder Eric Olsen