8/17/12

Hola familia!

Okay, again there is a lot to be said this week in a little amount of time, so I will be scattered, but hopefully you can keep up ;). Thank you to everyone who sent me letters again this week, i hope you got my response letters! I continue to love hearing from everyone! so remember that investigator Jennifer from my first letter? Well we are no longer teaching her, she went on vacation to Mexico and we were "tranferred" and now "Jennifer" is our teacher Hermana Ruiz...as we expected! But not only is she an awesome teacher, she is now one of our progressive investigators, Mario, too! Hosquito is a progressive investigator named Mario and they will both be our investigators for the rest of the stay here! Mario is an atheist, so that's kind of tough, but at least Carlos has a religious background.

Mormon Messages! If you haven't already, you should check out the Mormom Messages on LDS.org...my favorite ones so far are "Sanctify Yourselves," by Elder Holland for Priesthood holders, "Dare to Stand Alone," by President Monson for everyone, "Stay Within the Lines," by Holland again for Pre-Missionaries, and "Create," by President Uchtdorf for Young Women. They are all great to watch, but those are the main audience genres. :) watch them and I promise you'll love them!

On Sunday we watched the new version of the movie Joseph Smith Prophet of the Restoration that was remade last year...it is aimed more towards investigators now rather than the life of Joseph Smith. I miss the old one, but this one is till way good! What was ironic was that Joseph Smith was sitting in front of me during the movie! You heard it right, i met the missionary that played the young Joseph Smith in the movie and is now off serving in North Carolina, cool huh? I took a picture with him, like everyone else did ha

So the reason why i titled this email "Music" is because outside of continuing to study and learn the language, this week was MUSIC! Elder McMahon, Elder Burgon, and I participated in an the Mo Tab rendition of Redeemer of Israel in our Tuesday night devotional MTC choir, it was AWESOME! So powerful and spiritually, i loved it. Not only that, but Tuesday during study time, an Elder came to my room and asked me if i would like to sing to an arrangment he had of Savior, Redeemer of My Soul....at first i was a little nervous, but Elder McMahon wanted to pracitce some music, too...so we worked on it together! the Elder played the violin and wanted me to sing a solo, and have a piano accompanist, so we practiced with the violin because he couldn't find an accompanist at first. The next day we were supposed to meet, he didn't show up and I found an accompanist! So i practiced with the pianist, who was amazingly talented! First time seeing the music and he played it with perfection, i was amazed. So we planned on trying out for a devotional or for mission conference and at the last second the violinist showed up and wanted to join in. I didn't want to do it because we hadn't all practiced together...only separate, but I felt bad because he came up with the idea himself and everyone convinced me to let him...not that it was up to me ha So we tried out...and he messed up a bunch, so the performance was kinda shot. Sister Nally, the one in charge told him thank you but no (in a nice way ha) beause he was leaving on Tuesday anyways , but that she wants me to come back with just a piano accompaniment, so wish me luck next week! Not to mention my voice wasn't at its best because i was still kind of sick :( I love music!

Mom, I need Matthew's address to write him! I dont have time to email him :(

Elder Russo has turned out to be JUST like you Chandler! He is skinny like you, funny, knows the quotes to EVERYTHING, knows every word to a rap song (we have had to work on not letting him bust out in rapping ;)), talks superfast and laughs a lot. It's crazy how much alike you guys are. Congrats on doing great in running, he runs, too ;)

Thank you so much for the CTR ring! I LOVE it, and it is the perfect size to where i could barely get it over my knuckle with soap, so that it won't ever fall off :)

We have new district leaders now, Elder Glasset and Elder Jarvis are leaving Monday for the field! The new ones are Elder Tengberg and Elder Watt, they are super funny. Elder Tengberg tries to get everyone to sing the "7am the usual morning line up.." song from Tangled every morning in the shower exactly at 7, we all crack up ha.

Still having a great time here, but I'm so tired of how bad the food is for you. Still tastes good, but it is so unhealthy! :(

Yesterday, I made a goal to memorize Joseph Smith's vision, and this is it from memory:

Vi una columna de luz, mas brillante que el sol directamente arriba de me cabeza, y esta luz gradualmente descendio hasta descansar sobre mi. Al reposar sobre mi la luz, vi en el aire arriba de mi a dos personajes cuyo fulgor y gloria no admiten descripcion. Uno de ellos me hablo llamandome por me nombre, senalando al otro: "Este es mi hijo amado. Escuchalo!" :)

What a blessing it is to have the gospel in my life, i love it to death, and I can't wait to get out into the mission field to teach :) More to come for next there is never enough time! Love you all, thanks for the support!

-Elder Gallego