First Hola to the familia!

Hola familia!

Thanks for the birthday package! You have no idea how fantastic it is that my P-Day and my Birthday matched up perfectly. I definitely needed this. The junk food was much appreciated and my glasses case was much needed. It made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

I totally forgot that it was my birthday until I logged into this computer here. We were at the temple today doing a session and I had no idea that today was March 12. I had told everyone yesterday that it was my birthday, but for some reason it didn't stick in my mind. The temple was fantastic but it was weird not having you guys (Mom and Dad) to talk to afterwards. The whole sitting and pondering thing was really weird. Also, the screen was much bigger in the ordinance room.

Masey! For some reason it didn't register that the MTC was going to be this difficult to get used to. Maybe you wrote about it in one of your emails but I was just dying in the last few days. We get there and immediately (within two days) we're teaching an investigator totally in Spanish. His name is "Rolando" and the first two lessons were a bit iffy. It's hard to translate all of my thoughts about the Gospel from my Brain into Spanish. But the third lesson was amazing. Me and Elder Blotter (my companion) had prepared a really good lesson on the Restoration and the First Vision and comparing Joseph Smith's experience and questions to Ronaldo's, but instead of teaching that we ended up teaching about Repentance, Baptism, and the Atonement. Something we hadn't even studied! He just asked about it (we had given him a Libro de Mormon and told him to read the guia in the back about anything that he might have questions about. He started asking about being with his family forever (his "parents" had died in a car accident) and how he could do that. We just began testifying to him and everything turned out fantastic. At one point he asked about the ability of the Atonement to make all of the pains that happened to him in the past go away and I just started bawling my eyes out and testifying about the transformative power of the Atonement. It was one of the best experiences of my life. Even though he's not really "Rolando" (the actor is a teacher portraying an investigator he had in the past) I've grown to love him. It's truly fantastic.

Prior to that experience (yesterday) I had been having a really hard time. Elder Blotter and I don't really see eye to eye on much, we have different views about how to teach properly, and our personality's are almost polar opposites. But he's a really good guy with strong faith in prayer and the Church. Most of my faith is based on what I know and not on what I feel so we're able to combine those things to help teach the lessons properly. He also speaks much slower than I do so at times he's more thoughtful with what he says. Yo hablo muy rapido en Espanol y Ingles.

Oh I saw Axel here the other day. He's going to be leaving the same week as me so I'll be able to see him every once in a while. For some reason seeing him here gave me a big boost of strength and happiness that I really needed.

The food is terrible. It's some of the least appetizing food I've eaten in a long time. But I discovered the wrap bar the other day and so that should help me get through all of the coming nasty plates of gunk that they'll be giving us.

My district is awesome. The Hermanas are all strong in the Gospel and so are all the Elders. I've already learned to love them all in the short time that I've been here. It really does feel like a long time though. I swear I've been here for the past two years especially with all of the progress I've made in Spanish and all the stuff that we've been doing.

Oh yeah, I also have to wear a suit everyday! Isn't that fantastic? Our Branch Presidency told us that we had to wear our suits every single day unless they're getting dry cleaned. Which isn't that awesome since I have one pair of slacks that I can wear with the suit. I figure I'll get it dry cleaned tomorrow (especially seeing all the little stains that have gotten on it in the past few days) and that means I'll be able to wear whatever I want. I figure Elder Blotter and I could time our dry cleaning sessions so we don't have to wear suits EVERY day.

Oh! Before I forget, would you send me a "care package" of protein bars from Amazon? They have a weight room here that I go on splits with Elder Katich (in my district) to go use. There are also machines and pull up bars so I've been able to work out whenever I'm in the gym. No me gusta basquetbol and I can't play it with my Vibrams (I was told this by the head gym dude) anyways.

Te amo mucho! I miss all of you and can't wait for the day that I can come home from my mission and tell you all that I finished the work that the Lord sent me to do.

-Brayden (Elder Decker)