Week 2

Buenos Dias Everybody!

This past week has been fantastic!!  I am just loving it here in Madrid! Last P-Day we went to see downtown Madrid.  We rode the Metro (Subway) in to town and we got to walk around the town.  Madrid is such an amzing city!  We got to go inside the giant cathedral, and got to meet a preist and he was super friendly and his English was fantastic!  Right next to the Cathedral was the Royal Palace which was just massive!  It was so cool to see!!

On Saturday we got to go to the park and try to get contacts and place copies of the Book of Mormon.  This week was hard.  I was paired with Elder Kyle Gill from Kaysville, UT and we were both really nervous.  We ended up getting lucky and finding a pair of girls from Texas who spoke English.  So we proceeded to unload basically all of our English Pamphlets on them!  I hope they read them and contact the missionaries while here, but if not there is a quote here in the CCM that reads, "Most people require 7 missionary encounters before they will start taking discussions."  Hopefully we were one of those encounters!

On Sunday we had meetings as usual, but on Monday we had a big sending off Dominos Pizza party for the Sitteruds (The MTC President and his wife) and the Portugese Elders.  It was a taste of home that I really enjoyed!!  Whilst eating our pizza, Elder Stapleton and I got talking about life in Utah.  Just a refresher, Elder Stapleton is from Orange County, California and is a year ahead of me in school so has already attended BYU for two semesters.  He is also in the Kilmer's ward for my mother´s reference.  Anyway we were talking about how I played soccer for Lehi High School, and he said, "Lehi High School, huh?  Did you happen to know a girl named Amanda..." he then paused with a questioning tone.  "McHenry?" I asked.  He then got this look of pure astonishment and proceeded to tell me that he had dated her while he was at BYU!!!  In fact, come to find out, he was dating her WHILE SHE WAS SITTING BEHIND ME IN MY ENGLISH CLASS!!!!  This world is too small!! It made me laugh pretty hard!

On Tuesday the Sitteruds and Portugese left for home and their respective missions.  We gave the Portugese Elders hugs, and sister a handshake and then returned to class rather sad.  My district (all 3 of us) and I then had to teach an "investigator" we were teaching her and were planing to talk about the Plan of Salvation and then out of the blue the question came, "Why do you not drink wine when taking the Sacrament?"  All three of us looked like deer in the headlights.  Suddenly we were saved when there was a knock on the door saying that the Sitteruds were leaving.  All the missionaries filed out into the hallway and we sang a capella God Be With You Til We Meet Again in Spanish and man I teared up and felt the Spirit so strongly.  Hymns bring the spirit so much and we couldn't even understand what we were saying!  I love hymns!!

Yesterday we went to class as normal and some new Russian Speaking Missionaries got here!  It'll be cool to get to know them better as time goes by!  One of my favorite things we get to do here is play soccer about 4 times a week!!  On Wednesday we got to the court and it was taken so we ran a little farther down the road to ANOTHER FUTSAL COURT!!  It was so cool!

Concerning the Language.  Basically the only thing I trust myself to do in our lessons is bear my testimony in Spanish.  Which as far as things I could know how to say in Spanish that's a pretty good one!  I love all of the Elders and Sisters here and they all have such strong testimonies.  They help strengthen mine.  Today we are going to tour the Santiago Bernebeu (the Real Madrid Soccer Stadium) so I've got to go!  I love you all!

Con Amor,

Elder Jonson

P.S.  Sorry for any mistakes with my English it is getting worse.  I have to use very easy words to spell when writing now...