October 27, 2016

Ciao ogni persone who happen to read this!!
So pretty much two things happened today, one we taught Antonio and I think he is finally starting to understand our purpose in life so that's cool, and two I dropped some sticky note things under a locked closet door and spent half an hour trying to get them out with a hanger, a string, swipe cards, and help from others... We never saw them again.
Today (saturday) we did this cool thing were we created a simpatizzante (investagator) based on someone we know who is not a member or something like that then we shuffled and taught someone on the spot we have never met, it was really cool for learning how to adapt to different people with diverse backgrounds and such.  The sorelle in my districto built a giant sand turtle because non perche it was quite hilarious. I also had an spiritual experience later while we were giving a lesson I just had a scripture pop into my head for no reason (Alma 36: 17­21). It was really awesome because it was just there and we shared and it was great.  We also had a district inventory and said all the things we liked about each other and that was way cool and really brought us together even more then we already were.
We got to go on our weekly temple walk and we took a bunch of pictures and we all even wore rossa (red) so we could match and look really cool. I taught at the district meeting about perserverando alla fine (enduring to the end), I mostly used "Our Search for Happiness" and went pretty well.  We had a devotional by Brother Allen who is a missionary management director, penso. Then we watched Meet the Mormons I had never seen it before it was pretty good, I really like the Candy Bomber story  just because he brought gioia in such dark times.
Today we sang popcorn popping in italiana just for fun and it was quite hard but it was worth perche the translation is hilarious.  We also got to pray for ten minutes straight which sounds weird but is actually super amazing and can give you a new perspective on prayer. Since you run out of your usual prayer stuff pretty quick you really have to think about what to say and it is way awesome, I invite anyone who has the time to try it.
We sang "Jesus Once of Humble Birth" at the Tuesday devotional and it was way good Brother Natriss of the 70 spoke and here are some of the snipit quotes I liked: "Be not Afraid Believe" (from Gordon B. Hinckley) and "know who you are, and know who he is".  We get to host the new missionaries tomorrow and I am way super excited.
I got to host four missionaries today and it was super great, yes people cry but it is also one of the greatest days for them so I was just there to help it move along. We did TRC again and it went very well.  We might be descending into ranks of abnormality because in order to study a scripture we made a game where you hit a smallish beach ball  around and when you hit it everyone says the next word of the scripture and surprisingly it worked and was super fun definitely and repeat activity.
Anyway to conclude I am doing great and I do love it here there is a lot to do and you can make stuff up to just make your experience even more exciting and fun while being surrounded by awesome people.  I am so glad to be here and am just having a blast.   volere bene a ogni persone!!! Ciao
­Anziano Hansen
P.S. I found more people Elder Brandon Kunzler, Elder Elliot Heines just arrived yesterday, and I forgot sister Weeks from the last time I said I saw people

Nose warmers

October 20, 2016

So last week after I wrote my email we got to go to the tempio except when  my collega e io got there we realized we had forgotten our recommends (because the name tags aren't quite enough) so we had to run all the way back to our dorms and then back to the tempio in suits trying to get there for the same session as our district which we ended up missing by like 2 minutes but it was fine perche il tempio is awesome e molto bello.  We taught Alessia and it went super well until she came into class and told us she was actually sorrella Francom from Washington when we all thought she might actually have been from Italy. It was weird cause she became our teacher and it's wierd.

We got to go on a field trip to the consulate in SLC to get our visas approved and it was super nice to be out and about for a few hours and while we were eating some random stranger paid for our meals all seven of them it was way cool.  We also sang a song in the marble room on the bottom floor of the consulate and it was amazing. 

I got to pretend to be an investigator named Marco for class and that was fun also I was super tired so I took a nap and it was awesome

On Sunday I gave the priesthood lesson in Ingles and it went better than I thought it would and my collega Anziano Macdonald and I said the sacrament prayer in Italian and that was super cool. And there is a Canadian sister here with a really long name that I can never remember so I call her sorrella Canadia because that's close enough. Elder Vai something a retired football player slash newscaster cam and spoke to us and it was super awesome than me district watched an elder Holland talk and he was super powerful and that was awesome.

Mio collega wasn't feeling too good today so we left class a little early so he could shower ad sleep but before he asked me to give him a blessing and it was the first time I've ever given one and it was honestly one of the most spiritual things I have ever done or even been present for.

We had service and took out all the trash again except like three times faster this time. Volleyball never gets old.  We a Devotional review after a member of the presidency of the 70 spoke president Robbins, it was super emotional and spiritual and a amazing.

I era the most stanco oggi and purpose teacher was sick so we were spilt between a few classes but we learned about the role of the holy ghost and it was super spiritual and way interessatto. We had TRC teaching resource center AKA teaching random citizens it was super funny when mio collega thought these vollenteer return missionaries were supposed to pretend to be investigators when in fact they were supposed to just be themselves so he taught a returned missionary how to pray after asking if she had have prayed before.  Then we heard some stories from sorrella Demann who crashed in a hot air balloon it was hilarious but I really don't know the story very well so yah.

just an overview it's great here you make great connections with wonderful people and although scheduled out there is always a way to have fun!

Ciao ongi persone

Mission group at MTC October 2016

Reunited with friends in the MTC from Burley, ID

So I finally made it to the mtc and it's awesome. When I was dropped off and pretty much that entire day I was just overly excited and it was spectacular.  Eventhough my ID card which you need to go anywhere got demagnitized so we had to fix that before I did anything else, but it worked out. I met my district♧ of three other guys and four girls then I met mia collega (companion) Anziano Macdonald♤.  Then we went to a new member meeting where I saw Josh Beck, Connor Campbell, and Sam Gates. Later I also saw Jaron Atkinson, Clinton Choi, Landen Gunnell, Dallyn McCracken, Chase Muir, kennedee king, and Miriam Stokes. We later ate cena (dinner) and yes there was unlimited chocolate milk and yes I have drank it almost every pasto (meal).  We went to a classe where we saw an example of teaching and we got to comment and stuff and then we went on a tour led by four Romanian missionari chi (who) left on Tuesday at 3 am. When the day ended mia collega e io met our roommates anzioni Drenk and Strong, they are pretty awesome.

The second day we met our investigator Alessia and we started to prepare to teach her tomorrow in full Italian which seems crazy.  We later went to another meeting and introduced ourselves to the zone which is full of missionari going to Italia, Roma e Italia, Milano e a few going to Romania.  Mia collega e io were assigned as the sacrament people so we are just in charge of that for the next three weeks.

So we taught our first lesson today (day 3) after we came out I could only describe it as le morte or the death.  We asked a few questions and it was fine but the instant she started talking everything went wrong perche we couldn't understand her and if we responded from the book we didn't know what each other was (mia collega and io). It was super humbling and crushing.  But the  we went to an uplifting gift of tongues seminar and we got back our shreds of confidence.  We feel we'll do better tomorrow. We also had un molto bello estudiar collega.

We taught alleviate again but this time it went much much much better molto bene. Especially since mia collega said "I know that if you pray that you will feel (he tried to say pace (peace) but instead said pesce (fish)" which was awesome. Then later in classe we learned about technology safeguards. Oh yah our teacher is fratello (brother) hatch he 2? At BYU and he is just a great teacher. 

Today was fast Sunday which was normal except we didn't go to breakfast or lunch. We had a good priesthood meeting taught by a Romanian and when we sang in Italian we struggled nut it was still super great.  Noi did basically the teachers jobs for sacrament meeting and people bore wonderfully heart felt testimonies. We also went on a great tempio Wallander took some pictures there◇. We sang in choir and that was way fun as well as one guy from my district Anziano Hughes was at Utah All State choir when I was and we talked about that and it was super cool. We were spoke to by brother Heaton and that was super spiritual and uplifting.

Four Suarez at the MTC is intense and awesome and it's one of the best ways to spend your excersice time. I got a bunch of stuff for my visa figured out and we memorized Moroni 10,5 in Italiano. Oh yah an elder got locked out of his room in only a towel because his companion left him to go to the vending machines, so leasson: always stay with your companion.

We had service this morning which was just taking out all of the trash for the entire four floor building which was actually much better than cleaning the bagno which is what everyone else did. We had choir again today where we finished learning "Precious Savior" and we eventually sang it at the MTC Devotional that night which was broadcast or sent to all the MTC's around the world.  The Amen at the end kf the song was beautiful and amazing Oh and we had Elder Bednar of the 12 apostles and his wife speak.  They both spoke to us but not before giving a shout out of sorts to a sorrella in my district, perche apparently they are neighbors.  He taught us how to really study and listen to conference talks and listening to the doctrine, the invitation, and the blessings, and how repentance can bring molto goaia(joy).
That night mia roommates and I played horse with a racquetball we found and trashcan. This was the only time we actually stayed past 11 ever at the MTC.

In classe we learned about Alma the younger's conversion story and how after their missions they talked about how great it was and boasted in God which is a good thing.  I played volleyball this time and it was also quite amazing. This last lesson with alleviate was our best ever we answered a question she had about how she can feel the holy ghost and we studied a  scripture for almost the whole time and was super spiritual.  It was so great she shared an experience of when she felt the spirit super strong and when  I tried to explain what it may have felt like I couldn't so we eventually got to calling it super grande sentimento which kind of describes it perfectly, then we had her pray and she asked us how she can feel the spirit all the time which is awesome and we will definitely have that as the vocal point for next lezziona. We are planning to teach about repentance and the joy it brings as well as the gift of the holy ghost by the laying on of hands and all that awesome stuff. Maybe the lesson after that we can talk about baptism.