Week 5 MTC

 

This week went was pretty awesome.  WE GOT OUT TRAVEL PLANS!!! I'm a little excited about that.  So we fly out Monday morning at 11:05 and it is a straight flight to Amsterdam.  It is flight 619 so mom and dad if you want to look that up there you go, and some kid looked up our flight and I guess there is a layover in Detroit that they didn't tell us about but it is only for like an hour so I'm not sure if I will be able to call on that one.  So there is this bald guy at all the devotional that sits up on the stand by the presidency and the speakers but he never gets announced.  Everyone on the stand gets announced except him and he always looks angry. Haha so elder brown went off about him the other day.  I guess he really doesn't like the guy! and then we read in 2 kings chapter 2 and the last three verses tell a story about what happens when you make fun of bald guys. haha so go look it up! That is my spiritual thought for this week.  So every week there are a bunch of protesters at the temple when we do our temple walk, I don't know if I told you about them last week or not, but they are awesome!! Haha they go off about Christ, and they know quite a bit about him but you can tell they know nothing about our church because they are preaching what we already believe in!  We like to sit under a tree that is just close enough to be able to hear them.  It is really funny.  I finally saw sister Hulet last week.  Her companion took a picture of us and she was supposed to email me the picture but I haven't gotten it yet.  I saw Elder Sanders the other night.  I forgot he was at the mtc and I saw Sister Tripp too.  I see nate just about every day which is pretty cool.  I love seeing people I know.  So I just got this random Dutch email from some company.  Haha It's saying I need to activate my business account.  I don't know what that is all about.  I'll have to look into it.

Week 4 MTC

About the Pictures, the red headed kid was my favorite of the ones that left.  He was a golfer. and do you like the fort we made with our beds? haha we get pretty bored. Did you see the pic of all of us piled in the sweeds room singing?

 

Last week in my letter I said that an apostle was coming and it turned out to be Richard G Scott.  Mom and Dad I already told you about it so I will keep it short, but it was amazing!!!! He was so emotional the whole time.  He talked about prayer and he pretty much just taught from D&C 6, 8, and 9 I think.  It was the coolest experience of my life!!! and when the pray was over, everyone just say quietly in their seats and waited for him to get up and when He stood we all stood and waited for him to leave.  He is pretty old and slow so it took a while but when he was halfway out of the gym he stopped and turned around and yelled "BE GOOD" haha it was pretty awesome.  We got a letter today from The Netherlands and it was from the AP.  He said they just announced that they are going to create a new stake in the Netherlands!! They said be ready because they will put us to work when we get there! This new stake will be the fifth steak in our mission.  Soo cool! We get our travel plans this week!! It finally seems like it's here.  In two weeks from now I will be in the Netherlands! About half of our zone left this week.  The Sweeds and the Danes, and it is kind of a tradition here to sing in their rooms the night before they leave.  I will try and send you the videos.  It was so cool.  I love the music here, and we sing all the time.  We got to skype for trc this week and we talked to some Dutch natives.  It was pretty cool but it was hard to communicate over Dutch because we aren't that good at the language yet and it's harder to understand them when they talk through skype so there were plenty of awkward pauses. Haha it was kind of funny though.  So we have been doing what they call SYL in our class room.  That is where we are supposed to only speak in dutch, and yesterday our teachers challenges us to do it all day everyday from now on.  We lasted until dinner and we couldn't take it.  Haha so we failed but we will try again tomorrow.  So in my last letter I talked about Lieke our investigator.  She is an atheist so she was really hard to teach but she finally started keeping our challenges and she agreed to be baptized!!!!! Haha I know it's a fake investigator but it's so cool!! She really has felt the spirit in our lessons, and she is really into music so we played a song for her from the piano guys and we talked about how good music can invite the spirit and she was just overwhelmed with the spirit.  I love it here.  It's hard sometimes but it's totally worth it and I can't wait to be able to actually teach real investigators! 

Week 3 1/2 MTC

August 13, 2013

Richard G. Scott came to the devotional tonight.  It was the coolest experience of my life.  The spirit was so strong the whole time.  He spoke on prayer, and he was so emotional the whole time.  You could tell how great of a relationship he had with his Father in Heaven through prayer.  I hope to be able to have that kind of a relationship someday. 

He told us about his mission, and he said he would wait until his companion would go to bed, and then he would go into another room and pray out loud in a quiet, but sincere voice.  He said he hated the feeling of being rushed through a prayer.  So he wouldn’t have his personal prayers with his companion because he would be too worried about who finishes first, and he couldn’t be sincere that way.  It was better how he told it, but it was really cool.  He said, “As we increase our dependability, he will increase our capability.”

He also gave us an Apostolic blessing to give us extra help with our language, but only through Faith. I seriously can’t tell you enough how amazing it was and how strong the spirit was.  After the closing prayer no one stood up.  Everyone sat quietly in their seats and waited for him to leave.  When he got half way, he turned around and yelled, “BE GOOD!”  Haha   It was awesome! Oh, and when he stood up, we all stood as he walked out.  Seriously amazing stuff.  He is my new favorite apostle!

I wish we could record those talks because they would be cool to watch again sometime.  It was also the first devotional that was broadcast to all of the MTC’s, so that’s pretty cool.  Well,  I just thought I would write you and tell you about it because I had such an amazing experience.  I love you guys.

Liefde,

Elder Hulet

Week 3 MTC

This last week was awesome.  Every week here just keeps getting better and better. Last Wednesday I tried to wait out by the curb to welcome elder jarvis and sister Hulet but some old guy got mad at me soo we kind of hid back out of the way a little bit and waited for their cars and I saw the jarvis family pulling in so I ran up to meet them and I got to see nate at the curb and give them all big hugs. It really was awesome but kind of sad because it reminded me of when I got dropped off.  Then, another old guy started yelling at me like I had murdered someone!! He's all like elder you need to leave.  Go!! Get out of here!! Leave!!! haha so I tried to leave but the door he was making me go to was locked and my MTC card wasn't unlocking the door so I had to try and sneak past the guy just to get out of there! Haha it was crazy stuff.  I wasn't really breaking any rules because it was study time and They say we can take walks around the outside of the campus and it just so happens that takes us right by where they are dropping the new missionaries off.  So I don't feel bad about it, but I'm sad I didn't get to see sister Hulet! I thought I would see her around the campus but I haven't seen her yet! I hope I will get to see her before I go.  So on Saturday Me and elder neptune got a calling.  We are the new sacrament coordinators! haha it's a huge responsibility.  We have to assign people to bless the sacrament every week.  Haha It's probably the best calling we could get.  So tonight we have a devotional and they told us they were broadcasting this one to all of the mtc around the world and we were like that’s weird I wonder why and then our zone leaders told us they heard that M Russell Ballard is coming!! I am so excited.  Also, the temple opened up this week so we get to go do a session today.  I'm pretty excited about that! So we talked to the travel offices and they said we will for sure fly out on September second because we don't actually need visas to get into the Netherlands only Belgium so if it doesn't come through we will just serve in the Netherlands until it does.  I said bye to elder Jaros a few nights ago. I can’t believe he is already gone.  It felt like he was only here for a couple of days.  I am jealous of the English speaking missionaries because they get to go out and serve after like a week and a half of being here.  I am already half way done with the mtc so that's a good thing.  I feel like I won't be able to learn all that much of the language here, and I will just learn it all out there.  Sometimes when we ask questions our teachers will just be like oh you'll figure that out in the field or you'll catch on once you're out there.  So I hope they are right.  We taught in the trc last week and that was cool.  We just taught people who are actually from the Netherlands.  It was cool to hear their accents and one lady just told us all about the food.  She said that the weather is better over there too.  She said winters in Utah are colder than winters over there so It won’t be all that bad.  A bunch of elders were sick like my first week here and I never got it so I thought it had passed and then I woke up yesterday with a cold!! Me and elder fonger are both sick so that really stinks, but I'll get over it.  Our investigator we are teaching is an Atheist, and we really struggled with teaching her the first few days but our last couple of lessons have been awesome.  She was having a hard time praying because she didn't believe heavenly father was actually listening, so we told her she needs to just have some faith and she didn't understand what faith was so that kind of had us stumped but then I explained to her the metaphor about having a brain.  Where you ask her if she has a brain and then ask her how she can possibly know that because she has never seen it.  It really helped her understand that even though you can't see our heavenly father that doesn't mean he doesn't exist.  It was the best lesson ever!!! I have had a big improvement in my Dutch this week so I hope that will continue for the next few weeks that I am here.  I really am enjoying the mtc, but I hope the field will be much better!

 

Elder Hulet

Week 2 MTC

Welcomed Nate to the MTC 8-7-2013

My second week here at the MTC has been Awesome.  I love my whole district, my companion, and my teachers.  Elder Jaros lives in the same building as me so I get to hang out with him for a little bit every night.  It is so cool to see someone I know here.  He doesn't really like his companion so he tries to get away from him as much as possible and come and find me so that's pretty cool.  The language is going a lot better this week.  I can actually carry on conversations now! But they have to be about the gospel because that's all I really know how to talk about in Dutch.  We have three teachers now, so its like one teacher per companionship.  It's crazy but it really helps me learn.  I am definitely the worst at the language out of everyone in my district so it is really easy to get discouraged but I have only been here for two weeks so I guess I'm really not doing all that bad.  In my letter last week I talked about "magic Tuesday" haha well it was true what everyone was saying and I will try and send you the pictures we took together with our paper bags!   I love all of the devotionals we get to go to here! We haven't seen an apostle yet but I hear they come quite often so I hope I'll get to see one before I leave.  All of the speakers are awesome and I have felt the spirit in every single meeting.  That is my favorite part about the mtc by far.  Also, the food here is pretty good.  We have some type of burger for at least one meal every single day, and we also have fries every day.  Elder Neptune makes fun of me because I make myself fry sauce every time we go to eat. haha he isn't from Utah so he doesn't understand.  I played four square last week for the first time and it was awesome.  Janalee will be proud of me because I kicked butt! haha Just kidding I really didn't do that good... some of the kids who were playing with us said they were in four square leagues back home. haha they were like trying to put spin on the ball when they hit it and all this crazy stuff.  It made me laugh really hard.  They don't have any decaffeinated drinks here so I find myself drinking about a cactus cooler every day.  I introduced Elder Brown, a kid in my district, to them and he is obsessed!  I really miss music a lot, so we sing hymns at least ten times a day.  It's pretty cool.  That is one of my favorite parts of the devotionals too.  I love hearing thousands of missionaries singing called to serve.  It is seriously the greatest thing!!  So the other night we of course all went to bed on time... but we laid awake and talked for a couple of hours just telling cool stories.  A bunch of the guys in my district like to hunt so we all had cool stories to tell.  It was one of the best nights I had here! I love my district.  They are awesome.  I miss you all especially Oy! So feel free to write me.  I love letters.

 

Elder Hulet