Hey family,

sounds like everything´s going good back home.  Im not sure of my exact address, but i live in a colonia called la bendicion.  So maybe if you look that up you could find it, i think its west of the actual city of totonicapan.  But ya, it gets pretty cold here some nights.  Today for p-day, we went a little up into the mountains, and it was sleeting, and pretty cold.  we played soccer, and just hang out for a few hours up there.  But I think its more like 20 or 30 miles outside of quetzaltenango but im not sure, but it does get pretty cold.  ´

   My areas pretty good.  we are just getting to know everyone, especially the less actives, but its fun here.  I saw a tractor on saturday for the first time in the mission, so that was good, haha, but it was just a smaller one, but it made me feel like home.  They plant here in april, more or less, so thats good.  But i like my area alot, and we do a ton of walking.  alot of our area is city, but usually were more where there are less houses.  But my favorite part is when we get on a bus, and theres never space, but we just stand up front because theres no seats, and people just stare at us, well me more, but it makes you feel important, haha.  But here i feel like theres alot of missionary work to do, because theres some places far away that other elders havent really been too, so were trying to take advantage of that.  Thats awesome too, that shane is AP, i know that hell do really good at that, and hes probably gonna end his mission in the office, because once your in, i heard, then you stay in for a long time. 

    Thats so crazy that richard is in dubai, isnt that over by iraq and iran and everything?  that´s good though, that he still has Mel on his side.  But I like to say that my uncle is an arceologist here, I think some people find it pretty interesting.  and that´s good too that romney´s got his papers done and everything, that´s exciting.  And when are you going with aunt jody and her sister, you´ll have to let me know more about that. 

  the spanish is going good, there´s always things that i don´t understand, and i´m not sure that there´s some things that the people don´t understand what I say, but i think having a companion that speaks spanish helps with that too.  But it´s fun to learn new things, but there´s always something, that i just say, ´how do you say that?´ But it´s fun, and it´s a good thing to have.

    I was thinking that I haven´t seen a picture of you all lately, so you´ll have to send me some pictures of you all, and then i can print them off in a photo shop or something.  But today i feel pretty tired, we did alot of walking this week and everything, but it´s good.  Oh, and i forgot to bring my camera, but i´ll have to bring it next week, and send some pictures of my companion, elder posas, and everything. 

    Everything´s good here, we´re still searching for some good people to teach, but I know we´ll get there, so it´s good.  I hope that you all have a good week, and thanks for everything.  I love you all, and good luck in all your school work, and in everything that you´re doing.

Love,

Elder Hansen

familia!!!!!! what´s going on,

papaito lindo, i hope that everything´s good there.  BTW that is the saying for the week because we contacted some lady, and she said papaito lindo to my companion at least 11 times.  Say we´ve been saying that, and papito lindo as well.  But everything´s going good here in totonicapán.  i´m right on the other side of the lake atitlan, pretty much, but it´s sadly not in our mission, which i´m actually bummed about, but in 2 weeks, i think that we´re going to hike up to the mirador, so that will be cool.  but ya, i´m in totonicapán central, and my companion is elder posas from honduras, tegucigalpa, but his house is in the comiaguila mission.  So he has 4 months in the mission about, and i´m going for eight, so we´re both pretty young, but i don´t really feel like he´s that young, so it´s good.  i think that´s funny, sadly the varisty lost, so you guys haaaaad to go to the cabin.  Actually you did have to if you haven´t been there for 3 years, that´s just sad, sad, sad.  Get in the system, or get up to date as aunt jody would probably say. 

    This week, i won´t lie, has been kind of slow, i thought it would go faster with transfers, but no, because anything new makes things go slower which is kind of weird.  But today was good, we went to some waterfalls, but i can´t send the pictures, because this computer doesn´t work so great, and doesn´t have a place to put the stinkin´ card or anything.  But here is the coldest zone in the mission, but i´m guessing that some nights it has gotten down to high 30´s or low 40´s but correct me if i´m wrong.  it was alot colder before we got here i guess, but i think it´s just perfect for me, and it doens´t get too hot during the day, but it is starting to warm up.  i like this area, because there´s more country, kind of, i mean there´s actually small fields and stuff, but they are only usually about a quarter of an acre or less.  i think they grow potatoes here too.  But we are trying to find investigators because what happened is there were two elders here, but they both left, and left 2 family´s kind of, but i feel like we´re kind of starting over.  but i´m also here in this area with elder del cid from the capital, and from elder parry from holladay, or whatever, utah. elder parry is in my  group so it´s fun to be able to talk to him on almost a daily basis. But i like this area, they just built a new stake house in january, and in our ward i think there´s about 80 active members.  But i think we have a lot of work to do, and mostly it´s just organizing things, putting things together.  here there´s alot of corte people, the skirt ladies, and they speak quiché here too, but probably 97 percent of the people in this area speak spanish, but i´m not really sure because our area´s big, and i haven´t gotten to know all of it.  But there are alot of people that speak both spanish and quiché.  But i like our ward and everything, and everything´s going good.  But i hope that you all have a good week. let me know what´s going on, and if jared´s doing track, and wow, with the varsity! that´s impressive, you´ll have to let me know more about that.  But i love you family, and i´m doing great down here, and there´s actually buses that we sometimes take instead of walking which is nice.  love you all.

love

elder hansen

Is winter over?

hey family,

sounds like everything is going good.   This week was good, we had a conference witht eh president, and that was good, i learned alot.  I do have changes, but i don´t know where i´ll be going, because we don´t find out until we go there.  how it works here, is wetake a bus to the terminal in xela, if we´re leaving the city, huehue for example, and then in the terminal they tell us to get on a bus and we go there, haha.  But it´s been fun being in this area, i know almost literally everyone. It´s so funny, cause i think i know how my companion feels, because whenever i went shopping with mom, she would always stop and talk for like 15 minutes with every single person in the store!  Well, now i kind of do the same thing with everyone here, haha, because almost every time we go out, i see someone who i know, or a friend of someone i know or something, so we stop and talk and try and set up an appointment or something.  But ya, my companion´s going to be staying here, but i think he´s glad, because he now has a good foundation here in this area,but he´s doing good, he´s funny and stuff, and i´ve learned alot from him.  

  all my clothes are fine.  my shoes are wearing down on the heels, moreso on my pair of red winds.  I usually wear my b oots about once a week, and then when we go with maria espital too.  i´ll have to send you a video or pictures when we went there.  

  

    For Grandpa and grandma, pretty much i always remember them at the family parties and how funny they always are and everything.  And that they always remembered everyone´s birthday.  i also remember one time when i drove them home from the cabin. That was really fun to just talk with them, and get to know them better, and learn more about them.  i remember all the times when grandpa would hop in the tractor with me, or the combine, and just tell me how things worked and why certain things are the way they are.  I remember specific things too, which is funny, just like when i was combining, for example, and he told me why there was a reel on the combine header, something that I didn´t know beforehand.  But i have always enjoyed going to the house.  Whenever i was working out on the farm, sometimes i would just walk in and say hi to them, and they would give me lunch or something, and ask me how everything´s going.  I´ve also always admired the testimony that Grandpa has had of the church.  Every time he bore it, i never doubted that what he said was true, because i could feel the spirit in the moment and everything.  I have always been grateful for the decision´s that grandma and grandpa have made in their lives, because i know for a fact that some of the blessings that i have in my life, come directly from them.  I have always admired Grandma´s good attitude about everything, and no matter what, she´s always happy and laughing and everything.  She likes to know what´s going on in our lives too, and she always asked me about what i´ve been up to, and how work is going, or how basketball or track or football was going. And they always came to the basketball games.  Especially the church ball ones, haha, they were always there so i always enjoyed seeing them come out, and talking with them and everything, they always make me laugh.

    love you family, thanks for everything.

love,

Elder hansen

hey family,

sounds like you´re all doing good.  that´s cool that craig got his call that´s exciting and he leaves pretty soon, so that´s great.  But everything this week was good.  esturado, i have no idea what he´s been up to.  We´ve been trying to call him and everything but never answers us or anything.  i think he got scared or something all of a sudden, so it´s been hard, but i guess it´s alright, there´s really nothing much more that we could have done.  but everything´s doing good, elder besendorfer and i are having a good time.  if i have changes it will be on valentine´s day, yes that is a holiday here, but idk if i do or what.  But we had a pretty good lesson last night.  We were talking with this guy named alex, who´s from a place called san juan ixcoy, (ishcoy) but he said that pretty much every church is the same, and that sure the book of mormon´s true, and he believes that joseph smith was a prophet. But it´s one thing to just say that and another to really believe, and feel it, and use your faith to act on the answer.  But then my companion just bore his testmony and in that moment it brought the spirit, and it was obvious that it came in and everythig.  i´m not sure how positive the guy is, but it was cool to have the spirit in that moment.  

    This morning we played ultimate frisby, so that was pretty fun, then we ate at zumba´s, then we came here.  if you want to look up zoomba´s on facebook, you can find it and see what it is and everything, or have mark or somebody look.  We found alot of new investigators in this last week, so i think that we can hold on to them.  one is a family, but we just need to talk with the dad first, that would be alot bettter, haha.  But this area´s pretty fun, the ward members are good, and the ward is really strong.  We bore our testimony´s yesterday, and then three other people including the bishop, thanked us and for what we do, so i felt really special, haha.  There´s this one guy that speaks pretty good english, named alfredo rios, who has a coffee finka, and he just barely started becoming active after like 13 years of being inactive, which is pretty crazy.  But he´s so funny, his wife´s not a member so we went to visit him one day, but his wife hid from us, which is kind of weird, but it´s alright.  And we pretty much shared a lesson with him in english.  But one thing that´s funny, is that one day this guy just decided to plant flowers in the church grounds.  And so he planted some in front, and kind of out back, also.  But he planted types that need to be watered regularly, like every three  days or something, and he doesn´t rain here right now, until idk what month.  So he took his backpack sprayer thing, and watered the flowers from the street, because there´s a fence around the church.  one of those pump sprayers, where you manually pump, haha, so that was pretty funny when i heard that, just this guy watering flowers from like 30 feet away.  But anyway, i´m having a good time, and i´ll let you know if i have changes next week.  But have a good week, let  me know of any new things that happen.

love you all and love,

Elder hansen