Halfway through the MTC

So my companion and I got new investigators this week, and we are teaching so much better now.  We don´t have to worry about planning out exactly what we are going to say, because we know the lessons pretty well now, and we have noticed we are much better at following where the spirit wants the lesson to go.  Our last lesson, we planned on teaching the beginning of the restoration, but after talking with the investigator a little more during the lesson, we taught about faith instead.  The entire lesson was led by the spirit.  When our investigator shared a story about her childhood in Spanish, quite fast Spanish I might add, I was amazed to notice that I was understanding every word she was saying.  When I turned to explain the story to my companion in English, he just looked at me an nodded.  That was the gift of interpretation of languages right there!  That was a really cool experience.

Down town last week was way cool!  I took lots of pictures, and hope I can get them all to you.  The first place we were at was kind of like the time square of Madrid! It was really open with buildings all around.  We walked around a lot and saw a lot of cool little cobblestone streets everywhere.  The architecture in all of the buildings was way cool.  We went to a chocolateria place for churros con chocolate.  They were so good!  The chocolate was way dark, but I loved it!  Some of the sisters weren’t so fond of it, but that just meant I got to eat moreJ.  We saw a cool looking sword shop, so of course all of the elders wanted to go check it out.  When we got in there and glanced around for a few seconds, we noticed that the only other people in the store besides us 5 elders were 5 nuns.  Still haven’t been able to figure out what they were doing in there.  Its not every day you see nuns shopping for swords and daggers. 

Speaking of funny shop experiences, my companion had an interesting one yesterday.  We walked into a really small candy shop type place, and Elder Reading saw some sort of wrapped doughnut thing right by the door.  When he went to pick it up, the store attendant just started yelling at him in Spanish.  With his limited vocabulary he put it back and kept saying “lo siento, lo siento”.  The little Asian lady wanted nothing to do with that and kept yelling at him telling him to leave and never come back.  That was another really interesting experience. 

Super excited for P-day today!  We get to go to the Prado!  For those of you that don´t know, I have been told that the Prado is one of the largest art museums in the world.  Third largest I think, but I could be wrong.  I am so excited for that! Its going to be an awesome story for next week.

Proselyting in the park last Saturday was pretty cool.  The first people we talked to were from Israel and spoke English.  We had a good conversation and got them a pass along card.  The girl took a picture of me and my companion, so that was cool.  Other than that, not much happened in the park.  A lot of simple holas and como estas, but nobody wanted to hear about religion.  I´m hoping this week I can finally find someone who is ready to hear our message.

Those were the main highlights of this week.  Other than that, its mostly been studying and practicing the language.  My whole district decided we are going to do a secret santa thing before we leave in December, so that will be interesting.  This week I have noticed a huge increase in my ability to speak the language.  Much more than usual.  The lessons go so much smoother when I don’t have to trip over my words all the time.  My testimony is getting much stronger as well.  I've been noticing how fast time flies by while you are busy.  I now realize what people meant when they say that 2 years will be gone faster than you know it. 

I miss you all, and love you tons.