March 21, 2012

Dear family and friends-
Well my area is pretty big. On Monday we biked over 30 miles in one day!!!!! Holy cow that was hard. My legs are getting so Big!!!! But ya right in the middle of our area is a place called NIST ( National Institute of Science Technology) You could look it up. We have to bike around it every day to get to the main part of our area. We have a sweet oriental market called the Grand Market right by our apartment. they sell lots of weird stuff like live lobsters and fruits and veggies Ive never heard of. Um We live with French Missionaries One from Saint George Utah and one from Belgium. That's fun. I'm learning a bit of every language we have a goal as a companionship to learn a GQ in every language. I'm currently trying to learn Spanish, French, Chinese, Russian. Those are all languages I've run into while talking to people on the street.
Its pretty sweet Tell The Rich family that I've been running into lots of people from Ghana. They speak English very well.
Elder Bott is from Lots of different places. He was born in Utah, Moved to Virgina and then moved to Denver. So ya he is sweet. He is exactly like me... Loud!!!! Elder Probst before he went home said that we were the loudest missionaries in the mission.
So our apartment is super sweet very fun!!! Its getting super hot already here. so i don't know how I'm going to survive the summer. Its going to be Death, i might die just to let you know.
Don't worry about the bike situation. I've inherited a really nice bike from my last companion he gave it to me. so I'm good with that.
Other than that I'm doing peach keen. Love you all. tell everyone hi for me.
Love Elder Olsen    

March 13, 2012

This week was great. I have a new companion Elder Bott.
David Sosa did get baptised on saturday.

                                          David Sosa's Baptism Day
It was so sweet.
His non-member dad came and was crying the whole time.(He dosent even
speak english, but the spirit does not speak through language) David
will hopfully get the Aronic Priesthood soon so he can baptize his dad
himself. So Sweet Hu?
David was baptised by a potential elder in our ward named jake griggs.

Jake Griggs, one of the young men in the Mission Prep. class, that was given the priviledge of baptizing David. 

We have been holding a weekly mission prep class because of
all the perspective elders we have in the ward. We had 9 boys come
last thursday and they are super pumped to be missionaries.

Elder Olsen with two of the young men in his Mission Prep. Class.

  
Elder Olsen took some of his young men to the
visitors center at the temple.


Lots of them participated in the baptisimal service. Danny Escober gave atalk, jake baptised, tony alverez baptised another guy named sabire,
and Sergio Oliva gave the closing prayer. We hope that by giving these
young men the opprotunity to be apart of this special day, they will feel 
the spirit of missionary work.  Its so great to see change
in not only investigators but members as well.
I dont know if i told you but Our ward(Quince Orchard) has two sets of
missionaries. one set are elders(US) and the other set are Sisters. so
they taught Sabir and we taught David.
Well thats been my week. Pretty Great! I hope i did ok this time with information. I
love you guys so much and i hope all is well. Until Next week...

Love Elder Olsen

March 7, 2012

Dear family,
Well this week has been really slow. My companion says that i am a head case. So that's really good. But I'm learning and growing as a person. I am a ball of clay and the lord is shaping me into a fine piece of pottery.
I am learning how to focus my mind and attitude no matter the circumstances may be. this is a huge challenge for me but I'm working at it. My teaching skills are lacking but I'm getting better everyday. We have a baptism on Saturday so I'm super excited.
We went to the temple today and i still love it!!never enough!
Tell Grandma to hang in there and that i love her very much.
Tracting is not effective at all here, in this area, that's what Ive learned this transfer. everybody is so set in there ways. "Hard Hearted". Its kinda depressing but you have to give them a chance to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. We don't tract very often. Its completely different than when you were a missionary, dad. You probability tracted every day. We don't. We focus on less active members and referrals and GQing.  (Golden Questions)
One of the guys that i came out with went home. he just wasn't working at all. So president Sent him home. its so scary for him. he didn't have a testimony before he came out on a mission. that's a No No. you cant preach about something unless you know its true. Because i had a testimony before i came out i have purpose. and that purpose gives me hope and drive.
well my ride is leaving. i cant write anymore. I wrote as much as i could mother. till next week

Love, Elder Olsen