Dear Family and other poeple who will read this,

Ne-how!

Oh my heavens.

This week has been one of the hardest, most discouraging,  tiring, happiest, funnest, and fastest weeks of my life. I feel like I am drinking out of a fire hose! There is so much to learn. I'm not meaning like about the gospel, there is so much to learn about TEACHING the gospel. I can't believe how much it takes to share this gospel with another human. It takes a lot of focus and determination, that's for sure

I love the MTC! The food here isn't what it was cracked up to be, but it's not bad. The teachers are amazing. We have two teachers for our district. Brother Carr and Sister Willis. They are incredible! I can't even describe how amazing they are. Sister Willis is the best teacher I have ever seen. She is spectacular!

If I were to give any advice to anyone going on a mission after being here for one week it would be to LEARN HOW TO LOVE PEOPLE. There is so much we have here in the gospel but if we don't love who we are teaching, we are not going to teach at all. You can pray for the spirit to be there, you can study your scriptures, you can read preach my gospel all you want. But, if you don't know how to sit down with another person and ask them question and really get to know them by listening to their answers, you will not teach them. You will not be able to meet there needs. You will not be able to resolve their concerns. If you do not love them, you will not teach them. Take opportunities to really think about other people and understand what you can do to help them.

But ya, the MTC is crazy. I love my district. I am in the Moroni District with Elders Razandahy (district leader), Mullen, Li, Butterfield, and Groll. Sisters Wagner and Urian are in our district as well. My companion is Elder Li! He is such a cool guy. Tell the Baker family that my first companion is from TAIWAN! I thought of the Baker boys as soon as we were assigned. He is the nicest and funniest guys i've ever met. He is always sinigng some pop song by like "we are never getting back together" by taylor swift and they keep getting stuck in my head. hahah. But he is a great guy and it's been neat learning how to teach along side him. Because English isn't his native language he teaches the gospel in a very simple and plain way. It's a good example to me because I make things way to complex. All I need to remember is that God loves us. He sent His son Jesus Christ to die for us. He has restored the gospel through the prophet, Joseph Smith and as proof that he has has given us the Book of Mormon which contains the fullness of the everlasting gospel of Jesus Christ. My purpose here is to invite and help others to come unto to Christ by figuring out what investigaor needs by asking them questions and really listening to what they have to say. I love it. I love that all I get to do here is focus on people and serving them and best of all, helping them return to there Heavenly Father.

The plane trip was pretty crappy. I got really hot and sweaty but I sat by a nice girl named Olivia on my way to England. We had a lovely chat about things.

It's hard to e-mial because I'm very short on time and there is so much I want to say.

There is one Elder in our district named Elder Mullen. He is from Oakley Idaho! He is awesome. He is probably my best friend here along with my companion. But, we've had some great conversations about the gospel. He's going to Leeds though so once we're out of the MTC it'll be hard to keep in touch.

We went shopping today and I discovered I am terrible at talking to other people here. Okay, not terrible but TERRIFIED. It's pretty scary. But give me a week or two and I think i'll adjust just great. The personalities here are very strange. Very loud and talkative. People are hard to understand. haha funny thing is, I thought I would come here and get an English accent but I am always with my companion and I am getting a Chinese accent!! Hhaha.

Well, I hope things are going well with everyone! I think everyone should take lessons from the missionaries at least once. They wil listen and help you anyway they can. That's why we're here. 

Love you all and praying for you always,

Elder Humpherys