Brandon's Ecuadorian Tales

Hey everyone! I hope You're all doing awesome! Thanks for the packeges mom and thanks for the watch. Its perfect! Your pretty much the perfect missionary Mom! This week has been pretty good.
Conference last weekend was awesome! We watched every session and loved every minute of it. My favorite talks were Elder Hollands talk about the Book of Mormon and I think it was Elder Hales who talked about how God's love doesn't supercede his laws. What were your favorites? Everytime they talked about families I thought about you guys and how much I miss you all. And during priesthood I thought a lot about Dad and Jason and how Dad and I used to go to priesthood together and go out to Dinner after.
On sunday night we had a fireside all about music because apparently they played a lot more music this conference than they have before. The mission presidency sang to us and they had a bunch of missionaries say their favorite songs and why they liked that song and then we sang a verse of it. It was a pretty cool fireside and it was nice to get to sing instead of just sit and listen like we had been doing all weekend. The guy playing the organ was sooooo good!He would always just add in extra notes and just like change keys in the middle of the song.
On monday we went to the TRC and taught lesson 1 in spanish. It went suprisingly well. We struggled over saying some stuff but all and all we were able to get the message across. I can't believe i'm gonna be doing that for real in a few weeks. I'm so excited to get to Ecuador! It feels like I've been in the mtc forever! It's kinda starting to feel like a prison now since we can't ever leave. I get excited when I get to go across the street to play volleyball or go to the temple. we get excited when we see cars or when we see someone walking a dog. Its kind sad haha.
Devotional on Tuesday was pretty good. We had some guy that used to be a member of one of the quorums of the 70. I heard him speak once at BYU and he gave the same talk again so it was really familiar to me. He told a story about a guy he met in south africa that owned a multi-billion dollar diamond bussiness but sold it to move to Utah when he read the Book of Mormon and heard about the Gospel. He was actually at the meeting so we got to listen to him tell his conversion story. Its amazing how much the Gospel can change someones life!
On wednesday we got a new district in our Zone. There are 12 elders in the zone: 9 going to el salvador san salvador east (the same mission as tanner), 2 going to guatemala, and 1 going to costa rica. Elder Noe and I got to talk to them for a bit and then take them to their rooms and help them get setteled in. Then on Thursday we got to teach them for an hour about planning, using time wisely, and having strong companionships. Then we took them on a tour of the Mtc and explained all the rules to them and all that good stuff. They all seam happy and excited to be here.
So basically the MTC has swine flu again. I don't think there are that many cases but there have been 2 on our floor right down the hall from me. Both of the Elders were Quarentined so hopefully it wont spread. It seems like everyone is getting sick though. One Elder in our district has the regular flu (I just took him to the doctor to confirm that it wasn't swine flu) and a bunch of other elders have colds, including me. I've pretty much been sick all week but it's nothing too bad so don't worry. I've been taking all the medicine and stuff that mom gave me before i left and it seems to be helping. I showed everyone "the spice of live" and they all thought it was super wierd. But then they took it and it helped them so they're believers now haha.
I can't believe I only have 3 weeks left in the MTC. That means we'll probably get our travel plans in about a week and a half-ish. When I get them I'll let you guys know. I'm allowed to call home while i'm in the airport so you guys have to make sure and be home or answer your cell phones when I call. We'll figure something out.
Anyways, I love you guys! Keep writing me and telling me about your lives! Thanks for your letter mom telling me about the disasters in Indonesia and somoa. It was cool to hear about that because we don't get any news from the outside world.
Espero que hay angeles en sus vidas!