2/9/17 Week 6 Almost finished at the CCM

Fireworks in Mexico City

Family and friends,

Week 6 is real. Five more days in the CCM. Tomorrow we start our infield orientations. It lasts all day. Yesterday we also got our travel plans for leaving to our mission. I leave early Wednesday and will be the last person from our group that came in. It's weird, everyone we knew is already basically gone. Our service activity is welcoming the new, English speaking missionaries, and at this point I've welcomed nearly every American and English first language missionary in the CCM. It's kind of a weird feeling because everyone we came in with is gone, and I might not see  a lot of these people ever again.

Our buddies who came in a week before us are all gone. Most were going to Chile, but two went to Missouri. They left yesterday. That was Elder Hoyt and Hunt. They were polar opposites. Hoyt is 6 foot 6,  is super loud and was in the army. Hunt is maybe 5 foot 9 and religiously played Zelda. They were awesome together though, it was hilarious. Our last meal together they talked about how their first lesson was basically sitting in silence and like half-way through saying "Dios nos ama."  

This week we started doing "missionary as progressing investigator." It's kind of interesting pretending to be someone who is learning about the church and what we are all about. You learn a lot putting yourself in other people's shoes. It was my turn to teach yesterday. We are assigned groups, so we teach one on one. Yesterday I also started to have a sore throat that was progressively getting worse throughout the day, to the point to where I almost couldn't talk. My lesson was rougher than normal but I was able to slowly get through. I can talk now mostly, and my throat isn't killing me anymore, but yesterday I was going through the cough drops like crazy.

Saturday we had TRC again. We've done it every Saturday for the last 3 weeks or so. We taught two lessons. The first one was over skype and was super rough. We talked about the Book of Mormon, but we had a really poor connection so we couldn't hear the other person and she couldn't hear us. The call also dropped like 4 times. It was funny, but we got through. Our next lesson we taught face to face with someone who was baptized a year before. We started with getting to know who she was and after a few minutes we said an opening prayer. Through the window on the door our teacher gave us the signal to wrap up our lesson, so we just bore our testimonies and said a closing prayer. The lesson was probably 5 minutes long. The lady was really nice to us and spoke in a way that we could easily understand her. As we left the room we could smell throw up in the hall. Luckily we were done, but one of the Elders in Sister Clayton's district mid- lesson vomited. He said he woke up that day feeling slightly ill, but in the lesson it came faster than he could react. Luckily he didn't throw up on anyone, but our teacher Hermana Gonzales was fighting mostly unsuccessfully to hold back laughter.

Sunday was a awesome day. It was fast and testimony meeting. I don't think I've ever fasted a full 24 hours, and it's not fun. It started Saturday at lunch and went to lunch Sunday. Our day started with the branch council meeting. It was pretty standard and I talked about how our district is bonding really well and the companionships that were struggling are doing much better now. I also talked about how we had our best lesson this week. President Bennet was in our branch meeting, and he had me dissect our lesson and find out why it was better than our other lessons. After we did that he talked about how commandments shouldn't be followed because we fear the punishment but because we love God. He also said that God wants to bless us, but the only way we can receive those blessings is if we follow his commandments. Our good lesson, we taught basically following that flow of ideas and it was a much more powerful lesson.

Testimony meeting was especially good. My district was in charge of the sacrament. I passed with President Bennet while Elder Pearson and Elder Henriksen blessed the bread and water. I've never seen a presiding officer pass the sacrament, but it makes sense. In Mathew or Mark, Jesus talks about leadership. I don't remember the exact wording but he says something along the lines of how the leader should be the one providing the service instead of leading. During the sacrament the presiding leader normally gets the sacrament first, sitting next to Bennet before the meeting started I had a thought to ask him what I would do in this case. I figured he would take it last as the passers normally would, and he said it reminded him of a story. During the testimony segment he bore his testimony and told a story about how he was at a Sacrament Meeting with a few apostles. He talked about how the apostles all took the sacrament last because they were also helping with the sacrament and were there to serve others. Our branch president also bore his testimony and quoted Chance the Rapper which was a little funny. He started his testimony with "I know this isn't really mission appropriate, but there is this line in one of Chance the Rapper's songs I really like." I cant remember the line, but it was something about worshiping. Later on basically all of our leaving district bore their testimonies. It was a super powerful meeting. You can learn a lot of Spanish in 6 weeks, it's almost unbelievable. Elder P bore an especially good testimony. He talked about how before he was a "rebel" and wasn't going to go on a mission and never prayed about if he should or not. A few weeks before he started his mission papers he received a really powerful prompting that he needed to serve a mission and he ignored it. It wasn't until the fourth time that he started his papers. He said that everyone is on their missions for a reason and it's to bless the lives of others. He then went into more detail about why he is here which I won't share.

Sunday evening there were a ton of fireworks for Constitution day. I was able to grab a few pics.

I don't think our district's afternoon language teacher likes us, she does an OK job hiding it. After the district in our zone left they left a bunch of stuff in their room, including some nice chairs. Before class with the teacher who doesn't like us, my companions and I grabbed those chairs and rolled them to our room. We sat down and she immediately told us we have to put the chairs back in the room we got them from and that those chair were only for teachers, but the thing is there are chairs in each room for the teachers but these where not them, and I kinda told her that. I probably shouldn't have but she was wrong and I wanted my comfy chair. She then said it's against the "rules" and at that point I knew I wasn't going anywhere. We put the chair back in the room we got them from. The kicker is after we put the chair back we were talking with one of the MTC supervisors, Hermana Sanches, who is maybe 5 feet tall and super nice. I asked her if it was a rule and she said it wasn't, but that teachers just don't want missionaries to play with the rolling chairs. Our intention wasn't to play with the chair, but to have more comfy chairs, but our teacher wasn't having any of it. I wouldn't have been annoyed if I was just straight up told that. If you make up rules you just back yourself into a corner. That was the only annoying thing this week

We still have yet to get in trouble for not having a perfect room. We've even talked to Hermana Bennet but she hasn't brought anything up. She was in our Branch council meeting as well and she off- handedly said she doesn't check missionaries rooms on their 6th week so I guess we are in the clear. I guess the lesson learned is that if you ignore problems they go away haha.

Side note there are two new elders in the CCM going to the DC south mission and one went yesterday. The one that went yesterday I played ultimate with a few times and I think his name was Elder Andrus, but I don't think he'll ever be in the Arlington ward being that he is serving Spanish speaking.

1/26/17 Fires, Playing the piano (!), Room cleaning

Dear family and friends,


It's crazy to think that in 20 days I'll be on a flight headed to Michigan. This week had a net positive feel to it, but had some hard parts. We don't have enough time in the day to really study Spanish as much as I want, and our teachers are only speaking Spanish now. I have to give my teachers 100% of my attention to be able to get what they are telling us. I often zone out, and it seems every time I do they call on me to answer something, that's not that fun. 

Admiring a Mexican moth

This week was the week of the fires. The CCM is surrounded on three sides by large hills/small mountains. Over the last 7 days there has been 5 wild fires on the mountains. The fires probably don't threaten the homes on the hills very much because they are of concrete construction. Most of the fires were pretty small, but the largest hill north of campus has a fairly large bowl with houses on the bottom and was covered with small dead brush. A fire broke out around lunch when we were in the cafeteria. It seemed to have started at one of the upper houses and spread up. It burned the whole face of the mountain and had a massive smoke cloud. 

This week was also the week of instruction. We are most of the way through week 4 and are finally getting some instructions on what we have to do during some of our designated study/preparation times. Throughout the day we have periods of time for planning, companion study, language study, and personal study. We haven't ever really used these times as they are designed because we were never really told exactly what is meant to fill the time. Everything points to teaching investigators, and we received this instruction after teaching "an especially boring lesson." Everyone was tired that day, and the lesson was the first thing we did after breakfast. We didn't relate why what we were teaching was important and the spirit was not there. Hermana Gonzales sat us down and asked us what we thought about the lesson. 

After we explained what we thought, she told us we need to plan better. Your planning time is used to figure out what each investigator needs to be taught. Personal study turns out you're supposed plan what topics would help the investigator and think about what the investigator needs to hear. During Companionship study you put everything together into a lesson, and during language study you learn the vocabulary for that lesson you need. I feel like we should have been told this a little earlier.... 

Yesterday there was a worldwide broadcast to all missionaries. There was a rule change that affects our schedule. Most rules are tailored to the region, but the main rule change gave more choice to missionaries in their daily activities. We are given an extra hour of sleep if we want it, and our various study times now have ranges of times they should fill instead of exact times. It wasn't as exciting and new as I had hoped. 

Sunday was another good day. Before church we had a branch counsel meeting. Our zone leaders have had some issues between themselves, as in they have very conflicting personalities and struggle with each other, but they gave a really good message on what it takes to have a successful companionship. One thing they shared was that when someone is criticizing you or correcting you in one way or another you should always look for the truth in what they are saying. 

One thing I do, especially when I'm being told off in Spanish, is I tend to ignore what they are saying and have a mind set that they don't know what they are talking about. It takes a little more to understand where they are coming from and apply the basic truths they are trying to help you out with. In the same meeting one of the sister trainer leaders in our district shared a quote from her dad, she said "you should leave your worst companion leaving them thinking they were your favorite." We should strive to treat everyone with love, even if they are really annoying.  

I played the hymns and Hermana Clayton conducted the music. Five people spoke on various topics about the Bible and Book of Mormon. I took the risk and didn't prepare a talk, which was really dumb but still paid off, because I figured if I'm playing the hymns and teaching the priesthood lesson there is no way I'm also giving a talk. My companions prepared a talk on how the Book of Mormon supports the Bible. Our topics this week are on the attributes of Christ. 

After Sacrament meeting, we have a district meeting which is typically good. That day we set goals for the week and reflected on the teachings from our branch presidencies. Priesthood meeting was taught by my companions and me. We taught about the power of the Holy Ghost. The first few minutes were a little awkward because no one was participating, and Elder Eeves was passed out in the back. After those few minutes we led a really good discussion on how as missionaries we can teach with the Holy Ghost and our duty is to always strive to have his companionship. We talked a little on obedience as well. 

Elder Eeves shared an interesting point about the Pharisees and obedience. The Pharisees were some of the most obedient people, but because they lacked the guidance of the Spirit, they missed the whole point. They were obedient but they weren't perfectly obedient. Elder Eeves then asked what is the difference between obedience and perfect obedience. He said perfect obedience is being exactly obedient, but also following the guidance of the spirit in every situation. We have a missionary manual with all our rules as missionaries, but if we had the companionship of the spirit always we wouldn't need the book. We closed our lesson with the message that ultimately as missionaries we can only do our best to teach the lessons. It's the Holy Spirit that really testifies of truth.

I almost made it through the CCM without getting in trouble. To preface, our room is pretty clean. It is not perfection, but it isn't dirty or unclean. We got a note on Saturday that we failed a cleaning check with some notes on what we need to fix and that we needed to find the CCM President's wife and tell her we fixed those few things. They asked us to put away our suitcases, but they were under a desk because they don't fit in the cupboard, and they asked us to take out the trash, which wasn't full and we don't know where to get more garbage bags. So like idiots we didn't look for her. On Tuesday we got a note saying meet to her at her office at 1 pm. We saw the note at 2:30..... so we walked over and she wasn't there. We left a note apologizing for not being there  and we still haven't seen her...... lol oops. I guess technically we still haven't gotten in trouble. At least now our room is perfection. 

Some things that happened that don't warrant a full paragraph:

-Elder Henriksen slept in the cupboard above our closets for the night for 200 pesos (about $9). He said it was reasonably comfy.

-Elder Wallin tried unsuccessfully to hop a fire hydrant box. At the ccm next to fire hydrants are these red boxes with a glass mirror on the outside that says incase of fire break glass. On this inside is a fire hydrant wrench and 100 feet of fire hose coiled up. Wallin was talking about  how he ran hurdles in high school and could hurdle the box. Well he didn't get nearly enough vertical and broke the glass, luckily he didn't get hurt, but he and his companion ran away. My district was in our TALL classroom and only saw them running.

-For breakfast we had french toast one day but I couldn't find any syrup to put on it. Hermana Petty and Quigley sat down, both with what looked like syrup and I asked where they got it from. Petty turned and pointed to a large plain jar filled with honey and said from there, they realized their mistake and it was pretty funny. They were really disappointed.