WATERMELON, CANTALOUPE AND BIG MIKE, OH MY!!
AUGUST 12, 2016
Hey fam!
I have a TON I could write about so I'm gonna just write like crazy and see what I can get done! First off, thanks a ton for the package and letters!!! Use missionary package mx for basically all emails; my companion’s the DL so we check the mail everyday. It’s the best! They were awesome and between what my other roommates have we´ll be set for a while. One of the Elders across the hall saw I had a Dr. Pepper and was like, “Dude!!! I’ll give you, like, at least 20 pesos for that!!” So, like the honest person I am, I accepted the offer and am now 20 pesos richer.
Getting in the the MTC was pretty boring and lame, but there were some cool Elders and Sisters I met on the way in and I still see many of them now. I’m right now blessed to have basically the best District in the CCM! My companion is Elder Neddo. It turns out he’s from Riverton so we have a lot in common. The food here is usually pretty solid. They’ll have something like a plate of meat with seasoning on it and then you can grab rice and beans somewhere else. The big plus is all the fruit they have! They usually are loaded with cantaloupe and watermelon. My companion and I share a room with another awesome companionship: Elder Tanner, a Coloradan, and Elder Whitaker, who’s from Memphis. Everyone in my room is hilarious and we talk all the time about random stuff and share funny stories.
Since being here, my Spanish has increased quite a bit. I’m naturally the most comfortable with the language in my District. Now would also be a good time to mention I”m not actually in the 3 week program...... yeah, there was a mix up so now, I’m in the 6 week program. [However], before I could feel gipped off, I’m actually really glad ‘cause if I were in the 3 week program, I would be only with Latinos who didn’t speak English and I would not receive any instruction with Spanish, so I really don’t mind at all. Kaden Bunch, however, just got here in the CCM and he is in the 3 week program. It was really cool to see him and he says so far he’s making it so I’m happy for him. I guess I could be in the 3 week, but I’m so glad to know my friends here in my District and many of them I can see after my mission.
All the non-americans here are pretty much only Mexicans and they’re actually some of the friendliest people to talk to in Spanish. They'll teach us some slang terms and then we’ll teach them how to Dab or Whip. It’s really funny to watch them do it to a random group of Elders and then they all cheer and high five them. One time, earlier in our time here, we were in line at the cafeteria and a table of Mexicans were biting into lime wedges with tijon and hot sauce on them. It was pretty much a stupid thing they were doing for the thrill. Then Elder Whitaker is all like, "yo, give me one" (except in broken southern drawl Spanish) and then they start putting stuff on it and he’s like, "nah more" and so they cake this lime wedge in all this hot sauce and tijon (some chili lime seasoning which I personally abhor) and he just pops it in his mouth and SWALLOWS IT! It was just one fluid motion and the Mexicans went CRAZY. They all just got out Mexicaned by some white boy from Memphis.
Another memorable experience was when we found a mouse in our dorm room. It just started running around and we kept trying to kill it until it escaped out our dorm and into the rest of the house (we live in little houses with 5 dorms). So a few days go by and Elder Whitaker and all of us are doing our laundry when the Mouse jumps out of his laundry bag! We closed the door to the laundry room trying to step on it, but we were all barefoot so we couldn’t do much. it escaped once again. Now the mouse goes by Big Mike. We’re now devising traps to kill Big Mike.
Side note: they have a tienda (store) here which has LOTS of great stuff from white shirts to watches. It’s all WAY cheap and they give us 100 pesos a week on an account here. I’m gonna buy some short-sleeved shirts (which are like $8) and some ties (which are about $3). I’m actually probably gonna buy a lot of stuff...
I presume JG noticed my CCM teacher contacting him on Facebook! They were in the same area and knew each other! That’s pretty dope! She also plays Pokemon GO! It’s so funny ‘cause we’ll be studying and she’ll be swiping on her phone and I’ll be like, "Hermana Guitierez...está jugando pokemon GO?" ( Sister Gutierez, are you playing Pokemon go?) and she’ll be like, “Yeah, it’s a polywag" and I’ll be like, ”Oh that’s a good one” and she’s like, ”yeah".
I wish I had time to write more than one email, but let JG know I’m so happy to hear he’s doing well and his relationship is doing well. Ask him to also dab for me once in a while... it’s what I would want.
Another side note: since the tienda is such a magical place, the only thing that could be sent that would be better than pesos to buy things for mad cheap would be, maybe, Krispy Kreme. (Also why in the heck do they have a flippin' Kripsy Kreme here in Mexico, like, two minutes away from me in the complete Ghetto of Mexico D.F., that they have to pass through a security post with a barbed wire wall ‘cause it’s such a dangerous place, but we never had one within 30 minutes of us in Utah!!) But yeah, we’ll occasionally wonder if what we heard was a firework or a gunshot. (we get both). But we’re also SUPER safe in our walled off little town here. [Insert mother here: >=( !!!!]
The CCM has been an awesome experience so far! Our days so far have mostly consisted of personal study, language study with our teacher, gym time, teaching a fake investigator and then studying more to prepare for the next lesson. We’ve finished up with our first investigator and now we’re doing two at the same time! It’s pretty dope and we teach the first one tomorrow. It’s honestly just the coolest thing being here, I’m training to do the most fulfilling job, with the most awesome people, eating literally as much as I could want and getting (usually) 8 hours of sleep! It’s not the easiest job, it’s actually pretty hard work, but if it was easy it wouldn’t be worth it.
I love you all and miss you and I’m glad to hear mom that you’re making it ok. We were reading scriptures from El Libro de Mormon as a district and we turned to the story of the stripling warriors and I found it neat that they would sprinkle in little details about the parents of the stripling warriors. I realized that a bunch of 18ish-year-old guys are, on average, kinda dumb and it probably didn’t set in that they were going to war, but the parents must have literally been having the most difficult trial of their lives. I think there are some parallels with missionary work. I’m going off to fight the adversary and bring people unto Christ, but I’m so dang busy I hardly have time to miss you all. I do, but moping isn’t on my schedule and a whole lotta stuff is. My branch president made a good comment that the best way to take care of your family back home is to not worry about them. The Lord will do a better job than I ever could.
I love you all!
Elder Sierra
P.S. if you could get all this edited and out to my list that'd be really nice. This is the only thing I've written and I'm already over my time.
Some pictures of my companion and my district. And yeah, my eyes are closed. I know. I'm sorry :(
Elder Neddo and me
My awesome CMM district!
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