WEEK #2

This week as gone by soo much faster than last. The Spanish is coming slowly but surely. But I have definitely learned more Spanish in two weeks than I did in 2 years in middle school. Haha. So funny story. We were teaching our new investigator for the first time (just our teacher acting as one of the people she actually taught) and we were trying to describe what free agency was. Well, none of us could remember what the word for agency was so Elder G** said that he thought is was agencia which made sense to us so we just went with it. I start talking to her and describing free agency and she gets a really confused look on her face. Thinking that she just doesn't fully grasp the concept because of my extremely basic Spanish I blow it off cuz i can't really explain it better with the vocab I know. Well, later when our investigator was our teacher again she gave us feed back. Apparently instead of saying that God gave us all free agency I said that God gave us all a free car dealership. HAHA ya...that's why she looked so confused. Oops.
 

That's about the most eventful thing of the week. It's mainly studying or teaching all day. Oh! Did you know that worms can jump!?! Ya, neither did I, but randomly as we were walking we saw this worm jumping like 6 inches in the air. CRAZY! And there's my weird story for the week.

Now for some answering questions:

Unfortunately we don't get to go proselyting out in the city but they do bring people in who are actual investigators or nonactive people for us to teach in what's called TRC. We don't get to do that until next week when ourS panish is a bit better ;) We do get to go to the Mexico Temple one week while we're here but it's closed so we don't get to go inside :'(  My thumb is feeling better but it's still not 100%. Maybe like 90%? No authentic Mexican tacos yet. Unless that's the weird stuff they give us for breakfast every once in a while. We do have the option of getting tortillas, beans, and rice for just about every dinner and lunch though. Except on Tuesdays which is PIZZA NIGHT. And it's Costco pizza too! Ya, definitely the best meal every week. 

Love ya all and  hope that you're not missing me too much.

.....Ha who am I kidding, you all are probably balling your eyes out still  ;)

 

Elder Groneman

 

okay so a quick explanation of the photos from last week (there will be a couple more this week)

 

the one of the yellow house is my casa. That is where I sleep at night and do laundry. Besides that we are basically never there. The classroom pic is where we spend 75% of our time. We study sooo much. That room is basically our home for the 6 weeks. The nighttime pic is our district before Elder G** went home. I can't remember the order people were in so I'll send a new pic of people. The bus is what we rode in from the airport. The hallway was in our casa. There are 5 rooms each with 4 elders. There was a bad pic looking down one of the streets that I took as we were headed out to email. It shows some of the other casas. There's 51 total and 2 three-story dorms. Ya, I'm happy I'm in a casa. I think that's it......if not, oh well. You will just have to wonder what the heck I sent ;)

 

The guys in my district. from left to right...

me, Elders B**, G**, R**, A** (district leader), A**, S**.

So here are the girls in my district.

left to right

Hermanas J**, L**, M**, D**

Okay so here we have the Pineapple Palm Tree. It legit looks like a pineapple.

(Mecham, this is your palm tree photo from me)

Me and my 2 comps. Elder G** is on the left and Elder B** is in the middle. 

I am the shortest guy and am shorter than 2 of the girls as well :P

 

 

 

 

One Week Down

 My week has been crazy! I have already had to teach 3 full lessons completely in Spanish! The first of which was during my second day here! It's amazing what you can accomplish when the Spirit is on your side. The food is actually pretty dang good. Some meals are better than others but on average they're good. My companions are Elder G** and Elder B**. Yes, I'm in a trio. It didn't start out that way but Elder B**'s companion went home yesterday morning. I feel sad that he left before we had even finished one week but at the same time I'm happy for Elder B** because now he doesn't have to prep all of the lessons by himself. His companion would literally write in his journal all day every day leaving him to do all of the work. But he's with Elder G** and me now so it's all good.

      My district is awesome! We all get along super well. We've seen other new districts and even some of the older ones that aren't as close as we are already. We like to joke around a lot but we know when it's time to work. One of the sisters in the district (Hermana M**) was super uptight for the first like four days. All she would do is study study study and then get mad at us for talking when she was trying to get study. Well, she finally broke down one night. Now she's more chill and is actually somewhat funny. That tells me that if all you do is work and never take some time to decompress, you will burn out. All of the teachers live in Mexico City so every single one of our lessons is only in Spanish. That's good, but also really annoying at times.

     My glasses work great and I haven't really had any headaches this week. That's probably because I jammed my thumb playing volleyball so i've been taking Advil for that because it kills (not really anymore though) and was super swollen. The swelling is basically gone now though. I haven't gotten sick yet and I'm hoping not to at all. Apparently like the week before we got here (there were about 200 missionaries that arrived the same day as me. The largest group they've ever received) about 80 missionaries had diarrhea because of a virus. So we aren't allowed to shake hands until they tell us otherwise.

     So we were given the assignment to write our testimony in Spanish when we emailed home so here goes. The grammar and spelling won't be perfect....

     Yo se que Jesucristo es el Salvador y Redentor. Yo se que el Libro de Mormon es verdadero. Yo se que Jose Smith es un profeta verdadero. Yo se que familias es eterna. En el nombre de Jesucristo, Amen  [I know that Jesus Christ is the Savior and Redeemer. I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I know that Joseph Smith is a true prophet. I know that families are eternal. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.]

Love you all!

p.s. I'll try to figure out  how to send pics....no promises for right now though

I made it!!!

Your Missionary's mailing address is:

Elder Groneman
26/08/2014  11 - B
Carretera Tenayuca-Chalmita #828
Colonia Zona Escolar, Gustavo A. Madero
07230 Mexico, Distrito Federal
Mexico

The estimated departure date for your missionary is 26/08/2014. The use of the
above address on all correspondence will greatly facilitate delivery to your missionary
at the MTC. Please don't send packages.

 

 

So after over an hour delay in Dallas we finally made it to the CCM. The plane was packed with missionaries, more than just the 4 we were thinking there would be - a lot more. I have decided that I really do not like the keyboards down here so until I get used to them my letters may be a bit shorter. My P-day is Wednesday so you wont hear from me for another week. Ill try to figure out  the wifi camera though.

 

 Love you all!

Mission Call - April 2014