The Mexico Missionary Training Center-Elder Andrew Cherpeski

8/5/2018

Well, as all of you know, I soon leave for Mexico City before heading on to Chile. I'm sending this email out as a final pre-mission message.

The start of the Amiens Offensive on August 8th 1918 to the armistice on November 11th 1918, constitute what was called the "Hundred Days Offensive" of World War I. As a history nerd, I cannot help but point out that the first hundred days of my mission coincide with the one-hundredth anniversary of the Hundred Days Offensive!

Therefore, I will title my group emails for the next 3 months as "The Hundred Days Offensive", in honor of such a historic event.

Anyways, I hope to hear from many of your in the weeks and months ahead!

Sincerely,

(Soon-to-be) Elder Cherpeski

8/6/2018

Hey guys, we had a great week of work and had lots of investigators come to church on Sunday.  The time is going by ridiculously fast.  In 12 days I'll have 16 months in the mission.  The point of todays email is to send off Andrew to the mission with a couple tips haha.

1: Don't freak out when you see Mexican traffic.  It may appear that every 2 seconds you're going to crash, but everyone is highly trained drivers.

2: The first full day in the MTC is longer than 3 months in the mission field.  Once you get past that day you'll be fine.

3: When you don't understand what someone is saying just smile and say sí.

4: Don't get down on yourself for the language.  It honestly just comes with time.

5: Read the scriptures everyday, and liken them to your life.

6: You'll find that some missionaries arent very obedient.  Don't follow their example.  Just keep yourself obedient, and dont criticize them for not being obedient, just show and invite them through your example.

7:  Keep a journal and record specific feeling and events.

8: Leave behind all your worrys and doubts.  The mission is a 2 year vacation from normal life!

9: When you're feeling down, read your patriarchal blessing.

10:  Last but not least.  Remember why you're doing this.  You have been called to invite others to come unto Christ.  Let that be your fuel that keeps you going.

Good luck with everything.  He aqui, una obra maravillosa está a punto de aparecer entre los hijos de los hombres.  You're going to be part of this incredible work.  I'm always here if you need advice.  Mucha suerte mañana con todo!

I hope everyone has a great week.  Love,

Elder Cherpeski

8/7/2018

Well, I made it safely to the MTC without any incident in what is probably the craziest day of my life so far!

My Preparation days are Fridays.

Have a great week!

Elder Cherpeski

8/17/2018

Hey all!

I have a lot to write about and only 1.5 hours to do it, so I am going to give priority to this email. To all of you who emailed me, thanks! I really appreciate the messages! If I do not get back to you personally, it is just because I am focusing on this email today.

The Trip Over

First, I have a confession to make:

The moment I said goodbye to my dad early on Tuesday morning was literally the scariest moment of my life. The flight over to Salt Lake was fairly uneventful, though I did have to book it over to the port for my other flight. I cannot describe how much of a relief it was to see all of the other missionaries standing around. Sheer relief. The first people I talked to were two sisters from Idaho Falls. Crazily enough, one of them was actually from Ammon! 

The best moment of my day was when I took first class from Salt Lake to Mexico City. I was literally in seat 1. It turns out that I was the only missionary to be in first class, so that was pretty great. I had lots of room, and even got a banana in the middle of the flight. I rested, wrote in my journal, and ate. I have to say that I kinda like that gig!

Arriving at the Mexico City airport was bizarre. It suddenly dawned on my that few people here know my language. The traffic in Mexico City is indeed crazy. I was actually surprised by how slow the roads were here (typically 40 or 50 kmh), but the sheer density of cars makes it a difficult trip. Very dirty and polluted! Our bus made it through without incident, but its lack of air conditioning really made things rough.

I did not expect the CCM (Mexico Missionary Training Center), to be as large as it is. I had the impression that it was would consist of a few buildings. In reality, the CCM is 87 acres (Larger than Provo´s MTC) in size and is basically a small town. I was assigned to Casa 25. Each of the Casas has 5 bedrooms as well as laundry and common rooms. Each room has two bunk beds, so it´s four people to a room and bathroom.

First Days in the CCM

Every Tuesday evening, there is a devotional for the entire group of missionaries. It turns out that my group of missionaries is one of the largest to ever come to the CCM in one week: 226, so the place has been a bit more crowded than normal.

When Brandon was here he told me all about the Mangos and how good they were. Imagine my surprise to find out that THERE WERE NO MANGOES!!! The cantelop is really good, but there are no mangoes to be found. I presume that they are seasonal. Speaking of seasonal, the weather here works like clockwork. Foggy and cool in the mornings, hot and sunny in the afternoon, and raining in the evening. It literally rains every night. It is not a question of whether there will be rain or not, but it is a question of whether it will sprinkle, or flood.

My companion is Elder Thomason. Hailing from Gilbert, Arizona, Elder Thomason is an obedient and dedicated missionary. He played Quarterback in high school, and took first in state in his division. Here is the pros and cons chart of my MTC companion:

Pros:

Works hard,

Obedient,

Faithful,

Optimisitic

Cons:

Doesn´t like going to bed

Farts a lot

I think that sums it up!

Aside from my companion, I share a room with Elders Richards and Ormond, who both went to the same high school as my cousin Noah! Speaking of Elder Talbot, it turns out that he is still alive and kicking, so good for him! We are in the same zone, so we have the same sacrament meeting.

Another neat encounter: One morning, Thomason and I sat next to an Elder Harmon. We got to talking, and when I mentioned that I was from Oregon, he said, ¨Hey, my brother served there. Did you know him at all?¨ It turns out that our Elder Harmon who married Sister Fletcher has a brother headed to Peru at the same time as I´m headed to Chile. It´s pretty crazy!

My morning teacher is Hermano Jacob Mora. Hmo Mora is a really nice guy, who likes to encourage us on. Hermano Oscar Valdez  in the afternoon is a bit more devious. His favorite thing to do is cock is head and say ¨eh?¨ if we say anything to him in English. Whenever we ask Valdez a vocab question, he responds¨Dictionario!¨ Both are really cool though. Hermano Mora actually went to the CCM when it was still a high school.

The Plague

My companion got sick on the first Wednesday, and I followed suit the day after. It was not fun to get a cold right away! ¡No bueno! However, my entire district avoided stomach virus that got over a quarter of the missionaries here in the first week. There was a quarantine imposed and everything! Fortunately my cold and the pandemic are over now. 

Summary 

A lot of stuff´s been happening, and it is hard to get it all down. Hopefully this will suffice for the week! I was pretty busy today because we went to the Mexico City temple.

Please, keep the emails coming. They made the week!

Regards,

Elder Cherpeski

Elder Taylor is a member of my district who is heading to Concepción as well. I am still cracking over the way he said something:

¨Satan, that guy´s a jerk!¨

It was the best thing I heard all week.

My best joke of the week:

Elder Richards: Hey who didn´t flush???

Me: It was probably Elder!

8/24/2018

Hello all!

I´m excited to write to all of you today for this hour that I have. As a note to my mom, please correct any mistakes I make in writing. I don´t have a lot of time, and my spellcheck is in Spanish, so if you could help me out that would be great!

I was reflecting on how strange it is to always have a nametag on. One of the first things that we all did when we got to el Centro de Capitación Misional was put on the new nametags. Nowadays, I do not leave the Casa without it on. I think of this with the recent MTC devotional broadcast from Provo where Elder Christoffreson emphasized the importance of the name of the church: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or as I know it: La Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Últimos Días). 

Life in the Centro de Capitación Misonal

I am now convinced that learning a language is one of the hardest undertakings possible. There are so many words! Oh well, I am already progressing at a solid rate.

Our little Casa is the best part of the CCM. It´s where we sleep, shower, and relax, during whatever time that we have to do such things.

Food here is okay. It seemed pretty good the first week I was here, but all of us are getting a bit tired of it. However, today we had hamburgers which really made us a lot happier. It was really good, and I ate until I was stuffed. Pretty much every meal here comes with meat, which does get long after a while.

We spend most of our time in our classroom. A lot of time! It is where we study, have Spanish classes, plan mock lessons, and plenty of other stuff.

Of course, when I say us, I am referring to my district, the people with whom I spend 16 hours a day.

I´ll talk about half of them here today as part of my group email.

Elder Thomason is my companion here at the CCM, which means that we basically spend all of our time together. He has a hard-charging personality that occasionally chaffes with my much more laid-back nature; however, Elder Thomason is hard working and obedient which makes it much easier to follow the CCM rules.

Elder Richards is one of my roomates and a total goofball. I am pretty sure that his smooth and energetic method of communication can transcend any language barrier. His stunts have included putting on Hermano Valdez´s second tag and imitating him to much hilarity, and starting a OREEOOO chant. First with him tapping his foot to a beat, then starting the chant, and finally pausing momentarity to call in another member of the district until the whole district has followed suit. 

Elder Ormond is my other roomate. He is not a particularly vocal person, especially in comparision to his energetic companion, but he is probably the smartest person in the district (besides me;). It is also apparent that he has made sacrifices in his life in order to be out here. He is the only other person in my district headed for BYU.

Elder Taylor is one of the four missionaries in the district older than 18, though you probably would not be able to tell from his higher pitched voice. Elder Taylor hails from small town southern Utah and is one of the funniest people I have met. The things he does, the things he says, and the ways he says and does them are somehow super funny.

Elder Moore is the most reserved member of my district. He was a dedicated soccer player before he came out here, so I am sure he will have no problem adjusting to that in Chile. From what he has told me, he only started attending church full-time about a year ago, so I am super impressed that he would come out here!

Summary 

   

The worst day of this week was Monday. For some reason, that was the day that the enormity of two years hit all of us in the district. Spanish seemed especially daunting that day.

However, this day is great. For one thing, no classes. Another is that Elder Bednar is coming tonight. The Apostle assigned us to read two of his previous talks to prepare for this devotional, so I am super pumped for him to come.

However, Elder Talbot will not be there, since he left early this morning. We hugged goodbye for two short ones last night.

I also got a pic with Elder Harmon.

That´s all I can pump out for this weeks folks,

I hope to hear from all of you.

P.S. Sometimes I forget I´m Mexico but then I see a parrot (not pictured) or a weird light switch, and it brings me right back.  

8/31/2018

 

Well another week has gone by, and things are definitely settling into sort of a routine. We spend lots of time in classes and study time, but the weeks have started moving a lot more quickly. I´m already in week 4 which means I am sort of a veteran now.

We twelve missionaries of Zone 8, District B have been going to some lengths to have fun. One is the ever recurring ¨steal the nametag¨. The funniest instance of this came when Elder Taylor took Hermano Mora´s tag during a hug and, after a few minutes, called out to him from his desk saying, ¨Hey, Hermano Mora, cuál es mi nombre?¨ 

¨Elder Taylor!¨, he replied incredously.

¨No! Soy Hermano Mora,¨ he replied showing his newly acquired name tag.

Lots of stuff becomes funny when you don´t have entertainment!

Only hours after I wrote last week Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles came to speak to us of the CCM. Unlike many of the Provo Devotionals, this one was just for us and was a much more intimate experience. The crux of his message was about the importance of learning by faith and that faith is a principle of action. His point for us missionaries is that to be effective missionaries, we need to help our investigators learn to act for themselves.

He bore a powerful witness at the end of the meeting of the truthfullness of the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ that gave me a strong witness of the divine mission that I have as a missionary for this church.

Spanish is coming along. Though the full extent of the task is finally dawning upon me. It is a task memorization of monumental proportions of learning thousands of words. However, it is more than just learning vocab. It is about being able able to use those words in a cohesive and fluid manner. Moreover, pronounciation is different than in English, so there is also an accent component to the task. I am thankful for my powerful faculties which, although they do not particularly help me learn vocab, help me to form sentences in a more rapid and coherent manner than many of my colleagues. However, this task will take time, take effort, and take a lot of prayer.

Elder Townsend is the youngest missionary in our district (he turned 18 on the day of his farewell); however, he is a funny outgoing member of our district. He is from the same Draper high school as my cousin and Elders Ormond and Richards. He is a great story teller.

Elder Bingham, Townsend´s companion is the eldest member of the district at the age of 20. Raised by a less-active mother, Bingham only joined the church at the age of 18 only after years of discussions with institute teachers and his girlfriend. Until last November he had no plans of serving a mission, but his patriarchal blessing changed his mind. Much to his girlfriend´s consternation, he decided to put off marriage until after his mission. Since she too is going on a mission, I would not doubt that they will get married.

The Hermanas

It must be interesting being an hermana. All around the CCM, I witness districts full of energetic18 year old boys accompanied by a couple of sister missionaries. Our hermanas are the focal point of our district, since they bring with them a higher level of age, experience, and maturity. Both have boyfriends on missions that they intend to marry after they return home. I think that the age change´s biggest effect is that in greatly increased the chances of relationships lasting through missions.

Hermana Martin is outgoing and funny. At first, I doubted her depth; however, I have found her a source of spiritual depth and know that she will be an effective missionary in Osorno.

Hermana Weldert is from Ammon Idaho. She is the most studious person in our district.

I am running low on time here, so I think that I will cap off this message right now.

Have a great week, everyone!

Sincerely,

Elder Cherpeski

 

p.s. Additional thoughts on Elder Bednar:  First off all, he has quite a sense of humor!

Two weeks ago, we received an assignment from him to read two of his talks so we knew something about what the devotional was to be about.

At the beginning of the devotional, he laid two ground rules.

1 ¨do not take meticulous notes of everything that I say¨

As he put it to us. ¨the most absurd example of this excessive note-taking at general conference. Don´t they realize that it will all be on the gospel library in an hour?¨

Instead, he wanted us to take a ¨small plates approach to our note taking¨

2 No playing Guess what is in my head

To demonstrate this guideline, he called out a random Hermana from the front row and had her stand up. ¨Now,¨he said,¨I want you to recite the 3 principles of Baptism for me. I do not actually want you to answer this, but the sake of the demonstration I want you to stand here. Of course, you may know what those principles are, but when you are in front of 800 missionaries and an apostle, you can´t remember your first name!...whenever, you ask such a knowledge test question,The Spirit will not be with you.¨

The rest of the devotional was primarily where he would ask questions from the audience, and occasionaly respond to these answers. It was, in a sense, a demonstration of what he expects from us missionaries out in the field.

My favorite part of his presence was at the end. The Spirit was so strong when he bore testimony to us and delivered an apostolic blessing to us in our efforts to become effective missionaries.

9/7/2018
Well all, a lot has happened this week, and depending on when I leave, this might be my last email from Mexico!

In the meantime, I have been learning and doing much here at the CCM. 

The primary role of missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is to preach the principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Hence, the primary focus of both my gospel and language study have been to advance this objective. Every day, we do mock lessons with our teachers who play the role of various investigators. My teachers, Jacob Mora and Oscar Valdez are both less than one year off of their missions, and the investigators that they potray are investigators that they taught while they were in the field.

The first lesson that Elder Thomason and I taught was on the Friday after we arrived. It was scary delivering a lesson in Spanish for the first time! Basically, we wrote out all the words we wanted to say and smiled and nodded whenever Efrain (Hmo. Valdez) spoke back to us. For the first two weeks of my time here in the CCM, we gave lessons to Efrain every weekday. This week, Valdez showed us a picture that the real Efrain had emailed him. Efrain is headed for Japan on his mission! It was cool seeing all the effect we can have on those we teach.

After teaching Efrain, we moved into our second phase of teaching, Roberto in the mornings and Alejandro in the evenings. This go-around was a lot smoother. My Spanish is awkward at times, and I struggle to understand conversational pace speaking, but in the slightly easier environment of mock lessons, I can actually have conversations. Overall, mock lessons are my favorite thing to practice here in the CCM because I feel that I get a full variety of Language, Gospel, and teaching practice.

As my friends probably know, I am a bit of a Grammar wiz. Ergo, my favorite thing about learning Spanish is learning the grammar and the conjugations. Pronounciation and vocab are much harder topics that will take a long time to internalize. Language classes are fairly instructive, and personal study has given me the ability to deepen my testimony of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I marvel at how much I have grown in this month here at the CCM.

I am enjoying myself here at the CCM. When I leave here, I will miss all the friends that I have made in my district (Putting 12 people together pretty much night and day for five straight weeks works real wonders). However, I am excited to begin the real mission. 

Sincerely,

Elder Cherpeski

 

P.S.

Although this week was great overall, yesterday was a bit difficult for the district in aggregate. Hermanas Martin and Weldert are great missionaries and the center of the district, but they started to wear each other thin this week. Yesterday morning, Elder Thomason gave Hermana Weldert a priesthood blessing and I gave Hermana Martin a priesthood blessing, so that is a first!

Overall, however, the strain in the district left a subtle cloud of discord in the atmosphere, so that night when we got back to the casa all of us Elders gave our companions a priesthood blessing. It was a powerful experience, and it left all of us with a greater feeling of peace. My first two blessings were on the same exact day.

I am hoping that since today is P-Day, we will be able to relieve some of the tension.

I am glad that Elder Thomason and I get along despite our personality differences and occasional disagreements. I am also happy that I get along with all of my district mates.

I think of home sometimes and occasionally miss it; however, I do not feel in any way homesick. For that I am grateful.

 

9/14/2018

Hello everyone,

It is great to hear from all of you, and I appreciate all of the encouragement and support.

Tomorrow is Mexico's independence day, so it is going to be quite interesting. Then, on Monday morning at 3:30 a.m., my district and I report to the reception building to leave the CCM! We are taking the 8:05 flight from Mexico City to Santiago Chile. After arriving at about 6:00 local time, we are going to have a 16 hour layover--on Chile's independence day! So basically, I am going to be in two different capital cities for two different independence days over the course of four days. It is going to be pretty sweet!

This last week here at the CCM has been pretty good. Everyone is excited to be taking off for the real thing in just a few days. It was weird doing the last lessons with my mock investigators this week; however, I have learned so much in these last six weeks. For starters, my Spanish has increased by leaps and bounds. I understand most principles of verb conjugation and have seriously increased my vocabulary. My companion and I have gotten to the point that we can teach our lessons in Spanish without any notes, which is pretty neat. 

Moreover, I have been able to read from the scriptures far more than I ever have before and have learned great deals there.

It is strange to think that, within the week, I will be in the streets of Chile, but that is what is about to happen! I have grown enormously here in the CCM, but now it is time for me to head out into the real thing.

Another cool thing:

Last Saturday, I was talking to the new members of our zone and found out that they are headed to Queretero Mexico, which is the mission where my brother Brandon is serving. I told them to look out for him when they get there.

 

 

Fresnos Queretaro with Elder Hernandez

6/l8/2018

Well, it was a very bittersweet week.  I have good news and bad news.  Elder Rubio was sick all week, and we hardly could leave the house.  He had to go home today, and since he had to go home once already for his health, he won't be coming back this time.  I'm pretty sad for that.  However, Presidente already had a companion planned for me.  Elder Hernandez came to the mission 10 months ago, but had to go home for personal reasons.  Anyways, today he came back to the mission, and I'm going to be training him! While I'm sad that Elder Rubio is going home, I'm glad that I'll have a good, hard working missionary.  It's gonna be a little tough opening an area and training, but I think we're gonna have a lot of success here.  

Most of this week I cleaned the house.  I also got some sort of stomach bug and was throwing up all day on Tuesday, but it cleared up by Wednesday morning.  It was pretty frustrating not being able to leave the house this week.  Especially since we really don't have a lot going for us right now in the area. But with my new comp, I'm sure we'll be working lots this week.  Elder Hernandez is from Puebla, the same as Rubio!  One missionary from there ends his mission today, and the other is just starting.  Kinda funny. I'm sure gonna miss Rubio though.  We get along super well, and he's one of the funniest guys I know. But I know the Lord has a plan, and everything will work out.  Anyways, that's about it from this week.  Also Mexico beat Germany in the mundial, and everyone is freaking out about it still haha.  That's about it from my week, I love you all and hope you have a good week!

Elder Cherpeski

Photos: Elder Paul. (he finishes in 5 weeks, he's a good buddy), Saying goodbye to Elder Rubio, Elder Hernandez showed up right before Rubio left so we snagged a picture.

6/25/2018

This was a really busy week.  It has been interesting opening an area, especially training.  The good thing is that we share the area with sisters, so they help get to the members houses for food and all that.  I feel like I have the area down now though.  This week was crazy with the mundial de fútbol. Saturday morning Mexico was playing against Korea.  You would have thought it was a ghost city.  Almost nobody was on the street, but you could hear the game because everybody was watching to it and was really like a huge surround sound.  It was a really bizzare experience.  

My new companion is Elder Hernandez.  He's pretty quiet, but he's definitely been opening up more lately. He was the first convert in his family, and got baptized 2 years ago.  Since then, his mom and brother got baptized, but still waiting on his dad and other brother.  He's already really good at teaching, and has a strong testimony.  However, I've been helping him learn how to contact in the street, teach a bit more clearly, and other odds and ends like that.  Really I haven't had to teach him too much stuff.  He was feeling a little homesick this week, so I kept him extremely busy.  We had a ton of new investigators this week, and 3 of them came to church!  We're gonna keep working really hard!  The ward here is mas o menos.  It's not the best, but better than some wards I've been in.  I went and presented my comp to the Bishop the first day he got here, and the Bishop was really impressed with that.  He was telling my comp to try and learn as much as he can from me.  It was a moment that I realized that I'm not a new missionary anymore, and that in fact I'm starting to be one of the veterans.  Overall, it was a good week.  We had our zone activity today and I was able to play basketball for a while today.  I sure miss it haha.  I'm happy to hear that you're all doing well, and have a great week!  

7/2/2018

It rained a ton this week!  I got completely soaked three days in a row.  Thankfully I didn't get sick.  My eye infection came back though, so that's been annoying.  Things are going really well here in Fresnos.  It's part of Querétaro, but on the outskirts.  My last area was a lot closer into the city, so it's been a different, but good experience.  A lot less people here are in a hurry, and it's pretty easy to have lessons in the street.  Elder Hernandez still is pretty quiet.  He teaches well and with the Spirit so that's the most important thing.  He still has a little trouble contacting people on the street, but he's made a lot of progress.  He's had a hard time getting adjusted to the mission, so I offered him a blessing.  I don't remember really any of it even though it was a solid 5 minutes.  I know that it was the Lord talking to him, not me.  We get along really well, and the work is going well in our area.  We've been finding some really good investigators, and put some baptismal dates this week. They had the elections this week, and only half the active members went to church because everyone was voting.  It was interesting.

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the importance of obtaining spiritual knowledge and how it has to do with our personal salvation.  We can't be saved in ignorance, so that means we have to learn about the gospel.  The moment we learn about the Gospel, it's our decision if we want to obey it or not.  Every single person will have this decision to make at some point in this life of in the spirit world.  It's an interesting idea, but it's making me try to obtain as much spiritual knowledge during my morning studies. Anyways, that was my week.  It went by really quick.  I'm not in my area right now since we have our interviews with Presidente in about an hour or so, and I forgot my camera.  I'll send lots of pictures next week!  Love you guys!

Elder Cherpeski

7/9/2018

Hey everyone!  I hope you're all doing well!  We had a pretty good week here.  First, I'm gonna give you a quick recap of how much of a pain it's been opening this area.  First of all, I saw the Elder who was here last transfer in the bus central the morning of transfers.  I had to run after him before he left so that he could give me the phone and keys.  That pretty much describes how they left the area.  The first few days, we threw away 13 bags of trash, and spent a good chunk of time sweeping and mopping.  There was no note of investigators, 4 teaching records from the last 6 months, and no hand map.  It was hard.  We're still having some difficulties.  For example, we didn't know who the landlord was, or that we pay the light bill here with a special card (that took us digging through the materials to find, and a dark morning without light haha), and also the fridge wasn't working when we got here.  I've learned how to not close an area haha.  But, little by little we've survived and figured everything out.  My eye is doing better.  We went to a Opthalmologist that is a member, and he examined my eye. It turns out that I have a gland infection or something in my left eye.  He gave me some special eyedrops, and I've been feeling better.  

Something cool this week was that we taught a Muslim!  He was honestly one of the most respectful people I've met in the mission.  It was pretty sweet.  We also had zone conference this week, and it was one of my favorite so far.  I think I forgot to mention this last week, but last saturday I went back to Colinas for a baptism of one of my investigators!  He bore his testimony and mentioned how everything started with a phone call one Sunday morning before church, a quick visit and invitation to church that would take place in just an hour.  I perfectly remember that day.  We had recieved a reference in the phone earlier in the week, but he never answered.  However, Sunday morning I was looking through my phone to see who else we could invite to church, and he answered my random phone call!  And now, two months later, he got baptized!  He's changed a lot and dropped a lot of addictions.  It was one of the best experiences of the mission so far for me.

Anyways, the week was fairly normal.  Just a lot of contacting, some good lessons, and lots of prayer.  Things here are going well.  I love you guys, and hope you have a great week!

Elder Cherpeski

Here's a picture of my two trainers, me, my brother, my two sons, and my grandson.  In that order from right to left haha! 

Also, here's the zone

 

The baptism of Jorge. He's the one on my left

7/16/2018
We walked a lot this week.  We didn't have a whole lot of success this week, but I'm happy with our effort.  We truly gave it everything we had, and I know the blessings are on the way.  Elder Hernandez got a little frustrated, and I had to reassure him that sometimes there are hard weeks, but that the good times will always outweigh the hard times. While we had a hard time with our investigators this week, we were able to find some less active members, and 2 of them showed up to church!  That was pretty sweet.  We dropped about 7 people this week.  Actually, it was more them dropping us than us dropping them.  We're gonna keep looking and see what happens.

On Saturday we still hadn't found any new investigators, so I decided that we we're gonna leave the house earlier and try to find people.  We left around 9am and got back 9:30pm at night.  Nothing.  It was honestly a super rough day.  We walked a ton, and didn't get any sit down lessons.  We gave lessons in the street, but it's just not the same.  However, today we had a sweet P-day!  We had a party with the entire mission and we watched Coco!!  I really enjoyed it.  Most of the sisters were crying, and everyone felt more motivated to do their family history work. Afterwards, we took pictures as generations.  I don't have my cable to send photos though!  We went straight to the internet cyber after the party, but I will send them next week!  It was a great time.  17 missionaries are going home next Monday.  I'm gonna miss them a bunch!  I love you all, and hope that you have a great week!

Sounds like the bend trip was fun!  I know how Andrew felt.  However, I was a little overly confident before leaving I think, and was really humbled those first few weeks in the CCM haha.  He's gonna do well.  My eye still isn't 100 percent.  It certainly has turned into a pretty nagging issue.  It is doing better, but I'm gonna give a call to the doctor tonight and give him an update.  My comp is doing well.  It was a frustrating week, but he feels a lot better being in the mission right now.  The first week he wanted to go home, but luckily with the time he's felt a bit better.

7/23/2018

This week was great!  It absolutely flew by.  We had transfers, and we're staying together.  My comp Elder Hernandez is doing a ton better now, and I think he's just about completely adapted to the mission.  We were able to find some new investigators this week, and we had some come to church!  I think we have some possible baptisms here these next few weeks.  A great experience I had this week was helping out with the youth conference here in the stake.  Throughout the week, our zone along with another zone prepared a couple special musical numbers.  It turned out really nice and there was a special spirit there.  After that, we taught the youth how to contact, and then the priests and laurels went with the Elders and Sisters to contact for a bit.  My comp is almost 18 and is super excited to go on the mission, and it was fun chatting with him and getting him pumped up for the mission.  

Anyways, looking back at this week it was kind of a blur.  My eye is finally back to normal.  It's just a little red now from lack of sleep and the sun, but the infection is gone.  That's a pretty big relief.  I can't believe Andrew leaves in a couple of weeks.  Time is going by too fast!  I love you guys!

Elder Cherpeski

My comp from the activity

Los Misioneros de Fresnos!

My generation that I will be going home with!

7/30/2018

This was a fantastic week!  We worked our butts off.  There were a few days that we had 6 or 7 lessons, and the time absolutely flew by.  Lately, I've felt in such a good groove in the mission.  I have the language down, I know how to teach, I can follow the promptings of the Spirit, and I have enough time left on the mission that I'm not thinking about home.  It's a good place to be in.  The highlight of the week was Sunday.  We were running around(literally) all morning passing by our investigators inviting them to church.  Some weren't there, some canceled on us, and some said that they would go if they had time.  It was pretty frustrating.  We arrived to church sweaty and annoyed, and we saw 4 of our investigators there waiting for us!  They're the ones who have a baptismal date, and we decided to test them to see if they would go to church on their own and they did!  It was a pretty sweet miracle.  All the blessings from the work from the last few weeks are paying off!  On thursday, Isaac, my favorite investigator from my last area called me and told me he was getting baptized on Sunday, and that he wanted me to come back and baptize him.  I obviously said yes, and then afterward asked Presidente for permisson.  He said yes as well haha.

So, right after the church services we took a taxi (they ripped us off pretty bad) all the way to my last area for the baptism.  It was the most special baptism of my entire mission.  When he came out of the water we embraced and he said that he didn't words to describe how he felt.  The Spirit was super strong in that moment.  I will never forget that experience.

On another note, my comp is doing really well too.  His confidence is definitely growing, and is pulling more of the load now.  Overall, this may have been my most productive week in the mission so far. I love all you guys!

This Pday we decided to climb a hill.  Turns out it was closed, so we hitched a ride back in the back of some guys truck.  He was super cool and didn't accept any money.  Maybe he was one of the 3 Nephites....  But I don't recommend doing that on the mission.  We had no choice though haha...

Elder Cherpeski

8/13/2018

This was a great week.  We worked really hard, got soaked twice, and finished off the week with 2 baptisms!  The family that got baptized had been in teaching for 8 years... We started working with them pretty much from the first week we got here.  We started praying for them by name in every single prayer, personal and as a companionship for the last 6 weeks.  We saw a miracle as they progressed slowly but surely.  They dropped lifelong bad habits, and really progressed in the gospel. They had been wanting to get baptized for a long time, but some lifestyle choices kept them from it.  However, we gave them a blessing, and from that moment they completely changed.  Their names are Claudia and Raul, and they have 3 kids that are in teaching as well.  We had lots of super spiritual experiences with them as they experienced that conversion process.  The best though actually wasnt the baptism.  The confirmation had a special spirit.  My comp and I each confirmed one of them.  The sisters that share the ward with us brought someone for the first time, and she told them that when she saw them get confirmed she started to tear up and said that she felt that for some reason she needs to make it a goal to have the same thing happen to her.  It was a really cool experience.

Today we went and bowled.  I scored 131.  Not to bad for literally never bowling haha.  Pres got 177. Anyways, I hope you all have an amazing week.  Love you all!

Elder Cherpeski

8/22/2018

Hey everyone!  I hope you're doing well.  This last week I hit 16 months on the mission!  It's crazy how fast time has been going.  Right now I'm in Querétaro in an area called Fresnos.  I'm currently training Elder Hernandez and District Leader.  We've had some baptisms recently and some really amazing spiritual experiences.  I'm feeling good as far as Spanish goes.  It's not perfect, but I understand 99 percent.  The mission has been a lifechanging experience, and now I can say without a doubt that the church is true.  The Book of Mormon is true and was translated by the Prophet Joseph Smith.  I think the thing I've developed the most on the mission is the ability to listen to and follow the promptings of the Holy Ghost.  I know that it's real.  I've had specific phrases and words put into my head when I'm teaching.  I've heard the prompting to talk to someone on the street just to find out that they were hoping that we would talk to them.  I've had way too many experiences like that to call it coincidence or chance.  The church is true, and the message we share blesses the lives of others.

Some Highlights from the last few weeks.

Working in the sun here in Fresnos.

Our zone conference.

The sisters that share the area with us made us flower ties.

Our zone activity that we had today climbing cerro cimatario.

Some cool clouds.

8/22/2018
I'm relieved to finally be writing!  It was so weird working on P-day.  It felt like a Thursday haha.  It was worth waiting though.  We were able to climb a hill here in Querétaro.  It's called cerro Cimatario.  We met up at 7:30 and took a bus up to the hill.  It took about 2 and a half hours to climb.  Maybe it was a little crazy using our day of rest to climb a hill, but it was really fun!  In a week and a half we have transfers, and almost every companionship in the zone will have transfers.  I think I'm out of here.  It's been fun, but I hope I don't train again.  It's just a lot of stress and especially at the beginning you basically have to do everything.  We'll see what happens!  Things in the area have been going well.  We have a lot of great investigators in teaching right now, but most of them have to work on Sunday, so it's been hard getting them out to church.  Also in a week, church will now start at 1pm....  That's super late.  That's what time church started at in my last area, and it made it super rough on fast sundays haha.  Especially since we start the fast around 3:30pm or so after the comida.  Anyways, we had a lot of conversations with drunk guys this week.  Most of them come up to us and tell us to share a message about God.  It's made for some interesting conversations, and interesting experiences.  It's really sad to see how much alcholism there is here.  It really destroys some peoples lives.  

We had a pretty insane experience with our recent converts this week.  We had just gotten home and gotten changed around 9:30 pm when they knocked on our door(they live a few apartments up the road from us).  They came by to tell us that their oldest son, who's about 30, had been mission for more than 24 hours.  They looked pretty distressed.  We told them that we would pray for them.  When they left, I had an almost verbal prompting from the Holy Ghost to go give them blessings.  We got redressed, and headed over.  Claudia had been crying and they were relieved that we came to give them blessings.  I gave 3 blessings, and each one was extremely different.  But they weren't my words.  There was a tender spirit in the room.  A peace was there that wasn't previously.  We left and they called us 30 minutes later telling us that they had been able to get in contact with their son and that God had answered their prayers right away.  It was a special experience.  Some of the most sacred experiences I've had on the mission were from blessings.  I hope you all have a good week.  Cuídense mucho, les quiero.  

Con amor,

Elder Cherpeski

8/27/2018

Hey guys!  This was a good week.  It was weird having P-day on Wednesday and actually made the week feel longer.  Anyways, we had a good week of work.  We spent most of the week in lessons and not in the street which was super nice.  The sisters here had a baptism and their investigator named Javier asked me to baptize and confirm him, so I had the opportunity to do that this week.  I was reflecting on how amazing it is that someone could ask me to baptize them and me be able to feel completely prepared and worthy to do so.  We were also able to give more blessings this week.  I always feel the Spirit the most while giving a blessing.  Today we had a district activity and went to hang around the centro here in Querétaro.  It was pretty relaxed.  Last week was super long and I'm glad that we were able to rest a bit today.  Also on Sunday, Isaac and his girlfriend (the guy I baptized in Colinas a few weeks ago) came to Fresnos on Sunday to visit me! It was nice seeing how well he's doing.  On Friday night, 3 different families came and dropped of dinner at our house.  The members love us haha.  Anyways, I can't remember what else happened this week.  Love you guys! 

9/3/2018

Hey everyone! I hope you're doing well.  My last week in Fresnos was amazing.  It was a spiritually packed week.  We had lots of great lessons, and I was able to give some baptismal interviews this week.  Those are always very spiritual.  The highlight of the week was Sunday when we had a fast and testimony meeting.  I felt a nudge from the Spirit to go share my testimony and to invite our converts to share their testimonies as well.  When they bore their testimonies I almost lost control of my emotions.  The hermano Raul shared one of the most powerful testimonies I've ever heard.  He said that he knew that the church was true.  He said that for many years he had been lost, but that now he had found it again.  It was incredible.  

Also, we got transfers, and I got transfered to Leon again!  I'm going to be zone leader again, so I'm excited for that.  I'm with Elder Wright from Washington.  We started the mission around the same time, and it's really cool to see how much we've progressed.  I'll send more pics in the coming week.  Love you guys!

Elder Cherpeski

This was a great last week in Fresnos.  I spent time this week reflecting on my efforts in this area and just the mission in general.  I came to the conclusion that I did not love the mission when I started.  I liked it, but also had a rough time at the start.  However, at some point I fell in love with the mission.  I have no idea at what point it happened, but now I know that going on the mission has been the best decision I've made up to this point in my life.  We spent the week in a bunch of lessons, I had to give some baptismal interviews, and saying goodbye to some people.  Sunday was amazing.  We saw a hermano that we gave a blessing to last week. He had half of his face parcially paralyzed.  The doctors had told him it was going to last between 4 and 6 months to heal.  We gave him an annointing and blessing last week, and this Sunday he showed up completely fine!  He said it healed the day after the blessing. That was a cool experience.  Later, I felt prompted to invite our converts to come share their testimony with me.  They shared some of the most powerful testimonies I've ever heard.  Actually Presidente Williamson went to our ward on Sunday and later went up to them and told them that their testimonies were amazing.

Saturday night, we got the phone call with the transfers.  I'm going back to Leon as zone leader!  I'm pumped because I'm going with Elder Wright. He's from Washington.  We were in the same district at the beginning of the mission, and we get along super well.  We're the oldest zone leaders with combined time.  I'm going on 17 months, and he's at 20.  Most zone leaders are a bit younger right now.  We're both really excited for this transfer.  It's going to be weird being with an American comp again...  Elder Hernandez was sad when I left, but excited to recieve another comp and take control of the area.  It was a good last week, and really good transfers.  I felt a little like I was going home when I went back to Leon.  Love you guys!

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