Week 1: The CCM

Hola Amigos y Familia!!!

I have officially completed my first week at the Mexico City CCM. Not gonna lie, it felt like a month but it was so good. Learned so much Spanish and have been making a lot of great relationships. Here are some of the highlights:

I landed in Mexico City last Tuesday at like 5 and had to wait like 2 hours until we could leave the airport. Apparently some Hermana was coming from another airport and had to Uber over to us. The lady that picked us up also said there was an Elder who had to change to Provo so that made me sad because I knew it was Elder Clark... rip. 

When we finally got there I went into my casa and found out that I am staying in the same building as Elder Johnson and Elder Powley, two really close buds from BYU so that was awesome to have and really relaxing.

My companion is Elder Doman, who is fresh out of high school and is from Missouri and will be going to BYU when he gets back. We get along really well and both know a good amount of spanish so we are pushing ourselves to keep going. I have 12 people in my district, 10 elders and 2 hermanas, and we all have lots of fun together which is good because we are together like all day every day. We make a ton of jokes and have fun with our teachers which keeps the mood light. 6 of the elders are going to Xalapa and the other 4 are going to Oaxaca. One of the elders looked up the word for beautiful which is hermoso, so now whenever someone does something good we say Hermosoooooooo. Its a lot funnier than Im making it sound I promise. Maybe we are just a little laugh happy because we've been grinding hard on that español. We get gym time every morning and play some volleyball and I have been taking over and taking straight dubs even with the fact that we arent allowed to keep score. My high school volleyball experience is really shining through here. 

Other than that we have been working hard and learning a ton of Spanish. Its crazy how much you learn here at the CCM. Its good to see a ton of friends from BYU in the comedor and around campus, its almost like a little bit of an efy or BYU type thing idk. 

I just want to end with a tiny spiritual thought. We have been learning so much spanish but we always make sure to study more personal time to learn about the gospel than about our language. I want to challenge everyone that if you feel like you are swamped or have so much to do, make sure you find time to dedicate to the Lord and you will be blessed tremendously. I have seen that time and time again here and I have no doubt it can help.

I love and miss you all so much,

Elder Anderson

ps: we are only allowed to take pics sundays from 5-7 and on pdays so I dont have any pics but Ill make sure to get you some coming up.

Note from Mom:  Here are some pics from our first video chat with Elder Anderson today! (July 3, 2019) It was so good to see him and hear all about his past week!