Week 9: weird tan lines

8-3-15

Hola familia y amigos!!

Another week down in the mission.This week was so good! I loved it. Time flies here though!

Th most exciting thing that happened this week was my first baptism! It was so great. There are no words! So remember that Ismael (the investigator that got baptized) has been investigating the church for doce años! So this was a huge deal to him and his family. His whole extended family was there and his wife couldnt be happer I dont think. It was a cool site to see. Anyways, we had a cute lil service before and when he got baptized, it was such a neat feeling in my heart. after the baptism, there was so much joy and happiness. they had a really good lunch after (tacos and rice of course). we went to an appointment after that and then Hermana Sic called us and told us that there was a Mariachi Band at the baptism! So after our appoinment, we ran (literally) to the baptism. I was so excited because I have never seen a Mariachi Band in person before and that was one of the things I was so excited for coming to Mexico. We get there and dang. They are so amazing. The best part was this little abuelita. (old lady). Rewind to right after the baptism. I was playing the piano after, and she came up and started singing along to the hymns I was playing. I will hopefully send a video of it. She had such a good voice and she was the cutest little thing. But with the Mariachi band, she was dancing. SO GOOD. she was movin her hips, swingin her arms, and just smiling so big. (no teeth). it made me so happy. we danced together. She is my grandma here. unfortunately she isnt in my ward, but I will still see her around Im sure. I love old people!

I was sick this week. older  missionaries in my mission said that I will get sick a lot. it is just something that Im going to have to deal with. hmmm.

Funny little thing. so Hermana Tirado and I were walking through the street one day and there was an open window with a movie playing. IT WAS FROZEN. anyone who knows me knows that I dont love anything more than Frozen. So I convinced her to watch it with me for like 5 minutes. So we stood outside this house and watched Frozen. 

que mas.

people have asked me how my spanish is. well it is definitely improving! My companion and I tell each other one story a night in our opposite language. It is good because it is pretty much all past tense so it is hard for both of us. But it is good! There are a lot of things that I dont understand in a lesson because in the MTC we just learned Gospel vocabulary. Not everyday things. So when people are telling us about their job, or about the government or something like that I just smile and nod and hope that they dont ask me a question. But it has happened so many times when Im just listening and they stare at me like im supposed to know what they asked me..haha. I have learned just to laugh at myself though and not let that get to me. poco a poco! everyone says that here with my spanish. but I love learning Spanish and cannot wait until im fluent! It will be the coolest thing! I understand more than I can speak. I can pretty much say anything that I want, im just slow. People here talk so fast! The people of mexico city are known to talk fast. Haha funny story. We went to a members house and I understood every single thing they said. And there were about 10 people there. I understood every word! we walked out and I told Hermana Tirado "umm...I just understood every single thing they said. this isnt normal. what happened?" and she was like "they talk suuuuuuper slow. its weird" and I was like "oh. dang". but it was still cool!

My subject line is "weird tan lines" for a reason. (I couldnt think of anything else...sorry). But I do have so many weird tan lines! every part of my body that is in the sun everyday is dark. dark. dark. but my toes are white. but the top of my foot is black. it is so funny. i will take a picture of it next week. i have a pretty bad farmers tan. my shoulders are white but my arms are black. my knees are white but from my knees down to my feet are black. it is pretty funny. dont make fun of me when i come home! :)

my p-day! people have asked me about that too. so every monday we have a "preparation day". we wash our clothes by hand! I actually love it. it is super fun! we wash it on a wash board/sink thing and then hang it up on a clothes line! quite a process. but fun! we usually go out to eat with the elders in our district. tacos. pizza. yeah. we clean our apartment. we have a couple meetings sometimes. and we write our families and friends! every monday night we go to a creperie here (owned by members) with our district and drink herbal tea and have crepes. so fun! i love pdays!

My favorite part of this week was Sunday. Testimony meeting. Fast sunday. I didnt fast because I was sick. but we were in testimony meeting and the bishop finished bearing his testimony and opened it up to the congregation. in a regular testimony meeting, there is about a 5 minute silence. maybe one person gets up. BUT HERE. he finished, sat down and 30 people got up out of their seats and went on the stand. families. couples. kids. old people. everyone. they made a line on the stand. there testimonies were so strong. seriously the people here are so amazing. they have such big hearts and strong spirits. our testimony meetings should be like this! we should be excited to share what is in our heart. we should WANT to share it with everyone we know because it is such good news! we have the gospel of Jesus Christ on the Earth AGAIN! in OUR dispensation! It was a huge testimony builder to me on Sunday. Also, two of our investigators were at church on Sunday too so it was even greater because I know without a doubt that they felt the Spirit. both investigators have baptism dates too! (and I extended them!). My testimony has grown so much here! I love this opportunity I have!

I love you all! Thank you for all of the emails!

Hermana Garner

p.s. I just read over this and Im sorry some of it is in Spànish, I didnt notice. it is hard when you speak spanish all the time and then type in english! haha!

 Baptism of Ismael - such a great day!

 The lady she mentions who sang songs with me after the baptism. :-)

 Got the Mexican stomach bug :(

So something funny. My eyes were super itchy one night (because I'm allergic to Mexico) and Hermana T said her mom has the same problem and she puts hot tea bags on her eyes and it helped. I thought I didn't understand her Spanish because that was the weirdest thing I have ever heard BUT IT WORKS MIRACLES. I am forever grateful for Mommy T.

Week 8: walking the streets of Mexico City!

7-27

This mission is real now! I couldn't love it more than I already do.

Where do I even start? aaaaah!

So. My companion is Hermana Tirado and she is from Tijuana, Mexico. She speaks suuuuper good English, but she speaks Spanish most of the time except when I don't understand something of course :) She is soooo nice, funny, obedient, organized, bold and so loving. I couldn't have asked for a better first companion. She is so perfect for me! She has everything that I need. She is such a good missionary. I live with my old companion, Hermana Crighton, and her companion Hermana Sic. Hermana Sic is from Guatemala and she doesn't speak much English. She understands a lot but doesn't speak English much. But let me tell you, she is like 4`5. She is THE CUTEST thing. She seems very conserved and shy from the pìctures but no. She is the fiestiest, sassiest, funniest person I have ever met. Hahahah she is so small but has so much power. I LOVE HER! Also, Latinos are verrrrry touchy. So she always wants to snuggle, holds our hand when we cross the street and just loves us. We all have so much fun together in our cute little Mexican apartment!

The first night in the field was crazy. We got to our apartment and kind of got settled in. Then Hermana Tirado and Hermana Sic were like "Do you want tacos?" and we were like "ok...." so we went and got tacos at like 8 at night. (it is safe....I know what you all are thinking). So to make a long story short, we ran across the busiest street downtown. We got in a taxi with like 6 people. And then we ate tacos on a street in Mexico City. I guess it doesnt sound too crazy right now, but all I was thinking that night was "what have I done....." hahaha but it was super fun. 

Meals. We eat breakfast in our apartment, usually eggs or cereal. Then we go to a members house around 2 or 3. That is the time of the main meal of the day. Soup first, meal, then dessert. Usually rice, tortillas, meat and whatever they have. Members don't have a lot but they give us soooo much! Another humbling lesson. Then at night, we usually just eat something small like a banana or granola bar before bed. I can tell you that I am probably going to come home a lot thinner :) 

So the people! I LOVE THEM. They are mostly old people, and whoever knows me knows that I LOVE OLD PEOPLE. It makes missionary work 10x better! It is hard though sometimes because a lot of them don't have teeth so it makes it 10x harder to understand them. Because Spanish..haha. But seriously I love teaching the people. Right now, I am not doing a ton of the talking just because it is still hard. But I definitely am trying my best and doing all that I can! So my investigators. Ismael. This is a husband of a member. He has been investigating the church for 12 YEARS. holy cow. anyways, he is a future bishop. i know it. seriously he LOVES the gospel. He is getting baptized next weekend! My first baptism! I'm soooo excited! He is very well-off. He has a really good job, he translates movies. Like Kung Fu Panda. He has a Mac, nice car, nice house. He is a veryyyyy good man. He said he wants to share the gospel with the people of Mexico. Such a golden investigator! I love him!

Another investigator. My first really cool experience in the field so far. We were contacting one day on a particular street and were having absolutely no success. It was discouraging. But Hermana Tirado and I have so much fun together so we are never sad or bored. Anyways, we knocked on a certain door and this old man answered. His name is Luis. He invited us in immediately. (sorry if my spelling is wrong, this computer says all of my words are wrong because they are in English..haha). We talked to him about the church and about his beliefs. He seems interested, but not like SUPER interested. Fast foward to Sunday. We were at church and were looking at the congregation and we didnt see any of our investigators. But then after Sacrament Meeting, we walked out of the chapel and there was Luis. I couldnt describe to you the feeling that I had in my heart. He had his pamphlet that we gave him when we talked to him and he was all dressed up. (as much as he could). He told us that he read the whole pamphlet and answered all of the questions in the back. He went to Sunday School and Priesthood with the men of the ward OUR WARD IS SO STRONG. I am soooo grateful! We met Luis after church at his house. He seemed so interested and already invested in the gospel. I extended my first baptism invitation to him (IN SPANISH)  and he accepted!!! Sooo exciting! 

My very first time contacting, we saw an old guy walking on the street so we started talking to him but I couldnt really understand him (no teeth). But after, Hermana Tirado told me that he wanted to marry me. So thats cool and weird.

So there was EFY and our chapel this last week. And the missionaries had to teach a class! It was soooo scary! It was in Spanish, obviously, and it was so hard. Latinos LOVE when people try to speak Spanish. I felt like a celebrity at EFY. They wanted pictures with me! Hahaha so weird. It was super fun though!

We had a meeting about the temple on Saturday with all of the Sisters in the mission. It was sooo good to see my old MTC district. Seriously we were almost crying when we saw each other again. Such a cool meeting and I am so lucky that I have the chance to work at the temple!

I love Mexico and the culture! I love the people! I love everything about it and I knew I would. But seriously. I am so humbled to be here. For everyone that is reading this, think about all of the blessings you have. A roof over your head, food in the fridge, clean clothes, toothbrush and toothpaste, washer/dryer, bed and pillow, everything. So many people dont have even close to all of that. I walk down the streets and I am surprised. Why? Because the people are happy. There are always kids in the streets with a huge smile on their face and they come up to you and speak English to me because Im white and they know I am from America. They play sports on the streets. They help their famliy with their restaurant. They are happy with what they have! It has already been a huge lesson to me. I need to be grateful for what I have and be happy because there are so many other reasons to be happy!

I still can't believe I am in Mexico City. It just hits me sometimes. WE ALL ARE SO BLESSED. I walk down the streets and literally feel angels walking with me. I love it. It is so amazing. 

I am so happy here. I didn't imagine this week to be as good and happy as it was. I expected it to be soooo hard this week. It has been hard, but I am sooo happy and sooo lucky to be here. I will write more next week!

I love you all!

Hermana Garner

 My bedroom in my first apartment - mine is the pink one!

 The Hermanas in my apartment.

 My kitchen with Hermana Sic - I feel like a giant here!

Week 6: the field!

7-20-15
What?!?! I´m not in the CCM anymore! Soooo crazy! I am sitting in my mission president´s house right now, we finished training pretty early so we have a lot of free time right now. It is super weird to have free time and to be just sitting around talking. 

I am soooo excited to be here though. I cannot wait to teach real people and be surrounded by the Mexican culture. The day before we left, there was mexican music playing outside the walls and I was sooo happy and excited.

It was suuuuuper hard for me to say goodbye to my teachers, especially Hermana Vergara. I cried for like 3 nights in class....haha. We were sooo connected in our hearts. Seriously. I have never been like that with anyone else. She has genuinely changed my life!

I don´t have a ton of time on the computers today so I probably wont be able to write anyone else and Im so sorry! I will have a lot more time next week! 

I LOVE THE MISSION PRESIDENT AND HIS WIFE. When they picked us up at the CCM, they walked through the door and my stomach dropped. I instantly loved them. They love me and they love life. It is soooo great and I am so excited to serve with them. They are so fun and energetic! It is just what I need! They make me so excited to serve! The sad thing is that we wont be able to spend the night at their house tonight and go to transfers tomorrow...we are going with our new companions tonight and moving into our apartments tonight! It is so crazy! They are just throwing us in here!

There are a lot of Natives that came with us to the mission home from the CCM with us and I was talking to a ton of them....IN SPANISH. I can have conversations! It is crazy how far I have come. It is crazy to think that I will be teaching real lessons tomorrow and might even have a baptism this weekend. 

I couldn't be more happy to be here. I really couldn't. I love it and I love being a missionary.

I love you all!! Read the scriptures!

Hermana Garner

 My district before leaving the MTC.

Week 5: last p-day in the MTC!

7-14-15

What?? I´m almost done with the MTC?? It is so crazy to me! If this is how fast my mission is going to go, I want it to be longer! I wish that right now but in a month it is gonna be sooo much harder. I know you RM´s know what I´m talking about. 

I have been here for longer than a month. I still can´t get over that. 

A lot of great things have happened this week that I´m super excited to share! 

So while teaching lessons this week, I have messed up some spanish that has turned into some funny laughs. We were teaching about fasting and tithing to one of our teachers. And I was talking about how when we pay our tithing, it shows our sacrifice to the Lord. She thought that I was saying that we sacrifice each other for the Lord....as in we kill humans...HAHAHAHA she was like "um....what? Im not comfortable with that..." and I was confused and she knew that I didn´t know what I said and finally I understood and we were just dying laughing. Another funny story. So I was talking about how we have to "feast upon the words of Christ" and I was relating it to when we are hungry we want food and that is how it should be when we read the scriptures..right? But instead I said something along the lines of how if we have men then we want food right? "Tengo hombre" and "Tengo hambre" sound verrrrry similar. This girl in my zone that already left one time said "Yo soy Jesucristo" instead of "Yo sé Jesucristo". She said "I am Jesus Christ" instead of "I know Jesus Christ" She said the Spirit was instantly gone and they couldnt even finish the lesson because they were laughing so hard. HAHAHA so funny to think about. 

So the really fun thing about going to Mexico City on our mission is that a lot of the workers here at the CCM live in our mission! One of the chefs lives in our mission, Estaban, the nicest guy. He said he will invite us over and make a ton of yummy American food for us. He has pictures of American missionaries making crepes and pizza and stuff. I´m suuuuper excited! Also, one of the members of our branch presidency lives in our mission and says he will invite us over and stuff. His family came to Sacrament Meeting this week and he has 3 little girls. I spoke to them in Spanish and they understood! So cool! One of the little girls showed me how she can play the piano! I loooooove speaking spanish.

We have a lot of cool meetings on Sunday and one of them is with the MTC Presidency. The President was giving the lesson and he had a powerpoint to go along with it. There was a slide where the only thing on the slide was a little tiny dot. He said "oh that means I have to tell a story" hahahahah so funny. And then another time he wanted to tell another story so he skipped a bunch of slides and got to the next dot on the slide and he told another story. He is such a funny guy but also so sweet and humble. Same with his wife. Sundays are kind of hard for missionaries to stay awake because it is all meetings. Just sitting. The whole day. In these really comfortable theater seats. So on Sunday, I looked down the row (after I woke up) and our whole district was out. Everyone asleep. It is hard work here!

For our service activity this week, we made a Texas Sheet Cake! And guess who it was for? Ourselves. Pretty sweet. Estaban wanted to try the recipe so we put hairnets on and went to work. We took a picture and hopefully he will send it to you. He loves selfies so he insisted on taking one. All Latinos know the word "selfie" here...so funny!

Everybody in our district always jokes about how me and one of our teachers are going to get married. It´s pretty funny. 

This week Elder Miller pointed out that we are here in Mexico City in the CCM. There are huge walls with tons of cameras and barbed wire surrounding us. But we are serving here. It is kind of scary to think that the CCM needs that much protection with in the field we won´t have that physical protection. I know I will be protected by the Spirit!

This week Hermana Crighton and I had a very humbling week. We work super well together and we are at about the same level with Spanish. But one day, I was pretty discouraged. I felt like everybody else in my district was progressing except for me. It was pretty hard. I was waiting for Hermana Crighton to get out of the bathroom one day and I was just sitting on the floor in the hallway. I wasn´t crying or anything. But Hermana Vergara (my fav teacher) saw that something was wrong and she came and sat by me on the floor and we talked for about an hour. She is one of my favorite people and always knows what to say. She is perfect for missionaries here. But the next day, Hermana Crighton was having a hard day but with something a little different. We were supposed to be teaching Hermana Vergara (as an investigator) but Hermana Vergara just said that we could talk about what was happening instead of teaching. We shared scriptures and bore our testimonies about how Heavenly Father is always there. Every single step of the way. The next few days, Hermana Crighton and I taught the best lessons we have ever taught. Most of them we didnt have anything to read or look at, we simply spoke by the Spirit. It was soo amazing. I will never forget that simple experience!

The next email I send will be from the Mission President´s house! IN THE FIELD! I cannot WAIT to be in the field. I cannot WAIT to teach real people with real problems. I cannot WAIT to be surrounded by the Mexican culture. I already love it! Sometimes on Friday or Saturday nights, we will be walking back to our casas and there will be music playing and my heart just aches because I want to be out there. Aaahhh just typing about it makes me soo excited! 

I love being a missionary and I cannot wait to be in the field! I could have a baptism next weekend!!! aaahhhh!!

I love you all and have such a good week! Dont forget to read your scriptures and say your prayers :)

Hermana Garner

 

This is the chef, Estaban. He loves our district!

 Making texas sheet cake - our "service project" that turned out to be for us! Estaban wanted to take a "selfie" with us!