I'm In Mexico

Hola familia!

So President Swapp gave me permission to email you guys to let you know i am here and safe. You guys should be getting a letter from me in a few days too but this is way quicker. So i´m in a little ´´ciber´´ right now to use the internet. So I first want to apologize for not calling from Mexico City! I had to go through customs and then we got lost and luckily Brother Midgely was actually on the same flight and helped us out! what are the chances. So i only ended up having about 20 minutes to make a call but i could not figure out the phone for the life of me. Something about everything being in Spanish... haha. But I asked for help but no one could figure it out either and my card wouldn't work so that was SUPER frustrating. I was way bummed! But i´m so glad i got to talk to at least a few of you. That made me way happy.


But we got to Monterrey safely and when we got there we were greeted by President and Sister Swapp and the AP Elder Peterson. They are way nice! So they took us back to the mission offices where we met up with all the other Elders who came in that day (we were the last group to arrive) and then we had dinner and got our stuff for the next day and went to a little house right by the mission offices where all 21 new Elders slept. So we just slept in one giant room with all the mattresses stacked right by each other. Haha, so that was fun. And there´s no AC anywhere so it was way hot! Also the cockroaches here are HUGE! they´re seriously the size of small dogs. There was one in the shower with me (which was cold). Haha, and you know how much I LOVE bugs! But anyways so the next morning we just had a brief training meeting and then met our trainers and got our assignment! My first companion is Elder Islas! He is from Pachucha and he is 21 years old. He also speaks little to no English. Which, even though has been hard, i know it will help me in the long run. He is way cool and nice, he just talks super fast.  So we took a taxi from the offices to the bus station to go to our area. The drivers here are crazy! I thought I was going to die the entire time. They don´t wait for anyone! So we then rode a really nice bus to our area, Zaragosa. The bus was crazy too though, it reminded me of the bus from Harry Potter. Haha, but then we got here and had to figure everything out because only the zone leaders knew we were coming so they had to help us find our house and everything. But I´ll tell you a little bit about the area. It´s about an hour and a half away from Monterrey. And we are opening the area, which means there haven´t been missionaries here for months so we have to start completely from scratch. Which is okay, it´ll be a learning experience. So the last few days we've been walking around getting to know the area and introducing ourselves to all the members and stuff. It´s tough because everyone talks sooo fast here. it´s so hard to understand. I have no idea what´s going on like 87% of the time. But i´m learning. 

So I don´t have my camera on me right now but i will on p day, which is Monday, so I can send pictures then. But everything here is soooo different than anything i´ve been around. The houses are all really small, and all connected. And the houses are connected to the stores and everything. So there´s a drink store literally right across the street from our house, like 5 feet away. And there´s always these cars driving around with speakers blasting trying to sell stuff like fruit or other Hispanic food. It´s kind of annoying. Haha, they drive Elder Islas crazy! There´s ALWAYS kids in the street playing soccer or doing something. It´s never quiet anywhere, even at night. And there are SOOOOO many dogs. I swear most of them don´t even have homes. But there are sooo many dogs, it´s crazy. Our house is actually pretty big. It´s only me and Elder Islas, which he said was weird to only have 2. But we have no stove or oven or microwave, no hot water, no AC. So it´s been kinda hard adjusting to not having the normal comforts that i´m used to. But i have a lot of pictures so i´ll send those on Monday. Umm.... i carry around a little notebook with me and everytime i hear a word i don´t know (which is like every 13 seconds) i write it down and ask Elder Islas what it means. But a lot of the time I cant understand the words he uses to describe it, because he does it in Spanish, so I end up having to look everything up in the dictionary. Haha, but it´s all good. Elder Islas is way nice about it. Also something weird here, is their big meal is at 2 everyday. Not at night for dinner like in America. So yesterday we went to the Relief Society president´s house and had Chicken Cordon Bleu.. haha. great first meal in Mexico. And today we went to the ward mission leader´s house and had really good tacos and enchiladas  We´ve met a lot of people today and talked to a lot of people so it´s been really good. 

Also the whole pesos thing is throwing me off too. A dollar is worth like 13 pesos, so i bought  some food yesterday(because we had absolutely nothing in the house) and it cost $150 pesos or something like that. But the sign for pesos is the same as a dollar sign. So it´s way confusing. Haha, but yeah. I really like the life here, it seems really simple. I´m definitely being humbled everyday.The area is a little scary in my opinion, but i´m getting used to it and the less i think about it the better i feel. I know God is watching over me.  Also, apparently the mission is splitting in 3 months? I did not know that. So I might be in the Santillo mission instead of the Monterrey mission in a few months. So... yeah! i didn´t know that. So i´ll keep you guys updated. And i´ll write you more on Monday  i don´t have much more time. I love you guys! and i hope everything is going great! i still don´t know exactly how mail works, i know we get DearElder, but how or when, i don´t know. So for now just send me emails! I Love you guys so much and miss you!

Elder Bird