Hey Everyone!

This week was an eventful week. It started off with intercambios (I honestly have no idea what it is called in English) and Elder Torres left with Elder Condori and Elder Wallace stayed with me for the day. After some contacting we managed to find family to teach later that night. The lesson we gave was my favorite lesson I have been a part of so far. The spirit was incredibly strong, and they said they would already think about baptism. They are two of our new investigators, and we managed to find 4 for that day.

The next day we switched back with our normal companions and went on with our day as normal. We went and visited the hospital because they wanted to do a check-up and while we were down there I may or may not have bought a ukulele, but that’s not important. We then visited a family in the ward because the father was thinking about baptism, and while we were there one of the daughters and her boyfriend came in, and we got to talk with them. Now the boyfriend is another new investigator.

The next day was interesting. Our Mission Presidents were in town, and had personal interviews with all of us, in our own houses. It was quite frightening, especially since we didn’t know when they were coming and they showed up around 11 in the morning. It was a good experience though and it’s always nice to see and talk with the Mission Presidents.

The day after we had my first zone conference. It was awesome. Being around a ton of missionaries and learning great lessons and tips for teaching was amazing, and then I also ate 20 tacos after we were done which were also amazing.

The following day was pretty normal, but we found 2 new investigators. We started teaching them, and the father’s wife came in and starting talking too, and didn’t stop. She didn’t stop talking for 50 minutes! I’m not trying to say it was bad or anything, because it isn’t, it was cool to listen to her beliefs and views of things, but it was insane! And every time we would come in a start talking, or even in the middle of the sentence she would just start going again. It didn’t end until we were walking out the door about 20 feet away from the house. They’re great people though, and I’m sure if we are able to get a message across next time, the lesson will go great.

-Elder Breinholt

Hey Everyone! This week has been an interesting week.

I’m saying this next thing in this email because I feel like no matter what I do, most or all of you will find out about it eventually. The first week in the field I was getting weird stomache aches. I just pushed them aside because I though it was just my body adjusting to the new food, but this last Tuesday it was so bad I had to be rushed to the hospital. We then did some tests and found out that I have Salmonella! Wow. That was crazy news, especially on my second week. We had to stay at the hospital until Thursday in the afternoon (which honestly was kind of luxury. We had warm running water, free food, and tv, which I don’t know if we should have watched or not but I watched tons), then we got to go back to the casa and now I’m on all sorts of medication and stuff. Don’t worry about it though, all of it has been dealt with and we’re already laughing about this. Just thought I’d get that out there though.

Besides that, we didn’t get to do too much because we lost some days of the week, but the day we got out of the hospital we had the best dinner of all time. 6 of us Elderes went to a members house, they put on the movie Coco (which we are actually allowed to watch, so we all good), and then had as many pancakes as wanted. It was incredible.

And then yesterday I had to give a talk in sacrament meeting, my first talk in Spanish. I was actually told last week that I would have to give a talk then but they never announced my name, and since I was already prepared I just used the talk I wrote for then. It was a cool experience. I don’t think I did too bad on my Spanish, but honestly I have no idea.

Other than that it has all been normal. We visited and taught families, we have 2 new investigators, a date for baptism, and my Spanish is improving. Hope everything is going well for you all!

-Elder Breinholt

Hey everyone! I am now out of the MTC and serving in Mexico teaching the people. Its crazy! It came up super fast but it is super fun and Mexico is awesome.

Before I start, sorry if my English struggles. Everything is in Spanish.

I’ll start with the end of the CCM. I woke up at 3:40 in the morning with the 2 other people in my district who were going to Xalapa. We went to reception and then from there got on a bus, then 30 minutes later got on another bus to go to the Mission Home. The trip was about 6 hours to get there. We got to meet the Mission President and a bunch of other missionaries who had been serving for a while now.

That night we got to find out who our companions were. My companion is Elder Torres. He awesome, he’s been serving here for just about 5 months now, and he is from Mexico. He knows a decent bit of English because his brother served in California English speaking and he said the rest he learned from video games.

We then stayed the night at the secretary’s house, and then the next morning got on another bus to go to our zones. That was another 6 hours (ugh).

We then reached the area and me and my companion walked to our home. It’s a decently nice place. We’ve got ropes hanging everywhere to dry our clothes and we’ve got a place to cook and wash dishes as well. Our shower doesn’t have warm water to we shower with a bucket. That’s an experience. We fill the bucket full and then put a water heater in it, and when it is warm, we shower. It’s weird but I’m already pretty used to it.

It is really starting to hit me how much I don’t know Spanish. It honestly is really weird that they would let us out without that good Spanish. For the first few days I literally understood nothing. I would just sit silent and I felt bad because my companion would do all of the teaching. But now I do help and even if the message doesn’t come out right, I still try to talk and teach. It’s the only way I’m going to learn.

I didn’t think the food could get any better, but it did. I won’t talk much about it because it isn’t important, but dang it’s going to be hard when I come back home, because this is the best.

This last Saturday also we had a baptism for an investigator. Elder Torres and Elder Wilson (who was his last companion) had a 14 year old investigator scheduled for baptism so I got to participate in that which was awesome. I didn’t do the baptizing but it was still a cool experience being behind one of those.

I could talk for ever already on all the stuff here but sadly I’m on a time limit. However, I love this place. I love Mexico, the people here, and I love teaching the gospel. I have already had so many spiritual experiences here and I can always feel the spirit so strong. Hope you all are having a great tiem wherever you are at!

-Elder Breinholt

I only have a second to send a short message but we made it to Xalapa and I am currently at the Mission President’s house. Everything is going great and we’re all having a super fun time. It’s awesome here.

I’ll be able to send my actual email next Monday, and then it should be every Monday from there.

-Elder Breinholt

Hey Everyone! Time has been flying here at the CCM. It is already our final week here. We have 3 more days until we leave to go into the field and we are flipping out. We’ve been working crazy hard to be as prepared as we possibly can, and we are already all packed up and ready to go. Us three that are going to Xalapa leave on a bus all the way at 5 in the morning on Monday. Everyone else is flying at 2 a.m.

I´m going to miss this place but honestly I am so excited to leave and start helping actual people in need.-

We get the opportunity to go to the temple once more today and I am super excited. It is an amazing experience experience doing a Spanish session here in Mexico.

They gave us some advice to write home in at least a little bit of Spanish so I decided I’ll use it in my testimony.

Yo creo la Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Ultimos Días es verdadera. Yo he aprendido por mí mismo mientras estudiando y orando. El Libro de Mormón contiene las palabras de Dios y Jesucristo, y todos que los profetas enseñan es revelacion de Dios. Sí nosotros tenemos fe en Jesucristo, todo es posible. Yo sé esta es verdadera.

-Élder Breinholt