My first week in the MTC (Missionary Training Center) was super amazing of course, but also the same as my last first week. Dejavú! But it was very successful none the less. The very first thing I noticed about Mexico on the flight in was the pollution. When we landed I was super scared about how I would get through customs. The people in customs didn't speak a lot of English but with the little Spanish I knew at the time I was able to get through. There were 26 missionaries on the flight with me but another missionary and I were the only ones that had our tags. We represented.
From the airport to the CCM (MTC) I got to see the life of Mexico through the window of a bus. It's just what I imagined it would be. Trash everywhere, rubble structures and crazy drivers. But all people I saw on the way were just so beautiful and radiated with humility and love to me. It made me extremely happy that I actually shed a tear or two and the missionary next to me got super worried and asked if I was ok. I reassured him I was.
My companion's name is Elder Noble and he is from Mesa, Arizona. He is all that and a bag of chips. We get along super well and he has a million dollar smile which really helps in our lessons. He's our district leader cause he slays with the spirit. He loves singing which is perfect because I also love to sing. So we sing and harmonize with each other wherever we go. We´re working on a companionship duet so we can spiritually blow the minds of the missionaries here. We teach together well and our companionship studies are super powerful. He's having a little bit of a hard time with the language but that's ok because I help out a lot.
The Mexico City MTC is established in an old high school built by the church that was turned into a missionary training center just a couple of years ago. It is a 90 acres campus surrounded by a stone wall 9 ft tall, with an even higher metal fence on top of it. We are told it is electric, but I don't think it is. I think we´re pretty safe. Inside there are several classroom halls named after LDS prophets that we have our studies in. There are houses that some of the missionaries and workers live in but my district and I were lucky enough to get the dorms. Just kidding, the dorms are not the business. They're basically small study rooms with beds in them, but its all good. My companion and I (the gringos) share the dorm room with 2 companionships of native speakers. It has been both a challenge and a blessing. At first communicating was difficult, but within a day I could understand them perfectly.
A typical day here at the MTC consists of a lot of sitting in a classroom and studying. We wake up early and bathe and prepare for our day. Then we go to our classroom and study for 30 minutes. Then we go to breakfast. After breakfast we have language and teaching lessons from our teacher hermano (brother) silva. He's awesome. I love that guy. Hahaha. He's so funny. But he's also super serious and spiritual when he needs to be. We have lessons for 3 hours then we have lunch. Afterwards we prepare our lessons for the mock investigators we teach and we teach them later that afternoon. We then eat dinner and have more language study till we go to bed. We are awake doing things for 18 hours a day, so each day feels like an eternity. Hahaha. But they're starting to go by faster.
Everywhere around campus there are these purple trees that look so beautiful right now. I wish I could send a picture but I can't run.
Mexico is a little sketch. They shoot off cannons everyday and it's kind of scary. Sirens are going off all the time but we are save here. It's like we are outside of the world.
The gift of tongues is such a real blessing and I'm learning so much. I love it here.
I'm out of time, got to go. Sorry I couldn't write more. I'll tell you guys more next week.
Peace and love,
Elder Murphy
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