The big thing that is going to be small (i.e. the letter)

Dear Family, Friends and other interested parties as clarified last time.

             I am doing really well, but I have had very little time to write in my journal so I will try to remember the big things. 

         Well p day ended pretty well, we played kickball, and I scored almost all the runs, but it turned a little painful when someone got out and I had to run back to my base and they tossed the ball, and Elder Hixson jumped up to catch it and I had to jump just barely around him and as he came down to tag me with the the ball he got me in the side of my chest with his elbow he knocked the wind out of me and it was to say the least, painful, but it was okay, I had to get an ice pack to put in my shirt to help it and I took my favorite drug, ibuprofen. 

          Wednesday was great I don't recall all we did but it was good, we got a talking to about not talking in Spanish enough. 

          Thursday was en 95% Espanol and I loved it it was fantastic, it was hard but I loved it, I need to do it again everyday like that but it is really difficult. I don't know how to keep it up but I have to. 

            Friday we got a class pet, it was a giant moth it was huge it is as big as my hand. We let it go Sunday morning but we had it for two days in one of our cupboards. Another district in our building found a cat hiding under the stairs by the comedor (dining hall), and they took it in, and kept it overnight, 

Saturday they then gave it to reception, who gave it back to them and our maestro (teacher) took it home with him in a box, it is so cute and small, one of our hermanas (sisters) held it and loved it and it did the Charlie paw paw purr. It is adorable. 

            Sunday is always fantastic we wrote our talks, and we studied and played around. sacrament meeting was great I love it. I wanted to speak again  but it is okay. We had a class on testimony and conversion. Testimony comes through prayer and study of the scriptures and fe en Jesucristo, arrepentimiento bautismo la recepcion del don del espiritu santo y el perserverar hasta el fin. (faith in Jesus Christ, Repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end.)

conversion comes through arrepentimiento santa cena la recepcion del don del espiritu santo y el perserverar hasta el fin. (Repentance, Sacrament, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end) Then repeat, have Travis help you with that. We had a great devotional by Jeffery R. Holland and it was about how every dispensation prior knew they knew that they would fail. yet they did they worked and failed so that ours could and would, and will succeed. We have to be the best missionaries the world has ever seen we have to outdo the ancients by a lot, but we can do it because there are 80000 of us and the almighty God and his son our savior and redeemer Jesucristo. (Jesus Christ)

The movies were also nice but nothing really topped Elder Holland's talk 

Monday, yesterday, was nice and we worked on stuff, and we helped teach another class some Spanish, TALL is an adventure, and the annoying elder is gone! Oh I got your dear elders with the talk on Thursday and I have been sharing the guys talk ever since, with everyone, it is awesome. And that sums up my week I saw Paul and he is kind of sick but don't tell his mom his room mates apparently have had it worse so he is okay but ya. 

We played soccer and basketball, the elders in my district are trying to scare each other and it is amusing so that is the big letter love 

Elder Logan Joseph Draper

--
Sincerely,
Elder Logan Joseph Draper

Some Random Pics from The CCM/Bene

Inside-out suit and being serious (why so serious?)

Elders in inside-out suits, "the sisters told us to do it"

Outside classroom/dining area

Mural 'Welcome to the Mexico MTC (CCM)'

Ancient Rock that is believed to be a representation of Lehi's dream of the tree of life (copy of the original)             (Which is in Chiapas, Mexico)

Picture of a picture of the rock previously mentioned

Getting Ready

Hitting my mark

GOAL!!!!! I am good at futbol

City on the hillside

I'm getting a little trigger happy

Oooohh, Shiny!

Thanks for the Doughnuts

Got doughnuts!! Donut settle for less

Elder Draper and Elder Ashcraft

It's a Olympus reunion down here

Map of the CCM, the green highlighter is Logan's route to classes

Bedhead, before the haircut

First Haircut, looks ROTC style

Sideview, this has nothing to do with prison

Spider we found

And here's another one

The big letter of crazy out of orderness

Dear Family and other interested parties that are either A. not related to me, or B. still not related to me and are fuzzy and cute, or C. are related to me but are not part of my imediate family but you all ready fell in the first category so don't worry about it.

      well I am having a great interesting time in the CCM and I cant give stuff to you in days but I will give you all the good stories. 

       Tuesday I saw Travis and we had a devotional and I took notes but I forgot what on so lo siento.        Wednesday we got the new recruits there are five people from Olympus here in the CCM Elder Alder, myself, Elder Monson, Elder Ashcraft, and Elder Smith. So that is definitely interesting seeing them occasionally. Oh and today starts the epic tale of the two Elders who want to flirt with our Hermanas and make their companions do awkward splits. Well two elders in our zone have been coming into our district room during our study time to talk with the Hermanas, they completely ignore us, the Elders, and go straight to talking with the Hermanas, ya weird, we say "Hola, como esta?" and they say "Hola" without looking to see the person speaking. 

        Thursday we played foursquare in gym which is always interesting. I bumped into an old wardie of Ryan Tatton who knows who I am, so that was interesting. We found this weird orange spider ant bug things in a bush, so that was weird. The two Elders are flirting with the Hermanas in class, and in TALL, which is no bueno, and they wont take the hints 'of we are trying to study' as a reason to leave us alone. The Big adventure: so Elder Romney can do toe touches, so he was doing them, and one time he did them, well the last time really, he split his suit pants! So that was fun and awkward. 

      We played nine square and volleyball during gym. Hermano Silva was giving us some feedback on our teaching, he said "Elder Draper can understand everything I am saying to him right now", but he speaks to me like a caveman. I am not calling him out because he is not alone in this practice practice practice. (all in Spanish) We got a huge rainstorm with hail and the whole shebang, it was awesome, and apparently my little cul de sac flooded, one elder not in my zone got pictures. The power went our in our casa, and we have no water pressure yah! That is fun, actually it kind of was luckily we are closest to the water tower so we actually had a little water pressure, we just had to let it build up for a little while. 

          Now this is Saturday, we made up a stupid but fun game thing foursquare, tennis, volleyball, soccer mix, it was really fun but we did so many stupid things. At breakfast Elder Fletcher was squeezing the butter thing, and it exploded all over, but luckily not him. Class was good, during our study time one of the flirt Elders came into our room without his companion! His comp was in the bano but still you don't do that especially when you ignore the elders in the room, so that set off a thousand and one alarms in my head, next we go to go get water from the jug in the hall, and his comp says to me sorry about him he is doing this with all the hermanas in the CCM. WHAT! ya creepy weird. Well then after TALL Hermana Collins and Hancock are outside because Collins isn't feeling good, and we leave them be because we can't really help and then I am standing outside while my comp is in the bano and the Elder who came in without his comp is talking to the hermanas and he helps Collins up and brushes her off since she was laying down! Another alarm went off. So we as the Elders that night called a super secret shower meeting to discuss this problem and it was determined to bring it up in leadership meeting Sunday. 

          Sunday we discover he is having problems being motivated, I am working on trying to love him and be kind despite his crossing the boundaries. We had great meetings but the best was the devotional by Hermano Shawn Cates, our director of instruction in the CCM. He is such a cool guy, he is working on his PHD and he has three kids and they are so funny. to watch run around the CCM. He gave a fantastic devotional about The Eye of Faith, remember Lots Wife, and we need to not long for the past, focus on the future, and be disease, or Never go away, never give up. and ya it was amazing. we watched a movie about John Tanner. 

        Monday we played our stupid game and this is the day of stupid great stories, I got two boxes of doughnuts, happy day. We played this game during our class which was run around and get your name tag and toss the other persons if you pick it up, I tossed Elder Fletcher's onto the roof on accident, luckily it bounced over so we got it. Elder Drennan had some sauce shotgun out of his meat onto his shirt so he wiped it up went to eat some, and he got one bite before he got splattered again. I will send the pictures. Oh and we had this plane fly over the CCM playing some recording about some fiesta that everyone is invited to so it was random that is Monday. 

                     Today I got a haircut and it is ROTC buzz style, which is not what I wanted, but it works so ay that was fun. We did laundry and we will go play some kickball that is my week.

        

--
Sincerely,
Elder Logan Joseph Draper

Mas Mas Mas Pictures

Last of the sunset photos, apparently I'm trigger happy (in a good way)

Riding the bus, now I know my district is behind me all the way :)

Mexico City Temple

Mexico City Temple (not too trigger happy)

Elders in front of the Christus

Elder Drapers. We saw each other!!!!!!

Draper Selfie

Another Selfie

Now someone else is taking the photo

Drapers in front of Christus

In front of the Christus. I am so glad I got to see my hero.

In front of the temple, me and my big bro.

My District in front of the Christus

Now I'm in front of the Christus

Now we switched sides

We got photo-bombed!

Elders of my district plus my favorite elder

Angel Moroni

Elder Draper and Elder Draper

Elder Drapers' name tags. The question is, who's whose?

I Saw My Brother!!

Dear Family Friends and other interested parties who I can not, will not, and do not even know to name.

          I have had a rather interesting week. so Tuesday finished up and we played kickball, and it was pretty great. We had a live devotional from BYU given by Neil L. Andersen. It was fantastic, it was about the Holy Ghost and I really enjoyed it though we ran out of time to talk as a district afterwards. 

           Wednesday is where things got interesting. I went to bed, and then woke up with a huge ingrown zit in my cheek, but it wasn't to big but it was like no warning signs whatsoever. Well I go through my day, wake up shower and get dressed go study for thirty ish minutes then go to breakfast study some more, teach eat lunch study more, teach more learn more eat again do more studying and learning go to bed. well that sums up pretty much every day but it gets more interesting so I decide to see what happens if I drain the zit well it drained lots of serous fluid then it  was gone nothing else it looked normal and I was like that was easy I went to bed and I woke up at midnight to blow my nose, and it was still perfectly good nothing nada, ha ha 

           Thursday I wake up and my cheek is swollen out of a healthy proportion and It is swelling towards my eye so I decided I need to go the Enfermeria, and they are like what the crap happened to your face, so I tell a sort of story thing and ya, I got some antibiotics and I had been praying for a simple miracle and here it was, the drugs, by Friday, had completely taken the swelling down to a safe amount, and it has just been getting better. 

             Friday was the day of confrontation, I bothered and bothered President Brown to know when I was going to the temple so that I could arrange to meet my brother since it is difficult to do when he doesn't have time left to spare. Well I had talked to him earlier and he informed me that my district was not going on Tuesday the 15th and I said that's not going to work so he actually got us on the temple trip, my entire district! I was happy and dancing around because I was going to see my brother.

              Well now it is time for the big day, Saturday. It was studying there is nothing much to note other than it didn't rain for twenty four hours! And we were walking to TALL and I saw Hermana Maestro standing outside and I didn't think anything of it until she came up to me and stopped Elder Drennan and I and asked, looking at me, "can you give a blessing in Spanish because we have a Hermana that really needs one." So after a second of confusion making sure we had what we needed, I gave Hermana Maestro a blessing of peace, comfort, and counsel because her Novio, fiance had just called off their wedding and she was devastated and he did it by letter. So that was sucky. I went to tall, and I was outside for a moment break and she was bringing her class in and happy and smiling. It was a really cool experience. 

             Sunday we said farewell to our branch president, Pres. Tenorio since he is going to BYU for two years. And I gave a talk in Spanish and I did total improv towards the end, and it ended up working out, we watched Mount of the Lord and I really appreciate the early saints in building the temple. 

              Monday we just did more work and teaching and freaking out that today would be Tuesday

            Tuesday I saw Travis! He is doing well and he is looking great. We got to the visitor center and I was kind of like where is my brother. Well we listen to a presentation about Christ in the Christus room. Then we are heading out for our tour and I hear "good to see you" and I know the voice. I don't even take look at his face and we just go bear hug on each other and I start to cry because here he is, my big brother, my hero. Wow, it was powerful moment and we talked in our British accents the rest of the time, we goofed off, and his mission buddies were like, wait this is your little brother you're joking right and we were like nope and everyone thought it was so cool. And Elder Alder was like Elder Drapers, "I'm happy for you." Since he was on the tour as well. We got some great pictures, which well come in another email. So I saw him, I hugged him, we had a great time and man, I really did miss him and I hope he misses me. And he game me a gift, he gave me one of his name tags to take with me on my mission. This gospel is true, we as missionaries sacrifice our friends, families, education, and other worldly things to share the gospel so that all families can be together forever. I love you all stay safe 

YOLO so don't do stupid

Oh and my comp Elder Drennan is friends with Emily Thompson's friend Sabrina, so pass the word on to Sabrina that I am companions with Jay Drennan, her home teacher at BYU 

Mom please edit out parts as you see fit, and please correct my grammar and punctuation.  

--
Sincerely,
Elder Logan Joseph Draper

Mas Pictures

Elders: Drennan, Draper, Hixon Fletcher, Gessel, Romney; Hermanas: Heufner, Garner, Collins, Hancock,  Brady,  Connor; Elders being awkward and the Sisters loving each other

Elders: Gessel, Romney, Drennan, Draper, Hixon, and Fletcher; Now we like each other and are trying to be cool (on the right end)

Tricycle, I want to ride it!

Nighttime

Nighttime, the outside world

On the road again

Flying High

The fence, to keep us in (or something out :)

Here at the wall, I thought this was the MTC not prison.

My Room, with messy boys (Elders)

My Bed, hopefully restful

The closet, I swear I have nothing to wear ;) and the end of the prison tour ( oh wait it's the CCM)

It's cloudy outside, I wonder if there will be rain

The CCM, my home for the next 6 weeks