October 27, 2014

Hey all! Sorry I didn't get an email out last week, I didn't get a pday because I had to travel from the CCM.

My second week in the CCM was both exciting, and boring. We had a lot of workshops about life in the field and things like that, which were extremely boring, but we were also getting ready to leave which was exciting.

Last tuesday we left the CCM and arrived in Cusco. We were picked up at the airport by the mission president, then he took all of us to the Cristo Blanco, which was super cool. We had dinner at the mission house and we all got to talk to President a bit and get to know him. He's a great guy and from what I hear he's done wonders for this mission. I'm excited to work with him more. The next day we learned where we were going and who our first companions would be. They sent me to a city called Puno and my companion's name is Elder Thompson. Believe it or not, he's from Spanish Fork too, which has been fun to see who our mutual friends are and talk about stupid things like how you could find anyone at Macey's. It really makes me miss home though. That night we went out contacting in Cusco. Elder Thompson and I talked to 10 different people (3 of which were famililes) and were able to get their numbers and stuff which was sweet. The people in Cusco are extremely friendly, I hope I get to serve there before I leave.

Puno's been really cool too, though. I can see Lake Titicaca from our building, which is sweet. The building that we live in is owned by this little old lady we call Mamita. She's a member and she does a lot for the church here. Our chapel's actually on the first floor of our building, Mamita lives on the second floor, and we live on the fourth. That's been really convinient because if we're doing something in the chapel like teaching seminary or sunday school (both of which we had to do) we can just hurry upstairs to grab things. The other ward members that I´ve met have been really strong too, especially the bishop's family. The problem in our ward is that nobody stays active, over 70% of the members never come. So sacrament meeting was basically just the Bishop's family, Mamita, and us. We're working with a lot of people to try and bring them back though.

Hope you're all doing well.

Elder Thacker