This week was really good. There were a lot of hard times but also a lot of great experiences and fun times. We landed in Peru at about midnight and bussed to the CCM (MTC) which was pretty sketchy because everyone here isn't good at driving and the bus driver cut like 6 people off on our 15 minute ride here haha. I had made good friends on the plane and was hoping I would get them as a companion but I got someone I didn’t expect and at first I was almost disappointed but I knew that I needed to stop being selfish and just give my best effort at loving him and adapting to him. Anyway, we didn’t get into bed until around 3 a.m. which was hard on us, but was good when I heard all the elders yelling Buenos dias!! to everyone. Then I heard Cam yell, “Where's Cory… I mean Elder Rokovitz?!" Even though he and I had a bit of problems before I left, we didn’t care and just hugged and were so glad to see each other here! It has been really nice to see him here and have him here. My companion's name is Elder Lee. He is from California, a little town, I want to say it's by Modesto, but I'm not positive. He's really nice and knows scriptures really well, which really helps for our lecciones (lessons). He's really quiet and that’s really hard because I'm definitely not. Also he seems to like to take his time with everything and we are usually last to everything which is annoying, but I'm trying to give him little hints at being quicker and earlier to things. I'm trying to adapt to him and love him. I pray for him every day and pray to figure him out better and it seems to be getting a little better each day which is really good.
I still haven’t missed you guys and don’t know if I will for a bit, haha sorry. I guess I'm just used to being away from home. There are 11 elders and 2 hermanas (sisters) in our district. One of them is a trio, that’s why it's an odd number. Most of them are from Utah but I'm not really positive haha, but I love my district. They're all really cool and funny. We all have a great time and we've had some really good spiritual experiences with each other too. We seem to have been friends for forever even though we've only known each other a few days haha, but it's really cool.
The food is half the time good and the other half it's so nasty and I'm almost already sick of chicken and rice haha. There are tons of really good juices here and some really good things that I don’t even know what they are. The corn juice is the nastiest thing ever and so are the olives… I almost threw up… The corn juice is straight purple and tastes like straight puke but other than that it's pretty dang good!
On the first morning we went in to meet the President and do all our passport stuff etc. He is really nice and his wife is really friendly too. I love them! He could already tell I wrestled before I told him haha. They're really great though.
The first day was pretty good. It didn’t hit me yet that the language is hard because they were talking in English.. but my typical day starts off with a shower that is either super hot or super cold, you don’t really get to pick the temperature here, it just sort of is good for a minute then it decides to let Satan lick your back with hot water, then go right back to the Antartic. It's pretty dificil (difficult) but I'll get used to it. Breakfast here is really small so you just eat everything they put out, it's not all-you-can-eat. Then we just have studying and classes etc. Our maestra (female teacher) for Spanish is really sweet and doesn’t know much English, which has been super hard some of the days, but she's a really good teacher. Our maestro (male teacher) for the gospel is super cool too, which is uncommon, and he served his mission in Utah! He also acts as our investigator, (Johan).
Anyway, I have been having a few hard days in the morning or flashes of bad attitudes when either my companion makes us late or I don’t understand the language. They don’t speak English to us which is very hard sometimes. The language is VERY hard. By the way, spoiler alert: Papia isn’t that great. Sorry, it can be decent at times but most the time it's pretty gross. (Mom here - I couldn't figure out what Papia was.)
Anyway our first time teaching Johan, I wasn’t stressed at all. I just was like, it is what it is, and pretty much read from my notes and regardless of what he said, I just kept going and asking my next question because I didn’t understand him hahaha.
I realized how much I am not good at futbol (soccer) here because we played with the Latinos and it was super hard. I did however score a really good goal when Elder Parker assisted me and then I headed it in. It was pretty awesome.
We've decided that the CCM is less of a training center and more of a carsel (jail). Yeah it's good and a great spirit but sometimes it seems like a prison, looking at the outside world, and we know everyone thinks that. Especially when we did service, which was straight cleaning the CCM haha. Anyway I love you guys and I'm really sorry that I wasn’t able to include everyting in detail! I wish I had more time but my compenero (companion) was taking a bit to get here. I love you all so much and don’t miss you yet!!! hahaha
Oh and one more thing, it's really green and pretty here and it's always cloudy and when it rains it's not even rain.
It's just like getting sprayed softly with a spray bottle. Anyway.. hasta la pasta.
Elder Rokovitz
On the plane shipping off to Peru. This is only a tiny bit of us, but the plane was cool and big.
I just thought this was cool. It was huge.
All the missionaries on the plane that were going to the CCM
A few of the Trujillo Sur (South) boys.
A little point on picture of my tag.
My bed and most of our room. Yes, I do make my bed.
The beautiful view from our window of the beloved futbol field.
Me and my companion, Elder Lee
All the elders in our district. All are going to Truillo Sur except Elder Simonsen on the far left who is in the trio and going to Arequipa.
Our district with the Hermanas. They are also going to Trujillo.
Our class/district studying.
Me and Cammy B (Elder Bates) being all matchy and stuff.
