Tuktumen Tuhcuncuin!

¿Tuku Kitwampa Kawaza? (whats up kids in totonaco)

I remember before I came out on my mission my uncle said to me "I remember laying in bed at night and thinking "Where in the heck am I?" Last night I was laying in bed and I kinda felt the same way. Sometimes its crazy to me I'm out here in Mexico preaching to the same people that alma describes as "hard hearted" "wicked" "set upon the traditions of their fathers" and it just strikes me that I am literally preaching to the decendents of the same lamanites that destroyed the nephite people. The same of which "dwindled in unbelief". I teach people daily that are literally set upon the catholic traditions of their fathers. A few months ago the counselor in the area presidency said to us as missionaries that if we wanted to baptize like alma, like the sons of mosiah, like any one of the great book of mormon missionaries, we only have to do what they did. That got me so pumped this week as I studied and me and good ol elder Noble are going to put them into effect for the rest of the time we are together.

This week I have also been trying to learn as much of the dialect language here, Totonaco, and I am stoked because a ton of people here speak it fluently and are teaching me. Next monday I am going to this little village next to the nephite ruins about a half hour away to go to the old library there to find a spanish to totonaco phrase book. Just in case I ever have to save some native lamanite souls. 

I will have nine months out on wednesday, high five for that.

This week the work was a little slower, I spent a lot of time on divisions and had 9 baptismal interviews but even with not a ton of time in my area we saw some miracles and had an awesome baptism for lucila yesterday! It was great to see her get baptized and for elder noble to have his first baptism! Her mom diana and her sister gabby are getting baptized in three weeks so pray for them, we just have to marry her parents between here and then but she is excited and the guy is willing even though he wants nothing to do with the church. We had a couple other investigators come to church and they are progressing well. This area is really good we just have to work hard.

Feliz cumpleaños to my main man Elder D-Money Puzey down in chile. You the best.

Funny story of the week.....I showed my companion which mosquitos here carry dengue and that freaked him out pretty bad. The next day I woke up with about 15 bites on my feet and ankles because we left a window open and that sucked but no dengue symptoms so thats good.

-Elder Draper

 

 

SOOOOO (mbrero) HOT

Family, Friends, my Father, and all you other Fools,

Firstly Happy Fathers Day to my dad, you are my favorite dad I have ever had and I am not just saying that. Thanks for being such a great example to me my whole life. Someone please go give my dad a hug for me.

This week was one of the best if not the best week I have had in my mission. We are seeing a ton of miracles and success here in Poza Rica. I think the biggest reason we have success because it is so hot people are begging us to get in some clean cool water. Another big reason is that Elder Noble is the best comp. Someone go look up his mom and drive to arizona to give her a giant high five for raising this guy.

I feel like Gandalf - Knocking on these Mexican Hobbit Doors

This week on tuesday we had a multi zone conference with president and hermana greer and it was awesome. President taught us a ton on how to better utilize the Book of Mormon while teaching and it really helped us this week to get people closer to their baptismal dates. 

Wednesday I did divisions with my zone leader Elder Mota and we found a bunch of people in his area that are soooo cool. He is one of my favorite missionaries in the mission and knows how to work hard and enjoy himself at the same time. I learned a lot from him.

Elder M

The rest of the week we had a ton of success in finding new investigators and met the goal we had set for the week. Yesterday in church we had 7 investigators and the other missionaries in the ward had 13 so we had like double the people we normally do!! Yesterday Lucila, who is getting baptized next week, brought her mom, Diana, and her little sister, Gabriela. Diana and Gabby have a baptismal date for july 19th. We are also teaching this lady named maria de jesus and she just has to get married and she can get baptized. We found a super awesome family this week. The moms name is Matilde and her daughter is a member but we also taught her other two sons and her mom, yail, abraham, and eloina. They are awesome as well and Matilde was able to go to church yesterday and has a baptismal date for july 19th as well. This area is killlller.

Lucila, Gabby, and Diana watching "He Lives"

This week in my personal study I was studying the role of Reflection in recieving Personal Revelation. As I read through the book of mormon I found many examples. Nephi when he recieved the vision of the tree of life was "pondering in mine heart" the words his father had spoken. Enos had reflected on his past transgressions before his wrestle with God, DyC 67 is another example, Joseph Smiths time immediately proceeding the first vision, another. When we read the holy scriptures, or the words of living prophets, and then in time ponder what we have studied, that is often when the Lord reveals many things unto us. I have seen this and bear witness that when we reflect upon ourselves and how we may be better, we humble ourselves, and when we humbe ourselves we allow the Lord to reveal many marvelous things unto us.

Funny stuff that happened this week, we found about 10 HUGE cucarachas last week in our house as well as a bunch of spiders so we asked our neighbor for Raid, they said just leave your door open and the lizards will come in and eat em. We now have about 3 lizards in our house and havent seen any cucarachas. Well played mexi-gyver neighbor.

Have a great week guys!

-Elder Drop air (how people say my name) 
 

Ai Yai Yai Yai....

Some Real Bull

Baptism Interview

Mortal Kombat on P-Day

Un Hombre Tan Sexi

Poza rica, mercury, venus, earth, mars, jupiter, saturn, uranus, neptune (pluto)

Hey you guys, it is super hot here. 

THIS WEEK ROCKED.

So last monday I had to go pack my bags and shtuff and that was great.

Tuesday morning we hauled over to the bus station to meet the other 15 missionaries heading north. We loaded our bags and we said peace to Xalapa and then spent 6 hours driving up the east coast of veracruz looking out at the ocean. The bus driver turned on some scandolous film to the bus television system but we were like uh no half of the bus is missionaries change the channel dog-to which he responed "gringo please take your seat"- so we chipped in, bought him and the other guy a big coke and chips and they put on robo cop and hunger games for us. Good guys.

When I got out of the bus in poza rica I realized I wasn't in xalapa anymore because DANG it is hot here. So hot. SO SO SO HOT, but it is a super awesome city.

Wednesday we had zone class and my old comp elder garcia is in my zone.

Tuesday to sunday we found a bunch of new investigators and met with all of the people we have in teaching right now to see how they are progressing. We are teaching a young lady named Lucila right now who has a baptismal date for the next few weeks as well as her parents who will hopefully be baptized next month. Maria de jesus just needs to get married to her husband (a member) to be baptized so we are working with her as well to get her to baptism. We had a sister tell us her non member son wants to be baptized so we are going there tonight to teach him, I am really excited!

This week was one of the best weeks I have had so far in my mission and it was because more than ever we had the spirit with us and we worked with the members. It is so important that you all work with the missionaries, you all are our only hope!

This week in my personal study I was reading my notes from last conference and there were a few things I really loved.

"The secret of discovery isn't in finding new landscapes but in seeing with new eyes" -Jose A. Teixiera

Elder Pearson taught six prinsiples of enduring to the end and started by saying "enduring to the end is a principle of the gospel, "hanging in there" is not". He then goes on relating these to the story of lehi's dream of the tree of life and the iron rod and gives the following
1. Don't forget to pray
2. Come unto Christ and be perfected in him
3. Press forward with faith
4. The Book of Mormon is key to spiritual survival
5. Don't be distracted and decieved
6. Stay by the tree.

He goes on to say three other statements I loved, first dont let someithing you dont fully understand destroy what you DO understand. Second, being politically correct may be spiritually lost. Thirdly, If you lose the spirit YOU ARE LOST. It was a super good talk, I would reccomend you guys go read it but in english so you understand :)

Funny story of the week happened this morning, my comp and I made this super big breakfast and were proud so we took pics. Then we realized we didnt have any syrup for our pancakes. so we run to the store around the corner and walk in buy and walk out. When we got home we realized we were both in matching flip flops, black basketball shorts, and mexico jerseys, and we are both gringos. We got some funny looks but its cool. gringos rule.

Have a fantastic week and remember, if everything is working out perfectly for you right now, just wait!

-Elder Draper

Feliz Cupleanos

Elder C

Bus Ride to Poza Rica

Stop kitten around

I mustache you a question - !Viva Mexico!

Mexican Air Conditioning

Cute Nina named Dulce

Me and Elder Noble

Elder Noble

Feasting on the word and a delicioso desayuno this morning

Soccer with zone in the pouring rain

19 Years and Changes!

HOLA! 

Shout out to elder clegg who also eats that fruit lichis all the way down in sur africa 

OK todays letter is gonna be kinda short I dont have a ton of time.

This week was pretty cool, I worked a lot with the assistants and that was a cool opportunity. Tuesday I did divisions with the new elder that was in my district and that was fun. He is a good kid.

Sunday night the assistants called me with the changes and I got moved to POZA RICA. It is the hottest area in the whole mission! I am going to be changing to an american companion as well! His name is Elder Noble and I am his mom, aka I will finish his training this change. I am pumped to work with a greenie and an american.

OK I leave tomorrow morning early so I gotta go back and pack my stuff up but THANK YOU SO MUCH TO ALL OF YOU WHO SENT ME HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAIL. I loved hearing from  you all, dave and dawn, ben and liz, kellee and dan and fam, halee and derek, grandma draper, grandma and grandpa thomas, mckayla, kadee, rylee, savanah, schaeffer, lewis family, all you guys seriously thanks! If i didnt say your name above send me a box of cat litter and I will accept it with open arms.

LOVE YOU GUYS!

Elder Draper

Mission Pictures

With Elder y Hermana Pino and President y Hermana Greer

Mision Completa
The Whole Mission with Elder Christensen and Elder Pieper

How many months does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop?

The world may never know. 

WHAT'S UP GUYS? How are you all? Congrats to all you kids who just graduated from high school, life gets pretty cool pretty fast. 

Ok well today is cool because I have 8 months in the mission, The time is going by crazy quick. This was a pretty slow week but it had its high points for sure.

The week started with a gnarly storm, the first hurricane of the year is kissing at the state of veracruz and here in the capital its been dumping some mad thunderstorms. We got soaked once again. 

I did divisions with the elders in my district this week and did 8 baptismal interviews.

Ward Baptisms

 We found a super cool family this week and are really excited for them but they didn't come to church on Sunday so that was a real bummer. Antonio works for the government and is working right now to send food and water north to where they had a tornado last week (1st ever tornado in mexico). 

Saturday we went to this little school and scraped crappy paint off the wall and then re-sealed it. Next Saturday we are painting.

Service Project

 Ate some crazy fruit today called a lichi. It looks like a big raspberry has a hard shell and is like a big white booger inside and it is pretty stinkin good. I ate probably 15 this morning, then got a knee to the face playing street ball with the zone so I ate 10 more and sat in the shade.

Lichi

 Saddest news to hear Elder Perry passed away this week. He was one I always learned a lot from, especially in the last few conferences. A great man with a great life.

This week I was thinking back to the good ol' days almost exactly 1 year ago when I graduated and I made a little list of "since then"s

Since I graduated high school.......

-I have gained 11 Kilos

-I have grown 1 inch

-I can now grow a beard

-I have developed a love for tacos

-I have learned a new language

-I have learned that Nacho Libre is 95% accurate

-75% of the girls I dated in high school are now married or engaged or on missions

-I have lived abroad for 8 months

  

So to all you kids who just graduated you have a lot to look forward to :)

 Exito y Animo en la semana!

Elder Draper

Helped a member cut down half of his platano tree

Elder C with his giant shrimp cocktail (sometimes he smiles!)

My favorite snack - Tuna filled avocado!

Don't be so crabby