Merry Christmas 12/23/14

Hola my friends and family!

This week has been awesome! My whole district is getting closer and closer and its a lot of fun. The Christmas season in the MTC is a little different but its amazing. Its weird having palm trees everywhere and one Christmas tree on the whole campus. This last week we had about 100 new missionaries show up so its been crazy. I'm pretty sure 90% of them were from Utah. 

Teaching has been going well. we have a lesson everyday except for Sundays and Tuesdays. This last Sundays we had a really good lesson in priesthood about priesthood blessings. Our branch president gave it to us. He said the first 3 steps before a priesthood blessing for the sick and afflicted is 1. good medical care 2. prayer of faith 3. blessing. those were the steps before the blessing and then the steps for the actual blessing is 1. anointing 2. sealing 3. have faith 4. words of the blessing 5. will of God. He then told a story of how this little girl was sick and had passed away. The father at the funeral calmly got up to talk and he explained that she had had the best medical care, we all had faith, the blessing was done correctly which led him to the last step and simply said that it was the will of God and she had a special place in heaven. It was very powerful. 

Today was awesome! My district and a couple other districts got to hop in a bus and head to the Mexico city temple! It was way cool. We didn't get to go in to the temple because it is having remodeling but the visitors center was way cool and it was nice to leave the MTC for a little. Mexico city is crazy! I have a lot of pictures that ill hopefully attach to my dropbox! The driving down here is nuts. There are nasty peros every where. We tried having our driver pull over for some street tacos but he wouldn't let us. 

Elder Berry in front of the Mexico City Temple

Street Taco shop

This last week we have had some amazing devotionals. Some about missionary work and others about Christmas. These next 2 days are loaded with some devotionals so I'm excited. on Christmas morning it says a "special Christmas devotional" so I'm hoping for a general authority which would be awesome.  

This whole week a crew of Mexicans have been putting in sewer or something on campus and everything they do is exactly what i did this last summer. Every time i walk by i tell myself never construction again. 

The food is same old same old. I would pay a lot of money for a burger... 

                                           
                                                 
Anyways hope all is well.

Love, Elder Berry 

First "investigator" in the MTC. 12/16/14

Hola friends and family!

So far my experience has still been awesome. Its crazy, i have never felt the spirit this many times in my life. its awesome. Every Sunday in between priesthood meeting and sacrament we have a district meeting that always turns into a cry fest. This week we all went around in the circle and shared why we came out on the mission. The mission is already changing me. Before the mission i'll be honest i never really wanted to read the Book of Mormon... now i cant put it down. I love it. Also i am definitely  closer with my Father in heaven. 

So the whole first week we would have to plan and prepare a lesson in Spanish for an "investigator". The lesson would be for about 30 min. My companion and i struggled for the first 4 lessons. When the 5th one came around it was awesome. I had only written down 2 sentences. When she would ask questions i could respond and show her the answer in the Book of Mormon or Preach my Gospel. It was awesome. My companion shared his testimony and then i shared mine. we were all crying. After the lesson we walked out and gave each other a big hug and I said, "The gift of tongues is real man". Then i come to find out that, that "investigator" was our night teacher.. Spanish is coming along though. If i think hard i can put together what people are saying but every teacher here says that Chileans speak crazy fast so that makes me a little worried.

My companion and i still get along really well. None of us clash in our whole district which is awesome and a blessing because there is another district in our casa that all don't like each other... The days are long here. 16 hours... Being with good people helps out a lot. Every one has their stories from home. 

This Sunday was really awesome. However each Sunday you have to prepare a 5 min talk in Spanish and they give you a topic a week before hand. After the sacrament The conductor will look out in the audience and pick people to come up and give a talk. We have about 30 people in our sacrament meeting and 7 got chosen this week. luckily i wasn't one of them. We got a new batch of elders this last week and 2 of them had to give talks and they were both super nervous. It sounds bad, but it was pretty funny. 

A funny story this week was when we were in our district meeting. Elder Coulson was telling us why he came out on his mission and he was saying how there was this kid who was always into trouble with everything. When he was explaining him he yelled "I mean the kid was a SON OF A BISHOP!" We all thought he was gonna cuss and we all cracked up. It turned around that the kid cleaned up his act and went on a mission and came back a changed man and that was one of his reasons for coming out. 

My favorite scripture of the week is Alma 29:9. Its awesome. I don't have time to quote in on here but i would encourage you all to look it up. It talks about missionary works and being an "Instrument in the hands of God".

I love you all.

Happy Birthday Momma! I sure love you!

Elder Berry

First week at the Mexico MTC! 12/09/14

Hola family and friends!

So far my experience has been awesome! When I showed up we ate and then checked in and everything and then met my companion! He´s awesome. His name is Elder Bliss and he is from Oklahoma. We make each other crack up and he is like the perfect companion. He is super into fitness so he is always doing push ups and different exercises at night  We live in a casa that has I think 5 rooms and 2 bunk beds in each room. Elder Bliss and I are roommates with Elder Young from Oregon/Utah. He is funny! ( mom he was the twin i showed you on insta that one day) he came with a carry on full of pills that he claims heal anything. He says they heal arthritis, they grow back your hair and they can fix almost any disease. But he is a hilarious kid. Elder Hillen from Alaska. He is an awesome guy. He is 21, went to BYU this last year and was converted 3 years ago. Its pretty cool to see him out on a mission.  In the room next to ours there are 4 other missionaries and all of us are going to Osorno Chile! We all got here the same day and are all in the same district. Elder Davis-Temecula Elder Linton-Wyoming Elder Coulson- north Utah Elder Weyand-Arizona. We also have two hermanas in our district but they are going to Pocatello, Idaho. They are awesome. I don't have a problem with anybody in my district. 

The weather here is awesome! its about 40's in the morning and then about 60's to 70's during the day. The MTC campus is pretty sweet. When we were coming in from the airport it was crazy. I thought we were going to get in 20 accidents. When we got to the MTC we drove through a security gate and saw all this green grass. Its really nice here. Its pretty wild because just on the other side of the security wall is what comes to your mind when you think of Mexico city... I feel very safe though. I was told what we hear are not gun shots... I don't know about that. Just kidding! This whole week is the celebration of the virgin of Guadalupe, which is like the biggest celebration in Mexico. Its pretty much where they just blow off fireworks all week, that kinda sound like bombs... I guess the big night is supposed to be the 12 of December. Last night one of the fireworks went wrong and lit a hill on fire that we could see from the MTC. I tried to take a pic but I didn't have my camera.. Overall the MTC is way nicer than I was expecting and so far I love it!

The food... The food is alright.. not bad, but not the best. Its a mix between Mexican food and American. One day last week I had chips and salsa and cheese for breakfast.. Every single meal has bread in it...and if its a sandwich that already has bread, then they will give you more bread. Also, beans and rice.. I kinda had to lay of those for a little if you know what I mean... Other than that the food isn't bad! Every meal I get grapefruit soda which might top a Mexican coke... Elder Davis is probably the funniest kid I know. This last week his mom sent him Krispy Kreme doughnuts (off of this missionary website or something where you can order things from Mexico city and it is supposed to take only like 3 days) but Elder Davis walks into our room and says "mom knows how to do it right" and he was just holding a whole box of doughnuts. It was hilarious. and then he gave us all a doughnut which was heaven. They have this store here that pretty much has everything. but its tiny. They have 100% real pomegranate juice for like 10 pesos which is less than a buck US. I get one everyday. 

Espanol... The Spanish is tough and hard but i feel like i have learned more Spanish in this last week than i have my whole 2 year sin high school. Everyday we are in our classrooms after breakfast preparing to teach our investigator in Spanish. Our 3rd day here we met our investigator and taught her a 30 min lesson in Spanish.. It was tough but we have taught her 3 times now and its getting better every time. Even though I don't know the language very well i feel the spirit every time we teach her.   My classroom is my district and then our maestro. Hermano Carranza. He is Hilarious! such a funny teacher but a great one. Always gives his testimony and the spirit is always there. I can say my prayers in Spanish and also give my testimony in Spanish so its coming along.

Sundays are definitely the best day of the week. Its just a break from all the learning and we just got to church, study and have a district meeting. Our district meeting was pretty much a cry fest. Ill be honest that was probably one of my top 3 most spiritual moments. We all went around the circle and gave our favorite scripture and a piece of advice we received before we came out. It was awesome. 

I love it here and I love all of you!!

If you have any questions let me know and i will try to answer them next Tuesday! ill try to be on the computer at 11 my time..  

Also i know my grammar is horrible, but i only have an hour and I'm a slow writer...  

p.s. I forgot my paper with all the emails on it so mom feel free to forward this to anybody

Love you all!

 Elder Berry 

Elder Bliss from Oklahoma, Tanner's first companion

                                                                MTC District        

Elder Davis and the ginormous Mexican spider

Tanner's first letter from Mexico City 12/03/14

Hola my friends!

Elder Berry reporting in from Mexico City! Flight was a little rough but not too bad. I flew with Elder Niko, Elder Madsen and another elder and then met some more elders down here in the airport. I went over my immunization record with the doc and he said I'm missing hepatitis A and tdap which is tetnus. He said if you guys could find the date that i got those immunizations and email me the date of when i got them, then i don't have to get them here. if you can't find a record of those then i have to get them here. here at the MTC they don't have typhoid... so i have have to get it in Chile or go without it. They only gave us 5 min to do this email so i have to run

Love you!

Elder Berry