Whitney's last mission email

Oh my DAAAAAYS, HERE WE GO!

So this week was pretty great--I'd say we ended off with a great finish and we got a lot of stuff done! It kinda feels like mission birthdays, where you wish it'd be special or amazing but really it's just the same as always!

As far as my plan for the next few days, I have a normal Pday today--I'm 75% packed, although I will probably send a package home that I've been meaning to send this whole transfer...na ja. So I might pull out money for that! I take a train tomorrow at 9AM to Berlin--it'll be interviews and last minute stuff--I should get my bike fund back since I didn't use it, so I should have more than enough Notgeld while I'm travelling. woot! So Tuesday, I will be in Berlin with all the Finishers. Part of the tradition is going to Mauerplatz--and they'll put pictures of that on the blog, keine Sorge. Wednesday I fly out and the rest...you know already! It feels really weird to be going home. Because it doesn't feel like I'm going home at all--like it's a big joke or something. BUT I'm pretty much packed and very much stoked. 

Anyway, like any other normal week, we had a few Termins fallen out or we tried meeting with people that we found in our area book and realized that nope, they still don't have interest! So that was good. Hahah, no, it wasn't good, but it's always good to know we went over and saw for ourselves that no, they really aren't interested so we don't "wonder" if they're ready again.

At DCM this week I had to give a Thema on what I learned on my mission. It was sort of scattered because I didn't neccissarily plan it out like a talk, but the main thing I talked about was keeping a good attitude. I personally find it annoying when people complain too much about how hard a mission is, because it means they're looking at all the negatives and they aren't shedding any light on the positives. I don't care if you did it out of Priesthood Pflicht, you signed the dotted line, you signed up for this, might as well make the most of it. Basically no one can decide for me if my mission is hard--I can decide if I'm going to enjoy my mission or if my mission was fun or full of joy. And I think that's helped me look at hard times and think, it's all in a day's work. I can stay inside and pout or get over it and teach lessons. I dunno, missions are stressful, but I don't like letting stress getting the better of me. That doesn't mean you can never say anything negative about what's happened, I know I've whined a few times, or many a time, but I see others who make hard things more difficult for themselves and they end up being their worst enemy, their biggest stumbling block, and then when they fail, it makes them sink lower and lower. But it doesn't have to BE like that. No one signs up for torture, so don't make a mission sound like it's some big scary thing. It's the coolest thing I've ever done and I wouldn't trade any of my days for anything. I'll keep my bad days, because this gospel has saved me and refined me and I don't have to stop because I'm going home. But no, I'm no judger of Sunday TV! Please, I'm no prude RM! But trust me, I've heard my share of excuses, meine flippin gute.

The funny thing is watching Sis. Avanesjan just jump into missionary work; she's waiting for her Visa so she can go to the Provo MTC and serve in Arizona, so serving a month or so in Germany wasn't really part of the plan, but she jumps right in with the lessons even without formal training in the MTC, of course she has the language down, and so she has no qualms calling people up, and that's how we ended up teaching SO many lessons this past week. But she's sometimes discouraged with OYMing because the people (I'm sure) are terrified of Dritts! So when she talks to someone, she's like, "I'm so nice, why do they act like they saw a ghost?" Just a trick of the trade! There's that, and she just laughs uncontrollably during really awkward lessons. Na ja :P

Friday was transfer calls, THAT was weird, because I knew they wouldn't call my name. Sis. Tidwell found out that she is double training--meaning she has Sis. Avanesjan and then a new girl fresh from the MTC. From what I heard, ALL the Sisters in the mission are training new Sisters. We will soon have more Sisters than Elders in our mission!!! Weird that I leave right when EVERYONE is getting a Golden, but training Sis. Avanesjan is about the closest thing to training.

Saturday was our big miracle day. We visited a Fr. Habaland, a contact in our Area Book. Sis. Avanesjan called her and set up an appointment, and later I read through the record and the last entry said to leave her alone because she REALLY didn't want contact, had some issues with commandments and didn't want to be baptized. So I was a little wary of how this would go. So that was a year ago. We showed up and after teaching a bit about the Book of Mormon and kind of letting her know our purpose and that we want to help her quit smoking and be baptized she was totally on BOARD. She wanted our number, when church was, when the English class was, when they had choir, and she was like, "you can come once a week, and I'd really like for you to come on Wednesdays." That my friends, is a MIRACLE if I've ever seen one! It was a real shot to the face, just to know that people may need time to be ready again, but she is really ready NOW for the gospel. She said the past year that she didn't go to church or didn't meet with the missionaries, she still couldn't stop thinking about the church and I think she really wanted it back. We changed our number this past month, so there was probably no way she could call us herself--unless WE called her! So that was really amazing. She is SOLID, and if she really has the desire, I know she will finally find a way to stop smoking and really make a baptismal date-finally! So cool!

Sunday was sort of weird, knowing that it would be my last in German! No more having to translate! I didn't get to know the ward as much as I'd like, because I only had 6 weeks, and most of them forgot that I was leaving, so they of course wished me well on my way home, but it wasn't really the same. I still gave a "farewell" testimony. It was just HILARIOUS because Chang, actually took a picture of me on his PHONE (we've already had to tell him he can't video-record musical numbers) and it made that camera click sound really loud and then he swore in German, so yeah, half way through I couldn't really concentrate. Meine gute.... XP

After the meeting, we met Wassili, a past investigator. He's Russian and his German isn't so good, so we just got to know him a bit and next week we'll ask a Russian member to help us translate. But he had a Book of Mormon and said, "I read this book, you can have it back." "No, we don't need it, we don't read Russian, but you can keep it really!" "But I already read the whole thing?" "Whaaat?" So I'm excited to see how the Sisters finish teaching him! Meine gute, the work goes on! We ended our Sunday with Schw. Busse and Fr. Frömmel and that was great. We watched Finding Faith in Christ and it lead to a good conversation that really helped Fr. Frömmel understand more about the Atonement.

So I'd say that's the hilights of the week--today we're just going to relax, teach some lessons, and eat a Döner Box one last time. (It's just Döner meat and fries--the part that everyone really wants!) It sucks leaving Sis. Tidwell and Sis. Avanesjan because we get along SO well and have so much fun. But Sis. Tidwell studies in Draper so we will be best friends when she comes home in 4 months, kein Problem! :)

So yeah...like jumping off the high dive. Think I might be sick. Just kidding! I haven't had a break in 18months, time for ein bissel Pause.

I'm beyond excited to see you in a few days!!!! Bis dann!

--Sis. Whit

Nine more days.....

Hallloooooooo Familie!

So this week has felt like a year, but also like 5min--all at the same time. Time is pretty weird when you're down to the wire. I'm not in denial, but it definitely doesn't feel like I'm going home. Maybe because I've had so many weird dreams about me being home it just doesn't feel real! But for right now I'm using it to my advantage and I'm just working like there's no tomorrow!

Well, one of our zone leaders had a birfday last Monday and we celebrated....by picking up our Golden! So for some missionaries, they get their call but they have to wait for their Visa for a few months...so she has a call but can't leave the country yet. If missionaries stay in Europe they go to Preston and the process isn't so lame. But she is going to Mesa, Arizona and so we're giving her pre-MTC training how a mission REALLY is, but her English is good enough that she'll probably be fast-tracked. She can teach in English schon.She is actually from Armenia but has lived in Germany for 15 years so she can speak really good German but ISN'T German, so it's great. She's actually learning a lot of slang from us, that'll get her places! Nothing too bad, just things like "dangit", "crap", "true dat" and solche andere Sachen. But don't worry, she's taught us some hiLARIOUS slang back. It's pretty intimidating to see three Sisters power walking across the street, so I'm sure we've given Dresden a run for her money. We are too le-dritt to quit! So yeah, btw, her name is Sis. Avanesjan which sounds like "I'm an Asian"--that's what I made up to help the Elders say her name right, because they don't want to get caught looking at her name tag. It's really funny because she says exactly what's on her mind in the most hilarious English ever, and I find myself looking over at Sis. Tidwell like, "should we correct that English?" Na ja, she' super sweet and ready to rumble, so we love it.

But for our actual Pday, we went to a cool museum to see a lot of cool artifacts and all these tiny, expensive things that people have crafted for the kings and queens here, kinda like looking at a jewelry. There was a special exhibit of stuff that used to belong to Ivan the Terrible and stuff like that, pretty impressive. We also had a surprise party for Elder Wride, and we blew up 195 balloons, made him a cake, and just hung out before our lessons at the church. It was pretty great.

As for our week, we had a LOT of finding time, aka not a lot of time to let Sis. Avanesjan get some practice on teaching the lessons. But we made a spontan visit bei Chang since our appointment fell out. And I pulled a random scripture out of NOWHERE to share with him as a spiritual thought, and he said (imagine in the coolest Chinese accent ever), "Olsen, that scripture was quite helpful!" Yeah, he calls us just by our last name, it's funny. But he's been stressin and I found a scripture I liked and he really needed it--quality, people!

On Wednesday, we got to go to the temple--my last time at the Freiberg. It was pretty great and I was able to do the whole session in German! I also saw some members from Chemnitz there! So that was a great surprise. It was a really great experience. What was even...more interesting as an experience was that after we ate Döners at the Dönerladen, a couple of dumb kids started throwing ROCKS at us. Like, in Germany, they don't salt the sidewalks, they use little rocks that get stuck in your boots, and the kids just picked those up and chucked them at us, like I got hit in the face a few times. We...couldn't really do anything because we're missionaries and we didn't want to do anything that would get us in trouble so we just walked away. Actually, we all stared at them dumb-founded like, "are these little snots really throwing rocks at us?" But we just walked away and the Elders were like, "we just got stoned! We're like the Apostles!" They WISHED they could call out some she-bears, meine GUTE. But if it makes anyone feel better, the weather has warmed up QUITE a bit this past week, all the snow melted away like THAT. It's back to being cold, but not really cold enough to snow. Woot.

We had this pretty cool German class--now that we actually HAVE a German-speaker with us. But we taught Peter, the investigator from the Elders how to say a prayer in German, SO cool. It's cool to be able to suppor the other Elders in their work as much as they support us.

We also had a miracle! We saw Alejandra! We haven't been able to get into contact with her this entire time and now, we finally have a Termin set up! That was a miracle for sho! Also, we've been having some major Golden Power as we call it. We had Sis. Avanesjan call people while we were updating records and she set up 8 appointments with less actives and contacts from our Area Book, in a ROW! That like, never happens, meine gute. 

My 18th month mark was this past Sunday! holy meine GUUUUUUTE. It goes by pretty fast, it's true what they say. But it was pretty great. We taught Fr. Frömmel, and ate a ton of food at our Essenstermin. I have a checklist of all the things that need to get done this week and I'm pretty excited to get it all done. I've learned a lot this past week about myself, that when others are like, "this is HAAARD" I'm like, "watch me how I WORK!" and we just get it done! And it's been great to show Sis. Avanesjan the ropes and such. We're doing a joint-training thing and it's been like, the best way to end my mission, because we're like 110% obedient and she wants to work, and we're hopefully going to see a lot of miracles this week, we already have! Sorry my email is so, lame, but our week didn't have too much to talk about and surprisingly I'm almost out of time! Email time i mean!

Anyway, have a great week everyone! I'm excited to finish strong and keep going on.

love,

Sis. Whit

A few more emails left...

Hallo Familie!

Things have been a little chilly--it's been snowing like Christmas here! But it's just the "pretty" snow--it's not too deep or too hard to manage. But it HAS been pretty dang cold.

For Pday, dad would be pretty proud of me--we went to tour the Gläsermanufator for Volkswagen, the only one there is! We did the tour in German and meine FLIPPIN gute, I learned a lot of new car vocab! It's like the BMW one in München, where people order custom cars and you see them build them there. Everyone wears white work overalls like Oompa Loompas or suits if they're giving tours. So that was pretty interesting. They wouldn't let us take any pictures, blarg. But our tickets looked pretty cool. We went with our Elders and they just geeked out over everything. *sigh* Act like they've never seen a shiny car before!

On Tuesday we were hoping to see this "golden" Russian lady, Olicia, but to our dismay, she never came, and that was a disappointment because we thought she was pretty solid. But she has our address and our number--if she wants a BoM, she knows who to call!

We taught Shun that day, and it went pretty well. For someone who didn't really believe in God before, he's pretty demut and willing to learn and keep the commandments. He said that keeping the word of wisdom would be hard for him because in China, just like any Asian nation I imagine, being able to drink, or to drink when the Chef wants him to...that's how they keep their jobs or move further in their careers. Pretty sad. But he's willing to try anyway. He's like, "I really think the 10 Commandments are quite wonderful." "Will you come to church this Sunday?" "Errrrm, I don't think I can make it." "Shun, that's the 4th commandment!!" Na ja. When students make it to church, it's a pretty big deal.

On Wednesday we had another shock. We went to find Andre at his apartment, and we met his "roomate," an older woman in his "cult"/group/Dingsbum that took him in because he had no where to go--well he told us that he went to Köln because of his father being sick. But she told us that his father died...and that Andre stole HER money to make it to Köln and if you can imagine, he's too scared to come back. But it sounds like he was pretty mentally unstable because of some things his father did to him in his childhood...and so yeah, we can't really meet with him anymore. We just left the apartment like, "are you serious?" We are in the middle of the craziest scenarios sometimes! But I can say mom, I've never been in any scary/dangerous situations! I know the Holy Ghost protects me, but I don't push the limits at all. But there are some things you can't control. Like our crazy investigators "living on faith".

We, however, had the best pick-me-up lesson ever right after. We taught a German class for Peter, a student from South Korea (they have to learn German here to be able to start their Masters or other classes, pretty intense, right?), but Chang and his "joint teach", Bru. Kato came early and sat in our German class. Can you imagine? A Japanese, South Korean, and a Chinese guy in our German class--taught by two American girls? Meine GUTE. Apparantly Bru. Kato can decifer Chinese characters, so I guess this means Jordo could potentially understand Chinese as well, mal sehen! We also taught Chang some of the Nachbelehrungen, aka, we retaught or reviewed the Plan of Salvation and it was just GREAT. It's great when they not only understand all the parts, but they realize how important it is and how great it is to know this stuff. Loved it!

We still went to see Frau Frömmel and had a pretty great lesson on prayer. It's kinda hard to hold a commitment to this lady, because she's old and wants to go at her pace, I guess. But we're patient and Schw. Busse, her friend is really nice and totally, the best joint teach ever!

Hilarious story. For a Stake FHV Aktivität, our ward is singing "Oh Happy Day" from Sister Act as a thing for a talent show or something, so this Friday we had the first practice. We needed Whoopie's help because...Germans can't sing GOSPEL! If Mr. Pellaton was there, he'd say they sounded pretty "white bread." But they at least asked us for help on pronouncing the w's. Meine flippin GUTE. It was still pretty hilarious, AND full of drama. Choirs in Germany are so full of drama because everyone says it like it is, if they think something's wrong of if it sounds bad. :P

After that, we tried to have a lesson with Chang. We decided to meet him at KFC because that is LITERALLY his favorite place in the whole WORLD, but it was pretty funny; we were going to meet at a Haltestelle and go together because he didn't know where it was...and after 30min of waiting we saw him walking away from KFC! He wasn't waiting where we told him to, but he found the place and ate like, a bucket of chicken while he was waiting for us! Meine gute. We want to help him be ordained a Priest and get the Aaronic Priesthood! Woot!

On Saturday I had to call out some less active on smoking, because her apartment smells like smoke all the TIME. That was a bit awkward! She blamed it on her son though, "My son comes and smokes here." What, all the TIME? So yeah, awkward dinosaur.

Sunday was wie IMMER, just a crazy day! For one thing, Familie Heitbreder came to visit their daughter in Dresden and came to church this Sunday--Präsident Heitbreder was the Branch President in Eisenhüttenstadt! It was pretty cool to see some members that I literally met a year ago. WEIRD. Their daughter, Della is going on a mission in May and I'm pretty excited for her. It was nice that they recognized me and were pretty happy to see me. Schw. Heitbreder is pretty crazy as usual. So yeah, blast from the past! Della told me that they're going to get Elders in FFO and the Sisters will live in EHS, the work is just booming there, doing me proud!

I also just got an email from Sis. Young--Michael Mauritz in Bielefeld moved up his baptismal date--he's getting baptised THIS SUNDAY! That's Feb 3rd, officially my 18th month mark. WHUUUUUUT??!?!?! So crazy!! I hope to get me some pictures! So great.

We also had the most hilarious eating appointment yesterday. We ate with Familie Lee, aus Tiawan and man, that family is hilarious. They all speak perfect English, because Bru. Lee (not Bruce Lee) worked a lot in the States--they move every two years! But the kids told us jokes the whole time and they were actually pretty good ones. The youngest one, Cydney was just random. We were sharing a spiritual thought about the Holy Ghost and she sits with her elbows on the table holding her head up, with a pout on her face and she said, "I don't like port-a-potties." What? How'd you go from the Holy Ghost to port-a-potties? Craaaazy stuff. We ended our day by teaching a great 2.Lektion to Zerrit....and we blew up 200 balloons at the church for Elder Wride's (one of our ZL's) birthday....today. Well, I popped a few, so there's 197. But still. That and we've been prepping for this Golden since Thurdsay...so I'm gonna write Präsident, and then we're going to go pick her up! MENSCH.

Well, hope that everyone's doing great! I heard there was a lot of crazy weather going on in Utah, so I hope everyone's doing alright. Ich habe euch lieb!

love,
Sis. Whit

Hallo Familie!

Soo...this week has been interesting I guess. Sharing a city with 2 other sets of missionaries is weird, because the work is split up, which also means we have a lot less work than I'm used to, but it's not bad at all. It's nice to be like break-neck busy, but it just means that I can focus on the few people that we have just a bit more.

So as far as Pday activities of last week--the Elders wanted to go to this...cheese factory-thing-a-ma-jiig which turned out to not be a factory. Anyway, it was this fancy place in the Neustadt part of town that sells really expensive cheeses from Germany and I think they have a museum/factory/was auch immer thing but it was closed. So we were kinda like, "now what?" We decided (stupidly) to buy this platter of different cheeses, and I like, believe it or not I actually like the cheeses they have here, but we got the STINKIEST cheeses ever and we, being missionaries, don't like leaving food on our plates, we ate it all. Every time I burped it was ICKLICH! So that was like, waste of money, but hilarious. Priceless, even. We decided to go back to Innenstadt were all the cool things are like Frauenkirche and looked around. THAT was cooler. Dresden got bombed out pretty bad during the war, but there's a lot of things that they've either rebuild or refurnished and it's so old and beautiful. Travel snob! :P

Tuesday was our Zone Training MTG--my last one, so I had to give my Tschüss Testimony--just like, my "last one" so to say. I had Präsident Interviews and I talked again about my Ecc. Endorsement and he said it should be done pretty fast--sometimes he gets an email from BYU asking about people going home to renew their endorsements and sometimes they don't--but all and all, it should be already taken care of; it's all electronic. So that's a relief! In my interview, Präsident said he had no worries about me "finishing strong" and working until the last day, and said that he got a good email about me from my GML in Bielefeld. He said that I always leave a good impression in each city and I certainly hope so. I also got a lot of "after Christmas" cards from Familie Bingham, the Ward, and from a lot of other people, Danke sehr!

The problem with this week, is that a LOT of things fell out. And it's a little bit harder to have the will to go outside when it is BUM freezing cold outside! I am bundled up and everything, but it's just bitter. For example, we went out to find a referral sent to us by the Chemnitz Sisters, and while we were unterwegs, we had two appointments cancel within 10 min. One was Andre the Golden (he's out of town to visit his sick father) and Cuong, Tan's friend. He actually tschüssed us, saying he wasn't really ready to do all the things we are "trying to persuade" him to do. He was very polite about it, but I already know that WoW is really hard for him and it was why he wasn't baptized a year ago. So that was kind of hard; I sorta celebrated too early and thought it was a miracle because of me, but na ja, it means we have to focus our energy elsewhere. Also, on Wednesday, our Ehepaar came to the church and told us they were being blitz'd to Kiel and were leaving the next morning, so a rough day, and having to say goodbye to our Ehepaar...it was rough. I only got to know them for 3 weeks and they already felt like my 3rd set of grandparents, and it was pretty hard for Sis. Tidwell because she's worked for quite a long time with them.

Thursday, we had an Austehlung. Remember those? They are literally the best of times and the worst of times. Mainly because Germans tend to be a tad bit grumpier when it's snowing outside and don't want to take our card, because that requires them taking their hand out of their pocket to take it! :P There were also some people that were pretty rude to us, sort of hard to ignore sometimes, but we made it fun, but shoveling an area next to us, and Sis. Tidwell drew part of the plan of salvation with sidewalk chalk next to our stand. A lot of people stopped to look at it while she drew, so that was pretty cool. The miracle was literally one YES out of a thousand no's. We met this Russian lady (I'M A RUSSIAN MAGNET!) who wanted a BoM after we talked about it, but for some reason we didn't have it dabei, but she agreed to meet us at the church for one, and she was like, "don't worry, I'm reaally gonna come!" I tried out the one sentence I can say in Russian and she loved it. Her name is Olicia! We are super excited. You can tell that she's special because not everyone says, "There aren't as many young people about you that care this much about religion anymore." When people notice our efforts and are moved by it, it makes it so worth it. Not to mention we taught 6 street lessons during those 3 frigid hours.

Friday was Sis. Tidwell's one year mark, and so we celebrated by...going to the Tafel again! It's our weekly service project and they really love having us come to help. We mainly do a lot of sorting but it really helps when things are organized! I also made Sis. Tidwell some Schnitzel! :)

On Friday, we also got to teach Cheng, the Neubekehrt, and it was an Essenstermin, so we got to eat some real Chinese food! We had to warn him to not make it so scharf, so this time it was a good level of spicy but not so bad, it would've made Dad sweat just a little. but we ate with chopsticks! I was apparantly the only one that knew how to eat with them! Jeez. Jordo's probably pro, though.

On Sunday, we actually had most of our termins...it was a pretty leer week because so many people fell out, so it was a LOT of finding this week. Makes you a man! haha But we taught our Aufbauklasse, MELANIE GOT THE GIFT OF THE HOLY GHOST, and we taught some great lessons this week. We met again with Zerrit and he really does want to read the BoM and know if it is true, so we are pretty excited about it. We also had a pretty powerful and intense lesson with Fr. Frömmel last night, mainly because it was on the Atonement and how it could heal us from the past and present. She's an older lady, which sometimes makes it harder to "push" her to take on commitments, but she has that desire to change. And she has such a great friend who's the member of the church. This member, Schw. Busse really knows how to explain things and make us look GOOD. :) So it wasn't so much quantity but more qualitiy this week. Hopefully we'll get to meet with Andre the Golden this week--everyone wants to know how he's doing  and get updates from him, i know!

I think...that's about it from my end! I hope to have more stories this week, but I mean, I don't think about home, but knowing that I have 3 weeks to enjoy everything I love makes me work hard, and knowing that I just have to ausdauer for 3 more weeks on the annoying things gives me a good attitude, so somehow it all balances out. It's a weird feeling, like I feel like I'm NOT going home, and I hope it lasts as long as it can. THEN I can cry, or whatever. :P

Ich habe euch lieeeeeeeeeeb! Miss ya!

love,

Sista Whit

Miracle week...

Hallo Familie!

This week has been like, SUCH a miracle week! I've been namin' those miracles one by one!

But this week was pretty intense, for reals. We basically did a lot of apartment work and that overlapped half of our week. We got new carpet in our Wohnzimmer, so we had to move ALL of our furniture from that room into our bedroom, so we were tip-toeing around for a few days before it was finished. But yeah, we went from having carpet that looked like cat vomit to having chic new-smelling gray carpet! So we basically did some Spring Cleaning so now our living room looks REALLY nice, and everything is back in order. We took great pictures from the whole process! It was like a makeover. But we got some boxes to organize a lot of our cards and such and we felt like it was a good excuse to go to IKEA, because the Elders needed stuff there too, so why not? It was a great excuse to eat some Swedisch Köttbular! I also sent Jordo a package, so I hope he gets it soon! I promise I'm not the lamest person ever.

This week we had a lot more lessons, and some new investigators! I got to met Sun (pronounced like "soon"), our progressing Chinese investigator, and he's pretty cool; it's like he's very open and progressing, but his girlfriend is against the church and is being a major stumbling block for him and he's sort of an air head and doesn't realize it. meh.

Wednesday was a miracle! We had district finding, which is where we give the Elders in our district (Meißen and Freiberg) our cards and they help us find appointments. Well, we used our hour to make out appointments with past investigators, (victory!) BUT the Elders found...or I should say, Andre found the Elders and we got to meet him this week! He's been doing so much research on the church, he quoted something from Howard W Hunter and sang hymns. This guy is more golden than Gold! He was looking for the church and so he just went up to Dresden to walk around and saw our Elders talking to someone and waited impatiently for them to be done so he could talk to them. It was SO cool! He's half German, half American, so his English sounds a bit western-country ish. He's met L Tom Perry because he dated one of his granddaughters or soemthing like that, and yeah. Keine AHNUNG why he isn't baptized yet. Do you think I got one more baptism under my belt? I look forward to updating you guys on that soon! HE LISTENS TO SONS OF PROVO FOR PETE'S SAKE!

So that was great. It's been snowing a bit on and off this past week which is way better than misty rain we had before then. So it's pretty cold; -5°C oder so. I bet that's not as cold as it sounds, but we're doing fine!

We went to the Tafel again, just me and Sis. Tidwell this time because the Elders had a meeting, but we sorted through books and toys and boxed up the good ones--they plan on giving them to kids as gifts later on in the year. They LOVE having us come and help and it feels so great to do something really easy, but somehow really helpful.

Melanie had her Taufinterview and passed, we met Andre the Golden, AND I got to meet Cheng, a Chinese Neubekehrt. PROBABLY the most hilarious person I've ever met in my liiiiife! Try to teach him how to say "Urim and Thummim!" hilarity. But he's great; we're teaching the Nachbelehrung, so the review lessons after his baptism (he was baptized in November) and he really remembers a lot, but he's one of those really happy people that acts so childlike and pure, y'know? He was just super friendly and hilarious. His prayers are the best EVER. We asked him if he wanted to get Döners and Pommes with us and so in his prayer he starts with: "Liebe Gott...I want to eat some Pommes..." He just really says what is in his heart! But he likes his food REALLY spicy! I put a spoonful of chili on my Döner, and he had a spoonful for every bite! We forbade him to eat lots of chili on Saturday night so he doesn't make himself sick on Sunday! He.is.amazing.

Sunday was phenomenal. I think we counted at least 6 major miracles! Unfortunately, Andre the Golden didn't make it to church, for some odd reason, but we still had a suprise investigator come to church. We met with Petra, who is sort of "church shopping" and so we didn't know how much interest she had, but she stayed for sacrament and the baptism! We also had some less actives make it to church, woot! Melanie's Taufe was also super amazing. A lot of people made it, there were a TON of treats, and we had like 5 investigators there! One of them being a friend that on of the JAEs brought to church. But Melanie just looked SO happy. Probably because her boyfriend got to baptise her! I think that everytime I've seen someone go in the waters of baptism, I just have this feeling like, it's true; it's all true. Fulfilling my PURPOSE! It was Sis. Tidwell's first baptism to help prepare, so she made sure we were wearing matching colors: maroon and navy blue and white! Meine gute. Our Essenstermin was with Familie Ebish, the Mann is German and the wife is Utahn and so they made us an American breakfast for lunch! Chang got to come with, because Schw. Ebish served a mission in Taiwan and can still speak good Chinese. We had the task of explaining how to "properly" chow down on pancakes and french toast. He at first put a bunch of bacon on his pancake and then whipped cream on top. Na ja. He liked putting peanut butter on it! The Ebishes also have this adorable baby so it was hilarious watching Chang make the baby laugh. Reminds me a lot of Japan. :)

We also met with Fr. Frömmel and Schw. Busse who introduced us and she is progressing! It was a pretty great lesson. Jordo would've loved it; this lady has 5 cats and they love neck rubs. The only hard thing about Sunday was trying to drink a glass of Routabega juice. *shudder*

But I'm actually doing really great, I'm just doing my thing. For now, I'm just going on like normal, like I got another transfer or something; I told Sis. Tidwell to remind me if I go either extreme "robot missionary" mode or way too trunky and she says so far so good. It might be a different story later, but I'm loving life right now. I LOVE MY JOB!

Ich habe euch LIEEEEB!

love,
Sis. Whit

New Year work continues...

Oh my DAYS. Here we GO!

 

So for New Year's Eve, we had Pday, so we decided to go to Hannover for a Zone Activity, nämlich an Ugly Sweater Party and we brought all our Christmas stuff that we didn't want to eat and tausch'd it/gave it all to the Elders. It was mainly cookies anyway! But it was great to hang out with our Zone because I pretty much won't see any of them anymore, because I'll be going home and obviously won't be in the same zone anymore. So it was kinda sad, but I'll be seeing most of the Sisters at BYU in a few months' time. :) We also walked around the Hannover Innenstadt one last time--everyone wanted to go shopping but I had to "sit out" because A) I had to pack and B) I AM IN DRESDEN! So I stayed up sowieso until midnight packing and clearing out. I pretty much said goodbye to everyone on Sunday, and called whoever else during the day because I just didn't have time. But at midnight, I just sat on my bed and watched people explode everything and anything all over the streets. It was a great panoramic view! There are still soggy remains all over the sidewalks. But as missionaries we have a rule that we have to be indoors/in our apartments at 6pm, or until 7pm if members invite us over. So that was my New Years!

 

I basically travelled for most of 1. Jan--I left the apartment at 7:45am and got into Dresden at 3:30pm. It was weird looking outside and seeing the landscape ever so slightly change. The west DOES look a lot different from the East, but I love having the Saxon accent again. I understand it ONLY too well! But I'm serving with Sis. Tidwell and she is HILARIOUS. We get along only TOO well; schade that it'll only be for a transfer, but we have so much fun and we make each other laugh. She is from St. George but likes to talk like she's from the ghetto or something. Even funnier in German. :) But jeez! Week 1 of the transfer is already gone--the time is just going by so fast and I gotta get in all my adventures in while I still can!

 

Dresden is amazing though; it's a big city that was extremely bombed out during the war--so they have this big Frauenkirche in the middle of the city and they used the old stones from it--the white stones are the new ones and the black ones are from the original. There are lots of museums here and of course a huge university, so there's a lot of art and science here. Everything in people's windows are still festive and fun. In the West people do NOT decorate as much as they do over here! Of course Dresden has one of the most impressive Weihnachtsmarkts auf der ERDE. They also have a Volkswagen Factory kind of like the BMW one dad told us about in München. I think we're gonna check it out. I pretty much have my Pdays all planned out, it's a JOKE. But Dresden is like, a big city, but it's not as grungy as Berlin, if you can imagine. Like a huge, beautiful city! I really like it; I just wish it wasn't rainy and icky and dark outside! The church is right by the famous Große Garten, and it's the Pfahlhaus. It has a statue of Karl G Maeser outside of it!

 

My address is: Wiesen str. 8 / 01277 Dresden

I guess if people would like to send me mail, I'd appreciate it but now it's almost ridiculous because I have so little time left. But that's how it is.

 

The work here is about half of what I'm used to--mainly because it's the after-holidays problem of getting into contact with everyone, but also because we share the city with the ZLs and Dresden Elders AND we have an Ehepaar. They are the ones that really like me because I apparantly look exACTLY like their granddaughter. Na ja.

 

Weird part? One of the Dresden Elders is actually an ELDER OLSEN. Everyone keeps asking if we're related and it's so awkward. Because HE is so awkward. Especially when he calls and says, "hello, Sis. Olsen, here is Elder Olsen." hehehe...

 

But Wednesday was a great start. We met with Viola and Drittan, the wife being a member and her husband is our investigator--they're from Albania and they have this adorable daughter, Debora. They actually invited a friend over, Alejandra from Columbia and SHE is one of our newest investigators! She was like, "yeah, half of my family is Mormons!" Nice to have some South America magic in my mission (P.S. just to make my Weltreise complete, we have a Familie Kato in our ward, the husband is from JAPAN and his wife is from Bulgaria but LIVED in Danmark!) Also, one of my friends, Rachel Sorensen from BYU--she was in my Dansk 101 class is actually in my Dresden ward! How weird!! She's off somewhere on vacation or something so I haven't seen her yet, but I know she's here because Sis. Tidwell mentioned that her husband is Danish. Land of friggin dreams!

 

On Thursday we did service at our local Tafel--like a place where poor people can get groceries, clothes and sonst noch was. We helped them sort through a shipment of food from random stores that donate the fruits and veggies that are packaged with like, 4 good fruits and one rotten one, so we sorted through to preserve the good stuff and threw the rotten stuff away. Our Elders were SUCH PANSIES. And they don't know how to tell if certain foods are rotten. Jeez, one of them came in khaki pants and moccassins. This ain't H&M! So it was fun and funny to see the Elders all squeamish. It's like, I don't care if my hands get gross, I just wash them before I put them in my mouth or soemthing, MEINE gute. The best part was meeting the boss of the Tafel and she couldn't stop thanking us for coming, especially because they had such a huge shipment and didn't know how they could handle it all and then right when they had this problem, one of the Dresden Elders called her and asked her if we could help. She was like, "Ich glaube nicht an Gott....aber ihr habt in den besten Zeit angerufen."

 

We also don't have very many investigators right now, but we DO have Melanie, and she will be baptized this upcoming Sunday! I feel pretty lucky. She is 18, so we took her with us to Institut which is always pretty fun; a few investigators from the other Elders, us missionaries if we bring people, and mostly RMs, some of which are married.

 

It's been sort of a long week thought. Lots of trying to find people--past investigators, less actives, members, you name it, we troop around everywhere in the misty rain, drenched, and it's just so hard to find them, they just aren't home! But I mean, Alejandra was such a big miracle for us, that it didn't seem to matter. I mean, we also had a miracle quite similar to it yesterday--a member invited us over to meet her friend, Frau Frommel and we taught her a lesson and set up another appointment. THIS IS HOW MISSIONARY WORK IS DONE! So we are pretty happy that we are getting referrals from members and they are going through. It boosts the members' confidence, too, and Germans need that. It seems like anyone from anywhere else have no problems referring people or inviting people over to Essenstermins but Germans...they have to REALLY like you before they think about referring their friends. I just hope I can help refer people I know once I get home so I'm not some kind of hypocrite! 

 

But I think I have some kind of idea why I'm here. There is an investigator here, who is actually one of Tan's friends that also had a baptismal date, but then went home to visit Vietnam and then came back, but didn't make his date and stopped meeting with the Sisters. Well, I called him up, because I actually met him when Tan brought him to church in Chemnitz, so I told him who I was and he remembered me, and he's willing to set up an appointment for this week! We have to call him today to ask when he has time--so I hope that it really does work out and I'm not celebrating too soon, but I think this is the last time he's answered the phone or anything since he left Dresden...so mal hoffen! Part of the miracle is that I was using a new phone, so a new number he didn't recognize, haaha. 

 

So I think that's about it. I think I'll be laid to rest in a pretty cool area. There's a lot I can still do, I can still help someone get baptized! I'm sooo happy. Also, our apartment is a 4-Sister apartment. My voice ECHOES. And it's all nice and clean because I'm settled in and we cleaned out all the crap that's been stowed away in plastic bags from past Sisters...a lot of people have died here apparently! 

 

Ich habe euch lieb!

Sis. Whit

New Year

Oh meine gute, Hallo!

 

It was great to see everyone for Christmas! Oh my gosh, last week feels like forever ago!

 

So wie gesagt, Monday was pretty fun; we had an Andacht, meaning an hour devotional and I played piano for the ward, because they asked us to do something musikalisches, and there ya go. It was a bit weird, because I've been having a really crummy cold and it was messing with my hearing, like I have to keep popping my ears and so I played the piece like, half deaf. Kinda pulled a Beethoven on everyone. So I hope it sounded good! haha

 

We had our Essenstermin over bei Familie Glomb, they have two craaaaazy little boys and it was a lot of fun. We actually had turkey as our main dish, interesting. With stuffing! Meine gute. But as for presents, they opened all of their gifts on Heilige Abend right before dinner so they didn't feel like eating, either. But we went with them and their grandma in their room and looked in the sky for der Weihnachtsmann while the parents put all of the gifts under the tree. We heard sleigh bells and they said, "Do you hear that? You should check under the tree!" and then paper went flying EVERYWHERE, they just attacked it all and it was over in 5 minutes! They got a racing track, Cars themed, and so the dad and grandpa spent a lot of time trying to put it together so the boys had to find something else to do until the dad let them play with it! That doesn't change! They also acted out the Nativity ("Krippespiel") and Finn, the 5 yr. old was the donkey and carried his mom in the living room. He said, "You are too heavy!" and she said, "I'm not even sitting all the way on you!" But he was a bit wild and cheeky before the nativity scene and his dad said, "Du bist richtig so der Esel!" I thought that was funny.

 

On Tuesday, I woke up at 6:30, said a prayer and fell asleep and didn't wake up til 9am! It was glorious. I made pancakes and we opened our gifts! I don't think Aunt Michelle had time to notice, but the sweater you all sent me was really nice and I wore it when skyping! Thank you so much! We sort of had a really lazy day because everyone here is out of town and aka all have other plans, and it just felt weird to RELAX. Like, am I allowed to relax? :P We had Christmas at Alicia and Sai's and he BBQ'd for us, SO much good food! I have been perpetually full this entire week, blarg.

 

On Wednesday, I had a British Christmas! Mainly because we went to eat bei Bischoff Brown! We had minced meat (meatloaf) and Yorkshire pudding! Which isn't pudding at all, dangit! There was like, no one outside at all the past few days, but we wrapped a Book of Mormon in wrapping paper and wandered around until we found someone who would take it, and we did, zum Glück! He's a pretty Golden Russian man who doesn't know he's Golden yet.

 

This week we also set a new baptismal date! Michael Mauritz! He'll take the plunge 24.februar, leider after I'm home, but I think it's right for him. He finally committed! Yesss! I saw him wearing white pants the other time, and I knew that meant something. A sign!

 

We still managed to teach 13 lessons, and most of them with investigators, all after Christmas, so we felt pretty happy about that. One of them was teaching in PV again! We taught about Joseph Smith and we all colored/drew pictures of the Book of Mormon together--there's like 8 kids in primary, which was pretty good for the Christmas season for us, but they asked us to teach because mostly everyone was gone.

 

And Vladimir was confirmed! Hot diggity! It was great! The ward is trying to be as supportive as they can since they really can't communicate with him. But he'll take some German courses pretty soon, hopefully.

 

And I should probably say why, before I forget: I AM BEING TRANSFERRED. TO DRESDEN!!!!!!

I wasn't even paying attention in transfer calls at that time, but all of a sudden I hear my name and I'm like, "WHERE AM I GOING? WHAT'S GOING ON??" and they said, "You're going to DRESDEN!" "WHAT?? I'M GOING BACK TO THE EAAAAST?!" So that's the next phase of my mission! City numba 5! I am serving with Sis. Tidwell, I served a day with her on Tausch so I know it'll be fun. A major plus is FINALLY serving in a big, beautiful city, and I get to go to the temple in my last transfer before I go home. Major plus. Everyone was joking that I wouldn't be able to understand the German but DOCH, I have spent many a transfer in Saxony! So that's what's up! I don't know if the ward will take me seriously, but I plan on acting like I'm not going home and take time to get to know everyone and leave a mark! A good one!

 

Saying goodbye was sort of bittersweet--mostly everyone is gone, so I couldn't really say goodbye to most of the ward, and not many investigators were able to come, so hopefully I can call them all and say goodbye. Sis. Young is getting a Golden, which makes it the 3rd time I've been replaced by a Golden! Meine gute.

 

It was absolutely the BEST that Jordo and I had a baptism the same day! It was really cool to know that miracles are just everywhere!

 

Ich habe euch lieb! This transfer is going to be CRAAAAAAZY! Who wants a postcard, NOW, y'all?? :P

l

ove,

Sis. Whit