So first off, today was awesome. Probably the best P Day on my mission so far. We went to the Artis Zoo in Amsterdam and the place is HUGE which tons of cool stuff! They have an awesome aquarium, an open butterfly place, an open monkey house, etc. You're not allowed to play with the monkeys there, but it was still super cool to just be in these little (sort-of) jungles with these animals crawling around all of the trees by you. There was just tons and tons of awesome stuff there. You should look it up online or something, but I definitely wanna take the family there sometime after my mission!
This week was very short on teaching, and very high on contacting. Which kinda sucks when you have pretty much a whole week of that. We have a bunch of potential investigators, had a bunch of appointments set up, but the week just went poopy and things didn't work out very well. None of this "woe is me" crap though, because that happens very often as a missionary. I'm just hoping that we can get some solid stuff going this week. I'm not sure if I've told you about our Sri Lankan investigator though? I think I've mentioned her before, but the latest news on her is that we find out today or tomorrow if she got her visa renewed to stay in the country and support her very very sick husband. We've moved her baptismal date back a few weeks (it was originally on the March 30th) just because her closest friend in the ward is going to be on vacation for a few weeks. Then we have general conference, but hopefully the next week will work out good. Anyways, we're praying hard for her and her husband's difficult situation. They're both like 63, have been married for like 40 years or so, but his sicknesses made him go to the Netherlands for care, during which time they were seperated completely except for phone and skype for 23 years. Then she finally got a visa to come here and help him out because he literally just cannot take care of himself anymore. Our bishop wrote a letter explaining that same story to the legal office, so hopefully they understand how important it is that she stays here with him. She's a golden investigator though, just loves the gospel, and is doing the very best she can to be prepared for baptism and live a righteous life. In other words, she's an inspiring individual. Also, we had two African investigators who's student visas expired and they gotta go back to Uganda for a couple months, and then hopefully they can come back after that. They're both planning on getting baptized as well and we're trying to keep contact with them through email. It would be so cool if they can learn more about the gospel in their own language and maybe even be baptized there.
A potential investigator we met a week or so ago sent us a drunk text. That's also a pretty good story. So there's this whole nuclear protection thing going on with 53 countries meeting here in the Netherlands, right? Absolutely crazy by the way. It's going down in Den Haag, but it still affects Amsterdam quite a bit and it's weird thinking that Obama's here. Anyways, there's military personnel everywhere, some of the public transportation has been closed off. They didn't want any newspapers in the Amsterdam Central Station for some reason, even though it was allowed at the other Amsterdam stations. Bla bla bla, just tons of weird and random stuff. The newspaper literally actually said on the front page, "Don't go to work today." Anyways, on Saturday, I texted this potential investigator, inviting him to church. Next morning, I woke up, got the phone, and there's this midnight text that says, "I love you. Nuclear bomb in the Netherlands soon." Psh, it's so dumb that people get so drunk... I hate it when we're contacting on the streets and accidentally contact a person who's drunk or high. There's no point in talking to them and they're just idiots making fools of themselves. Ridiculous.
Here's a good teaching story though: So that first week in Amsterdam, I contacted that super awesome African dude who we instantly just had a friendship between us. Finally got a lesson with him earlier this week and he wanted to meet at Museum Plein. This is a big cool grass area where lots of younger people go to hang out and teenagers make-out. Well, here we go!! He actually lives a bit outside of our area, but he doesn't want to speak with the other Elders or Sisters, plus he really just likes coming to Amsterdam pretty often. First off, he freaks out when he finds out that we're American. "U-S-A! U-S-A!!" He thought it was sooooo cool =D He actually grew up in France most of his life, but speaks good English and Dutch as well. He's got problems with drinking, smoking, and girls though. He kept talking to us about how much he likes girls for so long! I don't wanna hear that stuff ha ha!! He's actually a super spiritual dude though, loves the Bible, tries to go to a church every once in a while, etc. He thinks we're the coolest people ever. When we told him about Joseph Smith's First Vision, he kept asking my companion to repeat it. He loved it SO MUCH! Ha ha it was awesome to see that. The Spirit was pretty strong at some parts of our discussion, even though we were outside at this park, he kept smoking the whole time, getting off topic, etc. He actually explained pretty much the whole first lesson though before we even really started. So that was also super cool. God prepares people =) We just gotta help him get off of his addictions. But he loves us and thinks we are really like the coolest soldiers of God. And don't say he was just doing all of this stuff because he was high, some of it: yes. But I know the Spirit touched him at different parts and I've also gotten good at telling how drunk or high people are. Woo hoo =) More useful skills learned as a missionary?
Our ward is getting better and better at getting involved with missionary work, it's good to see. There's some members here in the Netherlands who just do SO much trying to help others experience the same happiness and fulfillment they've gained from Living the Gospel. We, as full-time missionaries, just keep thinking how awesome it would be if we could inspire more and more people to be like them. It really is a commandment from God to be a member missionary. Just to do a little bit to help out those around you. Super cool that I have the opportunity now to do that every day, the whole day, for two years =)
Okay I love you guys all very much (just like last week, and the week before, and the week before that), thanks for the emails and support! Sorry I don't have too much time today to write everyone back a personal email. Have a good week!
This week was very short on teaching, and very high on contacting. Which kinda sucks when you have pretty much a whole week of that. We have a bunch of potential investigators, had a bunch of appointments set up, but the week just went poopy and things didn't work out very well. None of this "woe is me" crap though, because that happens very often as a missionary. I'm just hoping that we can get some solid stuff going this week. I'm not sure if I've told you about our Sri Lankan investigator though? I think I've mentioned her before, but the latest news on her is that we find out today or tomorrow if she got her visa renewed to stay in the country and support her very very sick husband. We've moved her baptismal date back a few weeks (it was originally on the March 30th) just because her closest friend in the ward is going to be on vacation for a few weeks. Then we have general conference, but hopefully the next week will work out good. Anyways, we're praying hard for her and her husband's difficult situation. They're both like 63, have been married for like 40 years or so, but his sicknesses made him go to the Netherlands for care, during which time they were seperated completely except for phone and skype for 23 years. Then she finally got a visa to come here and help him out because he literally just cannot take care of himself anymore. Our bishop wrote a letter explaining that same story to the legal office, so hopefully they understand how important it is that she stays here with him. She's a golden investigator though, just loves the gospel, and is doing the very best she can to be prepared for baptism and live a righteous life. In other words, she's an inspiring individual. Also, we had two African investigators who's student visas expired and they gotta go back to Uganda for a couple months, and then hopefully they can come back after that. They're both planning on getting baptized as well and we're trying to keep contact with them through email. It would be so cool if they can learn more about the gospel in their own language and maybe even be baptized there.
A potential investigator we met a week or so ago sent us a drunk text. That's also a pretty good story. So there's this whole nuclear protection thing going on with 53 countries meeting here in the Netherlands, right? Absolutely crazy by the way. It's going down in Den Haag, but it still affects Amsterdam quite a bit and it's weird thinking that Obama's here. Anyways, there's military personnel everywhere, some of the public transportation has been closed off. They didn't want any newspapers in the Amsterdam Central Station for some reason, even though it was allowed at the other Amsterdam stations. Bla bla bla, just tons of weird and random stuff. The newspaper literally actually said on the front page, "Don't go to work today." Anyways, on Saturday, I texted this potential investigator, inviting him to church. Next morning, I woke up, got the phone, and there's this midnight text that says, "I love you. Nuclear bomb in the Netherlands soon." Psh, it's so dumb that people get so drunk... I hate it when we're contacting on the streets and accidentally contact a person who's drunk or high. There's no point in talking to them and they're just idiots making fools of themselves. Ridiculous.
Here's a good teaching story though: So that first week in Amsterdam, I contacted that super awesome African dude who we instantly just had a friendship between us. Finally got a lesson with him earlier this week and he wanted to meet at Museum Plein. This is a big cool grass area where lots of younger people go to hang out and teenagers make-out. Well, here we go!! He actually lives a bit outside of our area, but he doesn't want to speak with the other Elders or Sisters, plus he really just likes coming to Amsterdam pretty often. First off, he freaks out when he finds out that we're American. "U-S-A! U-S-A!!" He thought it was sooooo cool =D He actually grew up in France most of his life, but speaks good English and Dutch as well. He's got problems with drinking, smoking, and girls though. He kept talking to us about how much he likes girls for so long! I don't wanna hear that stuff ha ha!! He's actually a super spiritual dude though, loves the Bible, tries to go to a church every once in a while, etc. He thinks we're the coolest people ever. When we told him about Joseph Smith's First Vision, he kept asking my companion to repeat it. He loved it SO MUCH! Ha ha it was awesome to see that. The Spirit was pretty strong at some parts of our discussion, even though we were outside at this park, he kept smoking the whole time, getting off topic, etc. He actually explained pretty much the whole first lesson though before we even really started. So that was also super cool. God prepares people =) We just gotta help him get off of his addictions. But he loves us and thinks we are really like the coolest soldiers of God. And don't say he was just doing all of this stuff because he was high, some of it: yes. But I know the Spirit touched him at different parts and I've also gotten good at telling how drunk or high people are. Woo hoo =) More useful skills learned as a missionary?
Our ward is getting better and better at getting involved with missionary work, it's good to see. There's some members here in the Netherlands who just do SO much trying to help others experience the same happiness and fulfillment they've gained from Living the Gospel. We, as full-time missionaries, just keep thinking how awesome it would be if we could inspire more and more people to be like them. It really is a commandment from God to be a member missionary. Just to do a little bit to help out those around you. Super cool that I have the opportunity now to do that every day, the whole day, for two years =)
Okay I love you guys all very much (just like last week, and the week before, and the week before that), thanks for the emails and support! Sorry I don't have too much time today to write everyone back a personal email. Have a good week!