Week 39: A Visit to Nieuw Amsterdam and Deventer

Ya, I think so too! [How special it is that he is serving in the area his ancestors are from].  Ya, it does help me feel more connected to the area, I feel like I want to go out and find these relatives. One of the members here that I told about the Fernhouts looked up the grave and called the people and someone here is paying for the upkeep or something like that. It is paid for forever so it will be there a long time. I want to find out who these people are and tell them who I am, haha. I went to Nieuw Amsterdam and took photos of the graves, I’ll send them to you. Also, I found another Fernhout but I don’t think I am closely related. Ya, I searched all the graves in the Netherlands and there are a lot of Fernhouts. All over though.

Well, this week was not going to be very busy or exciting one but it turned out to be! We got a call telling us we would be going on exchanges with the ZLs [Zone Leaders] and both Elder Rytting and I would be going to Apeldoorn to work there, for a 48 hour exchange! The ZLs are great so I knew it was going to be fun and not only that but they actually live in Deventer with 2 other missionaries so there would be 6 of us there. The other two missionaries are also really cool guys, one of them (Elder Blackwell) is from Magrath. So we talked about home a lot and how hard it is to explain coulees to people, haha. Also one of the best moments of the exchange was when we were talking about Raymond then like 10 seconds after the conversation we both, in perfect sync, whispered under our breath “fetch Raymond" it was so perfect. So it was really fun to hang out with all those elders. We were going to head there Thursday morning but instead went on Wednesday night. It turned out that they were just finishing exchanges with 2 other missionaries so for the first night there were 8 of us!!! But the apartment is massive so we all fit just fine. One of the other elders was Elder Chamberlin, who is awesome.  He was in my district last transfer and he was also in Matt's [MTC] group. That night we watched the 4 original missionaries continue their game of Axis and Allies. Great time. We stayed up a little longer than we probably should have, haha.

The next day we did studies and had a chill morning, then after lunch we went off to Apeldoorn to do some work. I went with E. Enger and E. Rytting with E. Grondel for the day. We all went to this one neighbourhood then split there and went door knocking. We got a lot of work done and it was fun because EE is personable and has good Dutch. We had some good convos with people but no new investigators. The other 2 elders, however, found 2 new investigators so that was good. After about 1.5 hrs we went to another neighbourhood for a bit then to the centrum to street contact people. After that we got ijs! This week is cheap pizza week so on the way home we picked up some pizza for dinner. The next day was almost the same except we went to the church for a bit. That night we played the 6 man board game.  I got betrayed by my own companion, however, the alliance I made with EE and EB went well and EE ended up winning. Anyway, I had a great time. The next morning we left to go back home to Emmen.

Okay, on another note, I finished the Doctrine and Covenants in 9 days total. I had never read it that intensely before, only once for seminary… so it was nice to read it all again so fast. I will now begin the New Testament again which I am excited for. Although I really want to read the BOM again, haha. I will do that right after the New Testament. What I think is cool about the BOM is that it is much more pure than the Bible… the Bible has been translated so many times, for example the Holy Ghost is only mentioned 90 times in the New Testament and only a handful of times in the Old Testament. In the BOM it is mentioned over 300 times. The BOM is straight from the original words of prophets and translated one time to English by another prophet of God. I think that was cool.

Lately I have realized that if I decide to workout in the mornings it doesn’t happen so instead I workout at nights, which goes a lot better. For cardio I would like to go running but ER does not so instead I skip rope in the apartment which I really enjoy. Then in between I do exercises like pull ups and push ups and curls and dips. Skipping rope is great for indoors and I can do it in our apartment cause we are on the bottom floor.

After our exchange we came back and did some service for T. It went well, we helped her build a new path of bricks which was hard cause the path was curved so we had to get creative. Then after, I climbed on her roof to put something up there so her vines could grow… then I fixed her fence, just a bunch of random projects that needed doing. She then made us dinner which was her really good veggie and meat and rice dish. Healthy and tasty!

Questions:

1. How is your journal streak going?  Do you still write when you are staying over in other cities?
2. How did the work go this week?
3. Did you get to any other cities this week?  Did you go see your 2x great grandfather's gravesite in Nieuw Amsterdam?
4. Where is your zone conference this week?
5. When are transfer calls?
6. Did you have some good dinner appointments this week?  Do you have good visits with the families?
7. What topic are you studying in your personal study time?

1. 100 percent still, sometimes I have to catch up the day after but it's still good. Ya, when we sleep over sometimes I just write on a paper I find and then tape it into my journal when I get back.

2. Well we worked a lot in Apeldoorn, but it went well there. We are using this survey that works really well.

3. Yes and I went there already, haha. It’s only 15 min away and we worked in that little dorpje [town] for the day so it all worked out well.

4. It will be in Zwolle which is nice, not too far away. Also I get to see Elder Furniss!!

5. Saturday the 14 of next month.

6. No we didn't but we were gone, just T. This next week though we have some good ones!! Also, I am pumped for General Conference!!

7. The language and the D&C, and also how to explain the Gospel on door contacts. All kinds of things.

The word this week is, if you want to say “is that allowed?” you just say “mag dat” which literally translated means "may that?"  It's nice when Dutch is shorter than English!

That is all, tot ziens.

Hou doe

Elder Fernhout

Deventer

Dope orange cat

Fernhout gravestone

Elder Fernhout's 2x Great Grandfather Fernhout

Grey sky over Emmen

A rainy day

Week 38: A trip to Leiden

Hey again,

So this week we had nothing planned really but it turned out to be a busy week and not what we expected. Monday after we emailed we got a call from the office saying that ER needed to go down to Brussels for legality stuff so that means we had to meet them in Leiden at 9:00 in the morning. We had to sleep over cause it takes 3 hours to get to Leiden…that was Friday. So Thursday night we headed down to Leiden to sleep, the elders there are Steele and Gemmel. Both pretty cool guys so I knew it was going to be good. We got there at a good time and so we played some card games. It was a lot like Rummy if you have ever played that. E. Gemmel is from New Zealand and so I told him I used to live in Australia and he thought that was pretty cool so we talked about that and also rugby, haha. In the morning we dropped ER off and went back to the apartment to get ready. The Leiden elders were actually going on exchanges with the APs [Assistants to the President] so they came over and we all had lunch together. It was really fun to be with the APs in a not formal setting like a zone conference. They could be a bit more loose which was funny to see that side of them. Also both Leiden elders and the APs will all be home for Christmas so it was fun to hang with a bunch of old missionaries. I worked in Leiden for the day with Elder Gemmel and Elder Mackay which was fun. We had a car and drove to do some look ups and knocked a bit too. It was neat to see how they talked with people and their Dutch was great!

Also Elder Gemmel is dying [translation: is going home soon] so he wanted to sell his bike. It was given to him by another missionary who had just bought it but had to go home so Gemmel used it for a few weeks and so it is brand new practically.  It was originally 420 Euro but he was selling it to me for 100 and my other bike is not working too great anymore so I was like ya sure I’ll buy it. It’s a race type bike but also isn't uncomfortable. I took a few photos. I love it! It rides soooo smooth. Oh, also at the station later that day I saw a guy with an Eagles hat!!! [Elder Fernhout’s favourite team].  So weird cause I have only ever seen three NFL teams here: Raiders, Patriots, and now the Eagles. I tried to stop to talk to him but he had earbuds in and just kept going… sad.

We had service with T again this week and it was good. She had some questions about temples which I answered and after she told me that I have good Dutch so that was nice. We helped her make a shelf. I got the job to make the shelves in a box and ER to sand some planks. I measured the shelves I did with a level and they were pretty much right on. We also helped her carry some stuff around outside like bricks and tiles but then the rain came. We have had sooo much rain again. At least a few hours every single day… it has also been really windy. Anyway, we went to catch a bus after T's and this girl came to the bus stop as well. She began talking to us about the rain and when I asked her if it was always like this she was like, "are you not from here?" So then that launched into a convo about everything but she complimented me on my Dutch which is always nice to hear! That night we traveled to Leiden and the train passed over Lelystad, a part of the Netherlands that used to all be underwater only a bit ago. Anyway, I have never seen anything so flat in my life. I thought Emmen was bad but I couldn't believe it… there were no trees or anything just rocky grass forever.

We had the tacos you sent for dinner two days ago! So good! Thanks for that. Also at T's we had corn and it was not any where near as good as the corn back home. I miss that Taber corn!

Yesterday we had stake conference and it was fun to see a bunch of other missionaries, as well as go north to Groningen. I hadn't been there yet. After the conference I talked with some other missionaries I hadn't seen in a while so that was nice.

I heard from Opa that his dad was born in Hoogeveen. Do you know how close that is?! Super duper close. I go there all the time. It's 15 mins by train. Also, his opa lived in Nieuw Amsterdam which is even closer and he is also buried there, so of course I'll have to go there. All of these places are in my area which I think is super cool. I never knew.

Ya, I heard LCI is killin' it out there and that Football Canada tweeted about us! So great that Jake gets to be a part of that! Also, ya I thought it was super nice to get a note from the Primary. It made me remember that I have a whole ward back home supporting me! Ya, I can still use my planner, haha. Ya, it is really is green and lush here. Also I noticed the trees seem to be taller than I am used to. I remember how brown the coulees are and no leaves on the trees in Lethbridge. We have just have a washer, no dryer, so we hang all our stuff up. Some of the socks I have are super stiff after and others are normal, must be the material they are made from. I got the sweater in Belgium during sales, it was 6 Euro. Super nice for the temperatures lately.

Questions:
1.  Have you eaten herring yet?  If not, when do you plan on doing that?
2.  What have you learned from Dutch culture that you’d like to adopt?
3.  I looked up OV fiets, do you have to register to use them then?
4.  Do most Dutch kids have cell/mobile phones there?
5.  Can you take some companion photos?
6.  I saw a picture of Elder Rytting this week in Belgium (posted on Facebook), must have been with his MTC group?!  I didn’t see you in the picture, did you go too?
7.  How is the cooking going?  Are you getting more meals now that summer is over?
8.  How is the money situation?  Are you learning some good budgeting skills?
9.  So do you hear the dutch say “doei” for “bye”?

1. I haven't, haha. Uh, when I am forced to or when I serve closer to the coast. I will definately do it at least one time.

2. Wow, that is a good question. Uh, I guess how efficient they are. You definately see it in the way their transportation is all layed out and just how the people are is efficient. No time is wasted and they do it in the best way.

3. We just rent them with a card that we have that we use for everything: buses, trains, trams, metros, bike. Super nice and efficient!

4. Oh ya, and they get them pretty young. They use a lot more Samsung here than Apple I have noticed. They love technology.  They use it all over and implement it into everything they can. Even the advertisements at bus stops have a little nfc sensor you can use.

5. Sure

6. Ya, he went down there with some of his group. No, I stayed in Leiden for the day.

7. Decent. We made tacos and breakfast burritos and some other meals. We had a busy week and didn't get fed too much. T did feed us though! She always has super good tasty food and it is all healthy and full of veggies. I wish she could make all of my meals, haha.

8. Ya, I am doing great here! It’s cheaper than Belgium and we don’t eat out like ever. Also, I don’t buy any sweets really which are more expensive and I drink only water so ya it's good. I did buy that bike but it was pretty cheap.

9. Oh aaaaaaalllll the time! I say it now too haha. Like when you get off the bus you say doe! or doei or when you end a Phone call they say it like 3 times, haha.

Dat is alles.

Elder Fernhout hou doe

KD from home

Sock repairs

 A new bike

In Leiden with Elder Mackay

Week 37: Ik ben NAT

Well, this was the week of rain! There were 72 hours of almost straight rain... Kinda nice but at the same time not when you are wearing nice clothes and have to bike in it. We stayed mostly dry though. This one day we wanted to look up this referral we were assigned to look up. Only problem was they lived 2.5 hrs away by bike... or we could take a bus 1 hour closer and then rent crappy bikes from there and bike an hour. Either way it was going to be an adventure. They lived on a farm in the middle of nowhere. So we decided to bus then bike. Emmen was pouring rain but after we got a ways out of Emmen it was nice and no rain. We rented the bikes, you can look them up if you want they are called OV fiets, and we set out. The only map or directions we had was a little paper we printed off of google maps... took us a bit to find our way out of the city and into the country but from there on it was mostly smooth sailing. We had a little bit more difficulty finding their house but not too bad. It took us about an hour and a half to get there. The bike through the country side was super nice though and I loved it. There was a bunch of weird things out there on the farms. Things like egg vending machines, which I took a picture of, and also a fresh milk vending machine… cool other farms and houses. The person we were looking for wasn't home but her son was and he told us to come back Monday... we told him we live so far away and we exchanged numbers. Kinda of a let down for such a trip. So we turned around and biked to the city where we rented the bikes. In total we biked 35 km, not bad. Right when we got to the station it started to POUR rain. Super hard. It was funny cause there was a train that came and all the people were running out of it to find cover from the rain. We then hopped on a train home and there was this young couple behind us arguing in dutch. The gf was getting mad at her bf saying that he had a weed addiction. Then he said he didn't and she said she knows what an addiction looks like cause her dad had an alcohol addiction. Then he said “if you eat an apple everyday it doesn't mean you are addicted to apples!” I just thought that was pretty funny. Only in the Netherlands.

Friday morning we went to the market to look around as well as street contact. In Emmen they have a market every Friday morning and so we wanted to check it out cause we haven't yet. It was cool, lots of cheese and fruit stands as well as a bunch of random clothing and music ones too. I was looking for a fresh stroopwafel stand cause I haven't had one yet! but I couldn't find one... did find a good Turkish place though and we got a kapsalon. Even though it was raining at the time there was still people all over the market, it's like they don't even notice the rain.

I think it was last week when school started here. Emmen has a few colleges and other little schools and there are sooooo many students about. Emmen went from a quiet place to busy with young people! The buses are way busy as well as the train. I kinda like it though cause it makes Emmen feel less sleepy.

We had dinner with this one family and they gave us this cabbage casserole type of thing and it was great! It reminded me of some of the delicious cabbage dishes you would make, like that soup! Also I found this super good yogurt company called Danio. The yogurt is like the texture of whipped cream cheese. So good. The banana split is great.

Questions of the week:
1.  Have you had any Dutch cheese? Which is your favourite?
2.  Is there a regional food in your area?
3.  How did the missionary work go this week?  Did you teach many lessons?
4.  How is the finding going?
5.  What do you do for service?  Since you live with a lot of older people, I imagine there might be opportunities to help right where you live.
6.  Did you have any funny experiences this week?
7.  How was church?
8.  Did you travel anywhere this week? Where do you meet for district meetings?
9.  Your Dutch sounds so good ( I heard a little bit in the goat video).  So awesome!  Is the language progressing?

1. Yes, we have a chunk in the house that we use a cheese knife with to cut pieces off. It is gouda, which I think is the best.

2. Not really, they eat random things. Fish a lot, even though they aren't on the coast.

3. Decent, and a few...

4. Finding is still a struggle here, but it’s going all right I guess.

5. Just what we do for Tea. She bought a new garden so it will need some work. We like never see the old people in our apartment, I don't think they leave it...

6. I said that God has a body of flesh and legs instead of God has a body of flesh and bones... the Dutch words are pretty close to each other, beenderen and benen.

7. I love that vacation season is over. There are members who we have never seen come back now. This one family we met moved here from Miami 2 years ago. They are cool! ER and I also got to bless the sacrament which is always nice.

8. Zwolle and a little place called Stadskanaal and also Hogeveen which is where we rented the bikes. We meet in Zwolle.

9. Oh, haha, I didn't realize I spoke Dutch in that one haha. Ya, it's coming.

Word is arm, which means more, haha. You say it just like the English way.

Okay love you lots bye. hou doe.

Beautiful Dutch countryside

Egg vending machine

A member added memes to Elder Fernhout's planner

Week 36: Staying in Emmen

Okay, so this week a lot of stuff happened but at the same time not much... One of the best things was Zone Conference. I'll get to that in a bit. We also got transfer calls a few nights ago and it wasn't very exciting. Me and ER are staying together here in Emmen. I don't mind staying here though. 1 transfer would be really short so I am happy to stay. I like it here but probs will be done with this city after this transfer. In our zone there aren't too many changes either, just additions. There are so many greenies that a lot of people are training 2 people at the same time! We have three 3 mans in our district which means our district is 13 people now, which is huge! I love having a big district though. I heard about Matt. He is with a very new missionary and will be staying in Roosendaal.  He will be a DL [District Leader] there. Exciting for him! He said he's nervous but he will be a great DL!

Okay, so Zone Conference. So it was held in Zoetermeer, which from here takes about 3 hours to get to. And it began at 10:00 am, however, we had to be there at 9:30 am ... so that means our train left at 6:15 am and we still had to travel to the station from the apartment. So that was not going to be fun. We called the ZLs [Zone Leaders] and asked if we could sleep over in some city closer. They said yes and we got to go to a place called Deventer. That is the nicest apartment in the mission! It is huge! The Deventer elders live there as well as the Apeldoorn elders who are also ZLs. So we got to stay there with all 6 of us which was fun. One of the elders was Elder Blackwell from Taber. He's cool. His uncle is Bro Willoughby! So he's been to Lethbridge a lot. I told him where we live and he's like, oh by the Superstore? It was cool to talk to someone who knew Lethbridge. Anyway, the next day we got on a train and ended up in Zoetermeer awhile later.

Before the meeting began I got to reunite with all my buddies. I saw Elder Steele and my two MTC comps Tanner and Cameron and some other people I knew from before. It was so fun! I sat with Elder Cameron during the conference. Good times. I also met Elder Oliphant at the conference, the one that Maddie and Jackie know. He said that they are really good, like really good, professional level. [Elder Oliphant played in the orchestra with the twins in Utah - he played clarinet with Maddie who was the principal clarinet, Jackie the principal flutist].

Okay, the actual conference was great! I loved it, Elder Gary Sabin is a super cool guy. He talked for a total of like 3 or more hours I'd say. I have 3 quotes that I like from him. The first is, "you don't take the easy classes in school to grow." He talked about how if you only took classes like cooking and gym and fun option classes, you won't grow as if you took classes like calculus and sciences and things like that. Just like in life, you grow from the hard times more than from the easy times. And if you look in the BOM it is filled with people who are having hard times, it doesn't touch for very long on the easy times of the people.  The second quote is "don't trade what you want the most for what you want in the moment." Simple, but how often do we do this!? A bunch I'd say. We want to get a degree in school or lose weight but we decide to not study and do something more fun, or to eat a piece of cake or something. If we are able to focus on the end and broaden our perspective then we will more often achieve our goals. Think about what you are giving up when you are in the moment of the little decisions. The third quote is, "you'll never be happier than you are grateful." Have you ever seen a happy ungrateful person? Not really. If you are 30 percent thankful you will never be more than 30 percent happy, so simple. So be more thankful for things! He also proposed the thought,"what if every morning you woke up with the things you were thankful for the night before?" What would you say differently? I think my prayers would be a lot longer. But still, express more gratitude and be happier. I took many other notes but these are the main things I liked.

Random things paragraph. First, I have a bunch of music from other missionaries and one of the songs was sung by Tanner Linford, haha. [A missionary in Lethbridge that sang at Nick's missionary farewell and was a contestant on "The Voice"]. Pretty cool to have had that guy over to the house and now I'm listening to him on the misison... Also, we had an investigator ask us if you could give animals a priesthood blessing then asked if we would give her rabbit a blessing. Let's just say we did not end up giving it a blessing, haha. At one of our dinner appointments the family had pet goats in the backyard, I took a video of the 2 young ones fighting. It was pretty cute. A few days ago the JW girls knocked on our door. After they asked some questions about the Bible I asked them if they have ever heard of the BOM, they disappointedly said yes and walked away, haha. I lost the key to my bike lock... but the way it's locked I can still lift it up, so I carried it to the church from the station trying not to look like I stole it, haha. One of the members is gonna help cut the lock off.

Okay, now to read your email. Ya, September is here already! I can't belive how fast it is going! This past week we had, I think 3 [dinner appointments]. They fed us pizza at one, which was delicious. Oh, weird about Texas. There are few people in Sunday school but everyone says so much and has so many comments, the teacher doesn't even have to do anything cause people comment so much. They have to tell people to stop so they can bring up the next section. Ya, that is cool about our Proclamation a while ago, but it's cool they are putting theirs out there now! [Talking about the Church's "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" and the recent Evangelical "Nashville Statement"].

Questions of the week:
1.  How was Zone Conference?  Did you get your package?
2.  How was travelling to Zoetomeer?  Was that your first time?  Did you see the temple?
3.  How was your week?  Best thing/worst thing that happened?
4.  How is the training going? (I remember you saying that ER he has a good understanding of gospel doctrine).
5.  How was the teaching this week?  Did you help Tea in her garden again this week?  How is the mother/daughter investigators, are they progressing?
6.  Can you think of anything I can send you for your birthday?

1. Great, yes, I got my package! Thanks so much! The pants fit great, like perfect and I have worn them everyday since I go them, super nice. All the other stuff was perfect too! I love the food! Also, I thought the Canada lights were funny because it's a Dutch company that makes them and on the back the instructions are in 6 languages and none of them are Dutch... but thanks for those too, they are perfect!

2. It went well, boring to travel there but back was fun. I had been there once before for the Keukenhof Conference a while back. I didn't get to see the temple ... we get to go there early November though!!!

3. The best was Zone Conference and seeing all the missionaries and to hear Elder Sabin. The worst was Tuesday... just a boring day where nobody wanted to talk and we didn't have any appointments. Not too bad though.

4. Decent. ER knows the gospel well and can answer all the crazy questions we get, also my random deep doctrine questions, haha. It's always fun to have those convos. We were up till 1:00 am  just talking one night, it was fun. Oh, haha, I didn't even read what was in between the brackets till now.

5. Not great, no we didn't. Ya, we had a lesson with the mum and daughter. They are progressing but everyone else decided to take a break from us this week it seems.

6. No, I can't sorry...

That is all,

Oh, the word is vos which means fox. I don't know if the Vos' already knew that but I didn't...

Elder Fernhout

Reminding me what he looks like

Zone Conference in Zoetemeer with Elders Tanner and Steele 

MTC Reunion, Elder Oliphant in background

Elder Fernhout's journal