Week 80: Gemeente Raadgever

Good to see Elder Blackwell made it home safe. Ya, I am in his old area.  Ah, I love the Willoughbys! Monday night we had FHE with the YSA at this member's house, that happens every week. It is so fun, we play a bunch of games and eat dinner.  On Tuesday we met the president and he is super cool! Pretty much all meetings will now be in Dutch, well Flemish. He is pretty spunky and hyped. We all like him. On Wednesday we had a few appointments with members and also branch council. Thursday we had a lot of appointments with less actives. Friday we did a ton of service, lots of yard work. Saturday was awesome because we had a ward BBQ. It was great! Sunday was good, we always have to sit on the stand and if you show any sign of being tired the members will roast you, haha. It's really hard. You also get self conscious about everything, like if you are blinking too much or crossing your legs weird or all kinds of things.

Questions this week:
1.  Did you meet the new mission president and his wife yet?
2.  It looks like Lelystad is an island, do you take a lot of trains then? Are there a lot of bridges?
3.  What are your impressions of your new area?
4.  I’d like to hear about your duties as branch counsellor?
5.  Is the four man apartment working out well?
6.  I’d like to hear about the work this week?  Are you able to find many investigators?  What do you focus on in the area?  What is the best way to find?

1. Yes!
2. Yes it is. No we bike a lot, we don't cover a very large area. Ya, a decent amount of bridges, nothing like Brugge though.
3. It's good. I really like the youth and members here!
4. We have a lot of meetings and we come up with activities that would be fun for youth and we help out with less actives.
5. Really well!
6. We got nothing this week.... We are doing a decent amount of doors. We found a crazy Canadian Indonesian Dutch photographer motorcylce hunting military Christian guy last night! That was fun.

Week 79: Lelystad

Well, I don’t know how but it is hotter here in Lelystad than it was in Alkmaar… super hot. Also, I had to leave my borrowed bike behind so I didn't have a bike. I inherited Elder Blackwell's but Elder Jeanfreau left his in Haarlem. We went and got that today which is why I now have no time to email but transfer day absolutely sucked! All the busses in the country decided to go on strike on transfer day and we needed to get all our luggage to the station from our apartment in Alkmaar so we had no choice but to walk. I had my really large bag which had no handle plus my duffel and my side bag and my guitar. I had to carry that for 1 hour and 20 mins all the way to the station. Easily one of the hardest things I have ever done on the mission. It was so awful. My shoulder muscles are still in pain from that day. My big black bag was so heavy and awkward that when I got to Amsterdam Centraal the other elders came to help and couldn’t even carry it… without carrying my other bags at the same time... at least I don't have a bike. Other than that it was mostly fine. We had to wait for a bit in Amsterdam Centraal but I had already met Elder Jeanfreau there. There is a piano open to anyone to play and he is really good so he got on it and I pulled out my guitar and we played some music. We even got a bit of a crowd going, it was fun, I want to now be a rockstar…

We met up with Elder Chamberlin who is in Lelystad because it is a 4 man apartment. We went together to Lelystad where we then had to wait for Elder Crow. He also had a bunch of issues but we found him. We then went grocery shopping. We went so HAM and it came to a total of 111 euros. Usually it's like 30 for 2 elders so we are set. We had branch council that night and met some cool people, like the branch president. He is sick. We had some other appointments the other days, a few with less actives and one with a member. We are whitewashing into this area but there is pretty much no teaching pool so we will have to build it up. We did a lot of walking and getting lost this past week because the city is laid out really weird, really weird. On Sunday we had a dinner appointment with an investigator who had fed the missionaries every Sunday for the past year. She is really cool! We also had a cool miracle on Sunday, at the end of the 3 hour this random lady walked in and said she wants to learn more and wants to talk with a priest. We have an appointment for this week.

The branch is cool, lots of youth but still small. Sorry no time for a geestelijke toetje!

Here is President and Zuster Buysse's Mission blog link: http://buyssebelgiumnetherlandsmission.blogspot.com

Week 78: Overplaastingen en Gepinkwash

So, yes, I did finally get out of Alkmaar but it will be sad leaving for sure. There are so many people here that I love! But we are actually both leaving, Elder Peck and I. We are being replaced by 2 sister missionaries. In missionary terms that's called a pinkwash. Elder Peck will be going to Heerlen and I will be heading to Lelystad, which is in the same district. I won’t be district leader anymore which is sad, however, I will be a branch counselor, so that's new… I will be comps with Elder Jean Frau from the same group as Elder Furniss. I will be in another 4 man apartment, together with Elder Crow and with Elder Chamberlin who is from Elder Nielsen's group. They are all really cool people and we are going to have a great transfer. It's really cool for me to be back in the same apartment as Elder Crow again. We had talked on the phone recently saying how we need to get back together and now we are, haha. Can't wait!!! So, ya, big changes. We are really busy here now because we have to write a white wash packet and clean up really nice for the sisters. Also, we have a few more appointments and also have to pack up and prepare for district meeting and buy food… super kinda stressed but it komt toch goed [it’s okay]! I have no idea when I will see the new mission prez. I have heard that there will be a special little conference to meet him and then later we will have a real zone conference. IDK.

This week it was really busy, we had 2 exchanges and I was in Alkmaar for both of them. For the first, I was with Elder Leland and the second with Elder Simons, both great exchanges. I took a lot pics with members this week because I knew I would leave. I had service on the farm again with Elder Simons, that was fun as always. We had a good appointment with K and we got her a ride to stake conference because it was really far away. It was a good conference. I got to say hi to a lot of members from the Zoetermeer and Wasenar wards. I loved that. I also saw a lot of missionaries and the speakers were also really good. We had a General Authority from Spain speak, his talk was especially good. On Saturday we worked on the Munsters farm helping more with the tulips. We had to peel off a part of the tulip bulb, I took some pics. It was fun. I’m getting to see the whole process!!!

Week 77: TEXEL!!

Well, we finally made it to Texel, the island above the Netherlands that is in our area. If you ask the Dutch how to pronounce it, half will say “Tessel” the other half "Texel" with a hard x. I like to say “Tessel."  It was a super cool trip. We went to the marine museum in Den Helder before hopping on a ferry to get to the island. We rented bikes there and took a nice bike path through some dunes to the beach then went through a forest and went to the main city called Den Burg, I think it is called, also a super pretty place. I got a sticker and a flag for the memories. We then biked back to the ferry place and got back on to go home. It was super fun to go onto a ferry, that was one of the best parts of the day! So cool and really nice. Also, these navy looking boats came up to us at one point and were doing some kind of drill. It looked really cool, they all had uniforms on, I took a vid and pics. Also, at the museum we went into a submarine! I took a vid and pics there too, haha. Lots of photos this week!

Tuesday was like our member day. We met with 4 different families. We had lunch and dinner appointments as well as service with Zr VRand we visited Zr G. Super good day. We also got a call from the traveling elders. They are elders who go around the entire mission to go on exchanges with everyone for like 4 days. I worked with the legendary Elder Hunter for 3 days. It was great but they called with short notice and we had some plans already, service appointments, etc. Also, we weren't able to get sufficient food… it was fine though! Wednesday we had 5 appointments with onderzoekers [investigators]. It was a good day and we also found 3 new people. We also tried to fix our dryer and we started by taking it all apart. That was really fun. Also took a pic of that. We were able to get it all back together but it still doesn't work. Oh well.

On Thursday we had interviews. That was sad but really nice [last interview before the Bunnels finish their mission]. I got to take a pic with Pres and Zr Bunnell! Friday was the beginning of our exchange and we had a lot of appointments set up. I had a dinner appointment with fam D. Super cool family and took also a photo with them haha, and their “cavias” [guinea pigs].  Elder Hunter and I found 4 onderzoekers that day.

Saturday was a super weird day, killed us. We woke up and played soccer in the morning for our workout time, then we had service where we loaded up a moving van with stuff. That was heavy work. Then we had another service thing at a farm we go to now. We weeded for 4.5 hours straight, hard work. We all got wrecked by stinging nettle. It was really labour intensive! Then we had basketball that night with 2 less active guys. It went really well! I had a lot of fun too.

Sunday was the last day of the exchange and we went hard again and found 4 new onderzoekers. The last 2 are the parents of this family who are super nice. They are from a country called Eritrea. They speak a language that has no BOM translation which sucks. The parents speak nothing but their language but the kids spoke a bit of Dutch. When we knocked on their door they for some reason were really happy and invited us straight inside without even knowing who we were… they were a super funny family and they gave us a platter of food! It was like Ethiopian food, really good. I took a few pics and videos with them, such nice people. They were christian too. We go back later today!

It was a good week!

Week 74: NEMO in Oosterdokseiland

May 28, 2018

Hello! Ya it has been really hot here, around 27 C during the day. They say this is the hottest May they have had in the last 300 years!  The Dutch only know one hockey and that's field hockey. So no ice hockey. In other sports news the soccer team in Emmen made it to the highest level of soccer here. They are playing against teams like Rotterdam and Amsterdam.

Well, some fun news is that we got a call from President Bunnel telling is we need to plan a baptism for June 2. It is for someone who I taught in Emmen but they were taught a lot in Alkmaar. They are now living in a different area but he wants to be baptized here and also move here. so that will be really cool! He and his mum will be baptized.

Last pday we had a good time for district pday. We went to the science museum in Amsterdam and it was fun to hang out with Matt the whole day! The museum was also really cool, lots of cool kids science hands on exhibits. I didn't take many, if any, photos though... after that we went back to the church to play some sports. We then all left to go home.

Wednesday we had a long day. We had 2 appointments in Hoorn in the morning and also a dinner appointment later that day so we decided to stay there the entire day and go HAM. Our first 2 appointments went really well and they were both with young mothers who are pretty positive. After that we went to get lunch with Elder Sutherland. He was comps with elder peck and is off his mission now but came back to say hi and he took us out for lunch, so that was fun. Then we got back to work until dinner with fam TH. They are super cool.

Thursday we also had a sick dinner with fam H in Den Helder. We had an appointment in the area so it worked out really well. We have a zone challenge which involves getting people to church so we have made that a focus in every lesson and we expected at least 2 people for sure but no one came... Friday we had dinner with A our Hungarian investigator. We made Goulash with him and it was so good. He is so nice to feed us! We also finally got a Hungarian BOM for him and he really appreciated that.

Saturday was a long day of planning for the week and for the upcoming transfer, as well as for the district and for the baptism. We had dinner with fam dB. That was good as always. She calls us her guinea pigs cause she is always experimenting with food. It was really hot and they had the window open and there was a bird making a lot of sound during our spiritual thought and Br. dB gets up and goes to the window and yells "shut up!!!" in English, it was the best thing ever. Then it continued to make sounds and he turns to us and says "guess it doesn't speak English." We love that family.

Sunday was a good day at church. I had to translate for this family of like 17 people from America... then they stayed for classes and I translated again. It is fun but tiring. Fam K invited us over for lunch and their daughter came who lives with her family in Emmen and it was great to see them again! We also had to go to Hoorn yesterday for an appointment. Well ya it was a busy week and this next one will also be busy, 2 exchanges, a baptism, and many many other appointments!

Well that's all I got!
Elder Fernhout