I found out we are allowed to take little video clips so I have started to do that! I think you'll love it. We went to Rijswijk this week to get more legal stuff done for me. We also went to a haring [herring] store and Elder Tanner had his first haring but I couldn't do it. Soon though! We went to this one store and bought so many croissants. They make them reeeeaaaalllly good here, some with cheese, some with chocolate and some normal and they are usually really cheap! We did a ton of biking lately, especially yesterday. We have done a lot of biking in the rain which is so fun I love biking in the rain. In the morning ER and I have been good at getting up and working out, we do P90X, it's more fun to follow a video than do random stuff. It's hard though because we live in an apartment so we can't jump or be loud or anything. We also went to Gent again for district meeting, we went to Ikea afterwards again. It was fun and always nice to see Elder Tanner. We also made some FUFU this week which is the African food with the soup and big dough ball. We made it at a less active members house and it is not that great a food but I mean it's something you gotta try. I can't wait to try it from a real African person.
Questions from home:
1. How is the weather? Does it rain everyday?
2. How far a train ride is it from Brugge to Brussels, Brugge to Antwerepen?
3. Are you learning to cook Dutch/Belgian food at all?
4. Please let me know what I can mail you. (I’d mail you some Easter chocolate but you are in Belgium and I’m sure the chocolate is much better there!)
5. How did the work go this week?
6. When are your next transfers? In 3 weeks, when Elder Nielson comes in?
7. How’s the Dutch/Flemmish coming along? No doubt it gets better every week!
1. rainy and windy and only one sunnyish day this week but it is aweosme I love it and ya pretty much everyday.
2. Brugge to Brussels is like 1.5 hrs and to Antwerpen it's like 1.
3. A lot of Indonesian food haha like nassi, Elder Richards makes it so good.
4. haha I don't need anything that soon, I am just making a list so I can make sure I got it all.
5. It went well, a ton of dropped appointments.
6. Yup, but I will almost 100 percent stay with Richards.
7. It's hard but improving slowly.
Here is the stuff I wrote last week:
Hello again, this is my more detailed version of some things that happened this week. So ya like I said last week I was on exchanges with and Elder Higham from Red Deer. We had a lot of fun and did some good work too. We had a zone conference in Antwerpen, that’s why we went there in the first place. There was a lot of people there! And Prez Bunnell and his wife were there too. The conference was all day pretty much. Elder Richards and I went up to Antwerpen a day early so we didn’t have to travel in the morning, we would have had to get up at about 4 in the morning! So we hung out with them and played some board games because it was pday. Then we sat around and told stories and then we went to do some missionary work to end the day. I went with Elder Higham's companion named Elder Sutherland. What’s cool is that Elder Sutherland was trained by Elder Richards! So in missionary terms he is Elder Richards son just like I am haha.
So we split up and went knocking doors to find people who would donate food for the food bank. ES was doing most of the talking but then we found someone who spoke English so he turned to me. I was not ready for that, but I was able to talk and the guy let us into his apartment to get food. We ended up having a really good conversation about religion and he showed us this binder he has full of notes he takes when he reads the bible. He loves the bible. So I was like do I have a book for you! We didn’t have one but it worked out because he said we could come back the next day! So that was really cool for me because it was the second bell that we rung. ES says it was because I am a greenie. So after that we kept going to other houses. ER and EH were working together and no one was giving them food. But me and ES kept getting tons of food. It seemed like everyone we talked to was really awesome and gave us tons of food. So ya that was cool. That was all Monday night and the conference was on Tuesday. So we spent the night chilling with ES and EH and then in the morning went to the church for the conference. It was good and I learned a lot. ER volunteered to be the dummy for learning how to get haircuts, another missionary cut his hair in front of us all and taught us how to do it. Turned out ight.
After the conference we split up and it was just me and EH. ER and ES went back to Brugge for the day. Me and EH had a good day, we had a dinner appointment which is always good. The family was an older lady and her husband who isn’t a member but she is. And their youngest son was there. He is 21 and makes rap music in his room all day. He was funny but I can't imagine raising the kid, that must have been a lot of work. His mum asked him to say the dinner prayer and it took him like 10 minutes to say it properly. At first he went off in Arabic then in some other language then he pretends he is possessed then he starts talking in clicks and weird language. It was funny but I really wanted to eat! Then he starts his prayer “Yo Jesus, it'd be real nice of ya if ya could bless this food we have here in font of us” and just kept going like that. Then his mum pretend stabs him with a knife and he said a normal prayer. That family was really interesting, really funny though too. The mum is an amazing artist!
Earlier that day we were looking on a map of the city of Antwerpen and EH looks at me and tells me to pick a street that we were going to do some door knocking on. He said I pick it because I am closer to the spirit because I am a greenie. So I picked some random street and we went there. Within an hour we had 3 really good conversations and taught the restoration 2 times on the door. I don’t think y'all understand how crazy that is. It was a miracle, EH has been out almost 2 years soon and has never had that happen in his entire mission. We gave one of the people we talked to a BOM and we had really good conversation about the restoration. It was so good I can't even explain it. Anyway that was really cool for me.
Another cool story is when me and ER went to visit a member family here in Brugge. We didn’t really know what we were going to share with them but right before we entered ER decided on the first vision and gave me my part to do. I was nervous but I knew it was all going to work out good. We had a nice talk with them about stuff and then got into the first vision. After we shared our thoughts the wife said that just 2 hours before we came she was asking her husband questions about the first vision and was losing her testimony of it. I truly believe that ER was inspired to talk on what we did. It was so cool for me experience that and ER is such a great example of following the spirit. Part of the Book of Mormon I like is 2 Nephi chapter 4. I just like it because it shows the kind of person Nephi is and its interesting to see what he writes. Just read it and you’ll see what I mean.
Dutch word of the week is dingen which means thing. I just think it’s a funny word and really suits its meaning. They use it a lot here. For example “the dingen over there” its also really useful for me when I don’t know the work for something haha.
(testimony for the Stewart’s)
Learning the language has been hard and it restricts me to be able to only share simple thoughts. But I think it helps me focus on the most important things. When I bear my testimony in Dutch it is very simple but I think that is the most powerful. You don’t need fancy words to make a good testimony. Just the basic doctrines and principles. I have a testimony that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God and that he restored the true gospel to the earth. Every time we recite the first vision I feel the spirit so strongly. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God and that he leads the church in these latter days. I know that Jesus Christ died for us and that though the atonement we can we freed from sin. That gives me so much comfort in life. I know that God is our Heavenly Father and that he loves us. I know that he communicates to us through the Holy Ghost and as we keep the commandments and repent and live the word of God we can feel the spirit in our lives and it will lead us and inspire us. I know that that Church is true and that the Book of Mormon is the most true book on the earth. I know that we can learn so much from it and as we read it we will grow closer to God. I have seen the power of the Book of Mormon in my life and in others and I see the importance of reading it every single day. I know that as a missionary I have a very important calling and I am doing the right thing. I love my mission and know that I have been called here by a prophet and apostles who are inspired of God. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ amen.
Cool stuff about my mission area. So I am serving in a city called Brugge, which is the Dutch name. All the cities also have English/French names which I think Brugge becomes Brug or something. The area me and ER cover is he second largest in the entire mission the largest is in Friesland [in the Netherlands]. We are in a part of Belgium called West Flanders. Belgium has two parts Flanders and Wallonia. Flanders is Dutch and Wallonia is French. They have separate governments and Brussels also has its own government. Its all very confusing. Anyway West Flanders is known for having the hardest accent of anywhere in the mission to understand so ya that’s tough for me. The area that my companion and I are in covers a few other cities, some are Oostende, Bredene, Zeebrugge, Pittum. I’ll try to take a photo of the maps we have and include that so it makes more sense. Anyway Brugge is also known for being hard for missionary work but I absolutely love it here in Brugge!
Love Elder Fernhout
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| Gent |
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| Biking along a canal in Brugge |
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| LDS church in Brugge is on the second floor |
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