Herzlichen Glückwünsch Mumsie!!! I hope your birthday was the 2nd best ever, your best being any you've had with me.
This week was insane. Not in a good or bad way, just in a "I don't have any words to describe this" way.
First of alls, I saw my beloved and dear friend Eric. I used his visit as an excuse to go to Hard Rock Cafe for lunch where I could listen to normal music. HA. So thank you for coming, Ricsters. Twas great.
Also great news. We now have 3 investigators under the age of 12. Please don't ask how this happens, it just does.
Aaaaaaand Saturday my companion (because she's going home in a week) got permission to go to this career workshop thing put on by a member. I'm glad she enjoyed it and learned a lot from it but 10 hours is A LITTLE MUCH for me. I ended up leaving the room (a lot of the vocabularly was a little over my head) and went into another room where I read an entire 200 page book, played half the hymns in the hymnbook, tried to sleep, did a Snow White puzzle I found, and read "The Little Mermaid" in German, which I don't know if you knew this but the original story by Hans Christian Anderson is heartwrenching!!!! And then I still had time left over so I wandered around the building and then stared at the wall for about an hour. LONGEST DAY OF MY LIFE. Also after being a missionary for awhile days like that are like torture. I can't sit around doing nothing, it's against my nature. WHATEVER.
Sad news! My lovely friend (and investigator) Sika moved back to France! Saying goodbye was the worst. She was SO AWESOME to be around. Why why why are goodbyes so hard?! But no worries, we're staying in touch and she lives in Lyon so you know I will be there asap. Keine Sorgen, mes amis!
Other than that the week wasn't super eventful. I also can't really remember. Also I'm tired and just want to take a nap. K thanks.
Love.
Sister Young
8.26.2012
August 13, 2012
So.
This week was boooooooring and I can't remember anything that happened. Except that we got 5 joint teaches this week (2 of which were in a member's home!), which is AWESOME.
Oh yes, and a lovely friend of ours from Gambia is preparing himself to be baptized. Yes!
Also I ate this AMAZING spanish hot chocolate this week and I almost died from all the calories I consumed in a single sitting. And I hope you noticed that I said "ate" instead of "drank," because the hot chocolate was so thick I ate it with a spoon. And also they give you a side helping of churros, which are suprisingly delicious in chocolate. I LOVE EUROPE AND THEIR CRAZY CHOCOLATE CREATIONS.
Ok. So you remember how I told you about our little Korean friend and his awesome progess? Well it gets better. We had a lesson with him about Jesus Christ and the role he plays in the Plan of Salvation. We talked a lot about eternal life and how it means that we can live in the presence of God and how we can obtain this wonderful blessing. After we thought we made the point clear and tried to move on, he just kept getting hung up on eternal life and wouldn't let it go. He kept telling us he doesn't really understand. After trying to show him scriptures and things, we kinda gave up and decided to just look it up in the german equivalent of the bible dictionary. It roughly translates to "Eternal life: Living forever as families in the presence of God. Eternal life is the biggest gift that people can receive from God." All of the sudden his eyes lit up and he said, "That's it! Eternal life is with our families!!!" Well, we of course felt like IDIOTS for not mentioning that before! And wow, that just really struck a chord with him, that he could be with his family forever. We had briefly mentioned that once several weeks before, but for some reason in this lesson it just really hit him what that meant. And that was an aaaaaamazing experience for us, to be there for that!! We are so so so excited for him :)
Now the stupid story of the week. So Elders in another part of Berlin called us a couple weeks ago and asked if we would be able to help out with this service project thing, to which we gladly accepted. We found out a couple days before that this little town was having a birthday celebration of sorts (the city was founded 600 years before) and they wanted us sisters to help out at the Relief Society booth at this carnival/festival thing. So as we're counting down the days to help out with this thing, I had been making a lot of jokes about how we'll have to sit there and sew all day and wear bonnets and things. Well everyone got a good laugh out of it, until the day of this thing arrived and we showed up to find out that yes, WE WOULD BE SEWING PILLOWS THE ENTIRE DAY. I was pretty much dying. Worst day ever. Relief Society is sometimes a thorn in my side. That is all.
Ok ok I hope you all have a lovely week and I love y'all lots and lots.
Sister Young
This week was boooooooring and I can't remember anything that happened. Except that we got 5 joint teaches this week (2 of which were in a member's home!), which is AWESOME.
Oh yes, and a lovely friend of ours from Gambia is preparing himself to be baptized. Yes!
Also I ate this AMAZING spanish hot chocolate this week and I almost died from all the calories I consumed in a single sitting. And I hope you noticed that I said "ate" instead of "drank," because the hot chocolate was so thick I ate it with a spoon. And also they give you a side helping of churros, which are suprisingly delicious in chocolate. I LOVE EUROPE AND THEIR CRAZY CHOCOLATE CREATIONS.
Ok. So you remember how I told you about our little Korean friend and his awesome progess? Well it gets better. We had a lesson with him about Jesus Christ and the role he plays in the Plan of Salvation. We talked a lot about eternal life and how it means that we can live in the presence of God and how we can obtain this wonderful blessing. After we thought we made the point clear and tried to move on, he just kept getting hung up on eternal life and wouldn't let it go. He kept telling us he doesn't really understand. After trying to show him scriptures and things, we kinda gave up and decided to just look it up in the german equivalent of the bible dictionary. It roughly translates to "Eternal life: Living forever as families in the presence of God. Eternal life is the biggest gift that people can receive from God." All of the sudden his eyes lit up and he said, "That's it! Eternal life is with our families!!!" Well, we of course felt like IDIOTS for not mentioning that before! And wow, that just really struck a chord with him, that he could be with his family forever. We had briefly mentioned that once several weeks before, but for some reason in this lesson it just really hit him what that meant. And that was an aaaaaamazing experience for us, to be there for that!! We are so so so excited for him :)
Now the stupid story of the week. So Elders in another part of Berlin called us a couple weeks ago and asked if we would be able to help out with this service project thing, to which we gladly accepted. We found out a couple days before that this little town was having a birthday celebration of sorts (the city was founded 600 years before) and they wanted us sisters to help out at the Relief Society booth at this carnival/festival thing. So as we're counting down the days to help out with this thing, I had been making a lot of jokes about how we'll have to sit there and sew all day and wear bonnets and things. Well everyone got a good laugh out of it, until the day of this thing arrived and we showed up to find out that yes, WE WOULD BE SEWING PILLOWS THE ENTIRE DAY. I was pretty much dying. Worst day ever. Relief Society is sometimes a thorn in my side. That is all.
Ok ok I hope you all have a lovely week and I love y'all lots and lots.
Sister Young
8.06.2012
August 6, 2012
Naaaaaa?
That is a question people here ask when they want to know how you're doing. Does it make sense? No. It's not even a real word in German, I'm pretty sure. Don't worry, it only took me like half of my mission to figure this out. Naja.
So goooood news. We have a lovely lady getting baptized in October! It's extra cool because her husband and all of her children joined the church last year and she was totally against it! But now she's golden. And we have the privilege of being here. The only problem? She doesn't speak a lick of German (they're all from Cambodia). So everything we do has to be translated through her husband or children. It's quite an adventure, and not one I was really expecting on a mission. But it's still great, no worries.
With reference to above, I was thinking about how I'm not really serving in Germany as much as I'm serving in Africa and Asia. And all the returned missionaries when giving their homecoming talks are always like, "Oh, I just love the people of [insert country here]!" or "I really learned how to love the [insert nationality here] people." I don't really feel like I could honestly say that I just loved serving the German people because I don't know as many people originally from Germany as from Ghana for example hahaha. I teach just as much in German as I do in English. And now I'm learning how to pray in Cambodian! I don't even know what my mission language is anymore haha. Naja.
Ok. Now story time.
Cheesy story. So we were going to an appointment the other day and the address was not correct. We were of course bummed, and also not very prepared because we didn't have any backup plan (stupid, I know). So we decide to just walk around and try to make out an appt with someone on the street. Normally I would be totally down for that except we happened to be in a very German part of town, so there weren't many foreigners. This means it's waaaaaaaay harder to make out an appt. I was just totally and selfishly bummed, and ridiculously tired. I bent my head and offered a silent prayer that God would just PUHLEASE let someone here make out an appt with us, or at least that people would be nice. As soon as I looked up I saw a German man walking in our direction and decided to go talk to him. Surprisingly enough, when we stopped him he exclaimed "Mormons!," which is totally weird because most people here have never heard of us. We asked what he had heard about our church and, of course, he said we're polygamists and he thinks we're a cult. Needlesst to say, we cleared that up. And then we totally bore our testimonies to him and the spirit was soooo strong and he agreed to meet with us, even though he was super skeptical at first. It was a miracle!!!! But then I probably shouldn't tell you that he didn't show up for our appt 2 days later. BUT it doesn't matter because a) his positive experience with missionaries probably will prepare him to receive them later and b) it was totally a testimony to me that God really does love and care about us and he listens to our prayers. What is important to us is also important to him, and I was so happy the rest of the day.
And then. IT GETS BETTER.
So after making out an appointment with a German, which is a huge deal, we found ourselves walking into some sort of large outdoor shopping center with a million souls just waiting to be saved! But, still being our natural missionary selves, we picked out the first African we saw. The timing in which we approached her was unfortunate, due to the fact that someone had just barely stolen her purse that had her visa and stuff in it and she was kind of freaking out and didn't know what to do. So we calmed her down and told her that we would accompany her to the nearest police station. After walking a million miles to get there, we finally made it to the station and stayed with this girl while she talked to the police, who were all surprisingly jolly. One officer in particular was extremely nice and helped the girl fill out a bunch of paperwork. After telling us how cool we were to do this for her, he asked Sister Uhlig and I if we had any questions for him. I'm not sure what came across my mind at this point, but I opened my mouth and the words, "Well, do you have any interest in learning more about our faith?" just kind of fell out. Sister Uhlig turned a deep shade of red and just started laughing. The officer just chuckled and began to tell us the story of his religious awakening to agnosticism. We left him with a pamphlet and a card anyway and it was super great.
And that was the ending to a really great day.
I hope you are all loving your lives. I miss you all more than the moon and the stars. Peace and blessings.
Sister Young
That is a question people here ask when they want to know how you're doing. Does it make sense? No. It's not even a real word in German, I'm pretty sure. Don't worry, it only took me like half of my mission to figure this out. Naja.
So goooood news. We have a lovely lady getting baptized in October! It's extra cool because her husband and all of her children joined the church last year and she was totally against it! But now she's golden. And we have the privilege of being here. The only problem? She doesn't speak a lick of German (they're all from Cambodia). So everything we do has to be translated through her husband or children. It's quite an adventure, and not one I was really expecting on a mission. But it's still great, no worries.
With reference to above, I was thinking about how I'm not really serving in Germany as much as I'm serving in Africa and Asia. And all the returned missionaries when giving their homecoming talks are always like, "Oh, I just love the people of [insert country here]!" or "I really learned how to love the [insert nationality here] people." I don't really feel like I could honestly say that I just loved serving the German people because I don't know as many people originally from Germany as from Ghana for example hahaha. I teach just as much in German as I do in English. And now I'm learning how to pray in Cambodian! I don't even know what my mission language is anymore haha. Naja.
Ok. Now story time.
Cheesy story. So we were going to an appointment the other day and the address was not correct. We were of course bummed, and also not very prepared because we didn't have any backup plan (stupid, I know). So we decide to just walk around and try to make out an appt with someone on the street. Normally I would be totally down for that except we happened to be in a very German part of town, so there weren't many foreigners. This means it's waaaaaaaay harder to make out an appt. I was just totally and selfishly bummed, and ridiculously tired. I bent my head and offered a silent prayer that God would just PUHLEASE let someone here make out an appt with us, or at least that people would be nice. As soon as I looked up I saw a German man walking in our direction and decided to go talk to him. Surprisingly enough, when we stopped him he exclaimed "Mormons!," which is totally weird because most people here have never heard of us. We asked what he had heard about our church and, of course, he said we're polygamists and he thinks we're a cult. Needlesst to say, we cleared that up. And then we totally bore our testimonies to him and the spirit was soooo strong and he agreed to meet with us, even though he was super skeptical at first. It was a miracle!!!! But then I probably shouldn't tell you that he didn't show up for our appt 2 days later. BUT it doesn't matter because a) his positive experience with missionaries probably will prepare him to receive them later and b) it was totally a testimony to me that God really does love and care about us and he listens to our prayers. What is important to us is also important to him, and I was so happy the rest of the day.
And then. IT GETS BETTER.
So after making out an appointment with a German, which is a huge deal, we found ourselves walking into some sort of large outdoor shopping center with a million souls just waiting to be saved! But, still being our natural missionary selves, we picked out the first African we saw. The timing in which we approached her was unfortunate, due to the fact that someone had just barely stolen her purse that had her visa and stuff in it and she was kind of freaking out and didn't know what to do. So we calmed her down and told her that we would accompany her to the nearest police station. After walking a million miles to get there, we finally made it to the station and stayed with this girl while she talked to the police, who were all surprisingly jolly. One officer in particular was extremely nice and helped the girl fill out a bunch of paperwork. After telling us how cool we were to do this for her, he asked Sister Uhlig and I if we had any questions for him. I'm not sure what came across my mind at this point, but I opened my mouth and the words, "Well, do you have any interest in learning more about our faith?" just kind of fell out. Sister Uhlig turned a deep shade of red and just started laughing. The officer just chuckled and began to tell us the story of his religious awakening to agnosticism. We left him with a pamphlet and a card anyway and it was super great.
And that was the ending to a really great day.
I hope you are all loving your lives. I miss you all more than the moon and the stars. Peace and blessings.
Sister Young
8.05.2012
July 30, 2012
Hello hello.
This week was WEIRD.
But something cool. Did you ever see the movie "Valkery" (Walküre auf Deutsch) with Tom Cruise about the dude that worked for Hitler and planned this huge thing to try to kill him? So we totally went to the place where that happened. I stood in Stauffenberg's (his name) office where he planned it all, which is right above where he and the others were shot. There's this memorial for it in the building where it all went down, and then of course outside where they were all lined up and murdered. It was fascinating. Just thought you'd like to know.
Also I have officially succeeded in feminizing my comp. 5 down, 6 billion more to go!! But seriously, I am so proud of her. We were with our mission president while he was giving us a little devotional thing, and he accidently referred to all of us listening as "Elders," to which my companion (before I could say anything) blurted out, "and Sisters!!!!" HA. She told me she would never have noticed/done that before she met me. I WIN. 10 points to Feminism!
So I may or may not have eaten something yesterday that touched the subway station ground (for 2 seconds, totally under the rule). But listen, it was a french pastry thing (from France!!) and I can't let it go to waste just because I was clumsy! So if I get sick this week for any reason, I know why. But if it doesn't kill me then I think I am now building up immunity to at least 50 new diseases.
Nah ja. So this man called us a couple days ago and said he wanted to meet to figure out what we believe. I guess we gave him our card on the street once? I don't know. We were a little hesitant, so we agreed to meet at a cafe thingy on a very busy street. When we got there he asked us to follow him to another place. So we follow him to this arabic hookah smoking lounge thing where he invites us to smoke hookah with him hahaha. No thanks, dude. We're good. But thanks!
That's about it for this week. I hope you are loving your lives.
Sister Young
This week was WEIRD.
But something cool. Did you ever see the movie "Valkery" (Walküre auf Deutsch) with Tom Cruise about the dude that worked for Hitler and planned this huge thing to try to kill him? So we totally went to the place where that happened. I stood in Stauffenberg's (his name) office where he planned it all, which is right above where he and the others were shot. There's this memorial for it in the building where it all went down, and then of course outside where they were all lined up and murdered. It was fascinating. Just thought you'd like to know.
Also I have officially succeeded in feminizing my comp. 5 down, 6 billion more to go!! But seriously, I am so proud of her. We were with our mission president while he was giving us a little devotional thing, and he accidently referred to all of us listening as "Elders," to which my companion (before I could say anything) blurted out, "and Sisters!!!!" HA. She told me she would never have noticed/done that before she met me. I WIN. 10 points to Feminism!
So I may or may not have eaten something yesterday that touched the subway station ground (for 2 seconds, totally under the rule). But listen, it was a french pastry thing (from France!!) and I can't let it go to waste just because I was clumsy! So if I get sick this week for any reason, I know why. But if it doesn't kill me then I think I am now building up immunity to at least 50 new diseases.
Nah ja. So this man called us a couple days ago and said he wanted to meet to figure out what we believe. I guess we gave him our card on the street once? I don't know. We were a little hesitant, so we agreed to meet at a cafe thingy on a very busy street. When we got there he asked us to follow him to another place. So we follow him to this arabic hookah smoking lounge thing where he invites us to smoke hookah with him hahaha. No thanks, dude. We're good. But thanks!
That's about it for this week. I hope you are loving your lives.
Sister Young
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