Sorry people, this week will be short. And I probably won't be able to respond personally to all of your emails, but just hold your bunnies tight. Next week will be better. Probably. Mostly because I AM IN HAMBURG RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have no time for you, just my lovely and favorite city ever. Besides Lyon. And Paris. So 3rd favorite.
Ok. Bielefeld is a dream and a half. No one was kidding, this place really is the land of dreams. We NEVER have time to talk to people on the street, and we're teaching like 20 people. We don't have time for everyone! It's ridiculous! Also my new companion's name is Sister Olsen. She's from all over (army brat), and she's pretty cool.
So one of the people we are teaching is named Joe. He is so cool! He keeps telling us that he really wants to find his faith in Jesus Christ, and he's really interested in the Book of Mormon. It's a dream, really, except for a small point - we teach him at his friend's house. Normally that wouldn't be a problem, except that his friend is a suuuuuper anti-Mormon! Like times 10 million!! It's the weirdest situation ever. Joe in one corner, asking us about Christ and the Book of Mormon, and his friend in another corner, asking us about temples and telling us that Joseph Smith was a crystal ball glass reader. Whatever that means. Example conversation:
Friend: Did you know that when Joseph Smith died that he was found with a talisman in his pocket?
Joe: What the heck is a talisman?
Friend: An ancient device that helps people of the devil read the future. It's a symbol of bad things. Talismans are basically symbols that people carry around to remind them of certain things.
Joe: Like how the cross is a symbol of Christ?
Friend: No! That is different! Talismans are bad, and you can carry them with you!
Joe: Don't you wear a cross?
Bahahahaha hilarious. Sister Olsen and I were just dying. Also can I please tell you about one of our Russian members here? Ok I will. His name is Valentin (or something) and we meet with him once a week to help him with his english. So at our appointment with him this week we were talking about introductions and how in America we automatically say "how are you?" right after we say "hello!" because it's culturally polite. So then we asked him what they say in Russia. I quote the following: (In a thick Russian accent) "After we say hello, we say 'I WILL KILL YOU.'" Well, it took me awhile to recover from laughing, I think I fell off my chair. I'm just loving it here in good ol' Bielefeld.
The city itself is fairly small. Maybe the size of Omaha or a little smaller. It has this old castle thing that we are seeing next week. I'm in Hamburg today because we have a conference thing and we have to spend the night here, so we thought what the hey! Let's just go up early and spend our p-day here. Love it. I'm going to see some old investigators so I'm a little bit dying of happiness.
Ok I will go now.
Love your guts.
Sister Young
11.26.2012
11.19.2012
November 19, 2012
So guess what.
Did I ever tell you about a girl named Ronny from China? Well if I didn't, that's a shame because SHE GOT BAPTIZED THIS WEEK.
Ok ok this is the story:
So this cute Chinese girl walks into church one day and basically asks for the lessons. The Elders got there like 2 SECONDS before we did so they made out an appointment with her. I'm not going to keep going on this because it makes me SO ANGRY every single time I think about it, especially because the Elders got a lot of crap for teaching her, the ward thought it would be better for her to meet with Sisters, but she was golden so they wanted to do it. WHATEVER I'M DONE. Anyway, so Sister Larsen and I became friends with her and she turned into a Tiergarten Missionary project, being taught by the Elders and befriended by the Sisters and counseled by the Johnsons (senior couple here). And last week, last minute, she decided to be baptized!! And she's amazing. The baptism was so wonderful and she is such an example to me. Aaaaah man if I could just put into words the intense Christ-like love I feel for this girl. Someday you will all meet her because I made her promise to visit me in America :)
Well with all this excitement going on, putting on a baptism in 2 days and all, finding out that I AM BEING TRANSFERRED blew me over. Not really, I've been in Berlin quite some time (6 months) and I knew I would be leaving. But now that Ronny is here and everything is going great with our investigators I don't want to leave!!
Blah.
I'm sure y'all are on the edge of your seat now, so I'll just get the cat right out of the bag by letting you know that I am going to a city called Bielefeld.
This is excellent for the following reasons:
1. It's in the west!!!!!! West Germans are much nicer than the Eastern haha. Also I just really really loved West Germany so I am excited to go back.
2. Before my mission I always said that I wanted to go to Hamburg - check. When I got here and people asked me where I wanted to serve, I would say "Tiergarten and/or Bielefeld." Does the Lord love me? Yes he does.
3. The city is famous among the sisters of the mission for "being on fire." Apparently they have a ton of baptisms every year and really really solid members that love missionary work. I've heard from several sisters that served there that they hardly had time to find because they're running from appointment to appointment all the time, but no worries because people talk to them on the street all the time! And the people they teach are NORMAL! Hahaha this is quite a feat.
Ok ok ok I'm done writing.
I love you all.
Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you stuff your faces full and watch "It's a Wonderful Life" and sleep for me.
Love,
Sister Young
Pictures:
1. At Ronny's baptism!
2. Taken right after she was baptized!
Did I ever tell you about a girl named Ronny from China? Well if I didn't, that's a shame because SHE GOT BAPTIZED THIS WEEK.
Ok ok this is the story:
So this cute Chinese girl walks into church one day and basically asks for the lessons. The Elders got there like 2 SECONDS before we did so they made out an appointment with her. I'm not going to keep going on this because it makes me SO ANGRY every single time I think about it, especially because the Elders got a lot of crap for teaching her, the ward thought it would be better for her to meet with Sisters, but she was golden so they wanted to do it. WHATEVER I'M DONE. Anyway, so Sister Larsen and I became friends with her and she turned into a Tiergarten Missionary project, being taught by the Elders and befriended by the Sisters and counseled by the Johnsons (senior couple here). And last week, last minute, she decided to be baptized!! And she's amazing. The baptism was so wonderful and she is such an example to me. Aaaaah man if I could just put into words the intense Christ-like love I feel for this girl. Someday you will all meet her because I made her promise to visit me in America :)
Well with all this excitement going on, putting on a baptism in 2 days and all, finding out that I AM BEING TRANSFERRED blew me over. Not really, I've been in Berlin quite some time (6 months) and I knew I would be leaving. But now that Ronny is here and everything is going great with our investigators I don't want to leave!!
Blah.
I'm sure y'all are on the edge of your seat now, so I'll just get the cat right out of the bag by letting you know that I am going to a city called Bielefeld.
This is excellent for the following reasons:
1. It's in the west!!!!!! West Germans are much nicer than the Eastern haha. Also I just really really loved West Germany so I am excited to go back.
2. Before my mission I always said that I wanted to go to Hamburg - check. When I got here and people asked me where I wanted to serve, I would say "Tiergarten and/or Bielefeld." Does the Lord love me? Yes he does.
3. The city is famous among the sisters of the mission for "being on fire." Apparently they have a ton of baptisms every year and really really solid members that love missionary work. I've heard from several sisters that served there that they hardly had time to find because they're running from appointment to appointment all the time, but no worries because people talk to them on the street all the time! And the people they teach are NORMAL! Hahaha this is quite a feat.
Ok ok ok I'm done writing.
I love you all.
Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you stuff your faces full and watch "It's a Wonderful Life" and sleep for me.
Love,
Sister Young
Pictures:
1. At Ronny's baptism!
2. Taken right after she was baptized!
11.18.2012
November 12, 2012
Do you know what I do here in Berlin? I just teach spanish people.
I NEED TO LEARN SPANISH.
Also I have a shopping problem that includes buying old grandma sweaters with squirrels on them. If I ever remember to bring my camera with me to email, I'll brighten your life with pictures.
This week was a joke. Basically every new appointment fell through, and a ton of people we visit with regularly cancelled on us. We did a lot of walking and a lot of stress-eating at bakeries. Also my companion and I were bad and spoke a lot of English to each other, and then the fact that we teach over half of our lessons in English means that my German is getting WORSE. IT'S HORRIBLE.
Oh oh! I almost forgot to tell you that we met with an Irish woman and yes, THEY ARE AS COOL AS PEOPLE MAKE THEM OUT TO BE. She was so lovely and jolly and made us delicious tea and taught us some new words like "shmuck smhuck!" which I guess means something bad haha. When she told us the story of how she came to believe in God, my whole soul felt like it was lighting on fire. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever heard. Naja, it's too bad she doesn't have any interest in the Book of Mormon. We'll keep praying.
That's about it. I hope your week was swell. Transfer calls are on Saturday and we'll see if I'll be leaving! I'll keep you posted!
Love,
Sister Young
I NEED TO LEARN SPANISH.
Also I have a shopping problem that includes buying old grandma sweaters with squirrels on them. If I ever remember to bring my camera with me to email, I'll brighten your life with pictures.
This week was a joke. Basically every new appointment fell through, and a ton of people we visit with regularly cancelled on us. We did a lot of walking and a lot of stress-eating at bakeries. Also my companion and I were bad and spoke a lot of English to each other, and then the fact that we teach over half of our lessons in English means that my German is getting WORSE. IT'S HORRIBLE.
Oh oh! I almost forgot to tell you that we met with an Irish woman and yes, THEY ARE AS COOL AS PEOPLE MAKE THEM OUT TO BE. She was so lovely and jolly and made us delicious tea and taught us some new words like "shmuck smhuck!" which I guess means something bad haha. When she told us the story of how she came to believe in God, my whole soul felt like it was lighting on fire. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever heard. Naja, it's too bad she doesn't have any interest in the Book of Mormon. We'll keep praying.
That's about it. I hope your week was swell. Transfer calls are on Saturday and we'll see if I'll be leaving! I'll keep you posted!
Love,
Sister Young
11.10.2012
November 5, 2012
I will just confess something to you right now so you don't think I'm the most wonderful and obedient missionary ever.
I cannot get up in the morning.
Maybe my parents thought that this would get better over time, but it hasn't. I can't ever hear my alarm in the morning, so my comp always has to wake me up. It has been this way since the beginning. The problem now is that my comp is too nice and sweet to try to wake me up, so now I'm always getting up late. Of course I secretly love it, but I promise I'm working on it. But I am still a big fat failure at "Morgen Sport," the 30 minutes set aside for us to exercise in the morning. I don't do it. End of story.
But let me tell you something. It's called: I don't need morgen sport because I exercise enough in the day. And it's true. This week especially, because I'm pretty sure we ran for every single bus that we needed. IT'S THE WORST. Also yesterday we were invited with the elders to eat at a member's home, and before the member left church he cornered us and said, "DON'T BE LATE" in a very authoritative scary German voice. Well, the problem was that the Elders took too long with a member and so we had 20 minutes to get somewhere like 35 minutes away. I seriously felt like we were all in a spy movie or something, crossing 6 lanes of traffic to catch a bus, running to the u-bahn and the sprinting all the way to their apartment. And we kingled at 2pm ON THE DOT. It was a miracle. Sister Larsen used to be terrified every time I would make her run for a bus, but now she's a pro. I am so proud.
Also with all this crazy election stuff going on all the Germans are dying to hear about our opinions! We try to get out of these situations but it's so hard. One conversation we experienced last night goes as follows:
Julia (one of my favorite investigators!!): I heard that Rooney guy is a Mormon.
Us: Oh, you mean Romney?
Julia: Yes, him. How does that work? How can a Mormon be a Republican?
Us: Well lots of Mormons are Republicans.
Julia (shocked to death): WHAT? Why??
Us: The Church is very neutral - they don't get involved in politics. But they encourage members to get involved and to choose for themselves, so you will find Mormons that are on all sides of the political spectrum.
Julia: No, no. How can you be Mormon and not believe in helping people?
GOOD QUESTION.
I hope you are having fun voting your hearts out.
Lurve,
Sister Young
I cannot get up in the morning.
Maybe my parents thought that this would get better over time, but it hasn't. I can't ever hear my alarm in the morning, so my comp always has to wake me up. It has been this way since the beginning. The problem now is that my comp is too nice and sweet to try to wake me up, so now I'm always getting up late. Of course I secretly love it, but I promise I'm working on it. But I am still a big fat failure at "Morgen Sport," the 30 minutes set aside for us to exercise in the morning. I don't do it. End of story.
But let me tell you something. It's called: I don't need morgen sport because I exercise enough in the day. And it's true. This week especially, because I'm pretty sure we ran for every single bus that we needed. IT'S THE WORST. Also yesterday we were invited with the elders to eat at a member's home, and before the member left church he cornered us and said, "DON'T BE LATE" in a very authoritative scary German voice. Well, the problem was that the Elders took too long with a member and so we had 20 minutes to get somewhere like 35 minutes away. I seriously felt like we were all in a spy movie or something, crossing 6 lanes of traffic to catch a bus, running to the u-bahn and the sprinting all the way to their apartment. And we kingled at 2pm ON THE DOT. It was a miracle. Sister Larsen used to be terrified every time I would make her run for a bus, but now she's a pro. I am so proud.
Also with all this crazy election stuff going on all the Germans are dying to hear about our opinions! We try to get out of these situations but it's so hard. One conversation we experienced last night goes as follows:
Julia (one of my favorite investigators!!): I heard that Rooney guy is a Mormon.
Us: Oh, you mean Romney?
Julia: Yes, him. How does that work? How can a Mormon be a Republican?
Us: Well lots of Mormons are Republicans.
Julia (shocked to death): WHAT? Why??
Us: The Church is very neutral - they don't get involved in politics. But they encourage members to get involved and to choose for themselves, so you will find Mormons that are on all sides of the political spectrum.
Julia: No, no. How can you be Mormon and not believe in helping people?
GOOD QUESTION.
I hope you are having fun voting your hearts out.
Lurve,
Sister Young
October 29, 2012
Let me tell you a funny thing. It's called: a funny man from the Philipines saw us on the u-bahn and pointed at us whilst shouting, "MORMONS! THERE ARE MORMONS HERE!" We just laughed and almost made out an appointment with him. BUT I am happy to inform you all that he was a perfect asian version of Jimmy Stewart. I wish I got a picture, it was a perfect likeness. Sister Larsen and I couldn't get over it.
Also did you hear that ever since they lowered the mission ages that the 700 mission applications that the First Presidency receives every week increased to 4000 a week????? And even better, did you know that 61% are from sisters???!!??! CRAAAAAAZY things are happening!!!!!!
So. This week we decided to throw a little Spanish movie night party for all the Spanish-speaking members in our ward and their friends. We had 4 members come with their families and some friends! It was a great success. It also meant a lot to us to have this little group get together and share their testimonies, as only a couple of the members can speak any German and that means that they don't get a lot out of church every week. Also Corola got to finally meet everyone!! It was just great. Really great. Also I shared my testimony in Spanish...it was probably really horrible but Corola loved it so I was happy to do it.
Aaaaaand ja. This week was interesting. Very slow. But good, I think. I'm just starting to hit this point in my mission where I am just SO TIRED. ALL THE TIME. I think I'm going to come home and sleep for 3 days straight.
But I will tell you something really cute that happened yesterday that has just stuck with me. Love when that happens.
Yesterday we were visiting with a family in the ward and it was so great. They're from California, so we got to speak English and talk about normal things. They have the most adorable children on the entire planet, so teaching is always great because they are just SO DANG CUTE and love everything we tell them. So yesterday we decided to share a spiritual thought about the plan of salvation, and we had a little activity to go with it. We were talking about all the different steps and what they mean. One of the girls asked, "Why is it called the Plan of Salvation? What does salvation mean?" So we talked about that a little bit, and her parents were explaining a lot to her. By the end of our time together she said, "Oh, I get it now! That's why it's also called the Plan of Happiness! Salvation is happiness!"
"For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father." - Mosiah 3:19, Book of Mormon
I love you allllll. I hope you're having a lovely week.
Love,
Sister Young
Also did you hear that ever since they lowered the mission ages that the 700 mission applications that the First Presidency receives every week increased to 4000 a week????? And even better, did you know that 61% are from sisters???!!??! CRAAAAAAZY things are happening!!!!!!
So. This week we decided to throw a little Spanish movie night party for all the Spanish-speaking members in our ward and their friends. We had 4 members come with their families and some friends! It was a great success. It also meant a lot to us to have this little group get together and share their testimonies, as only a couple of the members can speak any German and that means that they don't get a lot out of church every week. Also Corola got to finally meet everyone!! It was just great. Really great. Also I shared my testimony in Spanish...it was probably really horrible but Corola loved it so I was happy to do it.
Aaaaaand ja. This week was interesting. Very slow. But good, I think. I'm just starting to hit this point in my mission where I am just SO TIRED. ALL THE TIME. I think I'm going to come home and sleep for 3 days straight.
But I will tell you something really cute that happened yesterday that has just stuck with me. Love when that happens.
Yesterday we were visiting with a family in the ward and it was so great. They're from California, so we got to speak English and talk about normal things. They have the most adorable children on the entire planet, so teaching is always great because they are just SO DANG CUTE and love everything we tell them. So yesterday we decided to share a spiritual thought about the plan of salvation, and we had a little activity to go with it. We were talking about all the different steps and what they mean. One of the girls asked, "Why is it called the Plan of Salvation? What does salvation mean?" So we talked about that a little bit, and her parents were explaining a lot to her. By the end of our time together she said, "Oh, I get it now! That's why it's also called the Plan of Happiness! Salvation is happiness!"
"For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father." - Mosiah 3:19, Book of Mormon
I love you allllll. I hope you're having a lovely week.
Love,
Sister Young
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