Week Twenty

MEINE FAMILIE!

Hallo, Guten Tag, Moin,

How's it hanging in SD!? (Have I ever mentioned that I miss home...?) It's OK, because I'm having way too much fun here!

Let me tell you about my week! It was Elder Thorley's least week in Germany, so we said goodbye to a lot of members, and had A LOT of eating appointments.

Monday, Last P-Day was a holiday here in Deutschland, so the Turkish internet laden that we email in was the only store open. It was Pfingstag (the day when Jesus gave the apostles the priesthood) and apparently the Germans are big fans. So we emailed like usual. I lied there was one more store open: Schweinske. It's a way good restaurant right on the corner by our Wohnung, that specializes in Schnitzel! (Schweinske...pig...schnitzel...get it?) It was really good! Delicious pan fried pig meat. So after that I went home and took a nap...which never helps on a mission! You'd think that naps would be nice, but the just put you further behind and make you sleepy. Well after P-Day was over, we went by on a recent convert from Ghana. She's super cool and she has two adorable children, but she has a hard time coming to church. She was baptized I think a year ago, but unfortunately has become less active. We try to go by on her a lot, because if she became active again, she would be perfect to take on joint teaches to all the African investigators we teach, because she speaks Twi. Ahoontisae. well that was Monday haha. Kinda slow.

Tuesdays are notoriously bad in the mission. For some reason everything goes wrong on Tuesdays. We don't really know why yet, but when we figure out, we'll let you know. We had to go grocery shopping in the morning because the grocery store wasn't open on P-Day (Pfingstag). That took until about noon. I made the Spaghetti Carbonara recipe! Everyone loved it, but my ratio of pasta to meat was way off. I cooked way too much pasta. Oh well, I plan on perfecting it. After lunch we went by on an investigator from Ghana. He is so frustrating because he's never home! He knows the Book of Mormon is true and wants to be baptized. He just needs to put forth more effort. This week we will be meeting with him and having a kind of "come back to Earth" lesson and see what his priorities are. So we couldn't meet with him so we went by on a member that is from Ghana, but has lived in Germany for a long time. She just moved to Hannover from Neubrandenburg. She's way cool and super strong in the gospel, but she's on bed-rest right now because she's pregnant. So technically she's less active, so that's why we visit her. While we were there, her 'man' (husband?) was there too. He's not a member, and didn't really seem interested, but hopefully we could start meeting with him too. That's be awesome. After that we went to visit a sister that is technically less active, too, because she lives in an assisted living home and has a hard time coming to church. She's so sweet and nice though. She came from Poland, so she doesn't have the best German, but she's just an angel. We had a short lesson with her and played 'Sorry' the board game. I lost. We then started trying to make out a couple new apps. We had a lesson on the street with an Indian guy. He was pretty cool, but not super interested. And as we were walking away, a true miracle happened. We walked by this car that a bunch of African guys were standing around. One of them said 'Hey remember me?' Apparently we had talked to this guy earlier and gave him a card, but this time he made out an appointment with us! So cool.

Wednesday morning was district meeting, which went well. After that, we went by on the investigator from Ghana again, but he still wasn't there. So went went home and ate left over Spargel Suppe. mmmmmm. After lunch, we started some crazy finding.We went to this huge Wohnheim (apartment complex) and spent around 3 hours doing doors. Believe it or not, we got nothing. It's hard times like that when you start to think how dumb it is and everything, but this is really the Lord's work and you can't have any doubts about what you're doing. So I think I learned something cool that day. After finding, we ate with an older Phillipino sister who lives here. She speaks English and lives alone, and she's awesome. She made us Lumpia, some Pork and mushroom dish, noddles, and rice, and Eis. It was delicious and we got to take home a lot of left overs. After that we played Volleyball with the JAEs.

Thursday morning we took a huge 4 hour study block. It was cool. I'm currently reading in Luke. (Just thought I'd let you know). After that, we tried going by on another investigator from Ghana. We need to have one of these 'come back to Earth' lessons with her, too. We just need to know how much of a desire she has. She wasn't there. Oh by the was, it rained cats and dogs on Thursday. We did a lot of finding. I talked to one man for a long time, but we couldn't get an appointment out. He was cool...until he offered me his 'E-cigarette' and almost shoved it in my mouth haha. We made out an appointment nonetheless with someone else. After that we went to Burgdorf, and visited a member family, where we grilled. Bruder Paschen works at a Fleischerei (butchershop) so we got some primo meat. Elder Thorley and I ate 50 cm Wursts (big sausages) they were delicious. We did the classic seminary doughnut lesson with them. I had to do the pushups...After that, we went to a member family to teach. We had some classic German Abendbrot with them, which included met (raw meat) and stinging nettle cheese....I tried it haha it just tasted like cheese. We're preparing a young woman that is staying with them to serve a mini mission. We talked about active listening. It went well.

Friday morning, Elder Staheli had to Anmeld, and Elder Thorley and Carlson had to Abmeld. It's basically declaring that you're living in or moving away from a city. Weird socialist stuff. That took a while. After that we went by on an investigator, who made us tea and delicious German bakery stuff. We always have tea parties with her. It's classy. She said she'd be baptized, so hopefully next week we can make out a date that she can work toward. She's super nice and funny (a little wacko) but she's just sweet. I really like her. After that, we went to a member family's where we ate Indian food! The made us lunch. It was way good. After we ate, the other Elders stopped by and we all ate Eis. It was so good and I ate so much. After that, we made out an appointment with this Polish guy. Hopefully he'll be home when we go by. We then visited with a sister (from Spain) and another sister. It was all good.

Saturday I was on tausch (exchanges) with elder Staheli. We started off the morning with Transfer calls! Which is always exciting. My new companion is Elder Whiteman. He's from Colorado. I've only talked to him on the phone a couple of times. He'll be here in Hannover on Tuesday. The other two had to go to Magdeburg to have finishing interviews with President. We started off our day bright and early with some greasy Turkish food. You guessed it! DÖNERS! Haha my favorite. We met with a younger neubekehrt (recent convert) and talked about him receiving the priesthood. Hopefully he will in the next couple of weeks. The rest of the day was just fallen-out appointments and tears. We had one first lesson with a potential investigator from the other two which went pretty well. Saturday night we went to a member family's home. I ate a half of a cheese cake. Not by choice. It was still delicious though. They always make us delicious food, I love it. We played Kniffel. I won. DER KNIFFEL MEISTER!

Yesterday was way way cool!!!! I talked to a lot of members and my Deutsch was on FIRE! I just felt good about it. I got to talk to one of our long-time investigators there, too. He's awesome. He needs to be baptized though! After Church, we ate at the ward break the fast. It was just delicious. We spent the rest of Sunday planning, fixing up the area book, and finding. We made out two appointments, which was good.

SOOOOOO that was my week!

So unfortunately, Elder Thorley is leaving tomorrow. But Elder Whiteman sounds like a really cool guy. I have a lot of big plans from the Hannover 2 area, even though I'll still be the junior companion. It'll be sick and we will tear it up here!

I'm sorry, but I don't know the name of that meat enchilada type dish. You should look up Rouladen and RotKohl though! I don't think I need any more recipes right now, I made the Spaghetti Carbonara and it was a hit. I'm glad everything's so busy! Busy is good. Just keep smiling and remember me! haha

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!

Elder Pollard