Week Twenty-four

Einen shönen, guten Tag!

Hey guys.
Sup.

SO this last week was a little rough. Ever since Elder Wightman got here, we've been on fire! We were just doing work. Bouncing from appointment to appointment all day, finding a bunch of cool people on the way, making out baptismal dates, and just having a good time while keeping busy. This last week however, was the exact opposite. Yes, we did put in work all day every day, but the success factor just wasn't up to par. Oh well, I've grown to learn that you don't measure your success on the numbers, just how hard you worked and how willing you were to do the work. The rest falls into place when you put forth the effort. I think that's something that I've learned a lot about on my mission so far. Just setting and having a goal, and doing what it takes to reach that. And when/if you fall short of that goal, you just look back on the effort, and you plan accordingly. Being a missionary is cool.

So like I said, the last week was a little slower, but I enjoyed it a lot.

Montag: After the usual Monday morning routine of getting ready, studying, cleaning, and emailing, we went to go get lunch. This is the exact point and time in my life when I discovered...BACK FACTORY! Oh my goodness. This is a momentous point in the history of my short life. Back Factory is a bakery/sandwich chain that is all over Germany. Little did I know (because I had seen it so many times before), that it is the most delicious/cheap/filling fast food on the face of the Earth. for 5€, you can buy 4 assorted sandwiches. And they are all primo. Most definitely going back there today. After eating, we went and played sport in the cultural hall of our building. We played football (short routes), a little soccer, and frisbie. Fun times were had by all, and nobody was hurt. I also purchased a 5€ 'cat lady' sweatshirt (good for studying), and a 1€ tie. Solid. After P-Day, Elder Wightman and I went to an appointment with a man named S P. He's from Iran, Muslim, super nice, lives alone, around 50ish. Anyways, he made us Iranian food! Which was awesome and delicious and a cool experience. We ate it sitting crisscross on the floor. Which was hard with my euro trash skinny slacks. Aber ich habe es geschaffed. So the food was rice, with some goulash meat sauce, tatziki sauce, citrus stuff. I don't know but it was delicious. We tried to teach him a little after we ate, which went as far as him telling us that he's the only person left in the world who can think, and he thinks he writes holy scripture in school spiral notebooks. A little wacky, but we're still meeting with him. Monday was fun.

Dienstag: Tuesday morning started off by going by on an appointment who wasn't there. Oh well it happens. We made our way home, and the Zone Leaders wanted to eat at the university cafeteria. That sounded like a good idea, until we got there and it was super packed and everyone was screaming in German. I politely backed out and we went home and ate bratwursts. I love wursts. After lunch, we went by on J, our super old baptismal date, but he wasn't home either. A Lamborghini just blew by the internet cafe and shook the windows of the store. Anyways, it's really frustrating when appointments go through. It's like we're two 20 year old kids who plan stuff all day and are always super busy and we're always on time and remember our appointments. And we meet with these adult people who are always forgetting and making excuses. Childish! That's what I have to say about it. Oh well. After all this we went over to a different area of Hannover. We did doors for a while, and found two cool-ish contacts/appointments. Actually one was super cool. A literal, tangible answer to a prayer. We were about to finish our finding time, so we prayed in order to get one more appointment made out. We wanted/needed it really bad. So we said a prayer. The second I opened my eyes, a girl was just standing in front of us haha. We talked to her and made out an appointment/gave her a BOM right there! That was super cool. After all this, we visited an older lady named G. She's from Iraq. She speaks better English than German, so we teach her in English. She was pretty cool, but pretty orthodox and not really willing to be open to what and how we believe. We'll see.

MIttwoch: Wednesday was insane. The weather on that day was: sideways typhoon. It rained like none other. And my euro slacks got drenched. Not fun at all. It's OK, they needed to be washed anyways. Wednesday started off normal. We went by a contact/appointment in the morning who wasn't there. We then went by 4 other contacts in the area who also weren't there. That was the theme of this last week. I made something new on Wednesday. Burger tacos. I just cooked ground beef in a pan with mustard and ketchup all cooked together in the pan. Then we ate that on tortillas with burger veggies and stuff. Not the greatest, but it was alright. I'm looking to improve the recipe. Suggestions are welcome. After that, we went by on a couple of people off of our HUGE ward list. A lot of the people on the ward list are dead/moved away, so we're playing runaround Hannover and narrow the list down to people who need our help. Which is fun. Pretty time consuming though. Es ist eine Zeitverschwindung! But it's still missionary work. After all this, we tried doing some finding in a student wohnheim, or dorms. Not too much luck. That day was slow and wet.

Donnerstag: Thursday started off with district meeting, which went well. After that, we ate hotdogs that the W's prepared for us. Delicious. After district meeting, I went on exchanges to Hildesheim with Elder Spendlove. I love that guy. He's such a good Elder, knows the language super well, and is just a good guy. I really enjoy spending my time with him. That day was super hot. And humid as heck. That's the worst combination. Hot/humid/suit. Worst! We did a lot of walking around. We walked like 30 minutes out to this appointment where we drew out the plan of salvation. That was way fun. We taught a mom and her three children about everything. After that, we walked the 30 minutes back (we would have ridden bikes, but they were broken). After that, we went by on J (I've talked about him before) He's my favorite 50 year old, Harley Davidson-riding, chain-smoking, cat-loving, Hells Angel. Solid. He's way cool. The people you meet on your mission haha. After that, we did some finding, and ended off with the usual Hildesheim treat: vanilla eis, peanut butter, Oreo milkshakes, listening to Phil Collins sing the Tarzan soundtrack in German (zwei Welt, eine Familie) and talking about life. I loved it.

Fritag: I came back to Hannover on Friday morning. we promptly went home, ate brats (I would've bought more Back Factory, but I ran out of money haha) and did weekly planning. I would also have to describe the weather on Friday as sideways typhoon. Tough luck haha. After weekly planning, we were supposed to meet this younger African kid at a Bahn stop, but he didn't show up. We then went by on a couple of contact near the church and taught one lesson.

Samstag: Saturday was way fun! We ate right after study, because we had the Sommerfest that evening. So we left the apartment around noon to go by on the ward list. We narrowed it down by 4 more names! Slowly but surely. We also went by on A impulsively, because we walked by her place. We taught a good lesson to her, and made out another appointment. Solid. We then went to the Sommerfest and enjoyed the next three hours. I rode a Segway, that was exciting. Other than that, I conversed with members, talked with Fred (who was there with his wife), ate slushies, shot bows and arrows, played basketball with little kids, missionary stuff. That was way way fun. We also gave a member from Britain a blessing. He was in India and just came back, and didn't feel too good so he asked for a blessing, which was cool. After the Sommerfest, we went by on a BUNCH of contacts. Nobody was there though! Sucks, but that's life I guess.

Sonntag: Yesterday was alright. I really didn't have a good attitude all day for some reason, which was stupid of me. The highlights of yesterday were eating at the B's house (super good) and trying to explain to everybody about my haircut. Elder Staheli, the ZL, cut my hair. He did a really good job except for the one big giant chunk missing from the back of my head.......I need to do something about that before I meet President Kosack for the first time on Wednesday. First impressions.

So that was it! Last week was kinda slow, but good. We didn't get the best numbers, but that's not what's important.

Hi parents! I miss you guys. I just hear about the food you guys make and the stuff you do and I miss SD and my family. Germany is awesome though! Today, we're having Zone sport day. American football haha it should be fun. I'm doing really well, I want you to know that. I've been assigned to teach a workshop at Zone Conference this Wednesday, so I've been studying that a lot lately. It's about the power and authority of our callings as missionaries. I'm comparing it to John 15:1-6 about how Jesus says he's the vine and we're the branches, and unless we're grafted to the vine we won't bear fruit. Pretty cool huh? Also, yea. I'm missing a chunk of my hair. IDK what to do about that. Also parents, none of the pants I came here with fit me. I weigh like 200 pounds...not 230 anymore. It's kind of a problem now. My pants literally fall off of me. Just let me know next week what I should do! because my dang pants don't fit!

Other than that, everything is going super well. What's it like only having Thomas zu hause? It's weird that everyone is getting married too! Rachel, Alissa, Emily. I'm super excited for them! Especially Emily. Tell her that please. Also, it's still way in the future, but what if you could send me a tie from the wedding?!? Like the best mans ties or something. Idk I was just thinking that it'd be cool.

Anyways, I love hearing from you guys! Tell me a little more in your emails!!!!!!!! Dad...tell me about sports please. I need it.

I love you all! BYE!!!