This has been a pretty fun week. I actually had to travel to Tallinn last Tuesday to do visa/living permit whatever stuff last week. Sis. Lepp from the Tallinn branch helped us with paper work which was splendid, but they were remarkably slow that day and we were there for at least 2 hours. Anyway, I got to see a little bit of Tallinn, but we didn't wander far from the bus station. It takes just under 2 hours to travel from Pärnu to Tallinn by bus. That's how most people get around the country, I think. Thankfully, we checked the mailbox before our bus ride up there, so I received a letter from Mark and fam with some drawings and pictures of the kiddos. Precious~♥
District conference on Sunday, in Tallinn was certainly interesting. Our branch rented a small bus to take up the members who signed up the week before. The branch leaders went up a day earlier for the Saturday training. I had the privelege of sitting next to Jana, a very energetic 9yo on the way up to Tallinn. Tickle attacks, funny faces, etc. She couldn't keep her hands off, lol. That was fun :P Hearing conference in 3 languages is sort of a brain overload, ha ha! Back and forth between Estonian, Russian, and English (since President and Sis. Dance spoke). It was fun meeting some of the other members and missionaries though. The Dances brought up mail from the mission home so I got the DearElder from Veronica. She seems to be doing super and I was so excited to hear from her~!!!! We had a few hours after the conference until our bus left for Tartu so we just chatted away. Then it was off to Tartu Sunday evening. We sisters got to stay at a hotel while the Elders had to fit in the other missionary apartments ;) We had training all day on Monday and then Monday night we met Tartu's oldest member, Helmi. Helmi is 90 years old and LOVES the missionaries. I think she was baptized about 7 years ago or so. She insisted on feeding us even though she is a very very poor pensioner. I only ate a piece of bread and some juice to show my thanks. After that, we each took turns playing her in chess. Apparently, she was some chess champion when she was younger, but of course some of that skill has faded with time. Technically, I beat her, but when I went to take her King, she could've sworn that he was one space to the left and not in check. So yeah, after that, then she beat me pretty good :P I'll let her have the victory this time. I think the Elders usually beat her so that should boost her confidence :D Helmi was so so sweet and thankful for missionaries. She certainly thanked Heavenly Father for sending us. She was sad when we had to leave to catch our bus back to center.
Walking around the center of Tartu is really cool. The old town hall plaza is really neat. It's also a lovely time of year to be driving around Estonia since the trees are starting to change colors. Unfortunately, a cold spell came in on Monday and Tuesday and it was quite nippy all throughout the country! Down to like 7 degrees Celsius which is somewhere in the high 30s I reckon. I had to bust out my big coat! And my legs and feet were chilled from the wind. Gotta start layering... Thankfully, today's not as bad.
I'm excited for General Conference this weekend. We'll watch the Relief Society session Saturday evening and then the Saturday morning session after that. Then we watch several sessions on Sunday, and then the last session we'll watch the following week. Maybe that's when we'll finally watch it in English too, I dunno.
Sis. LeFevre is from Draper, Utah. She is studying Journalism at the University of Utah. We receive copies of the Liahona from time to time. I think they just gave us the September issue at our district conference. I believe they try to get copies to each companionship when they can.
Last night on our bus ride home, I actually met some Italian kids who said they were singers in some choir with kids from Denmark, Estonia, etc. Random. I chatted only for a little bit about where we were from and what we were doing here and the guy I talked to was really nice. Even more random is that I think I remember seeing Italian Book of Mormons at our church building... I'll have to check again, but I'm hoping that the Lord will place them again in our path before they leave Pärnu on Saturday.
Ooh boy I'd love a recipe for mashed potatoes and gravy, biscuits, and soup. Yes, we can find some tortillas here. They only come in wimpy 8 packs though :P
Gotta run! Thanks for the love and prayers!
Courtney
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Email 9-20-10
Goodness, it's still that hot there?!?! It's been very windy and rainy here this week, probably 50 degrees or so. Next week, we have Zone conference in Tallinn on Sunday so we're riding a bus with our whole branch up there. Then on Monday and Tuesday, we have training meetings down in Tartu so I get to do some traveling next week! Preparation Day is temporarily bumped until next Wednesday when I'll be back in Pärnu. We ride the bus about 10-12 minutes to get to the downtown area where the library is and where we e-mail. You should probably send me this e-mail a bit earlier so you can get to bed and so I'll have more time to write news home. I think the other missionaries get a bit annoyed that I take like 2 hours to write all my e-mails :P Oh well, it's not like there's much else to do in Pärnu on Preparation day! There are about 30 really active members in the branch, most of which are women, but we have some really great priesthood holders now. There are a lot of inactive members, so that's something I'd like to see change while I'm here. ´
This morning and last week we went shopping at the Baltic equivalent of Wal-mart: Rimi's. It doesn't have nearly all the different departments like Wal-Mart, but there's a bit more than what's available at Selver. I think Rimi is about a kilometer from our apartment. A short, brisk walk away, but it's not so fun to carry the groceries all the way back. However, it's worth it for this awesome cereal that's only at Rimi's. It's a chocolatey granola with raisins, banana chips, lil' chocolate chunks that turn your milk nice and chocolately very quickly. It's yummy stuff, so we decided to buy more this week since we like eating it for breakfast and sometimes as a late night snack. That means that we have to buy a lot more milk though, ha ha ha. The cooking is all right. Mom, I'm thankful I at least watched how you cooked sometimes, because it's come in handy a little bit. I could use some recipes though. Sis. LeFevre has used some recipes that have been passed down to missionaries, but they don't seem to taste, or satisfy quite like they do at home. We only have hour long meal times, so we need some quick recipes, but sometimes, we'll just take both our meal hours if we have English class or appointments that fill up our evenings. I made some awesome quesadillas the other day. Sis. LeFevre made some deep-dish pizza in a casserole pan, but it was sorta, meh. Last night, I cooked spaghetti (of course it wasn't as fancy as your sauce ;) , and I attempted to make some French Toast the other day. I think I'll try making fried potatoes this week. That should be interesting since it's all sort of a guessing game, ha ha! Another odd thing, it's been hard to find measuring cups here. We only have one in our apartment, but we haven't really seen any good ones at the store.
We do have a washing machine, but it takes like 2 plus hours to wash stuff. I think because it's really compact or something... Unfortunately, dryers are not in existence in Estonia so we get to use big drying racks. Only one room in the apartment has carpet, but Mom, I'll bet you'll be proud of how I've been good about cleaning the dishes and sweeping and vacuuming! This week, Sis. LeFevre's legs have been aching a lot. She played soccer for years, so it left her legs pretty messed up. This has really impacted our work this week since we were put under house arrest for Friday and Saturday. I felt sooo useless... but there's no use limping around all over the place. It's a problem she had before the mission, so we still don't know if the resting does a whole lot. I guess the days we rested were all right since it was rainy most of the day. We ventured out to family game night on Friday. It's so fun being with the members because they love us so much. They're like a really close family and I really admire that about them. Since we were cooped up for so long I didn't have much else to do. I don't have boots, a hat, new gloves, or many new scarves yet. They're kinda pricey here :/ But, they are necessary so I'll have to do some shopping. I don't think Sis. LeFevre cares for it much, hehehe.
This week, we've been helping a member with English almost everyday. We've been reading a lot from the Book of Mormon stories since it's easier to understand and has pictures :) Well, technically, Maive is a mother of 9, but she actually can't be a member since her "mees" (man) doesn't want to get married. That's a common problem here in Estonia :( I don't know much about it, so I'll have to ask the Elders.
Elder and Sister Jacques came up from Riga to check our apartments and they treated us to dinner at Steffani's. That's like the only restaurant we've been to in town. Probably because it's more food for your buck (or Kroon, in this case). It's an italian restaurant, and I actually scarfed down an entire small, thick crust pizza by myself. We've gone there every P-day so far. Maybe we'll go again today, ha ha ha!
You're right about how everything starts out with faith. That's why it's the first principle of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Right now, I'm really trying to build my faith to have courage to find those who are prepared to hear this message. We weren't able to to much at all this last week, so we'll have to make a rebound. Hope you enjoy the pictures and videos! Thanks for all of the love and support.
Love you lots,
Courtney
Airplane food!!
This morning and last week we went shopping at the Baltic equivalent of Wal-mart: Rimi's. It doesn't have nearly all the different departments like Wal-Mart, but there's a bit more than what's available at Selver. I think Rimi is about a kilometer from our apartment. A short, brisk walk away, but it's not so fun to carry the groceries all the way back. However, it's worth it for this awesome cereal that's only at Rimi's. It's a chocolatey granola with raisins, banana chips, lil' chocolate chunks that turn your milk nice and chocolately very quickly. It's yummy stuff, so we decided to buy more this week since we like eating it for breakfast and sometimes as a late night snack. That means that we have to buy a lot more milk though, ha ha ha. The cooking is all right. Mom, I'm thankful I at least watched how you cooked sometimes, because it's come in handy a little bit. I could use some recipes though. Sis. LeFevre has used some recipes that have been passed down to missionaries, but they don't seem to taste, or satisfy quite like they do at home. We only have hour long meal times, so we need some quick recipes, but sometimes, we'll just take both our meal hours if we have English class or appointments that fill up our evenings. I made some awesome quesadillas the other day. Sis. LeFevre made some deep-dish pizza in a casserole pan, but it was sorta, meh. Last night, I cooked spaghetti (of course it wasn't as fancy as your sauce ;) , and I attempted to make some French Toast the other day. I think I'll try making fried potatoes this week. That should be interesting since it's all sort of a guessing game, ha ha! Another odd thing, it's been hard to find measuring cups here. We only have one in our apartment, but we haven't really seen any good ones at the store.
We do have a washing machine, but it takes like 2 plus hours to wash stuff. I think because it's really compact or something... Unfortunately, dryers are not in existence in Estonia so we get to use big drying racks. Only one room in the apartment has carpet, but Mom, I'll bet you'll be proud of how I've been good about cleaning the dishes and sweeping and vacuuming! This week, Sis. LeFevre's legs have been aching a lot. She played soccer for years, so it left her legs pretty messed up. This has really impacted our work this week since we were put under house arrest for Friday and Saturday. I felt sooo useless... but there's no use limping around all over the place. It's a problem she had before the mission, so we still don't know if the resting does a whole lot. I guess the days we rested were all right since it was rainy most of the day. We ventured out to family game night on Friday. It's so fun being with the members because they love us so much. They're like a really close family and I really admire that about them. Since we were cooped up for so long I didn't have much else to do. I don't have boots, a hat, new gloves, or many new scarves yet. They're kinda pricey here :/ But, they are necessary so I'll have to do some shopping. I don't think Sis. LeFevre cares for it much, hehehe.
This week, we've been helping a member with English almost everyday. We've been reading a lot from the Book of Mormon stories since it's easier to understand and has pictures :) Well, technically, Maive is a mother of 9, but she actually can't be a member since her "mees" (man) doesn't want to get married. That's a common problem here in Estonia :( I don't know much about it, so I'll have to ask the Elders.
Elder and Sister Jacques came up from Riga to check our apartments and they treated us to dinner at Steffani's. That's like the only restaurant we've been to in town. Probably because it's more food for your buck (or Kroon, in this case). It's an italian restaurant, and I actually scarfed down an entire small, thick crust pizza by myself. We've gone there every P-day so far. Maybe we'll go again today, ha ha ha!
You're right about how everything starts out with faith. That's why it's the first principle of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Right now, I'm really trying to build my faith to have courage to find those who are prepared to hear this message. We weren't able to to much at all this last week, so we'll have to make a rebound. Hope you enjoy the pictures and videos! Thanks for all of the love and support.
Love you lots,
Courtney
Airplane food!!
Frankfurt, Germany - Airport for layover to Latvia
We got to stay in the Lenin Hotel, called that because the man himself had stayed there a few times. Here's the lobby of the tiny place.
In Riga, Latvia. This is a large cathedral nearby the church building in town.
Food for the new missionary feast!
The mission home, pre-feast.
My new companion!! Sister LeFerve, who has actually been there 3 months. Learning Estonian with her should be fun ;o)
We got to stay in the Lenin Hotel, called that because the man himself had stayed there a few times. Here's the lobby of the tiny place.
In Riga, Latvia. This is a large cathedral nearby the church building in town.
Food for the new missionary feast!
The mission home, pre-feast.
My new companion!! Sister LeFerve, who has actually been there 3 months. Learning Estonian with her should be fun ;o)
Friday, September 17, 2010
Email 9-13-10
My week went by fairly quickly as well. Thanks for the reminders of cleanliness, ha ha! I've been doing a pretty good job since now I have my own place to take care of. I scrubbed the bathroom this morning while my companion got most of the kitchen done. There's still more to do, but the most important stuff is done :)
I forgot to mention earlier for my friends that DearElder is free for our mission since it's sent by pouch mail through the church. It may take a bit longer for it to reach me from the mission home, but it's a free option if it's not pressing news.
Now I'm like the piano guru in our branch. I already have a lesson set up to teach a member and another man wants me to attend some music festival thing he's putting on in October. Maybe he wants me to perform. WUT?!! They all think I'm like Mozart, or something. It makes me feel loved though :) The humidity from the fog and rain the last few days has killed my hair so I have to wear it back :P I tried straightening it one day and it was destroyed in about 20 minutes outside. I'm trying to look nice though!
Last Thursday we did some service for a member who lives 30 minutes outside of Pärnu. We just hacked away at some old uprooted tree and made a bit fire where we burned all the little bits. I guess we'll go to Saima's every week, so I wonder which day we'll go back and help her out this week. On Saturday I witnessed my first baptism! Eda Rahula was taught by the Elders, but now we get to teach her retention lessons. I think this week we need to do a bit more finding because we need to teach some lessons. I think we have one progressing investigator who committed to baptism when she finds out that this is true, so we just have to make sure we can get her to church this week.
One funny thing Estonians do is occasionally inhale their words. I mostly hear it among old ladies and it's usally some exclamation, or affirmation like "Jah!". It kinda weirds me out every time, ha ha! We cook most of our own meals, and they've usually been pretty basic stuff like spaghetti and tacos. Sis. Aitken is up in Keila with Sis. LeDuc. They are about 2-3 hours away, I think. It took us about 3 hours to get to Pärnu from Riga by bus. There are only 4 sisters in all of Estonia. 16 Estonian speakers and I think about 8 Russians. 2 Elders and 2 Sisters in Pärnu.
Well, I gotta go now. I've been hanging around the computer long enough. I hope to be a little more efficient with my e-mail writing soon :P I love you all and thanks for the prayers!
Armastusega,
Courtney
I forgot to mention earlier for my friends that DearElder is free for our mission since it's sent by pouch mail through the church. It may take a bit longer for it to reach me from the mission home, but it's a free option if it's not pressing news.
Now I'm like the piano guru in our branch. I already have a lesson set up to teach a member and another man wants me to attend some music festival thing he's putting on in October. Maybe he wants me to perform. WUT?!! They all think I'm like Mozart, or something. It makes me feel loved though :) The humidity from the fog and rain the last few days has killed my hair so I have to wear it back :P I tried straightening it one day and it was destroyed in about 20 minutes outside. I'm trying to look nice though!
Last Thursday we did some service for a member who lives 30 minutes outside of Pärnu. We just hacked away at some old uprooted tree and made a bit fire where we burned all the little bits. I guess we'll go to Saima's every week, so I wonder which day we'll go back and help her out this week. On Saturday I witnessed my first baptism! Eda Rahula was taught by the Elders, but now we get to teach her retention lessons. I think this week we need to do a bit more finding because we need to teach some lessons. I think we have one progressing investigator who committed to baptism when she finds out that this is true, so we just have to make sure we can get her to church this week.
One funny thing Estonians do is occasionally inhale their words. I mostly hear it among old ladies and it's usally some exclamation, or affirmation like "Jah!". It kinda weirds me out every time, ha ha! We cook most of our own meals, and they've usually been pretty basic stuff like spaghetti and tacos. Sis. Aitken is up in Keila with Sis. LeDuc. They are about 2-3 hours away, I think. It took us about 3 hours to get to Pärnu from Riga by bus. There are only 4 sisters in all of Estonia. 16 Estonian speakers and I think about 8 Russians. 2 Elders and 2 Sisters in Pärnu.
Well, I gotta go now. I've been hanging around the computer long enough. I hope to be a little more efficient with my e-mail writing soon :P I love you all and thanks for the prayers!
Armastusega,
Courtney
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Email: 1st Week 9-6-10
Oh goody!
I just wrote Shauna a decently long e-mail so that took up enough time for you to finish yours! My inbox said I received in 14 minutes ago :) The earliest I'll be checking e-mails is about 10am, so what, 1am you're time? I just realized that my camera doesn't have a usb port so I'll have to buy a card reader so I can attach some photos for you some time. I asked Sis. Aitken/Sis. Anderson to send the card to you... Sis. Aitken finally made it to Keila yesterday and I think Sis. Anderson should be leaving the MTC in a few hours so I really hope they dropped it in the box this weekend... If they didn't send it, I wonder how you could get it... Perhaps somehow get in contact with the Branch 41 Presidency? I'm not sure how you'd manage that, 'cause I think I threw away the paper with their phone numbers. Let's just hope it reaches you in a few days! Oh, and I did get Grandma Smith's letter :)
Goodness, I can't even imagine what 110 weather is like since it was cold and rainy when we arrived in Estonia on Thursday! Those first few days were quite cold! Today's not so bad, I just need a sweater. How I will survive once winter rolls around, I know not...HAHAHAHA! That'll be fun :P
I believe you spoke to Cinthia at work. I got to know her for a few months before I left. Cute little gal~ That's funny you had Mexican food last night because we made our own soft tacos for dinner! The only thing they have for salsa is this German-made stuff called Texacana that's not chunky like real salsa and it's a tad bit sweeter. Anyway, our tacos were pretty good. A Robot birthday sounds awesome, by the way. I happened to find a cute robot folder in the free bin at the MTC. It makes me happy :)
It was pretty fun traveling in a huge group of 19 throughout the airports. Sometimes we'd have to leave some people behind and hope they'd catch up as we weaved our way around. We all made it here safely though! I don't think anybody was really able to sleep on the Lufthansa flight over to Frankfurt. Everybody around us had their little entertainment screens going, almost the whole flight time so that created some added flashing lights. Right as everyone was starting to really settle down to sleep, it was about 5:30am or so in Germany and they started to serve us breakfast, lol. We all were tuckered out on the plane to Riga so we had a short nap :) Everyone at the mission home says that's was always seems to happen, ha ha. By the way, the mission home is a way sweet place!! They combined two aparments to make one big home. There are some doors so when guests stay, they can make it more private like if they were separate apartments. All of the Elder slept there during our stay while the 5 of us sisters got to stay in the Lenin hotel/museum. Hmm, fascinating name, eh?
I think the story is that Lenin stayed in that same building back in like 1900 so the bottom floor/lobby has a large bust of Lenin and some other little relics like old magazines on the table and some things in a glass case. I don't know why the missionaries call it a museum. There are no signs for it and the only time we saw other people were when we checked in. Other than that, we had the whole place to ourselves and a key to the front door. We stayed in two tiny rooms upstairs. Funny thing was we even had a bathroom, but no sink...? Just a toilet and a shower. So yeah. We had to spit in the shower. It was a really small room, but quiet. Latvians seem to like driving and making as much noise as they can with their cars and motorcycles. Silly kids.
Street contacting was a bit odd since I don't speak Russian or Latvian. I was stuck with 2 Russian-speaking sisters so they did most of the talking, but I tried contacting some younger women and asked if they spoke English. They didn't seem interested in religion, but they were willing to take our pass-along cards and we told them about English classes. President and Sister Dance and the Jacques and the Hardys are all super people. For the short time that I got to meet with them, I love them so much already.
On Wednesday, we split into groups and rotated doing office paperwork, creating lesson plans, contacting and study/nap time. I suppose our group seemed especially tired because the Dances pretty much told us to sleep, haha.
Thursday morning, we met at the Riga center chapel, ate some cereal and things and then waited for our trainers to get out of their meeting. Then we all gathered in a huge circle and President Dance gave a little intro of each of us before he announce where we'd be serving and with whom. And I ended up in.......*drum roll*............PÄRNU with Õde LeFevre!!! It's been a while since sisters have been here, and it obviously shows in our apartment. Actually, I guess we have one of the nicest apartments among the Estonian missionaries, but you can tell Elders have been there for a while. They said they tried to clean, but I don't understand what they meant by that... One of the Elders, Elder Aardema, was being transferred to Tallinn, but he stayed for a few days to help us get a little acquainted since only 1 missionary out of the 4 in Pärnu was staying. The best this about our apartment is that it has a great view of the sea! That's still odd for me to look out and see the Baltic Sea.
We were greeted at the Pärnu bus stop by the Elders and Janeli, a young 19 year old member who's really sweet, cute, and spunky, but she speaks SO FAAAASSSTTTT!! She's so willing to help us out and even did a little street contacting with us on Friday. I think she's wants to meet us all some time today and go to her house out in the country a little ways.
Yesterday's sacrament meeting was interesting. I tried to follow along, but I didn't even catch half of it. Oh well. All the members are very welcoming even though I can only understand a little of what they're saying. It's a really small branch with some 20 members or so, but they just baptized a family last month and they have a few really great priesthood holders now. No more need for the missionaries to be in the branch presidency, so that's a big step.
Everyday, I'm building up a little more courage to speak. It's kinda hard at the moment since Sis. LeFevre has only been here for 3 months and doesn't understand a whole lot more than I do! But, we're trying as best as we can. Yesterday, we tried our first day of knocking at the edge of town, but most people didn't answer their doors. I guess they were all away for the weekend? Anyway, we were able to get into 2 doors and talk to some older ladies. One was wondering what makes our church different so we told her about Joseph Smith but she wouldn't take a Book of Mormon since she has a vision problem. Perhaps we could return back and read some to her... Another lady took us on a tour of her garden before we entered her house and insisted that we take home some chives, tomatoes, a cucumber and some huge pink flowers. Inside we talked with her for a long while, and she had some very... interesting views about God and religion. Some of her thoughts on God's plan were spot on, but others were way off. Like she believes the spirit of her Father is now in her grandson who lives with her... yeah. Odd things like that. Anyway, she was nice to us and she actually took a Book of Mormon to read. I think we'll try to prepare more about the Plan of Salvation if she'll let us come back and teach next time.
We're just getting used to the town because we're both new, but the Elders before us left us a list of potential investigators and people to contact. We already have a handful of lessons set up for this week, yay! Well, I've spent a lot of time at the computer now. I gotta get going so I can do other things. Thanks for the prayers and love! I love you all so very much!!
Love,
Courtney
Minu aadress Pärnus (My address in Pärnu)
Hommiku 2
P-K 55
Pärnu 80010
Estonia
Addresses here are rather simple. I like it :)
I just wrote Shauna a decently long e-mail so that took up enough time for you to finish yours! My inbox said I received in 14 minutes ago :) The earliest I'll be checking e-mails is about 10am, so what, 1am you're time? I just realized that my camera doesn't have a usb port so I'll have to buy a card reader so I can attach some photos for you some time. I asked Sis. Aitken/Sis. Anderson to send the card to you... Sis. Aitken finally made it to Keila yesterday and I think Sis. Anderson should be leaving the MTC in a few hours so I really hope they dropped it in the box this weekend... If they didn't send it, I wonder how you could get it... Perhaps somehow get in contact with the Branch 41 Presidency? I'm not sure how you'd manage that, 'cause I think I threw away the paper with their phone numbers. Let's just hope it reaches you in a few days! Oh, and I did get Grandma Smith's letter :)
Goodness, I can't even imagine what 110 weather is like since it was cold and rainy when we arrived in Estonia on Thursday! Those first few days were quite cold! Today's not so bad, I just need a sweater. How I will survive once winter rolls around, I know not...HAHAHAHA! That'll be fun :P
I believe you spoke to Cinthia at work. I got to know her for a few months before I left. Cute little gal~ That's funny you had Mexican food last night because we made our own soft tacos for dinner! The only thing they have for salsa is this German-made stuff called Texacana that's not chunky like real salsa and it's a tad bit sweeter. Anyway, our tacos were pretty good. A Robot birthday sounds awesome, by the way. I happened to find a cute robot folder in the free bin at the MTC. It makes me happy :)
It was pretty fun traveling in a huge group of 19 throughout the airports. Sometimes we'd have to leave some people behind and hope they'd catch up as we weaved our way around. We all made it here safely though! I don't think anybody was really able to sleep on the Lufthansa flight over to Frankfurt. Everybody around us had their little entertainment screens going, almost the whole flight time so that created some added flashing lights. Right as everyone was starting to really settle down to sleep, it was about 5:30am or so in Germany and they started to serve us breakfast, lol. We all were tuckered out on the plane to Riga so we had a short nap :) Everyone at the mission home says that's was always seems to happen, ha ha. By the way, the mission home is a way sweet place!! They combined two aparments to make one big home. There are some doors so when guests stay, they can make it more private like if they were separate apartments. All of the Elder slept there during our stay while the 5 of us sisters got to stay in the Lenin hotel/museum. Hmm, fascinating name, eh?
I think the story is that Lenin stayed in that same building back in like 1900 so the bottom floor/lobby has a large bust of Lenin and some other little relics like old magazines on the table and some things in a glass case. I don't know why the missionaries call it a museum. There are no signs for it and the only time we saw other people were when we checked in. Other than that, we had the whole place to ourselves and a key to the front door. We stayed in two tiny rooms upstairs. Funny thing was we even had a bathroom, but no sink...? Just a toilet and a shower. So yeah. We had to spit in the shower. It was a really small room, but quiet. Latvians seem to like driving and making as much noise as they can with their cars and motorcycles. Silly kids.
Street contacting was a bit odd since I don't speak Russian or Latvian. I was stuck with 2 Russian-speaking sisters so they did most of the talking, but I tried contacting some younger women and asked if they spoke English. They didn't seem interested in religion, but they were willing to take our pass-along cards and we told them about English classes. President and Sister Dance and the Jacques and the Hardys are all super people. For the short time that I got to meet with them, I love them so much already.
On Wednesday, we split into groups and rotated doing office paperwork, creating lesson plans, contacting and study/nap time. I suppose our group seemed especially tired because the Dances pretty much told us to sleep, haha.
Thursday morning, we met at the Riga center chapel, ate some cereal and things and then waited for our trainers to get out of their meeting. Then we all gathered in a huge circle and President Dance gave a little intro of each of us before he announce where we'd be serving and with whom. And I ended up in.......*drum roll*............PÄRNU with Õde LeFevre!!! It's been a while since sisters have been here, and it obviously shows in our apartment. Actually, I guess we have one of the nicest apartments among the Estonian missionaries, but you can tell Elders have been there for a while. They said they tried to clean, but I don't understand what they meant by that... One of the Elders, Elder Aardema, was being transferred to Tallinn, but he stayed for a few days to help us get a little acquainted since only 1 missionary out of the 4 in Pärnu was staying. The best this about our apartment is that it has a great view of the sea! That's still odd for me to look out and see the Baltic Sea.
We were greeted at the Pärnu bus stop by the Elders and Janeli, a young 19 year old member who's really sweet, cute, and spunky, but she speaks SO FAAAASSSTTTT!! She's so willing to help us out and even did a little street contacting with us on Friday. I think she's wants to meet us all some time today and go to her house out in the country a little ways.
Yesterday's sacrament meeting was interesting. I tried to follow along, but I didn't even catch half of it. Oh well. All the members are very welcoming even though I can only understand a little of what they're saying. It's a really small branch with some 20 members or so, but they just baptized a family last month and they have a few really great priesthood holders now. No more need for the missionaries to be in the branch presidency, so that's a big step.
Everyday, I'm building up a little more courage to speak. It's kinda hard at the moment since Sis. LeFevre has only been here for 3 months and doesn't understand a whole lot more than I do! But, we're trying as best as we can. Yesterday, we tried our first day of knocking at the edge of town, but most people didn't answer their doors. I guess they were all away for the weekend? Anyway, we were able to get into 2 doors and talk to some older ladies. One was wondering what makes our church different so we told her about Joseph Smith but she wouldn't take a Book of Mormon since she has a vision problem. Perhaps we could return back and read some to her... Another lady took us on a tour of her garden before we entered her house and insisted that we take home some chives, tomatoes, a cucumber and some huge pink flowers. Inside we talked with her for a long while, and she had some very... interesting views about God and religion. Some of her thoughts on God's plan were spot on, but others were way off. Like she believes the spirit of her Father is now in her grandson who lives with her... yeah. Odd things like that. Anyway, she was nice to us and she actually took a Book of Mormon to read. I think we'll try to prepare more about the Plan of Salvation if she'll let us come back and teach next time.
We're just getting used to the town because we're both new, but the Elders before us left us a list of potential investigators and people to contact. We already have a handful of lessons set up for this week, yay! Well, I've spent a lot of time at the computer now. I gotta get going so I can do other things. Thanks for the prayers and love! I love you all so very much!!
Love,
Courtney
Minu aadress Pärnus (My address in Pärnu)
Hommiku 2
P-K 55
Pärnu 80010
Estonia
Addresses here are rather simple. I like it :)
Email: Last P-day at MTC 9-25-10
Howdy everyone!
It's sad to think I won't be able to attend the temple until after a year, but I had a lovely time, like always. Thanks for sending the package! I don't think I really need much else because I figured I should just buy the things I really need over there. I think I'll be able to find most everything. I don't have much time to type it here so I wrote it by hand. Sis. Aitken's illness from last week has not improved :/ She's on hold, but we're waiting to see if she improves by Friday when the doctor will give the final call on whether or not she has to stay another week... Not cool. It's really unfortunate that she's has such a rollercoaster of health while throughout her stay at the MTC, but we're all praying for her and trying to do what we can to serve.
It's been a nice week for letters! People are showing me some love during my last week here, ha ha ha! I got a letter from cousin Jessica on Monday, a DearElder from Lachelle yesterday, and a quick letter from Heather and Grandma Smith today. I'm glad everyone's doing pretty great. :) Wow, Dustin already has another kid! How fun! I think Brian Gashler leaves in about 3 weeks. I'm not sure how much time I'll have to write come next preparation day in the field, so I'm planning to mail out oodles of postcards so you can get my address. You already have the address for the mission home. I wonder how long it takes for them to forward on the stuff to those of us not in Latvia...?
Last night we finally heard from another apostle and it was the good ol' missionary favorite, Elder Holland! He started his talk by mentioning how all the general authorities love us and are thankful for the work that we do, because they wouldn't be able to do it without us. We may have feelings of inadequacy, but this work has to be done. He continually urged us to give it our all, because we have to be perfect every time. Elder Holland's mission changed his life so he just wants us to have the same happen to us. When I think about what challenges lie ahead for me, I wonder how in the world I can do it, but I've got the Lord on my side. Yesterday, Bro. Conway shared with us some of his thoughts about the book of Job and the afflictions that we'll encounter. Even when Job lost everything, he immediately praised God. I'm praying that I'll be able to do the same, because everything happens for a reason. It's a bit unnerving to think if some of the good 'ol Kensington ward may split, but I'm sure Heavenly Father knows what he's doing
My burn is about 3 inches long. It doesn't hurt, though. I don't think I'll worry about it because I'll probably start wearing long-sleeved blouses when I arrive, hehe. Skirts can now be patterned and colorful, yay~ I don't know if I'll have room to take them with me, so I'll let you know if I need some while I'm in Estonia. Sis. Luik says skirts are getting a bit easier to find, but they may be a little more expensive. I'll just wait and see.
Good luck with the planting! It was fun having fresh veggies from the garden. I'm kind of excited to start cooking for myself. Sis. Aitken is dying to start baking again, ha ha! She loves collecting recipes~ I'm going to take a few more pictures and try and get the with the cousins this Sunday at the temple. I'll have my roomate Sis. Anderson mail my memory card back and they do have bubble-lined envelopes that I'll use to send it with. I may send Stacey a little sum'n sum'n this week too.
Oh yeah! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARK AND KIDS! I don't think I'll get something in time to you so here ya go!
It's sad to think I won't be able to attend the temple until after a year, but I had a lovely time, like always. Thanks for sending the package! I don't think I really need much else because I figured I should just buy the things I really need over there. I think I'll be able to find most everything. I don't have much time to type it here so I wrote it by hand. Sis. Aitken's illness from last week has not improved :/ She's on hold, but we're waiting to see if she improves by Friday when the doctor will give the final call on whether or not she has to stay another week... Not cool. It's really unfortunate that she's has such a rollercoaster of health while throughout her stay at the MTC, but we're all praying for her and trying to do what we can to serve.
It's been a nice week for letters! People are showing me some love during my last week here, ha ha ha! I got a letter from cousin Jessica on Monday, a DearElder from Lachelle yesterday, and a quick letter from Heather and Grandma Smith today. I'm glad everyone's doing pretty great. :) Wow, Dustin already has another kid! How fun! I think Brian Gashler leaves in about 3 weeks. I'm not sure how much time I'll have to write come next preparation day in the field, so I'm planning to mail out oodles of postcards so you can get my address. You already have the address for the mission home. I wonder how long it takes for them to forward on the stuff to those of us not in Latvia...?
Last night we finally heard from another apostle and it was the good ol' missionary favorite, Elder Holland! He started his talk by mentioning how all the general authorities love us and are thankful for the work that we do, because they wouldn't be able to do it without us. We may have feelings of inadequacy, but this work has to be done. He continually urged us to give it our all, because we have to be perfect every time. Elder Holland's mission changed his life so he just wants us to have the same happen to us. When I think about what challenges lie ahead for me, I wonder how in the world I can do it, but I've got the Lord on my side. Yesterday, Bro. Conway shared with us some of his thoughts about the book of Job and the afflictions that we'll encounter. Even when Job lost everything, he immediately praised God. I'm praying that I'll be able to do the same, because everything happens for a reason. It's a bit unnerving to think if some of the good 'ol Kensington ward may split, but I'm sure Heavenly Father knows what he's doing
My burn is about 3 inches long. It doesn't hurt, though. I don't think I'll worry about it because I'll probably start wearing long-sleeved blouses when I arrive, hehe. Skirts can now be patterned and colorful, yay~ I don't know if I'll have room to take them with me, so I'll let you know if I need some while I'm in Estonia. Sis. Luik says skirts are getting a bit easier to find, but they may be a little more expensive. I'll just wait and see.
Good luck with the planting! It was fun having fresh veggies from the garden. I'm kind of excited to start cooking for myself. Sis. Aitken is dying to start baking again, ha ha! She loves collecting recipes~ I'm going to take a few more pictures and try and get the with the cousins this Sunday at the temple. I'll have my roomate Sis. Anderson mail my memory card back and they do have bubble-lined envelopes that I'll use to send it with. I may send Stacey a little sum'n sum'n this week too.
Oh yeah! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARK AND KIDS! I don't think I'll get something in time to you so here ya go!
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