March 16, 2010

you know you are in france when the sacrament bread is a baguette

Dear fam,
Today the email is going to be rushed. We went to Brussels today, which was cool. A bunch of people had to go for legality and so half of my district went. We went to grand place and saw Manneken Pis and ate Belgium waffles. I got you a present mom.

Tuesday was our first district meeting and boy was that interesting. Some of the belge missionaries aren't very happy about the merge and have a stereotype of Paris missionaries that we are all discouraged, down-trodden and have very low expectations of our mission. Our district leader played on that A LOT. He then asked us to fast every week for our area, one of the zone leaders said that he had heard that we weren't supposed to fast that often. Luckily zone conference was the next day and the district leader asked president. President said, "Dallen H. Oaks said, 'I don't know why people think they always need to do more than the Lord asks them.' keep your fasts to a minimum elder." SO GLAD when I heard that. I have a different attitude towards fasting, however it makes the work so hard when we are out and about as much as we are. On Tuesday I also saw a man walking a ferret like a puppy dog. That made my night!

So far no one is getting baptized on the 27th. However, we do have a baptismal date for Kai, the husband of Belinda. They are from Tonga and here so he can play rugby. They met the missionaries the end of January and Belinda was baptized before I got here and we set a date with Kai this week. Pretty exciting stuff.

Siva and Talei are good. We hope to see them tonight. All I know is the tj stuff is messing with Talei and making her more confused. Luckily I had my "lessons" with the tj's and know their beliefs. Definitely helps when teaching someone who is also being taught by them.

OH MAN, there was this one day where all kinds of craziness happened! We had just left Siva and Talei's and were walking down the street and I said “bon jour” to this woman. We continued to talk about the weather and how Paris area is nicer this time of year. We got on the metro and she was like, "would you like my phone number to come and visit me?" We were like "umm do you know who we are", but gladly took it. She invited us to Paris this weekend, but had to decline. Instead we are seeing her tomorrow.

Later that day I sat down and this teenage kid was like "hey, I know you!" and I was like "really," knowing he didn't, I never contact teenage boys. He said, “yeah we talked for like 20 at this place”. I asked him what we talked about and he said, “ Jesus” . I asked him if he liked what we talked about and he said yes, so I handed him a Book of Mormon, and asked him to read Alma 32 and call me. Then I went and sat by Soeur Kohler and a 17 year old started talking to us and told us we were charming with our accents. We gave him a plan of salvation pamphlet.

Samedi sports was good. I keep having to guard this kid named Thomas who is like 15 and WAY good. He reminds me a lot of Aaron!

Peace and love family, pictures next week!
camille