I'm loving Duisburg!

Hey hey!

Things are going really well! I'm loving Duisburg haha. We are talking to everyone and a fair amount of people are interested. So as a district leader I'm responsible for all the missionaries in my District. I follow up with them every Sunday about their goals and plan the District meetings that we have every week. I also go on Splits with all of the elders in the district during each Transfer.

This week has been busy. So as District leader I am blessed to be able to go on splits with members of my District. For any who might not know a split is a 24 hour period where two companionships trade companions. It's done for training purposes. Anyways, I got to go to Wesel this week. Elder Fugal and I had a really accident prone time. 

So we come from Duisburg to Wesel (home of the Esel) and come to our bikes. Then we realize that Elder Barker (Elder Fugal's companion) didn't give me his keys. So we had to walk home. After lunch and grabbing the spare key (which I put in my front shirt pocket) we realize that we need to leave because we don't have the bikes and not very much time. We run a little while and as we come to Hauptbahnhof we see our train leaving. This train only comes once an hour. So... now we're late for our appointment. But we go do what any missionary does in their free time. Contacting!

We walk to the Fußgängerzone and talk to a couple of people. "Kein zeit" "nein danke" but then we find this one woman who is really interested in Family History. We spoke about the church and how we have the largest collection of documents and how we can work at digitizing them and then finding our ancestors. She really liked the idea and said she would come by to try it. Then we got ourselves back the train station to catch our bus. We get to the appointment all fine. It goes really well and then the kids show me a trampoline our back. So I have to go do some Backflips! It was a lot of fun and helped to befriend some of the kids. 

We then left from there to go to Gemeinde Rat or... Ward Council. That also went really well. I was a visiting missionary so I didn't know what was going on but it was still fun. Then walking out we asked a member to drive us to the Train station so we could pick up our bikes.... but as I check my pocket its empty... my heart sinks as I realize all too fast that it must have fallen out while I was jumping on the trampoline... I turn to my companion at the time Elder Fugal and explain, quite embarrassed, what had happened. He was less than impressed and then we asked the member if they could drive us all the way home haha. Even though is was a disaster it was a really fun split and Elder Fugal even interviewed me! So I might be able to send that home as well. 

So yeah. Needless to say I'm enjoying it a lot. 

General Conference is the best on the mission haha I look forward to it really. So this is only the second in Germany. It's really different here. We watch Saturday morning in the evening then we have 3 sessions on Sunday. Because the time is so different. It gives it a weird feel. I'm not at home in pajamas but in a church building in proselyting clothes. But its amazing all the same :) 

Thank you so much for everything :) i love you so much!!!

Elder Mahendran is actually the brother of my Ward Mission Leader here in Duisburg!!!

Hey mom! Guess where I am!

Mom, You will be receiving a didgeridoo filled with swords in a few days. The didgeridoo is Elder Woolley's.

Haha hey mom! Guess where I am! That's right... I got transferred!!! Now I'm in Duisburg! If you can't find it on the map that's because its really small haha but its right above Düsseldorf. That's right! I'm back in the Düsseldorf Zone! Am so happy to be here haha goodness, it feels good to return home. The haircuts are cheap the Döners are cheap and potentials fall from the sky! Okay well, not really. The potentials all come from the Lord. But say the Lord is bowling, we're the ball and the potentials are the pins, he's striking out every time! Just in the last two days Elder Garner and I have found 5 potential investigators and! One of which I contacted and talked to in.... can you guess what language? It's not English or German hahaha nope not in the Ruhrpot, it was in Spanish!!! Haha estamos missionaros, hablamos de la inglesia Jesus christo. I've been practicing ;) yeah. So this guy's name was Wisdom. And he is from Nigeria! I had no clue that they spoke Spanish in Nigeria. Haha but yeah, thank goodness that I'm not the only one who can try to communicate with this guy. Our new Zone Leader Elder Mahia is Colombian so he can take over haha. And miracle story, while I was talking to Wisdom on the Bahn another man came and sat next to me and started telling me something. I was holding a Book of Mormon and was quite sure that he was telling me it was illegal to proselyte on the Bahn (its not but Germans like the word Illegal) but really he was just asking me if he could have it! His name was Bonny or something like that and he got off the Bahn too soon for me to get anything other than the house number of the apartment building he lived in... 

Fast forward to day 2. We go back to that part of the city to try to find this guy. With relative ease we find the house number but 1st, we don't know his last name. You need the last name for the door bell. And both the 2 klingels are businesses... so we try the top one and I ask for a Bonny... they said that there was no Bonny living there. But as I turn around to go my companion the amazing Elder Garner is contacting a man on the steps. So I join the contact and they are talking about God. If he's there, if he loves us. And then he asked us who we even were. We said "wir sind Missionare Der Kirche Jesu Christi, Der Heiligen der Letzten-Tage" and then someone from the Klingel box yells "seid ihr Mormonen???" (Are you mormons?) haha and we both chuckle and say "Ja!" And the Klingel yells back "Kommt Rein!" (Come in) so we did.

Turns out, it was the guy from the day before! We was listening to the Klingel on the inside and heard us.

Turns out he really likes the Book of Mormon. Also, he's a recovering addict. Haha so yeah, needless to say he seems pretty golden. Oh and his name turned out to be Bodo. Not Bonny.

Afterward we went finding and found two more potentials!!! Ramadan, he is Syrian and Elder Garner is a stud so he had an Arabian Book of Mormon dabei(there). And then Andy a young Turk who took a great interest in the Book of Mormon. So we have a lot to do already and only 3 days in. 

Today I got a haircut too. That was nice haha :)

I've been called as the District leader of the Duisburg district. My district includes the Elders serving in Krefeld, the Elders serving in Wesel and the Sister training leaders of the Düsseldorf zone who serve in Duisburg with us. 

I'm incredibly honored and excited to serve as a district leader. I'm happy that I get to have a more direct influence to help other missionaries. At about a year I feel like I have had experiences that can help other missionaries know that they are precious to the Lord and help them to correctly measure their work. I pray that I will do a good job and be able to bless those for whom I'm responsible.

Duisburg. So I moved from Hanau in Hessen to Duisburg in Nord-Rhein Westfallen. The people are quite different and we have already seen a lot of miracles in the first two days. My companion is Elder Garner, he was friends with Ethan for a little before he left haha so we speak often of Gilbert. He's a really sweet kid who says sorry a lot haha. I'm just overjoyed to be working here. The area is good, my comp is a hard worker. I have yet to meet the ward but I've heard many good things about them. I'm just thankful to the Lord. 

Well, yeah, in closing this area is amazing and Elder Garner seems like a Stellar missionary so I'm super excited for the next 4 weeks! 

I love you all and pray for you always <3

Some funny things:

Also this is what a Klingel Box is... they can be like this or have

100 buttons and more times than not there isn't a talk box but ours has one.

Also these are all over the place! They are all over Germany and mark the homes of Jews who were alive during the Holocaust. Sometimes there are 6 or 7 from families. This one is for something else but the Holocaust ones look the same. They say The name of the person, and often when and where they were deported or if they fled and where they died. If they were sent to a camp.
 

 

In Germany, all the bottles have what's called Pfand. It's like...

ransom money on bottles. Well yeah, you pay an extra 15 cents and then when you take it back you get the money back as a receipt that deducts it from other buys at the store. Well, Americans don't like it and we often go once a transfer to change them out. This is what it looks like...

Also if you wonder what our days are like... this is a good description...

We walk a lot haha

Von hier in Hanau