Hey, everyone! Well, here I am, emailing in a new city! My time went by very fast in Deventer, and I am afraid of how fast it will go here, too. For those who are wondering, the crazy day of transfers went very smoothy, or at least for me, and I am excited for what awaits in the future here in Spijkenisse.
I will start the contents of this week's letter with Tuesday. It was a pretty normal morning and afternoon; we had our last district meeting in the Apeldoorn church and then went out to Subway to celebrate. After a quick meal of a "centimeter sub" (European Subway, I tell ya!) Elder Tolman and I fast walked from the centrum area to catch a train back to Deventer for some appointments. We arrived at the station with a comfortable amount of time and got on the 1:48 to Deventer. About half way through the ride, the train slammed on the breaks, and we discovered there was a problem and we would be stuck on the train for a few hours. So, on my last day in Deventer I spent a good two hours on the train, and we had to cancel two appointments, sadly. But other than that it was a good day. We had a wonderful dinner appointment and a nice last lesson with Kenny to finish the night off.
On transfer day I packed up and shipped out to Rotterdam. Later that day after a few trains and a long ride in the public metro, I arrived with Elder Drinkwater to my new area, Spijkenisse! First off, we sadly do not live in a very odd-shaped building like in Deventer. We are actually housed by church members here. We do not live with them, but there is a living space above their law firm, where we live. The living quarters are a little small, but it's quite homey. It has been pretty exciting working with Elder Drinkwater, we have pretty similar personalities and likes and dislikes, which makes living and working with someone for 24/7 pretty nice. The members here are incredible, too. On Sunday I was warmly greeted with a handshake from the bishop and a number of other members. This is a very missionary-orientated Ward – super cool! We are also the only two missionaries in the Ward, which makes the first time in my whole mission that it is just my companion and I in a Ward. After church I was also checking the missionary eating list to find members checking it over, making sure there were no empty spaces! Perhaps I am gratifying myself or the members here, but how cool is that? So, yeah, I am really excited to get close to the members here and investigators, of course.
We have had a pretty good amount of success so far here, too. Elder Drinkwater is pretty new, but he loves to try and gives a great effort at anything that's thrown at him. What I saw a lot of success from in the past – if doors can be ineffective – is bike contacting. Basically, you go about normally doing your work throughout the day – appointments, look-ups, etc. – except you just bike a little slower and stop people that you come across on the sidewalk. It can be awkward at first, but I have found just smiling and making the best of the situation makes people feel a little comfortable about a 19-year-old kid riding his bike trying to talk to you.
We have a very cool miracle person we are working with named Edwin who has a baptismal date and was referred to us by a member, but I haven't been able to meet him yet. Apparently, he is on vacation in America right now fulfilling his wonderful dream of going to Memphis to tour and visit all sorts of Elvis Presley related things.
More stories and other news are on the way, but that's all the time for I have today! This Friday we will meet the new Mission President at zone conference, so watch out for big mission changes! I love you all and keep you in my prayers!
Elder Eli Andrew
PHOTO CAPTION: Eli bids farewell to President and Sister Robinson, out-going mission president and “mission mom.”
PHOTO CAPTION: Elder Selfie! (Deventer)
PHOTO CAPTION: Dutch parking lot. (Deventer)
No comments:
Post a Comment