Saturday, February 28, 2015

szia szia hallo!

23 Feb 2015
Well its another week in érd! I am finally getting used to being in hungary but that also means it is starting to lose a bit of the charm. Mostly I mean the fact that everyone here has dogs. So in hungary the houses all have gates around them and everyone has at least one dog. So when we are walking down the street or tracting the only thing we hear is the sound of a million dogs barking. Every time we go to ring the cséngő (or bell) the dogs usually try to jump up and bite your hand off so me and sister sellers have come up with the perfect way for me to distract the dogs while she rings the bell. It is really funny though to see how all the dogs are different here. Your typical hungarian dog is about the size of a german shepard or a bit bigger than a lab but most of them have long hair that is tangled into dread locks. It is funny to stand on the street and try and figure out how many dogs there are because it is so hard to distinguish between all the barks. but enough about dogs. haha
This week we taught ag_ and má_ again. It was awesome because má_ was totally into it this time. They were excited to see us and when we got in then they told us all about this tv show that they watch where they said that the man prays in Jesus' name at the end. They turned it on and put it on mute in the background while we were trying to teach so it was a bit distracting. Last lesson we gave them a pamphlet about the plan of salvation so we asked if they had read it and ag_ said he had but he was  a little confused  about it. We tried to start to teach it but they kept turning the sound back on the tv to see if the man was praying yet. When it finally came to that point then they both bowed their heads and repeated all the words of the man's prayer but then when he came to the end he didn't end in Jesus' name but just said amen, so they were confused but finally turned the tv off. We taught them a bit more but our time was about up. We asked má_ to pray but she asked ag_ instead so he prayed and it was great. His prayer sounded sort of like a baptist preacher it was so loud and funny but it was great. After that ag_ asked us a ton of questions but unfortunately we had to go because we had to teach angol óra. But we are hoping that they will come to csaladi est (or family night) tonight. They are really incredible people and I am praying for them so much that they will be able to understand everything we teach. 
After that we had angol óra which was great. We had this new young mom in the class with her adorable five year old daughter. We always share a spiritual thought at the beginning of class but usually it is a sort of awkward we talk about our religion while they just listen so we decided to make it interactive this week by bringing some extra books of mormon and have each of them read a verse and after talk about it. So we read and it went well. They were a little surprised at first but it was great. I think we're going to start doing something like that every week. Then we passed around the roll and every week we ask if people would like to meet outside of the class for more personal help with the language. We do a sort of half english teaching half gospel teaching and people can write igen vágy nem (yes or no) and we got three igens this week!! One of them was the cute mom (zs_) so we are set up to teach her on friday morning so that should be awesome. we also got to set up this week with another angol órian Kl_, who is this super cute 20 year old college student. She is so cool and fun and we are stoked to teach someone who is young! 
On Friday it was sister sellers birthday so we're both 20 now! We had district meeting that morning so after it we went to lunch with our elders at this buffet (or bűfé if you are hungarian). It had some pretty good authentic hungarian food so that was fun. and then we taught Il_ again. She said she hadn't prayed about baptism and is still being stubborn about it but we emphasized to her again that it isn't us that she is doing this for and it isn't even the church she is doing this for but rather it is all for Heavenly Father and He is the one that we make our covenants with. She didn't come to church this week and we aren't meeting with her until next week since she has a lot of doctors appointments this week so I am really praying for her. 
That evening though we met with fo_ , who is an older gentleman from angol óra. At the beginning of the program we asked him what he sort of is expecting or wants from our lessons, language wise but he responded that he just wants friends, that he feels lonely. He said that in college he had friends but then when he got married and started his business he lost contact with them and now he just wants friends. We were a little surprised at first and kind of worried it was going to turn into some sort of creepy old man thing but as we simply listened to him we saw that he really just wanted someone to talk to so we taught him about prayer and how Heavenly Father always wants to speak to His children, and just like a loving father always wants to hear about everything. He doesn't just want us to come to him when we are sad but when we are happy or when we are worried or when we just need someone to talk to. We also taught him about the book of mormon. We told him that, like the bible it is the word of God and that when we read it it is like Heavenly Father is speaking to us. I read him a scripture out of third nephi how Heavenly Father said he is always with us and will never leave us lonely and he had tears in his eyes. He is so great and I hope he really reads the book of mormon. I know he can find so much comfort in it. I know that in my life and when the mission is hard, prayer and reading the scriptures are the things that bring me the most comfort. 
On saturday we had a farsang buli! apparently in hungary on february 21st they all dress up and party, sort of like halloween mixed with carnival in brazil or something. So we had a ward party where they all dressed up and we played some games. We had invited our investigators but unfortunately none of them were able to make it. It was pretty fun though. Me and sister sellers dressed up as fifties housewives, since the options for costumes are kind of hard as a missionary. Not too many people understood it and just said that we looked pretty hahaha It was fun to just have fun with the ward members.    



Sunday was good. They are starting to get a little easier to understand but it is still difficult to not fall asleep. Hungarian just has this way of lulling me to sleep. haha That evening we went back to the branch house to have dinner with the elders. Elder Lindow had made a big banana bread and I made a rice stir fry so we ate a ton and it was fun. Our elders are really great. They are both so awkward and weird that things never get boring. Elder Lindow is super tall and he is really goofy. He sort of reminds us all of a big puppy that is just always happy and jumping around. Elder meek is the opposite. He is super quiet and sort of reserved, but is hilarious. We are finally starting to break him out of his shell and he is so sarcastic and funny.  They are just great and really obedient missionaries. I feel lucky to be in a district of such good missionaries. Some of the areas have problems with the elders not following the rules but we don't have to worry about that and it is so great.
Well that was my week. I love life here and I know that God is real. He has a plan for each of His children and I am slowly finding out the part that hungary plays in my life. 
sok szeretettel 
heath nővér

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