29 Aug 2013

This has been a long week, with Wayne's tooth and all.  I have had to make him milk shakes and soft foods to eat, but it is getting better.  Sorry I'm so late today.  We had a very busy morning.

Since transfers are coming, Sis. Malinowska asked us all over for lunch last Thursday.  This was a good test for Wayne.  She made this awesome Polish dish with vegetables, meat, and a kind of sour sauce.  It really tasted good and soft enough for Wayne to eat.  So here is our picture.  This may be the last time we are all together.

Elder Smith, Sister Ellis, Sister Blake, me, Wayne, Elder Stumpf and Sister Malinowska.  She is one awesome lady.  We love her to pieces.

Elder and Sister Lloyd from Lodz made reservations for us to go with them to the Salt Mine in Wieliczka for Friday and they had to pay when they made the reservations.  So we traveled about 2.5 hours in the car on Friday to just outside of Krakow to visit the Salt Mines.  Wayne was still on pain medication, but he drove and everything worked out well.  And we were glad that we went.  This is still a working salt mine, but they have made it a tourist attraction also.  The workers have sculpted statues and other things out of the salt.  When we entered the mine, we walked down 365 steps to the first level.  There were chambers connected by corridors that measure over 155 miles.  Our tour took us to 7 of those chambers.  We were walking on salt and the walls and ceiling were all salt also.  We tried to take some pictures.  Hopefully, you will be able to see some of the things we saw.

                                         This is what we walked through.

                                         This is how they mine the salt.

This is me trying to lift one of those cones of salt with the pulley system they had.  No can do!!

This is the Last Supper carved in the salt wall.

 

This is looking up in one of the chambers at all of the wood columns and walkways they built.

 

This was our lowest point.  It is a little under a football field length and a half of another one down in the ground.

 

Here we are waiting to ride the elevator up.  I don't know why we chose to stand in front of this place, but they had statues of Mary and other saints all over the place.

 

We also drove into Krakow to eat lunch and try to see one of the biggest castles in Poland, the Wawel Castle.  Here is the fortress part facing the Vistula River.

 

 

Here is the middle courtyard.  This place was huge.  We went through the state rooms, but they wouldn't let you take any pictures.  It was very castle-like.  Big rooms and very old furnishings  They had huge tapestries hanging in every room, each depicting a scene from the Bible, starting with the creation. 

 

 

  Here is the whole castle. Or the best we could do.

 

Here we are standing on the stairs going up to the tower.

 

And here is the Vistula River.  Many of the invading countries of Poland used this river to enter the country. 

 

 

Saturday was a stay home day, because Wayne was still hurting.  At least the puffiness had gone away. 

 

Sunday we had the sisters and elders over for pancakes.  Elder Smith's family makes syrup, called Uncle Bob's Butter Country Syrup and he is always bragging about it.  So his mother sent him 3 bottles of it and we decided to try it out.  It is actually buttermilk syrup, but they have done something to the processing so that you can store it on the shelf and the butter doesn't separate like it does in homemade syrup.  It was very good.  I had to make three batches of pancakes to feed everyone.  So after dinner, I went contacting with the sisters and Elder Durrant went with the elders.  We walked so fast and so far that I got a blister on my toe.  We didn't really get to start a lesson with anyone, but the sisters gave out 1 BOM.  The elders didn't have much luck either.  In fact, someone actually told them where they could go.   

 

Monday - Pday.  The elders asked if we wanted to play basketball with them and the sisters.  We just laughed.  They did get two of the YW to play with them, though.  Wayne went and got his stitches out also.  The dentist said that it was healing very nicely.  By the way, the dentist actually called on Saturday to see how Wayne was doing.  Very awesome!

 

We finally got a hold of the four YSA's we wanted on our committee.  One lives in Bialystok, one is  in Szczecin, one in Lodz and one in Katowice.  Two of them have only been in the church for 10 months.  It will be very difficult to meet in person.  So lots of emails and hopefully skype.  All of them said they would be happy and excited to help.  We told them that their first assignment was to find a place.  So that is what they are doing.  We have been in contact with Elder Adler (Area Authority) to find out our budget and what countries we specifically invite.  I guess anyone can come to the conference, but there are 10 countries that we are responsible for.  And we don't know for sure which 10 they are.

 

Tuesday, we had our last district meeting of this transfer.  Sunday, all of them will learn if they are being transferred or not.  Elder Durrant and I will hate to see any of them leave.  We have grown to love these young men and women.  They are all dedicated and sure try hard to help these Polish people try to see the truthfulness of the gospel.

 

Wednesday we were meeting an investigator with the sisters before English class.  But they cancelled at the last minute.  After English class, we had a "linger longer" with all of the people that attend.  The sisters made some cookies, we brought some fruit and the elders brought the drinks.  It was really fun.  The English classes start over every nine weeks (correspond with transfers), so the beginning class will move up to intermediate, and intermediate to ours.  Usually the same people just keep coming to ours after the nine weeks, because it's a good way to keep up on their English.

 

After that, we went with the sisters over to the Renik.  And of course, we had to get some ice cream.  Every transfer the missionaries get one day for "Cultural Day".  This is besides their normal Pday.  So the sisters went to a music forum in the cathedral.  We haven't talked to them today yet, so we don't know how it was. 

 

Wayne just went over to the Post Office to pick up a package from Jeremy.  Yeah, more brown sugar.  I can make some more cookies.  And they sent Peanut Butter, marshmallows and rice krispies.  I'll have to make Rice Krispy Treats for the nursery on Sunday.  They won't even know what they are, but I'm sure they will like them. 

 

Well, have a good week.  We love you and miss you.   

 

 

 

 



 

 



22 Aug 2013

Douglas, this picture is just for you.  No need to say anymore!

On the way to the Sister's apartment last Thursday night we ran into two more gnomes.  These are really cute.  I bet you can't tell what kind of store they were in front of:

 

 

 

Also, we stopped to take the pictures of the "Anonymous Pedestrians".  These represent people as they went "underground" during the middle of the night when Martial Law was initiated in Poland.  And then re-emerged after it was taken away.  So the statues are going down on one side of the street and coming up on the other.  It is really cool.

                                                         Here they are going down......                               

  And here they are coming up.

Wayne had a real hard time eating at the Sisters.  So when he got up Friday morning, we knew something was definitely wrong with one of his teeth.  We called President Cielenski to see if he knew of any dentists we could go to.  He said he had a very good one, but he did not work on Fridays.  He also said he would call around for us and see if we couldn't get in to one that day.  We did get into one that evening (8:00 pm).  The outside of the building looked pretty scary, but the inside was very clean and modern.  So the dentist (a young woman about 4'8" and maybe 100 lbs) came and took Wayne back to the examining room.  Pres. Cielenski came with us just in case they didn't speak English.  But they did and Wayne could understand them.  So they took an xray and found that his wisdom tooth was abscessed.  They shot him up with Novocaine, cut his gum around the infected wisdom tooth and massaged his glands and neck to get all of the infection out.  It was very painful and gross.  She gave him a prescription for pain and an antibiotic.  She told him that he would have to come back and get the tooth pulled.  So we made an appointment for Monday.  She said that the tooth was embedded a little bit in the bone, but shouldn't take very long to get it out.  Friday night was a very long night, but the swelling had gone down considerably.

On Saturday, it was Elder Smith's birthday and we had planned a little surprise party.  Elder Stumpf had found out that his favorite dinner was steak and potatoes and his second was hamburgers.  I told Elder Stumpf I would make the hamburgers.  So the elders and sisters came over for dinner and poor Wayne had to suffer through it all.  Elder Smith was surprised, a little.  Sis. Blake kind of blew it when she met them at the door and said she and Sis. Ellis got there before them for the party.  Oh well.  I had made some cupcakes and we put candles on two of them.  One candle for every ten years.   Sang the polish birthday song, which makes no sense at all.  It goes like this:

Sto lat, Sto lat

Niech zyje, zyje nam

Sto lat, Sto lat

Niech zyje, zyje nam

Jeszcze raz, jeszcze raz

Niech zyje, zyje nam

Niech zyje nam.

Sto Lat!

It means that you hope they live for a 100 years.  Anyway, we'll sing it for someone when we come home.  So here is Elder Smith blowing out his two candles:

Sunday morning at church Wayne had to conduct.  He did okay, but you could tell he was hurting.  We had invited the Call family over for dinner, so once again, Wayne had to suffer through another dinner and try to be pleasant.  He did great.  We had barbecue pork sandwiches, vegetable tray and some sliced pineapple and cantaloupe.  AJ Call, who is 14, had 2 1/2 sandwiches.  His mom kept telling him to slow down.  They all speak English so it was fun having them over.  We had ice cream and cupcakes for dessert. 

So finally Monday came and we walked over to the dentist's office.  They came and got Wayne at 12:30 pm.  At 2:30 pm, I was getting kind of worried.  The main dentist, a guy, came out one time and said something to the receptionist.  And in a little while, through the main door, walked in another dentist and he just walked right into the back.  In about another hour, I finally saw Wayne, holding a cold compress against his cheek and they were taking him back into the xray room.  He came and sat by me for a little while and then the main dentist came over and said they needed to go back in, because there was still a little bit of tooth they didn't get.  They had already stitched him up, so out came a couple of stitches and some more digging.  We left the facility about 4:30 pm.  So, the girl dentist had to call for help from the main dentist.  And the both of them couldn't get it out of the bone so they called for a specialist.  When I told Jeremy about the day, this is what he wrote back:

I'm picturing a cold, wet cinder block basement room with single light bulb swinging above a dentists chair and a table full of used, scary looking, torture-like tools.

Despite it all, Wayne was very pleased with the way they cared for him and made sure he didn't feel any pain during the procedure. 

To top all of this off, Tuesday was Zone conference down in Katowice and I was cooking some of the food for lunch.  So, there was no way Wayne was going to be able to stay at the apartment and rest.  We doped him up with pain pills Monday night and called Pres. Edgren to ask him if the Elders could ride in the car with us, just in case anything went wrong.  He said we could do that.  I haven't driven at all in Poland, but I learned very quickly on Tuesday.  People really drive crazy here, but I did okay.  We had Elder Stumpf drive home. 

It was a wonderful conference.  President Edgren told the missionaries that if they felt like going out at 8:00 in the morning to start contacting, they could do that.  They still had to do all of their study and preparation, but now they can do it anytime during the day.  Before, they could not leave their apartment until 11:00 am.  They all were excited about that. 

Sister Reed and I were in the kitchen most of the morning preparing the food.  I took a picture of the kitchen so you could see how tiny it is.  We certainly do enjoy the Reeds.  They will be leaving in two weeks.

 

We tried to get a picture of President and Sister Edgren and this is the best we could do.  They just wouldn't sit long enough for us.  This was during testimony bearing.

 

Pres. Edgren told a story about when he was Bishop and how the spirit influences us sometimes when we least expect it.  He was working on the roof of his house when his phone rang.  It was the mother of one of his priests in the ward.  David was preparing to go on a mission shortly and his mother asked if the bishop could help her find him.  He had not come home for 2 days.  His girlfriend had come home from school and his best friend had killed himself a week ago.  She was afraid that he may have done something wrong, because he wasn't thinking straight.  Pres. Edgren said he would try, but he didn't even know where to begin to look for him.  He got down from the roof and had to go to Home Depot to get some more things.  He said he asked the Lord to be with David and help him make it through this trial.  On the way home from the store, he passed one of his favorite ice cream shops and just knew he had to go back and get some ice cream.  There was no parking in front of the store, so he pulled down a little side street.  When he got out of his car, there was David in his car with his girlfriend.  Pres. Edgren started to walk towards the car, and David got out, looking very surprised.  He said, "Hi, Bishop, what are you doing here?"  Pres. Edgren told him that the spirit lead him here and he hoped that David was okay.  David told him that he was fine now and that he would be in church tomorrow.  David went on his mission and served faithfully.  He also told the president that he was glad he showed up when he did.  Small miracles!  And as David A. Bednar once said - the "tender mercy" of the Lord.

Since transfers will be in a week, Sis. Malinowska has asked us and the elders and sisters over for lunch today.  Another BIG meal. 

We love you all and miss you.  Have a wonderful week.

15 Aug 2013

We had a wonderful week.  The weather has been beautiful.  We went from the 90's+ down to the 70's this week.  Hopefully it stays this way for a little while.

Last Friday Wayne and I prepared for President and Sister Edgren coming to Wroclaw.   We went over to the chapel and did a thorough cleaning. It's surprising how dirty a place can get on Sunday and through the week. 

Saturday was spent on cooking.  Pres. and Sister Edgren had a Fireside on Saturday night and we had a little get together afterwards.  So I made Sloppy Joes.  I cooked up 6 - 500 g containers of ground turkey (beef was too expensive), used 4 plastic containers of ketchup, one container of mustard and a lot of my precious brown sugar.  And I made brownies also.  It was a hit though.  None of the Polish members knew what Sloppy Joes were and they got a big kick out of the name.  But everything went well and we all enjoyed our time with the Edgrens.  The kids got together and decided they were going to have a wedding.  Here is my little Mila and the oldest Zan boy, Samuel.  They were cute.

 

Anyway, the Edgrens came in from England after spending the week with Elders Nelson, Holland and Ballard for Mission President training.  Pres. Edgren said it was wonderful and is very grateful for the insight of the gospel these brethren have.  He said that Elder Holland spent over an hour teaching them from the first 14 verses of 1st Nephi.  He didn't go into detail, but was very emotional when he talked about it.  All of them also attended the very first Pageant presented in England by the Preston England Temple.  It was all about the beginning of missionary work in England and what has taken place since then and they said it was wonderful.  The brethren were there to observe and to make recommendations and if approved by the First Presidency, it will be announced as a Church Pageant, just like the others ones in America are.  Sister Edgren said that if the church does approve it, she is going to make sure her children come to England to see it.  It was that good!

 

Sunday was a good meeting because the Edgrens spoke again.  Pres. Edgren spoke mostly in Polish.  He is awesome.  And then, because there was some food left over from Saturday, everyone went into the RS room and had something to eat.  The Edgrens had a 5-6 hour drive back to Warsaw, so they left shortly after.  Wayne and the Elders had to fix a flat tire on the Edgren's car.  We all hoped they would make it back safe and sound.

 

Monday was P-day and the Sisters asked us if we would take them to the castle we went and saw.  We had to ask permission from Pres. Edgren, because it was way out of the boundaries for the sisters.  He said we could take them and so we did.  They enjoyed the trip and spent over an hour in the castle.  We didn't go in, but stayed outside and enjoyed the sun.  Here we are after they got out of the castle.  Of course, we had to get some ice cream.

 

 

Here's the sisters at the overlook to the castle.  It is an very impressive place.

 

On Tuesday, the Elders and Sisters rode the train again to Katowice for Zone Training.  It was lonely without them.  So Wayne and I just kind of "hung out".  We cleaned our apartment, did laundry and went shopping, and even did the sister's grocery shopping because they didn't have time on Monday, either.  Then we went for a walk and, once again, we stopped at Tra-la-la-la for some more ice cream.  I guess the walk didn't do us any good exercise wise.

 

Tuesday night, Wayne woke up with very sore jaw.  We thought maybe it was a bad tooth or something like that, but non of his teeth hurt.  He took some aspirin and put a hot towel on his neck and cheek.  In the morning when we both got up, his right side of his neck was terribly swollen.  His one gland looked like a baseball.  So we called the place where the church wants us to go and got an appointment.  The doctor wanted Wayne to get an Ultra Sound on his neck, but there weren't any doctors available to do it at that time.  So she wrote out a prescription for an antibiotic and Ibuprofen.  We have to go back on Monday if it isn't any better.  That night was English class, which didn't help and Wayne went with the Elders after to contact some more inactives.  When they got home, about 8:00 pm Wayne looked like, as Elder Smith put it - "Jabba, the Hut".  We all sat down to eat some dinner and Wayne was really struggling.  So the Elder's gave him a blessing and he went to bed after they helped me clean things up and left.  He had a peaceful night.  His neck is still swollen but doesn't hurt as much.  Hopefully the antibiotics do the trick.  We tried to take a picture, but it didn't really work. 

 

So today, I don't know what we will do, if anything.  We are going over to to the Sister's apartment for dinner.  By the way, today is a holiday in Poland.  It's the day they celebrate the Ascension of Mary!?!?!?  The church bells have been going this morning.

 

Have an awesome week.  We love you and miss you.

 

 

8 Aug 2013

It's Thursday already.  Time goes by so fast.  I hope you are enjoying Salem Days.  And school starts in two weeks.  WOW, where did the summer go?

 

We had a wonderful Testimony meeting Sunday.  A Sis. Allen who served here in Poland 2 years ago, came back to go to school for the summer.  She has a beautiful voice, so Pres. Cielenski asked her to sing prior to the testimonies being born.  She sang "I Know That My Redeemer Lives" (in Polish, of course) and it was just the perfect song to bring the spirit into our meeting.  After church, she came over to our apartment, because she couldn't get into her hostel that she needed to rent for the next two weeks, and had dinner with us.  I invited the sisters over also and we had a wonderful time laughing and telling family stories.  We also learned that our new Mission President and wife will be here this coming Saturday for a Fireside. It will take them all day to get here, so after church all of the women got together and planned a meal for Saturday.  I get to cook all of the Sloppy Joes.

 

Monday, we cooked dinner for the Zans. (She is in the Primary and YW with me and expecting  soon)  We took it out to their apartment in Legnicka, (an hour drive) and ate with their family.  We stayed for FHE.  This is the family with the 3 boys that run all over the church.  But I was impressed how well they listened to the lesson and played the game we had.  I guess they get excited at church because they don't see anyone for a week.

 

Tuesday was District meeting.  Always good.  We met with an investigator that the Sisters have been teaching.  She had started to read the Book of Mormon a couple of days before.  When the sisters asked her if she had any questions, she wanted to know how the Lord would direct someone to kill in the horrible manner that Nephi did and to someone (Laban) who was so vulnerable.  We all tried to tell her about the taking of one man's life to save a whole nation and all of the killing that the Lord directed the people in the Old Testament to do, but this really stuck in her mind.  Anyway, we continued with the teaching and at the end asked her if she would keep reading.  She said she would and would not think about that one instance.  She gave a beautiful prayer and asked Heavenly Father to let her know that the BOM was true.

 

Our English Class was awesome again.  After the story, we played a game called Typhoon.  We put words on a piece of paper and then made a 6 X 6 grid up on the board. We turned the words over so they couldn't see them.  In the boxes of the grid, we put numbers from 1 - 10 and some of the boxes said Typhoon.  We covered all of the boxes with the papers and then the students picked a paper and had to make a sentence out of the word.  If they got it right, they received the points.  If they picked a box with Typhoon in it, then they got to take the points of another player.  It was fun and I think they all enjoyed it. 

 

Today, Elder Durrant and I met the Sisters at church and were going to meet with two contacts.  Of course, one didn't show up,  But the other one, Ulenia (she's the one with the question about killing Laban) came and we had a real good discussion on the Plan of Salvation.  She asked some good questions and said she would read more in the BOM.  They asked her if she did find out it was true would she be baptized.  And here's what most of the Poles say - I've already been baptized, I don't understand why I need to do it again.  It is very frustrating. 

 

So that's it for this week.  Once again, it has been very hot.  It got up to 40 degrees C today. (You'll have to figure out how hot that is in F)  Again, it's about 86 in our apartment.  And really humid. 

 

I haven't shown some gnomes for a little while, so here are a couple.  Have a good week everyone.  We love you and miss you.

 

Here's a little traveler.

 

Here's our little sentinel to the city.  I think he's fast asleep.

 

Here's a picture I forgot to post some time ago.  This is coming into a little city by the name of Lubomierz.  This is what it looks like all through Poland.

 

 

 

 



3 August 2013

Hello everyone,

I'm late this week because we were down in Slovakia this past week. It was awesome. You'll see pictures later on in this post.

Last Friday I made some raspberry jam. It turned out pretty good. And then I made raspberry bars for Saturday's English class.  Here is a picture of our favorite fruit stand.  It is right by the tram stop.

Saturday I think I broke my little toe. So now I have two "pinkies"broken. Anyway, it turned a very pretty combination of blue, red and purple and it doesn't look the same anymore. Kind of bent like my little finger on my right hand. It really hurt especially when I had to walk on it.

We had a very special temple prep lesson with Marzena, a sister in our branch in the afternoon. Our district is going to the Freiburg Temple this month and she is going to so prepared. She asked Elder Durrant for a blessing so that she can have the spirit with her when she fasts before she goes. She is a very special lady. We wish we could go with her.

On Sunday, Sis. Cielenska asked that Elder Durrant and I go with her to the hospital to help her with her daughter who needed to get an xray. She is only 14 months old and very attached to her mom. And Sis. Cielenska couldn't go in with her because she is expecting. So we met them at the hospital Monday morning. I will tell you right now, I wouldn't have gone to that hospital for nothing. But it was the "free" hospital, so everyone goes there. It was really sad. Anyway, Lucia started crying the minute her mom left the room and I had to hold her hands above her head, hold her chin up, and keep her from bending over, all the while she was screaming. It was crazy. When I picked her up and took her to her mom out in the hall, Sis. Cielenska was crying too. But they said they got a good picture, so we didn't have to do it again. Thank heaven.

So Monday, we packed for our big adventure.  I think I wrote before that Elder Durrant and I were asked by President Nielsen to be the coordinator's for next years YSA Conference for Eastern Europe.  It will be held in Poland.  This year it was held in Slovakia and we left at 5:30 am Tuesday morning.  We put the coordinates in our trusty GPS and started on our way.  The closer we got to the southern part of Poland, the landscape looked just like home.  Mountains and pine trees and winding roads.  Here is the picture of the road we took up to the hotel just outside of Liptovsky Milkulas, Slovakia.  We were almost at the top.

 

 

So the place that we stayed was at a Ski Lodge.  This is the picture of our room and the view outside our window.

 

 

And here is the picture of the lodge. 

 

 

When the CES Institute teachers arrived, they each taught two classes a day for three of the days.  The first day, they split us into 6 groups and took us up in the woods.  Each of the teachers talked about different aspects of the temple.  It was really an inspirational day.

 

Some kids having a water balloon fight.

 

We had a service day.

 

Went on a beautiful hike

 

This was the view at the top of our hike

 

We have lots more pictures, but not enough room.  It was a wonderful week.  On Saturday morning at 9:00 am we punched in  "home"  our GPS and of course made a wrong turn somewhere.  Our GPS kept telling us it was "recalculating".  Anyway, we ended up in the Czech Republic.  I'm not sure what our Mission President would have said about that.  It took a lot of convincing of the Area Authority to have us leave our mission and go to Slovakia.  We did make it home, safe and sound.  And we also realize the responsibility that has been given to us.  Thank you for your love and support.

 

We love you all and miss you.