Bonjour Bonjour!
How is everyone? I hope its sunny there...because although yesterday was foggy and dreary, Brussels repented this morning and the sun is out again. Im not exactly sure how long this is going to last so Im pretty excited.
This week was awkward. Let me explain. It started off amazing with Zone Coneferance with Elder Kapishku (sp?)... he is the area President. He started off the conferance with asking us to write down a question or a worry that we had. He then promised that by the end of the day we would have the answer to our questions. Each one of us. Then he announced that he nothing planned that day and he was simply going to follow the spirit for the next 6 hours while teaching us. It was amazing. He then made us promise that if we got the answers to our questions we would then have to challenge our investigators to church the same way; challenge them to write down a question and promise them that they would get the answer. He wanted us to promise people that church is always, well can always be, a revelatory experience. I got my answers. So our theme this week has been challenging everyone we meet with to write down questions and be prepared for church.
Another activity he did, was during our lunch break we were to go into a room with our companions and really pray about what our area needed at this time. And then fix goals appropriately. Along with other goals, Soeur Murray and I have been coming up with some interesting contacting techniques. The first is what we like to call 'grocery story contacting'. Our Relief Society president actually came up with this one. She came up to us one Sunday, and almost as if pleading asked us to find solid families for our ward. She said maybe try in grocery stores around six pm because that is when parents, with solid jobs are getting off work and stopping at the store to pick up dinner. So we tried just walking into some grocery stores, asking some nice looking people where things are, and trying to tie that into the gospel. We'll just say it led to some awkward moments and we have yet to find our groove in this type of contacting haha.
Another one we came up with is to pray in the morning for what our 'theme' is for the day. Elder Kapishka really stressed that we are not the ones out there preparing people for the gospel, that is what the angels are doing. Our job is to actually find the people who have been already prepared. So we've been praying extra hard, and more specifically for the Lord to help us find the people who have been prepared and are ready to progress in the gospel. We have fixed themes for ourselves such as 'puffy coats' or 'red jackets' or even 'teenage boys'...and then if we see that during the day we have to contact those people no matter what. Well we've had some amazing experiences...we've have found some families that hopefully are ready to progress. BUT this has also led to awkward moments such as running off the tram for a lady in a puffy coat and awkwardly trying to invite teenage boys to church without feeling creepy. Its been good.
As well Soeur Murray and I have been trying to be better about just talking to people in general without hesitating. This led to one of my favorite contacts ever. And one of the most awkward. I was holding a Book of Mormon and Soeur Murray asked to see it. I handed it to her and she asked the guy sitting next to her in the metro if he was believing. He didn't say anything and just kept staring forward. So she tried again, asked if he had ever met missionaries. He just started shaking his head. She asked more questions (not even yes or no questions) and he just kept shaking his head. Finally she asked 'is my accent to strong for you to understand'...at this point he just decided to ignore that she even exsisted.Not even tell her that he's not interested or anything. It was sufficiantly awkward. But I was so proud of her!
I also had some awkward contact this week when we, for the first time this transfer, went to Saturday sports with other missionaries and investigators.I've been anti to this whole idea because a. it involves me playing football. B. it involves me playing football. But we gave in after enough peer pressure. Well just say me running straight into a very tall elder and almost breaking my nose qualifies as very awkward contact haha.
And this week we had a very uncomfortable feelings as we somehow ended up being fed THREE TIMES in one day. It was awful. AWFUL. The last rendez vous even had three courses. We just had rendez-vous with people and for some reason they felt like it was neccessary to feed us. All of them. By the last house we were dying. That gave us very uncomfortable feelings for about the next three days. Good.
But overall a very good week, I had a very missionary moment when we going from door to door, and it was late and cold and we got to the last house of the street and it a giant gate around the house and a security system. We walked past the house and started to head for the bus stop, when I turned and said to Soeur Murray 'its always the last house...' so we went back and rang the intercom. Shockingly they buzzed us in...so we leaped to the front door...ready to give our message...when turns out they speak dutch. We gave them a family proclamation in french and we will be passing them to the Netherlands mission. haha...
So what have I learned from this week? A mission is just one big awkward moment...embrace it! Carpe Diem.
Love you all!
Soeur Smith
PS OH YA Christmas. Ok so apparently Belgium has a wishy-washy mail system. So the best bet for me getting a package is to send to the mission home. They can then give it to me at our Mission Christmas conferance. I don't know exactly when this is...but probably early December, so you'll want to get sent soon so it can get to the mission home on time. Or you could risk it and try sending it to me here in Belgium. OR if you happen to be going to the states in the next little while, a family in our ward has offered to let missionaries' families send things to thier NATO mailbox...which means you don't have to pay international fees. The address for that is:
Dave Holloway
PSC 81 Box 119
APO AE 09724
Just put my name on the box somewhere I guess.
BUT here is the other trick. Transfers are next week. SO with the chance that I'm getting transfered...its probably just better not to send anything to that address till after Saturday. So best bet...if you want to send things this week. Mail it to the mission home :) THANKS!
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