Captain's Log

Received May 23, 2011

THIS is THE 3rd WEEK in a row...that MEMBERS have not FED the MISSIONARIES on Sunday...We WILL soon NEED to go out in SEARCH of NOURISHMENT ourselves...WHO knows WHAT we MAY encounter...WILL send out the RED SHIRT guy first to SEE if EVERYTHING is clear and then travel out INTO the UNKNOWNNNNNN.....

But seriously, this week has been one of the best. It all started on Monday with our opportunity to go on exchanges with the Assistants to the President. They came later in the day and Elder Baird and I went off to Ohringen while Elders Adams and Sills stayed in Heilbronn. We talked to quite a few people on our way to the Dieterle family. One of the most interesting people was a kid at the train station who was just sitting on top of a bench smoking. Elder Baird approached him and asked him if he had ever thought about some of the questions of life, "Where did I come from?", "What happens after this life?". He said that he hadn't really thought about any of those kinds of things. He accepted the invitation to talk a little more about the gospel later. We ended up having another meeting with him later in the week where he took a Book of Mormon. We continued from the train station to the Dieterles and talked to quite a few people on the way. Arriving there just on time, we came up and ate dinner. As usual, Michelle Dieterle's friend Kathrine and Brian Dieterle's girlfriend Jessica were both there. Neither are members and Elder Baird took the opportunity to teach them the message of the Restoration of the Gospel. At the end he committed both to read the Book of Mormon and Jessica even committed to be baptized on June 25th. We taught her one other time last week and she even came to church on Sunday. She's a little hard to get comments out of but she pays attention to the messages. We will be teaching her tonight. We also had Zone Conference this week and lots of fun things were learned there. Transfer calls were this week and Elder Sill and I are both staying for another transfer. Lots of fun stuff going on here. I hope everyone has a great week. Tschuuuuuusssss!

"That Looks Pretty Bad, Elder Sills." "Na, We'll Be Fine."

Received May 16, 2011

So this was a pretty good week. We got to go to Das Rheingold. It was really well sung but the production was really weird. But like I said though the most important part was that the singers were good. Oh and there was FIRE! It was a P-day well spent. On Sunday we didn't get invited over for lunch so we went back home to eat. As we left it started sprinkling a little but it looked fine. It was just a little cold. We took an S-bahn out to Leingarten to go to a former investigator. As we got out I looked to the east and there were enormous and ominous storm clouds. The conversation in the subject line occurred and then we started off. We got about halfway there when it was essentially a downpour with hail and lightning to boot! When the lightning started we were like "Let's go back"! The we ran all the way back to the station running through the huge puddles that had just showed up in the past minute or two getting pelted by hail all the way. It didn't really make much difference that I had brought my umbrella because we were soaked anyway. We just went back home and dried off for half an hour or so (my shoes are still not dry) and then we went back out, just to a different place where we ended up having some good conversations and gave someone a Book of Mormon. Maybe we just weren't supposed to go to Leingarten? Anyway, it's been a great week and today we are going on splits with the Assistants to the President. It will be awesome. It sounds like everything is awesome at home. I hope that everything is sunshine, rose, puppy dogs and unicorns! Until next week, Tschuuuuuuuuuuusssssss!

To All My Adoring Fans

Received May 9, 2011

First of all it was really cool getting to talk to everyone last night. It was really late and I was tired when I woke up this morning but it was alright. It was for a good cause. I forgot to tell you about Saturday. It was Europa Tag and you know what THAT means: Wine Women and Song! Well, kinda. We happened to pass through the Stadmitte a couple of times and there were some really cool dance and singing performances on a big stage. There were also booths set up all over the square that had things from each of the represented countries in the EU. A very kind lady came and gave us pretzels that looked like little EUs. It was really fun and I loved getting some culture. We also went out to a few places and doored! Ja Wohl! It was fun just to go around. With the coming of Spring and lots of festivals (and days off) so comes the excess of beer, dirndls and lederhosen. It's a lovely sight and great that so many people feel unashamed of their old culture. I just wish that there was less alcohol involved. But, all that aside, we have just been having fun here in Heilbronn. President and Sister Condie came to our branch on Sunday and it was a great surprise to see them come so far out of their way. President Condie served here 38 years ago and feels a special affinity for the people. There was also a very large family from Brazil in the congregation. They practically doubled our branch. We also taught the lesson in Priesthood class about Missionary work (something they seem to think we know a lot about) and it went well. Bru. Zander fell asleep in the front row and was snoring. I thought that was pretty funny. We went to a place called Guglingen (40-50 min bus ride) where we saw a couple of cool things. The first was a person's yard that had a US Army truck from the 50s or 60s just chilling out. That was cool. Then we went saw a person's yard where they had set up (as part of their landscaping) a model train set. I want one of those. There are just some really awesome things here and you just have to keep your eyes open in order to see them. I hope everyone has a great week and that everything is going well and not too stressful. Tschuuuuuuusssss!!!

Na Servas!

Wie geht euch? Everything is good here in the lovely City of Heilbronn. There were two protests yesterday. One was against Nazis and the other was against immigrants having jobs in Deutschland. There are approximately 6,000 police in Heilbronn in order to make sure that no one crossed between the two protests. We didn't see any of it but there were no buses and we had to be picked up to go to church. We were taken in for the whole afternoon by a lovely family in a little place called Zaberfeld. They are great members of the church and have a son preparing to go on a mission. Their daughter was the one who played soprano recorder with Schwe. Henkel on Easter. They live in a really cool house with lots of paintings by Gustav Klimmt and Paul Klee. It's cool. We do a lot of train riding here and a lot of buses riding. It's not the best but it does show us a lot of the countryside. We have permission to go to the opera and I'm excited! It actually costs a lot less than the Wiener Volksoper did. We can get orchestra level seats for 23 euros. That's what I call a bargain! Anyway, it will be awesome (they have fire). We went to our GMLs house for a meeting the other day and afterwards he wanted me to sing some songs for him. He sat at the piano and played some lovely operetta songs. Imagine the day when Elder Andrew Neumayer gets up and sings Komm in die Gondel and the Wolgalied while also have sung both of the Sarastro arias from Die Zauberflote. It was awesome! I got a letter from Ryan Wassenaar that obviously had something missing. I received a letter from Jonathan Wooldridge the next day and it shed a whole lot of light on the matter. They had written the letters where each took every other line to write their part. Nice job boys!

Anyway now the main event, Mothers Day calls. I will talk to you at 9 pm my time, noon your time. That way maybe you can call some other family to join in. I look forward to talking to you! I hope everything is great this week. Tschuss!!!!