The Zoo

this is a statue called
"the Dirty Bird". it looks like
something that should be at the
zoo... but it's in town.


last week we went to the zoo -
it was HAILING when we got there but then like 10 minutes later the sun was out. bi-polar weather.
but it was fun. we had like the
whole zoo to ourselves.

today we are going to LEGOLAND -
hopefully. if it looks lame we're
not going in. then I have no idea what we'll do.

A Hard Mission

it's still cold outside and we don't really have anyone to teach. my mission isn't at all what i thought. it's not a huge spiritual thing. in fact it's like the opposite. i'm trying hard though. really i am. for general conference this weekend i have some things in mind that i hope someone talks about. one thing you need to know though - i will NEVER regret coming on a mission. i have learned things about myself, met amazing people, and changed a lot. i couldn't have done that if i had stayed home. plus i do have fun.

well be thinking of me during the saturday morning session and then sunday morning session because we will be watching it at the same time!!

my companion and i are doing an experiment this week. we're going to try and be SUPER obedient and we hope that maybe we can have success. we'll see how it goes.

mönchengladbach is crazy! and all people want to talk about with us is SEX and i'm sick of it! we had one investigator that we gave over to the elders because every topic he brought back to the law of chasity. and then we talked to this guy on the street and sister olson stopped him and asked him something about prayer and he said - are you guys mormon? i dont believe the law of chasity is right - and then rambles on. and then later that day we visited a less active and she rambled on about the law of chasity. i'm thinking...you sick people! it gives us something to laugh about though.

A Lame Week

well nothing super exciting has happened in the past week. sacrifice week was lame. we now have like no investigators. pete moved in düsseldorf so we have to give him to the missionaries there and all the sweet contacts we got are actually lame. and now all we have is finding time.

anyway today we are going to the ZOO! i`m SO EXCITED and then next week we are going to LEGOLAND there's like nothing to do in mönchengladbach. it's the GHETTO so we have to go other places to do cool things on pday. so we`re going to the duisburg zoo. it's suppose to be way cool!

sorry no pictures this week. i`ll take a ton at the zoo today.

A Crazy Weekend

thanks Gramma for the sweater - i LOVE it!

at zone conference, president suggested something... for this week he wants us to wake up at 6am - leave the apartment 30 minutes earlier - take only a half hour lunch - and stay out until 9:30pm instead of 9pm - on pday do everything you need to as fast as you can and then start doing missionary work again - and at the end of the week fast. now i was under the impression that he was going to make us do that. but he said that it was up to us. he said that it would be our way to ´sacrifice´ and show Heavenly Father that we want success. i`m grateful that he said it was our choice. sister olson and i decided on things that we were willing to do. so this week we are getting up at 6am - taking only 30 minutes for lunch - leaving the apartment 30 minutes earlier and on saturday we`re going to fast. it's going to be a long week.

saturday was a very interesting day. so we had NO appointments at all. just finding time all day. but the sun was out and the weather was nice so it made it easier to go outside. so we had to meet some elders at 11 to give them something they needed. so we contacted on our way to the train station and we met this guy and set up an appointment with him for like 4 that afternoon. we met up with the elders and then contacted our way over to do doors. we stopped this couple (the Beckers) and they were really interested so we set up an appointment for 2 that afternoon. so then we went home to eat (didn't get to do doors) so that we could figure out how to get to the Beckers and have lunch. as we were getting ready to leave our apartment the Beckers texted us and said that we couldn't meet today. bummer. so we decided to head into town and talk to people. sister olson had to use the restroom so we went inside a store (kaufhof) and on our way back out i had to stop at the perfumee spot and smell my favorite perfume (erin it's the CODE stuff we found in karlsruhe). as i was smelling this perfume Christiana (the nigerian woman) stopped and said HI and that she was sorry that she wasn't home last weekend. i asked if we could come over the next day to teach her and she said yes! so then we went back out onto the street and there we met two men from england - Pete and Gavin. Pete is living here in Mönchengladbach for work and Gavin was visiting him for the weekend. so they said they would listen if we could walk and talk because they were out looking for food. so we taught them a first and they were both interested. so then we invited them to church and swapped info. then we went back for our appointment at 4 but he didn't show up and then the rest of the day wasn't very exciting but cool how things turned out huh!

so then it's sunday and pete and gavin were suppose to meet us at the train station so we could take them to church. and mrs. becker was also coming to church. well pete and gavin were late and we missed the bus. but then only pete showed up - gavin was too ´tired´aka hungover. anyway so we had to walk with pete to church who was also hungover - stupid boys. but he really enjoyed church so hopefully he comes again. mrs. becker also came to church all by herself! but we weren''t there because we were walking to church and she didn't know that church was 3 hours so she left after the first hour but the ward was really good with her and she got a book of mormon and everything and we set up an appointment with her for later that day (it fell out). but yeah. so we`re having interesting success. i have gavin's email address so i`m going to send it to the office so they can send it to where he lives and he can meet with the missionaries too. what a crazy weekend!

well that's me right now. time is going by slowly. i think its because we have like nothing but finding time all day every day. it's hard to get appointments that actually work out with these people!

schwester terhaag got the gift of the Holy Ghost on Sunday. that was awesome to see. and bruder terhaag blessed the sacrament!