20 Nov 14

Subject: Transfer 15 Week 3

This week was a really good learning week.

A couple days ago, it was one of those really low motivation low morale days. I think last week I mentioned that finding work has been super slow, and this week was the same. It had been days since somebody actually talked to us, so we were just super bummed. We were doing some street contacting and there were a few people in a row who said no before I even opened my mouth so I was pretty frustrated and decided to just go ring doors. So we were ringing and I said a little prayer and said "Heavenly Father, I have close to zero desire to be outside right now, I need your help." One of the next people answered and let us in. He was a student from Turkey, and right from the beginning he said he wasn't religious at all, but we could present our message. So we talked with him for tennish minutes and he said "Wait, are you guys mormons?" We said that we were, and he said he'd heard about us from the tv show South Park. If you don't know what that is, don't watch it. He still wasn't interested, but it was a huge confidence booster and gave us the motivation to finish the day strong.

Yesterday we went to Verona! We had a multi zone conference and I saw a ton of friends. Anziano Matau, Windley, Smith (from the MTC), Burton, an Anziano Johnson who I played against in volleyball, and others that I haven't talked about before. It was great to see them all. We had Elder Fingerle and his wife come and speak to us. He is an area seventy, and they did a great job. President and Sister Dibb also did a training and it was awesome as well. It was a really cool experience for me afterwards though. At the train station I was waiting for my comp to go to the bathroom. As we went in, out walked Elder Fingerle. So I said thanks for coming, and he asked what I took from the conference. I talked about a few things, and then we talked about some goals I had for my mission. I told him that my biggest goal was to work hard until the end, because I go home soon. He asked what I was planning on studying and I talked to him about some ideas that I have. I asked him some questions about what he thought and he gave some great advice. It was really cool to be able to talk to a member of the 70 for about ten or 15 minutes one on one. 

A bit of bad news. For the first time in my mission, I wasn't able to finish some food. I can't be competitive out here about anything, so I guess my competitiveness (if that's a word) went into the fact that I had eaten everything. My pride was hurt for awhile, but I think i'll be ok. I'm still pretty bummed though.

Sunday I gave another talk about worshipping the Lord's way and not our way, and it went really well. I had my first "You're the last speaker and there are 25 minutes left in sacrament meeting" moment. The phrase from Batman came into my head "You either finish early enough to be the hero, or talk long enough to become the villan." It went really well I think. We finished like 5 minutes early, but I think that it was ok. I don't think I quoted that word for word from Batman, but that's pretty much what it says.

Monday we went and helped clean out that evil basement at the widow's house. I'm hoping that it'll be the last time that I go down there, but it probably wont. Then after, we went and helped one of our members from Ghana move. We put together a giant closet for him and it was a blast. If all else fails I can just be an IKEA furniture assembler and live a happy life.

That's all I have for this week. I hope everything goes well for you all! That's crazy that Sophie is in driver's ed, 16 is way too young to drive. Does Amanda have finals coming up? And what is Kate up to? Anything exciting? But yeah, I love you all and I hope that you have a great week! I love you all so much!

Anziano Christian Fife McKinnon