Transfers & Macedonia

September 28, 2015

Dang a lot of stuff happened we'll see if I can cram it all in here!

 So anyway this time I'm going to try to not just fill the whole thing up with B. but basically this kid is amazing! He is inviting a bunch of people to his baptism and wants to go to the temple and on a mission as soon as he can (a year after his baptism.) He could very well be the very first missionary from Kosovo! Everyone in the ward already loves him because he is just such a nice guy! It was awesome after church we went to teach him in his apartment and while we were teaching about the Sabbath day the prayer calls went off and I just thought how interesting is it to be teaching about the Sabbath day with a prayer call in the background! He bore his testimony to us about how much his life has changed and how blessed he feels by God to have met us and how he truly believes everything we have said is true and it was just amazing. Elder Holm and I just can't believe it! Elder Holm says he has never taught someone like this who's so prepared! Basically just amazing! 
Also I think next PDay we are going up to Peja with him and he is going to take us up into the mountains there so I don't know how much email time we will be getting!

  I went on an exchange with Elder Kek this week which was a good time! We were going to go to Mitrovica to do a lesson but we called the AP's to ask if it was allowed and they said it was too dangerous so that's too bad! It would certainly have been an experience. The city is divided at a bridge and half is Serbian and half is Kosovar so you can imagine not the best relationships are there.

  This week has been pretty awesome though! So all month we tried to save money for Elder Holm's last week and we have eaten out at all the best places in Prishtina every day! It's been so awesome! Definitely feeling spoiled! It's also been our best week of work the whole transfer so we are feeling pretty good right now! Elder Holm is showing everyone that he didn't die hard!

  We got to go to Film City again this week and that was great! It's just a cool vibe going up there and visiting the members there. Unfortunately one of them couldn't make it but we are going to really try to visit him when my new companion comes! We ate in the mess hall this time and I ate soooo much! Holy cow it was like the MTC all over again!

  Then Saturday roles around and it's transfer calls! You all have no idea what transfer call excitement is like here! Especially because in my mission transfer calls pretty much means who you will be with and where you will be for the next 3 months! We didn't get the call till 10:28pm!!! We waited for an hour and a half for that thing! And so I will be staying in Prishtina.... I will still be District Leader... and.... I will be training! Holy cow I did not expect that one! I'm super nervous but excited too! It's going to be great and I am going to learn a whole lot!! I will found out who I will be training next week!

  On Monday we got to go to Macedonia! Man it was so awesome! Missionaries haven't been allowed to go to Macedonia on P-Days for a while but it just opened up the last week of Holm's mission! Man is that guy lucky! So we went down there and had a total blast! First of all the Macedonian Elders are probably my favorite in the mission and second of all Macedonia is sooo beautiful danggg! There are statues EVERYWHERE! Its crazy! It was super weird being in a foreign country and not speaking the language though! I kept trying to say things in Albanian and forgetting that they don't speak it! We got there and played Ultimate Frisbee because the Macedonian Elders are actually good! It was so fun! It felt like some real frisbee which I haven't gotten to play in forever! Then we went and got lunch and had Dominos! Like real American pizza! It was sooo good! Then we just kinda hung out and went every where we could in Macedonia! It was such a blast!

  Well, the church is true, the book is blue, I'm serving my two, and so should you! 

Great week I love you all!

All these photos are of Skopje the capital of Macedonia

  

Finally!!

September 21, 2015

Wohoo best week ever!!!  It's pretty funny because a week can become the best week ever from just one thing! and that one thing is B. - he is a 20 year old studying radiology here in Prishtina! So basically last week he walked up to Elder Munci and I while we were on an exchange and was like "hey I have been watching you guys from my balcony what are you doing out here?" turns out he lives in an apartment right at the spot where we normally contact. So anyways we met with him once last week and it seemed like a pretty good lesson, like promising but we just have so many first lessons that don't work out we didn't think too much of it.

  THEN, we met with him Monday evening and he had actually read from the book of mormon! like 20 pages, FINALLY! We start talking about the Holy Ghost and how it's the way God can talk to us and he was like "that explains the different feelings I had while reading the book" Elder Holm and I were like holy cow!!! (seriously people give the book a try I promise you will not be left disappointed!) We explained to him that was literally God talking to him and telling him that what he was reading was true and he totally understood it and started asking us a ton of questions it was so awesome. He accepted to be baptized!!

  After that lesson we have met with him every day and he is just progressing so fast! After the 4th lesson with him we went out and got drinks and he was talking and referred the church as "our church"! I seriously almost started crying when he said that it made me so happy! He is just a super cool kid. 

 He actually has some money and really likes to travel to places that other people don't normally go like less popular sites and stuff. He is from Peja and really wants us all to go up there with him and he will take us all up with his car and we will go into the mountains so he can show us some places!!

  I don't want to make this whole letter about him but really this kid is so cool! He speaks English super well so outside of lessons we just talk in English with him which makes it easier to become close friends with him! Now every morning while we are contacting outside of his apartment he comes and brings us juice and stuff! Just a way nice guy and is friends with all the ward already and tells them all about how he is going to be baptized! 

  So this week is Elder Holm's last week and he is freaking out because he still doesn't really feel like he is going home. I was thinking about it because it's crazy that he doesn't feel that way yet and then I realized that at the beginning of the month I gave him a priesthood blessing to continue to work hard till the end of his mission and that is totally what it is! Just another wonderful witness of God working miracles! It's crazy how just little things like that can make such big differences though!

  At the end of this week there were a ton of these tables out for a petition and it was like a really big deal with cameras and big crowds of people and stuff and so we were all wondering what was going on so we asked B. and I guess Kosovo is going to be losing land to Serbia or something and there are supposed to be some diplomatic talks starting between Serbia and Kosovo but these petitions are to stop the talks from happening! It's crazy how much the Kosovo people hate Serbia! I don't really know the whole story but that's what I understand. Hopefully it doesn't get too crazy or anything!

  Anyway thats pretty much it! Honestly I'm just so happy about B. it's awesome! I hope you all have great weeks and enjoy the weather cooling down! 

Also next week I will know what is happening with transfers and stuff! I really hope I stay here but it's up to the Lord! Also Elder Holm's last week! Crazy!!! Anyway love you all!

Above Prishtina

  

Week 33

September 14, 2015

Hello everyone! 

Not the best work week this past week but I got to go to Tirana so that was way cool! 

To begin the AP's came up this week for an exchange with the zone leaders which was awesome! Honestly we have the coolest AP's ever right now they are so fun! It's also awesome to see their examples contacting and stuff because everyone has different ways to do it so there is always something to learn! I also went on an exchange this week with Elder Munci and that was fun! Sadly we spent the whole day contacting because I couldn't get a hold of a single person to meet with but it was still good, and we got a lot of numbers!

  The week just kinda in general was hard to get lessons. I really feel like I'm getting tested right now to see if I will keep my faith up because I keep planning on these lessons and then just none of them show up! It's so frustrating. There was one day where we had 7 lessons planned and only 1 showed up! Our day was supposed to be packed and it just kinda turned into a well there goes another one! It just gets super discouraging after a while.

  Luckily one thing I have really learned on my mission is to find joy in the little things! Like chocolate peanut butter croissants!! We found those at a store and there is no peanut butter ever - so we bought every single one the store had! It was awesome!
  Something else really awesome that happened was we went to stake conference in Tirana on Sunday! 

 We left for Tirana by bus at 5am with our branch.  It was so awesome going back to that city and seeing everyone!  We got there earlier than the rest of the branches so we got to see everyone arrive and it was awesome! It was way cool seeing everyone that I knew again!

  The best part was when Tirana 2nd ward showed up though and I got to see my old ward! I was standing talking to someone and someone tapped my back and I turned around and it was Faton (my first baptism)! It was awesome talking to him again! He is still totally active and doing awesome! I also got to see some of my old investigators like Kurt Koci! I got to see Eljon but he was sitting really far away during the conference and I never got the chance to talk to him! Elder Greener told me he is like one of the best members in 2nd ward though! He goes early every week to prepare the sacrament! It made me sooo happy to see them it was crazy! 

  Stake conference was pretty awesome. I translated for it which was kinda scary but they spoke in Tosk so it was super easy for me to understand actually! President Mema (the stake president) gave a great talk about the Sabbath day and how it's a continual covenant that we are making with God and when we don't keep the Sabbath day holy we are pretty much telling God we don't want blessings! We also got to hear from President and Sister Wieddman and a member of the 70. They talked a lot about member missionary work which was awesome!

  We drove back after stake conference the same day and got a little sleep on the bus but were still pretty tired and had like 4 hours of contacting ahead of us which was not exactly what we wanted to be doing for the next 4 hours but we went out there and actually talked to some really cool people! This one couple just came and walked up to us and started talking to us and they were living in Dallas but the guy was from here originally and she was from the Boise area originally (she went to Bishop Kelly)! They were super nice and were asking a bunch of questions and when they left they were like dang we are really glad we talked to you guys, have a great time and hopefully we will see you around! It was really awesome, it's super annoying that most of the time Americans will just ignore us when they walk by and we say hi to them. Like you couldn't even just say hi back to us seriously!

  One scripture that Elder Kek shared with me this week that was really good for me to hear and hit me deep was in Acts 5:
40 And to him they agreed: and when they had called the apostles, and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go.41 And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. 

  So here it's talking about Peter and John who are out preaching as missionaries and they were told to stop preaching about Jesus and were thrown in jail but they were delivered and preached even more and they ended up getting beaten for it. 

Now I haven't physically been beaten for preaching of Christ but sometimes I am pretty emotionally or spiritually beaten for it, but I just love how this verse says they rejoiced because they were worthy to suffer for Christ. It just really hit me that Christ wouldn't send me here to experience those kind of things if he didn't know I could handle it and that I am worthy to handle it.

My testimony of the Savior has grown so much since I've been here in Prishtina.  I just realize how much I need Him when I see all the people that don't have Him.

  Anyway have a great week everyone! Love you all!

Traditional dance celebration

Our a/c was making snow in our apartment this week

We bought the store out of all the peanut butter croissants!

Bus ride to Tirana

Where we had Stake Conference

Peja

September 7, 2015

 Ok so this was actually a pretty big week with lots of stuff so we'll see if I can remember it all! (i forgot my notes!) 
First I'll start with just a super funny thing that happened! So we were in the road talking to N. that guy from Palestine and suddenly this huge, ripped guy in a tank top with facial hair walks up to us and we were like oh crap I really don't want to argue with him! And so he comes over and was like "hey what are you guys doing here" in English in like a scary tone and we were like "uhh we are mormon missionaries!" and then he said, "so if I convert to Mormonism can I keep my gains?" (gains means muscles) and then he just started laughing and was like, "no I'm totally just messing with you guys I actually had a mormon teacher in college and he is like the nicest guy I know! You guys have a great day and I wish success for you! If you have any problems let me know!" It was so awesome! 

  Then on Tuesday we had on awesome day! We got 4 new investigators in one day!!  2 of the investigators were these really cool college students (school is just starting back up here) and they were basically like American college students. They spoke English perfectly and they seemed like hipsters. They were like ya we have never really been religious  - we have never even read the quran but we want to learn more so we thought we would start with Mormons!  How awesome is that?

  On Wednesday I got my birthday package! That was awesome! We have been having a blast with the little drones that were in there! Also those Pop tarts are awesome! They have nothing like them here! We also have begun eating at home a lot more so those cookbooks are awesome!

  Then Thursday we had Zone Training which was great! The training was really good - it was just all about getting back to the basics which is nice because sometimes that gets lost with all the little things we are supposed to do as missionaries!

  Saturday we couldn't go contacting for reasons I can't put in the blog.

  

  Then Sunday we had the branch's first "break the fast" lunch after church and it actually turned out pretty well! Pretty much everyone stayed for it and everyone seemed to have a good time which was awesome. Then of course the most interesting part of my Sundays, branch council... It was another 3 hour one and now we are doing them in Albanian because we are starting to actually have the head of organizations come to it which is awesome, but it also meant that Elder Gajmen (me) had to translate at 300mph into English for the Hydricks and then into Albanian whenever they were speaking! My brain got so fried! At the very end President Telli started speaking in English to them but I didn't notice so I thought I was still translating and apparently I was just saying what he said back to them in different words for a couple minutes because I didn't realize he switched languages but then they stopped me. :)  I'm the main translator in Prishtina now which is crazy cause I'm the newest missionary here.  But it's good for me and I'm getting pretty good at it.  

Even though these branch council meetings are crazy, I love the people in this little branch!  Three of my favorite people in the branch are all Xhaxhis (pronounced jajees and it basically means old man but usually old men here are like a little crazy... like a lot crazy) Their names are J., N., and Y.
J. is this hilarious guy who actually fought against the Serbs. He has the craziest life stories! (which I can't put in the blog) He is so funny though and says Good morning amiga to Sister Ariza and thinks it's like the most awesome thing ever. 

N. is actually the 2nd councilor and is probably the most there of all of them. He is the one whose wife recently died and he is just awesome! He always brings fruit for us from his farm and is just a super nice guy! You always assume when he says things they are going to be crazy things like most other older guys but he is actually super smart and his comments at church blow me away like he really understands the gospel a ton! He also is really good at guessing what people are trying to say so whenever someone is translating into Albanian or something even though he doesn't understand English he usually guesses the right Albanian word that they are trying to think of! He also winks a ton it's awesome! 

Then Y. is probably the craziest of all! This guy is this little short dude with white hair and he looovvveessssss America! He always wears this American pin and his phone lockscreen is Bill Clinton in front of an American flag! He comments in church a lot but it's usually just like super random and off topic! It's so funny! Yesterday at church though I was pretty tired and I was resting my head in my hands during Sunday school sitting next to Y. and he just reached his hand over and started rubbing my back! It was like the sweetest thing ever! They are all just the nicest guys ever even if they are a little crazy! 

  Then today for P-Day we came to Peja by train which was awesome! Peja is a city that used to have missionaries but not anymore because the mission shrunk and there just wasn't enough success there! Its super pretty though and just a nice city! The train ride was awesome too!  

  Anyway that was my week! Next Sunday we get to go to Tirana for Stake Conference so everyone in the whole mission, members and missionaries will be there! Its going to be awesome! I'm really hoping to see Faton and Eljon!
Things are awesome here and I love being a missionary!  I'm honestly having the time of my life!
Love you all have a great week!

Birthday package from home!!

Train ride to Peja

Peja