Yo-Yo

Hello.

How is everyone? Not much has happened this week. The heating in our flat has not been working this week. We've had it fixed twice now so we're hoping it stays fixed.

I'm adjusting to my new area well. I still don't know my way around very well but getting used to it. There doesn't seem to be anything too unusual that I've noticed yet but I'll keep looking.

My new companion started learning the yo-yo yesterday. He hit himself in the face with it.

The English accents are heavier up north. There not too heavy where I am unless they're from out of the country. There are lots of different accents in the city areas. I've never had a problem understanding people though.

We are trying to get new investigators to teach. We have a lot of really good recent converts here that we've been working with. The members are generally good at getting involved. We go on splits each week with a few of the young men. They are great. We have one investigator named Khai Thu. He is originally from Vietnam but lived in Montreal for a long time. He comes to church every week but doesn't understand why he needs to be baptised. It's a bit hard to teach him.

Keep having fun but din't party too hard. I will look forward to next weeks e-mail.

Basingstoke

Hello,

There is a Gorillaz song playing right now and I'm singing along. "It's Dare!" Turns out we e-mail at the Apple store every week so now I'm on a fancy new Mac as opposed to a really old library computer with Windows 98. So there is also music playing in the background. It's definitely not as quiet as a library. Wow another Gorillaz song; now they're playing stylo.

 It's lovely here in Basingstoke. It's small but it's not too small. The buildings all seem quite new. Travel is fairly easy; we do a lot of walking and we can get pretty much everywhere by foot but we also take buses to save time. It seems really peaceful.

There aren't a whole lot of people on the streets. It's definitely not as busy as Oxford. The people here seem generally nice. Not a lot of them are interested though. I think younger people are more open to at least talk but from what I can tell so far there aren't a lot of young people here. There's more than in Romsey.

The new ward is awesome. The families are so nice and I think the missionaries have a really good relationship with the ward. The members are very friendly and the bishop already had us over for pizza. They also seem willing to help with missionary work.

My new companion Elder Goldsmith is a good guy. He looks like Tintin. He's a good missionary. He's from Arizona and he's a Marine. I'm helping him learn how to play the guitar. He has a pink electric guitar that members in his previous area gave him and he only started playing on his mission. He's already pretty good. He's been out for a year and we get along real good.

I haven't received any letters yet I'll probably get them tomorrow. My companion is district leader so we will be going to reading for DLC (district leader council) and I imagine the zone leaders will bring post from the mission home. I'll also see Elder Lika again because we're still in the same zone and his companion is a district leader.

I hope you all get better. It's no fun vomiting and having bad dreams. I've been having weird dreams too but they're not scary, just weird. I hardly ever remember them anyways. Have a good week!

Oxford Pics

We've been having freaky weather. Have you ever seen the movie Sharknado?

And this is brother Iverson from the Oxford first ward.

Basingstoke

hello everyone.

Sorry I didn't realise that I haven't sent any pictures of Oxford yet. I'll be sure to do that. We switched flats with the sisters a few days ago so now were in Didcot. But we still go to Oxford often. The sisters left all their decorations up as well so it's a very girlie flat. We moved to their flat just a week before the actual transfer moves so we still don't know if any of us will be moving again; but there have been rumours. We were supposed to find out this morning but we got no phone call. Now that we're in Didcot we have to travel a lot.

Well... I just found out that I will be moving to Basingstoke. I'd better start packing. Again. I guess it was nice to be in the Oxford second ward for one week and get to know them as well. I'll be serving with an Elder Goldsmith. Another American. Basingstoke is not far from Crowthorn I remember. It should be good. It's too bad I haven't stayed here long.

Is the MacBook Justin's now? That's some interesting family history.

It's getting warmer. I feel like this year was colder than last year but I'm not sure. It snowed a couple of times in Oxford but it only stuck once. And it melted by the afternoon.

Note from Mike: I have several pictures that was sent as well and will add them tonight when i have more time. Stay tuned.

A Good Flogging

Hello people.

Not much has been happening. We've been doing a lot of contacting and setting up appointments and re-scheduling and being flogged. 

A lot of the people we've been meeting with this week don't really speak English so it's been difficult. They don't speak Albanian either. I felt really confident that we could get a baptismal date in the past couple weeks but we haven't been able to meet with our solid investigators. Eufrozina is still too busy to meet with us and we still haven't been able to contact Rose. But we  have some other cool people we are trying to meet. 

I found out this morning that we will be moving to the other Oxford ward. That's a surprise. I didn't see that coming at all. I'm trying to think how that will be. We will be going to the same building but a different ward. We're also switching flats with the sisters so we won't have the same investigators either. It's weird but I guess that's where I need to be. Hope you have fun in Vegas.