October 11th, 2010 - Living Up My German Ancestry

Bok, Hallo, Bonjour, Moi, Hola, GUTEN TAG!

I just wanted to write all the languages I am learning and exposed to while out here, Croatian, French, Finnish, Spanish and German. Oooo I feel so multicultural right now! I get to learn French while Sister Whitaker teaches her French classes and I get to learn very important things to say like, Je suis desole, mais je dois partir, I am sorry but I have to go. I also got to learn Finnish from Sister Fitzsimmons, and when I say Finnish I mean really important phrases like, Elat hattarassa, you live in cotton candy, aka dream land. And our cutting board had some German on it that I could understand thanks so Herr Stehr and having to learn the accusative prepositions, ohne dich ist alle doof, with out you everything is stupid! I know I am so 80 million lingual right now. Just kidding obviously. Right now actually I feel that my language is really bad and I am quite embarrassed how not far I have gotten in Croatian, but now that I am sufficiently humbled I can maybe get better as I work harder. Work Work Work! I'll just keep practicing my 7 cases, enclitics, three genders, imperfect and perfect verbs and just plain old speaking.....sometimes I wonder why Spanish was ever hard.

Enough of that, now on to why serving with sister is so great. (other than we eat bullets, please refer to the previous email) For district meeting every week we have someone who is player of the week. Wait I think I already described player of the week. Okay well it's pretty much that last time I got a coconut and had to break it open with my BARE aka BEAR HANDS! Moving on so I gave player of the week to The Elders Padley, referring to the companionship of Elder Pashce and Hadley (one time I accidentally called them Padley and then we made it a title). I gave it to them for yadi yadi yada reasons, but the important part is what I gave. We can't have pets while on a mission, but I am pretty sure President will approve of my egg carton made Caterpillar. We made it a sisterly group effort by decking her out with eye lashes, legs and everything. Then we made life easy on the Elders and made a home for her from a shoe carton with a blanket and feeding box. I was going to get them pringles but this was, for obvious reasons, a lot better. All four of us sisters laughed hysterically and they laughed out of shock. But I know they liked it and I know they won't throw it away....for a while anyway.

But I have moved on from making pets to Halloween decorations. (what else am I going to do between 9:30 and 10:30?) You know that old saying, "you can take the girl out of America, but you can't take America out of the girl" and when I say America, what I really mean is Halloween. So we have pumpkins, drawn ones and ones made out of old toilet paper rolls, and signs, and the best.......VAMPIRE PROTECTION! I found a Stake! So I carried it home with me and wrote Vampire Protection and directions on how to use it on the back. The other sisters laughed and said I can't believe you brought it home, but they won't be laughing or thinking it was silly to bring home when they have to use it. Don't worry they are familiar with the system of how it works.

Enough of the nonsense, I got to enjoy my German Heritage this past week. For Zone Conference Elder Schutze came down, and he is an area authority from GERMANY! I met him the night before Zone Conference while he was eating ice cream. He shook my hand and I said who I was. Then I said, I think my last name is German. He says in his German accent, "oh yes it is, where is your family from?" .........uhhhhhhh.......... I didn't know so I said so. He was jokingly appalled and said, "What is the purpose of the church?" again....uhhhhh..... so he said, "1. Proclaim the Gospel!, now what is number 2?" ....uhhhhhh...I never felt so brain dead in my life. So he said, "2. Perfect the Saints. Now what is the third?" I don't think I have to write now what was in my head because I think it is more than obvious, so he moves on from my blank stare and said, "3. Redeem the dead. Now what are you going to do when you get home?" I thought quick and said, "perfect the saints!" Then he turns fully toward me and says loudly in the best German accent I have ever heard, "NO! REDEEM THE DEAD, YOUR GERMAN ANCESTRY!" We all had a good laugh and the next day in Zone Conference he went to write the purpose of the church on the white board and made me look really smart by asking me to say it. But beyond how funny he was, he really helped a lot. He is amazing and I really admire him. He helped the church grow in Germany when there were only few members and is a true pioneer.

I read Elder Bednar's conference talk from 2007 and he talked about clean hands and a pure heart. We can learn to better glorify our works for our Father in Heaven (Clean hands) and make ourselves better through the redeeming love of our Savor (pure heart). I am so grateful that the Lord speaks to us today through prophets and He wants us to be successful and happy. I am sorry if you are looking for missionary success stories, but my success story is watching all of God's creation go around me and realize I am part of a bigger picture. The Lord loves His children!

I hope you are happy and healthy and well!

Sister Dillender