Plastic, Waffles, Party Bus, Muscles - Week 99

It's been raining almost nonstop every day this week in Belgium, but I managed to keep my feet moderately dry thanks to a large roll of plastic wrap I found in the kitchen.

(editor's note: look at following pictures. Guess it's time to come home!)

It was transfer week, but since none of us got transferred, we didn't have much contact with the world outside of Namur. We usually have district meeting or conference exchanges or something to keep us informed, but we stayed in our little bubble the whole time. Since it was raining, there weren't many people on the streets, so we spent most of the week knocking on doors. 

As we were out in a neighborhood last week, we saw a 77 year old lady working in her front yard and decided to talk to her. We walked out from behind her bushes and probably almost killed her because we scared her so bad. Once she regained her senses, she told us that we could come back another day and talk to her. 

We went back the second time this week and had an interesting rendez-vous. After she realized that we were Mormons, she told a story about her father, who passed away decades ago. He went to a concentration camp in Germany during World War II for five years and came back home after the war was over. He then joined the LDS church in Namur and was at one point in the branch presidency, but his wife didn't want him teaching their children about the church. She said her father baptized her when she was 9, but she never went to church a single time. Consequently, she also knows absolutely nothing about any of the doctrine, and we started at square one with the Book of Mormon. Her eyes are so bad that she can hardly read, but she said she tried to read the Book of Mormon until she got a headache and couldn't continue.

At the end of the second lesson, she brought out a big plate of homemade waffles, which served as confirmation that she is, in fact, Belgian. They were pretty darn good, so I asked her for the recipe and started writing it down. "First, you take a liter of milk, 10 eggs, two vanilla packets, and a cup of coffee ..." at which point, Elder Rodriguez and I stopped chewing and slowly looked at each other from across the table. No wonder why they were so good. That must be why more Belgians don't join the church: they just can't give up waffles to keep the word of wisdom. Just kidding. I had her repeat the ingredients, and the recipe doesn't actually call for coffee. She made a mistake the first time.

Wednesday night, we decided to go out to a village to knock on doors. We walked over to the bus station in the center of town and had 10 minutes before the bus came. Standing right next to us was a group of blonde 20 year old girls that may or may not have been tipsy. They had a radio and were having a dance party while they waited for the bus. Elder Rodriguez leaned over and said, "I really hope they're taking a different bus." Three buses came and left, and of course they didn't take any of them. Our bus pulled up, we got on, then the group of girls jumped on behind us. The bus pulled away from the station and we just laughed at the dance party going on in front of us on the seats and the music from the little portable speakers. Some other 20ish year old dudes got on at the next stop, at which point the bus driver decided to join in. He plugged in his iPod and blasted some party music over the bus speakers, gaining claps and cries of satisfaction from all the youth on the bus. Party bus! That was fun.

We talked to a huge muscle bound guy at his door while we were tracting a neighborhood last night, and after he gave us some hardcore rejection, I said, "Just one more question. What do you do to work out?" He responded with, "It's all about four times a week at the gym, a good diet, some protein, and praises to the Almighty Lord!" Well, we counted that we usually say somewhere around 30 prayers a day, so we must be getting huge muscles.

Well, to wrap it up, "B" is doing really well. We taught her with the bishop this week, and talked about putting off her baptism until August 3rd to give more time. She thought she would be ready before then, so it turned into a game of the bishop and the missionaries persuading her to wait an extra two weeks to be baptized. To be honest, that's a first for me on my mission. She's sweet.

That's all I've got for you today. Happy Bastille day.

Elder Wilson

First pair

Second pair. These are my "GOOD" shoes

Maybe You Should Have Hired Piano Professionals - Week 98

Time for the final transfer decisions! No shockers. Everything is staying exactly the same, actually. That means Elder Rodriguez will be killing me, and Elder Hansen is killing Elder Price. None of us really wanted to leave, so it's good news. 

Tuesday night was the big Belgium/USA game. Walking home that night, we noticed that a big screen was set up right in front of our apartment. There were hundreds and hundreds of people there by the time the game started at 10:00 pm, so we sat on the roof and listened for a half hour. We couldn't see the screen, so every time the Belgian fans got sad, we started cheering and vice versa. We rationalized that it could be proper to pray for the US to win since eliminating Belgium would make the missionary work easier. Apparently we had no faith, because we woke up the next morning with voicemail messages from members: "ELDERS! YOU LOOSE THE GAAAAME! AHHHHH!" 

Swallowing our pride, we went on to do a good amount of service the rest of the week for the Belgians in the community. We helped some members paint a few rooms for a chunk of the day on Thursday, and we did a good job if I do say so myself. That's what six months of taking care of apartments in the mission office will get you. We even got to wear cool spacesuits.

Saturday, we drove over to Charleroi with the in-laws of some members to help move a piano. It took a little while to drive there, then it took all of 5 minutes to get the piano inside a trailer. We drove the half hour back to Namur and were literally 30 feet from the house when the piano tipped and fell on it's back. We stopped and loaded it into the house, at which point we lifted the cover and tapped the keys to see if it still worked. No notes. We all gathered around in a defeated little pow wow, at which point I reached in, un-jammed a piece of wood, and the piano started working just fine. Maybe piano repair isn't such a bad career either.

After the piano move, we went to the Bishop's house to eat with them and talk about missionary work in the ward. It was also the day of the Belgium/Argentina World Cup game, so the Bishop took out a makeup stick and painted our cheeks to show Belgium pride. It was the stipulation if we wanted a ride home. 

Tuesday morning was a "welcome" conference in Brussels with the newly-arrived President and Sister Babin. They're really cool, and I'm sad I won't be around too long to see what they do with the mission. I'll only get to see them a total of three times.

We taught a cool guy from Africa named "R" this week. He's 21 years old, grew up as an orphan, and came to Belgium a few months ago to learn French. He wants to become a computer engineer so he can go back and donate money to the orphanage that raised him. In the meantime, he only is given 7 euros of extra money a week, and he scrimped and saved to have the 4 euros necessary to buy the bus ticket to get to our lesson. He read a few chapters in the Book of Mormon and thought it was worth the sacrifice to learn more about it.

We showed up to church yesterday with no investigators there for either team of missionaries. Kind of a bummer, but it's not exactly the first time it's happened. Then, for the third hour of church, one of our investigator couples came in with their three children. I had forgotten that I invited them to sacrament meeting over the phone six days before. Some people asked if they were already members, to which the father responded, "No, we're not, but we might be soon."

I mentioned last week that we fixed a baptismal date for later in July with "B". Well, it was a bit difficult this week to find a time when we were both available, so we're going to have to push it back a few weeks. If all goes well, we and the other companionship should be seeing baptisms the day before Elder Price and I leave to go home. Cross your fingers!

See you kids soon. Have a good one.

Elder Wilson

Right outside our window

It's like "Where's Waldo?"

 

A pretty common train occurrence

So You Think You Can Dance - Week 97

Out with the old and in with the new. President and Soeur Poznanski are dead dead dead dead in Angers. They've officially kicked the bucket. I sure am going to miss them. They have been fantastic! President Babin and his wife came in on Friday, and we'll get to meet them tomorrow at another conference in Brussels.

Meanwhile, the members at the church might want the Elders to be dead as well, since Belgium and the United States are playing in the World Cup tomorrow night. The members were spittin' some fire at church yesterday. "If the Americans win on Tuesday, we're not talking anymore." "You've eaten your last meal in OUR household." "If you guys win the match, you're all coming over to my house for a barbecue. I figure I'm not taking much of a chance though." You guys are joking, right? Right? The primary kids got particularly fierce and really enjoyed taunting us. We responded by drawing a big Uncle Sam and American flag on the chalkboard, which is probably an example of why Europeans think American pride is obnoxious. Oh, and the Sunday meetings were good too.

Elder Price and I got to hang out and work together while our companions went to Brussels to exchange their drivers' licenses. We got to eat at a member family's house for lunch, and they gave us a huge bag full of hundreds of cherries they picked from a tree. Good thing too, because we ran out of food at the end of the week and ended up having two meals of 100% cherries. We eventually ran out of cherries too, and on Sunday night, upon seeing our options in the fridge, Elder Price and I resolved to eating five onions for dinner.

We got a phone call on Friday morning from an older lady who needed help upkeeping her yard, so we suited up and headed over. She had two lawn mowers, but one ran out of gasoline and the other was electric powered, and the cord couldn't reach across the yard. So, Price and I were faced with the task of figuring out how our lawn-mower-less selves could cut the grass. We eventually found a big, old sickle in the lady's basement, and we got to work reaping all the long grass with the giant blade. It was probably 50% service and 50% fun. 

On Saturday, Elder Rodriguez and I were out on the other side of the city trying to visit a less active when it started pouring rain like nobody's business. We had no choice but to run through the torrent for the 20 minutes required to get home, and we were soaked through after a few minutes. While we were speed walking the last leg of the flight home, an old lady saw us from a parking lot and chased us down. She apparently didn't care about getting soaked, because she came over and told us about how she used to be taught by the missionaries and went to church a number of times. She didn't want to be taught again, but thought to take the time and talk to us. 

Right after the lady stopped and talked to us, we walked passed a crazy dude dancing in the rain in the middle of the street. He had some leg-armor looking thing in his left hand and a weird hat on his head. He saw the two Mormons walking passed, and decided to jump in front of us and dance (or "wiggle and spasm" would be more appropriate) in front of us so we couldn't get passed. Somehow, all the insane people know the missionaries and they're the only ones besides members who call us "Elder," and he was no exception. He shook our hands with his right hand, at which point we both noticed he was holding a big kitchen knife. He kept dancing, made a joke, and then ran away. Whatever dude.

At the end of the email last week, I mentioned "B", the ex-wife of a less-active member. Elder Price and I taught her again this week and ended up scheduling a baptismal date with her for later in the month of July. All was going well with her, until yesterday when she didn't come to church. Elder Rodriguez and I were admittedly disappointed she wasn't there and didn't answer our phone call, so we decided to give her some time. Yesterday night, while we were out knocking on doors in a little city, "B" called us to tell us that her little son has been in the hospital for the last couple of days due to a sudden lung problem, which was why she wasn't able to come. As far as excuses go, that's a pretty valid one. However, now she's back on track. Score!

Cross your fingers. We sang the Star Spangled Banner this morning for good luck. USA! USA! USA!

Elder Wilson


(a new camera means more photos. Yay!)

The view from our apartment

The Citadelle de Namur seen from our window

Lawn mowing anyone!

Look what I found! Splashy's twin! (Trevor's car at home is nicknamed Splashy)

Apocalypse - Week 96

GOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLL!!!

Stupid World Cup. It's really cool, and I'm glad to be in Europe for it, but it's crazy.

Elder Hansen and I were on exchange on Tuesday night and, after finding that we were locked out of the apartment, had to skip eating dinner and took a bus out to knock on doors instead. The people were nice, but the response 98% of the time was, "I'm watching the world cup." Once, we heard everyone in the neighborhood simultaneously scream and I thought, "Looks like Belgium just scored another goal."

Elder Hansen and I took the bus back to the middle of the city and just happened to get there right as the game ended, with Belgium beating Algeria. What happened in the city after the victory isn't easy to describe. Everyone got in their cars, covered the cars in flags, drove into the city and stopped on all the streets and sidewalks. Thousands of cars full of people all were honking their horns for hours, and we had to take off our nametags as we speedwalked to the apartment. On one street, I walked passed a tow truck blaring it's horn, then looked behind to see two cars with a bunch of girls and shirtless dudes dancing on top with beer and flags. The guys all jumped off the cars, then I turned around to see girls throwing red smoke bombs from the cab of a truck, next to a group of people rolling on the ground in a big puddle of broken glass and alcohol. In a nearby city, my old companion, Elder Wood, got jumped by a bunch of shirtless dudes who forced him and his companion down and painted Belgium colors on their faces. This is the first time in twelve years that Belgium has played in the World Cup, so yeah, they are a little excited. 

There was another game last night, and since we weren't invited to a member's house for dinner, Elder Rodriguez and I outsmarted them by doing weekly planning instead. We took a good number of pictures of the crowds from our window as well. Elder Rodriguez wanted to show his pride, so he took my American flag and yelled as he waved it out the window for everyone to see.

Speaking of Elder Rodriguez, everyone thinks he's from South America. "Where are you from?" ME: "The United States." "And you? You must be from Mexico or something with a name like Rodriguez." HIM: "Uh, no. I'm a quarter Korean, actually." He changes up his story every time. Anyway.

The Argentinian and I were calmly teaching a lesson to a nice lady in the park on Thursday. There was a lake in front of us, we were under a tree, and birds were singing. As we started talking about the Book of Mormon, a dozen street youth came from behind with their boombox and started blasting dubstep on the bench four feet away from us. I flipped open to a scripture as they started partaking of the two crates of beer they brought with them, and the poor lady couldn't hear what we were saying very well. I guess we were done anyway.

That night, my Peruvian companion and I were knocking on doors and had just gotten rejected by a dude from Morocco. Someone driving by in their car saw us, stopped, and began mildly making fun of us. I walked up to his car window and started talking to him. When we mentioned we were from America, he stopped and said something like, "What? America? Dude, that's sweet. I live down there on the right. Meet me there and I'll give you something to drink and we can hang out." After declining an offer of wine, we chatted for awhile until we had to go home. Now we're Facebook friends.

Saturday, we went and passed by an old couple who said we could come back a few weeks ago. They were ridiculously nice, and loved me and my companion from Ecuador. They had the missionaries over a few times a number of years ago, but didn't remember too much of what we believed. Right after I reminded him about Joseph Smith, he started spouting complicated doctrine from the Plan of Salvation and the Atonement that he liked from our church. I was really confused why he knew all of what he was describing, and we later found out that he has a copy of Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage that he regularly reads. They invited us to come and watch the World Cup whenever we wanted, gave us cookies and juice, offered to feed us dinner, and even drove us home. They're sweet.

Two more things. Hang in there. Feel free to take a break.

Monday night, Elder Rodriguez and I walked to the train station to look at times for zone conference the next day. I walked into the building, then turned around to see that my companion had disappeared. I went back outside to find that a man standing in front of the door had stopped him after seeing our nametags and wanted us to teach him about our church. As we started talking with him, a second lady came up and said, "Hey, I'm interested in what you're doing here. Could you meet me another time and explain a bit?" Then, she noticed that we were already talking to the first guy, so she said, "Oh, you're already talking to them?" He replied, "Yeah, they're sweet, right?! I want to know what they're here for!" I split and talked to the lady while Elder Rodriguez explained to the man that he doesn't, in fact, come from Venezuela. If only that happened every day.

The last shoutout goes to "B", the ex-wife of a less active member that we taught once. She showed up to church on her own with her little son last Sunday, saying that she just "felt like she needs the church to be a part of her life now." She was already taught almost all the lessons a few years ago, but apparently wasn't that interested. Elder Rodriguez and I taught her with a member on Wednesday, and it went super well. She walked a half hour with a stroller to come to church yesterday, and we're going to teach her again in a few days. The members are excited that she's doing so well.

And there you have it! The World Cup debut, the book is blue, the church is true. See you soon.

Elder Wilson

Belgium Boys

European Union building in Brussels