Monday, September 8, 2014

Sepp y'all?
 This week was one of the greatest weeks of my life. Everything absolutely FLEW by! This entire month has flown by, too... on Wednesday I'll have been here for a month... LIKE WHAT???
     So in the Poland, Warsaw mission, the missionaries have a little more freedom than most missionaries I guess... President is super chill about us doing whatever we need to, as long as we don't get hurt, and as long as we're following the rules. Last Monday, Elder Blom, Elder Torres, and Elder White took me go-carting... like the legit go-carts that go really fast and have a professional track and stuff... ya those. I am proud to say that I am the fastest go-cart driver that this District has, and probably has ever had... but that's besides the point.
     I've adopted a 4th Mother... (behind my own Mom, Mamma Wardrop, and Mamma Dickson, of course). Her name is Malgosza. She is our landlord and she's fantastic. She is about 50/60 years old, never married, and as grandmotherly as could possible be... We even came home one day and found her doing our dishes-she's great! She has us over for the best soup I've ever had in my life, and even offered to take us to the bazaar to find good fruits and vegetables. She already called Elder Blom and I her boys.
     Elder Blom is super cool. We work really well together, and both try to be super diligent when contacting and doing missionary work, so I love him! He is a super big wrestler though. He's got like 45 pounds on me and was a super good wrestler in highschool-so you could bet I don't stand a chance. He tries to wrestle me, like every night, and usually I don't fight back(I've discovered that going "boneless" will usually ward off wrestling companions... but sometimes I fight back... and we'll go at it for like 20 minutes-destroying the entire apartment in the process... it's a bunch of fun.
     Thursday was one of the longest days of my life, for sure. I got up at 4:30, got ready, and got on a train to Warsaw by myself..... yeah. After a 3 1/2 hour train ride, Elder Pieper and Elder Jaeger picked me up at Warsawa Centralne. They're the best. They are the mission's office Elders, and we get along well. (Elder Jaeger was a marine, and could rip my arms off if he wanted.) I got my legal work done in Warsaw, so I'm finally legal... and then I got on another super long train ride back to Kielce. Once I got back at night, I had to do studies with Elder Blom, and that was probably one of the farthest things from what I wanted to do after my long day. But, we studied and I went to bed right after planning at 9:30.

     Our two possible Priesthood candidates from English last week didn't show this week, and we were super bummed. But, a really nice lady who NEEDS the gospel SO bad did come, and I talked to her the whole hour(Elder Blom was working with another man during English). She is super nice, and we hope to continue to teach her and bring her closer to Christ, because the gospel could totally change her life!
     I love contacting, but I have found one really terrifying drawback.... I am deathly afraid to talk to groups of girls around my age- because chances are they'll just freak out and try taking pictures with me and touching my arms and being all weird and stuff. I don't even know how to handle it. Honestly it freaks me out... like I'm staying away from girls for two years, no thank you!
     If there was one thing about Sienkiewicza I could change, it would definitely be the super big club right in the middle. Every time we walk down that street, there are HUGE innapropriate pictures up on the windows of the club, and seductive ladies with umbrellas who try to talk to us. OH, and there's a little problem here with girls forgetting to put pants on in the morning. I always look at Elder Blom and say: "Man... Don't you just hate when you forget to put pants on in the morning? Like sweetie, let's get you home quick before someone sees you." It's nasty and I hate it.
     On Friday, The Elders in my district and I did a whiteboard on Sienkiewicza. We have a huge whiteboard with a question on it. This week's question was 'What does it mean to Repent/Return oneself(Polish)'. I worked with Elder White, and the Lord blessed us SO much! We taught like 4 or 5 lessons and gave out 5 Book of Mormons in just over two hours. The Lord is blessing Kielce, and I'm so grateful to be a part of it!
     Every Saturday night is Rib night with the District. We go to some pub down Sienkie, and all get ribs and dinner for like 5$. It's glorious. It's one of my favorite times of the week! Elder White and Elder Torres are super cool, and we've become super close this transfer!
     We see miracles every day in Kielce. Every Day. But, this week, there were two HUGE miracles that happened. 1) Remember that guy who came up to us a week and a half ago and wanted to come to church but didn't? Well He Came to Sacrament meeting yesterday!! WOOOO! He was all banged up bad, though. He had bruises all over his head and body, and his hand was all bandaged up-I am 99% positive he got hit by a car. But he came! We gave him a Book of Mormon and set up a meeting with him for later this week! It was amazing!   2) We do a weekly service afternoon as a district, which usually involves us traveling out to the dzialki's(little gardens) and asking people if we can help with service. We went Saturday afternoon this week, and it was amazing! I was absolutely starving, and SO thirsty just as we were leaving... which is a shame, because we walk everywhere, and the walk is about 45 minutes to an hour away. By the time we got to the gardens, I was dying. (Everybody keep in mind that scripture in D&C about not taking care of what you shall eat, or what ye shall drink, or wherewith ye shall be clothed.) Literally the second person we talked to let us come and serve her. We moved tree limbs and cleaned up her yard, and Elder White and I went and talked to her about our church at her little house thing. We explained how we're not Amish(everyone here either thinks were J-Dubbs(Jehovas Witnesses) or Amish), and some of the things we believe in. We did a lot of listening because she did a lot of talking. She fed us the strangest and most amazing fruits from her garden, and gave us as much clean water as we wanted to drink, and even her own Kompot-which is like special boiled fruit drink that they use Polish magic on or something. All in all, we got fed, we got things to drink, we got to serve, we helped a lady come closer to Christ, and we exchanged numbers and planned to meet later this week. The Lord is blessing us so much!
     One of the biggest blessings in my life, however, is the Polish. I have nothing to say other than The Lord has blessed me so much. The gift of tongues is so real. I can't even describe it in words how real it is. The things I have been able to learn, and to say, and to bear testimony of, while only being in Poland for less than 4 weeks is a blessing from God. I would have NEVER been able to do/say anything in Polish without Him.
     I love God and I love Jesus Christ so much. I have come so much closer to my Savior over the past few weeks as I have studied and learned about Him, and then applied His Atonement in my life to help me through the good times and the bad. He is real, and He is our Savior. God answers prayers. He really, really does. I know the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is the true church. I am so glad to be a part of it and to be a missionary!
     I love you all, and I'm praying for you! Miss you, love you, talk to you soon

Starszy Quackenbush


Their new investigator in her garden

District in Kielce

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