November 25, 2014

 Elder Beaumont and I had an awesome week!

We had a miracle find this week. Well, it was more of a mistake that I
made that was miraculously solved!
Last sunday night, we stopped some random kid on the street, and he
was  really interested in meeting, so we set up a program with him for
P-day afternoon, 3pm. I wrote in the time of the appointment, but I
forgot to put his name in.

Come Pday (we had to take it on tuesday last week), I saw that we had
something at 3pm, but I had forgotten who or what it was for! It was
our Pday, and actually was in the way of our emailing time, because
the branch house and the library are on opposite ends of the city. It
might have been a mistake when I wrote it in. Who knows!
But we decided to go. We get to the Branch house, and nobody is there.
Maybe it was just a mistake. Maybe our mystery person dogged us! Maybe
we were supposed to go to their house!

So as we left about 15 minutes later, someone rode their bike up to us
and it turned out to be the kid we met on Sunday. "I think I had an
appointment to meet here, but I got lost a little." So we went in, and
he wasn't even sure what we wanted to talk about. We taught him the
Restoration, and it went really well! He loved it, and talked about he
believes in God, but doesn't really have a relationship with Him. At
the end, we asked him to say the prayer. He hesitated, and asked us to
wait. After a couple minutes, he said a really great prayer, and told
us that it felt so good to pray after such a long time. He kept
saying, "I feel so good right now, I have such a good feeling."
That was easily one of the best lessons of my mission so far. Today,
we are going to visit him again after emailing. Maybe it will be just
as good now as last time!

I'm so happy that I've been able to serve here and share my testimony
with people who are willing to listen! It's so weird to think that I'm
going home. I am going to miss so many investigators and members.

I'll tell about the rest in like a day and a half. bye.

Love,
Elder Young

November 18, 2014

Dear Family members,

We had a great week. In fact, we've been so busy, that we couldn't fit P-day things in yesterday, so that's why we're emailing on Tuesday. 

Last week started off slowly, with some of our investigators not showing up when we'd get there, and literally nobody having done any of the commitments we gave them. On Thursday, things started to pick up! We went to meet with a member who brought a few friends to the big branch open house a while ago, so we wanted to have Elder Beaumont practice teaching the Plan of Salvation, and then we could ask her for more about her friends who were interested. When we show up, 2 of those people were there waiting for us! So as planned, Elder B. lead the Plan of Salvation lesson for a new investigator. 

That night, a kid we met on the street a while ago showed up to english class, and met with us afterwards! He accepted a Book of Mormon, and we are meeting with him again this week, too! 

On Friday, we went to a city called Dunaújváros for a Zone Training, which was really good. Afterwards, we went on splits with the other elders in our city. I went with Elder Mellor, who is just a couple months older here than Elder Beaumont. We had a fun time tracting and teaching a couple lessons. We finished off splits with a big dinner at a family from New Zealand. They even invited one of our investigators to come, so it was really awesome, and Elder Beaumont and I were able to teach him the Restoration for the first time, and he really like it.

We ended the week with Stake Conference. They had some changes in the stake here too, and Hungary's first stake president was released. The bishop of the Buda ward became the new president, who is actually American, he just served here like 10 years ago and lives here now. A guy from our branch here also became one of the counselors, so they have a really solid Stake Presidency! 

Two Area Seventies came to speak at the conference, too- Elder Patrick Kearon and Elder George R. Something. It was an awesome conference, and super great to see all of my old friends from all over the country there! 

Yesterday was also a pretty crazy day. An old investigator from when I was in Budapest referred her friend to us, so we went to meet with him, and a new convert together. The investigator was running late though, so we just taught a lesson to the member first before he left, then had enough time to show the investigator around the branch house and set up another time to meet. He drove us to yet another investigator, who is doing really well. That lady knew some people that we could meet with and help, and referred us over to them. She also promised to come to church for the first time on Sunday! 

Later on, we met at the bus station with the Walmsley family from New Zealand. A member from a nearby town invited them over, and luckily us as well, because they needed translators! 

I'm super glad that things are started to pick up now, and even more glad that people are giving us referrals! I've never had so many referrals in so short a time! We've gotten 10 in the last 2 weeks! The Lord's work is moving forward, and it will probably do even better without me! I love when people have testimonies and share them with their friends. It's awesome to be able to help with that and let those people learn about the Gospel after they've seen it in their friends. 

The Church is true, and everyone should read their scriptures every day! 

So, my comp and I have planned to have the best week ever, and so far it is looking like things are coming into place! We have also planned out a Hungarian meal every day this week! Yay! Planning! 

Love,

Elder Young

PS.

1. (From last week) Our cat friend.

2. Taking funny pictures upon castle walls.

3. (From this week) Dinner with the Walmsleys.

4. The kids singing traditional New Zealand songs.

5.  The family. 

6. On the train to stake conference. 

7. Train.

8. Kiss Balázs (member from Buda) and "Jesus" Balázs (eternal investigator from Buda)

9. Szilvia (Buda) and Viki (Győr)

10. The Walmsleys and Ági néni

November 10, 2014

Another week went by. This week started out really hard for us. All of our investigators who looked like they were going anywhere simultaneously decided to give up any effort or faith in the baptismal goals we set together in the last couple weeks. Not only that, but most people don't really even want to listen to anything I say when we teach in a program. And when I can't get a word in, then my companion definitely can't because he hardly knows what's going on in the first place. I get really stressed whenever we teach anyone, and so after most of our lessons, I usually leave frustrated or angry, and so I can't really feel the Spirit. 

The week basically went like this until Saturday, when we had the big Open House for the branch's new building. They had a big meeting full of talks and special musical numbers to welcome everyone and introduce the church. The turnout was great, and about 150 people showed up, a large majority being non-members, or less active members who had never been inside the building before. One of the speakers is a man from New Zealand, and they asked me to translate for him. --- Fun Fact: Translating for large groups is really interesting, because you can tell how many of the people already speak English. Whenever they tell a joke, then like 1/3 of the audience laughs before everyone else. Or when the translator doesn't know a word, several people will shout it for him or her to try and be of help. It's scary because you can't just say whatever you want, haha. 

During the rest of the day, we had a whiteboard in the corner of the chapel with the Plan of Salvation on it, and we would talk to the wandering guests about the Church and try and get them to set up with us. We got to meet with a ton of really cool people, most of whom were invited by members. 

Sunday was also very good because some of those people came to church! I talked with one guy on Saturday and Sunday, and the whole time I thought he was just less active. I found out later that he had never even been to church before! He's a really cool guy, and we are going to meet with him later this week (at the home of the guy from New Zealand and his family). 

Although I started to get discouraged about lame things happening earlier in the week, the week definitely ended well.

Today, we went up to hike to a castle on a little mountain, with the other elders. It was super duper! Right as we get off the bus, we are welcomed to the forest by a stray kitten, who proceeded to jump directly into my arms (and was covered in dirt and gunk, which was disgusting). Then he followed us for the rest of our trip, as we wandered through the woods, and all the way up to the castle. We did our best to include the cat in every picture we took, but unfortunately, you can't see it, because I forgot to bring my camera cord today. But, go google Csesznek castle. It's pretty cool. I promise my pictures are cool. I'll show you all in like 2 weeks. 

Love,

Elder Young

PS. It's so weird when people ask, "So, how long do you have left?" I'm not at months anymore. We're down to days... days... days...

October 27, 2014

Dear People, 

This last week  was good, but it was pretty hard for us. We had new missionary training on monday, so we basically missed out on our pday except emailing and shopping, and we got sick at the end of the week. Elder Beaumont's got it worse than I do, but we both have a bad cough and fever.

   Other than that, we were only able to meet with like 3 investigators this week, but they were all doing really well! One lady has a baptismal date although she doesn't progress very well. One day, we went to visit her, and she had to go, so we stayed and talked to her 16 year old son- he likes the Book of Mormon and read what we gave him, and he wants to come to church. It was also very reassuring, because he told us that since we have been coming, he's seen a lot of positive changes in his mom. I was glad to hear that, because she doesn't seem to progress at all, I guess she just has to go at her own pace. 

   There was also a lady we met on the street a couple weeks ago, and she said that she and her son used to meet with the missionaries like 15 years ago. She was pretty busy so we couldn't meet with her much since then, but this week she called us, "Hey, I'm in the area of your branch house. Do you want to show me where it is and maybe we can talk more." So on the way, she stops into a store to introduce us to her friend, then we walked into the branch house during institute, so we sat in and listened, gave her a tour, and talked about the BoM. On the way home, she was talking to a stranger on the bus, "See these elders? I just went to their new branch house, and I'm going to church with them on Sunday at 9." 

Then she came to church for the first time, and loved it!

   Another cool one was a referral from my last ward. A member there has a good friend who moved to the Veszprém area. He is a member, but his wife is not, but they both wanted a copy of the Book of Mormon and they want to meet. And they came to church on Sunday! The other elders met the guy and were super jealous that we are meeting with them. The guy is super cool and wants to come back. His wife also loved church and really wants to meet with us! 

On Wednesday, we 4 elders went to a family for dinner. My comp and I gave the spiritual thought on the Atonement. We used another elder here as the volunteer. The family has a little girl. As part of the lesson, we gave her some chocolate. Then we said that because we offered her chocolate, Elder Mellor has to do 10 push ups. She caught on and decided not to take the candy, so we said that because we offered her chocolate, Elder Mellor has to do 10 pushups anyways. Then my companion, Elder Mellor's companion, and I each took some chocolate (nobody in the family wanted any), then we offered some to Mellor too, haha. By the end, he had done like 90 pushups, and the little girl was in the corner almost crying, and saying, "Let me do push ups too! I want to help him! It's hurting him." I think it was a pretty good lesson, and Elder M. was a good sport about the whole thing. 

I even told Elder Beaumont that if we leads that whole lesson on his own with another family, then I'll do the push ups, haha. It will be good motivation for language study! 

K, that's about all. My 2 year mark is on Friday. I think we might make pumpkin pie. It's goign to be so grand.

Love,

Elder Young

October 21, 2014

Dear Family,

We had the most wonderful week this week. We were pretty busy and have been able to work with our ward pretty well this week! 

One thing we've been doing is looking up inactive people to invite them to our new branch building open house! They gave us the addresses of people who haven't come in years, so it's always an adventure to see who actually opens the door, and then ask them if they happen to be a member. Usually they say something like, "Oh, yeah, think they moved away like 15 years ago..." but then it becomes a finding opportunity because we can just invite that person instead! ... and we're already inside the apartment building... 

We also got a bunch of members to come tracting with us around the area of the branch house. It blows my mind how much better native members can connect with the people. 

One night, we were going to make french toast with the other elders, so we ran to the store to buy a loaf of bread. On the way back, we saw a homeless guy digging through the trash can. My companion is such a good guy! He walked up to the guy and just asked, "Are you hungry? Here's some bread." It was also really funny when we went back to the same cashier lady with the same kind of bread, haha. 

We have some cool investigators who are starting to progress. One lady recently lost a son, and has been going through a terribly hard time. We have been teaching her the Plan of Salvation, and she accepted a baptismal date for December 13th! 

Another guy in our own building is pretty interested! We brought a really strong member in and they got along really well. He likes what we teach and wants to improve his life. The Holy Ghost was super strong in the lesson, and Elder Beaumont was able to be involved a lot too!

A couple people also stopped us on the street and told us that they used to meet with the missionaries and want to meet again! Which is good, because all the people who we stop on the street either ignore us or give us fake phone numbers, which is soo dumb! Haha. 

On Saturday morning, I get a call from the mission president something to this effect: "Good morning Elder Young. You have the highest phone bill in the mission- it's 18,000 Forint (75 dollars) over your limit. Why is that?" I was really, really confused, since there was no reason for me to go over the limit at all. Then I called one of my old companions to tell him about it, and he informed me that Elder Driggs, my greenie from January, has to go home because of an injury. So it was a lot of crazy news right at once, haha. 

On Sunday night, we went up to Budapest for greenie training. We stayed in the "Celestial room" where I slept my first night in the country. One of my favorite companions from last year was there, as well as my old greenie, my current greenie, and like 5 other greenies. We all stayed in the same place, and it was weird- like a big summary of my whole mission in one place, haha. 

Monday morning, Elder Driggs left for the airport, and all the greenies had an important meeting, so Elder Olsen and I were reunited in Buda again, haha. We had like 6 hours to just explore the city and stuff.

K, you're great. Have a great week.

Love,

Elder Young

1. Some greenies.

2. My sons!

3. The Duna!

4. Elder Olsen

5. The Olympic rings!

October 13, 2014

We've had a pretty hard week, I must admit. The work here is sooo sloooow! For us, planning is decided when we should take breaks from tracting and talk to people on the street instead. We also try to visit members all the time so that Elder B. has a chance to teach.  

We had a couple cool experiences this week though... we were able to go visit one of our investigators with an RM guy, and we had a really good meeting. Bringing members is awesome because the member can get along so much better with the investigator, especially since they each understand exactly what the other is saying... 

Later that day, we made calls to old investigators who we've never met. I spent a lot of time calling as many people as I could, 

 retracted our building. The first door that opened was a young family who told us to come back later in the week (we actually never were able to) and they seemed really excited to meet. Now that I think about it, they're probably Jdubs out to prove us wrong. Oh, well. 

Then the second door opened up, and this guy was not interested at all. But he talked for like 2 minutes about something... then let us in! It was the last thing I would've expected, haha. But we ended up talking to him for 45 minutes and setting up another meeting! 

Other than that, we met with a few cool members and taught english class and stuff (my class is nowhere near as exciting as Jason's). You know... doing missionary things... 

On Saturday, we went back up to Győr, my last area, to see a baptism! Two sisters got baptized, one 8, one 14, so it was awesome! My last 3 companions were all there with their companions, with a few other members! It was sooo awesome! 

Afterward, we had to run onto the train home. The trains are so confusing here- they put multiple trains on one track, and don't put up enough signs. So if someone were to... I don't know... be unaware that 3 different trains were on one track, it's possible that they could get on the wrong one. 

So when the ticket checker guy comes up and looks at the ticket that says, "Veszprém," and drops his head, it's not a good sign. 

So when that happened to us, we were in quite a pickle! "Good thing we don't have any investigators to have to cancel on today!" I thought.  

We called the other elders to let them know, and found out that the phone had low battery. So we were able to make one last call to a member, who told us when our next train would be to take us home. After that, our phone died, and the choo choo chugged on into the abyss. 

We had to take that train to the end stop, called Celldömölk, and we had to wait there for almost 2 hours till the next train, so we looked for a place to eat, and found a free concert going on in the main square. We got on the train, later had to get off in another city to a bus, and made it home at 11 pm, and died. 

On Sunday, I went up to bear my testimony by telling that story and trying to compare it to the Gospel somehow. Everyone thought it was funny, and they probly figured out by now that I'm an idiot, haha. 

We had a teenager investigator come to church for the first time, too! He really enjoyed it, but had to run out like 45 minutes in. Hopefully he learned something that will help him out. 

My companion is such an awesome missionary! Yesterday afternoon, as we walked around on the streets talking to people, I made my comp stop someone and do the whole approach by himself. He walks up to someone and says, "Hi, excuse me! I love my family. I love my family very much. And I love the gospel because it helps my family. The gospel helped me, so I know it will help you in your life. Can we trade phone numbers?" And the just stood there listening, and then says, "Sure, why not?!" We talked to him a little more, and he is actually really interested! I think that if I would have stopped him, he probably would not have listened. My companion is super good at just throwing himself in front of people and bearing his testimony to them as best as he can! 

So we are hanging in here with everything. I'm kind of tired all the time, but everything is good. The Church is true! 

Love,

Elder Young

1. Elder B. fixing something with the soldering gun he found in the apartment.

2. "Tracting."

3. Eating at a cooool family's house.

4. Same.

5. Sindy and Goldy.

6. Me and Sindy.

7. A cool family I taught who finally came to something (the baptism).

8. Riding the train in the day.

9. Still on the train.

10. Still on the train.

11. Concert.

12. Exploring.

13. Eating lecsó with the other elders.

14. I was the victim of a pumpkin pie food fight. 

September 29, 2014

Hello, this is the last first week of the transfer ever! And I'm

writing this email in a cake/ice cream shop... so if I don't end up
writing this time, it means that I just spent the whole time looking
at cakes. Man, it smells good in here...

So last week, I got the call that I am to go to a city called Veszprém
to train.
So the next morning, we went up to get on the train, and they were
doing construction by the train station entrance, and there was a
little tiny opening where one or 2 people could go at a time, and we
found a croud of maybe 2 or 300 people there waiting to get through.
By the time we squeezed through the peoples, the train should have
left, but somehow they didn't leave until about 3.4 seconds after we
hopped on the train, and they let us buy our tickets on board. What a
miracle!

Then we had the "sorting hat meeting" and I got a new companion named
Elder Beaumont! He's fresh out of high school and is super excited to
be here!
After our meeting, we coordinated to meet with the other elders going
to our new area (both my companion and I are going to a new area...
which means lot of luggage), but the walk to the train station took
longer than expected, and we could hear the whistles going as we ran
to the train! We made the 2nd train of the day about 2.9 seconds
before departure! Another miracle! I think Someone really wanted us to
make it to Veszprém on Wednesday...

Despite the fact that 3 of the 4 elders in our city are new, and the
other one has only been here for 3 weeks, we have been getting
adjusted to our city really well! The other elders here are really
cool! The city is beautiful, and the members are awesome! They really
want to help the missionary work go well here, and so they offer their
help, and give us lots of things to do, too. Everyone is also really
excited because we got a really nice new chapel here a couple weeks
ago, and the open house will be in about a month, so the ward is
hustling and bustling to prepare for it!
We have only met with one investigator so far, but our meeting went
super well, and it looks like our other investigators are really cool,
too!

Nothing too crazy or awesome happened this week. We have been trying
to get Elder B. to experience all kinds of missionary work- streeting,
tracting, tabling, teaching. We've only taught one person so far...
oops. But it was awesome. He doesn't know exactly what the people are
saying, but he can express himself fine, so during the lesson (we
taught a 1st), I lead up to Joseph Smith, then asked him, "What
happened to Joseph Smith?" and he could tell his whole story, the 1st
Vision, everything. Then when he would lose track, I could just ask
him a question, "What does the BoM mean to you?" and he can bear his
testimony really well! And the lady really felt the Spirit and
promised to read from the BoM (she's been meeting for 3 weeks and
hadn't read anything).
Tracting has worked pretty well for us so far. Maybe it was the fact
that we don't know the city, maybe just our laziness, but we did tract
our own 10 story apartment building out. It's awesome because we can
say, "Hi, we're your neighbors! Have you ever seen boys like us with
ties and shirts on? Can we come in sometime, get to know you, and tell
you why we're here?" It worked out really positive! And people love to
hear Elder B. try really hard to talk to them, haha.

I really love this city and I'm excited to work here till the end of
my mission! I could not have asked for a better place to be! I'm
excited to work with Elder Beaumont and show him the ways of the
Misszionárius. Hopefully I'll be a good trainer this time around...
haha.

Sorry, no pictures. I hope that I'll be able to send pictures at some
point this transfer, but judging at the quality of computers we have
in Veszprém... no promises... :)

Love,
Elder Young