Week Two in Ballerup

Hej guys!

How was your guys' week?  It was a good week here.  I got to meet more of the investigators and get to know the ward a little bit more.  We had an eating appointment every day it was so nice.  The members here are way cool and love the missionaries.   They (at least they seem to be) are patient with my Danish and the uh lack there of from my companion.  We had a ton of service to do this week.  Probably about 6 hours of service just this week.  Already more than I ever did in Slagelse.  It was nice to be out of the shirt and tie and just doing something different then being yelled at. 

Ballerup is nice because the Elders that came before worked really hard finding people.  We have so many potentials that eat up a ton of time.  Some of them are also relatively positive.  It is way nice because in Slagelse all we ever seemed to do was find and find and never find anything that would go past taking a BOM.  We also had interviews with Præsident in Roskilde.  That was good.  We had our District meeting.  That went good.  Otherwise it was just a normal missionary work week, except for all the service that wasn't as normal.

I met a missionary from Denmark in the MTC.  His parents are in this ward.  Its way cool to hear about his mission and just hear how another missionary is doing.  Yeah so far Ballerup is a good area.  Hope you guys have a good week.  Love and miss ya tons. 

William

May 23, 2011 from Ballerup

Kære Familie, (I am finally caught up - I hope you enjoyed William's updates)

How has your guys' week been?  Here it was way slow.  I think its just the getting used to a new area.  It was the same way first week in the MTC and in Slagelse.  I don't think I'll be going back to Slagelse just because I've been there for six months now, but we'll see.  This week should go by a lot faster.  We have tons of appointments and not enough time to do all the drop bys we need to.  I love being way busy! 

So far its going only OK in the companionship.  He's cool enough but his personality just rubs me the wrong way.  I don't know I won't regail you with all the annoyances.  I'm sure it'll get better. 

Today for P-Day we're going into Copenhagen. I'm definitely not going to get tired of this.  Being close to Copenhagen gives us tons of stuff to do.  Unlike west Sjælland where the library is the happening place. 

On Friday we had our Zones Conference.  It was way cool to get to see friends from the other zone whom I hadn't seen in a while.  I'm going to try to send a picture of our group 8 months after day 1 in the MTC!  :)

The ward here is way cool.  Almost every person came up to me and said hi.  Our ward mission leader is also way rad!  I think the change of scenery will help over all. 

Hope you guys are having a great week.  Love and miss ya'll tons!!!!

MKH
William

William's MTC group 8 months after entering the MTC

First Transfer!! Slaglese to Ballerup

From email on May 14th
Hey, so an update on a Saturday.  I'm being moved to Ballerup on Monday.  I don't know if I'll have time to email then or not so just in case this is an email so you don't freak out when nothing comes on Monday.  Love you talk to you soon.

William

From email on May 17th
Hej Familie!

So it was an eventful weekend to say the least.  On Wednesday (I know not the weekend) Æ. Mauler and Æ Meyer came on splits just for fun and to say good-bye to Roth.  They stayed until Thursday evening.  It was way weird walking around Slagelse with Mauler.  I hadn't done that in a month and a half and here I was walking through the staring city again.  But anyway, after they left Æ Lee our district leader came on splits.  It was  that next day that was way eventful.  Æ Tolman (from the MTC) is still way weird and a goof ball.  He ate a 930 gram (almost 2 pounds) burger for lunch and was basically down for the count until he left.  While we were at lunch, we got the call that I was being transferred and  that was a huge surprise.  So, Roth is in London right now, flying home and three other missionaries were leaving on that date.  So I knew something was happening, but I definitely wasn't expecting that.  I was told that Slagelse would be shutting down and that I'd be moving to Ballerup.  Slagelse will only be shut down for three weeks, but I was still a little taken aback since we had three pending baptismal dates.  But yeah my new companion is Æ. Peterson.  He has been in Denmark 6 weeks.......yeah I went senior companion.  I'm also technically training, since his training period is 9 weeks and his trainer went ZL on Jylland (my mission bro Æ. Ence, so Peterson is actually my nephew).  I feel really overwhelmed.  I feel like Præsident just stuck a greenie in charge of a greenie, but I know that the Lord can help me.  Last night we had an eating appointment and the Danish was just coming to me so easily and I am really grateful for that. 

Roth is on his way home now.  It is very weird to think about.  I can't believe he's gone.  We had a way awesome time together and I'll miss him alot. 

Friday is Zone Conference with both zones getting together.  It should be alot of fun.  I get to see some friends from Jylland that I haven't seen in a while. 

Ballerup seems to be a cool place.  I have a house!!!!  There used to be six Elders living there but now its just us two.  It is probably four times as big as my Slagelse apartment.  It's way cool so far.  I have my own bathroom, several couches, big kitchen, and a whole bunch of left over crap.  I am way close to Copenhagen now so I hope that I can go into the temple a couple times before I leave.  It'll also be nice to hang out with more missionaries in the area, instead of being stuck out on boring West Sjælland. 

I think I sent you a picture of Peterson.  It's the family pic I sent a while ago.  He's as bald as a soccer ball.  He likes to talk a lot, but I think it'll be ok. 

Well I'm glad to here, that LDSEHE is over and that you guys now have a breather of sorts for a while.  Hope everything is going well.  Have a wonderful week.  Love and miss ya tons.

MKH
William

May 9, 2011 - Day After Mother's Day

Hey guys,

 

I know I just talked to you, but things are going ok.  It was great to talk to you guys, even though I did get super trunky.  Oh well, that's life.  Not so much has happened since we last talked.  :)  But last night we invited Kirsten and Per to Præsident Andersens fireside at his house.  I don't know if I've told you about them before, but Kirsten has cancer and Roth actually taught her daughter in Odense.  That's how they found the church.  Mauler and I met with them once and its been way hard to meet again because she's always out of town getting treatment.  Anyway, we let Præsident work his magic.  We just chilled on the sidelines, while after the fireside he talked to them for about an hour.  He came up to us after they left and said, "I've just taught them the Plan of Salvation.  Explained temples and baptisms for the dead.  I then committed them to be baptized and they said yes."   I was just like.  OK awesome!!!  So yeah that was nice.  And then we finally got Jack into church after 6 months of him and Malene being taught. 

 

Yeah, good luck this week.  I'll be praying for mom with the conference and everybody else.  Hope ya'll have a fabulous week.  Sorry it's way short, but we talked for a while on Saturday. 

 

MKH

William

Bin Laden Is Dead!

Kære Familie,  (from May 2, 2011)

 

So far it's a good P-day.  We went to an appointment at Tom's and he said that Bin Laden had been killed by US troops.  We were pretty happy!!!  We plan on blaring Spirit of America by MOTAB when we get back to our apartment.  That made this week really good and it just started!!!  I think I've gotten sicker on my mission.  Sorry about that.

 

So last week was pretty uneventful.  Just normal missionary work.  I stopped by the freaking crazy not baptized girl who looked at me like a normal person would look at charred liver.  Yeah, it was way awkward and now she is officially dropped.  When I called Mauler and told him about it, he sounded way pissed that we had spent so much time on her to no avail.

 

Elder Roth says hi.

 

It was warming up and now its getting chilly again, but not too cold which is nice.  We had an eating appointment every night.  We did contacting and banking.  None of the investigators are able to meet with us.  So that still sucks. 

 

Elder Roth goes home on the 17th so we are going to go in for one last Copenhagen P Day that Monday.  Should be exciting! 

 

Sorry this email sucks, but nothing really happened this week.  Looking forward to talking to you guys!  :)

 

MKH

WIlliam

7 Months without Dr Pepper Streak ended!!!!

A note from the Mom - My apologies for getting so behind on posting.  The homeschool conference is over and I have resigned my job as youth conference coordinator so hopefully I can keep up with William's blog a little better.  Thanks for your patience

 

Kære Familie, from April 18, 2011

As the title says, I tasted my first Dr Pepper since I left!!!  Needless to say, it tasted amazing.  Anyway, how was the week with the Drapers?  How was Easter?  Easter here was probably the crappiest its ever been.  From Thursday to Monday everything, and I mean everything, is closed!!!!!  Even the library (thus I'm writing on Tuesday instead of Monday).  Also, I don't know what it is, but on holidays everybody stays indoors or goes on vacation.  Trying to contact was like trying to contact in a post apocalyptic city.  Completely deserted.  So we have been visiting old investigators all week because that's the only thing we could think of.  All of our young people banking places are empty because they are all on vacation!  Aggghhh.  It was probably the most frustrating week of my mission.  The companionship of cancellations continues.  Everytime we set up an appointment it falls through without exception.  Even the first teaching appointment of our companionship, the member fell through.  So we just went by ourselves. 

Hardly anybody fed us for Easter.  It was way long.  Only the bishop, who doesn't like us very much.  Dad please don't ever be like this bishop.  He basically tells us that we are terrible missionaries every appointment.  So Easter basically sucked.  It seems that Denmark celebrates holidays so that they can go on week long drinking stints and not have to worry about being hung over the next day for work. 

The best part of the week was definitely the Dr. Pepper.  Roth and I are getting along really good still.  He goes home on the 17th of May and transfers are the 8th of June.  So I may have a companion for those three weeks then move or just stay with him for two more months.  I'm starting to get a little sick of the area.  We get stared at all the time just walking down the road in our white shirts.  We get honked and yelled at almost everyday.  That was one thing nice about the winter was nobody could see your white shirts and ties so they didn't think anything different about you.  Anyway, I think it was just a way hard week so thats why I am so frustrated.  Slagelse has been a great area, but I hope I move next transfers.  I want to experince more than podunk West Sjælland for my mission. 

I'm including some pictures!  Should be fun.  Hope ya'll like them.  How's the dog?  How was the visit?  Hope you guys have a great week.  I also need to know what you want to do for the phone call.  If you can work out something so that dad can be home to skype I can do that, or I could call Saturday night here from the cell phone and we can talk then.  Its up to you, you just have to let me know pretty soon since there's only a couple more weeks.  Love and miss you all!!!!

MKH

William

Just leaving my mark on Denmark

Elder Roth

 DomKirke in Roskilde

Us trying to look like a civil war family :)

My brother (Elder Mauler) has a kid (baldie) so I am now an Uncle! (I believe this is his new companion in Ballerup)

The first Dr. Pepper in 7 months!!!!

Sniffle!!!!

Note from my Facebook

I got a call from William on Mothers Day and as a typical mother I was a little worried about him.  He sounded a little discouraged and while he dad brushed it off and said, "Ah, he'll be fine!"  I was still worried.  A lot of missionary moms had told be about the 6 month wall.  All missionaries it seems hit a wall after they have been out about 6 months and they have to figure out why they are really there and I was worried that William was struggling.  He assured me in his email today that he is doing okay and then I got this message on my Facebook today and I just had to share it with all of you.  It is from Susanne Molbek who is in his ward.  What a comfort to a worried mother today!!  The Lord truly is merciful and my heart is overflowing today!! - The Mom

Susanne Molbek

Hi Sherry. I just want you to know that Elder Veach is doing GREAT over here. I have never seen a young American missionary learn Danish as fast as he has. And what a wonderful personality he has. He is such a great example and friend to my teenagers. So thank you very much for sending him. I love his hair, too. It reminds me of my mission in Scotland, where almost everybody had that colour hair.

 

PS - I know I am behind a few weeks on posting.  The homeschool conference is this week and I have been a bit crazy getting everything prepared.  I will catch the blog up next week.  Thanks for the continued prayers on behalf of William.