Update from Slagelse

Kære Familie,

 

Another week gone!  It's actually nice to have Christmas over because now we will be able to get back to a normal schedule.  It was great to talk to you the other day.  Next time it will be warm!!!!  (I hope)  So I decided that since I already talked to you and told you most of the stuff I was going to say in the email I'd tell you a few things about the mission.  First off, there are three areas in our District Slagelse, Nykøbing, and Bornholm.  If you look on a map, Bornholm is off to the east, its just a tiny Island.  Small branch and not very receptive to the gospel.  Anyway, for some reason they get a ton more snow than anybody else.  Here are a couple of stories from there Christmas week. 

 

So a couple of years ago, their Branch President found a deer on the side of the road (road kill).  For some morbid reason that no human mind can fathom, he went home cleaned and gutted it and then froze it.  Over the next couple of months it ended up in the Missionaries on Bornholms fridge.  So they had nobody offer to feed them for Christmas, so they took a deer leg out of the freezer and cooked it then ate it for Christmas dinner.  President Andersen has invited them to the Christmas party (they weren't before just cause its such a long trip) out of sheer pity.  Yeah, they're warriors!

 

Next they've been snowed in for several days so yesterday they called their Branch President (Road Kill Man) and asked if they could bless the Sacrament in their apartment.  They were allowed.  This is how it went.  Two glasses of water, two slices of bread, and Æ. Hebbert's shirt as the cloth covering.......we laughed for a long time at that.  The snow drifts outside their apartment are taller than they are.  Once again, they're warriors!

 

But yeah, we had a really quiet week.  Its seems like all the Danes do for Christmas is eat because that's all it feels like I have been doing!  This week we're going to Nykøbing for splits and København for New Years.  Miss ya'll and love you too! 

 

Æ. William Veach

 

Once again a big thanks to all those wonderful Danish people who are feeding my son!!  Even to Branch Presidents who clean and gut road kill to feed hungry missionaries!!  You are the greatest!!  The Mom

It was good to hear his voice!!!

So here is my best Christmas present from yesterday!!!  Thank you to Leo and his wife for having my son in their home for Christmas and allowing him to use their computer to call home!!

William on Skype Video call for Christmas!!  I love modern technology!

William is doing well and really likes Slagelse (the g is silent) and his companion Elder Mauler who is from Denver.  He says it is really cold!!  On the 24th it was 20 below 0 F when they got home at night - now that is cold even for William who loves the cold!!!  Everything seems to be going pretty well.  He is understanding more and more of the language and although the speaking is coming slower he is progressing every day.  He says his typical day is to get up between 630 and 7 and take a quick shower then study scriptures for an hour, a quick breakfast then companion study for an hour, then language study for an hour or two.  They leave the apartment around noon and are out until 9pm.  Some days they have appointments earlier in the morning so they skip language study and go to work.  The sun doesn't come up until 10am and goes down at 345pm so they are doing alot of their work in the dark.  William is loving the food and the members feed them multiple times a week.  Thank you to all of them from this mom!!  The kids really enjoyed seeing and talking to William again.  I think they are amazed at how much they miss him.  He got a box from Tim and Kerry (thanks to you both), but still has not gotten the box from us.  I will have to post about the saga of the box!!!  It is supposed to be at the mission home and he goes to Copenhagen on Wednesday so hopefully he will get it then.  He goes to Copenhagen about once a month for training and other people bring boxes as they come and go.  It takes about 12 days to get a letter to him via the mission home, but it is probably still better to send them there.  He could be transferred on a 24 hour notice, then mail would be lost in transit for a while.  Well, that is the bulk of the conversation.  William, of course, got a sports update from Jeff and Matthew and then our hour was over.  It was so good to talk to him and hear his voice and know that he is well.  We hope all of you will join with us in praying for his success and good health.  Happy Holidays to all!!

The Mom

Week 3 Update from Denmark

Kære Familie,

Another week gone!!!  Its been a wierd one again because we have had more trainings and so our week got thrown off a little bit and then the Zone Leaders came on splits on Thursday and Friday so that was also off normal stuff.....I don't think that I will have a normal mission experience until January, seeing as this week is Christmas (we've been asked not to tract 23-26) and next week we are in Copenhagen for three days.  Wooo.  So yeah I was the newest missionary at the Specialized Training this week.  Needless to say, I got picked on a lot.  Good thing I knew all the answers basically.   I'm already looking forward to February when the new missionaries come and I won't be the newbie anymore.   

Yesterday we had a guest Christmas service in church.  The goal was to get all the members to invite nonmember friends.  We've also been handing out invitations around town like they were candy.  Anyway the grand total from all of our work..........7.  Only one of them was one of our 8 investigators we've got going and he is awesome!!!!  He comes from New Jersey so every time he talks its like angels are singing to me.  His daughter was baptized in the summer and she is way solid too.  Ex.  She called Mauler yesterday and asked if it was ok to help her friend move on the Sabbath.   So the guest service was a little bit of a dud, but we actually got more to come than alot of the stake.  One other lady that came is technically not an investigator but a former one.  She is also waaaay cool.  She was taught by the missionaries about 4 yrs ago but never really was interested, but she loves the missionaries and so she feeds us every week.  Her food is like the best that we have all week!!!  But anyway she didn't think that she was going to make it, because her son was coming in later and her car got totalled last week so we weren't that optimistic.  Lo and behold here she comes trekking through the snow right before Sacrament meeting.  She had walked the 3 or 4 some odd kilometers to get to the church.  Yeah hun er sej!!!!!! 

It is still way cold!!!!  Its been snowing the past couple days and look here it goes again.  Another thing that wears on the mind is the sun.  Up at around nine (unless its snowing then it doesn't come up at all) and down at a little before 4!  It sucks super!!!  We are going around for like four hours in the dark everyday!  The good news is that the shortest day is tomorrow and then it will start getting lighter again.  That'll feel like its taking a while though.  So yeah, just a fun little info thing I decided to share all the things we've been doing in our apartment. 

1. The tub was plugged when we got here, used like 8 bottles of drain cleaner and a plunger to clean it.

2. We tried to bake cookies for members on Christmas.  We didn't have a scale so we got like a box of tin foil and did a balancing scale using an object with the correct weight on one side and measuring our ingredients on the other.............we bought a scale the next day.

3. I couldn't find tape so I put something on the wall with sticky side of sticky notes.

4. We got sick of just waking up to the alarm clock so I, me, myself am the music alarm clock.  When the alarm goes off in the morning I turn on my MP3 and iHome to get things rolling.......

5. No dryers, clothes went on the heaters in our apartments.

Anyway, looking forward to talking to you this week.  Love you tons!!!!

Ældste William Veach

More Pics from the MTC

William loved going to the temple each week in the MTC!

This one really needs no caption - sheer beauty!!

The MTC Danish district.

William with one of his MTC teachers and I am sorry I don't know his name.