Called to serve Feb 2016

Monday 20 March 2017

Another week flies by

Hellosztok!
Well the weeks are flying by these days and somehow we're already at another P-day and that means another update on all the weird craziness that is my mission.
  On monday we got invited to attend a line dancing class that one of the YSA here teaches every week and so we decided to go along. The only thing that she didn't tell us was that it's all old women! So it literally just ended up as my companion and I line dancing in a room of probably 15 or so old women. It was surprisingly super fun, but also really hard.
  Tuesday we had the Elders come down from Kecskemét for exchanges with us. President told us to have as many teachings planned as we possibly could and so that's what we did. We somehow planned 6 teachings for that night, which is literally more than I have ever had in any other day of my mission. We were super busy but it went well.
  Wednesday was a national holiday here in Hungary. March 15th commemorates the anniversary of the outbreak of the 1848 revolution against the Austrian Empire, so it's kind of a sad holiday but it's really cool because there are red, white and green things everywhere. We met with a super legit woman who was a former investigator, she's probably going to get baptised soon, but unfortunately she lives in the sisters area and so we have to hand her over. We also met with a less active which was fun.
  Thursday was another early rise because we had to head up to Budapest again for MLC. It was actually a really great meeting though and I learnt a lot from it. We then got to have splits with the assistants straight after. I actually got to got to my first Buda district meeting and english class whcih was super fun, especially because I got to see a bunch of the people from the ward again. We also had a funny streeting experience when we talked to this girl and our conversation went a little like this...
Us: "What is the most important thing in your life?"
Her: "Money"
Us: "Okay, well why is money important to you? Why do you need it?"
Her: "So I can live like a STAR!" *Dramatic Hair flip*
It was just one of those really strange streeting moments and it was immediately following our discussion with another woman about her seeing hallucinations and hearing voices. It's a pretty interesting life being a missionary, especially in Budapest.
  Friday we got to continue our splits and met with a super cool couple, the catch was they both spoke english. It's super weird teaching in English now, it just doesn't feel right haha.
  The rest of our week was pretty normal, just a whole bunch of planning and stuff for our upcoming zone training and making a lot of phone calls, still good fun though.
További szép hetet kívánok!
McKim Elder
PICS!
Elder Hughes and I before line dancing with older women

            Weird native American looking statue thats on top of a hill next to a lake called Blood Lake.

Found this picture of Jesus on one of the signs near the weird statue,  looked a little familiar.


Are we even really companions?

Sziasztok!
Another week has come and gone and at this point in my life that means spending most of it away from my companion and in other parts of the country.
  On monday we got caught in a surprise rain storm while we were heading to a teaching and we had no coats or anything. We got super wet, but it was a lot of fun and our teaching ended up going pretty well.
  Tuesday we headed out to a little town called Szatymaz to look some people up but we couldn't find them. So we sadly ate the cookies that we brought them while sitting on a bus bench. We then had a really good teaching with our investigator Márk and a really awkward teaching with a less active here. All in all it was a great day.
  Wednesday we headed over to a city called Szolnok to do exchanges with the Elders there. It was a lot of fun and Elder Graham and I talked with a whole tonne of people, so it was all in all pretty successful.
  On Thursday we ended up having two district meetings because we got to go to the Szolnok one before sitting on a 2 and a half hour train ride home to get back for our own district meeting. We then immediately had english class straight after that before starting another exchange with the Elders here in Szeged. I really missed my own bed...
  Our exchange went really well on friday though and we were able to have a few teachings to go to even though a few people cancelled on us. I got to go with Elder Sharp who is just an absolute inspiration in terms of putting off awkwardness and talking with people, he's super funny and we had a great time together. 
  Pretty much the rest of the time that Elder Hughes and I got to spend together this week was spend either planning or in meetings, so we haven't had the most time to spend working together, but we still did have a cool tracting miracle on Sunday. We had been tracting a street and all of the people had been really unkind to us the whole time. Finally we were about to leave to get to our correlation meeting when we felt we should tract one more house where we found a very nice woman who was interested in our message who we were able to exchange phone numbers with and she said we could come back later in this week. We also had our investigator Márk come to church again and he told us that he thinks the book of mormon has power, so there's definitely potential there for Márk. We also got to visit a member here who fed us a very gross looking but surprisingly delicious food that I don't remember the name of.
Have a wonderful week!
Sok szeretettel!
McKim Elder
PICS!
Elder Hughes bought a thing to make a food called Kürtös Kalács and so he cooked it like this in our oven...

                                                                            Our good friend Róbi.

The weird food he fed us...


Trains, Trainings and a Trainer

Üdvözlöm!
To be honest this week was practically straight up craziness, but it was also a lot of fun and we got a surprising amount of work done for how much time we had, so all in all a successful week.
  Tuesday started in the same was as every other new transfer, sitting for ages in a government office trying to give them the 8 pieces of paper that tell them where we live. After that we were able to have a lesson with a guy named Márk that stopped us on the street on Monday and then had 2 lessons fall through in a row before meeting with one of the families here.
  Wednesday was an early rise so we could head up to Budapest for what would be the first Zone training that I would have to give. The train ride was great but we faced a problem when the tram to the mission home shut down and we ended up being 10 minutes late to our own training (along with half the zone who were coming with us). We all had a laugh about it though and zone training went pretty well after it, so it all ended well.
  Thursday we only had time to have our district meeting before we had to jump on another train to Kecskemét to do a baptismal interview there for a kid that is being baptised next weekend. We then got a recommendation for a restaurant there from one of the members in Szeged and while we were there we ended up talking to a random older man who it turns out is an olympic gold medallist and has coached a whole bunch of really good water polo teams and is now the trainer for one of Hungary's swimmers that competed in Rio. He also escaped Hungary during the communist days and live overseas for 50 years, he was a super interesting man.
  Friday took us to another new city, Békéscsaba (litterally translates to peaceful Jack...). I'd always heard that Békéscsaba wasn't very pretty but it was a great little city. We got to do exchanges there with the Elders and we also bought some fox tails for 600ft (like maybe $2.50). I don't know what I'm going to do with it but it has a keychain on it, so there's possibilities.
  Saturday after coming back from Békéscsaba we got to go to a members house and she taught us how to make a thing called Hortobágyi Palacsinták (basically crepes stuffed with meat and covered in sour cream). They were super good and it was super fun.
  Sunday we had a little miracle when our new investigator Márk came to church which was a big surprise but it was really cool. Other than that it was a pretty normal day.
That's all for this week! Jó hetet kívánok!
- McKim Elder
PIC!
Sorry the only picture I took this week was of this place that we ate dinner on monday. I'll try to be better this week.