A Schedule to Avoid Karneval

Hey Mom!

Well, for the most part, we had a pretty good week here in Hagen. The week started off with another P-day in Dortmund. I had left my coat there, so we just stayed for P-day. I got a couple more things at the BVB store for some people I forgot the first time, and we went to some other places to look around as well. We finished off the evening at the Kleinerts again for FHE.

On Tuesday, we didn't have a lot happen until the evening where we had English class and then a lesson with Lukas, our relatively new investigator. We taught him the Restoration, and he seemed pretty excited about it. He even accepted the invitation to say a kneeling prayer at the end of the lesson, and he did a great job.

Wednesday began with district meeting, and then afterwards I had a split in Hagen with Elder Richards from Paderborn. We spent most of the day in public transportation trying to contact a referral who wasn't home and then went to a member's home for a Wednesday FHE. In total, we were probably riding buses and trains for about 3 to 4 hours that day.

On Thursday, after heading to Paderborn to split back, Elder Moore and I came back to Hagen and then shortly thereafter went to Dortmund for a lesson with Lukas and then Institute. It went really well. We didn't have a ton of time to prepare for the lesson since we had been on a split, but it still went ok. We taught him the first half of the Plan of Salvation. Lukas has been keeping his commitments and asks a lot of good questions. He also enjoys coming to institute, so that was cool to see him stay for that as well. He was even asked to give the prayer at the end of the Book of Mormon class and prayed in front of everyone even though it was his 3rd time ever praying in front of people.

We had a pretty slow day on Friday. It was the start of Karneval where a ton of people dress up in costumes and get hammered, so the mission sent out a text and suggested we try to do effective things in the apartment. We still had a member appointment in the evening, and there was not really any craziness on the street, so it was kind of a boring day with a lot of planning and organizing things in the apartment.

Saturday was a day full of activity. After studies, we first had a lesson with a potential investigator from Egypt named Kyrollos. He was a cool guy, but seemed more interested in learning about American culture than in our church. It was also hard to try and get him to accept a Book of Mormon because he said he might not read it and it could go to waste, but we eventually persuaded him to take it with. After that appointment, we headed to Iserlohn to have a lesson with Manuella. It went pretty well after a kind of shaky start, and she read out loud today in front of us for the first time ever! She goes really slow in terms of making progress, but she step by step moves forward. The evening consisted of going to Bruder Kramer's son's apartment to help install a light fixture. We ended up not really having an opportunity to help much, but we had good conversation and food.

Sunday was a good day as well. Manuella came to church, but Lukas didn't show up. We were kind of worried since our plan was to meet him at church and then drive together to a member's home, eat lunch, and then have a lesson there, but it ended up being ok. He had a lot of paper work to do for applying for jobs and things so couldn't make it to church, but he still came to the lesson. We taught him the last half of the Plan of Salvation, and it went well. He will have a busy week this week, so we invited him to pray to know if the plan was God's true plan for us, and he asked for a week to be able to think and ponder, and then we will see us at church on the coming Sunday. He is taking it pretty seriously, and I think there are good things in store with him.

Well, that was pretty much the week. Today is Rosenmontag, which is the day of the Karneval celebration where all of the parties in the bigger cities go down, so we are pretty much just going to go finish our shopping, and then head inside for the rest of the day since it is going to be wild in the city.

I hope you have a great week! Love you!

LG, Daniel