Montag, November 7, 2011

Well, this week was good. We had 3 investigators at church on Sunday! It was way sweet. Then the stake president of the our stake came to church, and he is way tight. He's one of those guys that blows your mind when he speaks. He's such an awesome missionary, too. Our investigator Reimund really likes President Bolt (stake president) - and President Bolt talked to him and really gave him some encouragement. Reimund is trying to stop smoking, and when he does he can be baptized. But President Bolt is the man. He talked to all of our investigators at church, and stuff, and it was really sweet.

This past week was really good. We got to teach a lot of lessons, and we have a lot of lessons planned for this upcoming week, as well. Hopefully everything will go as planned. We got to meet with 3 of the 5 new investigators we found. 2 of them just simply forgot about our appointments (lol). They’re all way tight, though. One has a super nice drum set. It’s sooo nice. I want to do the metal on it so bad, but it isn't really set up to do the metal. I was in Freiburg this past week on an exchange, and there was a member in Freiburg who just thought ‘Caraway’ was the coolest name ever. She told me, like, 3 times how awesome she thought my named sounded.

But transfer calls are this week, so next week you will know if I'm getting transferred or not. I've been in Offenburg for 6 months now, so I wouldn't be surprised if I get transferred. I like Offenburg a lot, though. Today we’re going to a place in the Black Forest called Titisee. We've heard it’s way pretty there, so we’re going with the Freiburg Elders and another set of missionaries.

(In response to a comment from home:) I love the scriptures. That’s actually what wakes me up every day - is when I get to read my scriptures in personal study, not stinking morning exercises. I hate that crap.

(In response to a question from home:) Germany does have Daylight Savings, though. It started 2 weeks ago, I think.

But like I said earlier, we got to teach a lot this week, which is sweet. The work is picking up for sure, here in Offenburg. I like teaching the gospel a lot. Though especially in German. German is so much better than Englisch (English), I think. The great thing about teaching in another language, is you don't know the language the best - so you can just be more direct and bold, since you don't know that many words to bounce around the subject, or whatever. I think that’s why the Lord sent to me to teach the gospel in another language. Because it would have been harder to teach the gospel in Englisch for me, i think. German is coming along great, though. I can pretty much say what I want to say, and I can understand people - which is always good. I still need to get better, though, of course. I know I haven't talked about it much, but German is not an easy language. Even Germans will tell you that. A lot of Germans can't speak proper German. You have six different ways to use a German verb in German (lol). Luckily, you only really need to know 3 of them. But German is definitely hard. It’s not easy. I speak a lot of German every day, and I try not to speak all that much Englisch, so I can get better with my German. But at the beginning, man, was it a struggle. I didn't think I would ever learn German. I was, like, ‘the language is too hard for me’. I just wanted to get good enough at German to just get by. Sadly, a lot of missionaries I have met have not mastered the language at all - and I don't want to be anything like that. I want to master the German language. Then, after learning a new language like German, you find out how easy Englisch is. It’s boring to read or talk in Englisch (lol). ‘Trunk People’ here in Germany speak Englisch when they get trunk, because it’s easier to speak Englisch than german (lol). It’s pretty funny. German is going well, though. So you can tell the people that asked that I’m doing good with German. I pretty much just dream in German now. It was funny - I had a dream the other night and it was in German. I tried fighting myself to change my dream into Englisch because the person I was talking to in the dream didn't know German. I knew that, so I was, like, ‘why am I speaking German to this person when they don't know German’ (lol). So I switched my dream into Englisch during the middle of the dream (lol). It was funny, I thought. I haven't talked about the language, though, because I thought you would want to hear something else (lol).

Peace.

[ Elder Caraway ]