25 Jun 2013 {Transfer #2: Grenoble, France}

Okay so I'm emailing today because yesterday was so crazy that I didnt get a chance.

I got transfered. I am now in (drumroll, please) GRENOBLE!!! yay! Its in the Alps so it is absolutely gorgeous!!! I haven't had time to take any pictures and i forgot to bring my camera today so sorry no pics this week. I'll do better next week.

I just had the shortest companionship ever. My new companion Soeur Hall had to go home for medical reasons. but that wasn't decided until like an hour after I got here. So I got here, met her, we found out they were sending her home, found out they wanted to send her home this week so that she could fly home with the other missionaries headed home, then she packed and got on the train to Lyon. So in total, I was her companion for like maybe 6 hours. 

She is fantastic though. I am so sad that she had to leave. Im definitely going to be praying for her to have a speedy recovery so she can come back and we can be companions for real this time. I can't even imagine how hard yesterday was for her. She was so sad to have to go home. She is such a good missionary too.

Oh, don't worry Im not by myself or anything. There is another set of sisters here and we live together so now we are just a trio. Which I am not gonna lie, was one thing I was hoping I would never have to experience but here I am. God definitely has some bigger plans for me than I do because he is giving me LOTS of opportunities to grow.

Also we are a young trio, Soeur Smith is the oldest and she only has been here for 1 transfer longer than I have and the other sister. As scary as that sounds, I think it will be a really good thing because we are all fresh missionaries. We all are excited about missionary work, wanting to do our best and we all recognize that change is needed in order to do that.

Oh yeah, Nanou! She was baptized on Saturday. And that is a whole other stressful story in itself. Man! This last week has been a crazy series of events and an emotional rollercoaster. Anyways, I'll just give you the short version--She got baptized; I pretty sure that her family is not super supportive and I can tell that she was having a hard time with that but she seemed very happy after being baptized and then again after being confirmed on sunday.  One of the Elders' investigators (Serge) was also baptized on Saturday. He is fantastic!!! So a double baptism made for an awesome day!

I love ya a lot!

Jusqu'a la fin!

A) First Area: Montpellier, France

B) Second Area: Grenoble, France

-Shayna

21 Jun 2013

It rained for like 2 days but after that it was blue skies and SUPER hot. I actually think the weather here is a lot like there except it just rains a bit more here.

Nanou's baptism is this Saturday and the elders also have an investigator getting baptized that same day. We still need to teach her some commandments but we should be able to fit that in this week. It's going to be a crazy week.

Tonight we leave to do exchanges with the Sister Training Leaders in Aix en Provence and we get back Wednesday afternoon. As soon as we get back we are going to teach Nanou and she lives an hour away so that usually takes almost all day. Thursday we have a district meeting. Friday we find out about transfers and Saturday is the Baptism. Busy. Busy.

Nothing too unfortunate happened this week. It was actually a pretty good week.

We had a conference with a member of the Seventy and learned lots of cool stuff. The next day we taught a lesson to an investigator and we applied the things he taught us and she committed to baptism right then! She picked a time and everything! And it was the first lesson! Cool huh? And I saw Elder Crawley at that conference. He seems to be doing well.

With transfers coming up, I don't really know if I will stay in Montpellier or not. We'll find out soon enough.

-Shayna

Pictures!!

**I don't know the stories behind these pictures, but here's some pictures Soeur Young sent home.  Enjoy!
-Shayna

16 Jun 2013

Last week was pretty awesome!

Nanou is going to be baptised on the 22 and the elders also have an investigator that will most likely be baptised the same day so it will be really cool. Im excited. We taught her this week and it went well. I made some cookies for them. American cookies are a rare thing around here. They seemed to like them so i think it was a good idea.

This week seems to have been a series of unfortunate events. 

1. We were robbed by gypsy children. When the sisters from perpignan came for exchanges we were by the tram buying them passes for the day when these children came begging for money and trying to take our food. They crowded around the machine and zhen they got the chance they pressed the cancel button on the machine so all the money got spit back out and they all swarmed on it and ran away. 

It was pretty sad. I realized that as a missionary i get to see the true state of the people in this country cause I see them in their everyday lives.

2. I went to perpignan for exchanges and while I was there my companion here in Montpelier and the other sisters were contacting in our usual place and this guy came and started harrassing them saying that contacting was illegal though it is totally legal and he eventually brought over some police. They ended up calling president and it got all figured out and they werent arrested but it was close. 

We met a bunch of cool people throughout the week that I hope we will be able to teach. This week we have a conference so that will take up about a day and a half. But it will be really good.

Thanks for everything! I love ya lots!

oh by the way I realized that as of last monday I have already been out here for 2 months! how crazy is that?!

jusqu’à la fin!!!

-Shayna

9 Jun 2013

This week has been so awesome!!

First of all I had a big realization the other day that has changed everything. I realized that I wasn't happy and that I should be happy and so I was contemplating why that was and what I needed to do to fix it when I realized I have been going about the last couple weeks with completely the wrong attitude! I was focusing way too much on myself and my progress and not on my investigators as much as I should be. And just having that realization has completely changed my attitude and I feel like we have been receiving so many blessings and miracles since then!!

I noticed a lot this week that I have been receiving answers to my prayers and even in the most simple inconsequential requests.

We have this thing here in our mission about prayers. Basically our goal is kind of to pray too much. One thing we do is pray all together for specific people so each week we have a list of investigators with baptismal dates from around the whole mission that we pray for. It's really cool. And we have been promised that as we do this we will be able to witness miracles and it is so true!

We are teaching a little girl Nanou she is 11 she is going to be baptized on the 22nd. It's been hard to teach her since I've been here because her Mom isn't interested and is super hard to get ahold of. So earlier this week it was looking like it might not be possible for her to be baptized on that day. Her grandmother is a member in our ward and she gave us her 16yr old brothers phone number so that maybe we could talk to her that way. The other night we decided to try it out so we called but he didn't answer but her texted us back asking who it was. Long story short this kid, Lehi, is AWESOME he got his mom to call us and she was super open and seems suddenly really supportive of Nanou. So we invited Lehi to come to church on Sunday...and he said yes! Lehi and Nanou we both there and they are so awesome! Lehi said that he didn't really understand all that was taught in church but that he liked the feeling that he had there! AHH so cool! I mean I don't know any 16yr old boy that would be so willing to come to church without us even teaching him anything about the church. We are going to go teach Nanou this Saturday and Lehi being the sweet awesome kid he is said he would meet us and the bus stop and walk us to their house (the town they live in is kind of far away)!!!

Miracles!

Another one: one of our investigators, Hector, has been bringing his 6yr old son to church with him and his son LOVES church. His wife has been really skeptical and stand offish and didn't really want anything to do with us but this week she came to church! And it seemed like they enjoyed it too!

Well I got to go. love ya lots!

Jusqu'a la fin!!

-Shayna

2 Jun 2013

**This came in a letter we received. Soeur Young had typed it all up in an email, but it was all somehow deleted. Hence the delay and the letter**

The church building here in Montpellier is super small--only one hallway with classrooms, a kitchen, a font, an office, and the chapel at the end, but the chapel looks more like a cultural hall. (By the way, I don't think Europeans believe in water fountains. There aren't even any in the church buildings.)

There are a couple of American girls in the ward so I have someone to talk to. Here we have 3 sets of Elders and my companionship just in Montpelier. There is another set of Elders in our district but that's it. Our area to work in is pretty big though, so its not like we are fighting over investigators. We get around by public transportation which is just trams and buses. But they don't do everywhere. There are a bunch of small towns in our area that I don't hink we have a way to get to because the buses don't go there.

When I was in Lyon, we were "teaching" a man (he was a member) and he told me that I must be from Canada because I look like Celine Dion. That’s a first... And one man we are teaching is from Cameroon; he speaks English so I am very happy to be able to participate in at least one lesson! He is really cool!

A couple of days ago, I got stopped twice by people asking what my name tag meant!

We went into a little town called Sete the other day. It’s a cute town right on the ocean. We spent some time with members and went contacting. We ended up talking to a drunk man. He was SO drunk! He had beer dripping down his chin but talking to us he was coherent. Soeur Vidal told him he was a child of God and he sat up all straight and said "Je suis un fils de Dieu!" ("I am a son of God!") It was funny but cool at the same time. We gave him a Book of Mormon. Hopefully he still has it.

I had a realization the other day: I CAN UNDERSTAND FRENCH! I just have to listen in French. Until now, I have been trying to translate in my head as people talk to me, but I only get part of what they are telling me because I'm trying to remember what the words mean in English. But when I don't translate and just listen, I can understand a lot more!!

We met an awesome lady this morning on the tram! She saw our tags and started talking to us. Turns out, she lives in Sete! We gave her a Book of Mormon and something else. While Soeur Vidal was talking to her, I noticed a lady nearby that was taking note of our conversation, but she was holding a pamphlete in her hand. I could tell it was a Jehovah's Witness pamphlet, so I thought "oh no". At the next stop, the lady came up to our Ami (Ami de l'Eglise=investigator) and Soeur Vidal and handed our Ami the pamphlate and said something like "here's another point of view". Once that lady got off the tram, our Ami said "I don't want this" and wadded up the JW pamphlate and tossed it on the ground! So we are going to teach her in Sete next week!

We have two sets of exchanges this transfer. One with Perpingnon next week and then with the Sister Training Leaders in Aix En Provenence. I'm excited for my first experience with exchanges!

Jusqua la fin!

-Shayna