Rookie....

A week ago it snowed for about 4 hours in the morning.  The snowflakes were big and fluffy, beautiful.  It was a wet snow.  The storm dropped about 2-3 inches in the morning and then was gone.  Elder Johnson being the good missionary and person he is, decided to go to the church and shovel the front and back walkways.  He spent about 2 hours shoveling snow.  The walk ways looked good.  That evening, it started to rain.  It didn't rain hard, just a slow drizzle and the temp was warming.  We went to bed that night with snow still on the ground, but awoke to no snow!  No snow anywhere!  It had all melted during the night.  When Elder Johnson looked outside in the morning and saw there was no snow to be found, he laughed and said "Rookie Mistake."  The California boy will know for next time it snows if the temp isn't colder and there is rain in the forecast to wait a little while before running out to shovel the snow.

A visit to the Museum

Yesterday we went to the Pergamon Museum with Elder Liegty and Elder Angerhofer.  We entered the museum and went to the panoramic view of Asisi of Greece.  It was magnificient.  It was a circular view , 5 stories high of life in ancient Greece.  It started with mornings first light.  You could hear the birds begin to waken as the sun came up.  The noise of the city increasing with the progression of the day.  You felt like you were there.  As the day drew to a close, the noise  became less, and the lights started coming on in the houses.  The night sky became dark and crickets began chirping. This continued through the night until the dawn began again.  You could stand and watch from 3 different levels.  Each level gave you a different feeling and you saw different things.  Unfortuneately, no pictures were allowed in this exhibit.  After leaving the panorama, we went through the rest of the museum.  It had many ruins from ancient Greece to look at.  It is incredible that the people of that time could build those kind of structures with the intricate detail they had.  They were very skilled at their jobs.  We spent about 3 1/2 hours walking around, looking at the many ruins and recreations of that time.   

Someone has some explaining to do...

We live next door to the Syrian Embassy.  The Syrian's that live in Germany are not happy with the Syrian Government and they protest outside the Embassy once in a while.  There is a blockade fence around the embassy and police guards 24 hour a day, 7 days a week.  It was a bit surprising when last Sunday as we walked by the embassy building on our way to church that we noticed the building had been graffitied with red spray paint.  Since that time, the police presence has increased but I wonder where they were the night of the spray painting.  I imagine someone has some explaining to do.  I found out that it has been spray painted before and had to be sandblasted to get the paint off.  As of 1 week later, it is still not cleaned up and there are usually 2 vans full of police just sitting outside the embassy waiting.  It is kind of like shutting the gate after the cows escape.

Last Sunday we went to the Mattias home for dinner.  They are an English family who moved to Germany almost 20 years ago because of employment.  What a lovely, talented family they are.  Sister Mattias and her 4 daughters are all musically gifted.  The oldest plays the harp like I've never heard beore.  The other girls play the piano, organ, and violin, viola, and flute.  They quite often play for us in Sacrament meeting.  They do not have a car, so we all went on the bus to their home.  It was snowing and it was cold.  Sister Mattias got dinner in the oven and we had hot chocolate and visited for awhile.  When Sister Mattias went to check on dinner she found that her oven was not working.  Dinner was not cooked.  She had to call the neighbors and use their oven to cook dinner.  When we finally ate, it was very good, chicken and broccoli pie, potatoes, rote kohl, and corn.  We then had to wait for dessert, rubarb cobbler, to cook.  It was all worth the wait.  We sat around the table chatting.  The girls wanted to know how Elder Johnson and I met.  We also heard how the Mattias' met.  We were at their home fo 5 hours.  We took the bus home, it was still lightly snowing.

Today, Sunday, Brother Celnap invited us for lunch.  He cooked in the church kitchen.  He is a single middle aged man, very nice, but a little different.  He invited some others to help cook and eat.  I sat watching Hines, Sebastian, Kurt, Hardy, and Leno all run around the kitchen getting lunch ready.  They cooked rice with a bunch of veggtables(canned), and hamburger in a sauce.  I was a little bit worried, but it was very good.  Hines said it was his mother's recipe.  She calls it chinese food, but there was nothing about it that was Chinese. 

I have also posted a couple of pictures that show the canal by our house frozen, and a public toilet thatI couldn't believe.  Look closely at the top and read it's title.  Also,  one picture shows ice forming a mound where the water drips and freezes because it is so cold.  The temp hasn't been abouve 0*c in 3 weeks, staying mostly-5*C or lower.  This weeks forecast shows the temp rising to 4*C by Friday with snow showers on and off.  We will see if it holds true.  It isn't much fun riding our bikes to the store in minus degree weather.

We also had the opportunity to meet Elder Texeira this week.  He was here in Berlin doing a Zone Council with the Zone leaders in our mission.  We helped Elder and Sister Monson cook lunch for the Elder Texeira and the Elders.  Sister Monson went all out; she had Portugal flags on the cake, chicken enchiladas, rice and salad.  She had fresh tulips on the tables.  It looked very nice.  The Monson's work in the mission office and will be going home at the end of March.

It Snowed!

This has been a good week.  We joint taught a discussion for Jose with the Sisters Wednesday night.  Jose is going back to India tomorrow. He knows the gospel is true but is afraid to be baptized.  We taught the Restoration,  especially the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon.  I gave him my copy of the October Ensign.  I had brought it with me not knowing why, and was impressed to give it to him.  It is the one all about the Book of Mormon.  I had underlined a lot of things when I read it.  I hope he reads and learns.  We will miss him, he is a very nice man.
  On Saturday, Igor was baptized.  Igor is from Russia, but lives in Germany.  50 people attended.  President Pimentel baptized him.  He was so excited.  He has been struggling with the word of wisdom.  He really wanted to quit smoking.  Sister Risenmay had a 40 day fast for him.  That is where a different person fasts each day 40 days in a row.  He was able to quit with lots of prayers on his behalf.  He was confirmed a member of the church and received the Holy ghost on Sunday in church.  He looked so happy.  
Sunday, we went to bishop Barsch's home for dinner.  As always, his wife cooked a great meal for us.  The sisters went with us.  Their home has a wonderful feel about it.  One of their 5 daughters was there, Sabina.  She is one of our young adults.  She is in her early 20's, very pretty and nice.

The pictures included are of the view from our patio on Sunday morning and of Dan in front of the church at about 1300 on  Sunday afternoon.  As you can see, the snow hasn't melted at all even though the sun has been out.  There is no warmth in the sun here in Berlin!

Just another week in Berlin

We have settled into a routine.  We have FHE on Monday evenings.  We have between 5-8 young adults come.  We enjoy a lesson, play a game and eat.  It is a fun time for all.  Tuesday is usually our shopping day and personal day. We ride bikes to the store, gather supplies for home and institute night. When the weather gets better, we will use this day for sight seeing more.  Wednesdays we finish up what didn't get done on Tuesday and we get ready for English class.  We have a beginning class with  4 students attending.  Our advanced class has 5 students that attend.  It is a fun night teaching English and learning German from them.  Dan always has a silly song to sing and an idiom to expound on.  The German ladies in the class have started teaching us German idioms.  Thursday is Institute night.  This is the day we fix dinner for 45-50 people,  We set up, do prep work during the day and then start cooking around 1600.  some of the young people come early and will come into the kitchen to talk with us while we get ready.  We send them off to class and finish dinner so we can eat when class is over at 2015.  Many of the young people stay and help clean up.  Last week after clean up was done, we  sat around and talked and laughed while others played indoor soccer.  We didn't get home until after 2300.  Fridays and Saturdays are for activities with the young adults, and our Tiergarten ward.  Sunday is church and a new week begins.  We also have been straightening out the Institute Library, adding books in and putting them in order so people can find them. 
Every 6 weeks we have Zone conference with the Mission President, Pres Pimentel, his wife, and the others from our zone.  We enjoy lessons, eat good food, and visit with people we don't see very often.  Today was Zone Conference.  We learned how to communicate better with our companion.  We also learned about the Baptismal doctrine and why it is important to be baptized,  and how to be better missionaries.  It was interesting and informative.  We all enjoyed the day.
 Dan and I help joint teach missionary discussions when they are in English,(our German isn't good enough to teach in German yet).  We enjoy this very much.  One man we've been help teach, Joes, is returning to India next week.  We are sorry to see him go.  He has a testimony of the truthfulness of the Gospel but hasn't been baptized yet.  Hopefully he will seek out the missionaries in India and continue learning and be baptized.  Another young man, Igor is being baptized on Saturday.  He has had to over come a smoking addiction to commit to baptism.  He is trying very hard.  As you know, smoking is a hard addiction to over come.  Pray for him.  He is excited to be baptized.

I've included some pictures of the young adults and from zone conference.  I should have taken more pictures but you know me and cameras, I take it with me but forget to use it.  I hope to get better.

2012 Has Begun

This week the YSA came back.  We had 5 for FHE.  We talked about Pres. Monson's first presidency address in the Ensign.  he spoke about the Abundant Life -alife filledwith an abundance of success, goodness, and blessings.  He offered up his ABC's to help us gain the abundant life.  A refers to attitude.  So much depends on our attitude.  The way we choose to see things and respond makes all the difference.  B is for believe in yourself and those around you and in eternal principles.  Be honest with yourself and God.  Don't limit your self and don't let others limit you.  Trust and believe and have faith.  C is for courage.  Courage becomes a worthwhile virtue when it is regarded not so much as a willingness to die manfully but as a determination to live decently. There will be times when you are frightened and discouraged.  You may feel you are defeated.  At times you may feel like David fighting Goliath.  But remember, David won!  May we remember these ABC's as we begin the New Year and find the abundant life we deserve.
Institute class started up again.  We had about 35 people for class and dinner.  Spaghetti, bread and cake were eaten by all.  It was good to have the YSA's back.  We have missed them. 
Saturday, we had a training class for the ward YSA representatives.  We had cinnamon rolls, banana bread, and juice for breakfast and Pizza and pudding for lunch (thanks Sis Rokow).  The YSA's that attended were blessed for being there. 

Saturday night, Dan and I took a long walk.  We walked to the Tiergarten und Siegessaule.  (affectionately nick named Angel Moroni's girlfriend by Sister Risemay).  From there we walked to the Brandonburg Gate.  It was about 5 pm and already dark so the pictures aren't great.  We will get better ones later during the daylight.   We've been waiting for better weather to go sight seeing, but we may have to revise our thinking.  It is always cloudy, gray, wet and drizzling right now. 

Happy New Year

Last night was our first New Year in Germany.  We had heard it would be loud with fireworks at midnight.  What we didn't expect was  how LOUD it was or how long it lasted.  Fireworks are legal here and not just the safe and sane ones.  They have  more powerful and dangerous fireworks here.  They started about 1800 and kept on going most of the night.  The really big fireworks are smuggled in from Poland.  I still heard a few "loud bangs" when I got up this morning.  We stood out on the balcony and watched the fireworks over the Brandenburg Gate.  This was the official show.  As you looked around the skyline, there were firework shows everywhere.  People on the balcony above us were shooting off  big  loud  fireworks.  The vibrations shook the balcony we were standing on.  The loud noise caused ringing in our ears and gave us headaches.  Finally about 2430 we went inside and tried to go to bed.  With the help of earplugs, I managed to fall asleep.  It was a New Years like we've never experienced before.

We went to church on New Years Day.  The heat in the church building was not working and it was 5*C outside.  We sat through Sacrament meeting in our warm coats and gloves. The Bishop canceled the rest of the meetings due to cold. The mechanic came and got the heat working after most everyone hd left.  We had a YSA brunch planned after church so we went ahead with it.  We had 16 people there.  Everyone brought something to share.  I was assigned to make "American" pancakes.  Everyone ate them up fast.  I also made buttermilk syurp for them.  We will use the left over syurp for ice cream topping tomorrow night at FHE. 

We wish all of you a very "Frohes Neues Jahr".  Love,  Dan and Deb