Hello Everyone!
It's been a rather interesting week here in Liberec. I'll start off from Tuesday and let you know what's been going on.
Tuesday: I was mostly packed, and we had a ton of lessons. Taught english, tied up loose ends, and started emotionally preparing myself to pick up a new greenie. We had a small party (Elder Lance from Jihlava was alone since his companion, Elder Hicken, had to go to prague early for office training) and got everything packed. 4:30 arrives, and I started getting myself ready and out the door with the other two elders for my bus at 6:00. It was cold, but not too bad. It had snowed a little on Tuesday, but nothing significant. I watched the sun come up on the Czech plains and then we started winding up towards Prague. Mountain passes turned into snowy mountain passes full of traffic, and the bus started to get delayed. We made it safely to Florenc in Prague where I hopped off, grabbed my stowed luggage, and started heading towards the metro. The subway in Prague is just fun to ride and handle, but you can imagine how much more fun it gets trying to take care of your life in three small suitcases. Pretty exciting, hauling luggage up and down stairs. I remember it was harder earlier, so my hard-core exercise routine (aka. a couple of push-ups and a set of situps followed by some reps lifting weights) has started paying off. Imagine me dressed in my overcoat, suit coat, and my normal missionary garb, strong-arming two full suitcases with a carryon under my arm and a backpack full of books, running up and down staircases to catch metro stops and you'll get the idea. I was exhausted. I showed up for the trainer meeting just in time, but to my dismay half of the group was visa waiting for a day and would be arriving at 3 on Wednesday. So, I got to serve in Prague for a day! We spent the day helping people to stop smoking, teaching the restoration, and singing primary songs with families, all the while running around Prague, popping out of the metro, hopping on buses, using trams, running across namestis. It was really intense, and I had a blast serving with my temporary companion, Elder Johnson (He was actually a clothes model before his mission, so I picked up a few style tips while there :P). I spent the night with him and then we headed back to the building in the morning to pick up our missionaries. I'd reserved bus tickets for 3 and was ready to pick up and move out again. So, we got to the building, and I ran into Elder Osborn - one of the waiting missionaries. Yes, THE Elder Osborn, the one I went to high school with, saw around college, marched with American Fork with, and took math classes with. He's in the Czech Republic, Czech Speaking. Pretty darn sweet. It was good to see him. We had our meeting with the President and his wife and assignments were made. "Let's start with Elder Anderson - Elder Anderson will be serving up in the cold land of Liberec with.....Elder Bown!" I tackled my greenie with a hug, and we got plenty of great pictures.
So, Elder Bown is an American who was raised in Geneva, Switzerland, and that's where he calls "home." He speaks English, German, and French fluently, and has a really good attitude trying to learn and speak Czech because of it. It's really exciting having another German speaker around (turns out that Elder Weser, one of the other elders in Liberec, speaks German fluently because his dad is German, so we're tearing up the German work here as well as Czech). He's really enthusiastic, has high hopes and high expectations, and is ready to work. He's also willing to put up with a lot, as you'll see in a minute.
So, we had lunch, got to know each other a bit (he studied at BYU and wants to be a dentist, likes swimming, and loves reading), and caught our bus from the other end of Prague after another round of "run around Prague with luggage". The bus trip was comfortable, but when we approached Liberec we landed in a blizzard, with everything coated in about a foot and a half of white stuff. Lots of snow and slush. Elder Young, the district leader, and elder Weser were both waiting for us and helped us get to our apartment in Liberec South. After getting lost for a while, we hauled our luggage to the top of an apartment building to our new home. I didn't think to much of it at the time, but I noticed that some of the fixtures were taken apart and a few paint cans were on the floor. But, we had an English class to teach at 5, so we ran out the door and back into the center. After English, we had district meeting, set goals (I'll be earning my next language level this transfer along with the rest of the district), and headed home to unpack. We got lost again, finally found our apartment, and headed up to the top of the building. As we walked in, elder Bown sat down to relax for a second, but I quickly assessed the situation. Paint cans...ladders...missing fixtures...and work clothes. The apartment wasn't ready yet and was under construction still! Furniture was disassembled, paint was drying, and it was overall unlivable. A few phone calls to the office and some quick decisions later, and we were headed back out the door with soaking wet luggage into the snow to make it back to the other elder's apartment. We're still staying there now, actually, living out of our luggage, with Elder Bown sleeping on the couch and me curled up on a warm spot on the floor on a pad made of old blankets (they heat the buildings here with hot water, and I think the pipes bend where I'm set up, so it's nice). It's kind of fun, really, and we're really unified as a district already. Unfortunately, some of my books and most of my letters got soaked in the deluge, but most everything was salvageable and we're high and dry again. The snow is starting to melt off, but it's certainly looking to be an interesting "fall" into winter.
We've already started contacting, met the members (the branch here is great), and Elder Bown is hard at work on mastering the language. He's doing a great job already, and is doing most of the speaking when we start our contacts now. We're setting up to meet our investigators and to get contact with some of our potential investigators, and it's looking to be a very exciting, successful transfer. Of note, we went tracting Friday night as a district (which was a blast), and Elder Bown got his first "The police are waiting for you downstairs" being-yelled at experience. He handled it well (of course, no one was waiting downstairs), and we found a new family, an older woman, and one of our English students there. Overall, we're being taken care of by the lord, and we are looking ahead to some great successes this transfer.
I'm sending off mail today, including some birthday cards and letter replies. They were supposed to go out last week, but unfortunately packing took a slightly higher priority. In the mean time, I hope you all have a great week and I look forward to telling you about our coming successes this week. I did get to see Sunday conference on Saturday, and my favorites were easily Elders Holland, Nelson, and especially Elder Christofferson. Really good talk on moral agency, really sad how people just don't understand themselves or their environment to realize that everything does point back to a God in heaven. But, I guess it's my job to help people open there eyes to that and what that means to them personally.
Love and miss you all,
Elder Brent Anderson
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