Playing football by the Eiffel Tower

Tuesday, Aug. 11th, 2009

Well it's Tuesday again. I wasn't able to e-mail yesterday because it was Paris P-Day for the Paris-Villes, which you can probably figure out just means we get to go into Paris for one P-Day. It was my first Paris P-Day and it was fun. First thing we did was met at some field and played a big football game with a bunch of the elders from the Paris area. That went for a couple hours and was really fun, it was cool playing a football game in the middle of Paris with the Eiffel Tower off to one side and other famous things all around. Also it was kind of funny to have every tourist and every anybody walk by stop and watch a bunch of americans playing american football.

So we played till 1:30 or so then some of us walked over to the Paris Chinese elders' appartment to change and shower. And by the way I decided I want to get really good at my French so I can maybe get switched to a Chinese elder, I'm not sure why, I just like the downtown Parisness and their tiny little appartment and stuff. One of the Chinese elders mentioned that he is the only missionary in the world to sleep closest to the Eiffel Tower, which is kind of cool.

So after showering we went and ate kebabs and then just went to the Eiffel Tower to just take pictures and stuff. We pretty much just stayed there the whole time then had to leave a little earlier than we'd have liked because we had a rendez-vous but it was good too. So that was the highlight of the week.

Other than that I've just been getting moved and settled in, which is a pain but I'm well planted now. I'm still not super comfortable here and it just feels really different, like another mission. Paris P-Day was weird cuz I didn't know a ton of people there as where on the other side of the mission I pretty much knew everybody because of zone conferences and stuff. But it's cool to just meet a whole new group and stuff.

Anyways about my companion; he is from Oregon, he's been out for about 11 months or so and ya I don't know what else. We have different personalities but we get along fine.

But anyways it's cool to hear about calls and weddings and stuff, keep me updated on those things which would interest me.

First Transfer

Here's Elder Lyman's email. He is being transferred to Nogent.

P-day again. So I'm not sure if I mentioned it or not but Wednesday is the end of the transfer. It seems like I would have mentioned it since that has been a rather large part of my and the other missionaries I live with's thoughts but I don't remember saying anything about it. Anyways this one was the first real exciting transfer for me since the other ones I was pretty sure I was staying here. This one I was almost positive I was leaving, and I am. I'm going to Nogent, which is a Paris ville. So it is just on the outskirts of Paris I guess would be the way to explain it. I guess I'll be going in to Paris fairly often for different things. For one I guess we go in each Saturday for something called expo. I'm not sure exactly what I do but I guess they give tours of the church in Paris for the public and I think we just go contact and try to get people to come. So that's pretty cool and different from where I am now, the church in downtown Paris is just like a few minutes walk from Notre Dame and stuff. That won't be my ward's chapel but I'll still be there each week.

It will all be quite different I'm sure. I'll be going from little Angers with buses that I'm very familiar with to Paris and the metro and just a much more city-like place. My new companion is named Elder Carlsen but other than that I don't know him, I think I met him once my first transfer at zone conference. So basically right now everything is just a mystery to me, I pretty much have no idea what to expect. I think the Nogent ward is pretty big so that is cool. I talked to Elder Carlsen very briefly last night and he said about half the ward speaks English, so it might be fairly similar to the ward here. So you know what is going on right now with me, the next couple days will be filled with packing and laundry doing probably.

Angers is going back down to just 2 missionaries, so my companion will be staying and will be training and they'll be the only companionship. I'll be living in another 4 man appartement but I don't know the other 2 missionaries either, but one is from Zurick Switzerland. So anyways other than that I don't know.

As far as my week, notable things would be zone activity and a ward activity we did Saturday. Friday we went to Nantes for our zone activity, which was a luau at the church. It was fun we just barbecued, wore layuh layuhs (can't spell it but that is the sound) and played sports and stuff. Then Saturday night we did an activity we had put together with the ward, it was on the Plan of Salvation. We had them in the chapel and simulated a plane ride then a plane crash. Then dressed in white as angels we told them they were dead and took them through different rooms which represented the spirit world, judgement and kingdoms and what not. There was a member volunteer in each room who explained the kingdom or whatever they were in. At the end they ended up in the chapel which was the celestial kingdom and there were a few short speakers. Then we asked who wasn't there (celestial kingdom) who they wished was. So it was supposed to encourage member missionary participation and stuff. It was a good activity even though a very large number of members couldn't be there because it is vacation right now so everyone was gone. But the ward here is awesome and I am definitely gonna miss them. I will definitely come back to church here when I visit after.