Week 77: Burek, Sinuses, and Wet Socks

Hello everyone! Greetings again from Celje, Slovenia. 

Before I get any further, I should mention that my P-day next week will not be on Monday, but rather Tuesday, on the 13th. Why? Because the 13th is a Slovene holiday, and we're going on an adventure with other missionaries. I'm not going to give you spoilers though.

The weather here has been fairly wintery this week, because we got snow! Though that means that we've had wet socks and shoes for the last few days, and no one else is really outside, so maybe it's not actually too good, haha. It at least looks nice, though.

Anyway, last Monday we tried to go to the doctor for me to get my illness checked out, but they were already closed by the time we got there. We did some shopping and emailing and the other normal stuff, of course, and ordered pizza at the end of the day.

On Tuesday we did some contacting, had some studies, etc., and then had burek for lunch! This particular burek was from a place that's well known for having great burek. It was indeed quite good. Then we went to the doctor's office and they took some of my blood and told me I didn't have a sinus infection and to just move on with life. At least they broke my 50 Euro bill when I paid, haha. The rest of the day was just the typical Celje stuff like contacting and phone calls, and also ECG.

Wednesday started off with Elder Love and I having our weekly district meeting by ourselves, since the Monsons were on a "business trip" of sorts over in Serbia. It was good, but it's better when there are more than just 2 people that are already together 24/7. We did some contacting, had a lesson with a guy that talks really fast (who had met with missionaries before), and then did some more contacting. That was about it.

This is the kind of bike you see everywhere in Slovenia

Thursday started with a bit more contacting, but then we hiked up to the Celje castle and past it, wearing suits. Why, you ask? Because we were going to attend an annual lunch for representatives of faith-based organizations, put on by the Mayor / City of Celje. We would've used the car to get up the mountain, but the Monsons had it in Serbia. Anyway, we were the first ones there, and there was a bit of a news crew, and other representatives showed up, and there were handshakes and photos were taken of those handshakes, and it was all very formal. We all sat at a big long table, the Mayor gave a little speech, a guy from the Catholic church gave a speech, and then we all had a really fancy meal in this fancy restaurant up on the hill, overlooking the castle and all of Celje. It was quite high class, and the food was pretty good. I was sitting next to the Islamic representative, and I think he, I, and Elder Love were the only ones not drinking wine. When it came up in conversation that I'd been in Sarajevo (a city where the predominant faith is Islam) for a while, he was pretty interested in that. Anyway, after the whole thing as Elder Love and I were walking down the hill towards town, the Mayor drove past us a bit, pulled over, and offered us a ride. We of course took him up on it. The peculiar morning was compensated for by the rest of the day not being terribly interesting, except ECG, and when it started snowing that night.

The fancy restaurant where we got to meet the mayor.

Friday was of course then the day that the wet socks started, because of the snow. Anyway, we met up with a member that hasn't been coming to church regularly, and got to know him a little bit. The conversation did turn to the topic of how we can help him resolve his problems with some certain other members. After that we did some more contacting and tracting, since it's really hard to find anything else to do while there's snow everywhere. We did go back for another lesson with that guy from Wednesday that talks really fast. He said that he firmly believes that The Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith was a prophet, but also that the other churches were true and that he was going to stick with his own church. Later that day, for dinner, we went to a Chinese restaurant with that other member that we've been working with. To sum it up, 2 Americans and a Serb were sitting together eating Chinese food... in Slovenia. It was really good, though.

Scenes like this are common in Celje.

Saturday was pretty much just contacting and tracting in the snow, with more wet socks. I got burek for lunch, and that was a highlight of the day, even though it wasn't from "the burek place". For any of you that've forgotten (or never heard), burek is a dense pastry of sorts, typically baked in pieces about the size of a very thick, full-sized pizza, which they then cut in fourths to sell individually. It's typically stuffed with ground meat, or cheese, but it could also be something like potato or spinach, or even something more desserty like cherry pie-filling. Anyway, at the end of the day we stopped by the Monsons' place to say hi, since they'd just gotten back from their big Serbia trip to take care of some Seminary and Institute stuff.

Yesterday, Sunday, we of course had church like always, and we had a pretty good turnout. Nothing particularly exciting happened, but as they say, "no news is good news", and all the meetings were really good. Then we did weekly planning before going to visit a member family. The husband is from England and is learning Slovene, and the wife is from here in Slovenia and knows pretty good English, and their son speaks both Slovene and English, so we ended up talking in English the whole time. We go to know them better, taught them a quick version of the restoration, asked if they had referrals, and if we could help them at all, all in English. I kinda felt like I was a missionary back home in the US (or perhaps in England) and it was a fairly odd sensation. In any case, it was a great visit, and then we went to have dinner with the Monsons. The menu was hispanic food this time, and it was wonderful. Me gusta.

Good food is an important part of Slovenian life!

As for today, we did all the normal P-day stuff, plus we delivered some treats to a few members, and ran into a funny old lady that thought we were Amish. She started going off about how much she hates cars and technology and war and thought we didn't use cars or technology and didn't eat meat. So, we explained a bit more, and walked with her some, and in the end gave her a card and a copy of The Book of Mormon. But she doesn't have a phone, so it might be hard to get in contact with her again, haha. On the other hand, I would believe it if she read the entire Book of Mormon in less than a day and then came to church on Sunday and asked to be baptized; you never know, especially not with people like her. We'll see. We also discovered that the library's computers were not available for public use today, so we kinda shared the one computer in the church.

Working on the computer at the church.

Your homework for this week is to read "The Peacable Things of the Kingdom" by Elder M. Russell Ballard, from the April session of 2002 General Conference. He basically talks about how and why the gospel of Jesus Christ brings peace into our lives. It's quite a good one.

Learning about and following Jesus Christ and his gospel brings peace.

As for photos, here's one of the strangely-proportioned bicycles that they have around here, and a last name that seems funny to us English speakers. Also, a cool little arch in a small spot of Celje that I hadn't explored yet. Have a great week!

--

Elder Ryan Echols
Adriatic North Mission
Svačićev Trg 3/1
HR-10000 Zagreb
Croatia

Week 76: Member Visits, Someone's Birthday, and My Illness

Hello everyone! We're running pretty short on time, so this email is going to be a short one again.

On Tuesday we had french toast for breakfast, and that was a nice change. Shortly after that we had an appointment scheduled with a member, so we walked over there, but then right as we "arrived" I realized that we were on the wrong side of town. So we called him to tell him we were going to be late, but he told us first that he needed to re-schedule for later in the day. Convenient. For comp study a bit later we read some stuff from the talk "Be Ye Therefore Perfect. Eventually" by Jeffrey R. Holland. It's a really good one. You should read it. Then a bit later we went over for that appointment and got to know him some and shared a spiritual thought from that talk, and it was really good. Then we went to the church for ECG and had a fair group again.

Although it looks like we are drinking alcohol here, we are not! Just having some fun with water in those fancy glasses.

Wednesday started off with district meeting, and then after lunch we made a birthday card for a member and went to drop it off. Then we had about 5 hours left in the day and didn't really know what to do with them, so we kinda just started walking. To our credit, we went along the river, where there are usually a lot of people, so it wasn't just dumb. Though, it turns out that there weren't that many people there then. Darn. Later on in the day we set up a table in front of the church with a TV on it where we played the 20-minute Restoration video a number of times. After we packed up and started heading home for the night, we ran into a funny old guy that was willing to talk to us, though he wasn't interested.

A rooftop view of Celje, Slovenia.

On Thursday morning we drove out to one of the smaller towns around here to visit our beloved Peruvian member, the Elders' Quorum president. He's so great. We tossed a frisbee around a little bit, taught him how to play "Horse" on the basketball court, and then he cooked us some legit Peruvian food for lunch. After we got back to Celje, the rest of the day was just kinda the normal stuff, including ECG.

 

Friday started off with me feeling a bit ill. Just the standard "I have a cold" kinda stuff. So, we stayed inside mostly and did stuff in the Area Book and made calls. At some point we went with the Monsons to visit a different member family. Since they don't speak English, I was suddenly the translator, like my good old times in Sremska Mitrovica. They fed us some cake and juice that was pretty good, and we had a nice little discussion. That night for dinner we went with the Monsons to a restaurant called "Pri Prijatljih" that was pretty darn good. I got "the Celje burger", which had an egg on it. Like, "sunny side up" egg. The egg popped when I put the top bun on. It was a good time. For dessert we got a lava cake to share with some ice cream (and no, Elder Newton, I don't think it was better than the one at Ms. Sofija's 4 Rooms; the record still stands).

Elder Love blowing out a candle for his birthday! He's 19!

Saturday was Elder Love's birthday! And I woke up even more sick than I'd been feeling on Friday. In any case, we went with a member to do some Home Teaching. We visited one of the older members. What a funny guy. After we read a chapter together from the Book of Mormon, he fed us some cold lasagna that we ate with our hands (no, we didn't have plates either). But the other member didn't ask for a plate or anything, so I guess it's normal. Sounds good to me. Later in the day after some of the normal stuff, we met up with one of the younger members to briefly celebrate Elder Love's birthday. So, we went to Hotel Evropa where they have really good cakes. I got a lemon one that was really really good. The member even brought a candle for Elder Love's cake. Then he went with us back to the church to teach a lesson, but the lesson got delayed by an hour or so. In the end we did have the lesson, and it was pretty good. It was the same guy that we met at the end of the year and then had one lesson with while Elder Jensen was here on exchanges. He seems to have promise, but he's kinda busy so our meetings might be infrequent.

The yummy lemon cake I ordered at a restaurant.

On Sunday we of course had church, and the District President was there visiting. He's a really friendly guy. Our Elders' Quorum president gave one talk, and the District President gave the other, and they were both really good. The rest of church was definitely really good too, and since the District President served his mission in Spain (if I heard correctly), he helped translate for our dear Peruvian friend when he wanted to more fully express himself. The rest of Sunday was pretty regular, including weekly planning and a delicious dinner at the Monsons'. We even got leftovers to take home that we had for lunch today! Haha.

The beautiful cobblestone streets of Celje, with cafes everywhere.

Today, since I still wasn't feeling good, I asked Elder Monson and Elder Love to give me a Priesthood blessing, and then later tried to go to the doctor, but the doctor was first busy and then closed and it just didn't work. So, we'll try again tomorrow.

Your homework is to read that talk I mentioned, "Be Ye Therefore Perfect -- Eventually". It's super good. Here are some photos! Have a great week!

--

Elder Ryan Echols
Adriatic North Mission
Svačićev Trg 3/1
HR-10000 Zagreb
Croatia

Week 75: Slovene Food, Zone Conference, Lake Bled

Hello everyone! I'm going to tell you right off the bat right now that this email is going to be shorter than normal. And probably not anywhere near as detailed, since I don't have my journal with me. Hopefully I'll be able to remember what even happened this week.

On Tuesday we started off with a lesson with a lady that was baptized about 15 years ago, but who was never confirmed. It's kind of an odd situation. In any case, it was a really good lesson, and we had the Monsons there to help, and even though there are some problems with transportation so she can come to church, she seemed determined to figure out a way to start coming again. The rest of that day was kinda just the normal stuff until ECG, when we again had a full 6 people come, which was great. After ECG finished, we then put on the special broadcast/announcement from the church, in which we found out that President Russel M. Nelson is the new President of the church, and the prophet. It was a pretty cool broadcast, and he of course had some good things to say. The biggest that that I noticed was him talking about "the covenant pathway" and the temple. As followers of God, we ought to strive to make and keep covenants, including especially those in the temple. If you don't know what temples are for, feel free to ask. If you know what temples are for but have never been, work towards being able to go! If you've been to the temple before, figure out how and when you will go the next time. 

The Paris, France Temple

On Wednesday we had to take a trip to Ljubljana one more time, but this time for my visa stuff, not Elder Love's we were supposed to meet up with the guy who knows how all this stuff works at 1pm, plus 4 sisters that also needed to show up for similar stuff. Turns out our friend who had the forms and such couldn't make it on time because he had a doctor's appointment that got delayed pretty badly. So, then the plan was to meet at the visa place at 3pm. But, we were all already there. So, we found a restaurant nearby and sat down to have lunch for an hour, and then all had language study together for the other hour. But we didn't really have any books to study from, so we had a nice long conversation in only Slovene, asking each other questions along the way. There's no practice like real life, right? Anyway, we did eventually get the visa stuff taken care of, and then came back to Celje. We kind of ended up running in circles as the GPS tried to first take us to a gas station that didn't exist, but we eventually got it to take us to a real one to fill up. That night we had dinner with that member that came to church for the first time in a while last week, and it was again good to get to know him better.

On Thursday we didn't really have anything special, but when we had ECG for that evening, a whole 7 people came! This place suddenly came alive, now that the holidays are clearly over. It's good.

Me and Elders Jensen, Hanks, and Crapo at Zone Conference

Friday was zone conference! That means another trip to Ljubljana. It was really good, like always. I really love getting to see other missionaries at events like Zone Conference. Also, the lunch was catered by two ladies from the Ljubljana branch, which means that it was all native Slovene food. So, really good.

Me with Sister Squires and Sister Brown. The one photo bombing in the back is Sister Baker.

Saturday, for lunch we went to a member's house with the Monsons. So yet again, we had some really good native Slovene food. After that, we helped her prepare some food for the big branch lunch for Sunday. For most of the rest of the day we looked for members and did some tracting and nothing really happened. We were originally planning on going to Ljubljana to attend another baptism, but the investigator got sick and backed out and stuff, so we couldn't go either. Oh well.

Yesterday, Sunday, we of course had church, which was splendid. Yet another member that hasn't come to church in a long time, came for the first time again. That was nice. He's from Serbia, and so I ended up talking with him in Serbian about Sremska Mitrovica a bit. Then for Sunday School I was the one teaching the lesson out of the book of Moses, which we don't have translated into Slovene. So, we were using the old Croatian version (we don't even have the new one here yet), and it was pretty fun. Though, the lesson did end up going pretty well. At the end in my closing remarks I ended up accidentally using a Croatian word, since I'd just had all that Croatian influence in my head from the reading, and everyone thought that it was pretty funny (including me). The lesson for Elders' Quorum was again taught by our Peruvian member, who's learning Slovene. I'm pretty sure I've said this before, but I really like hearing him speak his mix of Spanish and Slovene. Also, he just teaches really darn good lessons! Then after church we had a big lunch all together, which means even more traditional native Slovene food! Plus, one of the members of Serbian heritage brought Sarma (meat and rice wrapped in cabbage leaves, that has then been cooked/soaked for a number of hours), one of my favorite foods from over here. It was really great. Later that night we had an activity sort of thing where we watched the broadcast/devotional from Elder and Sister Uchtdorf that they did about a week ago. Man, those were some good talks. His talk seemed really applicable to real life, you know? He just really answered pretty much any practical question that a young person can have. For example, "I have no idea what career would be best for my future; what do I do?" It may be one of my favorite talks ever. Then we had lemon bars after and it just added onto to awesomeness.

The island in the middle of Lake Bled. It's so scenic!

Today was a bit of an adventure. It's a bit of a long story, but after doing some of our business stuff in the morning, we went with the Monsons to Ljubljana for them to do some business type stuff, and then continued on past Kranj and over to Lake Bled! I don't know if any of you have seen postcard-photos from Slovenia, but if you have, then you've probably seen a photo of Lake Bled. It's a really pretty lake, that has a castle up on a cliff on one side overlooking the lake, plus an island right in the middle (the only island in Slovenia, apparently) that has this cool church on it. It was really cool. They also have a special kind of cake that's unique to that little region, I guess, so we of course got ourselves some of that. Apparently the Ljubljana sisters and Kranj sisters were there too, and we eventually found them with Sister Kanell stuck in the bathroom in a pizzeria. I'd say it's a long story, but it's actually quite short: they got lunch at the pizzeria, Sister Kanell used the bathroom, and the door wouldn't open when she needed to get out. Weird. On our way back to Celje, the four of us wandered our way into Kranj and got some of their missionary-famous Doner Kebab. It was pretty good, but I couldn't really tell a difference from the Celje Kebab that we have (which is equally missionary-famous). But, turns out that Kranj is a super cool city. That was the first time I'd ever been there. 

A view of Kranj, Slovenia.

Anyway, your homework for the week is to watch the announcement about President Russel M. Nelson being the new president of the church, including the messages that he and his counselors gave. Then, if you want extra credit, you can watch the devotional from Elder and Sister Uchtdorf! It's really really good, especially if you're wondering what to do with your life or how to make big decisions.

Here are some photos! Enjoy! Have a great week!​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
--

Elder Ryan Echols
Adriatic North Mission
Svačićev Trg 3/1
HR-10000 Zagreb
Croatia

Week 74: Jigsaw puzzles, Ljubljana adventures, and Member visits

Hello everyone! This week has been pretty good. The weather has been a bit colder again, and yesterday it even started snowing! So now there's snow all over. I like it. Anyway, on to the weekly adventures.

Last Monday, after emailing, we went to have dinner with one of the members around here that used to be the branch mission leader, and then we got ice cream after. It was a pretty good time. While we were over there in that part of town, Elder Love decided that he wanted a jigsaw puzzle, since he'd obviously seen my doughnut jigsaw puzzle, so he bought one too and did that this week.

Elder Love's completed puzzle.

 On Tuesday, Elder Love and I went "former hunting". That's where we try to find people that have met with the missionaries in the past, whose addresses we still have. This time it took us way over to the far north edge of Celje, near the church of the Holy Ghost. We found the lady, but she said no. On our way back, we talked to a lady on the street that started off with the response that her boyfriend had studied theology and had been planning on being a priest, trying to imply that she couldn't possibly be interested. But, I said, "Oh, then he'll love this book!" and showed her the Book of Mormon and explained a bit about it. She actually took a copy to show to him, and was amazed at how well we spoke Slovene. Then around noon the Zone Leaders, Elders Jensen and Zimmerman, showed up for us to start exchanges. But first we all got Kebab, and the zone leaders' car got a parking ticket. Anyway, then Elders Zimmerman and Love left for Ljubljana, and it was me and Elder Jensen here in Celje together again, just like old times. Then we had a lesson with "Ender", who Elder Jensen of course already knew. It went really well, and Elder Jensen was really impressed with how he's changed since even last transfer, a few weeks ago. A bit later we had a first lesson with that guy that we met just before New Year's. He talks really fast. But, the lesson went really well despite me often needing to rely on Elder Jensen to know what the guy was saying. Turns out he knows a lot of random stuff from the Bible, almost like he's read it a number of times. In fact, I'm pretty sure he's read it a number of times. Anyway, he said he'd be busy for the next few weeks, so we'll see what happens. Then we had ECG, and only our star student came, the 12-year-old. He really is great, though. We played pictionary at the end since we had a few extra minutes. For dinner, Elder Jensen and I made tacos.

Me and Elder Love.

Wednesday morning we had district meeting with the Monsons, which was good as always. Toward the end of that, we got a call from the APs asking me to get them some special numbers, since I'm "the DataMaster". It's pretty interesting what you can find out from writing down a lot of stuff, and then putting it all in a spreadsheet and telling it to give you a graph. Anyway, then we had lunch, paid the Zone Leaders' parking ticket, had studies, had a lesson fall through, did some roleplays, etc. Then we tried visiting a potential investigator that wasn't home, and went tracting. Since we were pretty far from our apartment, but were getting really hungry, we decided to just stop at a restaurant on the way home. The one we picked was called "Gostilna Amerika". Believe it or not, they don't have American food, but rather Serbian. It was some really good food.

On Thursday morning we packed up Elder Jensen's stuff, then headed out to Ljubljana to finish the exchange. Somehow we ended up giving a blessing to a member's friend before meeting up with Elders Zimmerman and Love. Elder Zimmerman made grilled cheese/paninis, and I messed with their Christmas-themed Rubik's cube that kept falling apart. From there, Elder Love and I headed out to get his Visa card thing, but the problem quickly arose that we didn't know where the government building is where we could do that, and neither did the Zone Leaders. So, we tried calling the other Ljubljana Elders, and then the Sisters after the Elders didn't answer, and to make a long story short, we eventually got there, after about 9 U-turns. Then we go in and the lady says that Elder Love can't get the Visa thing without his parent or legal guardian there, "because he's only 17". I told her that he was in fact 18, and then she checked her math with the years and realized that he really is 18. So then we got the Visa thing, and couldn't figure out how to get out of the parking lot. We did eventually get out, and then drove back to Celje. For ECG that night, a whole 6 people came! That's a large change from normal, and it was great. After that, we had a lesson scheduled with "Ender" and he didn't come.

Sister Brown, Sister Crosby, and me.

On Friday we went to stop by a member's place to pick up something that she needed to get to another member, and it turned out that she invited us in and fed us lunch, and we shared a spiritual thought, and it was great. Then we went to give that paper to the other member, and then ran into yet another member on our way to the library to use Google Maps. Once we got into the library, we ran into "Ender", and so scheduled a lesson for later that day. Time for the lesson rolls around, and he doesn't come. Darn. Well, at least I got to practice piano while we were waiting for him. Then we went and tried to visit another member, but they were sick. On our way back, the streets were really empty, and I don't really know why. Maybe it was because it got cold again. So, we went back to the church and got some other work done that needed to happen at some point. After dinner and language study, we went over to the Monsons' place (they're the senior couple here in Celje) to watch President Monson's funeral services (that President Monson being the prophet and most recent President of this church). It was really good. Everyone that spoke seemed to talk about how service-minded he was. Always keeping an eye out for a way to help someone, even if it might seem really small.

President Monson will be missed.

On Saturday morning we did some calls and such, then borrowed the Monsons' car to fill it up with gas, since we used it to go to Ljubljana. The GPS promptly led us to a gas station that doesn't currently exist, so we did some circles around town a bit trying to get to one that does exist. Anyway, we eventually got it figured out, had lunch, a lesson didn't show up, but we re-scheduled it for later in the day. We did some contacting, and then the re-scheduled time rolled around, and they again didn't show up. A bit later we went out to visit an older member, and we talked a bit with him, then read a chapter together in the Book of Mormon. He really likes reading the Book of Mormon. As we left, he gave us a little chocolate Santa. From there we tried visiting some other members, but none of them were home, so we ended up tracting a building. We met one really chill guy that was really friendly, but said he wasn't interested. We also ran into a lady that the Sisters had apparently met before, and so we're going to try to visit her sometime soon.

A very strange looking chocolate Santa.

Yesterday, Sunday, we had church of course. Probably the best part was that one member came that hasn't come to church in quite a long time! I don't know how long it's been, actually. Thanks to Elder Love for texting him and asking him to come. Everyone was very welcoming, of course, and it was great to see. The rest of church was pretty normal. Though, for Elders' Quorum, our Peruvian Elders' Quorum president taught the lesson in his half-Spanish half-Slovene. I love it. He basically uses Slovene verbs, nouns, and adjectives, but then Spanish prepositions and conjunctions. It's great. After church, Elder Love and I took care of the usual business stuff, and then had a meeting with that member who came again for the first time in a long time. It was a good talk, and it seems like he's pretty well on his path back to coming every week, but there are still some hang-ups. We'll figure it out, though. We had weekly planning like always, then dinner at the Monsons' like every Sunday, and it was wonderful like usual. That night in our weekly call with the Zone Leaders, they were of course extremely excited to hear that the previously-mentioned member came back to church finally.

As for today, so far we've gone to buy groceries, did a bunch of phone calls, some Area Book work, emailed, heard about some hype for the winter olympics, got approached by a guy that's in an Estonian band, and now we're going to go visit a member.

Your homework is to read I Have a Work for Thee. It's super good. Every one of us has a specific purpose here on Earth in this life. And it's not necessarily some one huge thing; it very well might be a series of small positive things every day that really add up.

Scrabble on someone's door!

Here's a photo of Elder Love's puzzle, plus the last name on someone's door that I thought looked like Scrabble. Have a great week!

--

Elder Ryan Echols
Adriatic North Mission
Svačićev Trg 3/1
HR-10000 Zagreb
Croatia