January 9, 2012

HOLA!!!!

            Hello mi madre, how are you doing? I am doing good, sorry that I am lame and didn`t tell you much about how holiday adventures, that is because we really didn`t do much. Chinese fondue takes like an hour and a half to eat, so to do much else. We ate Chinese fondue 3 times over the holidays. The Monday after Christmas we went with Elder Sullivan and Elder Alston to an eating appointment with them in Winterthur. It was fun. It was a big family get together, and it was cool to eat food. Then we went to the Maglio family, and had Chinese fondue, and talked, and ate, and talked and ate. That is what Swiss people do.

            Anyways, about the German food, I have no idea what German meatloaf is, but I have eaten meatloafy kinda stuff that had hard boiled eggs in it, as well as pickles. It was pretty good. I would actually prefer real fleishkäse. I don`t really know how to explain it, other then it is a loaf of meat. You bake it like you would bake a loaf of bread. We always buy it premade, but you can also buy the ready to bake kind here. I have no clue how to make it though, but the internet would know for sure. Spätzle is super good. I love it. When we, as missionaries eat it, we fry it, then as it is frying pour scrambled eggs on it, and then melt cheese on the top. But you have to spice it pretty heavily if you do that. Otherwise I would suggest you eat spätzle with gulash. I have no clue how you would make gulash, it is meat, potatoes, other vegetables, all in a stewy broth. But spätzle tastes really good like that. Or google schwabish spätzle. Zweiback rolls are good, but I have never had cinnamon swirl cake or apple Plachinga. Things that I would suggest.... hm... swabish maltaschen are the best, by far my favorite thing to eat. you could also try salz kuchen, or salt cake. That was pretty good as well. I was only in Germany for 7 weeks, so its hard to remember what we ate. But those are the things I remember the most. Spätzle with gulash and maltaschen. (Our family is having an FHE with extended family and we thought it would be fun to try some of the foods Elder Terry is eating on his mission.  So I found some recipes and asked Elder Terry what he thought.  The preceding were his thoughts on the matter.  The only problem is we don't live in a place that sells German ingredients so our choices were limited)
            No Leichtenstein today.... :( we will have to see maybe in a few weeks. It takes a little bit of planning, and the zone leaders keep saying they will plan it, but they don`t have time. I will plan it and then invite them. But probably not until end of January or so.  And we get the Liahona in both German and English.
            Now a little bit about our week. This week was pretty awesome. First of all we went by on a part member family from Brazil, and their cousin was over. We were able to give him the first lesson, the Book of Mormon, and got his number to give to the missionaries where he lives. (he also lives in Switzerland, just not in our area.)
            Then on Tuesday we went by on a former investigator that we have been trying for the entire last transfer to contact. She let us up because she thought we were her son, and as we came up the stairs and to her apartment she was smoking a cigarette. As soon as she saw us she threw the cigarette away and told us that she had just lost her job, and was at her wits end, and prayed to God that He would send help, and 5 minutes later we show up. So that was super cool. We were able to teach her and her 16 year old son, and an 18 year old girl that lives there with them.
            Then as well we visited C........, a less active sister who is super active now, and gave her a blessing because she was sick. We also taught her daughter to prepare her for baptism. She is 7. We are also working on teaching her husband, who is not a member.
            Then we also met with the C......... family from Eritria again. They are doing great. It is super hard because the mom doesn`t really understand what we are teaching, but the kids love it. We talked about baptism and asked if they would be baptized, and the mom said they needed to pray about it. So they definitely need some prayers in their behalf. Both both of the kids came to church yesterday, so that is a good sign. Anyways, things are starting to pick up again after the holiday season, and hopefully we will get a few baptisms in soon. We have a long way to go to reach our mission goal of 300+! I know this church is true, and I am so excited to help people learn that for themselves! The Book of Mormon rocks and I love you!

Liebe
Elder Terry