Sunday 21 September 2014

Bern, baby, Bern!!

Guten Tag!!!!

Es tut mir lied for any spelling mistakes, these German keyboards may take a while to get used to!!! Crazy things!!

So, I'll give a run down on life so far!!! Mittwoch was one long day! Up at 3, printed emails and we all met in the Foyer to say a prayer! Just my luck to get picked by Pres Edwards to do the last prayer at the MTC! We had a pretty nice flight to München, where Pres and Sis Kohler met us with the Assistants, Office Elders and the München Zone Leaders!! It was so cool! We put our suitcase in a van and then went in groups with one of the missionaries to get a train to München 2 (I think it was 2) where we had orientation. So on the train we had to try to hand out a Das Buch Mormon! I sat near two ladies. It took me a while to build up the confidence to start a converstaion auf Deutsch, but I did! They were on holidaz in München for a week, from Barcelona! One of them spoke no German and the other spoke basic, so my basic German was perfect for that Converstaion! It turns out there neighbour is a member and they've been to church activities, etc and read the Book of Mormon!! How cool! They said they'll see about meeting with the missionaries when they get back home, so it was pretty good!

So we got to München 2 and had lunch, and you'll never guess who President Kohler picked on to do the first prayer in the mission... yep, that's right, me! Fun times!!! My Deutsch prayers are getting better!! :D So we then had Orientation/training meetings, and an interview with President!! 

In the evening after dinner and interviews, we had a meeting where we were told our area and companion! We got a little card with our area and companion with a picture of them. My card said I was going to serve in Pratteln Ward with Elder Little... We then had a testimony meeting which was amazing. Then went to a hostel to go to bed. Becasue there were like 31 of us, our trainers didn't meet us in München, and we couldn't all fit in the mission home! 

Donnerstag- we began with training from 9.30 till 11, and then we went to Hauptbahnhoff (main train station) Where we picked up our bags, congregated in the middle of the station and missionaries from across the mission who were either moving to the München zone or going home came. Those staying in the zone were picked up by their trainers there. Those of us heading to Schweiz got a train to Zurich Bahnhoff, which was a 4+hr train ride, killer!! We met our trainers there and did the same thing in the middle of the station, it's a mission tradition or something! haha! That is when I found out we were serving in Bern, not Pratteln! Elder Little is from Northampton, yes! A Brit!! So we got our train to Bern, dropped my suitcases off at our apartment and went to a lesson with the Zone leaders (Elders Dewey and Simon), who are the other Bern missionaries! It is pretty cool! We had a really good lesson and then went back to the apartment to unpack and go to bed!
At Hauptbahnhof (See if you can spot Elder Robertson)

Freitag- What a day! We are white washing in on Bern, and Elder Little has never served here before either, so we are trying to find our way around this city and find new investigators as we don't really have any solid Untersuchers (investigators). Fun times! My finding lingo, is definitely expanding, which is great!
Elder Robertson & Elder Little

Samstag- We had a great day! More finding! Then Elder Little is also the District Leader so we went to District Leader Training Saturday afternoon, which was cool to meet more missionaries in the Zone! We then went up to Zollikofen to practice a song that we were doing for a Baptism on Sunday evening, which was fun! Zollifoken chapel is right next to the Bern temple so it was amazing! 

Sonntag- What a day! Church in German was well fun!! I understood about 30% of the meetings, and I had to introduce myself and bear my testimony in Sacrament, which was so not fun, but I did it and people told me it was great afterwards, sooo... :) We then studied, and then went off to Zollikofen again for the baptism. The guy being baptised is French speaking, so we had a baptism all in French! The spirit was so strong there, even though my French is worse than my German! ahha! It was great! We sang 'Je suis enfant de dieu' which was fun! Sister Edwards' music activities efery other week really paid off when singin I am a Child of God in French!! :D 

Have a great week Guys!!

Love you all!

Elder Ammon Robertson x