First of all, we had another exchange, this time I went to Kraków with sister Petersen and Sister Bąk went to Katowice with Sister King. Just after I arrived in Kraków, literally just after we walked into the sisters' apartment, sister King called me, to ask if I still had the keys to our apartment in Kato... unfortunately I did, so sister King and Sister Bąk had to spend the next two nights in the recently vacated zone leader apartment. We all still had a great exchange though. Sister Petersen and I got some good contacts, I finally gave out the Book of Mormon I've been carrying in my bag, and trying to give to someone, for like 2 months! And we set up a meeting for Petersen and Bąk with this awesome girl we tracted into. We chose to knock on her door because we were about to leave the building, when I noticed her keys hanging in her door and I was like "aww, man, I hate it when I do that!" So I told sister Petersen that we needed to let her know that she left her keys in her door. And when we talked to her she was totally interested in hearing about the gospel too, it was awesome!
Sister King and I went with Kaja to watch her handball training on Thursday night. It was really cool, but the warm up made me miss going to kung fu :( Handball is a sport I've been hearing about since the MTC. I didn't really know much about it before, and I can't say I know a whole lot about it know, but I can recognise it when i see it. It's kind of like a cross between basketball, and soccer and it looks like a lot of fun.
Sister King and I also went to mass with our dzieci english kids. There was a special event, on the 5th where the mass is kind of centered more for the kids (that's the only way I can think to describe it). They had Saint Mikołaj (Santa clause) come, and the kids had cute little lanterns that they carried around the cathedral. It was really cute, especially because we were with our dzieci and their mom. It was a really cool experience.
Unfortunately we had a very sad thing happen this week. Helena, one of our best and strongest members here in Katowice, passed away on Thursday. She had been sick for a while and had gone to the doctors for surgery and I guess something must have gone wrong from that. We had her funeral on Saturday. It was very sad, but she was a strong member, she knew and loved the gospel, and she was able to go to the temple before she died so I just know now she's chilling in heaven, getting all of her deep doctrine questions answered.
Sister king and I had a bit of an adventure trying to get to the funeral, it was like an episode of Spongebob combined with and episode of Seinfeld, because everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong on the way there, and we got really lost. (disclaimer, I never got lost before Sister King was my companion! lol) First of all, we had a YSA activity to go to in Kraków after the funeral, and we were in charge of bringing desert, so we had a pan of brownies in a big bright orange biedronka bag (plastic grocery bag from a store called biedronka, it's got a big goofy-looking ladybug on it) and were planning to drop it off at the chapel before the funeral. But on the way there we realised we wouldn't be able to drop it off and catch our bus on time, so we took it with us, only to find out that the bus was late, and we would have had time to drop it off. Then, when we got on our bus we missed the stop to get off, by two stops, and had to find our way to a tram stop. At one point the map indicated that we needed to be one street over from where we were, but there was a hill and train tracks in the way. So i said to King "Do you think we should just cross the train tracks?" She replied with "hmmm, I don't know" Then, just as she finished saying that, literally out of nowhere, a train goes zipping by at light speed with perfect cartoon comedic timing. We eventually found our way to the funeral, but now we were there, late, with a big bright orange bag, sticking out like sore thumbs. Also, we realised we didn't have flowers or anything to put on Helena's grave. I remarked to sister King that the only way this day could be more like an episode of Seinfeld is if we pulled flowers out of the garbage or off of another grave, to put on Helena's. Don't worry, we didn't, we have some tact. It was just a kind of funny thing amidst a day of sadness.
After that was the YSA activity, as I mentioned before. It was a lot of fun, Daniel came with us, and Kaja met us there. The Elders couldn't come, but Elder Gibby did get to come late with Elder Boyce who was back in Katowice for the funeral. We had a white elephant gift exchange. I really wanted Daniel's gift, it was an American flag mug, with a little Santa, and chocolates. But Elder Garcia stole it from me, like twice! and I ended up with roll-on deodorant :( It smells good though. After the party we swung by Wawel castle which wasn't open, but we got to see it from the outside. Then we passed through the rynek on the way to the dworzec so Elder Gibby and Sister King could get some last-minute souvenirs. We then realised, a little late, that our bus back to Kato was leaving soon, and so we had to run, all the way back. OK, well, I had to run, everyone else appeared to just be walking fast. Kaja was like a freaking elf, just booking it at the head of the pack like the main character in a bioware game. Gibby was basically just walking, and also managing to keep up, and Daniel and sister king were both keeping stride just fine. And there I was, huffing and puffing, and literally sprinting THE WHOLE TIME! At one point I was describing the situation when I made a horrible realisation... Me: "This is ridiculous! Kaja's like the main character, leading us all like it's no big deal, Gibby and Daniel are like elves, just walking, the hobbit (gesturing to sister king) is even managing to keep up, and I'm!... Oh my gosh! I'm Gimli!" Not even an exaggeration folks, I was like Gimli, running, the whole time, and exhausted, while everyone around me was fine... We made it though and were able to get back to Kato safely.
That's basically it for the week, some parts were great and funny, others were tough and very sad, but it's times like this I am grateful I have the gospel in my life!
Kocham was! i tak dalej...
P.S. It's starting to get really cold here... winter is coming y'all...
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