LilWhitley

Yay! Birthday week! I had an awesome birthday week guys! Monday was crazy though. after we finished emailing we all went to get burgers and then rode bikes to the mall for shopping. I was bardzo sick though. I had chills and I felt crazy weird. We all thought it was because I drank almost a liter of coke on an empty stomach, but by the end of the day it was clear I was sick. I kept freaking out though cuz I was hyper as well as sick. While we were eating lunch I kept shivering and occasionally saying things like. "Dude, that coke was totally laced with something!" At one point I turned to Siostra Whiteley and yelled "I'm trippin' balls, man!" She just busted out laughing, it was hilarious!

Tuesday, MY BIRTHDAY! was the best day ever, hands down! We had so much fun. We had district meeting in the morning and the power was supposedly off in the chapel for the day, so we decided to have our meeting at the senior couple's apartment, which is now vacant, and super nice. I opened my presents there (my package arrived just in time, yay!). Thank's so much for the lovely gifts guys :)

Elder Stumpf also gave me a present, he decided to pass on his lava lamp, because he can't take it home with him. Now it sits next to my desk all day. We turn it on first thing it the morning, and then first thing when we get home at night. Sometimes during nightly planning we'll get distracted by it and then just stare at it for about 20 minutes with our mouths open, occasionally just going "ooo! ahh!"

After district meeting we went to a Pierogarnia as a district and had massive oven bakes pierogi. Then Siostra Whiteley and I went out to take a book to a self referral the White Elders gave us the day before. We gave the lady the book and then she gave us 2 more referrals! it was awesome.

We ran into the Elders a few more times throughout the day and had a lot of fun with them. I'm happy to say that we achieved perfect jedność (unity) with our Elders this transfar, we love them all and had so much fun with them.

The rest of the week was just really chill, we basically just enjoyed our lives hard-core and occasionally shouted "BIRTHDAY WEEK!" We also played "Mexican Train" with our Elders, which is the funnest, most stressful game in the world. We are planning to play it again today too.

We had a cool moment at our "sit-table/whiteboard" on Thursday (that's a regular whiteboard except we have a table of free stuff set up and 2 people contact, and 2 people sit at the table and talk to anyone who approaches. Elder Fotu and I were at the table and a woman came up to us, so Fotu asks her if she has an answer to our whiteboard question. I don't remember what her response to that was, but she eventually asked it we were JW's, we told her no and told her a little about our church, also invited her to come to church. Then Fotu asks if he can give her a pamphlet, he starts reaching toward the Przywrócenie (restoration) pamphlet. Then he stops, and instead picks up the Plan Zbawienia (Plan of Salvation) pamphlet. As he handed it to the woman, she got kinda teary and said that her husband had just died. She took the pamphlet and immediately started reading it as she walked away, it was a really cool moment.

So, this week is transfer week, which means Saturday was calls. Prezydent Edgrin called us at random points in the day to tell us where we'd be and what we'd be doing with the next 2 months of our lives. I was freaking out! So was everyone else though. Siostra Owen and Siostra Ott in Katowice (Ott was my companion for my exchange a few weeks ago, and Owen was Siostra Whiteley's companion two transfers ago, so we're pretty tight with them) called us multiple times throughout the week to give us their predictions and to freak out. Stumpf was the only one not freaking out, of course, because he's going home. He had his own predictions, and was right about most of them. He and Fotu got on a train to Warsaw yesterday, Stumpf goes home tomorrow, and Fotu is going to be an AP (assistant to the prezydent). Elder Whiting is going to Bydgoszcz to be a Zone leader. Elder Owens is staying in Wrocław and is going to be companions with Elder Meherg. Elder Smith (who we have nicknamed Brother Zacharias) is coming to Wrocław with a trainee. And Siostra Whiteley and I are staying in Wrocław as well. :) yay! She will finish off my training and I will be a full blooded Whiteley trainee... or Lilwhiteley as Fotu has nicknamed me.

So yeah, that's basically what's going on with us here right now. We said goodbye to the Brown Elders and are hanging out with the White Elders tylko today. We'll have to say goodbye to Elder Whiting on Wednesday and drop him off at the train station too, it'll be very sad. Then we get a whole day to hang out with Owens because Smith and his trainee don't get into the city until 20:30 and Meherg isn't coming at all until next week... I'm sure I'll have many highly entertaining stories about Wednesday in my next email.

Kocham Cię i Keelah Selai i tak dalej...

I eat ALL the sushi!!!!

Yay! this week was fun, jak zawsze!
Our culture night was a hilarious disaster, which Whiteley says, is how culture nights usually are. I never found out what a milk bar is because it was closed. Ola blames Stumpf, she says he cursed the milk bar because the same thing happened when she tried to take the missionaries to the milk bar last year, when he was last serving in Wrocław. Funny thing is, she might be right, because the milk bar opens again the day Stumpf leaves Wrocław... We also didn't end up going to the oldest restaurant in Europe, because we ran out of time and it apparently takes a long time to be served there. We were going to meet Ola again, to ride bikes to the Japanese gardens, so our time was limited...

So instead we went to Pizza Hut... It was really good, but as far as Polish culture is concerned, it's pretty lame... By the time we were done at pizza hut, and Ola had showed up, it was raining, so riding bikes wasn't really an option, also, food took longer than we thought it would, so the Japanese Gardens were closed. In the end we decided just to take a tramwaj to a fountain show Stumpf had talked about, and call it a day. The rain stopped soon after we had made this decision. Unfortunately, we got off on the wrong stop and so, arrived at the water show 5 minutes before it ended... It was pretty while we were there though.

There were lots of little fountains around the big one, the kind that shoot water up out of the ground. Some kids were playing in it, so of course Ola decided she wanted to run through it, and convinced Whiteley to come with her. At first Whiteley just ran between the water so she wouldn't get wet. As Ola was trying to convince her to just run right through the water, Stumpf casually strolled over there and just shoved her in. It was hilarious! she got really wet, but it wasn't a big deal in the end because about 5 minutes later it started raining again and so we were all soaked.

So yeah, that was our culture night. It was disastrous, but also really fun. On Tuesday we went and got sushi with Prezydent Cielański. He wanted to take the Kowalskis (our senior couple) out to lunch because they are going home this week. The White Elders didn't come because they had a lesson, and the Brown Elders didn't want sushi, so they got kebabs and then joined us for the company, after they had eaten them. I was starving, because I forgot to eat breakfast, so I was toying with the idea of ordering one of the 30 piece dishes. Cielański told me that if I got it, and ate the whole thing, he'd pay for my meal... so I did :) It actually ended up only being 28 pieces, but still, I ate the whole thing.

On Wednesday Whiteley and I ate a the hipster place again (I found out the name too, it's called "Bułka z Masłem", which literally translates to "Roll with Butter"). It was the most awkward experience of my life, Whiteley and I could not stop laughing, it was so funny! We waited for about 40 minutes before they even brought us menus, no joke! And that place is so weird we couldn't tell who worked there and who didn't. As we were sitting there I suddenly had a vision, of a Portlandia skit, where they are waiting for menus at a restaurant a really long time, and finally a waitress comes over and tells them that they are sitting in the "no menu seats". Waitress - "We don't give menus to people who sit in these seats" Customer - "Well then, how are we supposed to order" Waitress - "You just kind of feel it out... and then you send your good vibes to the waiters, and they just know!" Customer - "But, we can't tell who works here, who are the waiters?" Waitress - "the customers are the waiters, and the waiters are the customers" After about 30 minutes into our waiting, we came up with three possible options... 1) Continue to sit there in total awkwardness. 2) Awkwardly get up and move to a new seats and keep our fingers crossed that they wouldn't be "no menu seats" as well. 3) Awkwardly get up and leave the restaurant, eat somewhere else, and never tell the Elders about our experience, because they would take the mickey out of us if they knew.

Notice how all three of those options had "awkward" in there, that's because there was no comfortable solution. We ended up accidentally falling into option 1, because we sat there for long enough, trying to decide what to do and laughing our heads off, that finally someone who we assume must have been a waitress, finally noticed us and brought us menus. I seriously love that place, it is so weird!

Not a ton happened the rest of the week, until Saturday, when we had our branch grill. Whiteley and I made a cake for it (mostly Whiteley... OK, all Whiteley, I washed out the pan and then pathetically sat there and watched her make it...). It was loads of fun, but it was bright and hot, and just about everyone got burnt. We had kelbasa, and yummy snacks, the Kowlaski's had games for the little kids, and a pinata. They didn't have a stick to beat the pinata with, so Cynthia Call stole one of Prezydent Cielański's crutches, and they used that... Then Starszy Fotu broke it, not irreparably so, but the rubber thing on the end went flying off when the pinata broke, and they had to search through the bushes to find it.

I had a cool moment right at the beginning of the grill, when Mariusz introduced me to the people who would be playing music for us (yes, we had a band). I had heard a few weeks before that it is customary in Poland for a man to wait for a woman to extend her hand for a handshake, the woman gets to decided if she is going to allow the man to have the honor of shaking her hand, but I'd never really seen it in action until I met the violinist. He was a really cool old guy with a huge beard and long grey hair. When I said hello to him he hesitated and just stood there with his hands at his side, waiting for me to decide if I was going to shake his hand or not. When I realised what he was doing, of course I stuck my hand out. It was kind of cool though.

Also, speaking of the band, they totally played the "Candy Mountain" song that is in "Charlie the Unicorn" it was hilarious, but now I want to know what that song is originally from. We spent a lot of the time playing a boardgame Starszy Owens made on the computer. It is called "Thud" and it is apparently from a Terry Pratchett book. He's been teaching all the members how to play it and they love it. I beat him both times I played it against him though and now he owes me 2 White Lion candy bars, and a White Twix, ha ha! Cindy Call played against him as well, she was losing horribly both times, but right before the end I got Owens to close his eyes and helped Cindy cheat but placing all of her captured pieces back onto the board in the perfect formation to destroy Owens at his own game. it was hilarious! I count it as a solid win, and so does Prezydent Cielański. Therefore, it is condoned by the church :)

Yesterday I taught Relief Society, all by my lonesome! First lesson I've ever taught in church and is wasn't in English. It was super easy though because the ladies in our Relief Society can yarn for hours! All I had to do was ask 3 three questions and they answered them for 45 minutes! I realised right before the close that I hadn't prepared how I was going to close the meeting, and I had missed most of what they had said during the meeting... so I awkwardly just said "Miłości bliźniego jest ważny... i dobre... śpiewamy?!" which directly translates to "Charity is important... and good... we sing?!" Then we sang and prayed and it was over. They all know I'm a greenie though, so I'm sure they expected nothing more or less from me :)

Well, that was basically everything cool that happened this week. All our lessons fell through/had to be re-scheduled so I don't have any cool teaching experiences or anything like that. It my birthday tomorrow though! Wooo! Whiteley has decided we are having Birthday week! Which means that I get to do whatever I want in the name of birthday week! I'm so excited! And I get to open my presents tomorrow! The ones mom sent me in the MTC (I did not open them, I didn't even peek) and some games that I bought myself, though Whiteley has taken them away and insists I didn't buy anything for my birthday, she's going to wrap them and give them to me tomorrow :) Laney, I know you will be interested to know what games they are. I got Mass Effect 2, Mass Effect 3, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 1 and 2. All together they were about 45 dollars! Awesome, right!

Today is Stumpf's last P-day in Wrocław, second to last ever. So we are going to be doing whatever he wants to do today. It sounds like we are going to get burgers and then ride bikes (if it doesn't rain again) to Magnolia Park (a really nice, nearby mall) and go shopping, I assume. Ola and Cindy Call are coming too. It should be loads of fun! I love you all family, I'm super jelous that you are at San Clemente, but it's OK, cuz I have Coke here... and hipster resturaunts... and birthday video games I can't play... and it's only going to start getting colder... :( lol, just kidding, I'm having a great time :) Have a good time!

Kocham Cię, i Keelah Selai!

Wszystko niezręczne

Hey hey hey, this week was pretty chill, so this might be another short letter. The main thing that happened for the whole week is that Siostra Whiteley and I laughed... a lot, like the whole week. We were on something, it was crazy! This was probably the funnest week of the transfer so far, which is saying A LOT, because this whole transfer has been so fun I don't even miss video games... Yes, that's right, I just said that. I'll say it again, in case you're brains couldn't handle that kind of crazy, impossible information, and just blocked it out... I don't miss video games... Don't get me wrong, I still love them and I'll probably cry the next time I hold an xbox controller, but I'm having so my fun and I feel so much purpose right now that it's like, meh, whatever, I'm good. I also don't really miss TV. occasionally I miss movies, like when Whiteley and I listen to the Pride and Prejudice soundtrack. but yeah, wszystko dobre.

I heard two songs this week, just out and about, that made me super happy. The first was "Breakfast and Tiffany's" ahhh! I love that song. A lot of the laughter this week came from Whiteley and I singing that song. The lyrics are just so ridiculous, it's like "yeah, we've got all these problems, we hate each other and can't agree on anything... but we saw that one movie that one time and we kind of remember it... I think we both kinda liked it... so we should definitely stay together." Ha!

The other song I hear was "Tango la Camisa Negra" (not sure if that's even close to correct spelling) It made me think of you Salsa, and it made me really happy. I was super surprised to hear it though.

We had a lesson with one of our recent converts this week. We had to have it through skype though because she's had to go home while her legal work for Poland goes through. She is from Azerbaijan, but she should be returning to Poland in a month or so. Her name is Tamara, she's super cool and totally solid, and we're pretty sure she's probably one of the only members of the church in Azerbaijan right now... so that's awesome.

We also are going to start meeting with some girls from our English class. Their names are Kasia and Ewa, they are sister and have been coming to English for about 5 years. They're talking to the missionaries before about the church, but have never been actually interested in investigating until now. They both speak English really well too. Siostra Whiteley had me set up with them. I was kind of nervous when she first told me I would be doing it. But at the same time, I know Kasia and Ewa really well now, we're tight. So it went great and I had no reason to be nervous. I think it's good that the first time I set up a lesson with someone it was people I know and am really comfortable around. I think teaching them will be really fun to. They are both really sharp ladies though and I'm certain they will have a lot of questions, luckily I know that they are both good enough at English that if I need to, I can respond in English.

This week we did some free tables, just Whiteley and me. It was super fun and we met the cutest kid during one. I call him a kid, but he was probably in his late teens early 20's. His name is Piotr and he was so funny. He walked past our table (with a friend), got like 40 feet away from it in the tunnel, looked back, saw us, ditched is friend and came over. He had already heard quite a bit about us, I think he said something about JWs, we're pretty sure he had talked to them. He asked us if he could have a Book of Mormon, and we gave him the Elders' number. While Siostra Whiteley was writing down the number he continued talking, to me. I didn't understand everything he said, but I did hear him say that he was going to a Catholic church, but he thinks Catholics are "dziwny" (weird) and made a hilarious face. He was adorable though, and we really hope he calls the Elders!

I had a really cool experience in church yesterday. We were waiting for it to start, and for about half the members to show up, cuz they're always super late. And one of the members, Andrej Cieślak, started talking to me. I've been having a lot of trouble understanding what people say when they are talking directly to me, I can actually understand a good amount when they are talking to someone else around me, but I always freeze when their questions are directed to me. It's been really discouraging and I've actually been worrying a bit lately that I'm never going to be able to really speak and understand Polish as well as I want to. But when he was talking to me (and mind you, I've never really spoken to him before, so I'm not used to his Polish) I actually understood almost everything he said, there were a few moments when I got confused and had to seek help from a nearby bi-lingual person, but for the most part I was actually able to understand and respond quite well. It was especially cool because at one point while he was talking, and I was understanding, I had the reassuring thought that I will be about to get this language. 

There's not much else that happened this week. Today we are having culture night though. We are going to the oldest restaurant in Poland... I can't remember what it's called though. Then we are going to see some Japanese gardens, we might rent bikes and take them there if it doesn't rain. Whiteley really wanted to rent tandem bikes, but I don't think they have them to rent anywhere, I haven't seen any. Then we are going to see a fountain show, thingy... not sure what it is, but I'm super excited! Yay! Culture night! Woo! Pants!

Talk to ya'll next week, next week's my birfday!!! yay! I'm freaking out! It's almost transfer week to and I do not want this transfer to end... I have never before wanted my birthday to just not happen as much as I do right now, cuz when my birthday happens that means we only have like a week left... AH!

Hopefully I stop freaking out by the time that happens...

Kocham Cię and Keelah Selai!

Kato Calling

Wooooooo! This week's letter will probably be shorter because I spent most of it on an exchange! In Katowice! Woooooo!

Tuesday morning, Siostra Whiteley got me all packed up and took me to the train station, loaded me on a train and stood outside the window of my cabin until I left. I felt like a little kid going an a big trip by myself. I saw a little girl getting on the train with her mom, and she was wearing a Dora the explorer backpack and I felt a kinship with that little girl. Whiteley had to be picked up at the train station by the white elders and she was super annoyed because she said it felt like she was a prisoner, being escorted to the chapel while she waits for Siostra Owen to come into town. She told me she really didn't want to have to be escorted to pick up Siostra Owen either, so I told her to make a run for it... I found out later that she did. When Owen called to say she was in Wrocław the White elders were like, "OK, we'll take you there." So she just full on booked it out of the building. Literally like 30 seconds later, the elders look out of the office window to see her running down the street like a hundred yards away. Hilarious!

Anyway, Katowice was really fun, I got to see Starszy Johnson, which was really fun. We taught a few lessons to some cool people, made friends with an Egyptian guy at a Kebab stand ended up walking like 10 miles in one day! Kato is really fun, but it's no where near as pretty as Wrocław. I missed Wrocław so much! I don't know how I'm going to leave it when I get transferred out of here.

The night I got back Siostra Whiteley was filling me in on what I missed while I was gone, and we were planning for the next day when she suddenly says "We should dye your hair tomorrow!" So of course I answer with... "OK!" So yeah, we dyed my hair... it's brown now, it actually turned out really good. Siostra Whiteley wanted it to blend with my roots so as I grow out my hair more it will look natural. It actually ended up blending really really well! I'm going to try and send a picture of it too.

Oh, also, an update on Anya. She won't be able to come back into town for church until September, she has a financial situation at the moment, and just doesn't have the funds for it. I'm going to see if we can go out and visit her soon though, also, we are trying to find out if we can work out a carpool situation with a member who lives in the same town as her, but I've never met this person before, so I'm not sure. Anyway, we are still keeping in regular contact with her, we text her to see how she's doing and if she's reading. She read the entire Liahona that we gave her and she's 3 chapters into the Księga Momona. She is awesome, seriously guys, keep praying for her, we'll need some extra divine help to get this one figured out.

I finally made my first stupidly hilarious language mistake. Every missionary learning a language has to make some ridiculously embarrassing mistake at some point and I did it yesterday! So, we were singing on he rynek and this super drunk guy eating a kebab came over. He picked up an Ewangelia pamphlet and stumbled right up to me, ignoring everyone else around me, because of course he would! Whiteley and Stumpf, who are both fluent in Polish, just stood there, right next to me, and watched this all go down. The guy started trying to as me questions. I could not understand him for the life of me, so I kept looking to Whiteley and Stumpf to tell me if I should respond with yes or no. They couldn' understand all of it either. At one point I looked at Stumpf and he had his confused face on, he just said "I don't even know what he's trying to say right now" and Whiteley was just like shaking her head, basically like, when in doubt, just say no. Eventually the guy was getting so annoying, and he kept trying to stand like right in front of me,swaying dangerously. And I was frankly sick of the sight of him, so I decided to tell him to go away so I said "chodź" Which I thought was the command form for "go" Siostra Whiteley busts out laughing, and the guy just looks kinda confused and doesn't move. So I say it again. Eventually, he decided to start arguing with Elder Owens about whether or not Obama is gay, so I was free of him. Then Siostra Whiteley informs me that if I want to get a creepy drunk guy to leave me alone I need to say "idź stąd" because what I was actually saying was the command form for "come". So yeah, that was embarrassing, luckily the guy was so blackout drunk he definitely wont remember it. It's kinda hilarious too, it's not awkward guys! it's only awkward if you make it awkward, lol.

Oh, yeah! Siostra Whiteley had another, mostly hilarious freakout on saturday. As it's getting closer to when she goes home she has to start thinking about how she is going to get all hr stuff home. She was throwing huge clumps of clothes out of her closet and yelling about how she hates all of it, and it's not coming home with her. It was hilarious! I realise that this is definitely one of the reasons why we are companions at this time. Whenever Whiteley gets like this, I basically just approach everything with a calm positive attitude and help her see that things aren't so bad. My positive attitude in the face of pretty much all negativity has been a real asset to me and my companion so far. I definitely have a testimony of staying positive. Remember that family. I know sometimes things can be crappy, and sometimes stuff just doesn't work out the way you want it to, but if you can just brush it off and look forward with a positive attitude, everything just gets better!

Well, that's basically it for the week. Sorry this is kind of a shorter letter than usual.

Also, the picture of my hair is not fantastic, the light is a little dim in the chapel and it's getting cloudy and rainy outside, but I'm sure we will take many more pictures in the coming weeks.

Kocham cię

P.S. Shazi! I'm so sorry I haven't written you back, I keep meaning to but then I run out of time! I think of you often though, and I frequently sing "Miss New Booty" in your honour!

"I'm working on Christlike attributes... like good posture"

Ah! This week was crazy! and hilarious! Siostra Whiteley's brain broke a little this week, but it's ok, I helped her get everything sorted out. She's just freaking out a little because she goes home in October and, quote "I don't know what I'm doing with my life!" Lol, it sounds kinda bad because you can't here the way she says it, but it's actually hilarious. She started freaking out at the beginning of the week when she got really impatient with the Elders and kind of snapped at them. It wasn't anywhere near as bad as she thought but it worried her a little. She's scared she will return from her mission as the same person she was when she started and as she puts it "I was a BRAT!" So the focus this week has been Christlike attributes! At the start of the week she was seriously stressing because she claimed she didn't have any of them and she found it really really hard to work on the others... so she made up a new one - good posture. She felt like that was one she could work on. I've been doing it with her, it's really good. Occasionally we'll both be in a meeting or something, sprawled out in our chairs, then we lock eyes, and at the same time adjust our positions so we are sitting up straight. To make it official I even made an entry in Preach My Gospel under the Christlike attributes chapter, I'm going to try and send you a picture of that today.

The attribute she's been focusing on the most... besides good posture, is patience/temperance. Occasionally when she's doing something that is frustrating her, like when her hair is in her face or something equally ridiculous, she'll suddenly shout "I"M TEMPERATE!!!!" However, after just a week of trying to be more patient she is actually seeing results. Yesterday when we were singing at the rynek there was a woman who came up to our free table, so Siostra Whiteley went to talk to her, next thing we know the woman was like freaking out, yelling at her and stuff and shouting that the book of Mormon isn't true and whatnot. But, because Siostra Whiteley has been working of patience she was able to just calmly bear testimony and respond calmly and kindly without feeling like she needed to "throw down". The woman didn't take a book of Mormon, but she did take a restoration pamphlet and she got Siostra Whiteley's email so she could contact her and ask questions. Siostra Whiteley said it actually ended up being pretty good. So yeah, right there is an example of how if you really want to overcome a weakness, even if you really don't think you are capable of it (because Siostra Whiteley told me numerous times at the start of the week "I can't be patient! I just can't!") If you have a desire to change, put forth the effort you can, and ask god for help, you can absolutely overcome that weakness.

I can't quite remember how it happened, but at some point this week we started quoting SNL a lot, specifically the Chris Farley quote "livin' in a van down by the river!" Whenever we talk about how we are losing our minds, which comes up a lot, we'll say something like "if I keep doing this I'm going to end up livin' in a van down by the river!" The day it started we had been talking about that Chris Farley skit and later in the day Siostra Whiteley was trying to explain the difference between different types of crazy, and she said something like "there's fun crazy, and then there's literally insane... like living in a van down by the river" And it's just exploded after that. We use it with the Elders a bunch but Stumpf doesn't know SNL so he thinks we're "livin' in a van down by the river!"

Oh my gosh!!!! I just remembered, Laney will love this! So, Siostra Whiteley totally watches Portlandia, which was like my favorite show before I left, second only to the walking dead. Anyway, this week we had a lesson with Ola (a member, I have mentioned her before, she is who Olek is based off of) and she took us for ice cream, which was amazing, but it was the only thing we had eaten so far that day. So after Siostra Whiteley and I agreed we needed to get real food after, so we decided to go to a nearby restaurant that has burgers, including really good veggie burgers... if you're into that kind of thing, which my companion is, so yeah. We were there for a really long time because seriously the waitresses there need to get their crap together. So we were looking around at the place. It was outside, all the tables were different, some were basically futons, none of the chairs matched, some people were drinking out of jam jars, and none of the waitresses had on anything even close to a uniform. The whole place looked really familiar and suddenly it hit us, this was the most hipster restaurant either of us had ever been to! So hipster in fact that it looked like it had been taken straight out of Portlandia! It was so funny!

This week we decided that our flyers for English class are bardzo sketchy. They are printed on crappy paper and super ghetto, they aren't even cut in straight lines! So we decided to re-do them. When we told Fotu (our district leader) and Stumpf, about this Siostra Whiteley joked about focusing on the fact that we are Americans... except for Stumpf. Fotu did not think this would be a good thing, he sometimes struggles to understand when Siostra Whiteley is joking. But because he told us not to do that we of course had to do that. We of course made real flyers, but we also made fake ones that are hilarious. I have a picture so I'm going to send it to you all. It's in Polish, but you don't really need to understand all of it to get the joke, except the last line. It says "Come practice English with Amurkins!... and one German".

We had a lesson with Anya this week. It went awesome, and I was actually able to understand a good amount of it. I found out later that during the lesson Siostra Whiteley was really unsure if she should extend the baptismal invitation. So, while someone else was talking, possibly me or our member Siostra Kuchno, she said a quick little prayer in her head, and the words came into her mind "Follow thou me". So she extended the commitment, and Anya said she would. We weren't able to set up a date though cuz she lives like an hour outside of Wrocław and she needs to figure out her financial/living situation first, but still, AH!!! I'm so excited!
Well, that was basically it for the week. It was crazy, and so much fun! I'm sad though because time is flying by, I'm over halfway through the transfer and I really don't want it to end!

Welp, Kocham Cię!

Jestem Siostra Snowywhite

This week was so much fun! Siostra Whiteley and spent most of the week singing... everywhere, at the kaplica (chapel) w domu (at home) out on the ulica (street). We have the same taste in music... rap and hip hop. Siostra Whiteley knows every word to most rap songs, it's hilarious. I don't know if you guys got all the pictures I sent you, but if you did, I included some pictures of Siostra Whiteley, she looks super hipster in those pictures, because of her glasses... and to be honest, she kind of is, but beneath that hipster exterior beats the heart of a gangster. Yesterday someone's phone went off on a tramwaj and their ringtone was gangster's paradise. She flipped out and started rapping alone with it, she knew the whole thing. She is also the only person I know (outside a few of my family members) who knows the song "miss new booty". Shazi and I love that song, it's hilarious, and ridiculous, and Siostra Whiteley has it memorised. We have also picked this transfer's theme song, because every transfer must have a theme song. It is "Check Up On It" by Beyonce. We are constantly singing that one. We sing it before we go to sleep, and we sing it first thing in the morning, it is just always stuck in our heads. The reason for it was because Siostra Whiteley has bought a lot of pencil skirts for when she goes home, and she was lamenting the fact that she can't wear them here because if she does the Elders will "check up on it" haha! It has been a lot of fun!

There was kind of a lot that happened this week, I'm not sure if I can remember it all. We talked with Prezydent Cielański a lot this week. I'm sure I've talked about him before. He's the branch Prezydent, he served a mission in Poland he speaks perfect English bez accent (without an accent) and he's hilarious! His nickname for me is "Sister Snowywhite" We had lunch with him a couple of times this week (which means we got lunch to eat at the kaplica, saw he was in his office and ended up eating in there and talking with him for a long time) On Wednesday we got kebabs with the elders, brought them back to the chapel and all ate with Prez Cielański. I got a fritkebab, which I promised myself I'd only try once because it is "the bane of missionary health" it's basically just fried flatbread with tons of meat and sauce all over in it and then fries... He likes to joke around with us and occasionally ask us deep physiological questions. He also likes to occasionally text us with totally random questions. This week he texted us saying "do you guys want to get coffee sometime?" Siostra Whiteley, knowing he is a big joker said "sure, when and where?" he responded with "on Sunday at the coffee shop below the chapel" lol Siostra Whiteley joked asking if we were going to see how many commandments we can break in one go. it was entertaining.

We had a cool experience this week though. While we were chatting with Prez Cielański and I was doing some of my trainee stuff on one of the computers in his office. Siostra Whiteley is suddenly like "ok, we have to go contacting now." We had very little time until we were supposed to be back at the chapel for our coordination meeting with bobby, and it was raining outside, not good weather for contacting, so it seemed a little random, but I was like, whatever, Siostra Whiteley knows what she's doing. So we went out, and it really felt like we were trying to get somewhere in particular. Usually when we contact we walk kinda slow, but we were at traveling speed. we didn't even stop to talk to anyone, Siostra Whiteley tried to hand out 2 cards but other than that we just walked right by everyone. Neither one of us felt like we should talk to anyone, until we reached a park and walked right up to a lone girl sitting there. Siostra Whiteley and I both felt like we should talk to her. So we did, and she was really nice and totally listened. We didn't set up with her or anything, Siostra Whiteley didn't even know what she was saying going into the contact, she had her read a paragraph in the przedmowa (introduction) and she's not even really sure what it was about, she just felt like she should have her read that one. We left her with a card that had our info on it and then turned around and headed right back to the kaplica so we wouldn't be late for coordination meeting. It was weird, cuz it felt like we were only out there to talk to that one girl. I don't even know if anything will come of it. Siostra Whiteley said something kind of cool though. She said that ours is a mission of hope, most of our efforts we wont see the result of, we just have to hope that every time we talk to someone or give out a flyer that we are making a difference for missionaries down the road.

We've had some interesting experiences with the gift of tongues, meaning that we are called to preach here in Polish. What I mean by that is, we have a few bi-lingual missionaries in our district, Siostra Whiteley speaks French, and Starszy Stumpf speaks German. But neither one of them can speak anything other than Polish, and English (kinda, but even that gets hard sometimes) While whiteboarding the other day we ran into a french guy, so Fotu sent him over to talk to Siostra Whiteley, who found she could not speak French. She could think of how to say something in French, but when she would open her mouth, it came out as Polish with a French accent. And Yesterday the same thing happened to Stumpf with a German lady. He kept accidentally speaking Polish to her, and couldn't remember any German, which is insane because it's his first language! It's funny though, I'm sure once they are released they will remember how to speak their other languages.

What else happened this week?... Oh! The White Elders (meaning Ownes and Whiting) accidentally made sweets akin to Virginia carmels or Bordeaux chocolates (just the inside, not the chocolate part) they were trying to make buttermilk syrup and they cooked it a little too long, so they decided to just keep cooking it to find out what would happen, and the result was some really yummy candies. They gave most of it to me too, and there was a lot, so I've been having a really good week.

I also tried Kaktus Sok (cactus juice). There are rumors about it that it gives you weird dreams if you drink it before you go to sleep. So of course I drank a shot of it like a minute before I went to bed. That night I decided I wanted to have a dream about aliens... and I totally did! It was super cool and really vivid, I thought for sure it was real. I forgot big chunks of it the next morning, but there were some things that I remembered so vividly I was able to draw them. I will have to show you guys pictures though. The details of the dream are not super complicated, basically Abed contacted aliens and they showed up and tried to take over earth so we had an underground resistance against them and Abed and I met their queen and the inside of her ship looked like something out of a haiyo miazaki film. It was awesome!

Lets see, what else happened?... Oh! we also had a girl in church yesterday, an investigator. She read about us on the Internet, found where we meet on Sundays and came to church. Yay for self-referrals! We gave her a book and set up a meeting with her on Saturday. Her name in Anya, pray for her! I'm so excited, she seems super nice and cool.

Also, Prezydent Edgrin was in Wrocław yesterday and today, visiting with his wife and sister. We went to lunch with him today, which was awesome. Yesterday though we ran into him in the rynek as we were going to sing. He was wearing Jeans and a Polo shirt, it was super weird "like seeing a dog walk on it's hind legs!" After we started singing/contacting he went and changed so he could join us. He taught a lesson to a guy with Elder Fotu. The guy looked super interested, I'm pretty sure that they at least gave him a book and might be meeting with him sometime. The look on his face as they were teaching him was so cool, you could see that he was feeling the spirit. While they were teaching him though Siostra Whiteley walked by them, coming back from talking to someone else. She came up to me and told me that Prezydent Edgrin had just invited the guy to be baptized. Prez is freaking awesome, he just goes out contacting with his missionaries because he's in the area and then invites a guys to be baptized right there on the street. He's been learning Polish since he got here and he's almost as good as most of the missionaries who have been here for a while, he's such a boss!
Well, that's basically it for the week, that's all I can remember anyway... except that I'm pretty sure I saw Mila Jovovich in an ad in one of the malls here! It was super cool! Ok, that's all now.

Kocham Cię!

Amurika!

This week was pretty crazy and literally flew by. We ended up spending most of the time with Elders Stumpf and Fotu. Stumpf is from Germany, but speaks perfect English, and Fotu was in Siostra Whiteley's MTC group. (we also have Elders Whiting and Owens in our district, but we didn't do as much with them this week) On Friday we four went to Legnica, which is about 45 minutes outside of Wrocław for some meetings we had set up. Siostra Whiteley and I had plans to meet with one of Siostra Zań's friends and the Starszy had a meeting with the Call's landlord. Then we all had plans to go out contacting with the Calls later. Unfortunately our meeting fell through so we went to the Call house early and hung out with Cindy while the Elders had their lesson. It was literally 2 and a half hours long, the guy they meet with could really talk! But it was cool cuz we got to get to know Cindy a little better and talk to her about her plans to serve a mission. She is about 18 right now and really wanted to serve at 19. Before the age change she actually prayed that they would change the age so she could go at 19. When they did she flipped out. Unfortunately because of some stupid stuff going on with her schooling she probably won't get to go until just after she turns 20. She's super cute and excited for it though. Siostra Blake gave her one of her Badges, and Cindy put her name on it, so she has her own badge now.

Anyway, after the Elders were done with their ridiculously long lesson, we went contacting with Cindy Call and her mother. We went on splits for a little while once we reached a park and I went with Siostra Call. That woman is fearless. She served a mission in Ukraine and is gung-ho about helping us missionaries find more people, especially in Legnica, they want another branch there really badly. We stopped to talk to some people who were just chilling on a bench in the park, and at first she just struck up a normal conversation, (I don't know what about because I couldn't understand her, her Polish is particularly hard for me to understand) and then she just switched into the gospel and the people were super interested, we gave them a Book of Mormon, and got their number and even told them about the English class we teach, which they were also interested in. Then later, when we had run into Fotu and Stumpf we brought them over and talked to the people again. This time we gave them a plan of salvation pamphlet and even taught them a little about the word of wisdom, and they were still super interested. It was so cool! At the same time this was happening Cindy and Siostra Whiteley contacted a girl and got her information and set up a meeting for Tuesday! We may have to reschedule because we actually have our coordination meeting at that time, but we'll see.

So that was the cool stuff with investigators. That was also the 4th of July. Siostra Whiteley and Starszy Stumpf have kind of an epic battle of Germany vs. America going on right now because of the world cup. Siostra Whiteley says she isn't normally this patriotic, but when Stumpf goes on about how great Germany is, she likes to talk up America just to bug him. They argue about it a lot, but it's all in good fun, it's obvious that neither one of them really cares that much, they just like to argue. On the 4th Siostra Whitely and I wore red white and blue and we even got Fotu to wear a red white and blue tie. Starszy Stumpf showed up to the train station wearing a German flag bracelet and tie that he stated is "Nazi Brown". By the end of the day though, we had managed to get him to say "Amurika!"

We had a funny moment with the Elders and JW's this week. We went Whiteboarding with Stumpf and Fotu. Whiteboarding is where we write a question on a whiteboard and ask people to answer it (not sure if I've explained that before). We were set up in a tunnel underneath a tramwaj station, about 30 yards away from where some JW's had one of their stands set up. It wasn't an ideal situation, but we didn't have a lot of choice because the weather was not great. Fotu and Stumpf really wanted the question to involve a verse from the bible, but no one had brought their bible, and Stumpf and Fotu couldn't agree on what the verse said. So Fotu looks down the tunnel at the JW's and says "I bet they have a bible... should I go ask them?" And that's what he did. Fotu went and asked the JW's if he could look at their bible. They kept him there for like 20 minutes talking to him and we presume trying to convert him. And it was all for naught, the verse had been changed in their bible and the meaning was totally different.
Along with their epic battle of Germany vs. America, Stumpf and Whiteley have also had an epic battle of planner covers. We realised at the start of the week that this is Stumpf's last planner, he goes home in August. So Siostra Whiteley asked if she could make him one. It started out innocent, she genuinely wanted to make him a nice planner cover. But at some point in changed and it became about making his planner the most embarrassing thing possible. So, we decided to use some truly horrible pictures from the chastity pamphlets. They are these ridiculous pictures of couples playing tennis... playing isn't quite the right word, their just standing there looking creepily at each other while holding tennis racquet's and balls.... it's creepy. We used pictures from both the English pamphlets and the European pamphlets. It's now very entertaining to see his planner. In response though Stumpf made a cover for Siostra Whiteley which is pretty bad too. It has a picture from the chastity pamphlet on it as well, and on the front has a collage of various stages in a relationship, with the words, "to date or not to date?" It's pretty embarrassing and Siostra Whiteley has worked hard to hid it from investigators and members when she is planning meetings. We still both agree that it is better than Stumpf's though.

I'm getting the feeling that it won't be hard to stay under budget with my food here. Last wee I spent about 40 zlots on my food for the week, those of you with calculators out there, who know the exchange rate will know that is a little over 13 dollars... for a week. Today I spent 43 zlots, and I got a good about of food. I came away with Salmon and Kielbasa and Pierogi (one kilogram... that's a freakin' ton of pierogi!) and a massive package of noodles. and that's not even all I bought. The food is all really good too, but I haven't been eating too much, Siostra Whiteley keeps me grounded, I haven't even bought chocolate since Warsaw. She is such a frustratingly good influence on me! I have mostly been living off of pierogi because they are the best thing ever and they take almost no effort! (unless you make them from scratch, then they are a pain apparently) I also have had a lot of pasta and grapefruit.

Oh! I have a fun game that I came up with that you can play while eating grapefruit. Laney! this is good surgeon practice! It's called Grapefruit Cancer Patient. You get some tweezers and try to pull out all the seeds without damaging the grapefruit. Then when you eat it you count up the number of seeds you found. If you find more than 4 seeds you get sued, if you find 4 or less, you get a lawsuit but you are not guilty, and if there are no seeds then the grapefruit's death was not your fault and you win! I have only won once so far, but I have been not guilty twice! It's a really fun game when you have very few forms of entertainment.

The weather here has been insane! Most of the time it's like walking around in an oven. The forecast shows we are going to get lots of storms this week, but it also says it's going to get up to about 34 degrees... Celsius... Celsius sucks, but that's what they use here. Anyway, that's really freaking hot. It's all good though, Siostra Whiteley and I decided to spend our dinner hour a few days ago, going to H&M to get summer tops because I have none, and she wanted more. Now the heat is bearable, I still don't like it, but whatever. At least I'll be sweating and hot in a cute t-shirt.

Contacting has gotten a lot easier lately, I've been working really hard at having a good attitude during it and not worrying about it if people turn us down, and it's been tons better. I've also been doing better with understanding people. I still can't really speak Polish worth beans, and when someone is talking to me face to face in Polish my brain generally just breaks and I can't understand them. But I've been able to follow conversations around me pretty well and I was able to pick up on a lot in church yesterday.

That's basically it for this week. Today we are going to the mall with the Elders, Stumpf needs new shoes for when he goes home so we are going to help him find them!