Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Greetings from Fuenlabrada

Hey everyone how was Thanksgiving?

It was awesome here, and we even got 2 Thanksgiving dinners. Well, they weren't just dinners they were feasts! We had a slow Wednesday night, and then a super slow thanksgiving day. Our thanksgiving entailed a 3 hour planning session, and some lessons that didn't happen, and some contacting.

We did go by and see a referral from some of the Hermanas in our mission though, and it was a gold mine! We found an inactive returned missionary, but we will work on that, and then his girlfriend who we already committed to baptism. Also, there are 4 other investigators living in the piso. They are all from Venezuela, and they all came to church on Sunday, how sweet is that! We are teaching them tonight, and I can hardly wait. The returned missionary knows one of my old neighbors, the Hamby family. He served with Jessica Hamby on his mission to Venezuela I think, but either way she had told him to look for me when she heard he was moving to Spain. Lo and behold, Elder Miller knocks on his door a couple of weeks later. This is such a small world.

We had a dinner appointment on thanksgiving that was just to die for. Homemade ribs,that were made by the loving hands of one of our members from Venezuela, Hermana Moro. She and her husband are awesome and feed us sweet stuff always. They asked the first time, what my favorite food is and I said ribs, they were delicous. She made them exactly like my grandma, mom, or Tony Roma's would, (which by the way they have here in downtown Madrid). It even had American bbq sauce that she got at AlCampo, Hunts brand.

That night, we had Elders Peaden and Cochrane stay over, and then, Elder Cavanaugh and another Elder Clark we have in our mission (they serve in Badajoz, part of our zone). It was fun to have them all over in our newly remodeled piso. We had zone conference the next day from 9:30 until 4:30. It was long, but much needed, and I learned so so so so much. Afterwards, we booked it as a zone to go to the mission home. Oh yeah, our zone conferences in this mission are 4 zones in each of 2 conferences, so just our zone was over at the mission home on Friday night. It was some good times, with delicious food and great conversation and Christmas/Thanksgiving spirit. We had some of Hermana Farnsworth's delicious lasagna.

Saturday we found Luis, a really nice guy visiting from Honduras. We taught him the whole first lesson. We invited him to church and went to pick him up at the park where we taught him. He didn't show up, but hopefully we will see him around before he goes home in 3 weeks. He is super interested either way, and we will give his address and phone number to the Honduras mission if we don't see him before he leaves. Oh yeah, we have transfers on Monday, and we find out what's going on Sunday afternoon. But we got a new assistant to the president on Monday. They announce it a week early so they can start studying the driver's hand book, because only the assistants and the office elders ever put there foot on the gas pedal or the steering wheel. The new assistant is Elder Manning who I had my awesome day with in October. It is sweet to know him already, because I haven't really gotten to know the others. The two that were here when I got here, are already back to normal missionaries, and so they are both new since I have been in the field.

Saturday during medio dia, we set up the Christmas tree that was in the piso. Somebody must have given it to the elders a while back or something. It is sweet. We taught a couple of our investigators at their Peruvian tienda on Saturday night. On the way to church Sunday, Elder Van Dyke almost got hit in the crosswalk. The cars here always have to yield to the pedestrians unless there is one of the walk/don't walk lights. Whenever there is a crosswalk, you just go for it and the cars have to stop unless the situation I said above. Anyway, this took some getting used to, but it always works out, except this girl was texting, and my companion didn't see she stopped like 2 inches from his leg. Call that luck... or call that divine protection whatever you like, but I prefer the second.

I had splits with Elder Cochrane on Monday, and he is only one transfer ahead of me... somehow we taught 2 lessons in Spanish. How sweet is that? It felt great to have that test of my Spanish. I was scared, super scared, but then they worked out and we were able to communicate just great. Oh yeah, I saw a castle on the bus ride back from district meeting on Tuesday, and we also saw a golf course. Anyway, it was a great Thanksgiving week.

Becky the inside of the temple is beautiful. That is sweet about the blog with Matthew. Thanks!

Well thanks Grandma Judy for the spiritual thought, I am going to pirate it. Thanks also for sending the package. English rings are just dandy. The people here will love them.

There was a good thought on the back of the Church News the week after Conference entitled "Edified and Uplifted." The article stated: "It will be another six months before Church members assemble for the next general conference. In the meantime, we may continue to bask in the glow of this past conference as we accept President Hinckley's counsel to read again and again its messages. These talks can serve as a spiritual oasis in a parched world where blow the winds of war, conflict, discord and all manner of temptations and challenges. The conference messages can refresh and revitalize the soul and mind as effectively as water in a desert freshens and enlivens the body. The challenge for us as Latter-day Saints, is to apply the principles we were taught, and do our part in helping the glorious work of the gospel to fill the earth, to bear witness of Jesus Christ, the Savior and Redeemer of all mankind."

Much love from Spain! The church is true and god loves you.

Love, Elder Miller

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Happy Thanksgiving part 2

Hey, I got time to type some more about this last week...

we went back to finish up the Calle Constitucion where we found Celedonio, but all we found was a dog. We were knocking doors in a building, when out of one door ran a border collie that is all black with a white spot, and its name is Luna. How small is this world that all the way in Spain, I saw the exact dog that we have at home with the same exact name.

We taught Mimi's family on Saturday, and they fed us hotdogs American style, but they also had this interesting mixture to put on them. It made them like Chicago dogs, but they are from Paraguay so I don't know how that works out... anyway, we keep getting back to back dinner appointments, and we went to Mirella's right afterwards. We literally took the train straight from Mimi's to eat another meal. We found out that she is moving to Germany where her husband lives, which is very sad because she really wants to get baptized. But, we got her info in Germany and we are going to teach her one more time before she heads off to Germany on Monday.

We had Stake Conference in which a member of the Quorum of the Seventy spoke, Elder Viias, and also our Mission president and his wife spoke. She has learned all her Spanish here and he served a mission in Argentina.

We had splits from Sunday afternoon until Tuesday morning before district meeting, and I was here with Elder Peaden. We had a great time, and saw lots of success. We also got very creative and made some delicious meals.

I would strongly suggest looking at the talk by Elder Bednar about the pickles in the April 2007 conference. We taught Miriam about changing your life using this talk. I hope all is well, and I hope that you all have a very grateful Thanksgiving. Thanks for all of the support and love.

Happy Thanksgiving from Fuenlabrada! P.S. I forgot to thank Hadley for his email.

Love,
Elder Miller

Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow!

Hey guys, how's it going?

It sounds like everything is going great. I am in Toledo today, in the library on top of the hill you can see from most of the pictures of Toledo, emailing right now. It's the building that has four pointy corner towers and is in the middle of the famous hill area. It is awesome. We have been to the Elder's piso here, and it was built in the times of Columbus. It has way low ceilings and is super, super old. We have been to the huge capilla on the hill also. We also went to the Lladro store that sells the Missionary Lladro and the one of the Christus. The only catch is that you have to mortgage your house to buy one piece of that stuff.

We taught Hamilton on Wednesday, and we had tuna fish with sliced tomatoes on top of rice and then some beans. Tomatoes and tuna fish are my kryptonite, but I scarfed it down and I am still alive. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

The floors were finished on Thursday, and then we moved back in on Friday morning, but couldn't put our stuff on the floors until that night. The floors are spectacular! You can use them as a mirror, they are so squeaky clean. It was fun living in Mostoles for the week, but I am so glad to be back in our sweet brand new looking piso. We are for the most part, finished, with a few odds and ends to finish in the next week and a half before transfers on the first Monday in December, when my companion is pretty much for sure leaving. I am pretty sad, but we have had a lot of fun, and have done tons of great missionary and construction work.

We taught Mimi and company at English lessons and it went really well. We took a member named Hermano Moro to teach a recent convert who isn't a very recent convert at all, but we just haven't been able to teach all of the after baptism charlas that the last missionaries started. Have a great Thanksgiving I will hopefully add more to this back in Fuenlabrada, but if not have some delicious food. Pete and Grandma Judy, thanks for the emails this week.

Love,
Elder Miller

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

4 months

Hey how's it going this week for you guys?

I am doing great. Last p- day, I had to drop off a suit at the dry cleaners, and the lady had to draw circles all over the suit for like 15 minutes. I guess missionary work isn't very nice to suits. Thursday morning we had the floor people come to give a bid on the closets, but we are going to go with a different company for around 2000. The floors are being re-varnished as I type, and they only have one more coat after this one. We have been living in Mostoles since Monday, and we will be there until Friday or Saturday. It is hard to commute 30 minutes to our area, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

We also had our normal 3 and a half hour planning session last Thursday, and we have it again tomorrow. This is where we plan for 10 days and plan for all of the work we are going to do. We get a ton of stuff done, but it takes quite a long time and amount of attention. We went to Mirella's after medio dia on Thursday, and knew not to eat before hand. We taught her, and she fed us rice with potatoes and meat. We had to book it to English lessons, and then after that we had to run even faster to catch a bus and get to our branch president's house to meet with him. He fed us again as he does every week. We had at his house rice, veggies, chicken, fried eggs, and ketchup, and don't forget the Tang. We went home that night very full if you can imagine.

Friday, we taught Miriam about faith, using Matthew 17:14 - 21, which is amazing about the mustard seed and faith. We also made a new baptismal calendar with her to see if we can't just get her to quit smoking this time.

It is getting very windy, and the leaves are really coming down. We are just getting to fall, and winter is just around the corner.

We taught a member named Maria Paz at her house. She is such a funny lady. She reads with her glasses and then a huge magnifying glass and her face right up against the page. She is an awesome member!

We were on Calle Constitutin, and we found this crazy church with no name, but it had a bunch of triangles with different things in them like faith and the Holy Ghost and stuff. We found an inactive member in the church, and talked to him. He was so scared I think, when he first saw us, but we really reminded him what is important in life. He was at church on Sunday, and started up his painting lessons again that he teaches the members. His name is Celedonio, and he painted all of the paintings in our capilla. (Mom, those are the ones I took pictures of and sent them home.)

Saturday appointments went sour, but we got some other ones. We found an Ecuadorian, and her husband and mother in law, who let us in to share a charla. We taught them the first lesson, and they loved it. We will see what happens with them. Also, we had a potential investigator who gave us the address of their weird church, and we will go by to see if we can't find some more miracles like Celedonio at another church.

Sunday at the capilla, we gave a member a blessing of health. Also one of the members gave us another left over surprise in an ice cream bucket. This isn't the first time, and I'm sure it's not the last.

We taught Avelino during Sunday school and it went awesome. We taught Florin the Romanian, on Sunday who rode his bike in from Humanes, because he wanted a change of scenery for our lessons. I guess he got tired of the park by his house.

Last week we completed the mission goal of 15 lessons a week and 70 contacts. We get the contacts every week, but only average around 10 lessons. It was an awesome sense of accomplishment, but we are in a new week already so just more of the hard work.

We had to do a ton of running on Sunday to get the 5 lessons that we had, but we did it. We taught Fabiola, who we gave the blessing on Monday night using Alma 13:24-26 which is truly fantastic.

We were rushing back to Mostoles for the night, and I did a double leg trip from a drip line in one of the gardens. I landed right in a bunch of dust. Another one bites the dust. I ate it really hard, but it was hilarious. We had companion exchanges yesterday and I went with my second cousin and zone leader Elder Bradshaw. Today we went to Xanadu Mall and it was awesome. It is huge and has tons of stores. It has go carts that we couldn't ride, and an indoor ski slope that we obviously couldn't go down. But it was way cool to see.

Much love from Spain. And Happy Thanksgiving!
Elder Miller

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Day in Toledo

Almost 4 months already!

Hey Everybody!

First off, I can't even believe that on the 11th I will have been on my mission for 4 months, absolutely insane...I am having a great time, and loving it as usual with Elder Van Dyke here in Fuenlabrada. Last Wednesday, we had a relaxing p-day. At Dia, our shopping store, I used coupons and really felt like my grandpa. But none the less I will be using more again today. Also, Elder Baxter and Elder Cutler were supposed to move out at 11, but it didn't happen until the office elders got there at 5. We helped them put there stuff in the van, and it has been a quiet peaceful piso of 2 elders ever since. I love it, but it was also way fun with 4 elders.

We organized everything in the piso, and got rid of the last of the clutter. on Thursday we had promised Mimi's family brownies if the kids read 'For the Strength of Youth', and so we made a double batch of missionary special colacao brownies. They loved them. Friday, the zone leaders came to paint again, and President told us to paint the entire day, and get as much done as possible. So we did, and almost finished. We painted the 2 bathrooms, calked it all, and painted 3 rooms except one ceiling. Also, we are going to leave one room that is a disaster until after the floors are going to be refinished next Monday night, Tuesday, and maybe Wednesday. Today we touched everything up and made sure all of the lights were in working condition. We are almost done, and the closets will be done shortly after the floors. It will be so, so, so, so nice.

After the whole long day of painting we were sweeping and mopping the dust that was everywhere, and I spilled the mop bucket. It went everywhere, but at least it was in the hallway where nothing got wet except for the floor that needed to be mopped anyway. Also I burned myself with the iron a little bit on the arm a couple days back, I have been really unlucky, but at least it didn't hurt it just left a little red mark. Also on Friday, I was moving one of the broken closet doors with broken glass mirrors in them, and I sliced a little gash in my toe, a little more bad luck. I just cleaned it out and put some super glue on, it's all good.

Saturday morning at a bus stop, there was this man that was soooo drunk sitting up against the bank behind us. The cops were there tending to him. He couldn't even walk, hardly at all, and was saying funny things. The ambulance had to come and pick him up. It was a little show to pass the 10 minutes while waiting for the bus. We had a slow Saturday morning, and then we ended up getting 3 new investigators, and taught 3 lessons. We also had a Mission fast for baptisms and confirmations starting on Saturday. About the new investigators, Florin is from Romania, and speaks Spanish. He lives in Humanes, but we gave him a Romanian Book of Mormon, so he could understand it better. Then there is Khalid, who is from Morocco, and speaks Arabic, French and English. We gave him an Arabic Book of Mormon and taught him in English. Also, there is Marshall who is from Nigeria, and speaks English, and we gave him an English Book of Mormon. The next day, we met with our new investigator from last week, Mirella from the Dominican Republic, and gave her a Spanish BOM. 4 different languages of BOM's in 2 days, how crazy. I have a list I have made of where all of the people I have met since I have been in Spain are from. It is about 40 countries long and growing everyday. I will put it in an email in the near future.

We taught Primary on Sunday, and taught about Nephi and his obedience. There were 4 kids there. It was way fun. Also, after church they held a correlation meeting with all of the leaders in the rama, and we were invited to come, things are really looking up here. After the fast was over, we went home and had some lunch... well lots of lunch. I made been and cheese burritos, by frying some pinto beans, and adding cheese, and a bunch of taco bell mild sauce that Elder Baxter left me. Also, Dia sells really cheap tortillas, which are usually over 3 euros, but are only 1 euro at Dia. After our meal, we went to teach Mirella. She fed us chicken noodle soup, with tons of chicken in it, and then some rice to go along with it. We were both so full, but crammed it all in there somewhere. Oh yeah, today I put on my jeans for the first time in a while, and they are pretty big. To date, I have lost around 30 pounds or about 13 kilos.

Monday, we cleaned the piso really well, and loaded everything from 3 of the rooms, and about half the stuff from another room all into 1 little bathroom. I don't know how it all fit, but I know that my grandpa would be proud. We translated for Hamilton again, but I don't know where he will be giving this speech. Tuesday, we had interviews in Mostoles again, and it was great. We had more Texas sheet cake, and learned from the A.P.'s and Hermana Farnsworth about the importance of planning and the area book. We are really going to focus on these things now.

Also, we taught Avelino yesterday, and then had to run to the bus stop. We had to run to the piso to get brownie ingredients, and then we had to run to the bus for English classes. We put the brownies in the oven during English classes, and gave them to the members we taught last night. We also had to run to make it to that appointment. We are busy, and I am loving it. Till next week.

Much love from Spain,
Elder Miller