Picture Update

First companion; Elder Perry.

Newest companion I believe... Elder Cherry.

First baptism.

"At the symposium. Me pretending to be interested in art so others would come ask questions. Furthest right in background = E. Perry talkin' it up."

"On our way back from the symposium in Quebec City, we saw a bunch of dinosaurs, so we took pictures."

"Dinosuars and monster trucks! Spare Time! Yeah right :)"

November 22, 2010

Family,

So this week has been...hard to remember....Things start to blur really fast out here. The ward is doing really well, E. Cherry and I are helping out the ward choir, that's a fun little break every sunday afternoon--I never thought I would be saying that about choir.

This week we had a lesson with an enormous family down in Stanstead, about an hour's drive south from Sherbrooke. We discovered that when we drove into the town, we were less than 3 miles from America. I could have driven straight into Vermont! What a strange feeling. The lesson went horrible, the parents were constantly yelling, at each other, at the kids, the kids were yelling at the parents, and at each other, we abandoned the thought of trying to teach them a full lesson and somehow squeezed out a good scripture and spiritual thought. The family is less active, but their two younger sons haven't been baptized yet, and the parents really want them to go through the lessons and be baptized, so we'll be making a lot of trips to the Vermont border in the next couple weeks.

We had an excellent lesson with our Gay investigator, we watched the testaments-and by the end he outright told us that he believed that Christ visited the Americas and started tearing up. But he's had a lot of rejection in his life, being gay-he's not even really gay, he's like a non-practicing gay...it's strange... so we invited him to church but he's just too scared of being rejected there. But we'll find a way to get him there.

We were sitting in church, and saw a girl sitting a couple rows ahead of us. Neither of us recognized her, we later found out she wasn't a member! We had an investigator at church without even knowing it! She came this week as well, the members are really working well with her, so we're giving her time to come to us, we don't want to push ourselves onto her and scare her away.

We had a couple from Madagascar visit our english class, they liked it and they are bringing their children next time...so hopefully we have some time to prepare a lesson for them. Also a Columbian guy is coming and bringing his daughter, so we'll have six new students in the class who don't speak any english. As my Iranian friend would say "Dat's Crazy."

One of the biggest problems here in Sherbrooke I've found is that missionaries in the past here, haven't really done anything, except baptize people who were not ready to be baptized. Most of our recent converts are inactive or going inactive because they were hardly taught anything before their baptism. Alot of them think church is more like a social club, and have no testimony--so we spend a lot of precious time fixing past missionaries lazy halfbaked work and reteaching these recent converts. But you know, work is work when you are a missionary. E. Cherry and I get along extremely well, we usually spend our in-between-houses time translating songs into french, songs like "There can be miracles" from Prince of egypt. All songs sound better in french.
E. Cherry and I have gotten really good at winging lessons in our Sunday school classes, because of course the default teachers are always the missionaries, the past two weeks we've been improv teaching, it has it's own thrill to it, that's for sure.

We had another investigator at church yesterday, the mother of the girl that comes on her own, and the older single ladies of the ward put on a dinner after church. While this investigator was eating and telling everyone about herself, (we were in the cultural hall) a girl kicked a ball and it hit her square in the face. I just about choked on my food, my first thought was "This is hilarious." I could just picture the rumor going around how mormons lure you in, and then hit you in the face when you least expect it. But she was cool about it, she got a little angry and rambled off something in spanish, but hey, everyone does that here. Spanish is the Angry language.

Well that's about all that's happened so far around here, E. Cherry and I are going to rock our own little thanksgiving this week, it will be...well pitiful. Neither of us like to cook and we found a sale on Ramen, so we've been having oatmeal and ramen this week, a 'self motivator to get more dinner appointments'

That's about all, keep up the good work at home,

E. Holm

November 15, 2010

FAMILY.

The Baptism went really well. We spent all day preparing for it though, but it went really well. Everyone who was supposed to be there showed up, I was lucky enough to conduct the meeting (Absolutely terrifying) but it all worked out to the best. There is nothing like a baptism, the Spirit there is a strong one. I just sat there, on fire the whole time, it felt like. I have a picture of the investgator and her husband and the son of the bishop and the coolest black person ever. He went to jamaica on his mission, english speaking, so whenever he speaks english he has some crazy accent slang thing going on. Also, I don't know if I told you this, but our bishop is black, like from the congo black, with some crazy cool gray hair going. He looks like Nelson Mandella and Morgan Freeman mixed. And excellent combination. He's way cool. Thanks to our investigator's excellent example, we now have two more baptisms coming on the way, two of another brother's sons from a previous marriage will be getting baptized within the next couple months, how excellent. It's amazing how many people are affected by one person when they decide to follow the light.

French is going really good, comprehension is at an all time high, speaking is still okay. We've run into so many people from columbia however, that we have started studying spanish, so we can make initial contact and set up another appointment, where we can bring a spanish speaking member with us.

E. Cherry is amazing. I was quite nervous at first, because transfers are like blind dates that last 6 weeks, but E. Cherry is almost like being comps with Carter or Hayden or Chandler or Noah. I knew we would bond quickly when he mentioned that he was a fan of the old Olsen twin movies they used to put out. I have never, ever met anyone who has seen those old movies. We are very much on the same page. It is going to be one of the greatest transfers ever. He's been out for 4 transfers, so we're both learning french really fast, and it is so nice to have a companion that isn't going home soon. The work will be exploding quickly, as it already has. Cherry is from Snowflake Arizona, so we are both going to freeze this winter. That's about all that went on this week, Hopefully more baptisms will follow. Our goal is to keep the font full.

Light up the Darkness,


E. Holm

November 8th, 2010

Family,

This week has been a good one, we went down and helped out with the Symposium held at a college, it was really cool. Yet, as missionaries on campus we weren't allowed to proselyte, we were there just to answer questions and show that mormons are normal people. There was of course a little confusion in the presentations, because a lot of them were done by religious professors and the like, so they weren't always accurate, but they weren't strictly contrary to our beliefs either. My favorite lecture was called "God is an American" It wasn't as bad as it sounds.

E. Perry and I were in charge of the art gallery and the homeless choir exposition. Yeah, apparantly an LDS guy wanted to do some good, so he rounded up a bunch of homeless guys and taught them how to sing. They weren't half bad! They didn't really mention the church or anything at all though...but it was a nice concert.

I've still been nasty sick this week, but only this awful cough remains now. The funniest thing happened in English class.

So our Iranian friend is studying and working in cryptography, which is message coding and decoding. He was trying to explain to our chinese lady student, what it was, so he got up and wrote and example on the board. This is the example he used.

"Attack on the eleventh September"

Using a sequence, he coded the message with Alberta wheat can't.... etc...Just a simple sentence, with which if you have the key, it's easy to read. There was a miscommunication upon the date eleventh september, so to jog our memories, our Iraqi friend drew two buildings and a plane flying right into them.

So quick recap. An Iranian, and Iraqi and a Chinawoman are discussing cryptography with the sentence "Attack on eleventh September" on the board next to a drawing of one of the most tragic terrorist attacks in history.

I'm teaching english to a terrorist cell. Haha. Anyways I thought that was humorous.

I'm excited for this Saturday, it is the day of our investigators baptism. We've got everything picked out and everything, she's just gotta make it to that day. Cross your fingers, or better yet pray. It will be exciting for sure. Today is E. Perry's last day in the mission field, tomorrow we're driving up to Montreal for Transfers, my new companions name is E. Cherry. Kinda strange, eh?

He's only been out 3 transfers, so it is going to be fun, we will both learn a lot.

There's not much else to say....


E. Holm's Christmas list.
1. Christmas music, more specifically Amy Grant and Taylor Swift's christmas album.
2. Christmas music, more specifically Amy Grant and Taylor Swift's christmas album.

Maybe possibly just send christmas music if at all possible as soon as possible? I am grieving over the lack of Christmas music on my ipod.

Have a good week!

E. Holm

November 1, 2010

Howdy,

This week has been a good one, a hard one, but a good one. I've gotten to the point now that when we go contacting, I'll usually talk to one person while Perry crosses the street and talks to another, there is no better feeling than conducting a full conversation while introducing yourself and then asking for a number and address and saying farewell in a whole nother language. It feels great to be at that point. And I've started making phone calls in french, that's just terrifying. But it's working out! I still need a whole world of practice before I am fluent however.

We had a temple trip this week, it's kinda crazy, before anything happens, they have a vote to see what language will be the language of the session, luckily it was english this time. Whew! Sometimes it's spanish and mostly french, how insane. We ran into a lot more Columbians this week, so many that we've pulled out a little book of spanish phrases so we know how to introduce ourselves in spanish. It's crazy.

We have a baptism coming up in a couple weeks, on the 13th, hopefully it won't fall through! But the investigator is ready and willing and wants to be baptized really bad, so I'm sure it won't. It's too bad that that's the week after transfers, so E. Perry won't get to be there, he's headed home to Alberta! But he's headed to Ogden to Weber State for college, it's a small world! Speaking of E. Perry, he's been awful sick lately, and I've finally caught it from him. I woke up a couple days ago without a voice, which makes it kind of difficult to contact and speak french and all that, so I've just been practicing my comprehension and listening skills. The doctors haven't gotten back to us yet, but they think that E. Perry might have pneumonia, hopefully my chest cold here doesn't progress into that. That would be a nightmare. We're on strict orders from the Mission President and his wife to stay home and rest, which is the MOST FRUSTRATING thing in the world. But what can you do? It seems like I was just progressing with the language too, but there are other ways to practice it than to speak it I guess. I've never really lost my voice like this, it's strange. Eh, give it a day, it'll be back.

There's snow on the ground up here. It's already begun, crazy. I might be buying boots pretty soon, especially since it's still snowing. We're headed up to Quebec city tomorrow, for the big symposium expedition thing, it should be awesome!

Well, that's about all I can think about, Have a good week, and take good care of Grandpa,


Peace be the Journey,

E. Holm