This is Calvin's area map
This is the mission home
A beautiful archway into Chinatown?
A horse to make Miranda jealous. :-)
Calvin's desk - and I don't know what I did to make the comments off center now.
A message for our family, written with a white erase marker on the back of his tag.
I've been really bad at keeping up with Calvin's emails home this month, sorry. But now I'm on Todd's computer where all the pictures from Calvin's latest snail mail are. So can I beg your forgiveness with pictures? Okay. Good.
First let me post Calvin's email from December 10th:
Momm,
So, this week was really interesting. our car got stolen. no not really, but in effect it did. What happened was we took the car to get the oil changed and the tires changed, and while we were waiting, the guy at the front desk started making calls about a car that was stuck on a lift. He was asking if someone could come and fix the lift, went back into the garage, came out, and said " well, guys that car on the lift is yours." We were like, "What.?" He explained that the lift's hydrolics had failed. so we went back, and luckily the car had had emergency braces put underneath it, otherwise, it would have been dropped. So, we ended up bumming rides off our Zone leaders and members for the rest of that day and part of the next. that stunk.
So in our companionship, we made an effort to do better at talking to everyone, and its really cool how that improves a day. Since everyone is really nice here, they will at least talk to you.
Most of our solid potentials right now are Hatians. They love missionaries, and they will always talk to you. Especially if you know French, and if you say "Sake Passe!" you are their new best friend immediately, mostly because sake passe means whats up in creole, and most people dont know anything in creole, so that scores you BIG points with them. Hatians also love feeding you. I havent had many dinner appointments with them, but they offer to feed us often enough. I love hatians!
what else is going on, well, as for skyping, i think we can, but I dont think we can use members' computers, so IDK, I'll ask my Zone leaders.
Momm, havent you been reading ANY of my emails, begging for us to come back after my mission?!? Of course I'll come back and show you everything!!!! [I asked him if we could go back and visit his areas because we stalk him on google earth and it looks so beautiful there in Ottawa! I also watch travel shows whenever I can on PBS on Saturdays and other days of the week and I've only ever been to Prince Edward Island and the Toronto Temple in Canada (which are not in Calvin's mission) but I've always wanted to go to Quebec and Montreal, and now Ottawa is on my list of places to visit.]
I am staying quite warm, i actually kick blankets off the bed because its too hot some nights, but usually i count my blessings and stay warm.
So what else can I tell you about my mission, umm.. well a guy just returned from his mission just this week, so that was awesome to see. he actually served where my companion is from, so he brought TONS of presents back for my companion from his parents. Oh, we have a Charlie Brown Christmas tree kit, so we set that up as our christmas tree for the time being. we have a bigger one, but we are just too lazy to set it up right now. We didnt put presents under it, we just put it on top of the presents!
By the way, in the pictures, the clouds were clouds before a tornado, but there wasnt one. It was still pretty cool!
Umm, yeah, so lots is going on. Umm, oh yeah! So we have that stratego game in the mission apartment, so we play it on Preperation days a lot. The last few preperation days have been us mostly playing Clue at the Zone leaders' appartment. lots of fun!
Love you all!!
Keep going!!
Do me a favor, and this christmas look for a way you each (except Sophie, she is my favorite! Just kidding ) can do meaningful service for someone else. I have been thinking a lot about that these past few weeks and how all my favorite families in the mission constantly look for ways to serve others.
LOVE!!!!!!!!
Watch out for ......... EVERYTHING!
Watch out for ......... EVERYTHING!
Calvin
About the "Watch out for . . . EVERYTHING!" I usually end my letters to Calvin with several one-line reminders: Study your scriptures and "Preach My Gospel!" "Pray fervently!" and I include a silly line "Watch out for ____________!" (Ninja Snowflakes and Dalek Christmas Trees are some of the recent warnings) It's just something fun I do.
Did I mention there is another Elder C Messinger in Calvin's mission? And that we thought it would be fun if they were companions at some point? Can you imagine "Hello, we're Messingers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." We thought that would be pretty fun.
Here's his email from the 17th of December:
Momm,
AUGH!!! I cant wait to get bck and see Sophie!!!!!! she is going to be so BIG!!! I cant wait to just do stuff with her! [When I write to him, I usually try to include some cute things Sophie says and does.]
yes i do love my other sisters, dont worry, and i cant wait to spend time with them too. oh tell miranda that my companion and I quote invader zim all the time. So, this week. Well where to start. So my companion and i have been thinking about doing more member work in the sense of teaching members lessons. That way, we strengthen Zion and make the members more confident is sharing the Gospel. we havent had a good comp discussion about this, how we are going to do it, what it will mean, etc. We got the idea, when a member who recently got back from his mission said that for the last 9 months of his mission, he only tracted about 10 hours overall. That was because he had been doing member lessions, and their baptism number actually increased. So, we were blown away by that. We just want to do stuff effectively.
Umm.... it was basically a regular week. We taught some people, and did missionary stuff. Yes that is a terrible response, but there is just SO MUCH we did this week. nothing too too exciting, except the fact that we have a girl commited to a baptismal date.
Now, we are meeting with this awesome guy who is super cool. He is part native, and is really interested in the church, and he listens to the lessons.
We got to see another recent convert. she is ok. We had a great lesson with her about the Tree of Life story . This has been our theme for lots of our lessons, and it works super well now a days, because we use everyone's Christmas trees as the tree of life. Its pretty fun !
So this week we have our Mission Christmas party. We are going to be away from our areas for 2 whole days. We wont really be doing any work for about 3 days strait. Our numbers are going to PLUMMET!! But hopefully not that bad.
So thats all new right now. We are goig to an aviation museum today, and then to dinner, and then off to do some random work (probably tracting this appartment building we have been working in for a few days) Then, we will go [to a family's house]. :) sooo happy, [they] are AWESOME!!!
Anyways, love you lots!
Calvin
Merry Christmas
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