Ausreichend

Moin moin!

Well I finally sent some pictures to you guys’ haha the ones with me actually in them are from my companion's camera too. I am very bad at actually getting my camera out and taking pictures. Hopefully I can rectify that in the future so that you can have something to look at and so that I can have something to look back on someday. Haha but anyway, this week was like most other weeks I guess nothing huge as of yet but definitely something in our future. Recently I have just been thinking upon the mission itself. Like why was I sent here and other people sent to other places? What do I need to learn while I am here and who do I need to find? My companion has told me a lot of the goings on in other missions where his friends serve. Like for instance one of his friends is serving in Thailand and they have a mandatory rule where they have to do at least two hours of finding a day. And oh how he hates that rule. And all we are thinking is what?! Give me that rule any day. We are lucky if we only have to do 2 hours of finding a day. And even when they go finding they ask questions like...."Do you want to be baptized?" or "Do you want to repent?" And they find plenty of people just doing that. Or he has another friend in Chile who has house-maids to cook and clean for him. Then I think about missions in West and Eastern Europe (that includes Russia), and it truly is a whole different kind of work. Same message, same gospel, same church, I am not trying to diverge from that. It's just a whole different type of hard work shall we say, not to take away from missionaries serving in other parts of the world. It just makes you think, what would you be willing to give up to find people who are ready to accept the gospel? Because I myself would gladly give up the first world comforts if it meant I got to teach more people. There is just something that each and every missionary needs to learn while on his mission, something personal, something sacred, something he/she needs to achieve or acquire or above all something that we need to give ourselves. -haha random thoughts of a missionary serving in Germany-

Anyway, back to what actually happened this week and not just what went on in my head at some random point. Alright let’s just start going off on random things and see if it goes somewhere. Something interesting that actually happened to us this week is that 3 people actually talked to us today and wanted to meet with us that is kind of random to say the least. Although one of them we already had an appointment with and I am not quite sure of him just yet. He has apparently read the Book of Mormon a couple of times as well as Doctrine and Covenants and The Pearl of Great Price already. And he says that he believes in the Book of Mormon but for some reason not Joseph Smith being a prophet or their being prophets at all in fact. So we will see how that goes I guess. One of the other guys is actually a Jehovah's Witness....but he is not active at least! But he actually seems the most promising so we shall see.

Okay something on a more language related subject. So we met this guy whose name is Willy and he owns a little American food somewhat stand thing right next to Penny (a grocery store) on Rickmer Str. in Bremerhaven. And he is from Georgia and has been in Germany for the last 25-30 years. He is one cool guy but oh goodness when one of his German friends came up and started talking to him, in German naturally. He has such a bad American accent when he speaks German. And unfortunately this isn't a rare occurrence but in fact a lot of Americans and missionaries have it and oh it is not pretty to hear. So that’s a little fun fact for you about German it is actually not a very easy language to pronunciate or acquire an accent for. The same goes for all the other foreigners so Americans aren't alone although I haven't heard it as bad from anyone else.

So last week we had Valentinstag as you all already know and of course my companion and I didn't really celebrate it in any way but Paul one of our investigators did come to the church and made us Indian food! Oh it was sooooo good; it was a nice change of all the usual foods that we eat. You don't get a whole lot of opportunities to eat what some people would call exotic foods I guess. Oh and something else related to food as well. The missionaries in Bremerhaven so my companion and the sisters companionship are doing Ninja week which means....that for an entire week they are going to eat nothing but rice and sleep on the floor with no blankets or pillows. It is there attempt at losing weight, something of which I am quite convinced I will never have to worry about while being on mission.

One last thing from this week is that when we were in Cuxhaven for the first time in about a month, we were meeting with one of our investigators. And his girlfriend is actually the mother in law of the branch president. And for some reason she decided to tell us about all the problems the branch president's family was having. So basically she told us far far too much then what we should've or even wanted to hear. There is something about being a missionary that just makes people want to say crazy things to you. Every day I am surprised what people will say to us on the streets or in their homes. Or I am just really confused because it makes no sense whatsoever. And it is not because I can't understand the language if that is what you are thinking.

One thing I am sure of is that the mission is definitely an interesting and worthwhile experience when it is done with the right intentions and for the right reasons—The Lord’s work. I am glad I am here and I only hope that I can live in crescendo and above all bring myself and others closer unto Christ.

Tschüss,

Elder Foster