Week 32

Subject: Up an hour of sleep and feeling great!

Hejsan,

Nothing funny happened this week, but it was an ok week as far as I remember. We've started trying to take A to families' houses so he can actually feel the Spirit. Last week was wonderful. We took him to Family Home Evening at the Svenssons last minute and it was fantastic. We actually invited him to come before we had anyone lined up to host us, so we were kind of nervous about the whole thing. We finally got a hold of Brother Svensson at about 5:30 and A was already on his way towards the church. I kept thinking about mom's story about grandpa and not being able to sleep over because she didn't ask him first. But, the only problem we had was we had told him an hour earlier than they would be ready for us, so we went to eat something before. He paid for us and it felt oddly like a date. FHE was great though and he was really impressed by their family and actually stayed longer than half an hour :)

On Tuesday we had zone conference. It was marvelous. I sliced 6 bell peppers and my team won General Conference Jeopardy :) Pres Anderson ok'd applying to grad school, so I'll try to get that done as soon as I can.

Wednesday was a good day, but left a bad taste in our mouths. Thursday was also kind of blah, but we had a couple of teaches and got the Swedish Class flyers in Swedish done and printed out. Now we just have to get people to come.

Friday was just fine. We had a teach with H from Nigeria who also came to church yesterday. He's really interested but feels too nervous to study the Book of Mormon. He's trying to learn Swedish and has been waiting a year to receive a response about his status in the country. He hasn't heard anything yet.

On Saturday we went to Arboga to meet the member from El Salvador who, turns out, is running away from gang violence that she accidently and innocently got swept up in. She was so active in the church back home and had her mission papers all done except for the medical part. There are a couple of nurses in the ward here that we hope can help with that, but the bishop isn't sure about sending her out from here. She probably could leave from El Salvador if she just went for a weekend and then left again. Right now she is just sitting at home during the day doing nothing. We thought it would be so fun to have her come and stay with us for awhile and be like our full time ward missionary. Only problem is she only speaks Spanish, but we could teach her Swedish or English real fast...maybe :)

Yesterday we went to an awkward dinner with 4 young adults at one of their parents’ house. The mom is no longer a member of the Church and two of his sisters who aren't members anymore either came with a boyfriend. They were all lovely people, but we got stuck there longer than we'd planned and really had nothing to say to anyone except the mom who is studying Somalian and loves foreign grammar. I told her a little about K'iche' and that was the extent of my contribution to any conversation except to confirm or deny details about American culture. It was Halloween yesterday and they don't really celebrate it here, but there are some that have tried to get it going. They have parties and some kids try trick or treating. It was so funny to hear them tell about trying to explain to people what they were doing! They would say trick or treat (in Swedish) and no one would get it. "What do you all want?" They said that one guy actually said trick and so they pulled a tame trick on him and he got mad. Anyway, you had to be there, but it was funny.

Also, there is a missionary from Örebro going to the Pocatello, ID mission next week if he gets his visa. I wasn't sure if the Lee's actually live in that mission or not, but I gave him their info just in case. If you meet an Elder Edvinsson, take good care of him! He's really cool and reminds me a little of Brian. I think it's his hair (think pre-mission). Also, there is an Elder Lindquist who is in the MTC right now and will be in the Salt Lake City mission. Again, I have no idea what that entails as far as boundaries go, but if any of you Salt Lake people happen to see him ever, tell him hi and that he's awesome!

Anyway, that's the news. I'm working on patience this week. Turns out I still don't have any. Sigh. Daylight savings ended this week (or rather summer time), so it's dark at 5 now. We are looking forward to Guy Fawkes Day and Sis Porkka's birthday this week. We'll probably have to burn something. It's tradition! (Not in Sweden...)

Love you all!
Syster Maxwell