busy busy busy

salut mes amis! vous feriez quoi si j'ecris cet email en français? Ca serait cool quoi? alors cette semaine était bien. on a fait du contacting et on a voyagé beaucoup. Ca c'est tout ce que je fais maintenant. je voyage.

 

okay i'm done now. anyone understand? i'm only going to speak french when i get home so everyone better start learning haha. but honestly it's so funny, my vocabulary is slowly diminishing. i forget words alllll the time. it's terrible. a lot of the time i can think of the word in french but not in english and then it's just weird. and when we talk to each other, we always just franglais, half english half french, and i'm going to get home and say the same saying and such and it'll be just embarrassing. so get excited! and good news is i still have like 2 more years, so it's going to get so much worse haha. oops. c'est la vie quoi!

 

so anyway, this week has been pretty good. it is now thursday instead of monday when i'm writing this, but that's cause we had our christmas zone conference on monday in paris, so our p day got changed for the week. so voila. this past week has been stressful. that's the best way i can describe it. it's hard to be a trainer. it's hard to go from being in charge of nothing to everything. and the stress is finally catching up to me. but it's good. it's just motivation to work harder. or break down and cry haha we'll see which feeling prevails. but life is good. the work here in mulhouse is actually still going very well. we actually have about 6 amis that we are working with right now. the bad part though is that the more amis we have, the more i have to organize with rendez vous and such. but i'd rather this than contacting my whole life. and elder andrus is doing well. he's a quick learner and he's picking up on french fast. it's amazing how much his comprehension has improved in just 2 weeks. and we're finally getting past that awkward first couple of weeks living with someone and we're figuring each other out, so it's good. we're going to have a lot of fun when we both figure out what we're doing haha.

 

so the weather here is pretty bad. i'm definintely not a fan. it's started to get a lot colder, and worse, raining. to make matters even worse, it's always so windy. so we can't even use our umbrellas because if we do, it would just break. so it's a win win situation we're in. oh and there's also the fact that i haven't bought a coat yet haha. silly elder meyers. okay but i feel like the email is turning into a complaint about life and that's not what i wanted. i really like it out here and the work is going well, so that's all i can really ask for. it's getting close to christmas too, so how could life get any better? and with a blue, i learn soooo quick. if i don't, then the work here in mulhouse falls apart, so it's good motivation. but my french is getting better and better because i'm forced to speak it, so it's really a blessing. this will help me throughout my mission so much even though i'm not very comfortable with it now. soon enough i'll be grateful haha.

 

but yeah, i don't really know what to talk about. i don't have any very cool stories to share or anything. elizabeth, our baptismal date is still doing well, and she's still set for the 7 of january. so that'll be super exciting. other than that though, we're just trucking along with our amis, trying to help them progress. sometimes it's harder then it sounds though strangly enough. but we're getting there. hopefully. we're learning if nothing else.

 

alors voilà! that's my life right now. i hope everyone is doing well on the home front with school and work and life and such! i love you all! a bientot!

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

Training Begins!

salut mes amis!

 

hi everyone! how's everyone doing? well. so this week has been crazy! first, i got to pick up my new companion! so i was in paris for tuesday and wednesday. so that was fun. and we got to go take pictures by the tour eiffel and arc de triomphe and such like that. so that was terribly exciting. and then we even got to teach a lesson on the train ride home, and then we passed off this person to the elders at strasbourg because she was from there.

But all in all, this week was terrific. we got to teach a lot of lessons, and mr blue got to have a huge culture speaking shock with french. oh oh oh also, we had 5 amis at church! 5! poor elder is going to think this is normal to have that many, so i guess we're just going to have to make it normal. the standard is set. but yeah, everything is going just peachy here in mulhouse. this next week is going to be just as crazy though cause i have to go to belgium to do my legality there, so tuesday and wednesday i'll be gone, and bluey is going down to belfort to spend those two days with the belfort elders. donc voilà!

 

you guys probably thought i forgot about writing about my new elder, but i just thought it was fun to refer to him as blue throughout that first part. but anyway haha. so, his name is Elder Andrus! he's from Lindon Utah, just down the road, and he's a super cool elder. we're going to have fun here in mulhouse. his french is pretty good, but he's still catching on to everything. yeah, i was just as shocked as you are that he wasn't a frankophone. but it really is super good for me because it forces me to do everything, so i'm learning so much. my french is improving a lot, and my teaching is too because i'm forced to do it. all of it too haha. no i'm joking, he does help out when he can, and i can tell that he has a super strong testimony because even though he explains things super simply and his french isn't terrific, you can still feel the spirit. it's super good. but yeah! that's him! he's a great elder and we're gonna have a good two transfers.

 

well yeah, that's kinda all for this week. we are super pressed for time, cause we're going to our turkey bowl! this p day, we have a thanksgiving dinner and turkey bowl planned with our zone in strasbourg, so we have to head off to that in a couple of minutes. i'm super excited, you have no idea. that's the thing that i've missed the most, is sports. i haven't got to do anything like that since i got here, but today we get to have a turkey bowl!!! yay. alrighty, well i love you all and i hope everyone is doing just stellar. bonne semaine et je vous aime!

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

the start of something new!

haha like my subject? couldn't resist. anyway!

hi everyone! how are you? here in mulhouse, things are going just peachy. and they will be for the next couple of days. until wednesday, then i'll be in charge of everything. then i'm expecting everything to explode. yay! so i don't know how much anyone really knows right now, or if my last little email even got blogged or forwarded or whatever, but for anyone that didn't know yet, i will officially be training next transfer. ummmmmm. yeah. i know right. so this will sure be a new experience. i went from being completely new and knowing nothing, and now i'm gonna be a daddy. went from no responsibility to being completely responsable for what happens in mulhouse and what becomes of this new missionary that's coming in. so to say i'm freaking out a little would be an understatement haha. no it actually hasn't really completely hit me yet. soon though. on one side, i am so nervous. but then on the other hand, i'm so excited to get to train. and super grateful. because although i may be crying for the next 6 weeks because i'm going to be doing everything (unless i get a french companion, which i can't decide if i want or not. because on one hand, it would make life so much easier for me, but then on the other hand, it's so much easier to connect and become like best friends with an american when there isn't a language barrier or anything, and just because americans and french people are different. just different mindsets.) i will be learning so much too. hip hip hoorah for forcing me to speak french and such ha.

 

so anyway, elder coleman is leaving! sad huh? we're super sad to be parting, but on the other hand super excited for what's ahead. he got called to Torcy, a suburb of paris, as a zone leader. what a stud right? he went trainer, district leader and then zone leader in 3 transfers. exciting. but yeah, our last couple of days together are just crazy. we have a lot of RDVs with our amis, and then rdvs with members too. oh and district meeting on tuesday, which we are going to the gare right after to hop on our train to paris, so i can pick up newby the next day. oh là là. but yeah, i'll give you all the information about my little tyke next week, when i have actually met him. so we're gonna be busy next week. and poor little newby is going to be so shocked. the first week was so hard. so he'll have fun ha.

 

so this week, guess what we did? we might have set a baptismal date! for the 7th of January! cool huh? her name is elizabeth gustave, and she is the daughter of a less active member, who is becoming completely active now, since he's been to church for the last 4 sundays. but she is 14, and she is from guadaloupe, and she comes to church all the time with her dad, and she has become friends with the girls in the ward and the young womens president. so last week, in church, she just walked up the bishop and told him that she wanted to be baptized. haha so we set up some rdvs with her and now we just have to teach her the lessons and voilà! she's super great though, she knows most of the stuff we teach her, and she already has a good support group at church and stuff. so next time, we're going to teach her with the young women's president, and it'll be just stellar. so yeah, although we didn't really do anything to find this girl or get her integrated, it's still cool to see things like this happen. this was completely our ward, and that's how things should be. go ward!

 

so PAM update. well. nothing really has happened with them yet. last week we had a RDV with them on monday, and marie, the mom, said to come at 7 o clock and then we can eat with the girls, and she'll get home at 8. so we asked to bring a friend since 2+2=bad haha and she said sure. so we brought aline, an 18 year old in our ward. we went and ate and such, and then it's 8, and she isn't home yet. 8:15, still no. 8:30 nope. she didn't end up showing up until 9... so we just sat around talking for two hours, and by the time that she got home, we didn't even have time to teach a lesson... it was a super bummer. so we have a RDV with them tonight again, with the same situation, but we're coming at 730 and hopefully she'll actually show up this time. i think we're just going to teach the girls if she doesn't show up by 830.. but we'll see. so cross those fingers. they were also going to come to church yesterday, but had to bail last minute, cause their ride fell through, but at least they are still making an effort.

 

but yeah, that's about the highlights of my week. it was a good week overall. so yeah. i'll update you about how bad i've corrupted this new missionary soon haha. jokes. but i hope everyone is doing well and having fun! love you all!

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

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TRANSFER

salut!

 

okay. so. here's the deal. we just got the transfer email, and guess what? welllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll. i'm training next transfer. so. yeah. pray for me haha. but i'm staying here in mulhouse! so i'll be here for at least 2 more transfers! and for christmas! so i'm super excited about that. but yeah. so. i'll find out who he is on wednesday! so i'll tell you next monday or something. but yeah. i'm freaking out a little right now, but it's fine. mais voilà! so i love you all and hope everyone is doing stellar. i'll write more on monday maybe! je vous aime!

-- 

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

transfers be a coming....

so it's super weird to think about the fact that transfers are in like a week. i will find out saturday what the deal is in dear old mulhouse and if i'm going to get to stay or be shipped off for somewhere else. do you want me to tell you what i hope? well. i either want to stay here in mulhouse, because i really love our ward here. they are all just super great. and the work is starting to get going here too. orrr. i'd like to go to paris or something for christmas. but we will see. it's not my decision, so i'll go where the Lord wants me to go and not complain. c'est la vie.  i'm sad to leave elder coleman too. but i don't really think that there is a chance that we are going to stay together... but we can still cross our fingers right?

so let's see. this week was honestly crazy. just fou. just to give you a quick glimpse of what we did this week, we spent 22 hours on trains this week. 22. it was just out of control. story. so this week was zone conference, and president kopischke, the president of the europe presidentcy, was giving the training. but he was only doing it 3 times, so there were multiple zones going to each conference. and it was in paris. so we, living all the way out in mulhouse, had to go in the day before. but on the bright side, the APs called us to stay with them, so that was actually super fun. anyway, so we got on our 3 hour TGV train to head into paris on wednesday night. we get in and the APs come pick us up, and just a side story, we went to Carrefour, a walmart type store, and got sushi, because it was Elder Hall's 6 month left mark. so we got that and ate it that night, and it was really good. they surprisingly have really good sushi there as it turns out. and yes, i may have eaten some octopus. it's super chewy. not the best. anyway, back to the story, so then we went to zone conference the next day, which was super good. but by the time it was over, there weren't any trains to get home. and it didn't help that it was a holiday the next day (armistice day 11/11). so anyway, instead, we had to get a train in the morning at 8 o clock, but since it was a holiday, all of the fast trains were full, so we got to take an intercité aka the slowest train in existence because it stops at like every city along the way. so that took 6 hours. ew. so we finally got home and then we unpacked and took a potty break, and we ready to get some work done, when guess who calls? president! he calls us and tells us that there is a mission counsel meeting, (the meeting that is usually just for zone leaders) and elder kopischke had asked him to invite a couple of other companionships to come too. so he invited us to come, and we said okay when is it? yup. tomorrow. so he tells us to go the gare (train station) right now and get tickets haha. so we hurry and pack and get our stuff together and head to the gare! we buy our tickets and hop on the train 30 minutes later. we had honestly been home for an 1 and now we were off to paris. AGAIN. haha. but anyway, we got on the train, and we actually got the chance to teach this guy from new zealand, in english even, while on the train. we started off just talking normal, but by the end, we had taught the whole plan of salvation. it was super good. and so great to be able to teach in english. so anyway, we went to the meeting the next day, which was just a greaaaat meeting, and then turned around and came home again. and we got to take an intercité again. 5 more hours. woo woo! so if we are counting RERs in paris and METRO times, we count 22 hours of train transit. haha. oh boy. it was a super great experience, and i'm really glad that president called us to come to the meeting, it was just that trains killed us this week. so anyway, we were in, or in transit from paris from wednesday to saturday at 9:45 when we got in. so our whole week was honestly wasted. we taught one lesson and that's it this week. but still, we had a super uplifting and spiritually (draining) week haha. i loved it.

but sunday, on the bright side, there is this less active, that is names frère gustave, who is slowly reactivating, and his daughter elizabeth is 11 and not baptized yet. but she is really good friends with the young women in the ward, and she is pretty much active, because she comes with her dad every week. so with the help of our bishop and our ward, we found out that she wants to get baptized now! and her mom is okay with it too (frere gustave is divorced). so we set up a rendezvous for saturday, and we're gonna set a baptismal date then! we are so excited. it's gonna be stellar. so now we just have to teach her the lessons, and then she gets to be baptized! it's gonna be great.

but yeah, that's pretty much my week this week. super crazy, and busy, but good. i hope everyone at home is doing well! je vous aime tous! à bientôt!

bises!

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

mormons aren't amish!

hi everyone!

 

so just to start off this email, why is it that everyone confuses mormons for amish!!! it's unreal. it's not even kind of the same thing. but everyone. they think that amish = mormon. and you want to hear the crowning jewel on this whole thing? well everyone knows that we're american cause we're just beaux gars (haha or maybe it's our outrageous accent), but the funny thing is, that they think that amish is an american thing too, when in all reality, it comes from alsace. yes. the very region that they are living in. incredible, france. well done haha. golly goodness people. get your facts straight. it doesn't even sound similar haha.

also, funny random fact. guess what the word for cotton candy is in french? yeah, barbe à papa, aka papa's beard haha. that sure is something that i want to eat. num num.

 

so anyyyyyyway. this week was honestly just terrific. so good.  first off, we had a mangez vous almost every day this week. it was stellar and it all tastes so good. the only bad thing is the fact that after each time that we eat with a member, all we want to do is explode. they just keep shoving food down our throats, and i'm still not sure how to politely say  <if i eat any more food i will probably die>. ps, those are french quotation marks. cool huh? right. so second reason, we had the coolest thing happen this week. so we got a call this week from an elder in the office of the lyon mission. and his name is elder prunin. and i'd seen this name before, and as it turns out, he had served in this very city just a little while ago. this was his blue ville, so he was trained here just like me. so that was a precious little moment that we shared. but anyway, so after he asked a little about how mulhouse was doing, he gave us this referral. it was from a member in perpignon (a city in the south) who had a cousin here in the mulhouse that was super nice and liked the church and so the member in perpignon gave us here address so we could go talk to her. so we said can do. so the day that we were doing it, we were on exchanges with the ZLs, and so me and elder coburn went on out. we found the house, and we rang the sonnet, and a girl pokes her head out the window of the apartment building, and said who is it? so we say we're missionaries! and she freaked out! it was so cool. and this was a good freak out mind you haha. she said wait wait i'm coming i'm coming! so she ran down the stairs, and she was actually genuinely happy to see us! and that does not happen often. so we come in, and the girl that answered the door is called pearl. she is 16, and she has a 17-18 year old sister named amour and their mom. and their mom was super happy to see us too! so we got to know them for awhile and then we asked if we could teach a lesson. and they said sure! so we pulled out our books of mormon, and she said wait let me get mine, and she pulled out this triple combination that her cousin had given her! it was just great. so then we proceeded to teach them the first lesson about joseph smith and the restoration. and it was honestly the best experience ever. when we got to the story of joseph smith, i told recounted his story, and then i got the first vision, and i recited it to them, and i've honestly never felt the spirit stronger. i don't know if it was just me that felt it, because God knew that i needed that confirmation, but either way, i can no longer doubt that joseph smith was a prophet or that this is his church. i know that he was called of God to restore the very same church that Jesus Christ established when he was here on the earth. but anyway, so we taught the rest of the lesson, and it went super well i think. we commited them to read the book of mormon together and the two girls said they would come to church, but the mom couldn't this week because she works, but she said she could and wanted to in 3. so we just get to wait for her a little. but that's fine, because the two girls came to church! and i think they actually had a good time and hopefully felt the spirit. we had a really great testimony meeting and all of our members and super great, so i hope they could at least feel something. so yeah, we're going to teach them again this week, and i honestly can't wait.

 

so another fun thing that happened this week, is that we got to put on a fireside where we watched the joseph smith movie. and that was really cool. except for the fact that none of our amis came and there was only about 10 members there, but all in all, it was a good experience for the people that came and i at least know that their testimony grew.

 

um. so yeah. that was about the extent of our week. so hopefully we'll have some good news about this family next week. we are going to try to set baptismal dates with them, but we'll see. so yeah. if you want to pray for us/them, that'd be fun. just pray for PAM. haha that's what we call them. Pearl, Amour, and Marie. pam. haha. anyway. so yeah! that's my life. everyone remember that this week is 11/11/11. don't forget to make a wish at 11:11. okay cool. je vous aime! bonne semaine!

 

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

hallloooowwwweennn!!!

so if i'm going to be honest right now, halloween is such a let down. i don't even know if it's a real holiday here in france. i've seen a total of like 4 kids dressed up today. how lame right? i was pretty disappointed to say the least. but anyway, how is everyone??? so first question of the day, how cold does it usually get in utah?? because i honestly have no idea what the weather is like in comparison to utah here. because it feels pretty same, but i don't remember what the temperature is at all. so that's good right? wrong.

 

well, this week was pretty good. we didn't do too many exciting things, we had a total of 3 lessons this week, so that should explain a little how it was. but still, press along press along right? and honestly, we love being missionaries. me and elder coleman have so much fun. we just joke and have fun the whole time that we are contacting and porting and stuff, and it really makes being a missionary so much better. because it's not really a chore at all to go do contacting or porting or anything. it's super good. i love being a missionary! oh also, we have this member in our ward, he just moved here from canada, and he's super cool. he's like a black belt in kung fu (i know that doesn't exist, but still) and he was showing us some stuff. so i'm just going to warn you right now that i'm like a professional fighter now. it's like dragon ball z fighting too. and yes, we do still kind of hurt from when he was demonstrating on us. goku vs him would be a good fight for sure haha. anyway, back to real life.

 

so you want to hear the miracle for the week??? it was so great. we'll see if it actually follows through, but it was terrific either way. so we had to do elder coleman's legality, so we got all of his important papers, like his whole identity, and went to the prefecture to do it. but guess what? yup, it was closed. lame. so we were kind of bummed, but we only had like 30 minutes until dinner, so we decided to just keep working instead of go home and put his whole identity back where it was safe. and honestly, the very first person we talked to, we had like a 30 minute conversation with. she told us that her first love was mormon! and he went to utah! crazy huh? and she said that she really like the mormon religion, but she didn't know it was here in france, so we told her all about it and then gave her un livre de mormon and she took it and she said she would read before our rendezvous and she was excited and everything! it was soo cool. so i'll keep you updated for if this actually comes to anything, but it was just a miracle that it even happened. hoorah for mulhouse haha.

 

okay well time is short today because i have to still write president and we were out with a member like the whole day today, so we have to hurry super fast. so i love you all, and i hope you are all just having the time of your life. je vous aime!

 

elder meyers

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 Rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

hey everyone!! quoi de neuf??

 

hi! so how is everyone? you know what the weird thing is? i honestly have no idea who everyone is. i have no idea who actually gets this email, but whoever it is, i love you. haha well, to start out, this week was good! we started off solid. monday we got to teach a lesson with a member, and then we taught another one on tuesday and wednesday! then we got to thurday, and we had a rendez vous with our best, most potentially ami, Isaac. AND we got a member to come with us! we were just on fire. and thennnn.... thurday afternoon, and we were eating lunch, he sent us a text... he said that he has made a decision and he has decided to stick with his beliefs.... so.. we got dropped. second time in one week ha. go fight win. I guess we're back to the drawing board and by drawing board, i mean contacting all day. but it's not all bad. everything happens for a reason right? we're not sure quite yet what the reason is, but maybe one day we'll figure out what we were being taught, besides patience. so yeah, that was kind of a low point of the month, but it's fine, life goes on!

 

oh so funny story. so this weekend, we got to eat with three members! it was super great. we started on saturday by doing service for frère apasamy, and then he fed us after, and we got to eat raclette! raclette is this super good dish which you have this raclette melting machine (raclette is cheese) in the middle of the table, and you all get potatoes and some meats, usually like lunch meats and such, and then you melt your own cheese, and pour it over the potatoes and meat. look it up on the internet if that made no sense at all eh? but it's suppperrr good, but you feel like you're going to explode after eating it, because it's like eating straight fat haha. it's terrific. So that's what we ate on saturday, and then we had lunch and dinner with members on sunday. so we show up to the Wassmer family, and guess what we're having?? you betcha, raclette! but it had been a day already, so it still tasted pretty good. oh also, side note about this family. he is the father of the bishops wife, so the bishop and his wife came to eat with us too. and i love these two. they are so fun! but the funnest part about them, is there little son. his name is lorenzo, and i have honestly never seen a kid with more energy than this one. he is sooooooooooo crazy. but so cute. one of his favorite things to do is just run around saying "cours cours cours cours" which means run run run run hahah. he's so funny. we decided that we want one for our apartment. a lorenzo that is. we'd be entertained for the rest of our lives. ohkay so anyway, back to the story. so after we had stuffed ourselves full of that, because they don't let you leave until you've eaten so much that you can't move, and then we went to our next dinner right after. and guess what we got??? RACLETTE! hahhaah oh boy, it was terrible. it doesn't even taste good the third time. but we still ate it. oh boy though. raclette......

 

So guess what happened this week in church??? we may or may not have sung a christmas song in sacrament meeting hahahah. it was sooooo legit. me and elder coleman just looked at each other and smiled. they're for reals about christmas here though. alsace is world famous for their christmases i guess. and we definitely saw them starting to set up the christmas decorations when we went to church too. it's going to be so pretty! hopefully i get to stay here for christmas... on verra. but yeah, we were pretty excited that here in mulhouse we were already busting out the christmas music.

 

so i don't know if i've told you or not yet, but we now have sisters in our district. they elders that we in colmar, another city in our district, got whitewashed, as in they both got transfered away instead of one staying and the other leaving, and they replaced them with sisters!!! crazy huh? no one was expecting that one. but yeah, so that's cool i guess. we met them on thurday at district meeting, and they are both okay, except for the fact that they're kinda serious. not the biggest laughers or anything. but ça va. they're both good missionaries, so that's all that really matters.

 

okay well i'm mostly out of things to say... being a missionary is still just stellar and i love it here in france. the language is coming along, and i've finally just decided to go big or go home, aka stop being afraid of making a fool out of myself and just spit it out, even if i sound like a dumb american. most people already think i'm an idiot anyway so i figure talking to them can't make my chances any worse haha. but yeah, life is going well. tout va bien. i hope you are all just having the time of your life wherever you happen to be. je vous aime tous!

 

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

Pictures!!!

hiya everyone!! so just a couple of pictures.

explication of what they are: on saturday this week, we did service for a member, and we definitely make home made apple juice. and it was the best thing that i've ever tasted. nom nom nom. he has these super old machines that tear up the apples, and then we put them in the press thing and it was just stellar. love me some fresh apple juice. he even gave us a bottle to take home. num. oh and the other picture is me and elder coleman crying because we were porting and we found ourselves in the creepiest alley in the world. the adventures of the mission! haha. but yeah, i have a couple of minutes here just waiting for the pictures to load so i can send them so i suppose i'll write you a little more explanation of my life or whatever. so this coming week, i'm so excited! it's going to be a truly stellar week. hopefully. but already, we have about 4 rendez-vous set, so it should be at least marginally good if that's all we get. oh and we started off the week with a lesson that we gave today! so that's good. we actually have a couple of amis now and it's so nice!  they are all progressing nicely (well at least they keep letting us fix rendez-vous haha) and i know that if they get that witness that the book of mormon is true, then they will act on it. now we just have to keep teaching and hope and pray for that witness. it's good though. and me and elder coleman have so much fun. it's funny how similar we are. we were talking about it the other day and it's just silly. but yeah! life is good here in mulhouse, and the work is starting to take off. it's not quite in the air yet, but the engines are started at least.

love you all and i'll talk to you soon! i expect a monster package for christmas too. just saying. haha jokes. love you!

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 Rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

 

I hate thinking of new subjects for posts

HEYYY ERYONE!

so this week was so good. sooo good. guess what we got to do? we had an exchange with the assistants!!! it was soo cool. we learned so much too. especially me. i went with elder plétain, he's from nice in southern france, and it was so cool being with a native french speaker! i want to be like that so bad! just being with him renewed my desire to be completely fluent. gah i love those two so much. i wish we could do that like every week. because after the exchange, i just wanted to be like them so bad and be the best missionary i can.

so also this week, i definitely blew a fuse.... and along with that fuse, i may or may not have exploded my hair cutter ha.................................... i've used it a total of one time, and it's definitely completely busted now. cause i grabbed just a random converter, and i went to cut my hair, and as i turned it on, it just exploded. turns out it wasn't the right voltage of converter... it was smoking and everything. go fight win.

oh so anyway, do you want to hear the miracle of the week? man i love being a missionary so much. but so here goes. so this week on wednesday, we had 3 rendez-vous! 3! that's like a record for us! so we were super excited and couldn't wait to teach these people. so then wednesday rolls around, and all of them fall through. we have 0 lessons on wednesday. so that was super sad, and we didn't have any other things to do, so we just put our shoulder to the wheel and went out contacting. for like the whole day.. so it wasn't the best experience, but while we were contacting, this guy calls us out of nowhere. his name is Jean, and he said that he had been taught by the missionaries 2 years ago and he wants to fix a rdv! 2 years!!!! that's a longgg time!! but anyway, the day that we fix the rdv for, was the day that we had our exchanges with the assistants, so i got to go teach this guy with my assistant companion, and we (mostly he haha) gave such a good lesson and then gave him a soft invite to baptism. as in when you know that the book of mormon is true, will you be baptized. and he said yup! and that also happened with the other rendez-vous that we had that day that elder coleman and the other assistant. it was so cool. prayers really do get answered, and God really does care about each individual missionary. if you are working hard, even if you don't see the results in your immediate surrounding, there is always someone being prepared. I love being a missionary.

okay well this is going to be a short letter, but i love you all and i hope you are doing just stellar!

bisous!

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 Rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

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Beginning of the transfer 2

Sunset in Mulhouse!

quoi de neuf tout le monde??

life is good over here in Mulhouse. we just got our transfer email last saturday, and the results are that i am staying here in Mulhouse for another transfer at least! and i'm actually way happy about it. i like my companion a lot, and we get along better and better and we just have a lot of fun, while getting a lot of work done. it's super good. and this week was really cool. okay so remember how i told you that i bought that coat? well it turns out, that i'm going to return it. i just can't really wear a 100 dollars worth of coat with a good conscience. and my Elder Coleman's trainer has a coat and he is going home after this next transfer, so he said he'd sell it to me for like 25, and that's a lot better ya know. so i'm just going to survive on sweaters that i'm going to buy today for a little while. and there is a suuuuuuuper tacky coat that some missionary just left in the apartment so i've been wearing that every so often too. it's hideous, but it's warmer than nothing! i might freeze to death, but it's not overly cold yet. i'm super glad that i grew up in utah, because it's pretty cold here, but not as cold as utah in the middle of winter, so it's not bad yet. i think it helped all those times that i went to school in the freezing weather with short sleeves and shorts. SO THERE parents, it turns out that freezing yourself really is a good idea, and it helps haha. all those years i was just preparing for my mission.   anyway, speaking of coats, me and elder coleman think we are pretty funny. whenever we refer to our coats, we always call them our disguises. because when we wear our white shirts and ties, we stick out sooooo much.  honestly no one in france wears a white shirt and a tie. if you wear that, you ALWAYS have a suit jacket over it, or it's a different color of shirt. so everyone knows that we are weird before we even talk to them. but now that it's getting cold, when we wear our disguises, we just look like super well dressed businessmen! it's just terrific. we're kinda cool i guess. at the same time it's bad though because we look more like Jehovahs Witnesses, and that's not a good thing.   this week was good! except for the fact that we didn't get to teach very many lessons because a bunch of them fell through, and then a bunch of them we couldn't get ahold of the person to fix the rendez-vous.. so it was pretty disappointing in that sense, but it was good other than that.

so monday, our preparation day, was fun.  we went to the car museum here! it's actually the biggggggest car museum in the WORLD!! cool huh? i took tons of pictures, and it was pretty cool. they had the most expensive car in the world there, at i think 40,000,000 euros. it was a Bugatti royal. oh and also the fastest and most powerful car in the world too. that was a Bugatti also. pretty cool though. but that was pretty much it for preparation day. nothing too exciting.

tuesday we had a RDV( rendez-vous), and it was literally in the middle of muslim community, so on the way there, we had some people spit at us and yell some....colorful things at us, and by the time we got there, he ended up boefing us. in other words, he didn't show up. so that was fun. oh on a side note, i discovered today that Mulhouse has one of the largest muslim populations out of all the areas in france. so that's good i guess. i would honestly guess like 2/3s of the people here are muslim. it's incredible.

wednesday was our golden day. it was so great. so that day for studies, i read this suuuuper good talk, about desire and drive. it said something along the lines of that the most successful people in the world don't get there because they have just raw talent, but they get there because they have a desire to be there. and if you really have a desire to do something, then you are going to do everything that you can to reach this desire. so i applied this to missionary work, and i was already super pumped up for the day. oh so then before contacting that afternoon, we talked about it, and we decided that we really need that desire, and we really need to want to do contacting and want to find people and not just see it as a chore and a way to use up time. so we prayed to have this desire and love for the people, because sometimes it's just hard. so we went out with this prayer in our hearts, and the contacting was just great. we were smiling the whole time and it was really just fun. also, we found 4 new potentials in just 2ish hours, so we got their numbers, and we fixed RDVs with two of them for the coming week. it was so great. and so now, our morning contacting that we do is like the highlight of our day. missionary work is really fun.

thursday. so i just want to tell you a funny story about today. so the weather here. it's been HOT. hottest it's been in 25 years or something. so everyday, we'd go out with short sleeves and such. so today, it started like any other day. we walk out with our short sleeves, and everything is just peachy.  we go through the whole day, and the weather is nice, and everything is just splendid. but then, it's night. and we are allll the way out of the city, doing some porting (door to doors if i haven't already told you). so we are just happily porting along, when all of the sudden, out of nowhere it starts raining. at first it's just kind of nice and it's no big deal. but then it picks up, and it's just pouring. we continue our porting like good little missionaries, and it just gets cold. so there is a bus at 815 that goes back to centre-ville where we live, so we get on that, but we get into centre-ville, and we still have 30 more minutes to do stuff until we can go in. so we are out there in the pouuuurrrring rain.  it was so cold, because we just had our short sleeves on, and we were just completely drenched through, but we had so much fun. there was literally no one out on the streets, because first off, people go in at around 7 in france, and second, it was pouring. so we tried to talk to everyone we passed, which was about 3, with no luck. i think this one girl that we tried to talk to thought we were going to mug her.  finally, we went inside, and drank hot chocolate while we planned for the next day.

today we got soaked. soaked through.

friday. we had a good rdv with an African today, and he loved everything we said. africans love talking about jesus and they are very open, but they don't really do anything about it. this guy was so super nice though and he was interested in everything we said and promised that he would come to church on sunday, but then he didn't. and i don't know. we are going to try to set a baptismal date with him next time, so hopefully he kept his commitment to read and pray and stuff. we'll see i suppose.

saturday we started off by doing some service in the pouring rain. this time we were smart enough to wear jackets though, so don't fret.  we had 2 RDVs set  for today! we were way excited and it was going to be a terrific day. but then we got boefed twice. both of them didn't show up for their rendez-vous.... so that was pretty disappointing... but that's missionary life i guess. hopefully next time. then we did some weekly planning and called it a night.

sunday was super good too. we ate with a member after church, and her non member husband, and that was good. this guy is sooo nice and just a terrific guy, but he just has different beliefs. i guess he has been taught the lessons 3 or 4 times, he hasn't felt that witness from the spirit yet.. so i think we are going to see if we can teach him again. he has a son that served a mission, and was married in the temple, and his wife is such a strong member and she really wants to get sealed forever, but i guess it's not his time yet.. so pray for that one.  we went over to the Dietschs after that. the dad here is french, but he went to school at BYU, so he speaks english fluently, along with german and spanish. his wife is from peru, and she speaks french and spanish and a little english. so they have 2 little twin girls, and they are honestly sooooo cute. they are my favorite, and they love the missionaries. we usually go over to eat every sunday and we always play with these two. it was even their birthday today! we made them origami things for their birthday, but then we forgot to give them to them. while we were there, we had a tea party and everything. it was just precious. i got a picture, but one of the girls was too shy, so she wouldn't be in it. i'll get a picture of them both soon though so don't worry.

tea party with the famille dietsch

but yeah!! that was my week. also, about the other investigators that i told you about before. this week we couldn't get ahold of them to fix a rdv, so we're going to keep trying. so no progress yet, but we're still praying.  but yeah, that's about it. i love you all.

this is our 60 eggs we bought for one week. two thumbs up. we're fat, so what.

POSTERITY! me, grandpa crump and papa coleman

-- 

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 Rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

SALUT!

so time flies. that's just how it goes. i cannot believe that i am almost done with a transfer already!! it's so weird.    So this week, at the beginning of october i remind you, it has been sooooo hot! especially for this area! they said that it has been the hottest here in 25 years in this part of the season. weird huh? it's consistently around 31 C each day, which is around 90 F i think? it's no bueno. especially since we wake up and it's freezing. it changes sooo much from morning to afternoon in temperature. it's mighty fine. oh so also, our professional cook-ness was going pretty strong this week. we definitely made a quiche. completely all by ourselves. we made the pate (crust) and everything. it was soooooo good. we found this swiss cookbook in the church that was gathering dust, so we asked some people and then just borrowed it, so we're making all sorts of exciting dishes now. although most of them take wine, so it's a little challenging,but we make due. oh also, a couple of weeks ago, i bought a coat! it is freaking chic. me and elder coleman look like models when we walk down the streets with them. although we've only had that chance for like a half of a day and then it got blazing hot, it was sorta expensive, although pretty cheap for here. it was 70 euro. so like 100 dollars, it was super sad using that much money, but i kind of needed it to survive and be warm, so i did. sad day for sure.... okay so everyone at BYU, another temple in provo?? what?? was that as big of a shock for everyone else as it was for me? that was crazy. speaking of which, conference was so amazing. i've definitely never gotten as much out of conference as i did this year. it's amazing what happens when you don't sleep through half of it haha.... but i was alert and taking notes the whole time. it was stellar. sad part about it though, is that we only got to watch 4 of the 5 sessions. the last one, sunday afternoon, was playing live, and it was at 10 o clock in the evening that it started, so we kind of had to go home and get to bed instead of watching it until midnight. we're probably going to watch it for study time tomorrow. 

so story time for the week.....we had the coolest experience everrrrrr. sort of. so we were doing door to doors, which was just magical. i love doing that so much, ha ha. we were just having everyone tell us that they didn't like us and wanted us to go now, comme d'habitude, oh side note, at least here in france, they don't slam doors in your face! because they have a fence around their house, and instead of having the doorbell on the house, they have it on the gate, so then they just walk out of their doors, see who it is, and yell they aren't interested. it's just great haha. anyway, back to the story, so we were having no success, so we decided to go back to do some contacting. so we go and get back on the tram, because we were pretty far away, and we took it a couple of stops, and then we decided to stop at a random stop and continue porting, and after more disappointments, we found this guy! he said he was busy, but to come back the next day, so we did, and we taught him a great lesson on the restoration. he was super curious, and he had tons of great questions and he was actually pretty open. so we taught him, and challenged him to read the book of mormon and pray to know if it was true, and that it could answer all of his questions, and so he said that he would, and then we set a lesson for this next friday! i can't wait to teach him again. we have been praying like everyday that he will get that witness that it is true. so cross your fingers! or better yet, pray.  that was so cool. so i hope he keeps progressing, but i'll keep you updated. that other young family, we didn't get to teach this week, but they seemed genuinely sorry, so hopefully we will get to them  this week.   time's up for this week, but i love you all! hope everyone is doing just peachy! à plus!

 

Elder Meyers

Fooled You!

oh hey there! so you definitely thought i wasn't going to write this week didn't you? fooled you! our district leader told us that it was mandatory to write an email to our family each week, so here i am! but i don't have much time at all, so it's gonna be super quick. paris was so amazing as usual. we saw sacré coeur and notre dame and it was just magical. there are honestly so many cool things here. it's stellar. so anyway, this week was pretty slow. we had interviews with the president, and that was in metz, which is about 3 hours away, so we wasted about one and a half days with that. well not wasted, but it kind of felt like it, just because we sat around for a lot of the day until we got to finally talk to president. but it was good. he said he was impressed with my french, but i think he just tells that to everyone to make them feel good about themselves. but honestly, the think that i want more than anything in the world right now is a native french speaker for a companion. i could learn sooooooooo much. because here in mulhouse, we don't get all that much practice to talk with real francophones... we don't teach all that many lessons, so it's kind of hard. the only real time we get to talk to them is at church. i just want to be fluent so bad so that i can communicate with the people easily so that i can be the best missionary that i can be... but anyway, story for the week! we definitely taught someone, AND fixed a return visit! i don't know if i've told you about that man that we met that was french and married a phillipino and has the cutest little daughter in the world (except clara,calm down everyone) but we taught them this week! and it was a lesson in english too haha. what are the chances right? but it was super good. but i'm out of time today so i'll write next week! love you all! buhbye!

BONJOUR!!!!

BONJOUR!!!!

 

ça va mes amis?? so i don't know if you've forgotten yet, but i'm in france. just thought i'd give you a little reminder haha. no but really! life is all sorts of exciting. so to start off, my thoughts for this week are as follows. french keyboards are still terrible, but i'm getting better so it's not taking so much time. bad news about that is that i'm going to return home and be used to a french keyboard and then my typing will be back at 5 wpm. wince. but whatevers. so here's the thing. mulhouse is very muslim. and that's a definite bummer for us. because number one, they are kind of rude. the kids i mean. they think they are pretty funny and stuff and they like showing off, but...... yeah.... the older ones are nice though! and it turns out they really like americans. most people here, when we tell them that we are from america, they ask us what the heck we are doing in france then, because america is so much better. viva l'amerique! haha but yeah secondly, we can' teach them. strictly forbidden. we can talk to them all we want, but it's actually a danger to their lives if we teach them. because part of being a muslim, means that you won't change religions. it's punishable by death. so if they ever plan on returning to their home country, or have relatives there or anything, then they are in serious trouble if they convert to a different religion. frankly it's kind of sad and super scary, but that's life i guess. so yeah.... anyway, thirdly, guess what the word for a transfer in french is? you call it a mutation haha. so i'm going to be mutated like 16 times before i leave france. yeah. wolverine is going to look like such a pansy when i get back haha. also, no email next week. i HAVE to go to paris for p-day.... so i'm not going to be able to. no really i'm so excited to go back there. but yeah we have to go there to do my legality. i have to go to a doctors appointment and then get my legality here in france worked out so that i can stay for another year. then i get to do it again in another year haha. but that's the price you have to pay to live in france i guess. besides, i get to do it in paris. so excited. but yeah so i'm not going to have time next week to write, but just remember that i still love you all k? k.

 

so yeah, this week was pretty hard... we worked really hard, but we have nothing to show for it. remember that catholic family that i told you about last time? yeah, we have had no luck with them. we have honestly made like 5 trips to their house this week, and their dad, the one that we want to talk to, has never been home..... so that's pretty depressing. especially since it takes like 30 minutes to get to their house, so it's like an hour of wasted time. but still, we are going to keep trying, and maybe one day we're going to be able to teach them. we did find out though that they have at least 3 children, one older than us, one a little younger, and then the young boy. we found this out from stalking them. we're getting good at it haha. and yes, that's honestly how it feels now with them. we're just the creepy americans that show up in their neighborhood every day. but yeah so anyway, we taught 3 lessons this week. and that's it. one was to our eternal amis, aka they just keep getting lessons, and they are going to get baptized eventually i think, but not anytime soon. they are called joni and chérizad, and they are a super great couple with a super cute little daughter, but they aren't married yet ha..... so yeah, one day they will. cause they come to church and they are good friends with the bishop and such, it's just a matter of waiting i think. so yeah, the other lesson was to this random man on the street, but he thinks we are crazy now, because we taught him the restoration and so yeah... that was fun. oh also, this week, we've done a lot of just contacting like i said i think, and we've actually found a decent amount of people that have given us their numbers to call, but when we actually do call them, they have either blocked our number, or they just don't answer. so it's kinda a really discouraging. i wish they would just not give us their number and say that they aren't interested ha. that'd be a lot easier. but yeah, so we're gonna keep on working hard, so hopefully in two weeks when i write you, i'll have a great success story. cross your fingers. or better yet, pray.  but yeah, one last happy story before i go. so on saturday, we were doing some street contacting (as usual haha) and we walked over to the basin, which is the usual route, because there usually are people relaxing there or just going for a walk, so they don't have the i'm too busy excuse. but yeah anyway, we ended up finding this guy, he's french, and he married a phillipino girl, and they have the cutest little daughter, so we talked to him for awhile just to get to know him or whatever, and he is so nice. so we found out that he is moving in a little, to just the other side of our area, so we offered him our help if he ever needed, and we reallllllly hope that he takes us up on that offer. but yeah anyway, so we exchanged numbers, and we're planning on calling him on monday to see if we can fix a rendez-vous! i'm super excited. he's so cool. but yeah anyway, on sunday, we decided to take the same route again, and guess who we saw? yup, the same guy with his cute little daughter. she's super shy though, so hopefully we can get over that haha. but yeah so we just talked a little bit with him again and he was still really nice! so i'll tell you all about his baptismal date in a couple of weeks haha. so yeah i honestly can't wait to teach him. or just serve him. or anything i just want to do something useful instead of just contacting all the time haha. but yeah, life is good over here. it's hard sometimes, but that's life right? there are always the good times to make up for it. (hopefully) but elder coleman and i have a lot of fun together, so it's good. but yeah, france is great, hope everything is going well back in les etats unis! i love you all and hope you are doing just splendid! buhbye!

 

ps cool address right? i'm learning how to use technology! haha

--

Elder Matthew Meyers

2 Rue Guillaume Tell

68100 Mulhouse

La France

week 2 in MULHOUSE!

Bonjour mes amis!

 

comment ça va?? vous allez bien? how is everyone? so it's my second week in france! second week in mulhouse. and it's pretty exciting. i'm not going to lie, the first week was super hard. it's hard getting used to the missionary life. the mtc prepares you for a lot of things, but not really for the mission life. it's so much different than the mtc. you actually do things with your day instead of just studying haha. so anyway, this week was good. the mindset that i kinda have to keep is that this is life. my mission is all that matters, because a lot of the time i find myself thinking about after the mission and other stuff like that that is important, but not at the moment. so when i forget about that and honestly just do what president hinckley said and forget yourself and go to work, it's a lot easier and i'm a more effective missionary. oh so also, here are my profound thoughts for the week.  Beavers are gross. i've never seen them before, but we have some that live in the basin next to us, and they are disgusting. i finally know how they filmed the scene in Princess Bride with the ROUS (editors note: Rodents of Unusual Size). they just used a beaver. because that's exactly what they look like. so gross. ROUS ftw haha. next, funny fact, every box of cigarettes that you buy here, has on it "fumer tue" in huge letters. which litterally means, smoking kills haha. so they have that on every box of cigarettes that you can buy, just as a reminder to everyone that they are going to die if they continue being dumb and smoking. too bad it doesn't help anyone... everyone here still smokes. viva la france ha. third, the malk (editors note: milk) here is terrible! no not really, but it's kinda weird. you don't even have to refridgerate it. kinda gross, but it's whatevs. silly malk. so yeah, anyway, here is what i did this week.

 

Monday

this was last p-day, and we actually went to the train museum. cool huh? haha it was actually pretty lame... i discovered that day that i wasn't really a train guy. trains don't do much for me. but cool fact of the day, i don't know if i told you this last email or not, but the fastest train in the world, or at least the one that holds the world record, is called the TGV. and we have riden on a couple of them. the world record is 574.8 km/h. that's fast. but yeah we went there with the rest of our district, which is colmar and belfort. you can look those up on a map if you want. and we shopped and stuff which was fun, since we literally had nothing in the fridge to eat. but don't fret, we're stocked up now. and me and elder coleman, as it turns out, are such amazing cooks. we're thinking about going famous. we're going to make a cook book too. we're going to call it "how to cook AND enjoy your lunch hour", because all of our recipes take less than like 30 minutes. we're kinda cool. also, speaking of which, mom, do you perchance want to send me a cookbook, or just a couple of recipes at least? because we got a cookbook for our mission, but it kinda gets boring after awhile, we need fresh meat. just recipes like soggy bottom biscuits or texas sheet cake and garlick mashed potatoes and just everything!

 

Tuesday

We had district meeting this day. we learned some stuff about how to begin teaching, and then we ate lunch after. twas great. then after this, i went on exchanges with the DL. named elder aarif. so i went to colmar, and honestly, it was so pretty! it's like super alsacian there which is the name of this part of france, and it's just a cute little tourist town. i didn't take any pictures though since we were contacting and i didn't want to look like a tourist. but it was super cool. anyway, we did some contacting for awhile, and then we went to a lesson. the lady that we taught though, funny story. so she is married to a member, and i guess essentially, she set her own baptismal date. the missionaries honestly did nothing. so we were kinda just teaching random stuff that she should know before baptism because she honestly pretty much knew everything else. so we taught about temple work and geneology. it was a good lesson and it was cool to be with someone else that could speak french well to learn some new things. then we went home and ate crepes for dinner and it was simply magical.

 

wednesday

i woke at the usual time and did some studies and then boarded a train back to mulhouse.  then we ate some lunch and did some contacting. yes if you are wondering, that is mostly what we do each day, and no, most of the time, it's not too effective. but then after, we went to teach a lesson to someone we found on a random paper that said calls for august, but we had no other record of her. her name was cécil, and she was a true african. she wore boo boos just like a real african does. super cool. but she was great. i guess she had met with the missionaries before so we kind of just retaught the restoration. she is an evangelist and her husband had heard a lot of good things about the church, and i guess he had a lot of questions, so next time we teach her, we are going to teach them both, because he wasn't there today. anyway, we talked for awhile and then taught our short restoration review, and then gave her a soft invitation, as in when you come to know these things are true, will you be baptized. and at first she didn't understand it, because she said she had already been baptized in her church, so we tried, as delicately as we could, to explain that it wasn't exactly valid, but it was good, and it's honestly a super hard subject to talk about, because you really don't want to offend them, but you have to make them understand the priesthood. but anyway, we think she took it well and said that if she knows these things are true, she would. so we'll see if that goes anywhere. then next we taught joni and cherazad. then are a couple that are just a great couple, with a cute little daughter than is around 2 i think, the only problem is that they aren't married yet. so today we talked about that. we brought a member, frere mortz with us, and honestly, we didn't say anything the whole time. he completely taught the whole lesson. i guess that's just the kind of guy that he is. It was a good lesson overall. so hopefully that affected them in the right way. but that's mostly all this day. oh side note, my comprehension has improved soooo much this week. i'm getting used to the super fast talking, so i can actually understand most of the conversations now! it's great. there are always words that i don't quite understand, but i can usually understand most of it. it's so much better. God really does answer prayers, because the first week, i was so frustrated, but i prayed for that, and it came so much quicker than i expected. woo haha.

 

thursday

so we woke up and did some studying, and then we did some contacting, and then we went to the durand famille for lunch, and they are great. they a couple, probably in around their fifties, whose kids are all gone and married, some in the states, but they love missionaries. they are super nice too. so we ate with them for awhile, for like 2 hours actually, because here, you don't eat quickly. so you kind of just have to go with it. it was super good though. then after that we headed home, and were kinda bleh that we had had like no success. so what we did, is decided to get the Lord involved. so we prayed and asked him to lead us where we needed to go to find people who were ready for the gospel. and we did that right in front of the map, and we both had the same feeling about where we should go. so we then hopped on a bus and contacted whoever we stood next to, and then got off, and did porting in the neighborhood that we ended up in. and yeah, the public transportations here is amazing. it's honestly so good and nice. that is one thing that france has down. they have tons of buses and also 3 tram lines. it's great. so i got a pass for 37 euros when i got here and now we ride it everyday so often. it's great. but anyway, back to the story, we did porting (editors note: tracting? ) in the area, and no real success, but we get back to the bus stop, and do one last house before we leave. a little boy answers the door, and so we say hi is your papa there and he goes and gets him. they were a super cute family. they were catholic, but they said that they would listen to our message, but they didn't have time now, so come back another day around 4. it was terrif. anyway, to make a long story short, we ended up getting 3 new contacts that day! it's amazing what happens when you really ask the lord with faith.

 

friday

i'm getting bored of writing and stuff so i'm just going to tell the highlight. we had a RDV (rendez-vous) with someone in the morning at our church, so we get on the tram and head that direction. we are on it, and on the first stop, a lady with a stroller hops on and sits right next to me. and elder coleman was sitting a couple of seats away, so it was just me. so i started a conversation, just about her and her son, who was super cute, and it turns out he is 20 months, and so i told her i had a niece that was almost that age and we just talked about that for awhile, and then i changed the subject to why i was here and such, and i told her we had a message about jesus christ that maybe we could share? and she said she had to get off the next stop, so i asked if we could just exchange numbers and we could call her later to set up a rdv. and she said YES! and i did it all by myself. it was super great.

 

saturday

we taught 2 lessons which was cool.

 

sunday

oh boy, what a day. we had stake conference in nancy, so we got on a train at 710am to go there. we meet up with the other elders in our district and head out. we get about halfway there, and we are jsut sitting there, and then out of nowhere, we hear something, and then it sounds like rocks are flying up and hitting the train. so that was weird. but then the train stops like 5 seconds later, and i guess as it turns out, someone had jumped in front of our train..... so then we sat there for awhile just waiting for them to do whatever they do, and then we went to the closest station and waited another hour for another train, and to make a long story short, we completely missed stake conference. it started at 1030 and we didn't get there until 1ish. and our train back was at 2. so honstely the whole day we were just on a train. and i guess that kind of thing happens often around here... but yeah, you can edit out this story if you think it's too graphic or whatever. but yeah, so that was interesting.

 

so yeah, that's all, time to go shopping! love you all!

 

elder meyers

 

ps, i wrote this all with a french keyboard. be proud

 

Jesus Loves You!

 We Live on the left end

 Nice building and super-cool tram

Meeting House in Mulhouse

pictures! and a better email haha

Okay hi! so this is me writting later because i felt bad for what i wrote earlier haha. HI! don't worry, i'm here at the church right now loading photos and sending them, so i can change it into a english keyboard! how great right? right. anyway, i'm just going to give you a little overview of my week. and you can just throw out my last email haha. i was a little frustrated if you couldn't tell.

Monday: i was still at the mtc. boo. getting on a plane though!

Tuesday: i arrived in france! what?? yeah. super cool. paris is so cool. i sent a picture of the eiffel tower, and honestly, it's so amazing! that was wednesday though, i'm getting ahead of myself. i think i already told you about tuesday though in my email on tuesday... or something.... hopefully haha

Wednesday: first, we started out the day by president telling us where we were going! i'm going to Mulhouse if you didn't know from my last broken email. then after that, i met my trainer! Elder coleman. he's a super cool kid and i'm already learning all sorts of things from him.  next, we toured paris! or at least as much as we could in the little time that we had before we had to go to mulhouse. but we made it to the eiffel tower, which is all that really matters, and it was soooooooooooooooo cool. it's so big! especially since there aren't really any other big buildings around, so the contrast is super cool too. then we got on a train from PARIS EST, and headed to Metz, where we stayed for the night, because elder coleman had left some stuff there and we couldn't get home before 1030, so we stayed the night. metz is super cool. the architecture is beautiful. so beautiful. i really want to live in europe one day now haha.  but yeah we got there and stayed with elder crump, which is actually my grandpa! he trained my dad, elder coleman. cute huh? i know for sure.  so we ate some crepes that we made and then went to bed

Thursday:  we woke up early (as usual) and headed to the train station to catch our train to mulhouse.  that took a couple of hours, but then we were here! not going to lie, compared to metz, i wasn't really impressed haha. but it was cool anyway. it's not the prettiest city in the world, but it's not bad at all. i love europe. it's so cool. so we did some stuff and whatever, and it was cool. but i'm kind of out of time for the day. i need to go do some contacting! which is always okay haha. so i'm sorry i can't finish this, but it's all in my journal, so maybe i'll send it to you one day.

we've taught 6 lessons so far, mostly to uninterested people, but we still are keeping our hopes up that we'll find a golden investigator.  french is kind of hard, they speak so fast, so i'm usually pretty quiet because i don't want to embarrass myself, but i think i just need to get over it and go for it. make a fool of myslef haha. because the more i practice, the better i'll get. the problem is that i can ask them something, but most of the time i can't understand what they're saying back because they speak so fast. i'm just going to have to invest in a sign that i can wear around my neck that says i'm a stupid american, talk slowly haha. but yeah!

just know that i'm doing well and everything is terrific here. i hope all of you are doing fine and not typing on french keyboards, cause that's the worst. love you all and i'll see you soonish!  buy.

elder meyers

The Eiffel Tower

French Pastries... yum!

France Paris Mission Map

Our Apartment Building

Elder Coleman and Elder Meyers

MULHOUSE! (pronounced like toulouse but with an m)

so here's the thing. i hate french keyboards. i feel like i'm seven again and i'm just learning how to type. i have to look at the keyboard as i type and it's the worst. i tried to change it to english but this computer wont let me. it's the worst. i dare you to write me back with your keyboard switched to french just so you can know how frustrating it is haha. anyway! as you may have already heard, i'm in mulhouse!  it's all sorts of exciting. it's almost the furthest east area in the mission. we are right there next to germany and switzerland, and i guess this place has been owned by both germany and france multiple times so it's kinda interesting to say the least. we are in the alsace region, which is just kinda a weird place. but it's cool. so let's see. so many things have happened this week. okay is it okay if i just write to you with the french keyboqrd qs qn english keyboqrd? qnd you Can trqnslqte it back? cause i'm getting super frustrated and i have a lot to say. anyway. so first dqy here. i think i already told you about. but second day. ze got assigned our qreqs qnd they gqve us our companions. it was all sorts of exciting. my companion qs you probably qlreqdy heqrd, is elder coleman. he's q greqt kid. he's from mqrylqnd, zhich is exciting haha, but he's greqt. he's been here for almost a yeqr now, in december. his french is good and he can understand everything, although his accent is a little american and he doesn't talk as fast as they do yet, but overall he's great.he's a good kid, and honestly, i don't knoz all that much about him yet because whenever ze tqlk, ze tqlk in french, so thqt's kindq q chqllenge haha. he plqyed soccer in highschool qnd rqn trqck, so he pqsses in my book. let's see, so lqter todqy, i'll probqbly send you the mqp of our ,ission. elder coleman hqd one, so i'll email that to you later if i get a chnce. so guess zhqt? it turns out thqt the ,ost co,,on nq,e here is ,eyer hqhq. so everyone thqt i tqlk to just zqlks up to ,e qnd tell ,e thqt ,y nq,e is the ,ost co,,on nq,e qround here, except zithout the s, I've honestly heqrd that like 10 ti,es. i sure hope that you can understand this. cquse itùs frustrqting hqhq.

so zednesdqy, ze definqtely sqz the eifffel tozer: it zqs so cool: iùll ,qybe send you pictures lqter: qnd iù, getting ,ore qnd ,ore lqwy qs i go qlong if you couldnùt tell: cquse iù, getting ,ore qnd ,ore frustrqted: but k: tuesdqy zqs good: ze sqz the eiffel tozer qnd then ze just zqlked in pqris q little bit; but ze hqd to be going; so ze got on our trqin qnd zere off; ze couldnùt get q trqin thqt took us here; so ze stqyed in Metz for the night. thqt zqs qctuqlly zqy cool; thqt city is so bequtiful: and then thurday we went took another train and arrrived at home! woo! our apartment is cool, and not too beat up haha. so just a heads up, i'm probably going to be a terrible letter/email writer. cause honestly right now this is so much worse than tracting. it takes so long and i really don't want to do it. just a heads up. but yeah. i hope everyone is doing well, but i'm done writing for today. i just really don't want to right now. so yeah you probably shouldn't send this on to anyone else cause there's nothing really in it. maybe i'll just write a letter. but yeah. i'm doing well and life is good. it's kind of hard and frustrating sometimes because i can't speak french as well as i'd like to, but overall it's going pretty well. but yeah, i love you all and i hope you're doing well. slater!

 

Elder Meyers

 

 

oh yeah, so my address is now

 

Elder Meyers

2 Rue Guillaume Tell

68100 MULHOUSE

La France

Bonjour De France

BONJOUR DE FRANCE

okay so here's the deal. not a huge deal, but i'm in france. bad news though is that i'm typing on a french keyboard. bleh. oh wait i just found how to change it to english. how novel. anyways, it's my first day in the field!!!! and oof. i'm tired. but i'm not gonna sleep til tonight because i don't want to be jetlagged to death. don't fret though. so anyway! how is everyone?? i'm doing just splendid. just had a little extra time so they told me to shoot an email your way. so here i am. so schedule so far. we got here, and then we met the president and wife and the APs. then after we went to paris and met our "moms" which means the person that took you out on your first day contacting, not your trainer which is your dad. so anyway haha, i went out contacting with Elder Dick. and he was terrific. i learned so much. and by contacting, i mean that i would say to someone, excuse me, sorry to bother you, but we're missionaries, do you believe in god? and then elder dick would take it over. and don't fret, we placed a book of mormon.  it was terrific. most people just completely turn off when you mention Jesus christ or god though... kinda a bummer.... at least the africans are nice. elder dick didn't want me to have it easy though so we didn't really contact any africans. it was hard and kinda sad, but it was super fun. i just wanted to talk to everyone but at the same time i didn't want to at all because i know nothing! they speak SSOOOOO FAST. it's gross. and super pretty haha. one day. anywho. i've gotta go do an interview with the president! i'll find out where i'm going and who's training me tomorrow. so hope everyone is doing well and i'll talk to you later!

Elder Meyers

Arrival of Elder Meyers

Dear Brother and Sister Meyers,

                Sister Poznanski and I were delighted to welcome your son, Elder Matthew John Meyers, into the France Paris Mission on Tuesday, August 30, 2010.  He and his MTC companions were enthusiastic and all arrived in good health.  He spent his first day eating some home cooked food, napping, visiting with me, contacting non-members in the heart of Paris, and sharing testimonies in our home.  We enjoyed his spirit.

                The next morning, after a mission orientation, Elder Meyers left for his first assignment to work in the Mulhouse Area with Elder Coleman, who will be his trainer.  Their apartment address is:

                                                Les Missionnaires

Elder Meyers

2, rue Guilliaume Tell

68100. Mulhouse

France

                We feel very privileged to work with your son.  We also realize the responsibility we share with you to help him continue to grow spiritually as he faithfully performs his duties.  May the Lord inspire us all to sustain him in this challenging and exciting assignment.  We hope you will join Sister Poznanski and me in praying each day for your son, his companion, investigators, and all of us serving in the France Paris Mission.

                A positive, supportive letter from home every week does wonders to sustain a missionary’s morale.  Proverbs 25:25 states:  As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country.

Sincerely,

Franck Poznanski

President, France Paris Mission