Week Sixteen

This week was another great week here in Germany full of great experiences and fun stories.  We manage to stay increadibly busy, I am not quite sure how, we have so much going on, but at the same time like not much.  I dont know how.  But as always, we had a great week.  It started out with meeting Brother Rajahkumar, a member in our ward from Sri Lanke.  That was so amazing, and what a cool family.  The got sealed in the temple this weekend after finding the missionaries 23 years ago.  It was cool to hear his story and everything that lead him to this increadible day.

Tuesday I witnessed a miracle. So I haven't quite said this before, because I never thought it was true, but I am thankful that I was raised by an OCD father. Someone that gave me this same cumpulsive desire for everything to be clean, and not sticky... I hate sticky.  But unfortunantly, not everyone has this same desire to scrub everything.  One of these less that cleanly people happen to be my companion.  In fact, he is quite the opposite.  I love him to death, but not clean. I conducted a little experiement the other week to see what his limits were.  We had recieved a big bucket of grilled meats from a member after an appointment last week, and so we had it as leftovers.  Last Tuesday, after coming home from Siegen, the tuperwear full of meat was sitting out on the counter.... So I decided to see how long it would take for him to put it away.  Well I lost... It took me till Friday, when there we an entire colony of flies living in our kitchen before I just cleaned it up myself.... SO ya.... Not exactly the neat freak that I was raised with. Which kinda makes things scary when I see how much I take after my dad... I was wiping out the corners of our cabenants the other day.... OCD... scary.  But the miracle was that on Tuesday we had an appartment check.  And we almost got our picture taken and put up on the outstanding appartment board.  If we didn't have a big pile of useless crap in our keller, which has been there over 6 months, we do not know where it came from, we would have had our picture taken.  How that happened I do not know.  But I am greatful for the miracle that wiped the sludge off our appartment.

Wednesday and Thursday were the big days this week.  They were a couple of days that I hope I never forget.  So we went to go help a member with some service, we were helping a member move, and the entire time we were getting ready to go Elder Butcher was just laughing and saying that I am going to be so suprised.  He wouldn't tell me what was going to happen, but I was just imagining the worst.  That the whole place was going to be sticky, or that there was just going to be nasty stuff everywhere or that it was going to be super unorganized.  I just didn't have a clue what to expect, besides that it was going to be bad.  Well I was defiantly suprised...  So we get there and I have never seen so much STUFF in such a tiny appartment.  I can see why he had to move, it was either buy a new appartment or swim through enough stuff to throw a neighborhood garage sale.  He was a hoarder, or pacrat, or whatever you want to call someone who collects anything and everything but has like a million of them.  There were enough stuffed animals to give one to every kid in Germany, the best unopened movie and cd collection of all time, and enough books to start his own library.  Not to mention about 100000000 kinder egg toys on the wall.  And we were helping him move....  And that is not even the best part... Oh there is more... much more.

So we go down into the keller to grab some boxes so we can start boxing some stuff up... I dont exactly know where the boxes are going to go, there was no room.  But we go down there and he grabs two boxes, about 1ft*1ft*1ft.... TWO boxes and says that we will start with that... It took every fiber of my being not to burt into laughter as I thought that we were going to pack up this man's house two boxes at a time.  So that was our Wednesday night.  We didn't get much done, and it didn't look like we got anything done looking at what was still left, but his big concern was the bed and the table.  He wanted that to be in his new appartment, and he had the key, so that he had more room to pack.... We sat there thinking a little bit about what we could do and how we could get his bed and table to his new appartment but nothing came to mind.  That brings us to Thursday.

I have done a lot of thinks for 5 kilometers,  Skated, Skied, Ran, Biked, Hiked, Drove, and probably Swam.... But I can now add another to this wonderful list... Caried a bed.  Yep thats right, thursday we carried his bed, with the mattress, bedding, a table, and two chairs, 5 kilometers to his new appartment.  Me and Elder Butcher, over two bridges, through a park, around a lake, to this new appartment.  That was by far the hardest thing I have done while on my mission.  And I thought wearing a white shirt and tie made people not want to talk to us, carrying a bed is even worse.  I am not lying when I say that there were litterally parents pulling thier children away from us as we walked down the street... But we made it.  After a couple hours of 100 meters at a time we made it, and that is something I wil never ever forget.

(there should be pictures coming with this, one of the appartment, one of the bed coming through the window, and another of the us with the bed all packed up)

Friday we got our new district members, Elder Liebold and Elder Penfold.  Because last week was transfers we lost Elder Fuchs and Elder Walker.  But I am really excited for this transfer,  I think that these new members to our district are really going to help, I am excited.  But the other big event of the week was watching President Monson in Hamburg.  It was a long day, driving in a bus to Hamburg, I think we spent around 8 hours in a bus total.  But completely worth it.  It is undescribable to be in the presence of a prophet.  The spirit there was just so strong.  A personal message to the people of Germany is exactly what the people here need.  I just know that there is a huge work to be done here,  and it is going to happen soon. I wish I could talk a little bit more about this, maybe next week, my time is running out in this internet cafe so I have to wrap it up soon.  But next week I will talk more about President Monson.

This was a very fun week, and it only keeps getting better and better.  We have the opportunity to hear from the prophet again on Sunday, and I am excited for all of our appointments this week.  I love and miss all of you guys back home, but I am absolutels loving being a missionary, and I wouldn't trade it for the world.  It is the best thing ever, and I know it is exactly what I need to be doing,  helping people come unto Christ.

Love,

Elder Blackley