Szczecin, Poland - Settling in, Branch callings, Tracting

Siostra Pierson and I
(In her personal email to us Raquel wrote this about Siostra Pierson:
"She is so amazing!
I honestly was so blessed with who I have as a trainer!
We work so hard but we also have so much fun!")

Our kitchen!

My bed!

Our "Great Room" & Office!

Elder Liechty & Elder Platter

Church door inside - it is small but does the job!  

Church building from outside
- the church rents space in an office building.

Elder Nathan Garrison from Boise, Idaho!  From Boise to Bydgoszcz!  
He was in the same MTC sister as my comp!
His mom, Amy, reached out to me when I received my call!
(There is also another Boise missionary - Parker Burdwell - who is currently in the MTC!)

Kabab:  kinda like a pita but with cabbage, lamb, vegetables, and sauce.

Planning session with the biggest, burger ever!  Yea!

Cześć Family and Friends!!!!

This week has gone by so quickly!! I am officially not jet lagged anymore so I am accustomed now to Poland time, which is crazy!  It gets dark here at 4 in the afternoon and everyone goes to bed at like 7:30-8!  I love it here so so much!  IT SNOWED!  However, it only lasted for a day and now it has turned to ice, neeedless to say it has been an adventure getting everywhere!

I can't believe how much happens in a week when you are a missionary!  I failed to mention my callings last week.  Because our branch is so small each missionary has a couple of callings!  I am family home evening co-coordinator, seminary teacher, youth leader, music director and chorister for the branch!!  I love each one of those callings because they have helped me get to know the branch so much better!

For this week I want ot share a couple of experiences I have had already!  It has kinda of been a little bit of a rough adjustment getting use to missionary life!  There have been a couple of times where I have had to get on my knees and let it out!  However, my motto on my mission has been "forget yourself and go to work!" - so I let myself, feel it, let it out, then move on and get to work!  

This week has also taught me so much already, so here are some of the top things from this week:

1. Following promptings!  One of the hardest things so far has been not being able to speak the language!  I just want to share the Gospel with everyone but it is difficult when I don't understand them!  However, I learned to open my mouth and that it would be filled!  We were waiting to grab a tram and I just had this feeling to go talk to this guy, but I was freaked out because I didn't know what I would say so I ignored it!  Again I felt I needed to go talk to him and again I ignored it!  Finally our tram came and he got on the same tram!  Again came the prompting to talk to him, so finally I went over and introduced myself!  We ended up having a great conversation and gave him the address and number of our church!  I don't know if anything will come of it right now but I learned how much I need to listen and obey promptings like that!

2. Ola and Nick are recent converts to the church!  They are 15 year old twins who have fire testimonies!  Sister Pierson and I have been called as seminary teachers!  This year in seminary we are studying the Old Testament!  We were a little nervous for our lesson and how it would be received but the twins were amazing!  They were excited to learn more and their comments made me stop and think about how I could have more of a fire testimony like them!!  It reminded me of simple ways I could improve myself!

3. I was able to go tracting to my first time this week!  It is crazy to tract here because we have to use the doma-phone for apartments, but luckily sometimes people leave the door open!  We had been rejected over and over again until we got to this one door and this lady opens it and says her daughter heard about us and she is interested and wants to meet, ahhhh!!!!  Then we met this incredible dad that we are meeting with the Wednesday, and finally we met this other dad in between apartments that is going to bring his sons on Sunday to our church!! We could not be more excited!  This week we had to let go of most of  our investigators because they weren't progressing so this was huge for us!! I can't wait to see where it all goes!!

This week we also had zone training and it was the best thing ever!  I absolutely love my zone and I was able to see Sister Dekker and Sister Barney again!

Many of you have been asking about the food here so I thought I would answer a few questions!  The food so far has been so good!  I had my first kebab which is kind of like a pita but with cabbage, lamb, vegetables and this sauce!  

I also had a paczek!  It is like a stuffed doughnut!  I tried the one with white chocolate on the inside and coconut on the outside, so so so good!!!  I am excited to continue to try more Polish foods!!

Poland is incredible and I am so blessed to be able to serve here!  I am sorry my time is so limited to write you all back! I am so grateful for everything I have learned so far and the experiences I have had!

I know the Gospel is true and that it really does provide happiness!

Kocham Was!

Siostra DeMordaunt