Este Pracujeme

this week was a little more rough than the last few have been. sadly, we didn't meet one of the goals we set for our companionship, although that isn't for lack of trying. we worked hard the whole week, but for whatever reason it was just harder this week to find people to teach. we had specialized training this week, which was great, but it did take up a whole day of work. also on friday and saturday it rained horribly, so contacting was a crapshoot. what we did in that situation was we found people who were walking to the train station or something who didn't have an umbrella and we would walk with them so that they had some protection from the rain. everyone was really appreciative, but that kind of work just isn't really conducive to teaching full blown lessons and getting new investigators. on saturdays, there aren't very many people in town. on the weekends, everyone goes to their little domcek (little house) in the mountains. in addition to that it rained all saturday. we called it dokonala burka (perfect storm). pun intended! anyway, it wasn't quite the successful week that we were hoping for, but in spite of that, there is still reason to rejoice. eva, one of our investigators with a baptismal date keeps on progressing. we still don't have her date moved up, but she has still expressed no concerns with any of the docrtrine that we teach. this week when we taught her we were talking about her asking her husband for permission to be baptized. she hadn't done it yet, but we committed her to do so this week. when we were talking about it, she said she doesn't know how he'll feel about it, but she knows what she wants and she wants to be baptized. that was very nice to hear. we are going to try to meet with her twice this week, and we are really going to encourage her to come to church and we are really going to try hard to get something set up with her husband. i think if we just went out to lunch with him so we can show him we are normal people that would go a long way. anyway, even though things didn't go as we had planned them, there were still a lot of miracles this week, just like there are every week. i mean, an investigator with pretty much no previous religious history accepting the law of chastity right off the bat is pretty miraculous i think. just when you start to get a little discouraged the Lord blesses you in some way that just makes your day so much better. for example, yesterday elder durrant and i were sitting on the bench in the namestie. we had just called in our weekly numbers, which we thought were very disappointing. we were sitting on the bench wondering what went wrong this week when all of a sudden this guy comes up to us and offers to buy us a kofola (a czechoslovak brand of cola, which, i might add, is way better than coke and pepsi combined). we sat down and had a kofola with him and asked him why he wanted to have a kofola with mormons. he said, i just needed to do something nice. i know you guys are just here trying to help people, and trying to help them improve their lives, and i know how hard it must be to be away from your family and your friends for two years. it's so great that a guy who doesn't even know us was willing to do something like that. we talked a little more and get this....the guy works at the local theater in town as a stage manager, but in his free time he is a musician. he plays (wait for it).........THE TUBA!! what?! i said. "i freakin' played that in high school!" turns out they are doing a concert this week on the town sqare for some fetival going on. maybe i can turn a chat about the joys of playing the tuba into a conversation about the gospel. uvidime ( we will see).
love you all!

cau
sam

ps. go mavs!

The week of the transfer (I hope)

ahoj!

this week has kind of been an up and down one. we have had days of great success this week, but we also had days of disappointment and struggle. one day this week were able to teach 6 lessons in a day (which is really high here). in total, we taught 11 lessons this week, which is outstanding because hitting double digits for lessons in a week can be pretty rare sometimes. 11 is good, but when you consider that we taught six in one day, we really could've done better. work was also made more difficult this week by the fact that we had to be in brno on sunday for a district conference. because of that we had to travel to bratislava on saturday evening, and then travel all the way back from brno to zilina on sunday. essentially, we missed out on a full day and a half of work because of the conference. anyway, we are hoping that this week is going to be really good. i think this week has the potential to the best week of the transfer if we really dedicate ourselves. we have a lot of lofty goals that i really think are possible to attain. first there is our weekly goal of three new investigators. the last two weeks we have had two, which is good, but it's still not up to par. this week we've set a goal to get four. i really believe we can do it. our other goals are centered around our progressing investigators. one of the people we are teaching right now, ferry, has been investigating the church off and on for about three years now. we met with him once like three weeks ago, and then told him to call us if he ever wants to meet again. this last week he called. we taught him a great lesson on free agency. we just threw out like a million great scriptures from the book of mormon. he thought it was a good lesson too; he was taking notes. after we were done going over the scriptures elder durrant said: "do you think nephi was a real man?" he said yes. after that i said: "that means that you think the book of mormon is true and that joseph smith was a prophet." he agreed to those two things. this week we are going to meet with him again and we are going to issue him a baptismal date. he has had a date before, but we are hoping that this time around he will be more mature and more prepared for baptism. we are also still trying to get eva to move her baptismal date up. we will be able to meet with her more often now that she is done with school, so we are hoping that she can make some really quick progress and find the strength to ask her husbands permission to get baptized. we really want to meet with her husband just so we can explain to him that we are normal guys just like him and that we aren't brainwashed robots from the church like some people think we are. i think once the people of slovakia just know who mormons are, the work will start to take off a little more. everyday we have to explain that we chose to be here, that we aren't brainwashed, and at least 3 times a day we use the phrase "nie sme jehovisty." we are not jehovah's witnesses. anyway, i have really high hopes for this week. we have also set a lofty goal for slovak speaking. we are shooting for 90 hours of slovak this week. we have set that goal for the last two weeks and fallen short, but this time we are getting it. anyway, if all these things work out, it is going to be a marvelous week. i know as we strive diligently to achieve these goals, the Lord will bless us and we will be able to achieve every single goal we set.

ok time for a funny story time. on thursday we went to roman's house. roman is an eternal investigator, who knows that joseph smith was a prophet, who knows that the word of wisdom is from God, but still won't get baptized because of his beliefs about the fall of adam. essentially, he believes that adam and eve were supposed to remain in the garden forever. when satan got adam and eve to eat the fruit, he backed God into a corner. essentially he believes that in the beginning, satan forced God to sand-bag. according to roman, this whole existence, this earth (and the atonement) were all plan B. anyway, beacause of this conflict of belief we quit teaching him but offered to meet with him again if he wants to. so, about a week ago we ran into him and he told us that he was building a house and that he would like us to help him. we agreed, so on thursday we walked across the river and walked up to his "house." we were astonished when we saw that it was just basically a hut made out of tall planks of wood stacked against each other. in the front of the hut he has some vegetables growing, and in the back of his house, he has a solar panel for electricity. i don't feel like i'm doing it justice at all. i mean, the guy lives in a hut on a river bank! what is this, burkina faso? anyway, it was quite the experience. when we were walking back, elder durrant said do you think that hut was big enough to have a shower in it? i said no way. no we know why roman always smells so bad. he is a perfect example of that distinctly slovak body odor, which smells like a mixture of smoked meat and regular BO.

anyway, i hope you are all doing well i hope you will continue sending me letters and emails and such. it's always nice hearing news from across the pond. keep elder durrant and i in your prayers this week. also pray for our investigators. we need some miracles this week, and i know we can get them if we just pray.

sam

Another week in Zilina

cau!
hope everything is going well back home. we had an interesting week here. our district leader challenged us to get three new investigators this week. with that in mind, we started working really hard. by the end of our first day we already had two potential new investigators. unfortunately, one of them canceled their lesson and as it turns out, the other guy entered the wrong number into our phone, so we weren't ever able to contact him. it's a shame too. he seemed really interested. he talked for quite a long time about all the problems that he sees with the catholic church. he said (in slovak mind you) "sometimes i wonder if the catholic church even has the priesthood like they say they do." that's like half the first lesson RIGHT THERE! and yet, we weren't able to ever get together with him. so, we are really praying that we somehow run into him on the street this week. we were able to get two new investigators this week, which put us in second place for the whole mission. we also came in second place for hours speaking slovak with 76. the boys in kosice west beat us with 101. show-offs. anyway, one of the investigators we ended up getting is a really interesting story. we were walking around the town square yesterday and we contacted this guy. as we began to speak he told us in english that he doesn't speak slovak. turns out he is a business man who is living in slovakia on business for awhile. originally he is from venezuala, but right now he lives in spain. immediately he was receptive. he wanted to hear more about our message, he listened to everything he had to say, we taught him every principle in the first lesson, AND (wait for it) when we asked him if we could pray HE offered to say the prayer! that NEVER happens! at least not in slovakia. most the people here only know the lords prayer or the rosary, and even still would never pray out loud in front of two americans. anyway, it was very refreshing to talk to someone so willing to listen. usually the only people willing to listen to our message are atheists. i'm almost to the point of praying for atheists. at least they are usually a little more open-minded. EVERYBODY else is catholic, and the most common response we get from those people when we go out contacting is literally: "i'm catholic, so i don't want to talk to you." as if that's a good reason. anyway, in spite of all of that, we are having success, and i am convinced that there are just as many prepared people here as there are in mexico or brazil or some place like that. we just have to turn over a few more rocks to find them. one of those prepared people is eva. she is one of our investigators with a baptismal date. her date isn't until next transfer, but we are confident that we can get her to move it up. she is practical, and really nice, and has the cutest little two year old daughter name karinka. she hasn't had any dreams or seen any visions or anything like that, but she is building a testimony the good old fashioned way. all she is doing is meeting with the missionaries, keeping her commitments, and praying. that is all she is doing, and yet, she is progressing right along. we just need to get her to come to church more. she is really busy right now with school, but school is almost out, so hopefully it will be easier to get her to do that in the near future.

in other news we went to brno for our greeny training meeting this last week. it was a great meeting, although elder durrant and i were about 90 minutes late. it all started when we missed our train from bratislava by literally a minute. we would have only been like 20 minutes late, but the next train was twentey minutes late, and after that we lost an hour trying to maneuver our way throught the tram system in brno, which was very confusing. luckily president was very forgiving. everyone at the meeting was very impressed by our teaching skills. elder durrant and i both have high hopes for how much we can progress on our missions. it's elder durrants second transfer and he is already training, and he thinks i'm better than he was when he was a greeny. i don't know if i want to believe that. he is pretty good at slovak.

this week all the missionaries in zilina gave talks in church. it was a really good meeting i thought. it was really cool to see all of us speak, and i'm sure the members appreciate getting a break from speaking every now and then. there is only about 10 of them, so they all have to speak very often. elder tomlinson told me after the meeting that my talk was the best slovak he's ever heard a greeny speak. i think i gave a good talk but i don't think i can really take credit for any of it. it sounds really cheesy, but i really felt something helping me. i mean, im not going to lie, i am a pretty good speaker for being a greeny, but yesterday the words just came effortlessly. my conjugations and declinations were all right, and it just came out like it would have come out if i were giving a talk in english. a miracle seems to happen everyday here, and that would definitely qualify as one.

ok i feel like this email has all been spiritual stuff, which is all fine in good, but i need to share temporal news too. let me just start by saying even though slovakia is great and i'm really enjoying my time here, europe SUCKS, and this is why: the euro. i know it's more valuable than the dollar right now, but i don't care. at least in america we realize a very important thing: that carrying a bunch of change around is not ideal. in america change is useless. the most a piece of change can be worth is 25 cents. in europe, however, one piece of change can be worth up to 2 bucks! what the heck! change is no longer that thing that you just eternally accumulate in a jar on top of the refrigerator. anyway, everything is going well, and i hope you will all continue to send me your letters and emails. i really enjoy reading them.

cau
sam

Sam has arrived!

Some photos of Sam (looking a little jet-lagged) with his trainer along with the mission president and his wife taken on his first days in the Czech Republic

Som na Slovenska!

hello from...(drumroll) zilina!
i have finally made it to slovakia, after nine long weeks in the mtc and a super long plane/ train ride, i am finally in my first area as a missionary in slovakia. we traveled from salt lake straight to paris where we had a two hour layover. i don't want to judge an entire country by its airport, but if i was going to, i would say that france sucks. there was only like 2 feet between the security line and the gate where we took off so we pretty much just had to crowd around the gate close to a bunch of smelly french people to get on the plane. our filght to prague was short, only about an hour and a half, but  it was so hard to stay awake on the flight. i didn't get much sleep on the plane ride to paris because i can't sleep when i'm sitting and the guy that sat next to me snored like it was nobody's business. i did have a cool experience in the airport while we were waiting for our flight to paris to board. a kid came up to us and asked who we were, we said we were missionaries going to the czech republic and slovakia. he said that he was from slovakia, which was a surprise to me, since he looked like he was hispanic, spoke very good english, and was wearing a lebron james jersey.he must be a gypsy. i spoke to him in slovak for a few minutes and talked to him about the church. i gave him a pass along card and told him to go to the church's website if he wants to learn more. i should have gotten his phone number but i didn't. maybe he will call the missionaries anyway and hopefully soon the missionaries in bratislava will have a good referral soon. first thing when we got to prague, we went on our prague walk with the aps. i have been a lot of really cool places in my life, and although i've never been out of the country before now, i have seen some really beautiful places. however, i can now say that prague is the most beautiful city i have ever seen. all the old architecture is so amazing. the only thing i wish is that we could have had more time to tour  all the cool buildings we saw. prague castle is absolutely amazing. it's hard to believe that building like that could be built so long ago in a time when they didn't have anywhere near the same technology that we have now. we didn't go through the cathedral, which was disappointing, but i'm sure i will get to go someday. after we walked across charles bridge, we came into the main namestie in prague and started doing some contacting. we contacted for about 20 minutes. it went pretty well. we got rejected by everyone, but a few people talked to us and i was able to give a pass along card to a lady, who i think may have had at least some interest in the gospel. after that we had our first czech meal, which was very delicious. i had some spicy beef goulash, which was very good. i know that i am going to have to cook most of my food here, but the food that someone else cooks for me, will be very good if it is anything like our dinner yesterday. i will try to send some pictures of everything as soon as i can. i also met president irwin for the first time yesterday. he seems like a great guy. he's a spiritual giant, so the mission will definitely do great things with him at the helm. after our tour and everything yesterday, we got our bags and we got put up in a small hotel just around the corner from the mission home. it was pretty good. the interior decorating was definitely reminiscent of a home once owned by grandma joleen. we got to go to bed at like 845 and we didn't have to wake up this morning until seven, so that was very nice. i haven't slept that  well in  months! this morning, we had breakfast with president irwin at his house, and then had our interview with him. after that i met my trainer. he is a young man by the name of elder durrant. this is only his second transfer, that's right, hie SECOND transfer. he is a legend in this mission already for just being a straight up whiz kid. he is already very capable at the language and president irwin assures me that i am a very  lucky man. after getting to know elder durrant on our five hour train ride today, i think i would definitely have to agree with that sentiment. he seems like a great guy, with a strong testimony and work ethic. i think we will make a really good team, and that we  will see some real success while we are here in zilina. we have two investigators right now, both of whom have baptismal dates, so right away we will have some teaching to do. most of our work, however, will be concentrated on finding new people to teach, meaning a lot of tracting and a lot of contacting. i should be very good at contacting by the end of this transfer. elder durrant seems to be really excited about our prospects this transfer. he says that my slovak is really good for a greeny and that by the end of this transfer, i should be speaking better than a lot of older missionaries. that was really assuring. zilina is a beautiful city, at least what i have seen of it thus far is. our apartment is pretty nice too. this apartment that i will be living in is affectionately called "the palace" because it is so much nicer than most missionary apartments. it will be a really nice place to live. tonight elder durrant is going to take me around the city and we will maybe do some contacting, but the real work will start tomorrow, when we are pretty much going to hit the streets all day. i think i am going to lose that 5 pounds that i gained in the mtc pretty darn quick. i can't wait to start getting to know the town, the people, and the culture here. it's an absolutely beautiful country unlike anything else that i have ever seen. it is definitely going to be a nice place to spend the next few years. i'm sure that i will have a lot to tell you when i send my email next week. now that i have more time to email every week, feel free to send me an email. i can only respond to emails from family, but if you want to say hey or update me on what's going on, you can send me an email, and i can respond via snail mail. i also love getting hand-written letters though, so i'm happy to receive them if you would like to send them. i will let you all know what my address is as soon as i can. until then you can send mail to the mission home. i will see the president again next Thursday, so if the mail gets there by then i will be able to get it from him. i look forward to hearing about everything that is going on in your lives. as for me, just know that i am alive, i am in Slovakia, and i am excited to get to work.

milujem vas
sam

Tyzden Osem

ahoj!

ako sa mate? as i write this i am six days away from leaving the mtc, and i have to say it feels great. don't get me wrong, i have enjoyed my time here, but i am just so excited to teach real investigators and speak slovak with real slovaks. it has been a really interesting week. this last sunday we had our usual fireside. it was good like always, except this time the musical number was amazing! instead of the usual crappy efy song sung by some squeaky-voiced kid from payson, we had an elder from hungary play a vivaldi concerto arranged for the organ by bach. it was sooooo cool! dad will you teach me how to play the organ when i get back? it's such a cool instrument. on tuesday elder scott spoke at our devotional. it was SO cool. thus far we've just had bottom feeders with titles like "managing director of the missionary department" or "managing director of the mtc." it was so great to finally look up at the screen on tuesday night and see "Richard G. Scott: Quorum of the Twelve Apostles" his talk was the coolest. in the middle of his talk he asked how many of the missionaries in the audience were in the mtc to learn a different language. after everybody raised their hands he said "i now use my powers as a apostle of Jesus Christ to bestow upon each and every one of you the gift of toungues." wow. how about them apples? he assured us that we will still be expected to work hard, but he also assured us that learning the language will now be easier than it would have been. it showed this week in the trc. our volunteer came up to us afterwards and say "mluvite pekne" czech for "you speak beautifully." elder scott also said that we should not let our potential as missionaries be determined by the past. that was very comforting to me, because i know i haven't always been the greatest kid, but i promise i've been trying, and right now i'm really trying hard to be the best elder meredith possible. i know that as i humbly seek the help of the Lord, i can do all things that will be asked of me not just on my mission, but in every other stage of my life as well. the best part of elder scott's talk, however, had to be his testimony at the end. elder scott doesn't speak as loudly as some of the other apostles, but his testimony could move a mountain with ease.

 

elder bezas was reassigned this week to the pennsylvania philadelphia mission. he left this morning, and although i'm sad he won't be making the trip to slovakia with me, i know he will do great work in philly. i'm excited for him. with elder bezas gone, i have two new companions. each one of us is the only elder in the mtc learning his particular language. elder genther is learning croatian, elder baker is learning slovenian, and i am learning slovak. needless to say, our "speak your langauge" time over the next week will be very interesting. we can understand each other a little bit, but the languages definitely have their differences. they are both great guys and i will really enjoy living with them for the next few days. it's weird that we are all going to be moving away from each other. i've become such good friends with so many of the elders in my zone, so it's going to be tough saying goodbye when we all ship off to our respective missions. it is possible that i will serve with one of the czech speakers on my mission, but even that isn't super likely. i will see them whenever we have mission conference, but that doesn't happen very much. i'm really excited to see who my trainer is out in the field. jake and joe both told me to just pray for a good trainer, so hopefully those prayers will be answered.

 

we got our flight plans this week. we leave on monday the 2nd. we go from the mtc at 5 am. our flight from salt lake leaves around 8 in the morning. we then have a 4 hour layover in dallas. yipee. after that we make an incredibly long flight to london where we have a 3 hour layover. after that it's on to prague. we will start traveling at 5am may 2, and we will stop traveling at about 130 pm may 3 prague time. needless to say, it's going to be a long day of travel. and right after that we have to go walk around prague for a few hours. i'm really excited for that part, but i just hope i will be awake for it. our teachers have been telling us more and more stories and sending us more and more pictures, and i am getting more and more excited. i am so stoked to serve the people of slovakia. everytime my teachers talk about their missions to slovakia, their eyes light up and they get a smile on their face. i hope that i am the same way when i return from my mission.

 

anyway, things are getting really exciting now. i'm only a matter of days away from beginning the experience of living in europe for two years. if you would like to write me in the mission field, you can talk to mom or libby or whoever and they can get you my address. o and mom and dad, i get to call from the airport in salt lake, so what is the best number to call for each of you? let me know. anyway, i hope that all of you are doing well. i miss you all and i can't wait to tell you all about the wonderful experiences that i know are in store for me once i reach slovakia

 

cau!

sam