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This is our first full week in Müchen.

I’ll start with Sunday the 27th activities. Friday night we were called by the Bishopric and were asked to speak this Sunday. I consented for Sister Mason and myself. Again Sister Mason did not take the call so I volunteered her. We talked on temple work. Sister Mason spoke German when giving her talk as did I. I was very proud of her. Without hesitation she said she would talk today in German and that is what she did. Some of them members congratulated her on her being brave enough to talk in German after being here only a week and I certainly agree. She was also asked and gave the closing prayer in Relief Society in German and she closed the meeting in German. I think she is fantastically brave and focused and will continue to do well in the Stake and Ward activities.

This evening we had the regular Sunday evening meal with young single adults. As with last week, we had 19 young single adults attend. Two young adults cooked the meal and we had two nonmembers join us, part of the 19, and they all had a good time and a good meal. 

 

Saturday we had a senior missionary couple join us for a lunch and Sister Mason trimmed the Sister’s hair. We had a good meal and good conversation. They left and we dove into getting our talks ready for Sunday. 

 

Sunday we had an interview with the 3rd ward Bishop. We have been assigned to the Münich 3rd Ward. He has some particularly difficult issues in his ward to deal with. Basically he offered to have some help with some of those issues. Sister Mason will probably be called to work with the young women and they, the stake and ward, are still not sure what they are going to do with me. The couple we replaced went to the international ward. They accept international members from all of the area around Münich but they only speak English. It will be more difficult for Sister Mason at first but she will learn the German and this ward needs our help and I don’t think we would be that helpful in the international ward.

We also teach an English class on Tuesday. We only had two folks come this week. One was originally from Iran and the other person is a basketball coach for one of the schools and is from Romania.

Wednesday night is also a very busy night. It is institute and we have a dinner before the institute class. The Office senior couple made the meal and it was good. This week we also planned young single adult (JEA) activities. There are some very fun and good singles that we are working with.

 
The picture is of our street. We live on Pfeufer Strasse 45. We are on the bottom floor and way in the distance on the left is a white building and that is our building. The church in the background is the Sedling Kircke.

 

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Elder and Sister Mason left for Germany Monday morning the 14^th of January. We arrived at the airport in good time and immediately checked in. Two bags were exactly 50 pounds and two were 52 pounds. The two were over because we did some reshuffling of contents the night before and did not have the chance to re-weigh them. The airline attendant said he would pass them because we were leaving for a good cause. Later, before we boarded the flight, Sister Mason wanted Elder Mason to buy her a bottle of water. I asked the clerk how much a bottle cost, picked a bottle, and then went to pay the clerk at the counter but a lady in front of me had already paid for the bottle of water. She has a son out in the mission field who will come back this spring. I feel bad when people do that because we are better off than many of them but I do appreciate their kindness. The rest of the trip has gone well. 

We arrived in the mission field on Tuesday Jan 15. The Coverston trained us on the transportation system, the shopping, the Centrum, and the nursing aspect of the mission field. We are assuming the position that the Coverstons served for the past 18 months.  

It started to snow Thursday night and snowed all the night and through the day. The picture is of the apartment with the snow on the bushes that surround our small patio.

In this picture we looking at the bushes around our patio. The opening in the center is the entry way to the grass in the center of our complex. The window to left of the opening is our living room window.

Thursday morning we went to the anmeldung office and registered. We visited a few more stores and went to the mission office. Sister Coverston showed us how to get to the office by taking us on the bus and train. We stayed in the mission office for a couple of hours and then the Coverstons took us to the Mission Home. Sister Mason, Sister Coverston, and Sister Miles talked for a couple of hours over the mission nursing needs while Elder Coverston and Elder Mason relaxed in the living room and ate nuts and cakes. After the sisters finished discussing the mission nursing needs, President and Sister Miles took us to dinner. President miles is a high energy, very positive thoughtful man, his wife is very pleasant. 

Friday we were at the Centrum by ourselves without the Coverstons to guide us. It felt strange to be in the Centrum by our self’s. Elder Mason vacuumed and cleaned. Sister Mason mucked out the Kitchen and moped floors. The YSA’S are very accepting of us and express their appreciation to Sister Mason for keeping the center open until late (midnight) so they could stay and visit with each other. We arrived early at the Single Adult Centrum and one young woman came at 5:00 pm. She was dropped off by the women she works for. She said she was really happy that we were here, otherwise she would have no place to go and it is very cold outside. She had a safe place to go. She said she was not given a choice to stay home. Most of the families want their nanny out of the house as much as possible on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I made yogurt sugar cookies and dropped chocolate on the top of the cookies. They were a hit. They liked them very much because they were soft. 

Friday we joined the district leader and his companion to teach a single lady. She was curious about the church. She said she would read the Book of Mormon, but would not commit to go to church.

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Kaye and Richard had an enjoyable week at the Mission Training Center or the MTC. We entered the MTC at 10 am on Monday morning the 31^st of December. We celebrated New Years Eve by going to bed around 10 pm.

The first week was devoted to being taught how to use the “Preach My Gospel” manual. Numerous short video clips – most of which can be found at mormon.org and lds.org – were shown. There were 44 couples and 12 single sisters at this session. At the end of the first day we were divided up into small districts consisting of four couples and instructors. The instructors were returned missionaries and students at BYU. Brother Hung instructed in the morning and Brother Pearson instructed in the afternoon. The instruction procedure was to review a section in the manual and then practice by role playing to apply and use the principle taught. On Wednesday and Thursday persons from the area would come to the MTC and role play a certain character. Most of the community role players have been doing this for a number of years and I was very impressed how well they stayed in character. I tried to get them to come out of character after the role play was completed and they did not. The maintained their character from beginning to end.

Elder and Sister Mason are in the center and the photo was taken in the class room that we were taught in during the first week of our mission.

Tuesday evening the MTC conducts a devotional with a church general authority. Elder Yoon Hwan Choi was our speaker. His message was very good and can be summarized by understanding that we are all handsome or beautiful. I think he embarrassed his wife a bit by making her come to the podium and have her tell us why he was handsome. She kept turning around to him – he had set down while she was talking – and would ask him enough if she had said enough things about how handsome he was. His whole point was, however, to make sure that we are all children of our Heavenly Father and to him and to us we should all be handsome physically and spiritually. He emphasized that if we are to become Christlike we must see and find the beauty in everyone and stressed that if you do not see beauty in you companion then it is your problem not his or hers.

There was an out break of the stomach flu so they moved the devotional to a class room and then ported the devotional to the class rooms for the missionaries to view. They are trying hard to minimize the spread of the stomach flu. It is lasting 48 hours and those that get it are, apparently, very sick when they get it. To contain it is a real challenge because you have over 1600 young men and women using the same dining room and class rooms and apartments. That is there is plenty of opportunity to spread it around.

This week there are about 1,600 missionaries being trained at the MTC. By April they expect to have 4,800 missionaries. Because the senior missionary rooms were filled Elder and Sister Mason were housed in a room in the down town Marriott – I know it is tough to be a missionary. We had not planned on keeping a car but it turned out to be very convenient to have a car and not have to depend on being taxied between the Marriott and the MTC.

We eat three meals at the MTC and they feed all 1600 plus in an hour and a half. There is a stream going in to the cafeteria and stream going out. There is a very good variety in the selection of the food so they have a very good and efficient system. We have been impressed with the meals. For a cafeteria system they are both efficient and good.