First Letter from Bayreuth!

Last Sunday was hard, as I am sure I already mentioned, because I had to say goodbye to many people that I love. This last pday we went to Bonn to visit some cool castle ruins, which were cool but as soon as we got there I was about ready to leave haha. On our way back we ran into this lady on the train. Boy, when we stepped on the train it just reeked of weed and we soon found out that it was her. One of the elders tried talking to her but all she was doing is laughing and nodding her head in agreement to everything he said. I must say it was kind of funny!

Because I had to leave this week, I had to say goodbye to all of my family in Köln that I have grown to love. We had a really fun time with Eric at the hospital, and he had lots of questions unlike normal. We ended up helping him too...so we may have accidentally stayed about 2 hours. After that we had a little get together with the Kozma family, and it was really good to see them all one last time. They are a solid family. Right after and going a little bit late, we had some really really good ice  cream with the Nowaks and the sisters. We had fun, shared a spiritual thought, and then parted ways. That was actually hard for me because we had gotten to know them so well. Sister Nowak for me was kind of my mom on my mission, so it hurt a little more than the others. Luckily, they gave me a CD of a bunch of photos together, so I am very excited to go through them!

Wednesday was my last day in Köln, and I sent off Elder Dean to Frankfurt so that he could go get his Golden, or new missionary. Because I needed to have people to be with, two other missionaries came over. One was from Aachen and the other from Bonn. Together we got to see John one last time, and as we left we ran into Ansgar, an investigator we have stopped doing things with. It was a total miracle how we crossed paths, and hopefully he will agree to meet up with Elder Dean soon. After John, we had my last dinner appointment in Köln with the Markaj family and we had such a fun time! Three elders, an awesome dinner, two games of darts where I accidently threw one at the reset button, and a great lesson. Finally, we got home and found the other Aachen companionship waiting for us already. We decided to go on an evening adventure and toured the 3 story garage and looked at all the cool cars and then went to the top floor to check out the cool view of Köln one last time. It was sweet!

The next day was all dedicated to travel. We had our bus at 910, but it was an hour and then the driver took a 45 minute break. Because of all that we showed up to Frankfurt a little bit later as anticipated so I didn’t get to meet the two new training missionaries in Köln, and that was a real bummer. After a bit of waiting around, we hopped on another bus and took that to Nürburg where we had to take a train to Bayreuth. We ended up getting home at 730 so I just unpacked and ate dinner after a tiring day of traveling.

Elder Carson and I have been getting along really well, but unfortunately neither of us have been sleeping very well because of my snoring haha. The first morning in Bayreuth we went on a small split because Elder Carson had to go get his foot checked out at the doctor. He may have to go home, but we wont know for sure for a few days

Sunday, what an interesting day! The branch asked me to give a talk 2 days before, so I prepared a little talk. We then gave the lesson for the first hour and then for the second hour I gave my talk. Since one of the speakers didn’t show up, I tried to take more time. Well...what seemed like 15 minutes was actually 30. I have no stinking idea how that happened, but I talked for 30 minutes!!! Poor guy after me had 10 or so minutes haha. I felt so bad! Our branch is really cool though. It may have only had 16 people including all the really small kids, but they are really really great. Afterwards we visited the new convert and gave him a blessing with a member of the Army, and afterwards he and his wife gave us root beer, doritos, salsa, an amazing cake, and this amazing chicken pot pie casserole. 

This week has been quite the adventure. It has been fun, and it has been sad. I have already learned a lot here in Bayreuth and I am loving it even though it is very very small. Right now we are going to take our bikes to get fixed so we don’t have to do so much walking. After that maybe a little shopping. Slower day, but it should be good. Have a good week everyone!