2/13/12

Yeah, it sounds like your week was calmer, at the very least.

I´m not going to comment on the dog. I´m sure he´s a wonderful little home-wrecker and the sofas will be in shreds in no time at all. >:O

Yeah, it was a crazy weekend. We´ve been busy trying to run around taking care of everything. On Friday the doctor for the southern European missions came down to Palma so we could go visit some doctors. That was fun-a nice break from the routine. They wanted the information so that we have good trustworthy doctors here and don´t have to fly into Barcelona for care if something goes wrong.

Today we´ll be out in the center part of town, just browsing through some stores and getting some things done.

Normally I should still be able to write on Monday, just that last week was crazy. But the next couple of weeks should be calmer.

So I has a problem. Between emergencies, paying for a dentist trip for my last companion(which he never payed back...that´s another long story, and 50 euros gone), and other bad luck situations(plus buying a few needed things) my personal card is a little low, and I need to go to the dentist to get a pinhole fixed. (and the mission doesn´t cover it) It´s starting to slowly turn black, and I know that needs to get taken care of ASAP before it goes into full blown cavity mode. I had to buy a set of gloves on Wednesday (it´s cold, and they were on sale for a great price), so there´s about 38 euros on my card right now. It´s probably going to be about 50 to get my tooth fixed. Do you thing you could put about 40 dollars into my account so I can get it taken care of? I shouldn´t have any more emergencies since I´ve been really skimping to rebuild my emergency funds and I´ve got them back now, so I´ll use the card and then just set it aside. I still need to get the estimate from a dentist, but the smallest filling here costs about that much. Sorry to have to ask this. If you need my account number, let me send it in a manner that it´s a little bit disguised.

Bob´s doing very well. He´s just a happy guy who always makes us laugh. We´re working with him at his pace towards baptism. He´ll be baptised either near the end of this month or next month. It´s one of the great things about Jehovah´s Witnesses, even if they´re inactive, is that they´re used to studying scriptures, praying, behaving, and doing things in a reverent manner. Like President Hinckley says ¨They´re great at preparing so many future members for us, that the first thing I plan on doing when I get home is thank them when they come to my house!¨.

I´d remembered that it was Valentines day. We don´t forget that many things.

Oh, the poor van. It´s had a rough life.

So this should be a calm week here. Hopefully, it´s a calm week there.

Have a good one,

Bradley.

2/8/12

Well, it actually snowed this weekend, or at least Friday and Saturday night. So it was kind of cold. My coat, scarfs, gloves, sweaters, etc are all in Barcelona in the office basement. But I was fine. I borrowed some stuff and was warm. It´s the first time it´s snowed that much since the 1960´s. The apartment´s old and drafty(and extremely overpriced), but we just close up the bedrooms at night with heaters and blankets and we´re warm. It`s probably equivalent to serving in Ukraine or similar countries.. Thankfully they came and fixed the dryer today. The electrical installation is a joke, and so when someone had a heater plugged in it blew up the timer on the dryer. We have to be careful to not plug in too many things at once either. Two heaters means nothing else. Just a few lights. And that´s after it was ´fixed´. But the expiration date on the contract is May 30th, so while we´ll start looking for a new place in March or so, I won´t be living in it. Oh well.

So we made it back to Palma on Tuesday. Had a calm couple of days, then we got a call on Friday morning saying that there´d been an office mess-up and Elder Pericle would have to fly out to Menorca to do a baptismal interview. We took him off to the airport, then I was with members on splits until the evening. I was joking around with Rafa (he´s interesting) while we huddled under his umbrella, then I noticed that the rain had changed to snowflakes. We were somewhat concerned that the airport would be shut down (island people really aren´t prepared for snow), but my companion made it back fine in the morning.

Sorry I haven´t been able to write until today. We had conferences on Monday and Tuesday, so we´re kind of getting a preparation day today. Kind of.

It sounds like you had a rough week. I´m sorry to hear that. Just remember that we´ll be able to overcome all things through Christ. Really, it´s how all these people we see here change their lives. We´re teaching a man from Bolivia named Bob(we can´t use real names anymore) who was previously a Jehovah´s Witness, though he´s been out of that church for quite some time. The day before I got here, they were passing by former investigators, and his stepdaughter had been taught before. As they knocked, Bob was reading in the Book of Mormon which he´d just found about fifteen minutes earlier. He invited the missionaries up and they started teaching him. He just surprises us every visit by his faith. The last time he´d invited us to have tea the next visit, so we commented that hot chocolate would be better, and briefly mentioned that we don´t drink tea. So the last visit was on the Word of Wisdom. He didn´t really understand why (like I told him, it´s a question of faith), but he just finally said ¨Well, I don´t understand, but if that´s the way the Lord says it has to be, then it has to be that way¨. That´s the answer we like to hear. He´s really trying to get his wife to listen, though she seems to really not like us at the moment (he says that her reason´s aren´t justified), and we´re going to keep working with him.

We had to manage the conferences on Monday and Tuesday. Of course, the planning was bad. The office only told us what we had to do Saturday at 8PM, we were headed to a visit, and all the stores close at 9PM. ANd they´re not open Sunday, and the first session was set for Monday at 10. We ran around getting everything bought (the stores also don´t open until 9AM), and managed to have everything set up by 930 when the Hinckley´s arrived. We´ll be pestering the office a lot earlier this time.

I have a working computer, so I´m attaching some pictures since I´m short on time. Most are just of the snow on Sunday morning, the last is when I took that trip down to Alcoy.

I hope you all have a good week, and that things are smoother this week.

Love,

Bradley

1/31/12

Arizona is almost as large as Spain, so don´t worry. Mallorca´s not that big. For the Spanish Postal Service, the Balearus Islands are the same tarriff as the mainland, so it shouldn´t cost extra. You might want to check, but it costs the same to send things inside Spain and to those islands, so it shoudn´t be different on your end.

My companion´s name is Elder Pericle, and he´s from Virginia. We´ve been having a jolly good time together.

The Office Secretary should give you a call soon to ask about travel details (or perhaps an e-mail) to ask how you´d like the flights configured, so you´ll just have to let him know. I don´t know if they´d have a flight from Georgia or New York to Tucson or not.

So we had to fly in yesterday for mission council, which took up the morning. Then by the time we got here there wasn´t time to write, and the meeting was from 4 to about 930. So we´re in the office now waiting for a 5PM flight (long story), and we´re writing today.

I had to laugh when you said ¨no turbulance¨. On yesterdays flight we´d just started to level off and they turned off the seatbelt light when the plane dropped, the light came back on, and they said ¨We´re experiencing a bit of turbulence, please return to your seats¨. It wasn´t that bad, don´t worry. But I hadn´t been in a plane for a year and a half, now I´ve had four flights in a week´s time, and we´ll be back in Barcelona on the 27th of February for another meeting, followed by a possible trip on the 6th for transfers (or to pick up my new residency card).

We were supposed to catch a 11:40 flight to Palma, but yesterday when we were in the office before the meeting I was talking with the Elder in charge of residency when we realized that the office records were wrong-they thought that I´d already done my fingerprints and everything for my second residency card.  Nope. So they sent us to do that this morning. It went extremely fast, thankfully. Now we´ll be headed out around 5PM for the short hop back to Mallorca.

Actually, I was happy to leave things. Only having one suitcase and my briefcase was rather enjoyable. A lot easier to navigate around airports and trains. And I really haven´t missed the items I stored away. It´s not like I´ll be without them for too long.

Yes, it´s been rainy and cold. I was told I was going to an island, and yet I´ve yet to see any banana trees, straw huts, pineapple plantations, Hawaiian people, or savages. Just a city with normal goodies. It´s quite large, however. With the way the branches are split three quarters of Palma is in our area, with just a quarter for the other Elders. But they survive just fine.

I´m definately not in the same level of apartment we had in Gandia. It´s old and cold. There´s heaters, but we can only have them on if there´s nothing in the washer, and if we don´t have too many lights on. In the summer we´ll be fine, we´ve just got to survive the winter, which will be ending soon, no doubt.

I´m glad to see that all appears to be well back home. I´m sure my cat is fluffy and happpy, as usual.

So I don´t know when I´ll be writing next week. We´ll be having training conferences with the Zone and President on Monday and Tuesday, so I suspect we won´t have our preparation day until Wednesday. I´m not sure how regular my writing schedule will be from here on out. Most of the time it shoudn´t be different, but you never know.

I hope all goes well and that everyone has a good week.

Bradley.

1/24/12

So yes, I´m not in Gandia anymore. I´ve been transferred to Gilligan´s Island out here in the Mediterranean. I´m in Palma de Mallorca.

So, it was kind of a surprise. I´d expected to be going up north to finish things off. Then when we had interviews on Friday, I was chatting with Elder Allphin while my companion was in with President, and he just said ¨You´re really going to like your new assignment. The Lord has big things in store for you.¨ So the next morning President called and said ¨Elder Mattice, I´m calling you to serve in the Poniente Branch on Mallorca as Zone Leader.¨ So here I am!

It was a crazy week last week. We switched with the Valencia Zone Leaders on Tuesday morning, then I spent that day and half of Wednesday there. Their piso was being repainted (it was in bad shape), so we all ended up throwing mattresses on the floor in a tiny room trying not to die from paint fumes. Elder Reeder, who´s there in Valencia, was pretty entertaining. He´s very neat and orderly, so this was just like murder to him. He complained about every five minutes.

Wednesday evening, I went to the train station, and got onto a train BY MYSELF to Alcoy. It´s the longest I´ve been alone for twenty months-two and a half hours. It was significantly weird. The train from Valencia got me to Xatíva, then I had to switch trains to go to Alcoy, which is that lost little town in the mountains. It was a diesel powered train from the 70´s out there...at least it was warm. Pulled into Alcoy about 10:45PM (way past the time we should be inside) and had a warm reception (I love those two Elders that were there). We had a great day on Thursday (ate about 8 quasadallas (hehe) each with El Pato. They´re both from Gilbert, so at least we all can talk about Arizona related things and they get it. And they know what Casa Mañana is...ooh....

It was a much needed little vacation. I realized after being with Elder Taylor how sad and stressed I´d gotten. Elder Taylor was my companion´s last companion and he´s just said ¨I know exactly what you´re going through, exactly how you feel, and I´m here to tell you that you absolutely cannot feel that way.¨ I guess he´d been in bad shape and President had to give him a bit of a pep talk.

So we had interviews on Friday. I renewed my temple recommend (it´s just an extension that´s good from now until three months after I get home). President Hinckley knew the questions from memory, without pausing. I was pretty impressed. I definitely can´t do that during my baptismal interviews.

I had to leave most of my stuff in Barcelona in the basement of the office. I only took the middle bag out to Mallorca, but it had everything I really needed, so it was actually nice to travel with fewer bags. We traveled up from Valencia on Monday, then I ended up sitting around the office all night Monday and until about 12PM today, until Elder Montoya and Elder Garces and I all left for the airport.

It took a long time to get out there. We rode a little plane out to the island (Airbus 320-200), and it was about a 25 minute flight. Nice short hop, really. Now I´m in an internet shop with some other Elders, and my companion, Elder Pericle, is with Elder Salmon, who´s in the other half of Palma.

I´ll be going back to Barcelona for Zone Leader Council next Monday. I think I´m going to be on planes a little more often now. We hit a little turbulance on the way down, which wasn´t my favorite experience, but at least I didn´t scream.

The address is
C/ Gumersindo 11, 3
07004 Palma de Mallorca
España

With the voting it would probably just be easier to do it from there. We certainly don´t want it to be late, and you´ll just have to send me a list of the candidates. A registered Republican, huh? I need to register with the NRA next, though I hear that´s gone down hill a lot since Charlton Heston died.

That was my week. I know it´s a large wall of text as we say, but I hope it makes up for some of the shorter letters in the past.

1/16/12

A fuller account of Elder Whitney´s vision is in the March 2008 Ensign, in the article by President Packer.

I don´t have my license on me, actually. I know it´s D50 something, but I´ll have to look and tell later.

So, it was an interesting week. Jesus fell through, but we found some new people who might progress towards baptism. One crazy thing that happened was that on Wednesday, I contacted a woman who wasn´t interested, but as I was talking with her, a guy who was walking by stopped and started talking to my companion. He asked for money to buy a plane ticket back to the Canary Islands (a lot of people ask us for money). We told him that we couldn´t help him, but gave him a pass along card and directions to the information office (he was looking for a motel). On Thursday, we had exchanges planned with some members, and to our surprise one of the members (he´s a crazier sort) had this same guy with him. He explained that he was coming home from work, when he felt the impression to stop at an Internet cafe and buy candy for his wife (he said that he never does that). Then he saw this guy inside, felt like he needed to talk to him, and long story shout (I´m short on time) he´s staying at the members house right now, came to church on Sunday, and he´s going back to the islands in a week or so. He´s a pretty dedicated Baptist, so we´re not sure how receptive he´ll be (he was a little contentious on Sunday in Gospel Principles class ¨Where´s that in the Bible!?¨ but we´ve got a visit set for Wednesday.

Glad to hear that Mitt won. We´ll have to see how things go, because I believe he won New Hampshire in 2008 as well. I´ll send a letter home with my DL# today, so you´ll have it by Friday probably.

Love,

Bradley.

1/9/12

I´ve only three transfers left, and that´s about one areas´ worth, so I´ll be there the rest of the time. But that´s not until the 24th of January. And I don´t know where I´ll be going.

President Hinckley sent him here so I could work him out of it, and it seems like he´s finally coming out of it. It´ll take more time to be sure, but I´m optimistic at the moment.

We´ll have stake conference at a Spain-wide level in February (satellite broadcast from Salt Lake), so that´ll be exciting.

As Brandon expressed, I don´t know most of these relatives. I´m not sure that´s fixable. I´ll just start calling everyone uncle and aunt.

If I end up going back down to EA I´d like to go to the temple weekly. Especially with it being that close. Maybe a couple of sessions (not to mention I´ll take advantage of the Spanish session)

Hannah being a lazy old dog sounds about right. I´m sure she´ll probably thin up a little in the summer, but she´s probably entering the golden years of retirement and lounging on the couch all day.

The church´s media push this last year and with the increase they´ve got planned for this year will help Romney out a bit. President Monson´s been focusing a lot on visibility and openness, and that´s why we´ve been getting a lot of media attention.

I´d suggest watching the types of music that the munchkins listen to. I´m not going all 80´s anti MTV style, but look up the lyrics on the songs and make sure there´s not anything inappropriate in them.

So the conference was good. We were concerned that the general missionary would get scared off by placing the yearly goal we wanted (there was a large push for 1000 or more), so we set the quarterly goal of 150 plus for the moment, from here until the end of March. But things in Europe are changing a lot. In the highest baptising missions in the church ( the Utah missions) they only have 3000 a year, and Portugal´s on track for 1200 or more. Basically, things are different, and one of the things that will help is that the people start getting the news. Talk about that with the ward the next time you get a chance-European missionaries baptise regularly. We´ve pretty well managed to stop the new missionaries from getting that corruption by having them stay connected to the mission blog, but not every mission has a President Hinckley. The widespread goal is to baptise every week, not just every month. And we´ll be doing it.

Time went by fast today. I´m fine, my house is clean, and everythings okay. Quick summary.

Love,

Bradley.

1/2/12

We managed to pull a fast one and end up with 451 for the year, so yes, we did get that.

It could happen. One of the members here was just talking about the newest stake president in his home country. He´d been bishop of a ward for two weeks when they called him to be the new stake president.

I´ll be travelling up to Barcelona this afternoon for a conference. I won´t be back here in Gandia until Wednesday night, fairly late. One of those things.

The week was pretty calm. I had planned to to exchanges with the Alcoy elders, but the Elder responsible left his suitcase in their apartment. So I was here in Gandia all week. Right now things are all kind of exploding around my ears, but it´s okay. Nothing new, and nothing I can´t handle. I´ll be using the full war chest, though. We had an easy transfer in the last one, so it´s semi-natural that this one would be difficult.

Thankfully, the Lord´s taken a big weight off my back. My companion´s been dead for the past couple of weeks. Not doing much, getting up around 10AM instead of 7:30, and just generally not helping matters. I´ve finally involved the leadership, and they´ve all been praying, not to mention I´ve been working with him pretty hard. He seems to have had some kind of 2012 reset, since for the last two days he´s been getting up on time, doing everything he should, helping with small things (the dishes, cleaning), etc. So now I´ll be able to focus less on him and more on my own area and the district. I´m here in the last three weeks of my time here. I´ll be leaving January 24th unless there´s a really unexpected change, so I´ve got to leave everything in good shape.

Oh, the joys of having ISP problems. It´s obviously Obama´s fault. There is no other explanation. I know a few of the members were asking if we hear anything about the news back home. When I said that Obama was probably going to be replaced by Ron Paul the poor guy nearly had a stroke. Ron Paul: Good for America, bad for everybody else. Bye bye Monopoly Money! (the Euro)

We´re teaching a great guy named Jesus right now. He threw out his cigarettes right as we taught him the Word of Wisdom, and he´s getting ready to be baptised the 21st of January. It´s just a pity that we don´t have someone named John to baptise him. Then it´d be perfect.

New Years eve, we ate with some members. Since we had to be home early, and the food was late, we ended up scarfing down a quick plate before everyone else ate. It was pretty sad. Then we were in bed by 11:30. I plan to have a much better time this coming New Years Eve. I also set the goal to be in Times Square one of these days when it happens.

Well, the holiday laziness still hasn´t ended here in Spain. We´ll have round three this weekend with WiseMenDay. Some how, here in Spain, their Bible translation became corrupted or something, because they´re not just wise men, they´ve been converted into Mage Kings with magic powers who bring toys and joy for all. I think I prefer the fat boy.

So, happy new year. I hope you all have a good week, and that things move smoothly.

Bradley.