This week was full of excitement and whatnot.
Start with Monday. After p-day stuff and dinner with a few members, we went to try by this guy named Mickey. We met him on the street a few weeks ago, and he said something during our conversation like, "I'm into the rock and roll." We said that was cool, but he said no it's bad. So we think "rock" might be a name for crystal meth or something, and roll maybe drugs of other sorts. Charlotte, please verify.
But anyway we stopped by, and when he opened the door his face was all covered in dry blood, and he had a bad cut above his eyebrow and a bunch of other bruises. He said he suffers from epileptic fits, but it looked like he got beat up. Bad. So we wonder if he is in the drug business of some sort, and maybe got into trouble with that. We're gonna try again soon to see how he is.
We also spent a fair bit of time with the branch youth, making their video for the Dublin All-Ireland seminary convention thing. It was pretty good. Haven't seen it yet, but I think they're showing it to us on Thursday and feeding us dinner at the church too or something.
We helped Josefine, the Hungarian lady, prepare for her English placement exam, which is later today. She is learning quite quickly...gift of tongues I guess.
Also a fun thing we learned: her name is actually Ilona, but when she married Josef she became Josefine Kovacs, basically Mrs. Josef Kovacs. And she told us that Kovacs means Smith, so her husband is Josef Smith!!! I think she got the reference too, because I think she knows who J.S. is. When Elder Holm and I looked at each other in amazement after hearing this, she cracked up, so we think she gets the coincidence too.
Saturday we taught a lesson to a girl, about our age, named Emma. We had met her out walking the other week, and she said she was interested and gave us her address. She and her brother both listened to our message, and she agreed to read the Book of Mormon and seemed really excited about it. The brother had to go to work half way through the lesson, but I think he would have accepted as well. They both seem real solid!
We had some Enniskillen adventures as well. So there's this guy named Thomas, who the missionaries met in Manchester, who lives in Enniskillen. We've been in phone contact for a while, and we finally set an appointment with him. When we show up at his address, a lady answers and looks real confused. She says he was probably pulling our leg. She said he didn't live there, but then she helps us get to the bottom of it. She is friends with him, so she called him and asked why he sent us to her door. He denied it, and then she chewed him out.
Apparently he does stuff like that all the time. She was angry, kept apologizing and saying that it wasn't a nice thing he did. But we thought it was very funny. (Probably because we don't pay for our petrol.) She gave us his actual address though, so maybe we'll show up at his REAL house unannounced and see his reaction.
Also in Enniskillen, we were driving through an area with a bunch of Irish flags on light poles, and some graffiti on a wall that said "Rot in Hell Thatcher, We remember 81". Apparently Margaret Thatcher, a former prime minister or something, died last week. We heard a lot about it. She was hated by a lot of people, especially the Irish So there was probably something in 1981 that she did that was real bad. It's interesting being in the middle of all this and trying to stay neutral.
Yesterday was real good. Gertie was able to come to church. So far her marriage thing has gone well. She is in her house and her husband received a court order to leave. We went with Tom Henry to pick her up in Dromore, because no other members were able to take a 30 minute round trip drive to help her get to church. The last convert baptism was over two years ago. But it turned out ok, she will be baptized on May 4th as long as she makes it to church next week!!!! So excited.
Last story: last night we were tracting, and this guy invited us in. He said they were celebrating their daughter's "first communion", which is a big deal for Catholics. So we walked in, and there were about six other people dressed up in their church clothes, all drinking and celebrating their eight year old's special day.
They asked us a ton of questions...about ourselves, about missions, about the church, about why we can't drink, etc. Very loud, and crazy with tons of people talking at the same time. Hilarious group of people. It was a fun experience, and I think they hopefully learned something from it as well.
Have I told you guys that EVERYONE who's not a member calls us by our first names?? Every time we say our names are Elder Burt and Elder Holm, they ask, "You have the same name?" Then we tell them it's just a title, another name for missionary. So then they always ask for our first names.
Gertie calls us Hans and Spencer, Brendan Bradley used to (still not sure where he is...), and the Catholic party house all did as well, and same for everyone we meet in the street. Joey, Dad, Ryan, did you get this in your missions? It's weird haha.
Anyway, those are the stories for this week. No pictures to attach...but I SENT THE SD CARD IN THE MAIL ON WEDNESDAY so you should hopefully receive it soon. When you get the pictures copied, just send it back and I'll put pics/videos from my wee camcorder on and send it again. (it was 100% full!)
Love yous, and have a grrrrrrrreat week.
$pencer
