Well, it looks like our first week has successfully come to a close. We were hustled around for five days by our predecessors who were successful in showing us where 5 of the 7 ward houses are located as well as the missionary apartments that go with each one. We ended up being pretty confused but have pretty good instructions as to how to get back to each one. The Youth Center for which we have primary responsibilities is pretty nice and set up close to the center of the City Hall and the University of Vienna. The young adults seem to like to come and socialize and they have three primary activities each week. On Monday your Mom is primarily responsible for a meal that costs them each about a $2.00 fee and I guess I'm supposed to help out a bit though I'm busy as the set-up guy with all the tables and chairs and also being the cashier. So far they've let our predecessors be the only responsible people on the cashier end which breaks one of the big no-no's in church policies of always having two people handle money but I guess we can be trusted and the rules and regs are pretty complete to document people and receipts for all expenditures.
After the meal, one of the YA's is responsible for family home evening. Apparently occasionally someone has fallen through in which case it's our opportunity to pull something together. They have a lot of talent and virtually every one here has had English in school. Though they certainly like speaking German, many get by very easily if we don't know how to express ourselves yet with helping us out a bit. Today we met the couple responsible for the YA's for the entire mission. They help supervise the seven stakes in the mission which include two in Austria, three in Switzerland and two in southern Germany. Interestingly, the Swiss have really clamped down on foreign missionaries, primarily to hold back the Muslim influence and so Americans and others who are not of the EUA are not permitted to proselyte and can't get visas to do so. Therefore all the missionaries there are from Germany, France, Spain, etc and even they are not allowed to tract or do any active proselyting. It's all driven by the members. At any rate our couple was very helpful in giving us some ideas about how to get started as a new couple and change up from what's been going on up until now.
Speaking of visas, still no sign of our missing briefcase with all of its important documents. I think the laptop and hard drives we had there are probably long gone but the two credit cards that were tucked away were not used and have been cancelled. We're still grieving over the lost documents but there's still hope that they might turn up. We've registered with a couple of lost and found places and will really have our first chance to check back with them in the morning. We were supposed to register within 3 days but the mission failed to give us an officially stamped form we need to do that. We now have that in our possession as of today and should be able to officially register tomorrow. After that we have 91 days to apply for our visas and hopefully we can have the necessary documents ready to go in that time. We have to reregister at the end of a year but I don't think we have to reduplicate anything at that time. We're still living on the money we took with us, most of which has gone to buying a year's pass on all the public transportation systems which has been really neat and the rest will go to the registration processes when we get there. Eating hasn't been too expensive and so far we're living pretty well and actually losing a bit of weight. As things settle down, we'll see if that changes!
Last Sunday, we visited the International Ward which was quite cosmopolitan with people from all over the globe who work here. They use English as their basic language so it was an easy start. Today we visited the other ward which meets in the same building which happens to be the Stake Center. We've met the Stake President Friday night at a Youth Forum which they have planned for some time and which went Friday evening and Saturday morning. We basically helped with the physical set up and your mom worked to help the sister who was doing all the cooking as her basic calling in the church. She also helps on Wednesdays at the Youth Center where they have institute classes followed by a meal and where we have the responsibility to teach a class in English. Our class is attended by the BYU students who come and go on the study abroad programs but even they have their own schedules and aren't always there. The others are all basically Austrians who enjoy learning about the gospel in English and many are returned missionaries who had American or English companions. The church really emphasizes learning English as well as the mission language.
One of our missionaries is from Spain and between English and German we communicate all right though he gets a little confused as to which language he's speaking. The full-time missionaries offer both English and German language training as well as their regular missionary discussions on Tuesdays and Thursdays at the Youth Center so we're busy every weekday afternoon and evening. Mondays-Family Home Evening, Tuesdays and Thursdays-missionary discussions, Wednesday-Institute. Fridays are "Waffle Night" and a night just to relax, play games and socialize. The waffles are free and our responsibility to prepare. Last Friday we got off because of the special Youth Forum they held, and this Friday we're off again because Sister Wixom, Primary General President, Sister Reeves, 2nd counselor in the General Relief Society Presidency and Elder Kaeron of the First Quorum of the 70 and the Area supervisor for Europe are coming for a special presentation at the Stake Center. Then next Monday is Pfingsten or Pentecost which is a big national holiday as most Catholic events are and runs the whole weekend from Saturday through Monday. So I guess we have a 4 day free weekend as far as the center goes. We do have an assignment to teach a topic at the weekly District Meeting with the missionaries which occurs on Tuesdays at noon which we just received today and once a month we meet with the Institute Board on Thursday mornings which will occur this coming week. Never a dull moment. We figure we'll have our feet on the ground in just another couple of weeks.
Miss you all, but have had opportunities to Facetime with Mindy and Emily and see the pictures from Memorial Day. It rains a lot here! and we frequently are carrying our umbrellas so we don't get drenched. Happy Birthday to Tim!
Hopefully our usual letters will get posted on Saturday which is our designated P day.
Love, Elder and Sister Parker
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