Dear Family,
As the days seem to be getting a little longer and the nights shorter, school has been out this week in Austria which has meant our attendance at the YSA Center has been pretty minimal. There were no institute classes this week and so instead of getting a great cooked meal from the sister who's been assigned for several years to do it, Sister Parker decided that we'd provide any comers with a bowl of hot soup and some buttered bread before they headed out to an ice skating party that evening. Instead of the usual 50 people or so who are there for classes we probably ended up with about 15 or so and she had both some yummy noodle soup that was kind of like we'd set up at home with some Ramen noodles but we had to make it more from scratch, and also some yummy potato soup with a few veggies left over from the Monday home evening fare. It was an easy evening and after everyone had left and we'd cleaned up, we went down to the Rathaus (pictures from last week) where everyone was ice skating and saw them all having a good time. We decided not to participate just in case we slipped and broke something important, our ice skating skills being a little limited.
We have had some good attendance at our language courses and we seem to be focusing at the moment on teaching German rather than English. Our Zoroastrian family never returned after the holidays and we have assumed that the visas came through and they're all happily ensconced in the USA, using their skills for real. I did mention a couple of weeks ago that I'd fill you in on an interesting session with two Hungarians. For quite some time we've enjoyed regular visits from a member who joined the church about 5 years ago and is now living with his mother here in Vienna while he works for Nuskin. His English was virtually non-existent as was his German and so it was a real challenge to teach him either language. We initially started out with English using the Google Translate to get his Hungarian into our language and that really worked OK but he wasn't a real hard studier and so it was slow going. Then for about 2 1/2 months, our Internet connection has been down and it was quite difficult to get it repaired. So for quite some time he would come and seemed to make some progress just in hanging around all the English-speaking missionaries. I really don't know how he managed to survive with as little language as he knew but he is one of our more active attendees and always shows for home evenings, institute and waffle night along with the language classes.
So in December, we had a young lady appear who wanted to learn German who has family in Budapest! That's right, she was Hungarian and spoke really quite good English. We had a couple of sessions learning basic vocabulary and I asked her if she would mind being our translater for our Hungarian young man. She readily agreed but left for Budapest over the holidays so we had to wait for her to return. She's now been back for a month, comes regularly twice a week and has been very helpful in aiding our devout member. She's a much better student than he is but she's been very willing to help him out. So it's routine at every session to start and end with prayer which she probably thought was a little strange but went along with us. Initially, I was saying all the prayers in English and after our member joined in with us, he tended to pray in Hungarian. My prayers were pretty short and to the point. His were long and went on and on and on but at least she was understanding them! I then asked her if she would be willing to pray and she acquiesced after a short lesson on how to pray after the Mormon style, she being a long standing Catholic. So in the past couple of weeks I've been encouraging everyone to see how they'd do praying in German and that has kept the prayers considerably shorter. So the whole point of this lengthy report is that last week after we were finished, our young member presented her with two Books of Mormon, one in Hungarian and the other in German! He told her it would be a great way to practice her German as she read in one and followed in the other. She graciously accepted and I congratulated him on being a good missionary. We'll see where it goes from here.
So while everything else has been kind of slow, we've had several challenges with the physical facilities of our missionary apartments. One group had their washing machine breakdown and after a challenging foray into speaking with the Whirlpool repairman who will come by sometime this Wednesday between 8 AM and 6 PM(!), I suddenly realized that it was a machine that we had actually purchased only 7 months ago. So at least it's still on warranty but we're going to have to arrange for someone to hang around the apartment all day until someone shows up. We told the Elders we'd help as we don't do too much during the day and can get our studying done. We have to still mount their carbon monoxide monitor on the wall anyway and I found a drill set in our apartment that will work out fine. Another set of missionaries down south in Wiener Neustadt, about an hour's train ride from here, have decided their mattresses are shot and so we talked it over with mission headquarters who have said they won't be able to advance them the money meaning we'll have to go down, purchase them, pay for them, and get them back to their apartments. They'd already picked out a couple but my office mentor didn't think they would be high enough quality and recommended something a little pricier, usually available at IKEA. Well, fine, but there isn't an IKEA anywhere close to where they live and we don't feel like hauling two mattresses the equivalent of SL to Spanish Fork on a train so they'll look for something else and when they find it, we'll head down to get their mattresses for them.
In the meantime, two other elders just about killed themselves when one jumped on his bunkbed to have it come crashing down on his poor companion beneath him. Inspecting the damage, we discovered that the mattress support in the top bunk had been destroyed. New bunk beds aren't cheap wonder of wonders, a short trip to OUR local IKEA turned up just exactly what we needed and will only cost 70 Euros instead of the 300-600 a new bed would cost. While we were there we even inspected the recommended mattresses we need for the distant elders and will be able to see if their choices make the grade!
Finally yesterday we spent our P day heading off to view the Imperial Treasury of the Austrian Empire, one of the museums in the new Year's Card bargain we bought a while back. This treasury was put together largely by one of the famous empresses who ruled toward the end of the 19th century. Now we're all up to speed on the fancy vestments, crowns, jewelry, swords, staffs and even spiritual relics from the European past and the Holy Roman Empire. Although I don't think we're even close to being convinced, we did view items that were reportedly pieces of the actual cross, a fragment of Jesus' loincloth and a fragment of the actual table cloth used at the Last Supper! All in the same room!
Today we went to St. Poelton, another far away branch in the stake for our Sunday meetings where we got to help in a joint teach with a man from Romania who's really got the spirit. He's scheduled to be baptized on the 28th and promises to be off all of his smoking at least a week before. He's already received a blessing to help him in that regard and is making great progress. His English is better than his German so it was an easy lesson. We're looking forward to a long trip to Munich on Thursday with all the other missionaries to meet with Elder Kaeron of the First Quorum of the Seventy. Leaving at 6:30 in the morning and not back until 9:30 that night. No wonder they call it the Mission Tour!
(Sister Parker) Today I felt like the postman: Through all kinds of weather, the wind, rain, and snow the trek to the Gemeinde (ward house) went forward. Bundled up warmly we came from the Train Station through the village and around the corners to our Gemeinde. Actually, there is only one Gemeinde in Vienna that is across the street from our bus stop where we don't have to make a big trek. However, all this makes us feel that we are truly persevering. The small branch in St. Poelton really has a sweet spirit among the sisters and I enjoy visiting with them. They are all so serious about the gospel and applying it to our lives. A diligent sister who leads the choir, conducts Relief Society, and, also taught the Gospel Doctrine lesson, gave us some great advice. She said, when we receive spiritual insights about changes we need to make in our lives from lessons, talks, etc, we should immediately write it down, talk about it and then incorporate it into our lives. She then shared a little story about Pres. Kimball visiting a ward where he took out a little piece of paper and started writing on it. .The ward leaders thought someone had done something wrong and he was going to tell them about it. Instead, he told them he had just heard something he needed to work on and wanted to remember it. It sounds like great advice so I'm passing it on.
This week on Saturday is Valentines day so I'm wishing everyone a HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!
Lots of Hugs and Love,
Grammy, Grampa,
Mom, Dad,
Elder and Sister Parker
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