The Sound of Music and Hallstatt

Dear Family,

A review of last week's epistle would reveal that we were hustling out the door, as it was sent, with Andrew and Ruslana and their two children leading us on a tour of a couple of cities in our mission, one where we've been a few times but not toured and the other a completely new experience for all involved.

Salzburg is renowned for the site of the film about the Von Trapp family known to all of us as "The Sound of Music."  Although the film was apparently never really big in Austria, it's a favorite with the tourists and there are multiple tour groups who have set up visits to the places made famous in the movie.  Arriving in the morning by train, we checked into a hotel recommended by good old Rick Steves in his book on the Best of Europe.  As we walked to the hotel from the station we actually passed right by the place selling tickets and signed ourselves up for that afternoon, receiving a discount for everyone willing to show their tour book.  Off we went to see the lane Julie Andrews walked down as she left the nunnery, the exterior of the house chosen to represent the front of Colonel Von Trapp's mansion, another by a lake chosen to represent the back of the house where all the kids fall into the water (apparently it was very cold and had to be done twice because one of the kids about drowned on the first take), the famous gazebo where 16 going on 17 is coached by 17 going on 18 and where eventually the Colonel acknowledges his love for Maria, then a drive by beautiful Mondsee where the church is located where they filmed the wedding, ending up back where we started at a beautiful garden where they filmed much of the Do Re Mi song. 

Here are a few of the sights:

The lane where Maria sings about having "confidence"

The famous gazebo with Alex standing guard.  

And the steps where they all sang Do Re Mi and which the bus driver encouraged us all to sing by going around a round about a few times until everyone warmed up to the idea (great picture of the fortress in the background.

Great sights along the way like this one:

The next day it was back to the train station and off to the wonderful little village of Hallstatt which we'd never heard of but Ruslana had been reading about.  

It's crowded between a beautiful lake and the side of a mountain with a Catholic and a Protestant church dominating the view of the city.  

We hiked around the village which didn't take too long and then decided on a five mile two hour hike up to a high waterfall which gave us a wonderful view of the Alpine countryside.  

The next day it was a ride up a funicular tram and a tour through salt mines which made the country famous as far back as 400-800 BC! Everyone has to put on miner's clothes to go on the tour and you walk and ride mine trains and even slide down a few slippery slides along the way where they clock your speed.  

Grammy didn't like her picture but she was the fastest at 28.9 Km/hr!  

Above is a fuzzy view from our hotel window down into the village plaza. 

While we were in the salt mines it snowed for the first time this season.  They told us usually the mine is colder but the day we were there it was warmer than outside!  Still the cold air made the whole area very beautiful with mist and clouds all over the mountainsides.

All in all it was a lovely trip and we were home by Thursday afternoon in time to get them on their plane by Friday morning.  Saturday evening was the beginning of our first Stake Conference since we've been in Austria and it was like a big reunion with a huge stake encompassing all of the eastern half of the country.  Missionaries were a plenty and from Saturday evening until the Sunday morning session, many of them were grouped together with  as many as 12 to an apartment.  One of our Stake Institute Council sisters that we know well spoke at the Saturday meeting and raved us up so we got good press for the Center.  In fact they gave us the flowers from the podium to take home because the Sunday session wasn't in the Stake Center but at the Austrian Center where the United Nations have their European headquarters. 

There was a great Primary choir at the Sunday meeting including some pipe whistles and violin players. 

Transfers again this week so we'll be saying goodbye to a few elders and sisters, two of whom have been in Vienna as long as we have but new faces to say hello to by Tuesday evening.

    It has been a very busy week and a half since Andy and Ruslana came to visit. It was very nice to have a couple of grandkids around and Alec said all the right things about wanting to stay with "Gram". He also made good use of our time on trains and buses, refusing to sit anywhere but next to grammy and the window. Its sweet to be loved by a child. It was hard to see them leave, but we hope to see some others from time to time.

  (Sister Parker)  I must say the Austrians take the prize again for doing all their outdoor activities in any kind of weather--pouring cold rain and snow as we went up the mountain to the Salt Mines. Never the less, it was very cold and I had to buy some gloves to keep my hands warm and most of the time we were quite wet. This weather change also affected Vienna and I had to finally go out and buy a new winter coat. So nice to know that I won't freeze through the winter in my little rain coat. 

   Friday at waffle night we were greeted warmly and told how much we were missed. But it seems when the need arises the young adults step in and take over. They cooked a meal on Monday night and made some waffles on Friday night. They, however, preferred that we keep the job. The elders also took care of the language classes and said there were so many people that they even had to use the lounge area as a classroom. They were also glad to have us back. 

    Two other important things happened today. One- It is the National Founding Day of modern Austria and we sang the national anthem as a pre-opening song before Stake Conference started. We had never heard it before. A rough translation would be "Land of mountains, Land of streams, Land of fields, Land of cathedrals, Land with a rich future on which to build! A homeland of growing daughters and sons, A people graced with beauty, Much praise Austria, Much praise Austria! (It rhymes in German) Two- It is the end of daylight savings time and now it is dark at 5 o'clock. But it is light when you wake up in the morning. Better enjoy it while it last. 

    Happy Birthday to all those who have birthdays today and the next couple of days, Myles, Emily and Uncle Alan, also Adam's whose just passed. 

Take Care, we love you all. 

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder and Sister Parker.

Andy & Ruslana Lead Us to Germany

Hello Dear Family,

Wow, has this ever been a busy week.  Seems like things continue to really pick up.  We had a great Home Evening on Monday which Mom prepared early because Andy and Ruslana were arriving at 3 PM and we normally open the center an hour later.  So we decided we'd get everything ready to go except for just warming things up, then leave for the airport and be all ready when we got back.  So off we went, bought all of the supplies we needed, headed to the center and were only 20 minutes behind our schedule when Dad suddenly found out he'd left the keys back in the apartment.  Mom has a second set for the apartment but not for the center so he left her sitting on the steps and ran back to the apartment which is almost an hour round trip.  We called our district leader who has a second set of keys for the center and he graciously came over and let Mom in which was definitely out of his way so by the time Dad got back, she had most of the things ready.  He helped get the vegetables ready for the salad but by the time we actually left for the airport it was almost time for their plane to land.  We attempted to text them as we traveled but had a hard time getting a connection.  We knew it would take a little time for them to get their luggage and clear customs but even so we weren't on site until almost 45 minutes after the plane had landed.  We desperately searched around the arrival hall for about 5-10 minutes without success when they suddenly walked through the door and our reunion was a complete success.  We were able to get them to our apartment to unload a little bit and then returned to the center, arriving about 6 and proceeded to have a lovely home evening which the sister responsible for the spiritual thought graciously did in English.

The next day we had a lot of walking around to many of the things we had previously seen and visited with others plus took in the State Opera House which was something Ruslana really wanted to see and which we had never toured. I was impressed to find out they perform over 50 different operas a year, alternating up to 3 at a time on different days so it's really quite a production. There was still time to get up to our favorite mountain top viewing place and then it was dinner at our favorite restaurant, the 12 Apostles Cellar and home for a good sleep and maybe get a little further out of jet lag.

The next day, Dad had the responsibility of teaching the first Institute class of the year that night and not wanting to haul all of his notes around all day, ran over to the Center to drop things off while Mom showed them the beautiful City Hall and Parliament buildings which are close by.  Then we decided to head off to the Schoenbrunn Palace grounds where we've taken everybody including Steve Lyde and Tom and Laurel but we somehow took our streetcar one stop too far.  That put us right in the neighborhood of the beautiful church dedicated to Charlemagne which one of our BYU young men had said was one of the more beautiful edifices in the city.  It's being renovated but they have built an elevator literally up to the top of the dome.  Again, we had never been inside but decided to do that because it was so close and were amazed at how lovely all the work was up close.  There's frequently a dove at the top of a few of the cathedrals and we were about 10 feet away from it as we finished our ascent, the last 30 feet or so being on a set of stairs.  Then it was off to the summer palace of King Franz Joseph and his wife Maria Theresien.  Their home is translated as Beautiful Fountain and we think it's really the highlight of the city.  As we approached the front gate we were greeted this time by a statue of Mozart  He definitely seemed a little more friendly than some of the other "living statues" that we have previously seen.  

We had plenty of time to enjoy the grounds and then left in time to get back to Institute for the class which Andrew, Ruslana and David attended while Mom helped out in the kitchen and entertained Alex.  Two of our young adults are also named David and Alex and everyone really enjoyed teaching young Alex how to play Fussball, the little game using a ping pong ball to score points.

The next day we were off for our Senior Conference in Munich and we managed to get tickets for Andrew's family on the same train there and back. While we were engaged in the three days of conference, they went on to Neuschwanstein, the beautiful castle of "Mad" King Ludwig which inspired the Disney Sleeping Beauty castle, enjoying the beautiful sights of Bavaria in that area.  We had just a wonderful time with 25 other couples working throughout our mission.  We had several sessions of instruction and both a time for introductions as well as a testimony meeting which were wonderful.  One couple working in Switzerland have learned to play the Alphorns and actually brought two and gave us a wonderful serenade.  We met the second counselor to the mission president and found he had served not only in Hamlin where Mom had served but even with the same landlady, Frau Ehlkes!  Matt and Mindy may remember her as we stopped by her home while bringing Matt home from his mission and she still remembered Mom even after over 20 years, exclaiming as we rang her doorbell unannounced, "Ist dass Ruth Ann?"  The remainder of the conference was superb with the next morning offering a tour of Munich being led by one of the high councilors in the stake.  

We heard the Glockenspiel at the City Hall and heard all about the story concerning the architect of the main Munich cathedral who had reportedly made a pact with the devil.  As the story goes, if the construction could proceed without any major mishap or loss of life, the architect agreed that the first soul to enter the cathedral when it was completed would belong to Satan.  Apparently when that occurrence was about to happen and the devil attempted to enter the cathedral, the architect stopped him with the observation that although there was a bright light in the cathedral, there were no windows and the devil was denied entrance beyond his first step.  That footprint is enshrined in the back of the hall and the devil was blown back out the front door resulting in a wind that apparently still revolves around that entryway! 

After the tour was completed and we returned to our conference sessions, things got interesting.  Apparently negotiations were heavily underway with the drivers of the German railway system who were threatening to strike, thus disrupting the train service throughout Germany.  Negotiations failed and every driver went on strike at midnight.  We notified Andrew that their return from Neuschwanstein might be impeded and we weren't sure whether we'd get home or not.  They were able to find a train that was running earlier than their original intent and we found the transportation system heavily delayed but not completely inoperable and numerous prayers were offered up.  With considerable delays the next day as we visited the mission home and mission office we were able to obtain a ride with another couple to the train station where the Austrian system was still working and had an enjoyable ride back to Vienna.

Sunday we attended the International Ward which holds its services in English and enjoyed a real family meal with Andrew, Ruslana, David and Alex.  We are now literally minutes away from leaving again for Salzburg to enjoy the sights there and in nearby Hallstatt.  More to come next week.  

Love, 

Mom and Dad, 

Grampa and Grammy, 

Elder and Sister Parker

Brummen, Sssssss, Clic, Schsch, Schluerf, and Klapper

Dearest Family,

We thought we'd start our letter out this week with the humorous title which came with the instructions to our new dryer.  The instructions that came with this apparatus were careful to point out that the above noises were quite normal during its operation and not to be concerned if we heard such a commotion emanating from our new purchase.  We have indeed noted that it can be a noisy beast and because it doesn't have a vent to the outside, a cycle can take up to three hours to complete.  We learned early on not to start a cycle after 10  PM or it would keep us awake for quite a while:)

It has been a very successful week at the Center which continues to build and build as our Young Adults come back to school.  Monday night the spiritual thought was taken care of by a lovely young lady who has been a member for less than a year.  We were clued in to look out for her while we were in the MTC in Provo by the elder who helped teach and baptize her and she has become a regular attender.  She frequently also comes to our Waffle Night activities.  More of the seasoned and long standing YSA's are likely more involved with their own families on Monday nights but Fridays we had five members, 3 investigators and about 4 teams of missionaries so it was a good group.  That's really our social night and we were all ready to play a little Scotland Yard for those of you who remember that game and we had a Rummikub session also set up but it turns out that everyone was just having too good a time talking and socializing to get involved in these lesser pastimes.

  

One young couple was especially interesting.  A young lady had been quite ill and had been hospitalized for quite some time but is now feeling better and coming quite a bit for some good fellowshipping.  She felt like her Bishop had been quite down on her for her inactivity and didn't seem to understand that she'd been in the hospital but they have apparently now got all of that patched up and she's feeling quite a bit more hopeful of the ward now.  She's only been a member for less than a year so she's really just getting established in the church but is quite a delightful personality and very fun to talk to. She's from Italy and speaks German and English as well. 

Meanwhile we have a very talented young man whose responsibility was to get some newer computers set up in our computer room.  Our old two sets were quite ancient and the stake was apparently upgrading and so we got three of their old computers.  Still old but much newer than what we had.  So he's been around quite a bit getting the new ones all programmed and ready to go and while he's been working, we've had the opportunity to get to know him quite well.  He's still very young in his early 20's, a returned missionary who went to England Birmingham where our nephew Jacob Kmetzsch is now serving, and as many do here, speaks an excellent English.  Apparently he had a girl friend before he left who wrote to him, though there apparently was a 6 month gap where no correspondence was going on.  At any rate, everybody got really excited as he prepared to return home to get these two on the fast track to marriage and within just a few months after he returned he was a married man.  Things began to deteriorate from that point and although he has remained quite faithful and true, his wife went the other direction completely and they are now separated, awaiting completion of their divorce.  The details are not important at this juncture but he and our young lady mentioned above found they were very compatible souls and spent most of last Friday talking and socializing.  He, of course, can't date until the divorce is final but they are really a cute couple.  We're sure he's going to take things much slower this time around but it's still fun to see these interactions occurring as they should be in the social lives of our young adults.

We are always amazed at the international flavor of Vienna.  We have been studying the map a bit and Austria is bordered by Germany on the west, the Czech Republic and Slovakia on the north with the latter wrapping around to the west and Hungary below Slovakia. Coming around the south we have Slovenia with Croatia just below that moving to the west we get to Italy and just a small area of Liechtenstein before Switzerland and then Germany again. So now that you've got the geography down it's no wonder that this week in the Center we have dealt with Italians, Hungarians, Kazahkstanians , Slovenians and even a few Austrians!

This weekend was our official Institute opening which began yesterday with workshops during Saturday afternoon about dancing and a closing dance social last night at the Stake center. That was followed by a Singles ward Sacrament Meeting, which following General Conference was also a Fast and Testimony Meeting. We were unable to attend yesterday as we had been away to Salzburg all day at Zone Conference, getting instructions from President Kohler about how to be more effective missionaries.Here a small sample of the missionaries in a couple of the Vienna districts waiting on a rural street near the chapel to be picked up and returned to the train station for our trip back to Vienna.

​ I had been given the assignment for our Singles ward activity today to teach the Sunday School class on the subject of how we develop faith and how important it is for YSA's.  I spent an inordinate amount of time preparing a lesson in German without a specific manual or a lesson plan to work with but came up with several ideas that I thought would be good.  On the way home from Salzburg, Mom developed a little intestinal bug of some kind which had a few of the signs of possible appendicitis but she had a pretty rough night and so we made no attempt to go to the Saturday night dance.  She was somewhat improved this morning but still pretty shaky so we decided she should stay home and I went over to the Center alone to help set up.

For quite some time, they have been anticipating that we would have an international flavor to the Institute opening social and so it was as we had 8 YSA's join us from Slovenia.  None of them spoke any German at all but most spoke English so it was decided by the leaders that there were fewer in the group who wouldn't understand English than there were those who wouldn't understand German. Hence we were instructed to teach our classes in English. Consider it a tender mercy but it was actually a little trickier to re-translate the lesson from German back to English than I would have thought. The testimony meeting that followed was held in anyone's language of choice and we heard Deutsch, English, Hungarian, and Slovenian.  Elder Parker actually bore a testimony in German just to stay in practice!

We were informed this week that our Zoroastrian family has had some of their visas come through and some of them will be leaving in a couple of days for southern California.  One of our Zone Leaders lives within 30 miles of where they're going.  He'll be home within about 4-5 months and promised to check up on them.  They seem to have a wonderful impression of the church and we hope enough seeds were planted to bear eventual fruit.

   (Sister Parker)  Love the dryer with all its interesting sounds, love going to Zone Conferences with all the young missionaries, they make us feel younger and we enjoy meeting some of the other senior couples. We love to compare notes and check for new ideas on food and fun activities. Its a great way to keep yourself busy for a year and a half and serve the Lord.

    We're looking forward to Andy and Ruslana and kids coming tomorrow. Unfortunately, Benji just found out the his passport doesn't have enough time left on it to be able to come. One needs about 6 months left on their passport to come to Europe. We will miss him but will expect him to come some time in the future. 

Love you all. 

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder and Sister Parker

From the Ridiculous to the Sublime!

Dear Family,

Boy, these weekends do roll around fast!  In addition to our routine doings we have been trying to catch up on apartment inspections prior to the next transfer in a few weeks.  We found one apartment that despite frequent urging to report missing alarms, (and despite our having visited and inspected the apartment once before) still was missing a smoke alarm.  Apparently there were a couple of elders in Taiwan who were killed from carbon monoxide poisoning so there has been some real emphasis on all of us to make sure all of our alarms are in place.   

Besides that, it apparently was the month for microwave failures.  We had three (3!) microwaves all go out in just one week.  Two failed completely and the other just wasn't functioning according to the input instructions.  Now all are replaced and everyone is enjoying rapid warming or cooking of their food once again.  Seems to be a biggie in the lives of those not blessed with a nice woman's influence in the kitchen.  

So in addition to buying and replacing microwaves, we decided it was time to do something about our ancient method of drying our laundry.  

Behold the old method:Notice the fan back there in the corner of the second photo.  That was an essential method for our previous system and even though smiled upon by the Savior, (notice the picture on the wall) even the mission president said we were entitled to modernize.

 And so Voila!:Welcome to the 21st Century, even in Austria where real dryers do exist, even if they have to be placed in your bedroom because there's no room anywhere else.  

But we can still get around the bed and into the closet without too much difficulty.  We have yet to try it out as it was just delivered and we're not sure how much noise and humidity it's going to create.  There's still no way to vent it to the outside and so the water is stored in a small container on the left front and once we're done with a load, we simply dump it into the sink in the bathroom and we're ready for the next load.  What could be simpler! We decided we'd temporarily decorate it with a lovely book we got from the Wiese family when they visited us showing the beauties of Sachsen (Saxony) as well as a cute little book Sister Parker chose on the various beauties of Austria as drawn for children complete with little puzzles like Where's Waldo (only in this case it's Lieber Augustine) and can you find the five animals who escaped from the Schoenbrunn Zoo and are running around the grounds.  (Took Elder Parker a long time to find the fifth one!!)  Oh and there're also some envelopes from the family reunion letters that we're still enjoying from all of you.

Otherwise the week was remarkable for a great District meeting on Tuesday where it was agreed that we would all meet at the Schnitzelwirt, our favorite missionary restaurant here in Vienna.  12 of us descended on it at 2 PM so we could be finished in time to get back to the Stake Center and the sisters could enjoy the General Women's meeting that was aired for us at 4 PM.  Then we were all able to enjoy live the Saturday morning session of conference which aired our time at 6 PM.  Tomorrow at 11 we get a tape delay of General Priesthood meeting at 11 PM and a tape delay of Saturday afternoon which will air at 2 PM.  Then we get the Sunday morning broadcast of the Tab Choir live at 5:30 PM followed by the morning session at 6.  For the real diehards where six hours isn't enough, we can stay until 10 PM and watch the closing session but we think we'll probably catch that on the internet the next day. 

We have an interesting investigator who shows up at the center periodically on her own time schedule and has been coming for the last 3 months or so at least once a week.  She likes to talk but doesn't follow through on many of the commitments we've given her.  Elder Christopherson's talk will be added to her list of things she doesn't read as soon as it's translated because he really hit her particular situation right on the head.  

Since we wrote that last sentence, it's now Sunday evening for us and we've caught all the sessions of conference except Sunday afternoon which starts in about an hour.  The stake shut everything down so I guess if we catch it it'll have to be on the Internet.  We really got a lot out of conference this session and we think it helps when you're really paying attention and taking notes.  Loved President Uchtdorf and his dandelion analogy and it just seemed like there were so many talks that would apply to so many of our investigators.  Elder Parker, however, took careful note about President Uchtdorf's penetrating question as the various apostles asked at the Last Supper, "Is it I?"  It's a question I guess we should all ask ourselves about our level of commitment.  At any rate we feel really charged up again to go out and do the work!  

It was fun to be with all the missionaries in our zone as we attended conference.  We had three room options to listen in German, English or Spanish.  Most of us opted for English though a few of the elders went for German.  It was interesting to see how many of the Austrians understand English well enough that they wanted to hear it in the original language and sat in with us.  Very interesting to hear that it came across in Catalan and Spanish as well.  We were amused because we got the English translation verbally anyway instead of the subtitles and frequently the translator got well ahead of the speaker and really had to slow down.

So speaking of the multiplicity of tongues, our language classes are really booming with three to four classes going on simultaneously and as many as 10-12 people attending.  Our Zoroastrian family keeps coming bringing a variety of family members and they got a good dose of genealogy this week as part of their English instruction in talking about fathers and mothers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.  We're still keeping the younger set entertained while the classes are going on with drawing, paper airplane flying and this week it was even a little bit of soccer in the main hall with the two year old who fortunately couldn't do the windows any damage with any very hard kicks.

Coming home tonight, our district leader informed us we're canceling the Zone training scheduled for Tuesday because we're all heading for Salzburg on Saturday for Zone Conference anyway.  When we get back we'll be in the middle of the Opening of Institute for Saturday evening with a Singles Ward at our center the next day which will also be our Fast day.  Elder Parker got asked tonight to give the Sunday School lesson for the second hour in German so that should be a real challenge.  There will be a real purpose in his fasting that day to see if he can hold out for 45 minutes in German.  The next day, Andrew, Ruslana and Benj should be arriving with David and Alex for a 12 day excursion through the heights and depths of Austria.  An exciting agenda seems planned but we'll see how next week's letter goes in the midst of getting set up for their pending arrival, the Sunday School Class, and our leaving in 3 days after their arrival for a three day stint in Munich for a Senior Missionary conference.  Never a dull moment around here.

    Lately it does seem something is going on every minute or maybe its just that there are so many things to take care of in relationship to the missionaries, their language people, investigators, apartments and appliances etc. It would be a lot simpler if there wasn't so much travel time but its just part of the missionary experience. Its kind of fun to meet the other missionaries just randomly as we are traveling around. Its always a joyous greeting.

   (Sister Parker) Dad or Grampa has really covered about everything we have been busy with this week. There was a lot of rejoicing as the dryer was delivered. Now if we can only figure out exactly how it runs through its drying sequences. It takes a lot longer as the water is pulled from the clothes into a container, instead of being blown into the air. But it is a joy to have something soft next to you.

     Conference has been wonderful and I finally got to see and hear the women's conference. The Korean children's choir was of course the outstanding highlight. As I have listened to conference and heard all the things we should be working on, I thought of all our little family units. Each one is doing the best they can to teach and train their children in the way they should go in following our Savior. I think you all do a wonderful job and that our Heavenly Father is also pleased. What a great blessing it is to know about our Heavenly Father's plan and why we are here on this earth. Its great to be a missionary and to share that message with other good people. 

Love and Miss you All, 

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder and Sis.Parker

A Spirited Home Evening

Hi Guys!

Sometimes we feel like things might be getting into a rut, same old, same old, but whenever that feeling comes across, it seems like something exciting and new happens to keep us fresh, alert and enjoying what we're doing.

For most of the summer, Elder Parker was responsible for the spiritual thought on Monday night home evenings. Most of the time that turned into a lesson but as we got more comfortable with the young people present, we started playing a few more games and really getting to know everyone better.  A few Monday nights, things were pretty sparse with perhaps only 6 or 8 people present but as the summer has pretty much gone, things are getting more active again and people are ready to take assignments for the spiritual thought.  Coming up in the next few weeks are a young sister just returned from a mission to England (who's really happy to be able to speak German again!), a young sister who has become a regular attender who's been a member only since this past spring, one of our Institute council members who is in every picture I can find going back for the 7 years the center has existed, and a young man from Iran who is really the subject of the title above.  He has been a member for about 9 or 10 months and is scheduled to receive the Melchizedek priesthood next month.  His native tongue is Persian or Farsi and he learned German from attending the language classes at the center. His German is certainly now better than ours and he decided he wanted to use as his theme, President Eyring's message from the First Presidency on prayer, found in the October issue of the Liahona and we presume also in the Ensign.

  

There were about 12 of us present and it was a very interesting and diverse group of people.  There was one team of Elders present plus us as the senior couple, 4 members, one of whom was a returned missionary from a year back or so but the other three had all been members for less than a year.  One was a young lady from Vienna whose missionary we met at the MTC with a request to be sure and look her up, another was from Russia and is one of the most recently baptized members, and our third was our presenter.  Then we had 4 investigators.  One is our young lady from Kazakhstan who has committed to baptism but not until she returns home in December.  Interestingly she was unhappy that we are still referring to her as an investigator and we told her we couldn't call her a member until she had been baptized.  So we compromised and said we would henceforth refer to her as a "friend of the church" and she was somewhat mollified.  Two of the other three have been there several times but still seem hesitant to commit to formal lessons, picking things up catch as catch can as we have time to work in various principles in our discussions.  But they brought a friend along with them for his first visit with us who stated he has been a Christian for 20 years but had never been baptized in any church. His name was Gerhard and we took this to mean that he hadn't yet been completely satisfied with his experiences with other churches at least to this point. 

So the subject was prayer and it was interesting to see how intensely interested everyone was on the subject.  Everyone there could relate to prayer but there were very many different approaches and experiences as the discussion progressed.  We discussed that prayers should be addressed to God the Father as the Father of our spirits and in the name of Jesus Christ.  Many had been praying to Jesus and we assured them that we felt their prayers were still being heard. But remember John 14:13-14 and 15:16. We discussed how one gets answers to prayers and the discussion brought up that some answers take longer than others to receive, some answers were no, and that occasionally no answer might be an answer.  We had given Gerhard a Book of Mormon earlier in the evening and borrowed it back to read about the experience of Enos that interestingly we had studied earlier that weekend. (There are no coincidences in the work of the Lord!)  He had prayed all day in an intense fashion to get an answer, a quite rare event we all agreed, to pray that long.  As the discussion went on we were prepared to read Moroni 10:4-5 to cite that as the scriptural recommendation about how to get answers to prayer when our leader started reading it.  Elder Parker was sitting next to Gerhard and had it ready so he could read along as it was recited.  Aigerim, the "friend of the church" from Kazakhstan didn't seem to have much to say but we could tell from her expression that the whole discussion had had a major impact on her thoughts.  The Spirit was strong and we felt it was a wonderful opportunity for everyone present to reflect on their ability to talk to our Heavenly Father and get direction for their lives.

This week also represented a scheduled trip to the Swiss Temple for many of our young adults so the numbers were a little smaller than they had been while everyone was away but we still had about 25 or 30 present for Institute on Wednesday night and we're starting to see new faces that haven't been coming by all summer.  They announced another Polterabend or pre-wedding party for this next weekend prior to General Conference the ceremony itself coming up immediately following conference the next week.  Additionally announced is another wedding for a couple we don't know at all that's supposed to take place before the end of the month.  We'll be going to their ward tomorrow so maybe we can get filled in on the details then.

Only one picture this week.  Some of you may remember us getting locked in the cemetery a few months back while checking out the graves of Brahms, Beethoven, Strauss and Schubert.  We had always thought that no one knew where Mozart was buried because he died as a pauper and was buried in an unmarked grave.  But further research has shown that even though he was buried in a pauper's grave apparently the location was known and he has now been recognized appropriately.  We found his grave in the St. Marx Cemetary nicely decorated with recent flowers, a couple of lanterns and a well attended garden.  Behold!

Sister Parker has mastered the European sewing machine we found in our apartment and helped to repair one of Elder Parker's pants that had been ripped.  After feeling a little better about her ability to handle the machine she then tackled a Dirndl or native dress for Aigerim who needed it taken in just a bit.  It seemed to go quite well and she put it on last night at Waffle Night and was quite pleased with the results.

    This week has been kind of cool all week in the 50's and only reaching 61 or 62 in the day time. It rains occasionally and if we decide not to take our umbrellas it is sure to start, even when it looks like it will be a nice day. Surely Autumn is here but the leaves have not changed here in Vienna yet. I'm looking forward to the leaves changing as there are many beautiful parks having deciduous trees. It is sweater weather for sure but many of the Austrians wear coats. I'm not quite that cold yet, I guess I'm tougher than I think. We have been out looking for winter coats and long ones have been hard to find. On a recent excursion to a street market we found a high quality department store and they had many, many coats some of which were over 500 Euros. Not exactly what I was hoping to pay. So we'll look for a bit longer before we choose to spend between 200 & 500 Euros.

 (Sister Parker)  I don't know why it seems we have to step back and look sometimes to see the tender mercies the Lord gives us and how He blesses us through other people. A sweet young woman, I must use that term a lot as they are all sweet young women, decided to come to Family Night and to Waffle Night so she could help me cook and just talk. Well, I was thinking about Manina and how nice that was to have her come, when it hit me that she was a blessing from the Lord. I don't have many opportunities to speak a lot of German, outside of greetings and casual expressions with the young adults. My real talking sessions come with our dear sister who cooks for Institute and speaks almost no English. There on Wednesday we share whatever we can. Now with Manina the Lord has sent someone to me who is willing to speak slowly and wants to help me with my language. I also help her with some English. Along with Aigerim, she also helps chop and stir and prepare food so I can cook, which helps out my bad arm. On Waffle Night it seems many young adults want a chance to cook a waffle and see how it turns out. This past Friday we could hardly cook them fast enough. In the end though, it was Grampa who helped finish the cooking so the young adults could enjoy some time eating together. After all, that is why we have it and we enjoy seeing them enjoy and socialize with each other.

 So the suggestion for the week is to stand back and look at the tender mercies the Lord puts in our lives each day.  If you are feeling down go to Mormon Messages and play one. They are all inspiring and will pick you up. Love you all and hope you are enjoying the cooler weather. It is fun to see all the different temperatures Mindy setup on my cell phone. I can see how it is in West Virginia, Utah, Calif., and even in Bothel, Wa.

         LOVE &  HUGS,  

Grammy, & Grampa,  

Mom, & Dad,  

Elder &Sister Parker 

Defining Zoroastrianism!

Dear Family, 

It has been another great week with lots happening as the new school year really jumps off to a great start.  Monday night is our night to cook dinner and support Family Home Evening.  It has generally been a sparse crowd through the summer months with around 10-15 people showing up, 4-6 of those generally being missionaries who showed up with an investigator.  One of the very sweet sisters in the stake is on the Stake YSA council and she has the responsibility to assign someone for a spiritual thought each Monday.  There has been a sign-up sheet available but very few takers and for about 8-9 weeks in a row, no one having taken the assignment, good old Elder Parker came through with Sister Parker busy in the kitchen.  For several weeks it turned into a lesson of sorts and the sister was always very apologetic that no one had signed up.  She herself is a kind of miracle.  I may have mentioned in an earlier letter about her being the young lady who was deaf until about a year ago when a new procedure became available with cochlear implants that restored her hearing, a miraculous thing in her and everyone else's judgment.  But as a rule she is one of the few who doesn't know much English and was really dealing with lip reading and sign language as her primary means of communication.  She was quite willing to do the spiritual thoughts herself but worked on Monday nights and we never seemed to be quite ready to go after the meal until she had to leave.  But it wasn't a real problem and gave us a chance to hone our German a little better.  So as of this last Monday, suddenly we have about 5 people lined up for the next month to do the spiritual thought, hurray!, but no one was set up this week so we chimed in again.  

There was quite a good article on the importance of modesty in the October Liahona, did it make it into the Ensign as well?, so we decided to make a few points about that. There were a good twenty YSA's present and we found it very interesting that there was some difficulty amongst all of those present including our leaders understanding the German word for modesty, that being Anstaendig.  The discussion was good but we both wondered if that isn't something seldom referenced here.  The Austrians in general have a real problem with modesty, primarily the young ladies with very short skirts and spaghetti straps if that and we have taken particular notice of a prominent young lady in the stake who has just received her mission call and will be going into the MTC in December.  Her father is in the mission presidency and both he and his wife are tremendous stalwarts but they haven't yet taught their daughter the importance of modesty.  We're assuming and hoping that the realities of that principle will hit home when she has an opportunity to go to the temple as she was present in our missionary preparation seminar a week ago with pretty marginal clothing.  At any rate, she wasn't present at the home evening so we didn't make any progress there or able to pass along a few clues about its importance.

Our language classes are continuing to go very well and we have a whole family from Iran who come every week to learn English. There have been about 8 of them but different members of the family continue to show up and we may have taught up to 10 of them.  I took a picture through our glass doors so pardon all the reflections but this was the class this week with Elder Pugmire, our new district leader and his companion, Elder Brady, our only "golden" (remember we don't use the word "greenie" in this mission) leading out.

Everyone agrees that they are a delightful family.  When we asked about their religious background, they informed us they are neither Muslim, nor Christians but Zoroastrians, a religion which goes back about 1500 years.  Zoroaster is sometimes translated as Zarathustra and some of you knowledgeable folks may remember the opening theme song from 2001, A Space Odyssey, from many years back which opened with some impressive music from Richard Strauss's Also Sprach Zarathustra. Anyway that's the only time we ever remember hearing his name.  At any rate, the Zoroastrians have diminished considerably in number since about 800-900 AD but were formerly the dominant religion in the Iranian region.  But they have been heavily diminished with the rise of Islam to the point where they are now being persecuted just like Christians.  This whole family is fairly well to do as we can tell and decided to get out of Iran while the getting out was possible.  Their plan is to move to the United States where they anticipate they can practice their religion as they like and hence their motivation to learn English.  They are just waiting for their visas to be approved and then hopefully will be on their way to a new life.  With any luck and the help of the Lord, we may be able to convince them that there is yet a better religion that also has a history of great persecution.  While the Moms and Dads, Aunts and Uncles and even a grandparent or two are busy, Sister Parker and I have taken on the responsibility for two young men, Sasan and Radman, respectively about 7 and 4 years old.  They can repeat any English word we tell them with great accuracy but don't have much understanding of the meanings yet.  While we take care of them, they converse in Farsi at a high rate of speed.  We got them drawing this past week and they were quite talented in their abilities. We'll see where it all goes as the next few weeks carry through. 

Wednesday night was yet another surprise.  That's institute night and originally the new opening of the Institute year was to have been this weekend.  There are several international things going on with this opening that involve people from Hungary across the border and it was decided a few months ago to delay the start until the middle of October.  That's when we have to be ready to start teaching our English Institute class again but in the meantime we're continuing with Summer Institute and guest teachers each Wednesday.  We must say that, to the extent we have been able to understand what is said, the classes have generally been excellent.  We are beginning to appreciate the difference between German and Austrian and when someone is really heavily into the latter, it's still pretty much Greek to us.  So this Wednesday we had our biggest group out yet since we've been here with about 40 YSA's in attendance.  Often during the summer there have been investigators present but interestingly, not a one this week until about three showed up at the end of the meeting.  As the time came for the class to start, no teacher had yet put in an appearance.  That happened once before with a teacher who had never been to the center before and he arrived about 5 minutes late but the council member who generally knows what's going on was in America this past week and so no one had a clue who the teacher was supposed to be when no one showed up.  It turned out it was supposed to be our Stake President and apparently there was a medical emergency of sorts with his wife that appropriately demanded his attention but in the meantime, there was no communication whatsoever and so our YSA young man who has been a great support and the leader of the council stepped up and he decided that we would take all the chairs out of the classroom rows model and turn it into a big circle around the room. He led off with his testimony and opened it up to the group to fill the allotted time.  After a minute or two, a young sister who had just returned from her mission to Manchester, England offered her testimony and the general theme was supposed to be to report on those spiritual happenings of the past summer.  When she finished there was a very painful five minutes when no one offered a testimony but then things got going and we were gratified as the spirit finally sprang into action with many more sharing their thoughts. Everyone on our Institute Council got into the act except for one fellow who is a recently baptized member but we know his testimony is strong nonetheless.  It turned out to be a great evening.

Friday was waffle night and we had quite a few investigators, at least 3 with one member from Hungary and three sets of missionaries.  We got into a hot game of UNO which wasn't bad for a strictly social night and we kept playing excerpts on line from the Piano Guys who have a nice selection on You Tube with music that was acceptable to the missionaries present. We pointed out to everyone that they were all Mormons (or at least we think so!) and they're coming to Vienna in November as part of their big European tour. 

Today we set out on a tour of supposedly a great sidewalk market we heard about from a married couple who are living here in Vienna. They were recently married in the temple and the husband is from England.  The wife is from the States but has taught German for many years and sounds like a native.  But apparently the market was not operating today so we ended up walking ourselves around to exhaustion, finally trying to find a great gelato store recommended by one of our departed sister missionaries.  We decided we either couldn't find the right one or it was greatly exaggerated as the one we eventually tried was definitely below average.  Our best store so far was one we recommended to Tom and Laurel when they were here.  

We ended up our date night today at a place affectionately known as Herb's but officially it's known as the Schitzelwirt.  Prices are really pretty reasonable and the food will last for about two or three days before we're able to eat it all.  Tomorrow we're able to sleep in a little bit because we're going to the International Ward which is the only one that starts at 1:30 PM.  We were up late tonight talking to a bunch of different family members on Facetime to make sure everyone is still really there but it's 11:30 for us when most of the family is enjoying a restful Saturday afternoon.  The joys of being a senior missionary means the rules are a little easier on us and we can stay up later and also get up later in the morning if necessary. 

One of Grandpa's old pair of pants he brought along for work days developed a tear along the front of one of the legs and Grammy decided to tackle an old sewing machine we've had here in the apartment.  First we had to find a sewing store and figure out the name for the right color of thread.  Then she was able to figure out how to load the bobbin, get it to go forward and backward and deal valiantly with an old needle that really wasn't that sharp.  But the pants were repaired nonetheless and now they've been washed and hung out to dry.  We're getting closer to getting a dryer and one of these days things will get easier in that department.

    It seems like this week has been long and busy at the center, but fulfilling. I enjoy the missionaries and their investigators and language people, especially these families from Iran. They give me a whole new prospective on people from this country. I see and feel their goodness. I so want to give them the gospel, but we'll have to see how the spirit directs. Every time the family leaves the little boys give me a big hug and it feels good to have children around. I miss all of our grandchildren and send them our love and hugs. I hope they are trying to be good missionaries with all of their friends.

Wishing you all lots of love and kisses,  

Mom and Dad, 

Grampa and Grammy,

 Elder and Sister Parker.

Singing in the Rain

Dear Family,

Having written pretty late last week it doesn't seem like a lot has happened this week but there are a few interesting things to report.  Our numbers continue to swell as the YSA's all realize that the Center is still there and are starting to show a little more interest with the summer over.  Two weeks in a row now, we've had this family from Iran show up for English lessons.  They are not Muslim but apparently Zoroastrians which we'll have to look up and learn about a little more but 8 more came in on Thursday to continue their studies.  They have two young boys about 4 and 7 years old who find they're more interested in the pool table than learning English.  That was fine up to a point but their idea of pool was to make as much noise as possible pushing the balls into the holes and that was such a racket that no one could concentrate on their lessons so we had to put a stop to it.  I attempted to try a little finesse with them to teach them the finer points of 8-ball but they understand neither English nor German and a finger to the lips with a stern SHHH also didn't seem to cut it.  So we had to finally bodily take them away from the pool table.  Grammy bought a few kid's books at the local book store and they came in handy for distracting them for a while but the thing that eventually did the trick was teaching them to make and then fly paper airplanes.  They had a lot of fun and it was much quieter as we relegated them to our conversation area while the language classes went on.

Thursday was our our third transfer day since we've been here and again we all showed up early at the train station. Two elders and one of our threesome of sisters were being sent to other assignments in the mission, we had no one going home from Vienna, though Sister Smith, one of our Zone sister trainers that we talked about last week was heading home from her assignment in Graz.  But she didn't come to Vienna to turn around and head back to Munich so we really were just saying temporary goodbyes to the other three.  Our district leader got transferred from one of the other outlying cities into Vienna but is in a different district so we're getting a new DL that we know well and we got one "Golden", the local mission term for a greenie who will be working with our new DL.  He'll have double duty to both lead the district and train an Elder straight out of the MTC which in our case is Preston, England.  

Tuesday night Grammy got to go with the sisters to the special Women's meeting where Elders Ballard and Bednar were speaking live from Frankfurt but I'll let her report on that.  Wednesday night was still summer Institute but we had a good crowd out of about 35 people and things are looking good for that activity.  Grandpa has started preparing a few lessons for when we start up regularly but that won"t be until after General Conference.  We've still got to ask a few questions about how that goes forward.  We can hear it live on the internet or at the Stake Center but it will be 6 PM and 10 PM for us which I guess is doable.  Have to wait and see what they do with General Priesthood meeting as that will be 2 in the morning.  I guess we can sleep in on Sunday if the morning sessions doesn't start until 5:30 PM with the Tabernacle Choir.  

Friday we decided to check out the elders' apartment that has been vacant for six weeks since one elder became ill and had to be sent home.  It had some definite water problems in the walls that we've perhaps talked about before.  We had recommended that no be assigned there until it was repaired but heard that it had been worked on.  When we went by there was a big hole in the shower wall where they had torn out the tiles and apparently found a small leak but it hadn't been put back together again and there were still enough problems with the walls throughout the apartment that we have recommended it not be used again until it is completely redone.  One of the local members who is in the mission presidency apparently has a vested interest in the whole building and right now it's us against him as to recommendations so it's a little touchy as we move forward.  We'll see what happens.

For most of the week it's been rain, rain, rain so we didn't do much on our P day except clean the apartment and catch up on things.  Grammy needed to do some shopping which is always a challenge for Grandpa but she was able to pick up some good winter boots.  I guess I'll just sing quietly as she looks around.  A little singing in the rain never hurt anybody.  We haven't yet found any decent long coats she can wear but I guess it's still a little early in the season.  Currently I'm munching on some Cornichons mit Honig which is as close as the Austrians can come to sweet pickles while we attempt to defrost our little refrigerator for the second time in three+ months but Grammy's got a good method of keeping a pan of hot water in there which hurries things up considerably.

A picture of all the redheads in the mission zone, plus dad! :)

 (Sister Parker)  My best times this week were working with the little Iranian boys. They love to be noisy but they are also such cute little guys. They talk up a storm and try to tell me all kinds of things which I, of course, don't understand. I try to teach them a few English words by drawing pictures of things. Its amazing that they can repeat them back to me, perfectly. Then when they leave, they give me great big hugs. Oh, it is worth it. My other great achievement of the week has been the eliminating of mold on our bathroom shower rack. Yes that is right. Mold comes everywhere if you don't watch out for it. We finally found a spray bottle of Shimmel Entferner, in other words Mold Destroyer. We laid the shower rack in the bath tub and sprayed away, or at least Grampa did, also the tile on the wall behind it. Wow, its incredible. It looks like new and I feel more comfortable using the shower. It is the little things that make you happy. We don't really even mind the rain. It's much better than the heat. The Austrians don't seem to mind either. They still all go outside and meet in little groups with their umbrellas. I saw a group of 5 umbrellas just standing together chatting. Its great not to be afraid of the weather. But we'll see when it starts snowing.

Apparently the transmission from Frankfurt didn't go as well as we had hoped for the big chapel presentation but we all moved down to the Relief Society Room where for some reason it came in better with video.  All the sisters from 8 up were invited but there weren't really that many there considering the whole stake was invited.  But it was fun being out with the sisters.  Dad had one of the YSA's who stayed with him until he left to come home.  Always nice to have the apostles paying attention to us!

Love, 

Mom and Dad, Grammy and Grampa, Elder and Sister Parker