19 Dec 2016

Dang.

68 weeks in a row of getting of emailing me, and the streak is broken. But it's ok, I'm pretty sure you still love me.

Anyway, since there's no questions that are being asked, I guess I'll just go ahead and talk about neat things that happened in the week! First off, I got the packages, and the letter with my card in it! So you don't have to worry about that anymore. 

Merry Christmas!!

If you want to say Merry Christmas/Happy Holildays in Polish, you say

 'Wesołych Swiąt!"

(Ves-oh-wi-h ("wi" as in wick) ("h" as in the ch sound that you do in German and stuff) Sh-vee-on-t)

It's that time of the year, isn't it?

I really like that book you sent me, one of the things it talks about is Pondering. And I think that Christmas time is a great time to do that! I like to think of the scene of Christ's Birth after everything has settled down, and there's just Mary and Joseph watching over the child. I like to the think of the peace and calm that must have been there, and what Mary and Joseph must have been thinking about as they were sitting there, and what a night that must have been.

Michał is doing good, and he's also reading my blog now, so I'll give him a quick shout-out. 

Hi, Michał!

That should be good:)

During the week there was a lot of confusion and date changing concerning his baptism, but now it is firm and set for the 31st of December, at 13:00. Zapraszam. Like you know, the transfer is going to be happening right before the baptism, so there's no way to know if I'll be here or if Elder Curtis will be here. President Turek visited Kraków yesterday, and he knows who will be here and who will not, and he told Michał, so he could choose who would baptize him, and so he and President Turek are the only people who know what's happenening. We do know, though, that one of us is leaving and I have a feeling that it's me. No real good reasons, but just a feeling.

The missionaries that would have gone home at the end of this transfer went home last Friday, so they could be there for Christmas, and as of that day, there are only 4 missionaries in this whole country who have been out longer than I and my group have! It's crazy! All the people I knew are home, and all the people I know that I have good friendships with are younger than me! (mission-wise, not age-wise) Speaking of that, though, I think I've finally reached the point where when I look in the mirror, I don't see a highschool kid. And then one day, when I had forgotten to shave, and there was a bit of scruff on my face, I looked like a straight 25 year old! Wow.

We had transfers last week again within the city, so I was with Elder McPherson, and Elder Pettit was with Elder Curtis, and it was good, nothing too crazy!

The picture I sent is of a guy named Grzegorz from Szczecin, and Sister Cutting sent it to me, and it just made me so happy to see his face again! He's not even an eternal investigator, but just a guy that shows up at church all the time - it made me really happy to see him!

The work is going good, we're all pretty happy here, and life moves on! I am constantly aware of the fact that the end of my mission is still pretty far away, but at the same time the last four months since my year mark feel like they happened in a couple of weeks or so. Things are ending and I hate endings, and I don't know what to do about it... I'm in the autumn of my mission but it doesn't feel like it should be at all. I have no way to describe these feelings. Ask any missionary, from what I've heard we all feel the same thing.

You see what happens when you don't email me? I just start going off on weird things!

Anyway,

I LOVE YOU ALL!

Elder Liechty

12 Dec 2016

Sam conducting a Gnome orchestra

The food they have in the Christmas markets is delicious, by the way!

For their cultural outing, onstead of an "old" culture event, they went to a "new" cultural event: Motorcross

Elder Pettit, too. He wants me to let you know that his mom says he has a cute face

Incense from the gift exchange - lovely

IT'S COLD.

Maybe not right now, but a few weeks ago it was as cold as the coldest day I experienced last year, and we're not even close to that time! I keep putting on more layers, but there's just nothing that stops the chill! Last year i came into the country with this weather, so I didn't know any better, but now that I know what it's like in the Summer, it's just tough! It's ok, though, we're surviving.

I hope so too (mailed a debit card, hoping it makes it)! So far I don't need cash, so lets just hope I don't get caught on the bus without my bus pass! That happened once, and then someone started playing country music, and it was just an all around bad day.

They do have a Christmas market here! I don't know what to buy, because it's all very expensive, and I didn't pull out enough money, and I don't know what to get... someone tell me what they want! One really neat thing they do here is make these nativity scenes out of colorful foil and make them really fancy and neat. If you look up "krakow tin foil nativity" on google you'll see what I'm talking about

I actually heard about that commercial! It sounded really funny because we all understand what that man was doing and the types of book he was reading! )A Poloish commercial I saw on FB but didn't send to him since it's got some swearing:)

Michał Is still doing great! It turns out that he won't be in town on the 24th, which I figured would happen, so he told us that he would like to be baptized earlier! But earlier that day we had actually planned out everything we needed to teach him and when we would be able to teach him, and if he can't be baptized on the 24th, it'd have to be pushed back to the 31st, which means that there's a chance that Elder Curtis or I will not be there because transfers are on the 27th, which would be a bummer but it's no problem because Michał is so great it was just awesome to be able to teach him! We're going laser tagging with him tonight! Jan is doing fine as well. He calls and talks to me a lot, and says that he might go down to Kraków for a visit, but I'm not sure if that's going to play out in the end. Either way, I've still got four chances to go back to Szczecin! 

Speaking of laser tag, we had culture night last week, too! Now, let's take a look through culture nights that have already happened, going by transfer- 1. Nothing 2. Georgian ballet 3. Trip to Toruń 4. Trip to the beach and German border 5. Opera concert 6. learning how to make Pierogi from scratch, and 7. (this transfer) Motor Cross World Championships. 

Now, you may be asking "Elder Liechty, where is the culture in that?" Well this time, instead of hundred year old culture, we decided to do some modern culture. And yes, we did ask permission from our mission president. Having been there, though, I would not reccomend that missionaries go to the Motor Cross World Championships. It was probably one of the craziest things I have ever done! 

Also this week, I was in Katowice for two days! Elder Curtis had to go up to Warsaw to do some legal work, and so did one of the missionaries in Kato, so I stayed with that missionary (Elder Baldwin) and spent the day here. They do a lot of less active finding, so that's what we did almost the entire day. No one was home, or they all moved away. Basically, if there's leaders of a ward or branch out there, they must know that there are better ways to find less active members than to have the missionaries knock on their doors. Please use us as a last resort! Then the next day, we had zone conference, we're going to be doing a lot more work having to do with Family History! And we also had a gift exchange! It was supposed to be random stuff that you could throw together in a few seconds, so of course the first thing that came to my mind was to give someone a rock pet. I got some incense. Our apartment smells very nice now.

We'll be at the Dalton's when skyping, but havn't figured out the times yet. It's going to be in two weeks, though! THATS SO SOON!!!!!!!

I love you all so much!

Elder Liechty

6 Dec 2016

Hi Family,

This is ok if it's too late, it can wait til the next thing that's sent, but if it's not too late, could you send some of those gel pens that are just so nice? The PIlot G-2 series or whatever? Max or Caity will definitely know what I'm talking about.

Last week we went to a trampoline park like Jump-On-It in Utah! It was so fun! We were all really sore afterwards because we had not done any sort of movement like that in so long, but it was just great to go and jump around. What's even better is that we got the whole place to ourselves somehow, and we could do whwatever we wanted! WOO!

When we come back and visit Poland we definietly need to spend a lot of time in the south. No one else in my district wants to go to Auschwitz or the Salt Mines, so i'm not sure if i'll be able to to that...

Ah! The home looks so nice! I MISS CHRISTMAS AT HOME SO MUCH! I mean, I love serving, and we've actually been able to find a real place to help people this transfer, but somedays I just want to go home and lay down on my face and do nothing and not feel guilty for it. Nine months, though, that's close enough. (doesn't it just feel like a little bit ago that I hit my year mark!?!? It's going too fast.)

No, sacrament and Sunday School are are in Polish, with one of the missionaries translating for the english speakers through a microphone in the back corner of the room. However, with last Sunday being Fast Sunday, and the branch already being made up of 60% english speakers, and with there being 4 english speaking visitors, almost all the testimonies were in Polish. And do you know who was the lucky one who had to translate them all into Polish on the spot? That's right. Me. I wanted to take a long nap afterwards. BUT what did happen afterwards, was that one of the members came up to me and said that I did the best translation since Elder Allen (he's long gone, but he was basically a Polish genious, and made lessons that people still listen to to learn Polish.) So that made me feel pretty good.

We get invited to dinners at least twice a week! One with the Daltons and the Strobles every Sunday (the Strobles are a family from the states, but the husband Spencer served a mission here a while ago, and he studies medicine here) and usually a meal with Lucas and Helen from Argentina and Brazil. They're here for work, and they're both amazing cooks. Very blessed here.

It's really about the same as all the other areas I've been in. The branch is larger, for sure, but the problems are the same and the way we spend our time is pretty much the same as well. It's just prettier and smoggier here. 

The American's are pretty helpful, and they like to be on lessons with us a lot, but the fact that building friendships with Polish people has that extra layer of difficulty just makes it difficult for finding people for them. But they have given more referrals than other members have.

Ok, you guys ready for a miracle? We begin over a year ago, with the missionary who had my phone before he left. We don't know his name, for it has been forgotten in the anals of time. But what he has done, is while serving in Kraków he gave a Book of Mormon with his phone number in it to a man named Michał. Let time pass by, and let Elder Liechty take up the mantle of this phone, and let him serve his mission for over a year in the north of Poland. In fact, the way the patterns of the mission have been going, is that if you're serving in the North you're probably going to be there for your whole mission. BUT what happens is I get a transfer call from President Turek to go where? To Kraków. The exact opposite side of Poland, breaking all norms and customs of missionary life. And what happens just a few weeks after I get here? Michał calls. What happens after 2 meetings with him? He's preparing to be baptized for the 24 of December. Merry Christmas.

But really, this man is so ready (he's 18 years old). He called asking for time and place of church, and then he actually comes! He's just wearing street clothes and a t-shirt that says "sorry ladies I'm on the night watch" and it's something to laugh about, but guess what!? Two things- first, he came the next week, and he was wearing a collard shirt, a tie, and slacks! And Second- he overheard that the next week (yesterday) was going to be fast sunday, so he asked what that was, and then he ACTUALLY FASTED. WHO IS THIS GUY!? He read 20 chapters of the book of mormon within a week, which is a record for any of my investigators, and he accepts pretty much everything we teach! We don't feel like we're doing anything, and he's just going to end up baptizing himself! 

This work is God's work, and he's definetly the one moving it along. I know that even if we're not seeing the effects of our work, seeds are being planted, and someday, someone will come along to sow just as we were blessed enough to do with Michał.

Love,

Elder Liechty

(I just got my camera charger back yesterday, so pictures will come)