Week 73: "...moet zingen na President Monson. Wie...DOES that?!"

November 3rd, 2014

When I was back home, before I got my mission call, I wasn't too picky about where I wanted to go. I did have one main preference, though: I didn't want to go anywhere that gets too cold in the winter. Then, I was called to serve in the Belgium/Netherlands mission, on the edge of the North Sea. Not the coldest mission in the world, but if you think that it stays warm during the winter, you've got another thing coming. Anyway, I imagine Heavenly Father kind of saying, "Look, I know you didn't want to go somewhere cold, but this is the mission you need. But, I've still got your back, little man. I'm going to make this summer last a long time."

And it is. Last week was a great week as far as weather goes -- on Saturday, the first of November, the Netherlands had (according to a member here) the warmest recorded November day ever. It peaked somewhere around 65°F. We've had sunny and warm days. However, that's coming to an end...it's cold and rainy outside right now. Well, it has to get cold sometime.

This past week wasn't too exciting, I'll be honest. We didn't go on any exchanges last week -- we never go on exchanges during the week of transfers. Also, on Wednesday of this past week, my twelfth transfer began... At the end of this transfer (six-week period), the sisters who were in the MTC with my group last summer will be going home -- their eighteen months will be up. That's pretty nuts. I feel like they're kind of getting cheated -- they have to leave, but we get to stay for six more months. I'm glad that I still have some time, because I'm not ready to go just yet...

In other news, Elder Pouwer and I are going to be moving! Right now, we live in an apartment in Heiloo, a suburb just south of Alkmaar itself. A member, Br. van der Put, from Haarlem (who is in charge of the apartments in the mission) came to check the state of our apartment. It's a pretty old apartment, and it isn't in good condition, but Elder Pouwer and I did our best to make it clean and make it look presentable for this inspection. After the inspection, Br. van der Put says, "well, you guys did your best...but this apartment isn't fit for living in, and you guys need to leave it as soon as possible. It's not just bad here. It's unhealthy!" He was pretty funny about it all, but I was pretty distraught that I'll have to pack up all my stuff and move... We should be getting an apartment in Alkmaar in the near future. We'll see what happens.

We are still working with Victor. He's making great progress and is really excited for his baptism. I've never been so sure that someone will make their baptismal date before. He's still got about five weeks until his baptism, so we've got more than enough time to get everything organized and let everyone know. This should be a relatively stress-free baptism. But, we'll see -- sometimes, the last thing you expect happens. Either way, we're moving forward. Victor is fun to teach. He already believes it all (I mean, he's read the Book of Mormon multiple times and loves it), so most of our teaching is us sharing small doctrinal points, then him going off for a while or bearing his testimony about that principle or something (boy, can he talk). He's also got some pretty cool/funny/awe-inspiring stories from his time living in Aruba and Venezuela. He's really just a great guy who hates Miami. Why does he hate Miami? Yeah, I never understood that one, either.

On Wednesday, Elder Pouwer and I had to go to Leiden Centraal to help out with transfers. It wasn't very exciting. At all. But, I did get to see Christiaan, a young member from Lelystad that I worked a lot with. He came down to hang out with the missionaries. We talked about Lelystad and how different people were doing -- it made me miss that little city. I mean, I spent almost six months of my life in that city... I can't believe that it's already been almost five months since I left it.

I can't forget to tell you guys -- there are elders in Hoorn now, a city close to Alkmaar, and they go to the Alkmaar branch! It's super cool that they're there. You guys probably don't understand just how cool this is for us Alkmaar missionaries... And, get this. So, the missionaries in Hoorn are Elder Cooper and Elder Hunter. Elder Cooper served in Alkmaar up until about six months ago, and the members love him. And Elder Hunter is his greenie. Elder Hunter is a pretty cool cat -- he's from Scotland (like seriously, who is from Scotland? I don't know if I've ever even met someone from Scotland before). And, when the MTC choir sang during the priesthood session of General Conference, ELDER HUNTER WAS THE ONE SINGING THE SOLO. How cool is that? He's super funny about it all -- he said to some members, in his Scottish accent with greenie Dutch, "Ik moet zingen na President Monson. Wie...Does that?!" ("I had to sing after President Monson. Who DOES that?") Apparently he was pretty nervous. But, his voice is winning the hearts of the members here. Elder Cooper, Elder Hunter, Elder Pouwer, and I had to sing "Christus is Mijn Heer" (in English, the hymn is "I Believe in Christ") in church yesterday, and the branch loved it. We weren't half bad, especially with our boy Elder Hunter. His voice is killer.

And Friday was Halloween. For those who don't know...Halloween isn't that big in Europe. So, we didn't do much. But, Priscilla (the one who just got baptized) invited Elder Pouwer and I to come to her Halloween-themed birthday party (her birthday is on Halloween). It was...interesting. But that's a story for another day.

Because I'm tired of typing.

Keep it real, homies.

-Elder Bonney

At a district meeting on Tuesday, my boys Elder Besendorfer and Elder Toole surprised everyone by leaving part-way through and coming back in animal suits. You had to be there to understand. Like Elder Toole says, you gotta be worried about the 'bear necessities.'

Week 72: "In Australia, we don't even cook shrimp on a barbecue. That's just not true!"

October 27th, 2014

Well, believe it or not, I've been here in Alkmaar for just about six weeks now. It feels like I just got here... Fortunately, though, I won't be getting the boot yet. Elder Pouwer and I will be staying together here in Alkmaar for at least six more weeks.

 

Before I say anymore... I NEED TO CORRECT MY ADDRESS. Because the address the mission gave me for our apartment, the address everyone thinks is right, is wrong. You would think that my address is Kennemerstraatweg 91, in Heiloo. I discovered the other day, though, that number 91 is...the hearing aid center that we live above (on the upside, that means we know we don't have to worry about our downstairs neighbors complaining about us being too loud). So, all the mail that comes to us missionaries actually lands in their mailbox, then those kind ladies move it into our mailbox (which, turns out, the mailman has rarely touched). Our address is actually number 91a. I don't think I've missed any mail, but if you've sent something, and if you don't know if I've received it or not...you should probably ask.

 

In conclusion -- my address is:

 

Kennemerstraatweg 91a

1851 BB Heiloo

the Netherlands

 

Good to have that cleared up. And to know that our neighbors haven't been stealing our mail.

 

Let me start off by telling you guys about Victor. I talked a little about him in the last email, about how we thought he was less-active, but he turned out to not even be baptized. So, a long time ago, Victor was on a search for truth. He was raised in a Christian faith but had come to the conclusion that something was missing. He investigated a lot of churches to find the one that was true -- to no avail. One day, though, he met the elders. And his life changed. (This sounds so dramatic...as it should.) Everything started making sense to him. He read the Book of Mormon and prayed about it, and he received a spiritual witness of its truth. He knew that the Church was true. As he was preparing himself to be baptized, though, he somehow lost contact with the elders and with the church. Fast forward a few years, and he's moved to the Netherlands for help with his health. He'd been living in Alkmaar for about three months, and he had been praying that he'd be able to find the church again.

 

A few weeks ago, Elder Pouwer and Elder Price (on exchanges) knocked on his door. He came to church again this past Sunday, for the second time here in Alkmaar. He's already chosen the day he wants to be baptized on -- December 6, his birthday. This whole experience (and it's not over yet) has just been a testimony to me about how aware our Heavenly Father is of our individual circumstances. He answered Victor's prayer. It was no coincidence that we knocked on his door.

 

This past Tuesday, I was on exchanges in Zaandam with Elder Toole. We had a fun, very wet day. We got to help lay down tiles at home of the bishop of the Amsterdam ward. (I can't even count how many times I've laid tile on my mission...I'm starting to get really good at it.) It rained almost the whole time... I was very cold. Bishop de Jonge kept saying, every time I handed him a tile, in great English, "thank you plenty." I don't know if we really say that in America, but he bought us Chinese food after the service, so I'm not going to judge. After that experience, though, I decided that I really didn't want to lay anymore tile in the cold weather.

 

On Friday, it rained the whole day again, and I was on exchanges with Elder Price in Den Helder. We went to go do service for this one Colombian sister in the branch. And...we laid tile. I don't know what it is with people in this country and tile. Once again, it was a very cold and wet experience. She made us lasagna for lunch, though, so I guess I was okay with it.

 

So on Sunday, we had to go pick a member up from the train station in Alkmaar and bring them to church. We were parked out in front, waiting, when we hear whistling. My first thought? It's a cop, and we aren't supposed to park here. Then, we see that it's some guy sitting in front of the Burger King at the station. My second thought? Great, he's gay. (That one was never confirmed either way.) Elder Pouwer suggests that we go talk to him, but then we both notice the almost empty (but previously very full) wine bottle that he's holding. Ahh, now we understand why he's trying to call us over. He's drunk! We decide to ignore him. Then we look over, and he's walking towards our car... I look at Elder Pouwer. "Lock the car. Lock the car. LOCK THE CAR." He locks it, and rolls down my window a little bit. We ended up having a very strange conversation with a very drunk younger man. He spoke of many things, including "intergalactic stellars" and about how he's an archangel. How does he know that, you ask? In his words, "they've told me. Oh yes, they've told me. Many times," while pointing at the sky. He ended by leaving us these words of wisdom -- "you have to trust everyone. Then everyone will trust you." Deep. I still don't trust everyone. Especially drunk guys.

 

Today, we went to Amsterdam with the Leiden elders, Elder Reynold for a good chunk of P-day. It was pretty fun -- the museum we'd been planning to go to turned out to be closed on Mondays (just like a ton of other museums in this country...), so we just walked around and saw nice things. Today is a beautiful day, so that was fun. We ate lunch at this one burger joint, and we sat next to this one guy, Ben. He turned out to be Australian, from Sydney, in his mid-20s. We had a fun conversation with him. He told us about how Americans have a lot of weird stereotypes for Australians -- apparently, Australians never say anything about "throwing shrimps on the barbie." He said that they don't even really barbecue shrimp... Very enlightening. Part-way through (we were sitting outside), he lit up a joint (and this one had nothing to do with burgers), and the conversation got even more interesting...he asked us why we, in our church, believe that drugs aren't good, and we told him. He courteously disagreed...then went on to tell us about how he was on some hallucinogens the other day, and how he was, in his hallucination, riding on a meteor through outer-space, a meteor he could almost control. And that is just another reason why drugs are not good. Kids...don't do drugs.

 

Dang, I love people.

 

--Elder Bonney

Elder Pouwer, Elder Bishop, and me, from the week before this past one, at the mission home after mission leader council.

A tram picture from this morning -- Elder Price, Elder Pouwer, Elder Reynolds, and myself, in Amsterdam.

Week 71: "Basically, you destroy your vocal chords until you find the sound you like."

October 20th, 2014

I remember telling myself at the beginning of last week -- if I could make it through the week, I could make it through the rest of my mission. There was a lot of stuff that needed to happen and a lot of things that needed to go well. Only a miracle would get me through the week. Fortunately, God hasn't ceased to be a God of miracles...

 

So, here's a quick overview of what I was facing on Monday. First, Elder Pouwer and I had to prepare a thirty minute presentation to present to, like, seventy missionaries at temple conference on TUESDAY. The next day. Some call that procrastination, but I like to call it...alzheimer's? We also needed to prepare our plans for mission leader council on Friday. And our district leader council on Saturday. (These names probably don't mean anything to you guys, but just think of it as...a lot of meetings.) Did I mention that our baptismal candidate, Priscilla, had to have her baptismal interview, and if she passed, we'd have to prepare her Saturday baptismal service?

 

I WAS FREAKING OUT. And I'm not a very stressful dude! I was pretty sure that I was going to end the week by getting an ulcer and ending up in the hospital. Or having a brain aneurysm and ending up in a coffin. (Disclaimer: I do not actually know if stress causes brain aneurysms. And yes, I had to look up how to spell the word.) Let's take it one day at a time...

 

Somehow, we got our act together and had our presentation ready for Tuesday. It was actually pretty fun -- for part of it, we called missionaries out from the group to give short lessons on non-gospel topics that they were good at, ranging from motocross to music therapy to magic tricks to screamo music. Yes, screamo -- there was an elder who sang (and screamed, apparently) in a punk band before his mission. I'm not a big fan of screamo music (it kind of hurts my head), but I thought it would be cool to hear about the "science of screamo." He started off... "well, basically, you destroy your vocal chords until you find the sound you like." Apparently, you find a screaming sound you like, and then after doing it for a while, it stops hurting. I think I had a look of mild horror on my face during the whole explanation. But hey, I was grateful that he was willing to teach about his talents!

 

We had people teach random topics to help missionaries see what it's like to be in the shoes of an investigator. Our goal was to help them improve the quality of their questions in lessons. We're always teaching about the gospel, a topic we know a lot about, so hearing about things they didn't know a lot about helped them analyze the situation in a better way. It was eye-opening. Anyway, our presentation went pretty well, and we were satisfied with it.

 

I almost forgot -- all of us missionaries got to go to the temple on Tuesday morning, before the conference! It was great. The temple is always a great experience. It was strange -- as an elder, you get to go to the temple four times on your mission (twice a year, in April and October). This was my third time... I only get to go once more before I go home. It's weird to think about.

 

On Wednesday, we were on exchanges with the Leiden elders -- I worked in Leiden with Elder Reynolds, and Elder Pouwer was with Elder Argueta (the district leader) in Alkmaar. Elder Argueta was going to give our investigator, Priscilla, her baptismal interview. Elder Pouwer and I were a little nervous -- we weren't sure how it would go. We'd been teaching her regularly since we got to Alkmaar, and she seemed ready to us, but only the interview would tell. Meanwhile, I'm working with Elder Reynolds in Leiden, not knowing how it's going. (While we were knocking doors, a giant dog came out of a shed and tried to killus, and I thought I might get maimed...but we made it out of the gate and shut it in time to get away.)

 

Long story short -- Priscilla passed her baptismal interview! That meant that Elder Pouwer and I had a baptismal service to finish planning for Saturday. It was hectic, but we did our best to pull it off. Meanwhile, we got everything for our councils ready, and those went well.

 

On Saturday, Priscilla was baptized! The branch president, President 't Hoen, baptized her. It was a great service. Her sister (who referred her to the missionaries a couple months ago) came up from Amsterdam to give a short talk at the service. It was simple, but the Spirit was there. We were all really happy for Priscilla.

 

That night, we were in Amsterdam writing up a report about the zone (another thing we had to get done), and we finished it, then decided to go out to eat -- we hadn't had dinner, and it was already around 8 PM. We thought we'd celebrate Priscilla's baptism. We learned an important lesson, something we hadn't foreseen -- going out to dinner on Saturday night in Amsterdam's centrum is probably not the best idea. We saw (and smelled) some scary and strange things while trying to find a place to park... But, we ate out anyway. And while I was sitting, eating my calzone, relaxing, thinking about how we got everything done that week, the phone buzzes. It was a member of the branch presidency. "Elder Bonney, kan je morgen een toespraak geven van 10 minuten?" ("Elder Bonney, can you give a 10-minute talk tomorrow?")

 

Well, it's not over until the fat lady sings. For church on Sunday, Priscilla made it just in time to get confirmed (her train was late). My ten minute talked was on the spot transformed (out of necessity, I was the last speaker with thirty minutes left until the end) into a twenty minute talk. There. We finally made it.

 

Also, we'd helped someone get to church that morning, named Victor. He'd explained to us (we found him knocking doors) that he was an inactive member from Aruba who had just moved to the Netherlands and wanted to become closer to God. After church, we discovered that... Victor has never actually been baptized. He's not even a member. But, it looks like he's our next baptismal candidate. God is too good. Not only did everything this past week go as it was meant to, but He dropped a new person in our lap.

 

It's a good thing I didn't have a brain aneurysm.

 

--Elder Bonney

 Elder Pouwer and me, looking good at the temple in Zoetermeer.

Elder Pouwer, President 't Hoen, Priscilla, and I at Priscilla's baptism.

Week 70: "Where did you get Greenland from?" "I'm not sure..."

October 13th, 2014

So, there I was. Sitting on a bench, all alone, in the rain, in a city I'd never been to before. Without a phone. It was one of those times that I had to take a step back and ask myself how I got there. I feel like I have a lot of those moments...

I was in Den Helder, at the very top of North Holland. To make a long story short, I was on exchanges with Elder Da Silva, an elder from Brazil, and we were first working in Schagen, a city about 15 minutes (by train) south of Den Helder. As we were walking back to the Schagen train station, we saw the train pull up into the station. Elder Da Silva and I look at each other, and he says, in his thick Brazilian accent, "I think we must run." "Yeah, I think so too." We drop into a sprint to catch the train, which only comes once every 30 minutes. We get to the platform -- the train is still there. Good. Unfortunately, everyone who just got off of the train is swarming around the OV-chipcard scanner thing, trying to check out, and we were trying to check IN. Elder Da Silva pushes his way to the front of the swarm, but there's no way I'd make it. Divide and conquer -- I run to the next one, scan in, and as the whistle blows, I hop on the train, assuming that Elder Da Silva would jump in the train car in front of me. As the train pulls away, I walk to the next car and see Elder Da Silva...through the train window.

You've gotta understand, I'd never been to Den Helder before. Elder Da Silva and his companion (who is actually my MTC companion, Elder Price!) had left their phone at home that morning, so there was no way I could get in contact with him. So, I rode the train all the way to the last stop in Den Helder, the main Den Helder station, got off, sat down on a bench, and waited. (Okay, I got off, checked out, found the closest mailbox, mailed some letters I needed to send, came back to the station, sat down on a bench, and waited.) This is the moment I found myself in. Nevertheless, sure enough, thirty minutes later and after some self-contemplation, I see a very relieved Elder Da Silva get off the train.

And that was only Tuesday. That was only the beginning of the week.

I have to be honest, though -- I'd be lying if I said the rest of the week was so exciting. It was a good week, though. On Wednesday, we met with our homie, Carlos. (Isn't it a good thing he didn't kill me?) He's going away for a few weeks on vacation, but we had a really spiritual appointment with him. Turns out, he wants to be baptized. Who knew? I'm going to miss seeing that guy for a few weeks, but he'll be back in November.

I got to work in Amsterdam again this past week, this time with Elder Besendorfer. It wasn't planned to work in Amsterdam (the plan was to go on real exchanges and for me and Bessie to work in Alkmaar), but Elder Pouwer and I brough our car in to have the brakes checked out, and...our brake pads needed to be changed. So, car-less, we went on splits with the Amsterdam elders. We had a cool day -- found some cool people, had a good talk. We reminisced on the good old days in Groningen -- it was almost exactly a year ago that we became companions.

On Friday, Elder Pouwer and I ate dinner with a member, her adult son, and one of our investigators, Priscilla (who could get baptized this Saturday! I hadn't mentioned that yet...). Priscilla was talking about how one of her roommates doesn't understand how we could think that 30°C is pretty hot. The member asks, "waar komt ze dan vandaan? Groeneland?" (Where is she from? Greenland?) I was sitting there thinking...uh..Greenland is cold, and like nobody even lives there. Priscilla tells her that her friend is from Suriname. The member's son asks, "Where did you get Greenland from?" She couldn't remember... It's the little things that you have to laugh about.

The other day, Elder Pouwer and I went on splits with the elders in Zaandam/North Amsterdam. The heavens opened up and it poured on us. But, we still found four new people who were willing to give us their information and let us come another time. Blessings from diligence... I also almost accidentally stabbed a man with my umbrella, but that's a story for another time. For now, it's time for me to go.

Have a great week! Keep it classy.

--Elder Bonney

Last Monday, Elder Pouwer and I went to Alkmaar's cheese museum. This city is famous for its cheese market. It was a pretty fun museum, and we were like the only ones there, so we got some good pictures, including this one of me and a model of the Dutch cheese girl. Looks like my T-Rex girlfriend just got replaced. I never was one for following the rules...

Week 69: "Try! Just try."

October 6th, 2014

Alright, hey everyone. Happy October. I can't believe (you've never heard me say those three words before...) that it is already October again. I feel like it was just yesterday that I was watching my first General Conference as a missionary.

How about that General Conference? I thought it was pretty good. We got to watch all of it except the last two hours (which were broadcast from 10 PM - 12 AM our time), and I thought it was pretty great. I love conference. There's a lot to be learned from the talks that were given. We watched about half of it at the home of some awesome members, the de Bruijn family. The rest we watched at the church building -- it was broadcast.

Did I mention that we watched a session of conference with Carlos at the home of familie de Bruijn? Yep, the same Guatemalan Carlos who I thought was going to stab me. He's actually becoming one of my favorite investigators here. He's so funny... We ate dinner with him and the de Bruijns, then watched conference. Before dinner, I was just chatting with him (in English -- he lived in the US for quite some time, and his Guatemalan accent-peppered English is pretty good), and it turns out he loves playing music. "So, which instruments do you play, Carlos?" "Well, I play a lot... Piano, guitar, trumpet, trombone..." He went on to name a lot of instruments. "What kind of music do you like playing?" "Hmm.. Well on the guitar I play mostly anything. I can play a lot. On the rest, mostly I can only play the happy birthday song. You know the one? Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you..." He was serious. A musical wizard.

He says the funniest things... I'm thinking of starting a Carlos quote-book. During our lesson last week, we were talking about something, and he says, "you know, people with glasses always look like they are more connected to the Holy Spirit!" Maybe we should wear glasses to our appointments with him. He's getting better at his prayers -- last time, he ended with, "in the name of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, amen." Almost there. He loved conference -- afterwards, he told us that he'd learned so much that he thought he'd never have to go to school or read a book again. I think he was being dramatic...

I had a pretty funny moment on exchanges this past Tuesday. You know, sometimes I think that someone could make a pretty funny sitcom from my life as a missionary, but this moment definitely could have been in a funny movie. I was working with Elder Argueta in the city of Leiden. We were having a good time -- seen some pretty solid miracles earlier in the day..found a lot of people on the street, got let in knocking doors and taught a surprise first lesson... God is good.

Anyway, we're walking on this bike path on the side of a four lane highway near the city of Wassenaar. (I'm pretty sure it was legal...) There was a lot of traffic -- it was rush hour -- and the cars were moving pretty slowly. Suddenly, Elder Argueta and I hear honking (which you don't hear a lot -- you can get fined if you honk in a non-honking situation here). We look, and there's this guy waving. Is he waving at us? People don't wave very often here...usually when people make gestures at us from their cars, it isn't a friendly wave. We look around, but we're the only ones he could be waving to. His hand is still out his sun-roof, waving, trying to get our attention. We realize that he's an American member (there are a lot of those that live in Wassenaar). Keep in mind that this is all within five or ten seconds. We start waving back, and then...the man (who is not paying attention, but more focused on waving to us) slams into the car in front of him. Ouch. We would be of absolutely no help in the situation, so we...just kept going. And watched as the traffic got even thicker behind the mild accident. Sorry, guys!

I got to go on some exchanges with past companions this past week -- Elder Robbins and I got to work together in Alkmaar, and Elder Toole and I worked together in Zaandam/Amsterdam. Elder Toole and I had a pretty fun exchange -- it was good to work with that big guy again. It had been almost a year since we were companions, toughing it out as second transfer missionaries in Kortrijk. We've both grown a lot since then. Anyway, we had a dinner appointment with a Ghanaian family and all seven of the other Amsterdam missionaries. We ate this African food -- a lot of it. With our hands. It was like some sort of hard, cooked potato and this green stuff with fish in it (never figured out what the green stuff was). Anyway, we were all stuffed, and Brother Nti (the father of the clan) comes in. "Oh, you all need more!" "No, brother, we can't! We're full. We can't eat anymore." He responds... "Try! Just try." After "trying" (Ghanaians go HARD when it comes to eating!), I eventually respond, "brother, my mother was once pregnant with twins. THAT is how full I am right now." He laughed, but didn't ask me to "try" anymore.

Well...that's all for now. Just remember, though, when you think you can't go any further, or work any harder, or...eat any more...just take on the Ghanaian mentality and try.

Stay cool.

-Elder Bonney

PS -- Me, with Elder Bishop and Elder Alston, at the Nti's...trying. I thought I'd explode.