Week 75: "...am I smelling blueberry muffins?"

November 17, 2014

Friday. It was a nice day -- pretty cloudy, but not raining. I was on exchanges with Elder Andrew, a younger missionary, in the area of Zaandam. We were biking through a beautiful, very Dutch-looking suburb of Zaandam, with a nice river on one side and a highway and traintracks on the other. The nice breeze in my face, the sound of trains, with a thick smell in the air of...blueberry muffins?

"...am I smelling blueberry muffins?"

"Welcome to the many smells of Zaandam, Elder Bonney."

And the smells did come. Zaandam is a pretty industrial city, and by that, I mean that a lot of interesting foods are processed right outside of Zaandam. As we rode on, for a period of about twenty minutes, I was hit with waves of different smells...first, blueberry muffins (that was probably my favorite smell)...next, ground wheat...the next one was hard to pinpoint, but I came to the conclusion that it was a strong stench of dog food, though I was never quite sure. We stopped in a neighborhood that smelled very clearly like dark chocolate. That was a rough one -- after knocking doors for a while with that smell everywhere, it made me want the blueberry muffin smell back. I did, though, experience the many smells of Zaandam, no joke.

Today marks two months since I was transferred here to Alkmaar! I can't believe how quickly it's gone by. Time escapes me. This past week was no exception. Between exchanges, visiting other cities, and getting things done here in Alkmaar, it feels like it was just yesterday that I emailed...this was a fun and relatively eventful week, though.

On Tuesday, we met with Carlos again! He is pretty awesome. Such a homie... He was actually here in the library just a few minutes ago, becoming friends with the Moroccan man sitting next to him. Carlos is seriously one of the most friendly people I've ever met. On Sunday, he showed up at church, and he just got along with everyone. When I saw him walk up to the doors of the church, I busted out in a grin and greeted him. He responded, "good morning, Elder Bonney! I brought my good friend, Hank," and introduces us to this 70+ year old Dutch man. Seeing Carlos, a super-talkative Guatemalan in his mid-forties, with this old, quiet Dutch man was pretty funny. Carlos is friends with everyone. And hey -- he's bringing his friends to church. And Hank loved the service. I can't complain.

Victor is also doing extremely well. I don't know if I've ever seen someone endure hardship so well -- he was talking to us about his past and the things he's been through, and some of them were pretty crazy. He's had a hard life. When you teach him, though, you can just feel how much God loves that man. On Tuesday evening, we ate dinner at a member's house with Victor -- the members are loving him. It's been really amazing to see the members open up to the investigators we've been bringing to church. I can't say that they aren't helping us out. After church on Sunday, Victor told us about how being at church always feels like home -- like where he belongs, and that he just feels really good. He told us that he never wants to miss a Sunday. We're working on some things with him, but Victor is making huge progress.

Okay, stamppot. I need to talk about stamppot. When people ask me what Dutch food is like, I usually tell them that the Dutch just pick and grab things from other cultures -- which is largely true. Lots of "Dutch" food is more Indonesian than Dutch. However, there is one extremely Dutch meal -- stamppot and sausage. Stamppot isn't a super complicated concept; basically, it's mashed potatoes with vegetables (cabbage, spinach, carrots, etc.) and maybe some other stuff mixed in. It's a pretty good meal, and it's very Dutch -- however, it doesn't get fed to us very often. At least, until recently. On Sunday night, at some members' home a week ago, we had stamppot and sausage. Then, on Tuesday evening, with Victor and the member family, we had stamppot and sausage. On Wednesday, I was on exchanges in Haarlem, and the member who fed us dinner gave us...stamppot and sausage. And THEN (yep, there's more), on Thursday night, guess what Elder Pouwer and I had for dinner at a member's home? Stamppot and sausage. Four times within five days. Some call it Dutch eating. I call it death by stamppot.

For any of you who have seen the movie "the Best Two Years," you might know that most of the movie was filmed in the city of Haarlem, in North Holland. However, I have told a number of people that that movie is a lie, because there have been sister missionaries in Haarlem for forever, and no elders. At least, until a few weeks ago. There weren't enough sister missionaries in the mission, so the Haarlem sisters were replaced by Haarlem elders! (There are still sister missionaries that attend the Haarlem ward, but they serve in the beach city of IJmuiden. They've been there for about a year now.) And the third elder to get to serve in the city of Haarlem was...me. (It was just for a day, but it still counts.) So if you've ever seen the movie, just know -- I've worked there. I even saw specific places in the Haarlem Station from the movie. It was pretty awesome. I was working with Elder Silva, a greenie who just got out a few weeks ago. (Not to be confused with Elder da Silva in Den Helder.) Elder Silva is Brazilian, but he's from Portugal. We had a blast.

Before I forget -- on Friday night, Elder Andrew and I were coming back from a ward activity, a sports evening, in the Amsterdam church building. It ended a little late, and we ended up being on the tram to Amsterdam Centraal at 9:30 on a Friday night. That was...interesting. Interesting people board the tram at such a time. Including, but not limited to, a group of pretty buff Irish guys who are a little drunk and all acting like pirates. True story. I don't get intimidated (that's not the right word for a manly guy like me), but I was...on edge. Fortunately, they only punched each other.

To close off, I'll share a quick story from Saturday. On Saturday afternoon, Elder Pouwer and I were coming back from a meeting at the Amsterdam church building, and the Amsterdam sisters were on the same tram as us. We all sat down, and we noticed a man sitting on a tram seat, with his pet rabbit sitting on the seat next to him. (You see the weirdest things on Amsterdam's trams.) The sisters start talking to him, and he asks if they would like to hold his rabbit. He picks it up and hands it to Sister Frandsen. She excitedly takes it and holds it in her lap. And then, the rabbit proceeds to immediately poop on her skirt.

Be careful on the trams in Amsterdam.

--Elder Bonney

After district leader council on Saturday, we couldn't resist going back to the Burger Bar. This time, though, Ben wasn't there.