#9 Pest: Look to the East!

Well, I got some news, I'm getting transferred again! I have been a missionary for 8 months now in Hungary, and I have yet to stay in one place more than 4 months, I don't like moving. But anyway, I'll be moving away from Budapest, and to a city called Nyíregyháza. I'm not going to try to spell that out phonetically, so have fun trying to say it. Nyíregyháza is basically the farthest east city in Hungary with missionaries, its about a 3 hour train ride. Its also outside the stake so I'll be in the Miskolc district of the church, it will also be the first branch that I will serve in. Fun fact, My trainer Elder Martin started his mission in Nyíregyháza. In Nyíregyháza I will be the district leader but I'm not sure how many other missionaries I will be over. I don't really know anything actually. I'll be with Elder Gilson, who is the group above me (meaning he arrived in the mission one transfer before me), but I think of the two of us will be new in the area so we will have to learn the area again. Little stressed, but it will be a fun adventure.

Last P-day we went to the zoo, it was a really cool zoo. They had elephants, zebras, and giraffes and they had this vulture exhibit and we stood about five feet from this giant vulture. They had a really cool kid discovery pavilion that was pretty cool. I was pretty surprised, since I have pretty high expectations for zoos. It wasn't as good as the Omaha zoo, but it was a really good zoo and I was impressed.

On Monday, the Bradshaw's, the coolest senior couple ever (they're from Beaver, UT and are the self-reliance couple missionaries) drove us about an hour to Nagyacsád which is where a recent convert lives. We drove past beautiful sunflower fields. It was a nice drive and a great visit. On Tuesday I did splits with Elder Surdu. For 4th of July eve I bought sweet corn and that's all we ate, corn on the cob, in honor of America. On Wednesday we had a meet President Hettinger day! It was pretty cool. 

When I had my moment to go up and meet President Hettinger I was impressed by how friendly he is. Much less stoic then President Szabadkai. Sister Hettinger was super surprised when I told her I was from Omaha, NE because she is from Lincoln, NE! That was so cool! We had Nebraska bonding time, I think I'm her favorite now. We talked about that for awhile. She has family in Omaha, the Hinckley's, who she says went to Millard public schools. So look them up!

Next transfer is going to be 5 weeks because of a large group going home early for school. So they will do a 5 week transfer and then a 7 week transfer to get us back on schedule. Or something, there are rumors that they may be moving us to 12 week transfers to line us up with the MTC, but we don't really know what's happening rights now.

We took Peter with us to visit Magdi on Wednesday, our plan was to teach her about baptism. I took the reigns and talked to her about baptism and Elder Fales invited her to be baptized on the 11th of August, but she said it was too soon. Then Peter jumped in and told her his story and bore testimony. After that she agreed to the date and said she would prepare for it. On Sunday Magdi went to church and the gospel principles lesson was about baptism, so that was a nice coincidence. Then we met with her at church for another lesson. We talked about prophets and the word of wisdom to help her with choosing to give up coffee. By the end of church she was super excited about her baptism date. I hope she will make it, and that the sisters who are coming into our area will be able to help her.

Josh Schnider gave his mission homecoming talk in church. Josh gave a talk about the things he learned on his mission and the spirit was super strong. It was also funny, because Josh is super funny. We could totally be friends and hang out if I weren't a missionary... but maybe I'll meet up with him at BYU. After church, Brother Blood invited us to have lunch at their house. The Blood family has a son on a mission, one who just came home from his mission and one preparing to go on a mission. The son who is going on a mission soon picked us up and drove us to their house. He is going to Thailand on his mission and he's super excited. Brother Blood served his mission in Tiwain, and the son who just returned served his mission in Miami Florida, Creole/Hatian Speaking. So we talked about missions and how to be better missionaries. It is great to see the blessings of missionary work.

This week, a ton of amazing things happened in our area including picking up a new golden investigator and made significant progress with several of our investigators. We helped one commit to reading the Book of Mormon and another to giving up cigarettes. I'm a little sad to say goodbye, I love it here. But Nyíregyháza will be great too.

I want to let you all know that I love you and I'm glad to see that the Smith family reunion went well. It's a little sad that I missed it, but I love being here in Hungary. Stay safe, drink water, wear your seat belts. Be awesome!

Love, Morgan Elder.