een week van voetbalzone dinges, Slovak, en wat dan ook (a week of football zone thingy, Slovak, and whatever)

If I write the title in Dutch, do you understand it?

Seriously though,
Things have been happening here,
I gotta get a move on to fit it all in

I forgot to mention last week. We had a run in with a bloody man. Kinda like Rachel did. But things didn't go as smoothly for us heheh.
Why?
Cause Elder K. saw someone in their car slumped over the steering wheel with blood on the side of their face.
He was certain, that he was dead.
I told him (being reasonable and more experienced) that he was not dead, but sleepeth. But when I went back up, and actually looked in the window, I ran back from the sight of blood and was quite a lot more certain that he very well could be dead. (Please realize that we were not bloated chickens, but seeing the blood on his face through the not so clear glass of the car, gave the mind powerful creative liberties, which it utilized quite well in the making of an all around terrifyingly horrid image)

Well, after an embarrassing few minutes where we talked to an old man to help us figure it out (he didn't even look in the car he was so unconvinced)
And then calling the zone leaders for advice on what to do in case of dead men in a Kia, (there advice, uuuh wow. call the cops if he's dead I guess)
We, after pondering it awhile I worked up the nerve to knock on the window and talk to the possibly deceased fellow
==========Now please note, it was I who wanted to try to talk to him. So as all of you laugh at our cowardice, just remember that it was I who said lets talk to him before calling the cops (all Elder K. wanted to do was take a pic of him (so he could have a crazy pic) and then call the police. lol 
I knocked on the window, several times, he sat up. He opened the door to talk. It smelled strongly of alcohol. (in Dutch) I asked him if anything was wrong. He like just stared, uuuh no, he said. Ok, we just saw like, blood all over your face and thought that, you know, you were dead (I actually didn't mention the dead part)... he mumbled some response we let him be and left.
We didn't call the cops.
Turned out dead guy wasn't dead.
Go figure. Just got drunk as a skunk and clobbered a good one apparently

Anyways,,, heheh

Weird area. I love it :)
A few more things, before I go.
~We had an awesome zone dinges. And the zone leaders did an awesome job. Our zone leaders are awesome.
Our district is awesome. We got to play soccer and ultimate frisbee today and eat buffet pizza hut!! SOO great!!

We also taught the Slovakian family and they had read clear into 2Nephi since last week!! They love it and want to be baptized!
And we started teaching her mom too!! (btw, please pray for her mom. her name is E. She is having some rough times in her life. Pray that she can have peace, and understand about the truth of the church. Thank you:)

We are gonna baptize N., not this week, but the next. Sadly, we had to postpone.
But we are excited for it. He’s legit. He came to church yesterday.

Wow. Gotta run. It’s late here. We got back at different times from soccer, so we had to switch things up.

I love you all. 

And hope that life stays,,,classy ;D

TOT later eh?
Elder Chantry

Busy Life

So I think I’ll give some info of what's going on over here. 
(Imagine that, me, doing what I’m supposed to!)

We had some cool happenings, though none quite as dramatic as losing my companion :/ sorry about that Mel. Like you said though, all for a reason right?

We went to Brussels on Wednesday. Went for legality stuff for Elder K. Hard to believe that it was over 7 months ago that I was down there for my legal stuff                      .....weird.....

We went the next day with the branch to an activity. It was called a 'blotefoeten pad' which, being interpreted, is a 'barefoot trail'
We got to walk along this trail, on and in all sorts of different stuff, barefoot.  So much fun! Talk about legit. The zone leaders were there for the day, so they gotta come along. We had a blast.

We also got back in contact this week with some peoples that we were teaching. Really cool story, a missionary who just served in this mission got back and is now living in the Netherlands. She is originally from Slovakia, and I called her up cause we met a family from there (or rather the sisters did, and we started teaching em), and we wanted to see if she could come along. She agreed and met with us. She is gonna come along to our future lessons, every week on Saturday. The family loved her :) its awesome, cause they speak a little Dutch, but not a lot. Also their mom wants to hear from us, so we're gonna get in contact with her too :D... Things are busy here

We also met with N., and he wants to be baptized by the 1st of Sep. So we're gonna keep meeting with him. He's busy with moving still, and working. And his wife just had a little girl (his girls are cute as heck)

A. and K. are still doing good. Although finding an appartment is not going so well :/ ... they're still trying...

~We have more people, but I don't think you’ll be able to keep all the names straight ...so suffice it to say :) we're busy.

It’s week 4 of this transfer now. Next transfer 30 elders are coming in. Which is huge. And this place is gonna keep pumpin...

Rachel, i was so happy to hear about the people in your last area who got baptized. :) To know that you were able to play such a big part in their journey to follow Christ and that they continued on with that is the greatest thing. You've done good work. And even though you had to leave, Many remember the work you've done. Not the least of which is Him who remembers perfectly each effort you make ...


I’m glad the ward picnic was fun :) hopefully you didn't get another gang of verhuising bees who decided they just couldn't leave a good thing alone ;

I think that's all I have to say. But ill mention again my love for you all. want het is er nog steeds :)

ttfn!
(That’s tigger speech. I use it quite often)

Elder Chantry!

At the Barefoot Walk activity

Mijn Week

Well.
I thought maybe I’d mention a few things that are going down here.

We have two guys, A. (from Togo) and K. (from Ghana). They want to be baptized. The sisters taught them most stuff, and we just finished it off. They're super cool, and funny too. We ate lunch with em after church yesterday, with another member, and we had a blast. They've been looking for an appartment that they can rent together, and they've maybe found something. We’re praying it goes through.

We are also gonna meet with N. The guy who moved here and wants to be baptized. He's awesome. Along with some others were working with, we're staying pretty busy.
I got to go on exchanges with Elder Pimentel this week :) he's my district leader.

You know, while traveling on busses (which we do a TON) I’ve seen tons of corn fields. Apparently they grow a lot of corn in this area of Belgium.
You know what else? A lot of Axe products (the brand) are made here in Belgium. True fact.
  
Elder K. is enjoying things pretty well. He knows a little French, so he can understand some. He really does have good Dutch for how long he's been working on it. He comes from a family of two. He has one older sister. He's done a lot of different work, especially truck driving. We've been having fun together :).

I threw on a pic of a church in this area. Belgium has a lot of old stuff. like buildings and stuff from back in the day.

I am for some reason at a lack of things to say. However, it's great to hear about you guys.

I'll have much more to say next week. I am certain
Love you all!
Elder Chantry

Life in Belgium

So,
We had a bunch of appointments that fell through this week. Although we did power calls and we got a bunch set up for this coming week.

The branch here is so cool. There’s like 15 people who come besides us, but they really wanna see growth. They’re super willing to help us, and they're just all around goed bezig. The people at church when they found out it was my bday were super cool. Some invited us over tonight for dinner to celebrate :)
And others said that at our dinner appointment with ‘em later this week, they'll wear a party hat and everything; heheh 

 Elder Key is settling pretty nicely. We've worked pretty dang good. We gotta go with the ZL's the other day. They worked with us, and that was cool. They’re great guys..

Family is the greatest thing on earth. yaa.......God knows each of us.

I gotta run, but thanks all again for the bday well wishes, I’m planning on having a great week :)
You guys too?
good :)
Try not to get too busy. Swim a little for me eh? I can't really weet je nog? ;

Love you all!

And yes indeed. He does send an email today.

Wow. So much to say: so little time

First; the keyboard here is jacked up!! The letters are in the wrong spot and so I’m like one third speed:::
I feel like I never learned how to type

But I will prevail: no keyboard will conquer me. after all; I arrived in Genk with my greenie (new missionary) at like 8pm. like 7 hours on trains. Get this,
We picked up our greenies at a big old hotel: they had rented the conference room and they had a super legit meeting: did you know the Liahona interviewed the new group and took pics of em outside of the airport. I bet you could find it online: coolest thing is that they’re probably gonna be in the next month ensign so that’ll be worth a good read weet je wel?
Also; on the church website there’s a video about missionary work and there’s people on it that I met, ate dinner with, served in our mission, live here in the Netherlands, and are missionaries here from the Netherlands. Take a gander. It’s legit

So we picked em up (i know, no pics of me or Elder K. on the blog together. lame)
But we headed out. If I went into all the complications of getting here I’d be here all night. Suffice it to say, I tied a plastic sack to my broken suit case stubs, Elder K. used his belt to hook my small suitcase to the big one, we got all the way down to Antwerpen, then my wheels started to break on my other suitcase, but it worked enough to get all the way to the city next to Genk. We had missed the train; and would have to wait an hour. So we called a member. He was awesome and picked us up btw, vlaams is like the same language, but boy let me tell you, the accent is so different, and they say a few things different, and it is HARD work to understand lol)
We got in his car. But he couldn’t fit my bike. no prob (except it was cause it would come back to bite me later)

We get there, thank the heck out of him, laugh a lot, eat some stuff, sleep, and the work has begun...

A few random, cool things, we have two legit Africans on date to be baptized from the sisters. And a guy that is moving here from Brussels and is going to be baptized asap! He is already taught everything and is ready; we meet him tomorrow.

We have another GREAT appartment (rewards of moving into a sister appartment heheh) the branch here is super small, (like 20 people small) but are really helpful in the work and have faith to grow :) its already happening

Oh man. Elder K. is great. We’re having so much fun. He’s from Casper Wyoming and is about as uneuropian as you can get lol: gun toting? conservative who speaks his mind and is funny as heck. He wrestled like a pro and is gonna go into div. 1 wrestling when he gets back. He’s shorter then me and has pretty good Dutch. Though this vlaams accent is makin it tough for him.

Sad thing; my bike got jacked!!
We came back like a day and a half later and it was just plumb swiped. I had chained it up in the bike area but to no avail. Someone wanted it more than me I guess......
Good thing our area is so huge that we mostly use bus anyways heheh (I wept a little though, cause that was my old reliable)

Gotta run! Love you all: 

tot zo!
Elder chantry

The week that has ended with threatening the life of my second suitcase handle

So a few things:

We had pday this Saturday. We went fishing. Off of a dijk :) into the sea. We went with the ward mission leader and the elders te Amsterdam. SOOOo cool guys. Guess what the best part was?
--We didn't catch a single fish!!
hehe! But I did catch a starfish :) which was cool
And the others caught some crabs. Which was awesome. And we threw it on the bbq and cooked em right there on the beach. Then: we ate em! It was pretty tasty. In a ghetto primitive savage type way. heheh we had a blast. So long as it's (at least mostly) cooked I can eat seafood you know :)... That was fun for sure. I got to ride a ferry to the place and saw some cool sights....
  
I Got transferred!!! AGAIN!
But this time I’m goin to another country. Belgium. I'm gonna whitewash the city from the sisters who were there (one of them was in my mtc group) and I’m doing it with none other then 'fresh from the states- greenie'...
I'm gonna train. heh.
And all I can say (besides all the stuff I already said and everything I will say) is that it's gonna be an adventure for us both (that's the word you use when you try to make an insanely ghetto rigged situation sound exciting and sophisticated)

Oh boy. I'm excited :)
I’m sad to leave Zaandam. Cause this place is gorgeous and it's just flat legit. But this'll be fun. Elder King gets to train here in Zaandam, too. So cool stuff. There’s 16 Elders and like 13 sisters coming in tomorrow. So things are gonna go nutso..
I’ll email you guys next week with the news of how the trip went (we’re gonna assume and pray that I can get down there, me And my greenie, both with our stuff, to white wash the area, and NOT break my other suitcase handle)
(I don't like my chances here on this one  o.0 )...

I love you all. Have a blast at girls camp. The weather here is now in the 30's. And I melt each day. And they don't believe in AC here. no joke. Not one apartment has it... boo hoo. woah is me.... lol Rachel has bulging cockroach infested floors with ice water to shower. And I’m sweating a little in our middle of the centrum appartment heheh.......yaaaa im blessed :)
Life is good

Tot volgende week!
Jullie zijn Toch het beste :)
    sincerely,
Elder Chantry

That one week where it got hot, and i got sick, and our numbers got better and we ate delicious chicken

Actually the week started great. We meet with several less actives and they like let us in right then and there :) so cool. I've started to see a pattern with a lot of em. Lady is a member. She comes from South America. Married a Dutch man (who is sometimes member, often not) moves here, really doesn't like the church here. Opposite culture, not open/friendly enough, sing way different, too structured, (did I mention Opposite culture?), so they go inactive. Still have a testimony. Just not feelin the church here.
I saw it in Almere and I’m seeing it a lot here. It's a real challenge of their faith. Especially when their husband isn't a member. We're really trying to help them. Right now we're trying to get to know em more, see how we can serve em. It's good work though. They're great people.

I also managed to get a nasty vicious cold that tried to destroy my life. I got it Thursday or so. Still have it. Although it's FINALLY starting to get better. Tjonga jonga

Can you all believe that next Sunday/Monday is transfer calls??? Last week of transfers this one O.O
boy.....
It’s gonna be a great week though. I can feel it

Love you all! 
tot volgende week!
Elder Chantry