July 9th, 2011

Oh my! I just LOVED talking to you on Sunday! I have the best family in the world. :)

Big news, people.

I have a brand new daughter! Her name is Sister White. She's from Florida. She is already a whiz at Czech. And a whiz at everything else--she studied neuroscience at BYU. She also played on the rugby team (so she knows Keilani Paul, my roommate in Romania). She has gorgeous curly hair and freckles. She is maybe a little bit quieter than I am, but laid-back and has a good sense of humor.

ALSO. We are in a THREESOME with SISTER GANBAATAR!! She will only be here for 6 weeks, and then she is dead, so we will be here to keep her from getting too trunky. :) I am so excited for this transfer--it is going to be filled with miracles!

This is how good I am at training:
Since both Sister G and Sister White had all their luggage, it was a little tricky getting it all on the tram. Marketa, a wonderful member in the branch, helped us. However, it took so much to get 6 suitcases (many of them quite large) on the tram that our time ran out--the doors closed before we finished, leaving me, Sister G, and Marketa in the tram with all the luggage and poor Sister White all alone at the tram stop in the middle of Prague. At the next stop, Marketa jumped out and ran back to find her, while Sister G and I battled with the suitcases all the way to the apartment. This is how we haze new missionaries. :)

Yesterday an American family in the branch invited us and anyone we wanted to bring over for dinner. I forgot that we put things like crackers on our chicken in America--it suddenly seemed so silly to me. Silly, but oh so delicious. We brought a member, Diana, from Peru, and her czech husband Kaja, who is not a member, with us, along with their little tank of a son, Sebastian. The Armstrongs have 3 wonderful little kids and we were able to share a thought with them about following Jesus Christ afterwards--I think it touched Kaja to see children raised so well, who could find a good role model in Jesus Christ and who were able to talk about important things together. I hope his interest grows--he comes to church whenever Diana comes, which is not as often as we'd like--but he's really supportive of her. She is working towards coming more now, however, so she can go to the temple in Frieburg and be baptized for her grandma. She's been having dreams about her and thinks it's because she wants her work done for her.

Interesting fact: On birthdays here, people feel obligated to shake your hand and wish you all sorts of things, like health and happiness and success. It's really funny--I never would have thought to shake someone's hand because they have a birthday before, but now it's starting to seem natural.

We also have another interesting new investigator: he's from China! His name is Li Hang. He is learning Czech, but it's only so-so. His English is minimal, at best. He was sent to our English class by a girl that works at a local chinese restaurant--works so often that she never has time to meet, but can come to church with us every so often. We've given him a BOM in Chinese and a pamphlet. He came back with a page and a half of questions and comments that he'd had his sister translate into English. We taught him how to pray, mainly through pointing at the pamphlet and speaking a little Czech and he prayed at the end. It was really interesting--not something I'd expect here. But his desire is so strong--it will be so interesting teaching him. Where's Beks when I need her?! Oh yeah. Taiwan.

The work is going great. Sister Christensen went off to Hradec Kralove this morning--she's back with the Sister that trained her. How unexpected! President is just full of surprises. :)

I love you so so much!

S laskou,

Sestra Dean