Some weeks are better than others

We haven't had a lot to post the last few weeks. Elder Brande is in an area where the internet is expensive to use so his emails have been pretty short. So here are some excerpts of emails he has sent to various family members. We hope to hear more soon. On a fun note, their Mission President's farewell gift was to allow them to watch the Germany/USA World Cup soccer match. It was kind of neat watching it on our end knowing he was watching too. Even though, he only had a short time with President Shwartz he was very impressed with him and grew to love him and will really miss him.

Here is his new companion, Elder Jack:

To give this letter context Michael wrote to Elder Brande detailing his experiences at Girl's Camp:

Dad,

I'm glad you survived that much Estrogen and pain :P It's funny, you can relate anything to the gospel, and I think that is what is so amazing about our church, there is simplicity and all comes back to it. Just when we think we are most prepared that's when temptation hits the hardest. "Let me tell you something you already know, life ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It will beat you to your knees and keep you there if you let it. Me, You, Nobody, will hit as hard as life, But it ain't about how hard you can hit, it's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward."- Fun Quote

Love you Ganz Liebe

Elder Brande

 So where to begin? Well I found out that my trainer is going to be leaving me in the middle of my Golden cycle and that a new elder is going to be finishing me up :P We had a HUGE storm come through Aachen last week and it went in as far inland as Düsseldorf, it knocked over a bunch of trees and completley knocked out the train systems out here. Public transportation is the only way people get around here in Germany and this storm made it so when we went to Zone training in Düsseldorf, a normally 2 hour straight train ride turned into a six hour adventure. Getting home on time isn't an option anymore :P Good thing is that it has given me the oppotrunity to talk to my Mission Präsident a lot before he goes. I'm in a small little internet cafe in the middle of Bonn now, because we are having our own Distrikt Meisterschaft :) the downside of it all is that this place charges waaaaaay too much for me to justify writing a longer letter so Tschüß 

'm so tired and I don't know what to write about and I don't have time so yeah, ask dad if he knows a Blackley family from Alaska, with a kid named Brandon, just curious, I think I'm a little grumpy because we haven't been eating well because I was out of MSF waiting for some reimbursements, because me and Elder Anderson thought we had at least another transfer together. I'm so hungry and tired. I hope dass alles gute. Love ya

Chio  

Elder Brande

Here's a little excerpt from a letter he wrote to his Uncle Justin. This kind of hurt my heart a little bit but I am so proud of the way he and his companion didn't get discouraged and kept working. It's a great life lesson for all of us.

"Thank you so much for all the letters. They have been a strength to me on tough days like today. Just today we were cursed and spat at (though that's pretty normal). I have a man accuse me of the most horrible things, then a punk kid body checked me and said the most vilest things to me. We got back to our wohnung and I wanted to give up and honestly,just cry. Instead we went out and worked, and we found people that God had prepared and put in our path.

An invitation for baptism

He's been extra busy so his letter is short and sweet. Don't ask us what his "German" says. It doesn't quite make sense in Google translate so I'm not sure if the spelling's correct 😄.

Ja, alles klar. Mein Deutsch ist nicht schlimm. Mein mitarbeiter und ich sind töll. Die Idea von meine schwesterin fahren gibt mir ganz angst! So we just hit a minefield of investigators, here's a quick list of all of them; Dragos is this romanian guy who's homeless but not a druggie and he seems quite intelligent, Susan is an older lady who we call Kenya Oma because she is always so nice to us, Matthias is this old 40 something man who REALLY loves AC/DC, Till and Patrick are two Uni students who live in a HUGE frat house, Taran is a turk who is really religious the only problem is he worships the wrong side, then of course there is Dania who Nammen die gelegenheit für taufen an! Dania acceptet the invitation for baptism and here date is on the 19 of July! She was just so prepared and I was just lucky enough to extend the invitation. I love you and I hope that everything back home ist klar.

Elder Brande

Here's a picture of Elder Brande on a P-Day having fun with his Dusseldorf zone.  He's holding up his zone leader Elder Varney.