Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Helsinki Finland...visa trip

I’m not sure where to begin…
It’s been an amazing week full of many memorable experiences.. It’s been a week of Thanksgiving celebrations, unpredictable travel plans, meeting up with members from past areas, attending the Helsinki Temple, catching up with the Elders from my group, and a personal search for some inner peace (which seems to come in small moments.)
I’ll start with pday which was our usual kind of boring pday. After internet we stopped in at the eye doctor for an eye exam and a pair of new glasses. I found a very cool pair of Ray Ban’s that look very similar to what President Spencer W. Kimball used to wear…classic!! During my eye exam I had the opportunity to chat with the eye doctor about the church, I guess he knew the missionaries from before. Later, we met up with the other missionaries at the church
We had three meetings scheduled for Tuesday, however one bailed on us…it happens. We had to go back to the scary building, okay...call me a wimp, but I’m telling ya, it’s a building straight out of a horror movie! At least we were there during the day and not at night. We also had a pretty terrific English Club. We had a tight kid show up who is really into soccer, so we discussed words relating to sports to keep his interest.  I love my English Class!!!
After district/zone conference on Wednesday we celebrated Thanksgiving as a zone. We had a great feast!! Not to brag on myself, but I have to say that I made the best mashed potatoes that I have ever tasted!! No offense mom. I’ll let you in on my secret…RED PEPPER! Yep, it gives it a bit of a kick and turns ordinary, boring mashed potatoes into something spectacular!! It was a great time. I surprised myself by not stuffing myself or overeating. I guess it’s that inner peace I have been working on, I didn’t have to eat a lot to be happy and satisfied…I found me “chi”. Later, we had a meeting with our investigator which went really well, we just need her to want to act on her desires to make the necessary changes.
We woke up about five Thursday morning to catch the train to Ekat for another visa trip, only to find out that our train wasn’t to leave until four that afternoon. The ZLS messed up a bit. Elder Smith and I really wanted to make it to Ekat so we booked it over to the bus station to see if we could buy bus tickets, however the bus had already left, so we were stuck in Perm waiting for the afternoon train after all. We left around 4 and arrived in Ekat around 10 that night. The train we rode on was pretty decent with seats that reminded me of airplane seating…not to bad
We left Friday morning around four to catch the plane for St. Pete’s only to find out once again, that the plane wasn’t schedule to leave for a few hours later than what they told us,,, someone made a mistake, haha…no biggey…stuff happens. When we arrived to St. Pete's we sat around the airport for another few hours and flew on to Helsinki. When we arrived to Helsinki we headed straight for......PIZZA HUT! We all ordered the “all you can eat” lunch special, however we all let ourselves down because we ate very little. I think it’s because we are not used to eating as much as we used to and many of us have lost some extra baggage. Later, we went to the temple where we stayed at the guest house and hung out.
We were able to attend two sessions on Saturday with members from our mission! It was pretty dang cool to see so many members from the Ekat mission at the temple, it made my day. I was also able to gather a lot of "chi" or “inner peace” while at the temple. The peace one feels at the Temple is a great thing, nothing quite like it!!!  Later, we went to the store where we found some ben and jerry’s ice cream...this was a small highlight of our trip!  We left for Ekat later that night. It was funny; on the flight back to St Pete's the flight attendant didn’t give me a card to fill out because she thought I was Russian. It must have been my angry face for having to sit next to an old smelly dude. When we finally arrived to Ekat early Sunday morning we were able to catch some shut eye for a couple of hours before attending church.
I was able to attend the Botanica branch…my old stomping grounds! It was amazing to see all the members that I used to meet with! I love them. We finally arrived home to Perm around ten last night! Wahoo!! That pretty much sums up my week…an amazing week!
So, I continue on with my journey to find inner peace and me “chi”! It’s pretty exciting. I have been a lot more relaxed. I have been trying to meditate, however I really don’t know how to relax and shut by brain off…it’s a work in progress. Maybe I need to take up yoga…picture that!! Haha!! Anyway, I love you all and hope you have a great week. I will send pictures home next week.
Love,


Elder Dewey

1 comment:

Bart said...

I'm still trying to find my chi, by the way what is chi, how do you go about finding it? Love ya