7th Letter from England (Eastwood)

Hey!

Sorry about yesterday!  Of course I have a good excuse but I'm going to write in the order of the week.  So I wrote last Tuesday.  This week seemed  uneventful but I look back and tons of good things have come from it!  After we emailed Tuesday  we went and visited the Kerr's who are an inactive family from Lehi, Utah.  She hasn't been to church in over 10 years though but she likes it when we visit so that's sweet. 

I went on exchange on Wednesday with Elder Eckelt, he's the zone leader.  We had a lot of fun together and he is an absolutely amazing teacher.  The Zone leaders arrived at our flat at about 11 and said 'You two must be the most popular two elders in the mission!' as they carried in a pile of POST!  I was so excited!  I got the raincoat, 4 letters (one dear elder from you, one from Kelcy, a letter from Jordi Schumaker, and  a package from Kelcy and a mystery package of candy... was that from you??  Anyways it was extremely exciting!  It was Elder Harris' birthday on the 29th so he got a lot of stuff too!  I then went to Nottingham with Elder Eckelt.  It was really cool being in the bigger city for a day.  The proselyting is quite a bit different.  We taught one Chinese girl and got her a baptismal date so that's awesome.  It really was just a good time and I learned a lot from him.  He goes home pretty soon.

The next day we had district meeting and it was Elder Harris' Birthday.  We had cake and stuff that some of the members, the Stinsons, gave us.  And Elder Harris' mom had sent some TMNT plates and stuff so that was funny!  We had a great time!  He's been juggling non-stop because he got some juggling balls and didn't know how to before.  He's awesome.

After the District Meeting we went to this kind of dodgy place,  and before I tell you this I should tell you that damn and hell are not swear words here.  The British Elders and stuff even say it, members in our ward and everything.  So that's kind of interesting.  Anyways we asked this guy that was walking if he knew anyone that could use our help or service of any kind and he replied 'No, but if I were you I'd get the hell out of here!'  I don't know why we thought that that was so funny.  We took his advice and left. 

The next day we went to Ilkeston again!  We seem to go there all the time, we both love it!  We were at the hill top and its kind of like city center and just talked to people.  We actually waved some guy down and he was like 'Hey Elders!!' it threw us way off guard.  It turns out he was an ex-mormon from Idaho!  He loves the church though... which is strange.  He was a great guy and we talked to him for probably about 10 minutes.  Then Elder Harris and I went into the big church of England just to look at the building and it was really nice.  Here's where the most exciting part of the week happens:

We went to our investigator Sean's place to give him the stop smoking program.  He's so ready for it.  Anyways we just introduced it and the rest of that story comes from last night.  We went to Ruby's for supper which was really good of course. 

      Another day we had a flat inspection so we cleaned for a while in the morning, then we had English classes that only one family could show up to.  We knew that was going to happen though, lots are coming this week. 

Sunday was awesome, it was of course fast and testimony meeting.  It starts at 10 and its like 9:58 and we can see that the people who were supposed to pick up Sean were already there and Sean wasn't!  We ran out to the Stinson's car and drove to Ilkeston real fast and got him!  He had a great time at church!  The whole sacrament meeting was just tons of people bearing there testimony and I couldn't have thought of a better day for him to come.  Ruby taught Sunday School and it was a really great and powerful lesson. 

And now yesterday and why I couldn't email... we had Zone P-day in Nottingham so at 10 we were on a bus to Nottingham.  We had a whole lot of fun though!  The ZL's told me to bring my Frisbees so we played Frisbee and basketball and football!  It was great.  Its always awesome to get together as a zone.  Our zone is the best in the mission actually!  The work in this area is doing so great!  Then immediately after Zone p-day we had a DA which was really fun.  We went to a little barbecue.  Then we had to go to Ilkeston and buy all the stuff for Sean and Claire to stop smoking.  We got all the stuff and brought it over to them.  We talked for a while and I'm SO EXCITED!  They totally have it!  I just know they going to be able to stop for sure.  I'm just really excited for both of them.  Sean's baptism is going to be amazing.  Claire already a member by the way.

So that was my week, it was really good!  I'm glad everything is great there!  I miss you all! 

Love, Elder Evan Pogue