28th (Sheldon)

Hey everyone!!  

 

 This week seems very long! A lot has changed. I already told you last time that on Monday we went to a Seik temple! They gave us a short tour and gave us some very interesting food... that was all good! So Tuesday was Elder Hoffmann's day to leave.  We spent all morning packing, cleaning, and just getting ready! Elder Hoffmann wouldn't really admit it but I know he was so excited to go home!  I had a good time last transfer with him.

 

So Tuesday was actually so sick! We went to the mission home to drop him off and I was going to stay with Elder Watt (Coventry Zone Leader) for the night. Anyways I get in Elder Watts car and in his Scottish accent said 'So, you're Pappa is in the district' Elder Watt let me spend 3 hours with Elder Harris! We taught a lesson to one of his Chinese investigators and then had a chippy for dinner. It was so great hanging out with my dad, the day before I got a son! (...hanging out with my trainer the day before I get my new trainee) Wednesday was transfers so we had to be at the mission home early. I had accidently left my exchange stuff at Elder Harris' flat so we went over there so I could change and then headed off for the mission home. For a few hours we just hung around and all the trainers got pizza for lunch. After that, we watched all of the new missionaries stand on the mission cornerstone and say who they are and where they are from. We then had a meeting with all of the new missionaries and trainers and at the end of the meeting they announced the new companionships. My new companions name is Elder Tupou from Tonga! It's so cool! He doesn't speak English very well so we have to do language study! It's really cool trying to talk him through everything in a way he'll understand. He's already such a great missionary though. He tracts and GQs better than I did when I was 2 days out! And I spoke the language! His testimony is so powerful too. He is the only member in his family and has only been a member for 2 years! Wednesday night we had ward coordination meeting. Thursday we had district meeting in Solihull, we woke up and studied then went straight there. It was nice to meet the new members of the district. When we got back we went finding until our dinner appointment at the Stilgers (Bishops family) Bishop was traveling for work though. We had a great time there and Elder Tupou's spiritual thought was extremely powerful.

 

Friday we had to weekly plan, I hate weekly planning! That took a couple of hours and then we had a bit of a miracle. Elder Chardon and Ruka called us and we had a lesson with our investigator that speaks Dutch! Her name is Wedwhatie and she talked to the missionaries 8 years ago in Holland. Elder Chardon is Dutch so we all four went and had a lesson completely in Dutch.  Saturday was my six month mark! I can't believe it, time has gone by so fast. We found all day on Saturday, then a storm started coming in. There was thunder and lightning and it didn't start raining, but hailing! That was extremely interesting, especially for Elder Tupou!  He was like 'is that ice!?' We escaped the storm for a little while and warmed up in our flat.

 

We had a dinner appointment at the Watsons again and had a really great time there. We burned a tie, well two ties that night in honor of my six month mark. The first one wouldn't start so I got another one and poured hand sanitizer all over them and caught them on fire. It seems like yesterday we were burning Elder Harris' tie in Shaun's back garden.  Sunday was another good day at church. After church we had a dinner appointment with the Matthews family. They are an awesome family. They made us big English meal with tons of... mushrooms. Again, you know my feelings about mushrooms, but guess what, I ate them all! And enjoyed it! Miracles happen every day. 

 

Things have been really great this week. It's been funny watching Elder Tupou deal with the cold weather here. He's been sleeping in thermals, a jacket, sweat trousers, a scarf, and socks all under a big duvet. He does have a pretty bad cold though. I can't wait for these next few weeks to watch the miracles that come. I hope all of y'all have been great!
Love you all, Elder Evan Pogue

27th Letter from England (Sheldon)

Excerpt from last weeks letter first:  (Take this out of the blog until next week as it is suppsoed to be a secret)  So I got the call to be a trainer!  I'm so excited for that!!  President called on what we know to be training dodge Monday and I heard the special president's ringtone and answered the phone, 'Hello, It's Elder Pogue!'  'Hello Elder Pogue, how are you?  It's President Rasmussen.'  'I'm great President, how are you?'  'I'm great, now Elder Pogue I have been engaged in much fasting and prayer and felt prompted to give you a call.  Have you been living your life in such a way that the spirit can work through you?'  'Yes president.' 'Are you willing to follow preach my gospel and do the work in the way the Prophets and apostles have outlined?'  'yes president!  'Well Elder Pogue, I'd like to extend a calling to you, I would like you to be a trainer, and train one of the new missionaries, would you be willing to accept that calling?' 'Yes, president!  Of course, I'd love to!'  'That's great!'  Then he gave me details on meetings we have and things like that.  I'm not sure how transfers go because Elder Hoffmann actually leaves a day earlier.  So I'll probably be with other missionaries next tuesday night, then on Wednesday morning I'll go and we'll have meetings then get assigned our 'greenies.'  I'm extremely excited!
Now to this week:
Hey everyone! 

This week has been pretty good so far!  So I guess I emailed Tuesday??  That's right because I got the call that I would be training on Monday.  So because it wasn't put on the blog last week I'll kind of recap.
On Monday I got a call from the mission president, President Rasmussen and he asked me to serve as a trainer!  I'm so excited for that.  I'm already going to be a dad (trainer)! :D  I think Elder Harris might be one of the youngest grandpas (trainer's trainer) in the mission.  He trained me well.  So Tuesday we emailed and got on with our day.  I unfortunately forgot my planner and can't really remember all the details of what we did or when we did things.
Wednesday was interviews with President.  We have interviews for all the missionaries every once in a while.  That went really well, along with that we had district meeting.  I basically just asked President Rasmussen a couple of questions pertaining to some of our investigators.  Those interviews are typically quite rushed because he has so many to do.
On Thursday a lot of the day was spent cleaning and packing for Elder Hoffmann, that's actually been most of the week.
Friday was the trainers meeting for new trainers, so we went to the mission home early.  I was so excited when I saw Sister Stapley and Eldredge walking up to the mission home!  Sister Eldredge is training!  I got to talk with them all about Eastwood and catch up on things that have happened!  There are 19 trainers this transfer and only me and 2 others are from my group (Debeikes and Dunn).  Sister Eldredge is the only missionary younger than my group training.  That was an extremely good meeting, we talked a lot about how our patterns will greatly affect our new missionary.  I realize that I still follow so many of Elder Harris' missionary patterns.  He was the best trainer.  After the meeting we had a dinner appointment with the Hadleys.  Thats always great.
Saturday was a pretty good day, we had a lunch appointment with family named the Rollins.  Their son is autistic and requires full time attention.  He made us burgers.  We then went back to the flat and once again spent so much time packing and cleaning... too much time.  I was mostly preparing my talk though.
Sunday came, I did some last adjustments to my talk.  We had a really interesting 3 hours.  First was priesthood taught by Bro. Hadley.  It was a great lesson.  Then we had sunday school taught by... Bro. Hadley.  That lesson was even better.  We talked about the creation and the class got pretty lively.  A lot of people had good input.  Then we had sacrament meeting conducted by... Brother Hadley.  He just did everything this Sunday!  I spoke first, I was pleased with my talk.  It went a little longer than expected.  I can't believe I prepared a whole talk without a computer.  That just seems crazy to me.  Then Elder Hoffmann spoke on repentance that was really good.  Then a guy from the stake got up and said he didn't have time to share the message he wanted to but felt prompted to share a story. Basically it was, do your home teaching and magnify your calling.  It was a really powerful meeting.  I could tell it was a little weird for Elder Hoffmann to say goodbye to everyone.  We went to our flat and I literally cleaned all day.  I worked some miracles in the kitchen and living room.  I'll send before and after pictures. 
So today is Monday and we spent the morning as a district and went to a Siek temple!  That was really cool!  They gave us a slideshow and taught us a lot about their religion then even gave us free food!  They're really nice people.  It's an interesting religion.  My week has been really good so far.  I can't wait for Wednesday to get my new missionary!

Hope y'all are all doing great!
Love,
Elder Evan Pogue

26th Letter from England (Sheldon)

Hello everyone!!

This week has been a great week!  I've already sent so many emails today that I'm kind of worn out of typing but I'll still try to make this email good.  It has been a really great week though.

I don't think I want to write this email in the usual way I do, where I write day by day.  I don't know, I'll just start typing and see how it comes out.

This week has been full of ups and downs for me, it's been a week of intense study and praying.  In the past few weeks we hadn't had very many lessons, and not very many people to find answers for.  I had gotten a little discouraged, and I noticed that it was becoming easier to wake up a little later, and studying a little less, and talking to a few less people.  I'm glad that I caught on really quickly though!  This past week has been so rewarding and so great as I studied and worked harder, and refound my desire to work as hard as I can! 

Last Monday we went and had Zone P-Day.  We had fun there, I played some ping pong and volley ball.  Nothing much went on other than that though.  We had a dinner appointment with the Stilgers (bishop).  We went to this really good buffet place.  I finally got to have some hummus!!  I had been craving some good hummus for  a while!  After that we had a lesson that night with Salin that went great.  We taught him the law of chastity and he really already knows and lives it!  Those are the best kinds of lessons.  On Monday I had really made the goal to wake up on time every day, get to study on time every day, and do everything I could.

Tuesday morning, I had a great study.  I studied tithing because that's what we were going to teach Salin that night.  So then we went to the chapel to get some stories of miracles of tithing and also find a nice video to share.  We found a really good one by President Hinkley, where he told a story that could be the same situation as Salin is in!  So at the chapel we were going to fix Elder Hoffmann's bike... but then we looked and my bike wasn't there.  It was locked up in a way that the wheel couldn't move and locked inside of the chapel!  I feel like a member just moved it somewhere or something but we looked everywhere and couldn't find it.  We'll see though.  That night we had our lesson with Salin, we went in a little nervous knowing that money is a concern for him.  He accepted it immediately and knew its something he should do.  What a blessing.

Wednesday morning we had Zone meeting in Harborne.  That went really well!  I got a present from Ruby and also the thermal g's finally!  They're so great!  The gift from Ruby was the book 'The Continuous Conversion' By Brad Wilcox.  Which I've already read all the way through and am planning to start it over again.  It's amazing.  Conversion has been my main personal study topic all week!  Wednesday night we had a lesson with a lady named Donna and her family.  We taught the restoration and it went really well.  I hope they read and pray!

Thursday was another good day, we went and tried to visit a few people we'd previously talked to. We had a dinner appointment at the Reynolds-Jones house.  (Guess what!  It was a dish with rice and mushrooms and lots of them... I ate ALL of them!  It was not easy but I did it!  What a miracle.) That night we had another lesson with Salin.  We taught him the importance of baptism, and coming to church.  It's great to see how much he is learning and progressing.  He has such a strong desire to learn more. 

Friday, as usual, we have weekly planning which takes so long.  Elder Hoffmann was sick that morning as well and slept in a little.  We really didn't get much done.  We went GQing that night.

Saturday was a good day as well, we woke up and had to cut study short for a lesson with a referral we got named Wayne.  He is a really solid Christian guy, he kept saying AMEN AMEN!  To everything we said!  He went to some prayer revival thing in 2003 in New York and just really trusts God.  We went there and he promises he'll read the book of mormon and pray about it.  I'm excited to see how that progresses.  On the way back to our flat for lunch we stopped in this little corner store in the middle of a prominant Arab neighborhood and guess what I got!  Mountain dew and Arab Coke!  I was so excited!  They taste just like the mountain dews and coke I had in Saudi all the time!  That night we had a dinner with a family named the Watsons.  That went really well!  They have us over every Saturday and are really great people.

Sunday we had a good day at church.  After Church we went and stopped by a potential named Wedwati.  She lived in Holland some years ago and met with missionaries there.  She's hesitant to start investigating again now because she's moving back to Holland soon.  We are going to get Elder Chardon to call her because he is Dutch himself so maybe he can sweet talk her in Dutch! (:   At church that day Brother Hadley asked Elder Hoffmann to speak in church next week on repentance, then turned to me (uh oh) and said 'and You'll speak on conversion!'  How convenient!  I'm so excited and prepared for that talk. All thanks to Ruby!  :D  I miss all of them in Eastwood.

I hope everything is going great at home!! I love and miss you all!

Love,
Elder Evan Pogue

25th Letter from England (Sheldon)

Hey! 

So here's my first question, what are you doing in Louisiana by yourself for a few weeks?!  Why'd you stay!  Poor dad is going to be so lonely, he doesn't even have a dog to keep him company... is that taboo to talk about??

So for some reason, I'm in a weird mood right now and would like to take a minute to talk about some funny quirks of the English.  

1. The young english generation (chavs) have much less moral standings and values that anything I've ever imagined.

2. English people tend to say bye about 100 different times in at least 50 different ways before you can actually leave (ta!  Bye now!  Bye!  Cheerio!  Take care!  bye again!  Bye bye!  Ta!  See you later!  Bye!  Alrighty then!  See you later!  Bye now!  Bye!)

3. For some reason chavs think yelling and swearing at you to leave their country is good ole and I quote, 'English banter'.

4. They apologize ALOT if they almost run into each other on the streets.

5. There's much more but I'll end with they 'can't be bothered'. 

 Now I mean these in the best way possible.  I'm trying to be satirical about it all, much in the same way every American is 'fat' and things like that. In all honesty, I LOVE it here.  It's been great.  I love the people!!

My time in Sheldon has been a challenge but I've also enjoyed it.  I'm almost for sure not leaving this transfer but I'm having a good time!  I'm actually really looking forward to next transfer, to start off a transfer kind of knowing the members, knowing where I'm going, and having a little more to work from. It should be good.  

So for my week, 

Last Monday we emailed, then we hung out with Jeremiah and Jake!  (a couple of young men from the ward.)  We spent the day going to charity shops and buying cheap treasures.  Elder Hoffmann and I had a Christmas Miracle!  We found a £4 waffle iron!  I also found some good CD's, and was able to download a nice gospel CD from Amazon.  :D  We had a great time.  Monday was the start of my seriously considering buying new shoes.  Both of my black pairs of shoes are warn down far too much to be good for my feet.  I just want to make sure I buy a decent enough pair.

On Tuesday we tried to go around, find some new investigators, and see some potentials.  We talked to a few people, got a few return appointments, but without much luck.  Things have been like that for a while, but it's okay.  I'm optimistic for these next couple weeks.  President promised that January would be the most baptizing month in years.  We had to be in the flat by 6 because of the risk of drunk chavs stabbing us or something daft like that on New Years Eve.  We spent the time playing cards and listening to some old talks.  It was nice.  We talked until midnight when we heard tons of fireworks going off.  I can't believe it's 2014!  Where has the time gone?  How have I already almost hit my six month?  I'm not ready to go home!  (;

On Wednesday, it was the new year.  So I got to start of the year with a wonderful cold that gave me a fever and took my voice away for a couple of days.  That was not so great.  We spent a lot of time in the flat, fearing mixing the fever with the cold and rain.  At 5 we had a dinner appointment at the Martins house.  He's our ward mission leader.  Then we had ward coordination.  

On Thursday We had district meeting!  That was a lot of fun!  Actually to back up a little, we were supposed to have a breakfast at a members house called the Wilkins, then we get nearly there, then we call the other Elders and they had 'forgotten' to tell us that the appointment was cancelled!  We ended up going to Lidl, buying donuts and having breakfast at their flat.  (:  We then had district meeting, it was a nice meeting where we talked about the importance of working with members.  We then had lunch at a chippy, where I got a kebab that was the greasiest thing I've ever seen.  Elder Hoffmann bought some pickled cockles...  <-- I refused to try one, but it was fairly unanimous that they were disgusting.  I don't know what they are.

On Friday we had a funeral to go to.  This man named John Pritchard from the ward died, I never met him.  It was a nice service, the first funeral I've ever been to.  The spirit was very strong there.  We then had lunch, started weekly planning, and had a dinner appointment at the Hadleys house.  They are cool!

On Saturday, our day was devoted to  helping a lady named Sister Wright move into her new home.  Only us, and one member showed up.  That was disappointing and we ended up taking about 6 hours of heavy lifting work.  We got most of it done just in time though, Brother Camiasani drove us to our dinner appointment at the Watsons house.  Brother Watson is a cool guy!  He's just in the wrong country though!  He likes fishing, carving wood, cooking, and he just bought a mandolin to learn how to play.  He reminded me of someone you'd find in Louisiana.  

Sunday, was another good day at church.  Fast and testimony meeting, for some reason I let Elder Hoffmann to convince me to fast for lunch and dinner instead of breakfast and lunch though...  So I ate a couple waffles and a quesadilla.  We went to church, taught priesthood on the Holy Ghost.  We had a nice testimony meeting, Elder Hoffmann and I passed the Sacrament (it's been ages since I've done that).  After that we went to see a media referral we'd gotten!  This indian lady who lived in Holland 8 years before answered the door!  She had talked to the missionaries 8 years ago!  I'm excited to start teaching her!

So now today is Monday and we're actually in Birmingham library.  It's huge, and looks like a birthday cake.  The poshest library I've ever seen.  Maybe I can find a quick picture.    

 We have Zone P-day today then a dinner with Bishop Stilger and his family.  I'm looking forward to this!

So I recognize that this email is written in a different mood/style than usual, I'm not sure why!  I've had a great week, and really look forward to the weeks to come!  (15 days and a new transfer!!!)  

I love you all!  Hope you've had a great week and a happy new year!

Y'all are the best!

Elder Evan Pogue

Bye!  Bye now! Ta!  Cheerio!  Bye!  See you!  Take Care!!  Bye!  Love you!  Bye!  Be safe!  Careful how you go!  Bye!  Ta! Bye now!  (:

24th (Sheldon)

24th
Hey everyone!!

It really seems like there is nothing to tell any of you about because I just talked to (my family) on Skype on Wednesday.  But I'll go through the normal week as usual.  But first: to answer your questions. So we've been really reaching out to the ward and building relationships.  We've done a pretty good job and there are several people who I am getting quite a bit closer to.  Elder Chardon is in the other Sheldon team with a kid named Elder Peek.  My companions name is Elder Michael Hoffmann from Clinton Utah.  We get along fine, no fighting or anything like that. We're here to build up the ward and to really get them excited to do the work.   When Elder Hoffmann leaves I'll almost for sure stay here.  I know we're working on getting sisters here in Sheldon so Elder Chardon might leave.  Or just come with me.  Hopefully that will be the case.

Okay so this week.
Monday was not p-day so we just emailed really quick then went to try and do some work.  We had a potential from Yemen named Adam that we saw.  After that we did some other work around the area.  Then we decided to go caroling to members to try to build relationships.  That night we carolled to a family called the Maloneys and they invited us in for dinner.  Then the Matthews and we also saw a guy named President Abbott from the ward.  It was a great start to meeting all these people.

So Christmas eve is when we started getting a lot of work done.  We had district meeting in the morning in Solihull, then ate at subway.  After that Elder Hoffmann and I went caroling and were able to stop by 4 members houses.  All but one of them were able to let us in and the one who didn't only didn't because she was alone and that's against the rules.  We shared the Nephite Christmas Eve story from 3rd Nephi 1 and talked about how Jesus Christ is the Prince of Peace (by the way, did y'all see the Christmas Devotional??  Elder Nelsons talk was amazing.)   I was getting excited for Christmas and to open all the presents!

So Christmas morning comes along and I wake up, take a shower and put my onesie on.  The first thing we did was open presents.  I had bought Elder Hoffman a box of Kraft Macoroni and Cheese, a delicacy for any foreign missionary.  I was shocked when I opened the things y'all sent me.  There was so much in there!  I love the Ghutra Ties the most I think.  It was weird seeing the Pez in the stocking!  I got kind of emotional ahah!  Then Kelcy sent me some icebreakers because I love those, and a picture in a frame of us (the one she posted on Facebook a couple weeks ago.)  That was nice.  That day we went to a family called the Camisani's.  They're from italy and we had italian starters, lasagna, then turkey and potatoes, then a cake!  It was a lot of food!  and extremely delicious.  We hung out with them.  Then of course we skyped home.  That was such a quick 40-50 minutes!  I'm glad to hear y'all are all doing well!  I can't believe the Zacharys are moving though!

Thursday was our P-Day and we went to Birmingham for boxing day.  Tons of sales.  (oh yeah, to answer your question, I didn't spend any of it I just took it out just in case)  I didn't end up buying anything but Elder Hoffmann bought some stuff for his family.  It was really hectic!  We went with Salin (our investigator) and he brought his friend named Tony who told us that he is interested in learning more about the gospel!  Such a huge blessing.  The other Elders also came, and brought a member Kenny Jones with them who I'll speak more about in a bit.  Some of the lines going into the stores were so incredibly long!  It was just daft.  Especially Next, and Hollister.

On Friday we had to Weekly plan then go and stop by a couple of less actives, neither of them were in.  We had a party to go to that night!  Kenny Jones's mission farewell!!!!  I'm so excited for him!  He's officially gone, he was set apart last night (sunday) and left at about 6 AM this morning to the Provo MTC.  He's going to be speaking Spanish and serving in the Texas McAllen (I think) mission.  He'll be a great missionary.  His farewell was fun, it was at the church and most members came.  We had some texmex food, sloppy joes and things like that.   We went on exchange that night so I was with Elder Chardon in our flat.

Saturday Elder Chardon and I wake up, and study.  We then went to visit a couple of members and just talked to everyone on the way.  We ended up getting about 6 potentials mostly with solid return appointments!  That's pretty good compared to how we've been doing.  I had a great time on exchange.  We exchanged back late that night and Elder Hoffmann and I didn't end up getting back to our flat until 10:30!  If you're in later than that you have to call president.

Sunday morning we got up and went to church.  Went to a joint sunday school, Priesthood Relief Society class.  It was by the bishopric on Hastening The Work of Salvation.  that's really good.  I'm excited for this new year.  It was Kenny's farewell talks that day, and so he talked, then his mom talked, then bishop talked.  We sang a special musical number in between and by we I mean us Elders and a few women.  I don't know why they keep wanting us to sing!  We got in after church and ate.  Then went to visit some more members and less actives.  It's been a pretty good week so far.

I'm getting a cold which sucks but its alright.  Just sinus' and all of that.  It was hard not to be with all of y'all this Christmas season but also very good being here.  I'm growing every day.  It's amazing the knowledge of the gospel and of the scriptures I've gained.

I can't believe that Piper is 4!!!  That's insane!

What are your plans for new years eve, I'm so grateful that nobody is going to try to convince me to go to a ridiculous stake dance and end up succeeding because I'd realize I had nothing better to do.  Ahaha, we have to be in our flat by 6 on New Years Eve...

Send me that package with the Tonys!!  (bold??)  and whatever else it was!  I'm dying without it.

I love and miss you all!

Love,
-Elder Evan Pogue  

23rd Letter from England (Sheldon)

23rd
Merry Christmas everyone!!!

Reading your email was so hard this week!  I can't imagine all of you in Louisiana without me... but that's okay.  The other day at church Elder Coppin (a senior, public relations missionary) said something like 'looking forward to Christmas gumbo??'  and he just laughed at the face I made.  He could tell it really hit a spot.  I wish I had time or money (or knew how) to make some!  How did Taylor and Mitchell do fishing??  I guess I'll talk to all of you about this on WEDNESDAY WHOOOO!  So today is technically not P-Day our P-day this week is going to be on the 26th of December, boxing day.  We probably won't email then though because we're emailing now and we want to go to Birmingham to get in on all the cheap sales, especially because Elder Hoffmann is going home soon and needs to buy souvenirs.

So I guess I'll go through the week as normal, even though this week has been very very uneventful.  Last Monday we were at the Stilgers house to email.  After that we got together with Elder Peek and Elder Chardon (the other Sheldon Elders) and we tried to go to a Seik temple but we couldn't go in because we needed a reservation.  We'll do that some other time.  That night Elder Hoffmann and I did our weekly planning because we didn't have an opportunity before then.

On Tuesday we got with Elder Peek and Chardon again to go over a list of less actives in the area and plan to meet them all.  Elder Hoffmann and I were going through our area book and found a lady with very little information except for the fact that her husband is a member and she wants to be baptised so she can be sealed to her husband.  We tried to contact her but we haven't found her in yet.  Tuesday I got our white board and drew a nice tree on it and put my presents under it.  Its not quite the same as having a real tree but it's better than nothing!

I'm sorry this week is so boring.  On Wednesday we went to Zone Meeting in Harborne.  It was a good meeting.  My new zone leaders are named Elder Kulow and Elder Parr.  They're really nice.  That meeting lasted a really long time though  we barely got in on time to go to our ward coordination meeting.  Elder and Sister Morris (senior missionaries) gave us some caramel popcorn that is extremely good.  It's nice getting ready for Christmas!

Thursday morning I was feeling sick so Sister Rasmussen told us to stay in the flat until I felt better.  It sucks being in the flat so we left as soon as we could really.  It just feels like so uch time is being wasted.  We tried again to contact that lady that wants to be sealed to her husband.  We also have been going around and trying to find members who are on the record that have kids that never got baptized.  That night we had a lesson with our investigator, Salin.   We watched the biography of President Monson with him and talked about the prophets.  Have you seen that documentary?  Its dead good.  I think its called On The Lords Errand.

Friday we had our weekly planning session again... the most boring time.  Our appointment that night was cancelled too so that sucks.  We have this potential family and I really want to teach them because they seem so nice!

Saturday was just like all of the rest of the days.  A lot of finding, going to try to see some members and less actives.  We really have had no success.  I've been studying this letter though that Elder Steel gave me from a missionary in the 80s.  It was cool as I was reading the part where he had the hardest time on his mission and he mentions that he was in a small town in the suburbs of Birmingham named Spark Hill.  That's really cool because Spark Hill is part of my area now.  Its nice to read another missionary's experience here.

Sunday church was good. A lot of members gave us food and a few presents!  That was nice.  After Church we got flogged by this guy from Yemen named Adam.  We were late though so it was more our fault.  After that we went and had lunch.  Then at around 4 we went to a methodist church service where they were singing Christmas hymns and stuff!  I really enjoyed that.  We met a lot of nice people and we were able to share a little bit of our beliefs without being disrespectful.  Only if they asked (because we were guests in their church).  We spoke with the reverand and he offered us some cordial because he knew we didn't drink tea or coffee.  It was really nice and they had a really good choir.

It's been raining like crazy here.  I'm so glad i bought those rain trousers a few weeks back!  I just really want it to snow already!  It's been well cold enough.  And also very wet.  Just not snowy yet.

So I guess the primary purpose of my emails today were supposed to set up skype times... so we are going to skype at 5 oclock our time.  So that should be about 11 for you i think???  Be logged in before that also though just in case.  I don't know which account I'll call from.  maybe mine maybe theirs.  Just if you get a call then tell me.  WAIT!  What's your skype name?!?!!  If I don't know it I'll have to call from mine but tell me what it is just in case!

I love you!
-Elder Pogue

22nd Letter from England (Sheldon area)

Hey everyone!  So I have a lot to talk about but the problem is I don't have enough time!  All of the library computers in the Birmingham area are crashed....  We're at a members house using two iPads to email so it's a little hard to type.  I guess I'll just start off at the beginning of the week as usual.  That seems like ages ago!
So on Monday after emailing ElderSteel and I went to Derby after emailing.  We just wanted to do some shopping and get out of Eastwood.  That night was 'dodge night'. Where we find out about transfers and all of that.  So as you know I'm in a place called Sheldon which is literally in Birmingham.  My companions name is Elder Hoffmann.  He's from Utah.  I'm actually killing him this transfer so I was scared that he was already 'dead' which means he's too trunky to want to work.  I'll talk more about us later. ("killing him" means his time is up and is heading home!). Not the case, though!

So Tuesday was my packing day.  That morning we went so I could have a last Eats n Treats breakfast. It was so sad telling Claire and Rachael that I was leaving. Amy wasn't there yet but I told her on the phone and she hung up on me. It was really upsetting. Anyways I ate my bacon and egg cobs and had to go pack some more. I packed and packed and packed and packed a little more. I still managed to forget my TONYS!  You should send me some (:  Tuesday night we had ward coordination so that was hard saying bye to Ruby.  She has done so much for me. She's the best. Also other members like Bill Marinas (who said that I'd be back). And Peter Morrison said some really nice things. Alan Stinson said that Gemma was going to be gutted. She had asked if I could be in the confirmation circle when she got the Holy Ghost on Sunday.  She just turned 8.  That night we had young single adult family home evening where we ate pizza, made cake and played Jenga. I had to say bye to Amy, Rachael, Claire and Martin which sucked. Hopefully Rachael will get baptised soon.  She knows she needs and wants to. Claire is going on a mission later this year so that will be exciting.

On Wednesday we had transfers so Elder Steel and I woke up early and got a train to the mission home. I basically just stayed there and hung out all day. It was nice seeing all my missionary friends like Elder Harris and other people from my MTC group. Elder Hoffmann and I made it to Sheldon pretty late at night after a lot of stressful train rides with two things of luggage and a bike. Walking through Birmingham town center was nice though. It's a lot different than Eastwood so far.

Thursday morning we went and taught our only investigator. His name is Salin and he's from India. That's cool!  Sheldon is very multi cultural.  We did some finding and went to see a lot of potentials we didn't have too much success but we had fun.  We've been working hard and having a good time. He hasn't had a baptism in like 18 months so it's my goal to send him home with one.

Friday was a really good day!  We had the mission Christmas conference in Harborne.  It was great having the whole mission together. Singing hymns with all 260+ missionaries was powerful. We had a good dinner and a good devotional by President and Sister Rasmussen. President gave us a temple recommend holder with pictures of us from our trip to Gadfield Elm chapel so that's really cool. Maybe that's why I could never find one that I liked. Remember?  Again it was really great to hang out with all my mission friends and to see how they're doing.  I got 3 packages.  I only opened one because it didn't have a name or anything.  It's a bunch of hand warmers so I'm assuming that's from you?  I'm glad I openned it before Christmas because they're handy! <--- get it?  Handy....  Anyways I'm saving the rest for Christmas.

Saturday morning we went "white board finding". We wrote on a whiteboard 'what does Christmas mean to you?'  Quite a few people stopped. We got a couple solid potentials. One of them was really great. His name is Martin so hopefully you'll hear more of him later.  Saturday night we had the Sheldon ward Christmas party. That was fun and it was nice to meet some ward members. We ate food and sang christmas songs and things like that.

Sunday was good too. Sheldon ward has sacrament meeting last which I don't like much.  I met a lot of people but now it's a struggle to remember their names.  The ward is also a lot smaller.

So it's been good so far!  I've spoken to a couple of people in Arabic!  There are more Arabs/Indian here than English people is what it seems like!  It turns out my mission call was to Pakistan and not England.  Just a small mix up.  (;  that's what it seems like at least. I'm loving it so far though! A huge change of pace from Eastwood. At the same time though I miss Eastwood so much.  My relationships with the members there was amazing.

So to answer at least a couple of your questions.  On Christmas we Skype. I don't know the exact details yet though.  Sorry.  I'll let you know. I don't have a car.  There are only two areas in the mission with cars unless you're a zone leader or ap.  I do like the area and the new companion.  My flat is small. Very small. It has a nice bath tub and a fake fire place though so that's amazing. Also carpet floors.  It's been nice and warm so that's a plus.

Hope you're all doing great. I love and miss you all!  I hope you're having a great Christmas season.

Love,

Elder Evan Pogue

PS typing that much on an iPad kills!