06.06.12

Walking trail outside our flat.

I am writing my email today, because the past few days were bank holidays. I am not sure what that even means, but they randomly have days off where all the banks, libraries and most stores are closed. There were just people partying all over the place. It was also a holiday because the olympic torch came through Coleraine on Monday. We didn't get to see it, but the party for it was going on directly across the river from our flat.

 

Thats pretty awesome that Connor got his call to Argentina. I think Andrew Wilson is there, but I'm not positive. He will be surrounded by small latinos haha.

 

It has been WAY nice these last couple weeks. We didn't have to wear our suits most of the days, just our slacks and white shirt. I even got to wear my short sleeved shirts. Unless it's warm and not raining, we have to wear suits. It was such good weather, I even got sunburned. It got up to like 85 farenheit one day. It's pretty rainy today though. The weather here is way random hah.

 

We walk a ton here. We don't have a car or anything, so we walk EVERYWHERE. I actually enjoy it though, especially when it's not raining haha. I think our area could really use a car because we cover a few different towns, but we can't get anywhere except Coleraine. Gas is just too expensive here though. USA drivers license's are valid for a year here, so we don't have to get new ones. We just renew our licenses after a year.

 

Everyone is getting pretty excited about the olympics being here. They have a giant outdoor TV in Belfast with a countdown for the Olympics. We were there for Zone Conference and got to see it. There are olympic souvenirs in almost every store. Belfast actually isn't that dangerous anymore. I would say the place where fools still fight about religion the most is London Derry. They even fight about the name. Catholics call it Derry and Protestants call it London Derry. So on signs and stuff it says London Derry/Derry. haha that is also why they built the peace bridge, to symbolize peace between the protestants and catholics, but everyone thinks it's foolish. Sometimes we go to our mission leaders house and tell him we love the rangers (the main protestant team) and his non member wife gets mad at us because she is Catholic haha. It gets INTENSE when the Rangers and the Celtics ( the catholic team) place each other. After the game, there will be drunk people celebrating for days in the streets. haha I love watching drunk people walk around. It is a classic sight here, especially on Saturdays.

 

This week has been pretty good though. We are really starting to see some good results of the fast everyone is doing. We had 6 less actives at church and we found a new investigator. He also came to church. It is really good for the branch to see new faces at church because there hasn't been much happening here in years. It was fast Sunday, so all the member talked about there conversion in their testimonies. It was way good, and our investigator said he wants to go next week too. His name is Aiden. He actually found us on the street. He is a pretty bad alcoholic, but he really wants to change. I would say that is the number 1 problem for people over here. Alcohol. We had a lesson with him on Saturday and he came to church on Sunday, which is pretty amazing. We brought Norman (our mission leader) with us because he had a huge problem with alcohol before he met the missionaries. He helped the lesson SO much. It went very well.

 

We got to go out to dinner last night. It was epic, we went to a place called Pizza Pomodoros. I got the meat feast pizza and it was delicious. A family named the Kilgors took us and paid for us. Our meals uaually include barbequed chicken, sandwiches, frozen pizza or hot and spicy chicken, so it was a good change of menu haha. I don't mind those other foods though, I actually really enjoy them usually. I haven't had any really gross food except for that awful polish soup. Polish soup is of the devil haha.

 

Well, I really do love you all and thank you for your letters, prayers and support. I hope you all have a good week. I pray for you all. I love you.

 

Elder Goodwin