03.11.13

Elder Nordfors & Elder Goodwin

The family of champions!

Here's the deal. . .I am going to tell you what has been going on in Galway lately. But really, there has been some good miracles here the past week. 

Last week, President Brown was in town to do some temple interviews for our branch and he decided to take us out to dinner. I was pretty scared because I had to drive when we picked him up. He paid for us all to eat at a place called Eddie Rockers and it was dang good. It is supposed to be like an old school American diner or something. Anyway, President Brown was singing along to our Disney music in the car the whole way there. It was hilarious. He is such a spiritual giant. 

I have been succeeding in becoming a master chef. I have cooked stuff like every night this past week and it's delicious. My favourite thing was some chicken korma. ha All I really did was make some rice and chicken and pour sauce on it. But it was good! I also poured an excellent bowl of cereal the other day. 

The biggest miracle of the week was probably when we were doing service for an African family. The Atairu family. We helped them move a bunch of storage and there were a few other non member friends there. After we got done moving stuff, they fed us a classic African dinner. It's so hilarious when they give us dinner, because they just guilt us into taking a TON of food. It's usually different types of chicken and spicy rice. They like really spicy food. Anyway, Elder Nordfors got guilted into taking too much and I just enjoyed myself while I watched him eat a mountain of African food for the first time. Haha he was chewing soooo slow by the end and I could tell he didn't want anymore, but you can't just stop eating or they will be offended. Then, we taught them all a lesson. We just decided to read 2 Nephi 31:10-12 and go through the Gospel of Jesus Christ lesson. One of the nonmembers there was named Winner, and she loved the whole lesson. She is really well versed in the bible and while we were teaching, we found out that she used to be a missionary for another church. She told us that she is waiting for God to show her the right path to take now and that she is very open. We read Moroni 10:3-5 with her and promised her that the Book of Mormon is what she is looking for and that the teachings in it can change her life. She LOVED the lesson and invited us to come to her house and teach her more at the end. We didn't even have to ask. ha and then she gave us her address and everything. It was really powerful. I think she is very prepared, especially since she already has friends that are members. 

We are going to try and start up an English class here. There are so many foreign people and they all want to learn English really bad. We already have lots of people who said they would come if we did it and I think it will be a really good opportunity for missionary work. I'm actually pretty excited about it. 

Yesterdays sacrament meeting was probably my favourite one of my whole mission so far. It was Mothers Day over here, so that's what everyone was talking about. They turned the time over to the congregation to go up and say why they appreciate their Moms. (they say Mums here) I got up right after the Branch Presidency because I was soo excited to tell everyone about how wonderful my Mom is. It was a really neat and spiritual experience. I'm soooo thankful for the good family that I have. Almost everyone who got up cried when they tried to talk about their Mom's. Even all the big guys who act tough all the time. They cried the most. 

Elder Nordfors is tearing it up. He is going to be a really good missionary. It's so classic to have a trainee. When we go tracting, I just stare at him until he says something because he gets too nervous unless I do that. It's pretty funny and we always have a good laugh about it. He got approached by his first drunk man a couple days ago. The man was completely plastered and he was walking around all angry holding his Ireland rugby jersey. His team must have lost or something. Anyway, I was like, "Oh no, don't look at him." And then Elder Nordfors stared straight at him so he came over and chested me up, but we just gave him a card with Jesus on it and he was happy. He only had one tooth. haha. 

I love you all! Family is what it's all about! Keep being the awesome people you all are!

Elder Goodwin