Geef de schuld aan het Boogie (Blame it on the Boogie)

Oh my goodness, I'm not sure what to say about this week, so much has happened. Goodness.

Okay, transfers were on Wednesday. That was fun; a little bit stressful-- but s'all Gucci.

Elder Silva is hilarious. He's a very talented singer, and a little ball of good times. EVERYTHING makes him trunky, and it's so funny. I'm pretty sure he does it on purpose, but it's funny just the same. 

Haarlem is a very cool place. Very different atmosphere from Rotterdam; I like it a lot. I have a few stories from the week.

Saturday we had a bunch of missionaries sleep over so that they could all make it to stake conference on time the next day. It was a nice night, but the morning after became HELL. First, we didn't know how to get there, so Elder Silva and I had to get up early to come look up how. We got back, then it happened. See first picture. Because of this we missed our bus and it became a terrible morning of trying to get there on time.

I am now suit-less, and don't have time to buy one today. SUCKKKKKKK. WE actually have an appointment today (yeah, I know), and then we have to wait for someone to come look at our washer, because that broke before I even got here. So, no P-day for us today, really, just email and grocery shopping. Also I'm feeling pretty ill today. Surprisingly, despite all this, I'm happy! How weird right?

Other stuff-- met a very cool investigator. We went bowling with him and the Elder's quorum on....... Friday? I think. I can never remember days out here. He's a very funny guy; I have a picture of him later. He sounds kind of like a mix between George Carlin and Bobcat Goldthwait. But he's a little Indian guy born in the Netherlands. I like him.

Okay, funny Dutch thing. The word "hoor"-- it is pronouned like "or" but with a very slight aspirated H. It hard to explain the meaning, but it's something kind of between calling someone buddy, and telling them thank you. And............. They will throw it at the end of almost every phrase. That's an exaggeration, but they do use it a lot. Because of that, in my last week Elder South and I did try to put it at the end of EVERY dutch phrase. People complimented our Dutch a lot! How dumb is that?

Well, here are pictures.

Dinu, the investigator, and us

The Silvanator

The street of my people. (We're gonna knock the crap out of it.)

Artsy transfer photo

The remnants of that sleep over

I sick today.

Love you all!

Elder Shaw

Tot de volgende keer, Roffa.

Good morning, good morning, It´s great to say hello.........

I´m getting transferred! To Haarlem! It´s right next to Amsterdam. I´ll be with an Elder from Portugal on his second transfer. You have absolutely no idea how excited and nervous I am. It will be difficult, but people say it´s their dream city, so I´m very lucky.

I don´t have packages. Hopefully I get them on the 16th. We´ll see! The work went much better this week! We found a ton of potentials that I´ll be leaving for Elder South and his new greenie. Yep, he´s training. I´m really going to miss him, but he´s gonna be a good trainer. Yep, Elder Shaw is feeling good. His Dutch has improved, he is getting in better shape, and had success this week! How cool is that? I´m pretty jazzed this morning I guess.

Dealing with the cold is a matter of less biking, and more layers. I will wear thermals, a white shirt, sweater, scarf, and jacket. That generally is enough for your body, so long as you also have gloves. The wind here is insane. It can push through so many layers like they´re fishing nets. But it isn´t too bad.... yet.

I have a few pictures!

This was four in the afternoon on Friday. So weird.

Someone lost a bird.

Look how European I look! It´s hilarious right? Don´t worry, I don´t dress like this every day.

We got an advent calender.

Elder South is sleepy on the train.

Elder South got the swag on.

Pretty lights. Rotterdam is pretty at night

Good bye everybody! 'Til next week!

Elder Shaw

IT`S FREEZING

It´s hard to know what to say about this week. It was hard. Most of our appointments canceled, so we ended up doing a lot of contacting. Which yielded....... nothing. But, I do have a few stories and some pictures to go along with them.

Thanksgiving was a lesson on the wonders of the internet. The family that fed us got all of the recipes online, and it ended up being a very good meal. That was a good experience. 

Baptisms. Nearest is in January. We´ll see what happens.

Okay, picaturs. (No, that isn´t Dutch)

Okay! This handsome devil is Raymond. He was a less active member who has recently started coming back to church. We meet with him a decent amount.

Well! He got us presents! Hahahaha. We were very surprised. He got us chocolate letters and hand knitted us scarves--which I am currently wearing. This is us with the stuff. 

This is the fine Dutch art of achteropping. (literal translation: after-on-ing or behind-on-ing) I took this very cool picture out with the sisters one night. I was on the back of a bike with Elder South when I took this picture. 

I made a cake!

Then I covered it with peanut butter and sprinkles.

Ja, toch? Of niet? Ja wel!

South and I had a very cool week. We had some awesome lessons; people are coming along well for the most part. The sad bit is, WE CAN´T FIND GULIA! She hasn´t responded to us and hasn´t been at church. We don´t know what´s happened! UGH!!! It blows.

But Eliza brought a friend to church! That was really cool. I had to translate for her. I did okay! It´s kind of weird though, because translating directly into English isn´t hard, but trying to translate into simplified English while defining unfamiliar gospel terms is REALLY HARD.

If you can´t tell by the many phrases of capital letter screaming it has been an emotional week. Ups. Downs. Shake it all arounds.

Do things like Dad? I dunno, Dad, what did you do? I make it an effort never to mix my Dutch and my English, especially when speaking English. We refer to that as Nederengels. Missionaries are notorious for doing it, but I´ve noticed that all the people truly good at the language never do it. SO! I have made it an effort not to do that! I get sick of hearing about how "Lekker" things are. Or people talking about how many "Doop"-dates they have. Ewwwwwwwwwwwwww.

Most fun moment of the week? Well, we did some service for a member this week. He had all of the missionaries there. So we all sang a bunch of songs and had a really great time while helping him get his new house ready to be moved in. It was definitely fun.

Well, the big thing to say about Dutch holiday traditions is a big topic of debate over here right now. They have a very catholic Santa Claus, and then his helper, Zwarte Piet (Black Pete). Black Pete is always a white person, dressed in black face, with very red lips, and he´s Santa´s little helper. Thus, the country is caught in some civil war over whether or not it´s racist to keep a children´s holiday tradition around because it has to do with race. I´m really tired of hearing about it, and it´s ALWAYS in the freaking newspapers. Dumb.

Here are a few pictures!

PONY! IT´S SO CUTE AND LITTLE!

(Mom note: the entire picture didn't download in the email)

Elder Bitters and bikes. (Crouching Pony, Hidden Exchanges)

Rotterdam at night (Meaning 5 in the afternoon)

Artsy picture of really awesome dart throw by Elder South

Good bye!

Elder Shaw

Dutch rain ruins clothes!

It´s true. I have clothing that has been stained and ties that have changed color because of the rain here. How ridiculous is that?!

This week has been wet, and cold! I wear a scarf and jacket everyday. It´s kind of funny; the colder it gets, the less we look like missionaries and the more we look like everyone else. Since we´ve had to start pretty much always keeping the white shirt covered, we don´t really get call outs on the street. Just feels strange to NOT be stared at constantly. People still stare at the badge of course, but they don´t really notice it when you go hauling by on a bike.

The best thing about being in a big city is...... It´s fun! It´s lively; there´s a pleasant hustle and bustle to the streets, but not one too intense:

Mom Note: Elder Shaw wanted me to put in a picture of the Shibuya District in Tokyo, to show you what he meant. We happened to be here a few years ago and the crossing at the intersection outside the train station was exactly like this--so full of people! He thought it was really a little too congested, and assures me that Rotterdam is not like this!

We live nearly right in the center of the city, so It´s very cool to have all that business constantly around you. Then, when it gets too much we can go and work in the suburbs! So that´s nice, too! 

I will probably get transferred. That will be on Dec. 10th. Yay?

I can read Dutch and all that just fine. But there´s this super annoying thing about street names here. They are not marked well; sometimes you have to go down three streets just to figure out where the heck you are, and they´re SUPER LONG! Also, many streets in an area will have the same beginning, but just different endings. e.g., Crooswijksestraat, Crooswijkselaan, Croosewijkseweg, Crooswijksebak, and so on and so forth. Dumb right?

Pictures!

Us in Raymond´s swaggin' shades

Have pamphlet, will teach. (Chinese Edition)

It´s cold!

Zwolle tickets: So espensive!

Zwolle Group: Thom, Cook, Neptune, Taggart, Roemer, Kemp, Me!

Geen belangstelling!

We hear that phrase at the door a lot.
Not a bad week I guess. We did a ton of contacting! It's hard sometimes, but we gotta keep pushing through!

I'm not really sure what to say about the week. We really have mainly been contacting, trying to increase our likelihood of coming across someone with interest in our message. It's not common, sadly. We did have Eliza come to church again! She is progressing very well! We are very excited about working with her. Gulia is still coming along as well. Her baptismal date was moved, but I should still be here to see it! YAY! 

I guess I can talk about today--

I'm in Zwolle right now! It's very cool. That's why the email is late today. Elder Kemp invited me to come with him to see one of his old companions, Jeremy Romer. We met Elder Taggart and a few other missionaries I haven't told you about out here and are having a very good time. Sadly, I forgot my camera. The pictures will come next week after I get them from Kemp! Don't worry! We did get permission from President to be here. We aren't just going apostate. ;D

P-day schedule: wake up, breakfast. Email! Grocery shopping. Do some cleaning! Find something to do with other missionaries! Games, sports, shopping, museum visits, anything really! Do that until dinner, then we have to work again afterward!

Favorite Dutch food: I like Oliebollen. I will have a picture of them for you next week. All they really are is Dutch, round beignets. I also enjoy Stampot. Basically mashed potatoes with things in. Very good.

Inspiring thoughts/notes from the week:

If you don't have anything nice to say, definitely don't say it to a Dutch person!

It can be difficult, sometimes it just feels like it absolutely is terrible, sometimes it sucks, sometimes you hate it, sometimes you wish you were done, or just asleep in bed. BUT! It's all good. No worries! I love it despite all that can be thrown at me!

Much love; pictures next week!

Elder Showuh*

*Why the crap is my name hard for DUTCH people to pronounce? I mean really!

Helloooooooooo, I´m Elder Shawwww (Rotterdam, Week 13)

First off, Elder South! He is....... Seth. Like, in so many ways. Similar mannerisms; he has that same really high pitched laugh. We have a lot of fun! But it´s a little easy to get distracted during study time......

Dutch is coming along pretty well. I think I´ve dreamed in it. But languages are so mixed here I can end up speaking English, Dutch, and the little bit of German I remember in the same appointment. I really want my Dutch to improve, but haven´t had the chance to do my language study in many days. Luckily I should have it again tomorrow I believe. 

Jus´ trow it on tha blog. It `ll be grand. 

Investigators? Gulia is progressing well (Yeah, apparently it´s spelt with a G). We are trying to figure out when she is going to be baptized, because for some reason she is very nervous. So hopefully that turns out for the best. We honestly had a somewhat bittersweet week. Saturday we contacted a referral from the office that is very positive, and she came to church yesterday! It was very exciting! But other than that... most of our appointments have fallen through. Every single appointment yesterday fell through, including our dinner one. And no one told us that they were canceled, we just arrived at their houses and no one was there. It sucked. It sucked hard. It sucked donkeys. It sucked eggs. It sucked like a mosquito. It, yeah, it sucked.

Yeah, we had daylight savings time. We actually had it last week! Not this one. It gets dark very early now. Which blows.

I have a few pictures.

This was outside that new investigators house. I thought it was rad.

Last anime stance with Taggart

Elder South and Elder Shaw