January 29: Fun week with the uke

Hello everyone! 

This week was pretty awesome. On Monday we were able to go to a members house and have a pancake party and stuff. He made us some madár tej which directly translated means bird milk. It is pretty similar to egg nog in America but more of a vanilla pudding taste. The member said that it is called "floating islands" in America. I have never heard of that before but I guess that is what it is called in english. But it was really fun. We played "Sorry". Which after much backstabbing and fighting I emerged victorious! 

On Tuesday we went over to a members house for lunch and then later in the evening we had another appointment with a less active member. It was a party. The weather recently has been really weird. It usually snows in the really early mornings so when we wake up there is snow, but in the afternoon it rains and melts all of the snow and then the wind blows really hard and dries everythings and it all repeats the next morning. It happened, like, 3 days in a row this week. 

Wednesday we went up to Budapest to have a leadership meeting. It was originally planned to be held from 10-1 and then we would go home. Well... because of people always bringing up very unlikely hypothetical situations and asking for how to solve them we ended up going 2 1/2 hours over! It was such a long meeting! 

Thursday we didn't do much. The sisters were in charge of district meeting because my companion thought it would be fun to see what happened. We ended up doing about 10 minutes of spiritual things and then they had us do a personality test.... I guess I am a "Defender" according to the 16 personalities test. It was an interesting meeting. 

Friday we went up to Szolnok and had a split over there. My split companion was sick so I stayed inside the whole time and became a pro with the uke. I can jam out to "Lava". It was quiet interesting. 

I think that is pretty much everything interesting that happened this week. I hope all of you had an equally amazing week!! 

Biesinger elder 

January 15

Hello everyone,

This week was pretty fun. We had a lot of fun adventures. I think I forgot several of them so you will just be getting the most memorable ones.

On Saturday we had a lesson planned with someone who lived in a small falú about 30 minutes out of Szeged. It was a kind of weird address and location so we made sure that we invited on of the youth members who had a phone so that if we got lost he could figure out where we needed to go. Well... he canceled on us about an hour before we were scheduled to leave. We were also rushing home from holding a 24-hour exchange with the the district leaders in Kecskemét. So we got home, dropped off our stuff at our apartment and went to the bus station to get out to the village. We got there and due to miscommunication we started off our journey lost. We called the potential investigator and she gave us some instructions, then we called our member so that he could look up on a computer what we had to do. Both of the people were telling us different things. So after a while we the lady (potential investigator) sent her son to show us the way from the train station. We had to go on this little deer trail for about 10 minutes and then 30 minutes on these crazy complicated dirt roads. We wouldn't have every made it without her son guiding us. Today we tried to find it on google maps and it didn't have some of the roads we went on. It was pretty exciting. But yeah, after about 1-1 1/2 hours we found it and had a grand old lesson.

While we were on splits the elder that I was instructing wanted to have a rematch with some KFC buckets. I think I wrote about it like 3-4 months ago but we all ate a bucket of KFC except for one elder. Well he made it to Kecskemét and insisted that we do it again. So we went for our lunch break. The other elder (who had been there longer) said that it was at the mall. So we left. We headed out the opposite way of the mall. At first I thought that there was a different mall and that was why we were going out in the other direction, but after a time it became evident that we were getting to the outskirts of town. Well.... I called the other elders and found out that the mall, that was 2 minutes away from the apartment, was the one that we wanted... Only few people can get lost going to a building that you can see from their house. 

On Sunday we need to translate for a guy from Japan who is here for school. A little background. Yesterday my companion was saying that if someone speaks Hungarian well enough they usually are asked to give at least one talk in church. Well.... after the 3rd hour one of the branch presidency came up to me and said "you must speak really good Hungarian if you are able to translate the talks in sacrament meeting". This man knew his stuff... They always compliment you and butter you up and then stab the hot knife into you. He continued to compliment my Hungarian skills for a couple seconds and then said "since you speak so well we want you to give a talk in Sacrament meeting". They do this to everyone! Whether or not they speak good Hungarian. Oh well.... practice is always a good thing. 

The rest of this week was good. We had some really cool lessons with investigators and had some parties tracting with only a few angry/rude people. Weather has been good. Last week it was getting really warm and awesome but this week it got really cold and is now snowing... I guess there is still hope for a snowball fight! :)

I got some pictures this week. 1) While my companion was talking on the phone I started building a card houses. 2)There is a weird kind of monument on top of a hill here and on one of the signs the catholics used our Jesus for their stuff. The one from the most recent Bible videos. It was really weird to see. 3-4) the monument 5-6) my companions previous companion collected little pokemon things and during our weekly calls with the missionaries he would impale old oranges with them and stuff... Party. 

Hope you all have a great week!! 

Biesinger elder 

January 15: More Pictures and Important Story

So... I forgot to tell this story. Last Monday we received that one of the sisters investigators found an injured pigeon. She brought it home and tried to care for it. When she brought it back to the square where she found it she put it down, it sat up, looked around, and then fell over dead. On Wednesday she called the sisters and asked if they could meet. They met in the branch house and the lady brought her bird. The sweet dear lady has some mental hardships. She brought the birds and asked the sisters to pray over it and bring it back to life. It didn't work. So she told them to make us  go over there and give it a priesthood blessing. We had a lesson so we couldn't go over. They scheduled to meet at 3 to bless it again. We got there about 2:30, looked at the bird, thought about it. And then like all parents do with animals that die (if you haven't told your children yet don't read this next part) we threw it away and told the lady that it is in a far better place then here in the cold of Szeged. She took it really well. She told us that now the bird can fly forever with God. Sweet dear lady. But now she has a testimony about priesthood power and the Plan of Salvation.  

And then the other picture is of a dinner appointment with my dad's friend. 

January 8: Jaj....crazy week

Hello everyone!! 

So I guess I neglected to tell this in my last email. I got a transfer call to go to Szeged as Zone Leader with elder Garrett! I was pretty surprised considering I had just barely gotten to Érd. But I got to move again. I love being here in Szeged. It is a pretty big city and the people are pretty awesome. A cool thing that happened on Sunday is that I was able to meet with a member that my dad baptized! She has been a really active member for about 20 years. It was really cool to see how much things that missionaries do can change peoples lives for a long time. I am so happy to be able to follow in my dad's footsteps here in Szeged! 

For P-day today we started it all of with a nice round of squash ball (sorry if the spelling is wrong). It is pretty similar to racketball except the ball is super super not bouncey. If you just drop it on the ground it won't bounce up. But, it is rubber so if you hit it hard enough it will get the job done! But yeah. It was a lot of fun. My companion has been here in Szeged for about 6 months and so he is pretty good at it so I lost every time to him. But I was able to toy with my rounds with the sisters in the district which was pretty fun! After that we went to a court to play basketball. It was an outdoor court and the material on the ground was really slick so it was hard to play with cuts and stuff. My companion played in highschool so he is really good. After the sisters left we had a 3-pointer contest (my companion and I) and I destroyed him every time. He has a lot better technique and is about 6 foot 5 so once we are down around the rim he can destroy me pretty much every time. But with the 3-pointers I could hold my own! 

I can't think of anything huge that happened this week. We got cussed out by a drunk bacsi because we were trying to help him and he kept telling us that we can't help him because we don't speak Hungarian.... I guess everyone needs humbling moments like these :) The members are really cool here. We are meeting with some awesome investigators and the Lord is blessing our work! It has been really exciting to see it grown, even within the short amount of time the I have been here. 

I hope all of you have a great week! Things are booming here in Hungary! Thank you all for your love and support and updates!! I love reading about everyone!! I will send pictures next week! 

Sok Szeretettel:

Biesinger elder 

January 2: Pink Party!

Hey,

So this week (two weeks) since I email has been great! We were able to celebrate Christmas Hungarian style, lots of fish soup, herbal/fruit tea (cause we don't drink other tea), and huge meals several times a day. I must say I am not a huge fan of the tea and fish soup. Usually. We went to one of our investigators homes for Christmas eve and they gave us fish soup that was pretty good. They puree the fish soup so it is a kind of creamy soup, and then add fish chunks. They also put in something else and refused to tell us until after we ate it. Every sensible person would probably take that as a sign that they probably shouldn't eat it. But since when were missionaries ever normal? And they insisted that it would be delicious. So we ate it. It turned out to be big clumps of fish eggs... Awesome. Well, I am becoming experience with the Hungarian specialties! 

This week I was attacked by the pink eye. It was pretty great! I made sure not to take any pictures :) No one else got sick with it so that is good. 

For new years we went to a members home, not until 12, and had a party.... kind of. It was with his new girl friend so it was kind of interesting..... But we have to acquire the experience of a Hungarian new year somehow right? 

So these are some pictures!! 

The first one is of our Christmas party a couple weeks ago when one of the delightful missionaries snuck up behind me and strangled me. Second is of a friend from Kispest that came for a visit and insisted I make a sign. Third is pretty normal but there is a story behind it. Right before this there was a little kid that was attacking me and maybe almost breaking me suit, bag, coat, and yeah. So I tricked him into going into a room and then closed the door and during the picture I am holding the door and preventing him from getting out. Everyone had to adjust around me. But yeah... I had the them open the door to the church and then after the other missionaries made it to there I let go of the door and ran... Sometimes the greatest dangers of missionary work come from those who you should be able to trust:) Oh... and I am blinking. Can't make that picture any more perfect! 

Over all it was a great week and the holidays were really good! Oh, we had a baptism on the 23. Not my companionship, but it was in our district. It was really cool. I was able to see some dear friends who came to support the girl that was baptized. It was a perfect Chirstmas gift! I got some amazing gifts from family and friends! I will have to take some pictures of some of them and show you all... Some are pretty atrocious! 

I hope you all had amazing holidays!!! 

Biesinger Elder 

December 18: What would you do for your companion?

This week was a fun week. Nothing much happened though. Our baptismal date canceled on us but rescheduled for January 20th. We met with a man who loves the Bible and has read the Book of Mormon before and was kind of mad cause he thought we were trying to replace the Bible. After we explained that neither one replaces the other he was really open and awesome! We had a really good discussion with him and we agreed on almost all of the points of "discussion" that come up when talking about religion (about baptism, the Godhead, attributes of God and the Spirit) It was really refreshing! 

 Yesterday my companion and I were tracting on the outskirts of town and we were going into this hilly area. We turned a corner and there was this freaky ghost town set up thing... It was at about 7 in the evening so it was pretty dark and the street was weirdly lighted. We walked up the street to make sure we got all of the houses on the street. All of the houses had signes on them explaining their history. It was fun, just kind of creepy. At the top of the street there was a field (which was on top of a tall hill). It gave us a really good view of Érd and part of Budapest with their night light stuff... My companion likes taking pictures of stuff like this (Hence the uploaded pictures). The only problem was was that it was really woody (the area around the field) so we had to walk down this really steep hill in the dark that had a ton of underbrush. My companion couldn't get a good angle because there  were a couple of trees in the way. So me, being the awesome companion I am, climbed further down the hill, had a nasty encounter with some kind of prickly bush, and grabbed a couple trees by the top and pulled them over so they weren't in my companions way. Afterwards he took a picture which kind of shows how dense the foliage was! It was a party! And I only almost died twice because of things that will not be mentioned! :) So the question stands. What would you do for your companion? 

I hope you all had a great week! I will not be emailing next week due to Christmas! I hope all of your weeks go AMAZING! Merry Christmas!! 

Biesinger Elder 

December 11:Dracula

Hello y'all,

This week was a lot of fun. It started of with a great P-day in Budapest! We went to Castle Hill and into the labryrinth beneath the castle where it is believed Count Dracula was kept prisoner. It was a lot of fun. there were sections were there is a fog machine and we couldn't see a foot in front of us. My companion disappeared and the jumped out and scared the sisters a lot. It was a party. While we were walking around (after we came back to the surface) it started to snow! Lot of fun. After we left the sisters we went to the mission home for interviews and then went back to Érd and played games with the other elders till the end of our P-day.

Tuesday. We went to a members home and had a really good lunch. I guess there is a thing here in Hungary (maybe in America too) that says that if you have a clean plate after a meal (you wipe it clean with bread or something) then, depending on how clean it is, the next day will be just as sunny. So if there are a couple marks on the plate then there will be clouds the next day. Interesting theory. We tried it out and guess what! It was still really cloudy and rainy:) I always love working in the cold and wet! It is just so much more fun for me (I'm not being sarcastic)! Maybe cause it is more like the first missionaries who had to do similar. I now this is nothing CLOSE to how hard it was to them, but it still is fun to think about!  Right after lunch we rushed home to change into sporting gear. One of our investigators invited us to play soccer with a group of her friends. So we went. It was a lot of fun. About 30 minutes into it I felt some blisters on my feet. They hurt pretty bad but when you are playing sports there is no stopping. About 50 minutes in I made a really hard cut while running with the ball and I felt a lot of pressure build up in one blister, then a little pop and the pressure left. It was a pretty interesting feeling... When we got home I took of my shoe and thought that my sock was just wet from the sweat. I took of my sock and lo and behold the bottom of my foot had blood all over it!!! SUPER AWESOME!!! My blood blister grew and popped while playing, in addition to this I had weird lacerations around the blister.... Super cool! After hobbling around for about 5 days the pain left and I was able to walk like a normal person!!!! 

Thursday and Friday we went to help a member finish chopping his wood. It was a lot of fun! He took a bunch of pictures and send that he would send them but he hasn't yet. I will be sure to send them in an email whenever I get them! 

Saturday we went to the branch house to practice a song with a member. My companion has a pretty good singing voice and so he was singing a Hungarian Christmas song and his sister is an incredible singer so they are working through the member and both singing parts to the song and the member is compiling it for them. So we practiced that for a long time. I was the camera man and had to hold the camera about a foot above my head so my shoulders died!! Good exercise I guess... After the practice I was able to have an interview with one of the other elder's investigators!! She is 14 and comes from a not-very-religous family. She has incredible faith and is getting baptized in a couple of weeks!!! 

It has been a really great week! Lots of fun things happened and are happening!! 

I hope all of your weeks were equally wonderful, and if not, that this upcoming one will be even better!!!! 

Biesinger Elder 

P.S. Somebody else has the pictures from our Budapest adventure so I will send those once I get them.

The girl is Dorka, the one getting baptized. and then thos are the goodies we got from the branch! 

I am sorry these are coming in a series of small emails..... Don't judge. It was cold...