February Milestones

Christian hit the 8-month mark
and was assigned his first new area since arriving in his mission.

He will also turn 20 years old this month!

First Transfer -- Sittingbourne

from Jen’s e-mail:

             I looked up your address on Google Maps streetview and I think I saw where you live.  At least I saw a sign on the driveway that said "Albion Mews."  Are you in the house facing the street or in a house behind it? 

            Sittingbourne looks like a nice little town.  I read that the main jobs are working at the paper plant and making bricks.  Even their football team is called the “Brickies."  You'll have to tell me more about St. Michael's church in town – it looks pretty historic.  Oh – and how's the driving?  I seemed like there were a lot of random one-way streets in town :)

reply to Jen’s e-mail:

            Our house is the one on the street, and we are WAYYY up top in the loft, our flat is just a loft conversion. I really like it though.  It’s a nice place. 

            Yeah we have a car! I don’t need a British license yet. But I need to practice up on driving on the left. Our area is really big, and it’s all on country roads, so I am stoked. Having a car is something.  We are switching our car for a stick shift, so I will have to learn to do that before I drive for reals, haha.   Elder Jensen does all the driving.  He is really good at stick shift.  I need to start getting stuff done for my license before my American one expires. It’s fun stuff.
            Sittingbourne is very . . . English.   There are not that many people and we just travel around little villages in our car.

reply to Michael’s e-mail:

            So to answer some of your questions –

            Yes, there are more missionaries nearby.  There are a couple of sisters who are in the Gillingham 1st Ward, and we are in the Gillingham 2nd Ward.  We always give them rides places and we work really closely with one another.

            Yes, I am a senior companion now – moving up the ranks, haha.  Just kidding, but yeah, I am senior. Elder Jensen is only a transfer younger than me though, so it’s good to work with somebody around the same mission age as I am. 
            Well, I’ve got to go -- time is money.

Albion House, 30 London Road, Sittingbourne, Kent
(downloaded from Google maps -- streetview)

Moving . . .

Hey there loved ones,

            Well it looks like I will be moving!!!!!! I am moving to Sittingbourne, Kent, which is in the Canterbury Zone.  Kinda weird.  It is pretty much right across the river from where I am now.  We have a car in that area so that will be nice.  My companion will be Elder Jensen from Utah.  I think he has only been out a few transfers.

            Anywho, I am excited to move.  Dover and Canterbury are really close by so I can go check those out on p-days.  However I will not be able to go into London much, which is a bummer.

            Still it’s kind of sad.  I have said good bye to people like Andy and Chris who I am REALLY going to miss. I will definitely have to keep in touch with them. People grow on you when you stay in an area for seven and a half months.  It makes it hard to move on.

            But I am really excited.  I hear Elder Jensen is a great missionary who works hard, and as long as he does that I am sure we can get along great. Sounds like a cool kid and a good hard-working missionary, which is what I need.

            This Sunday there was a lady from Peru who came to sacrament meeting. I didn’t know who she was so I talked to her afterward.  She did not speak any English at all. I thought it was so cool that she was so dedicated to keeping the Sabbath day holy, that she went to a church meeting even though she did not understand it at all. It really touched my heart. I spoke what little Spanish I have learned over the years to her.  She found out I was from America and thought I spoke Spanish fluently.  She went off a million miles an hour in Spanish.  I picked up two things – “spirito santos” and  “El Libro De Mormon” haha. But she was really a lovely lady, bless her.

            I am SO glad you guys are reading the Book of Mormon. What a book!

            This week it has been snowing for like three days straight.  The place has pretty much shut down.

            Not much else is happening.  I’m  just doing my thang.

Love you guys,

Elder Purdy

Well Chuffed Over Two Baptismal Dates . . . and Praying to King Edward Longshanks

Hey there one and all.

            I hope you guys are doing well. I had a fantastic week last week.

            We found two people that are preparing to be baptized on February 10th!  Their names are Michael Everett, and Lucia Everett. I am really excited about them, Michael is Lucia's son.  They have family that are members of the church, and they know the bishop really well.  They came to church last week which was really exciting. And they really fit in with everyone. I am super stoked on them.

             We also found a super rad guy named Thomas Hooke.  He’s like 21 and has a friend in Grays who is a member. He is interested in the gospel.  He asked us questions about polygamy and said he thought the idea of us practicing the polygamy way back then was pretty cool and that he liked it.  Strange, but it is better than the other reactions we get to it.

            Transfers are next week, so don’t send any letters yet till I find out what is happening.

            Had interviews with President Jordan.  He is truly an inspired man.  We talked for a good hour about . . . well all sorts of things -- the Book of Mormon, England, home, and what is going to happen when all these missionaries start pouring in.  It is truly an exciting time to be a missionary. Our mission is like doubling in size.

            Also, we went sightseeing yesterday in London, and because we are ministers we got into Westminster Abbey for free, which was nice.  So we were walking in there (super cool place) and then one of the clergy came up and said, "Oh, you are ministers, come follow me."  So we followed him and he took us behind the coronation seat to the stone casket of KING EDWARD LONGSHANKS.  I had no idea what was going on.  I was in shock.  And then the clergy guy calmly just said, "Let us pray."

            What the heck?????? 

            Anyways, he gives us a piece of paper with a written prayer on it, and we literally prayed to King Edward right in front of where his remains are lying. I don’t think I will ever say "King Edward bless us" as many times as I did in that prayer haha. It was a good time.  There were four missionaries there and we all did not know what we were doing. 

            After that the guy took us around to where Handel is buried and Charles Dickens, and Mary Queen of Scots and explained some of the stories behind them. I loved it.

            Here are some pictures.  Love you guys.

CHEERIO

People are Loving Us

Ahoy there everybody,

            We had a really good week this week.  We found a ton of people that are interested in learning about the gospel!

            One day we were tracting and we ran into a lady named Anne.  She seemed kind of awestruck when she answered the door.  We started talking about the plan of salvation and then she got kind of spooked out and she said, "You guys are freaking me out.  I was just sitting in my kitchen, thinking about what the purpose of life was, and then you guys showed up."  

            I love moments like that.  She was really interested and we will go see her this week. I will let you know how things go.

            I am really enjoying everything that is going on. People around here are loving us for some reason. I think they think it’s cool that they have two guys walking around their town like the Book of Mormon musical haha.

            That has definitely caused some waves around here. It makes everybody interested in the actual book itself. I guess any publicity is good publicity. And we always get on the topic of Native Americans too. People here love anything to do with Native Americans.

            For instance, Mom you sent me those Native American socks that have buffalo on them. Whenever I wear them and people see them they think they are the coolest thing in the world.  I even got asked once if I had thrown a tomahawk hahaha.  I love how fascinated with that stuff these people are.

            England is great.

            brothas and sistas . . . adieu

Elder Purdy

The End ... of 2012

Elders Purdy, Hansen, Smith, McCormack
Southend-on-Sea, Essex, England

Merry Christmas One and All!

Here is a picture of me on High Street by a Christmas tree.

For Christmas we are going to some members’ house...and church.   

It’s a really English thing to go to church on Christmas so we are doing that for an hour.

            I love you all . . . have a Merry Christmas.

Merry Chris-mice

             I am certainly feeling the Christmas spirit.   The ward here has been super nice and have given us presents and fed us a lot.  I love the holidays.

            On a much more sober note . . . we have no investigators.  We have people we are teaching . . . but they aren’t really going anywhere.

            And on a much more solemn note, we have mice in our flat!!!! I am so angry about it.  We found one on Thursday night and we bought traps, but they just aren’t working! So my brilliant companion decided to buy an airgun to get rid of them.  So we have a pretty strong air pistol to get rid of these vermin.  I hope we can get rid of them soon.

In his Christmas phone call Christian told us that his Christmas miracle was catching two mice -- in one trap.

Foxes

Christian finally put some pictures up on the photo-sharing site we set up.  We were so excited to see that he had uploaded 35 pictures . . . until we realized that 32 of them were of foxes.

Christian wrote:

"One night we were just walking home and some fox was digging a hole in a park and then it started running circles around us.  Then its friend joined in.  We were playing with [them] and it was way fun.  They got super close....it was cool.  I wanted to pet one but it would have probably bit me.  They have really sharp teeth."

Baby Blessing

Ahoy friends and family,

            One thing that happened this week was with a part-member family.  They have a little two-year-old named Evelyn and they had never given her a baby blessing like all member families do. Well they both decided that they wanted me to do it! So I did that yesterday.  It was really cool to do it for a kid that wasn’t my own.  I felt very honored to do it for them.

            I guess the biggest news is the Book of Mormon musical is coming to London, which should be interesting.  Elder McCormack and I were on a bus and everybody had their newspapers and were reading them.  On EVERY single front page there was the phrase in big gold letters "the Mormons are coming."   Needless to say we got some strange looks on that bus ride.

            Everything is good.  We are just preaching the gospel in Southend . . . it is as simple as that. 

            Read your scriptures.

Elder Purdy