February Blues (but not really)

Ça  va? Ja, ça va.

It's funny the traces of French that make it into Vlaams (Flemish).

Coming out of the Tram Stop in Antwerpen
Elder Reese, Elder Hill and Elder Lott

This week has been a wild one.  First of all, I want to say this week was great!  But before I talk about that I'll talk about February Blues.  Even though this last week has been great I found myself feeling a little down which was super weird.  Then I started reading in my journal for some random reason and I realized that same thing happened last year around this time.  It's the February Blues!  In the winter here the sun hardly ever comes out, in fact last year I kept a tally of how long I went without getting direct sunlight, it was 3 months. This year hasn't been quite as bad, but the effect is the same.  So today I'm going to go get some Vitamin D tablets, that seemed to fix it last year.  I guess that's a tip for anyone coming here to Europe during the winter.  Also, I don't want it to seem like I'm super depressing because I'm not, I'm loving life.  But a funny story from this week would be that our hot water has been pretty unusable this week because one of the heaters in our house sprung a leak.  So we had to borrow a space heater from a member, and to have a warm shower the other person had to run around like a bucket brigade catching the water from a leaky heater for as long as the other wanted to take a shower.  Ok, end of sad stories, now we'll talk about how the week really went. :)

Broken Heater

We were really able to get some good work in this week, looking up some more people Elder Reese knew when he was here the first time and one of the people we looked up we were able to set on Baptismal date!  His name is Fxx and he is from Suriname.  He is a super cool miracle.  Its crazy how many people have fallen through the cracks that we are picking back up.  We were also able to get some solid finding in to get some new investigators.  On Saturday morning we found a golden street. We were able to find 5 new people, and 2 families to teach!  It's crazy how much success we can see as 2 older, obedient, hard working missionaries.  The Lord truly blesses, guides, and helps us and all his servants.  I am convinced that any missionary who is willing to give themselves completely to the Lord and go out and work hard will not struggle for extended periods of time to see success on their mission.  Maybe it won't come in the amounts or in the timing that we would like, but this is His work and it will get done in the Lords time and His way, and He will help us progress along the way.  

Timing
Elder Dallin H. Oaks
Ensign, October 2003

This week we were also able to have our first exchanges under the new system.  (I don't know if I've explained this in previous emails.  The old way we did exchanges was that zone leaders would exchange with everyone in the zone during a transfer, which meant that we would almost always be on the road, going from one exchange to another.  The new way that the Quorum of the 12 and First Presidency would like us to do it is having zone leaders always stay in their areas. They only go on exchanges with district leaders, and the district leader and their companion both come to our area.  This is so that they can see an example of a model area to learn and pattern their work after. Also so that when missionaries get to their prime they have the biggest chance possible to see success in their own area and really make a difference rather then always be on exchanges all the time.  I feel like this is an inspired move, and that the Lord is hastening His work.) With that, we were able to work with the Elders from Brussels this week.   I got to work with Elder Roberts, from Dallas(ish) Texas.  He is a super funny kid and is amazing at contacting people, really not being a robot and treating people like people.  Super cool to work with him.  

Also this week we were able to go up to the mission home (close to Den Haag/Leiden) for Mission Leader Council.  That is always super cool to have every month, it's been good to see how the mission works and councils to overcome problems and move the mission forward.

This last week was a super good one for the Zone.  We taught more total lessons as a zone this week than we have in quite awhile, maybe a year or more, I still need to look back in the records.  Our missionaries are so solid!

Love you all!

-Elder Hayden Lott

Dag! Salut!

Question of the Week:  Does anyone in Europe care about the Super Bowl?

Answer:  Americans in Europe care about the Super Bowl.  Plus maybe one random Dutch guy me and Elder Stanworth met in Breda (Haha he had no interest in the gospel but had us come in and chat with him about American sports for like an hour).  Other than that, not really at all.

Car Selfie

Rush Hour coming back from Mission Leader Council