Best Christmas ever.

Christmas has come and gone. Without the song "Christmas Shoes" blaring, how is one to feel the true spirit of Frosty the Snowman creation. He only comes around once a year! We ended up in Alexandria with the intention of watching movies all day. It was a normal announcement for us to get the movies we wanted watch approved by the mission Pres's wife. Last year we watched Spider-man and Batman, so I wasn't that worried, but the rumor was that Transformers wasn't approved so we kind of got worried. We made our list and it was as follows and called:

Spider-man 3

Pirates 3

Fun with Dick and Jane

Evan Almighty

(All was good so far, and for the test...)

Transformers? (rejected and she explained there was a scene that talked about something inappropriate, which is okay, but gave us little hope for the rest of our list. . .)

Bourne Ultimatum? "Yeah, great violence," said she.

Die Hard 4 (pg-13 mind you) "Oh super good Action. A little bit of swearing but a great film."

Did I ever mention that I love my Mission President and his wife? The way she talked about all these movies, you know she had seen them. I always wondered what she did all day. Best Christmas ever. We saw some others but I can’t remember what they were, and today we get to watch the rest, but all I have left is HP5 for priorities. So we had 4 Christmas packages of candy and a good bunch of movies and didn't see the sunlight once. Who needs a white Christmas when you have Bruce Willis blowing things up? It will be a new tradition for my posterity to never see the light of day on the 25th of December.

And then this week was transfers and mission council, so we didn't have that much to do as in Missionary work. I have a new Comp. as my former just went up to AP status. Now I can control the mission through him. My new comp. is form Florida, Tampa area and is a nice kid. It’s weird but all the elders who were still juniors when I got here are starting to go home. I have almost completed one of them sister’s missions. It’s scary to think about. Well, cool but I’m out of stuff to say so "La multi Ani" and a "Feliz Navida" and don’t forget, "Ich Haben Sie Fussbol Speilen Gern Hagen Voltvagon Kia". Bet you didn't know those were Romanian.

Love,

The Maglebeast

She's Baa-aa--ck!

12/14/07

You can at least take pleasure in the fact that I’m obedient

Hey Comrades,
Sorry again, I spent all my time writing my dear formerly Sister Magleby. Such a nice girl. But if she gets married before I get back, I’ll club a baby seal! I’ll do it too!
Sincerely,
Elder Baby Seal Killer-d’I mean, Magleby
P.S. You can at least take pleasure in the fact that I’m obedient.
P.P.S. Who cares anyway? Now that Berkeley’s gone, (or back, depending on where you are) this website has fulfilled the measure of its creation and its calling and election are made sure. I guess it's outer darkness for the Elders Magleby, oh well.
P.P.P.S. Bite bite, gnash gnash.

Laboring until you're exhausted is fun and rewarding

Wow, so much to explain (as in you explain) and so little in emails. It's cool that you hang out with teenagers but I would like to know what's happening.

Well we had a lot of snow for the first time. We had to travel to Pitesti for some exchanges and there were 3 crashed semi-trucks and a couple of off road buses. So encouraging in bad weather. We made it safe and it is a great city. I want to serve in every city in this mission (Not in every sector in Buch., but everywhere else) and we have permission to go to Alexandria for Christmas Day. Hopefully I will be able to cut the head off a chicken. Its going to be great. And we have our Christmas Zone party this week which will be. . . awkward? We had to prepare a skit and the only thing I could contribute was throwing a giant cow stomach out of my shirt (you can buy those here pretty easily). It won't be funny, just obscene.

We found a couple of cool people this week and had one of the better weeks building up to a beautiful Sunday with a possibility of 7 investigators who said they would come to church. Sunday came and ... no one. It was so lame. We worked our fannies off and had such a good week only to crash and burn. So after church we had to help with a program with the stake president to help people understand how to teach lessons, which went okay but no one was really excited to change anything (lessons for priesthood and Sunday school are a bit of a joke here) and went to our new investigator family's (that had work so they couldn't come to church) house. Only to find out they hadn't read and we can't meet with them until next Saturday. And what is worse, is the cool guy who came to church last week let us come over after, and we talked and he said that our church was really prideful and cited examples that he saw in church. The worst part of it all was it was all true. Everything he said happened and it was really sad to see a cool guy driven away from the church from casual members not understanding what it means to be a disciple of Christ. So many members hate every other member and it is terrible feeling at church. No one likes coming and of course we try and try and try but the real problems stem from some members just being baptized and not understanding what we have to do. Doing missionary work is not hard. I always expected it to be a lot more taxing when I first got here, but laboring until you're exhausted is fun and rewarding, but the stress of members and investigators who are not progressing or rather, digressing is so hard to see. A less active member that we have been working with for months and had been coming so faithfully to church didn't come last week because he had to buy a rug at a market. This market was open for the whole week and before and after church if it was that necessary. He made this decision the night before and we tried to talk him out of it but of course he has his agency. And don't get me started on gossip. Sect. 5 has twice as many active members as my beloved Iasi (four times as many on rosters) and has so many problems. Not the best end of a week. But not even pride and gossip can completely stop this work though it is a huge hindrance. Hope all is good in Provo,

love Elder Magleby

Hills like white elephants

Hey all,
Week three with Elder K. here is going good. None of the new investigators I wrote about last week have really panned out, but we’ll keep at ‘em. President Makarof (stake/district president) the rock of a member I’ve mentioned earlier is really working to get members more involved with the work here. The wife of one of his councilor’s has really taken the work to heart and she is trying really hard to get a friend of hers meeting with us. I’m grateful for members like her, especially since her family is the only active ones in our area. Her husband is a really cool guy and I think he may have served with Morgan because he told a story about his mission that I heard Morgan tell. I keep forgetting to ask him. His name is Colya and his last name is apparently the hardest name in the whole mission to pronounce so I, of course, have no idea what it is.
Zone conference is this week so that will be really fun. It’s always fun to celebrate stuff here, Thanksgiving was a blast, in case I didn’t mention it. We are having a white elephant exchange so let’s hope I don’t get a hand made oven mitt or anything. (Crossing my fingers for an iPod) I’m thinking about putting in a shopka made out of dog fur. (They’re legit!)
Winter is still fun, it snowed a whole bunch the first couple of weeks so everything is white but is hasn’t snowed in a while so the snow is getting dirty in most places, I hope it snows soon. I know I like to talk about how much I like winter so I think I’ll be able to handle it even though it might get old, but I think I can honestly say that I won’t ever get tired of the process of snowing. It’s magical every time no mater what.
Regarding “in-weeks”: It seems that, like in Romania, New Year's is the biggest holiday of the year. And the ancient tradition of choice is to get as drunk as possible for as long as possible. I’m told everything shuts down except for the bare necessities (public transport et cetera) and everyone gets drunk for a week. And since we are to avoid drunks and a large crowds we are not allowed to leave our apartment for December 31st through January 1st and the for the following week we have to be in by sundown, which due to the marvelous tilt of our fine Terra Firma is about 3 pm here in Perm. So it’s a magical time to write a lot of letters and avoid cabin fever by lighting various things on fire. I’m looking forward to it.
If you’re reading this that means you will probably get a letter from me some time after New Years. Yay!
Bye Bye,
Elder Magleby

A typical week here in Sector Five

It is always embarrassing when you ride the same same tram everyday and you don't recognize your stop (the end of the line), and what's more to not understand why all of the people are getting off, but the worst is when the engines turn off with the doors closed to realize you are stuck in there until the driver sees you (which is hard when the windows are painted over with advertisements and you are in the second car). We decided to pretend like it was intentional by sitting down and acting bored like we knew what we were doing so the people outside walking by would stop telling us that we needed to get off. But how?

The week was... a week. Had its good moments and bad ones. One investigator didn't come to church who had been planning on it all week, but was suddenly called out of town for a family crisis. The other slept through it even though we called and talked to her that morning (we must look like idiots, eh?) and then later refused a b-date. Well, we won't ride that tram anymore. But on the plus side a really nice guy came and he could really be a great member. The problem is he is going to Iraq in January. Dang! And it probably didn't help to be accosted by a crazy member to hear his whole life story. This member has his good days and his fair share of bad ones, but that was not good timing. Don't think it did too much damage (And when I say tells his life story, I mean he tells it AND why he should be emperor of Hong Kong, direct quote) and we got him out of there. But church went great.

And talking to many a drunk in the blocks, we were invited in by a nice lady, who let us talk with her husband as well. Nice fellow who immediately made jokes of why women talk the whole time and he never talks. 30 minutes and many a joke later (he was in that half drunk stage so he was coherent but silly. You can be brutally honest with drunks and they don't get offended, yet...), we start our lesson (after talking about the word of wisdom already). The wife is interested but then we talked about how Jesus brought a light to this world (or something with light) and he started talking about how he had already installed millions of lights in apartments and that he is the Jesus of the lighting business. Then we told him he had to be perfect and that he had already drunken a beer. He accepted out rebuke and said "but at least I'm super-frumos (beautiful)". The stories are never as good when I try to type them up in a limited time frame, but I haven't laughed that hard for a while.

And along those lines we visited a member and he was complaining that he didn't have anything for us to drink. We said it was good cause we didn't want our teeth to rot. Normally he is very jovial and quick with a joke, but he just hung his head and after a minute he muttered, "But I don't have any teeth."

And there has never been so much fog here in my mission as this past week. It is really cool when you walk past a cemetery. While street contacting this week we were stopped by a man in a cape (I would have made the effort to stop him if I had not smelled the alcohol radiating from him ten feet away) and of course he really wanted to come to America. After a short conversation he admitted he had never been baptized and would like to be. Not jumping to have a problem member for the branch, but giving a good discussion of what that would mean we felt was necessary. We sat down on park bench and then my comp told him how to pray and had him offer a prayer. You never get so many people's attention as having a semi-coherent man shouting and two Americans smiling like awkward idiots. He must have forgotten when church started cause he didn't show up.

And that is a typical week here in Sector Five. Actually better than normal because I don't think anyone was offended at church this week. And these next two weeks we have something planned for everyday. Fun days ahead.

Rots of Ruck

Elder Magleby

My Testimony

As it turns out, I don´t have much time to write you today. But believe you me, there is plenty to tell. Perhaps, I will tell you my simple testimony and leave the crazy last week stories for another day.

I know that God is our Heavenly Father. We are His children. He loves us and wants us to progress and return to him. I know that His son, Jesus Christ, lives. He the Savior of the world and through him we can have eternal life. I know that He is the center of God's plan for us and that He directs His church through a living prophet today.
The gospel that Jesus taught, the church that He set up and the priesthood that He gave while in His mortal ministry were lost because of foretold apostasy. I know that later, Joseph Smith prayed in faith to know which church was the true church of God. His prayer was answered. He saw God the Father and Jesus Christ. Because of Joseph Smith's prayer, the same gospel, church and priesthood that Jesus once gave were restored to the earth. The Book of Mormon is proof that Joseph Smith was and is a prophet of God. I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I have read it and through the Holy Ghost I know it is true. Because I know it is true, I know that we have a living prophet today. The Priesthood is restored. I know there is much good in many churches everywhere. But I know The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the only true church of God. It is the only church with priesthood authority, the authority to act in God's name. I know that through faith, repentance, baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost and endurance to the end, everyone can have eternal life. This is because of Jesus Christ's infinite atonement. I am grateful for my Savior, Jesus Christ. "I glory in plainness, I glory in truth, I glory in my Jesus, for He hath redeemed my soul from hell." (2 Nephi 33:6) I am grateful the opportunity I have had to share what I know with the wonderful people of Germany. I love the gospel, I love being a missionary, I love Germany and I love my life. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Love,

Sister Magleby

A broken heart and a contrite companion

Hey y’all,
Great first week here with Elder M. he used to be the office Elder so he’s good at getting technical stuff done and he’s used to being really busy. We started the transfer with zero investigators and now we have two solid ones and several really good potentials. I like having investigators; it means real solid missionary work instead of floundering around talking missionary work in theory, trying to get people to listen to us. It was actually quite miraculous, we were knocking on doors and the craziest thing happened. Someone not only opened the door (!) but THEN they didn’t immediately close it once I said my line! THEN, the insane part, he invited us in! We didn’t know what to do! That never happens! He was very nice and said he didn’t have much time because he was cooking dinner for his wife (sweet) before she got home but he’d give us a call. We walked out in a sort of stupor and decided we liked this building so we’d keep going. Which was funny because we had debated about tracting it because it was a lot nicer than the usually domes (apartment type building) we usually tract, and we thought the people would be mad that we even got in the building, but even the several others who didn’t listen were nice and THEN, we found this one guy who after I sputtered off a few sentence fragments he, in English, asked if we were from England or something. Then we said America, and he stunned, said, “wow, so far away” Then we talked about why we were here and what we had a message about and he took a Book of Mormon and agreed to have us come back and talk more. He’s a young guy just finishing university and will make a fantastic leader in the church. Also! Remember old golden Stass who read anti-Mormon stuff and we lost him, we were talking to his friend who is still investigating and he said the reason he stopped was because he was embarrassed about stopping in the first place and he will be at the next ward function and we should be able to set up a meeting. It’s amazing to see how the Lord answers the prayers of missionaries concerned for His children.
Funny thing o’ the week: Elder M. is a pretty different guy from me right, so we don’t have a lot in common to talk about but I did hear he had a girlfriend and you know how much missionaries like to talk about those, so I thought I’d be nice and ask him about her. He turned out to have a lot to say but one of the first things he said is that she hasn’t written him in a while, to which I responded with a deep exhale and said, “Well, that’s not good” sort of joking (sort of not). And then we talked about her long into the night about how worried he is about the whole thing and I’m listening tying to be consoling (like I know what I’m talking about) trying to explain how whatever happens, happens and there’s no point in worrying about it now. And as he was emailing her “the big letter” last week asking her questions about what she’s feeling and all that jazz, I’m emailing my brother about how my companion’s being Dear Johned and doesn’t even know it. And then today, just a half hour ago he stands up and declares that he has been Dear Johned. I hope he will being as willing to make jokes about it as I plan to be. We’ll see.
Well, that’s it for me,
Elder Magleby
P.S. Seriously, what do I do if he starts crying in the middle of the night? There’s only so long you can pretend not to hear. AND we’ve got an 'in-week' coming up for the holidays. I’ll try to have him over it by then. Oh boy…

Cabbage Cabbage Cabbage

Hey,

I can feel it in my fingers,

I can feel it in my toooes,

Christmas is all around us...

Western Europe's Largest Christmas tree was set up this week and had a great celebration at Piata Unirii to celebrate Romanian's independence Dec. 1st (The Day they revolted and machine gunned their dictator, which they still show on television despite entering the EU and saying that they wouldn't. Next Christmas we can all watch it together). Sadly we had English classes the morning with the military parade, and that night we went block knocking. Not that exciting for a missionary but apparently it was awesome.

Still no snow here, and in fact it was over 50 degrees today. It was nice to walk around in a t-shirt for a bit and lay on the grass wasting our Internet time by doing nothing. I cant wait to do nothing again. Of course I work hard and obey the rules here, but the only thing that gets me through having such busy days sometimes is the thought I will get to sleep and take naps when I get home. One of those days happened Sunday. You never complain when you have success, but man on Sunday we had no real investigators show up to service with a general authority (the one time of the year) not get to eat lunch or take any break because we had an important lesson with someone only to find out she didn't read yet (she was bed-ridden and in a hospital, so we gave her another BofM so she could read there but...) she somehow didn't have time. Then she had to leave within 15 minutes to... actually she never really explained. It was very disappointing, and then we ate our apples that we brought (Its now 3:30 p.m.) and get to the blocks cause no one would set up with us. And we did not get one (real) lesson until eight o'clock. It was probably one of the hardest days I have ever had. People slamming doors on you just because you say "Isus Hristos" is kind of depressing. We could get in to a lot more doors if we just talked about soccer or America, but then they aren't elect people to build up the kingdom here. It was a tough day, but we have a good amount of investigators right now and hope that we can get some people baptized by the end of the year. We have some great goals and we are putting our trust in the Lord that we can accomplish them. But this morning we made s'mores with the marshmallows we received from my comp's family and that made everything better. And tonight is going to be good. We have a great family that we just started working with that really felt the spirit of the restoration.

So quick here is a list of Romanian Holiday Delicacies:

Cabbage Rolls (Like you all talked about, without any red sauce, but plenty of grease)

Toba (Any kind of meat forbidden in the old testament and with real chucks of hobo in a gelatin salami role Warm Milk straight out of the cow (Milk tastes different if the cow eats garbage instead of grass)

Pig Fat Jello (the same as toba basically, but more pig fat and bigger hobo chunks)

Corn Meal Mush

Cabbage Cabbage Cabbage

And whats weird is I love it all now. Last Chrismas I lied.

Love, Elder Magleby

The Penultimate letter . . .

Dear Family,

I have no excuse for this lame email except that I`m being deported from Germany in a few days and I got a lotta stuff tuh do. Perhaps next week I will drop you a line. Please give my love to any and all of my remaining house pets.

Love,

Berkeley Magleby

Welcome Home Sister Magleby--Oh wait . . .

Berkeley's Home!!

"I really miss Germany, but it is wonderful to be back in Provo with family and friends. I'm struggling to express myself in English even though I spoke it with my companions every day. I can't wait to take the German Literature classes now at BYU. I'm thinking of changing my major for the fourth time." These are but a few of the things people close to Berkeley Magleby imagine she will say when she actually returns home on December 14. In preparation for the event, her parents have staged a number of drills with stunt double Mary Gunnell (pictured above) standing in for Sister Magleby. "I've played a lot of dramatic roles in my life," said Ms. Gunnell, "but portraying Sister Magleby has allowed me to truly stretch as a character actress. Berkeley is so complex."

The Magleby's are preparing for Berkeley's arrival. "We've still got a few kinks to work out. We thought it best to not sheet rock the damage on her ceiling. We won't do anything for her that we wouldn't do for Andy or Rob." said her Dad, while curry combing an obese black Labrador. "She wants a long haired Dachshund, but Julie and I decided to build her a little toy dog out of Puppy's molting thatch." Watch this site for further developments. . . .