The Work

What a long, strange road its been...

The past few weeks in Kispest have been insane!

Last Sunday, there was a huge national holiday in Hungary. We had a difficult time getting to much accomplished in the way of missionary work because of it, but it still turned out to be a lovely day. It involved me making nearly a whole kilo's worth of french toast for my companions and I as we waited the night to roll around as our apartment is in perfect view of the sure-to-be awesome fireworks display.

The time of the fireworks rolled around and we went out to the balcolny to have a look. It was most impressive. We noticed the wind pick up ever to slightly and the rain started to sprinkle, but there was fireworks, there was music, there was a laser show reflecting off the clouds, it was awesome...

And then we heard the unmistakeable sound of shattering glass from within our apartment.

My companions and I glanced at eachother for only a moment and scrambled through the window we use to go onto the balcolny. We found the window in our bathroom, which was closed, mind you, was in shards on the bathroom floor. Our mouths stood in a hanging standstill for only a moment when we heard another shatter. We investigated the sound and found the window we had just crawled through also in peices on the floor in front of us.

Luckily all of the windows in our apartment are double windows, which means there is one on the outside and one on the inside so that we were able to close them all and begin cleaning. As we did so we saw the storm literally blow in from nowhere and what had been a peaceful Sabbath evening just moments ago turned into an apocolyptic nightmare. We couldn't see the building across from us, the rain was pouring so hard!

It was crazy! We later learned that a million people were stranded in that storm. Three people died and a boat on the Duna capsized. The worst part is that the weather services gave notice that a terrible storm was going to hit at exactly nine o'clock, when the display was to start and city officials didn't cancel it.

Last Monday was a good day not to be a politician in Budapest.


But it was a good day for sites...
Mária is a very recently baptized member of the church here in Kispest that I had the privlege of being able to be one of the missionaries who taught her. The whole district met up with her for lunch not far from our apartment. After a fabulous feast of delicious Indian food, Maca (a nickname for Mária) led us to something quite fantastic.

The highest point in Hungary.

The trip involved a ride on a mini bus, 10 minutes in a ski lift chair, and then a very steep hike to a charming little tower just for the purpose of enjoying the view.

It was amazing...the weather was goregous and the view was crystal clear. We could literally see for miles and miles around.

The feeling up there was just as special. My companions and I just that day had discussed how much we miss the Temple and not having the opportunity to partake of the almost tangible spiritual nourishment that comes with going into the House of the Lord. Outside of these temples, mountain tops are the most holy places on the earth, and standing on one gave us a taste of that spiritual refreshement we have only experienced in that place so very missed to us.


On with the show...
The Spiritual Refreshment didn't end there, though. Wednesday marked our favorite part of the transfer: Zone Conference. And construction finished on the Metro here which made the trip from our apartment to the mission home one of a few minutes rather than nearly an hour. As we waited to cross the street very close to the mission home we spotted a group of Elders walking toward us, heading into the Match (convience store) on the corner across from us. Waldie, Anderson and I upon closer inspection noticed that one of the Elders looked very familiar...only to realize it wasn't an Elder at all, but rather the infamous Andruska! One of the teachers at the MTC from whom all three of us had the privledge of being tutored.

He was in the country for the first time since returning home from his own mission a few years ago and he and the friends he came with all came to Zone Conference and gave a few sage words from the stand. Seeing him here was a visit to the Twilight Zone.

It was most certainly a shock and a weird trip down memory lane, but a good one. Andruska is one of my heros, and I absolutely adore him so it was quite wonderful not only to see him, but to spout of a word or two of Hungarian to him as well.


All things just keep gettin better...
So the last crazy spot of our week occurred Saturday night.

It started when the lights flickered out and we were a little taken aback, as it was night and we quickly discovered power was out in the whole building. We don't have candles or flashlights, any of us, so we were trying to figure out how to get some light to finish our planning meeting when the commotion really began.

An ear-splitting alarm sounded in the hallway outside of our apartment. Our door was closed and it was so loud we had to yell at eachother to be heard. Confusion began and thinking that the noise was a fire alarm the Senior companion yelled at us to get our shoes on and grab the phone, we were leaving now.

We live on the top floor and we passed a neighboor on the one under us wearing nothing but pajama pants and a very confused look on his face holding a flashlight and trying to ask us what was going on. We told him we didn't know and frantically continued down the stairs.

A few floors later, we realized we were the only people in the building evacuating it and decided to make our way back up. We ran into the neighboor bácsi searching for the source of the alarm as all we said was "up" in our distress. We led him up to our floor, where the sound was so loud it literally hurt our hears to be exposed to it. There was a box at the end of the hallway with a flashing light on it. He pointed his flashlight at it and pushed the rather large button the middle of it. Immediately, our ears relieved of the peircing shrill and silence filled the air.

The neighboor bácsi pointed to the box with his flashlight and read from it, "Sirien ki."

"Nem tudjuk amit jelent," we explained we didn't know what that means.

"Sirien ki!" he repeated.

Then it clicked.

"Siren off."

We felt like complete idiots and spent the rest of the time until lights out laughing like lunactics at the antics that had just transpired.

Stories like this can only happen on a mission.


All in all...
I am safe.

I am well.

I know what to do the next time the power goes out in our building.

Life is pretty darn fabulous.

I am loving you all, Dear Ones.

posted by Ashley @ 2:34 AM

Be still, and know that I am.

So has been the theme of my week.

I am no longer considering going Home at this point. As I told my mother in the email I sent her this morning, I have put my trust in the Faith that I have traveled ten thousand miles and learned what is said by many to be the hardest language of man to preach.

It is through our trials that our character is made clear-and I hope that my character is one of Strength and Integrity. Of Hope and Faith that is bigger than my trials. Cancer is never a routine word to consider, but from what I have gathered my Dad is going to be okay without me for the time being. I have a really wonderful opportunity to take the extra effort in my correspondence with him to show him this woman I am so proud to be. A woman of Faith.

Many of you are not members, but if any of you are prayers-perhaps mention my Dad if you remember. I know he is recieving blessing that he wouldn't if I weren't a missionary, because I know Heavenly Father blesses His missionaries. Let's be honest, millions of prayers are offered every day for us throughout the world, including in every Temple session and by the Prophet himself. If there were any time to request someone to pray for my family, it would be while I am included in the blessings He gives to His missionaries for the sake of those ever-so-many who ask.

De azon kivül...
But outside of that...

Things are going really well. My sixth transfer has begun-I am still in Kispest and I am currently enjoying the blessing of being in the third threesome of my mission. That means I get two companions. I say "get" only because I refuse to complain even though I dispise being in a threesome. I refuse! Obedient missionaries count their blessings, they don't complain!

And it isn't toooo bad. It means we can very easily go on splits with the members, which we did on Saturday. I took a member tracting (knocking on doors) and streeting (stopping people on the street to talk to them) for a couple of hours. We didn't have a lot of success in the way of finding people to teach, but it was awesome to talk to someone a little bit about the church and then turn to a native and see her bear her own testimony of the things she knows to be true. I hope we get to do it lots more!

I have picked up a quirk as a missionary-if I approach someone to start talking to them and they are super rude, I simply smile and make it my immediate goal for that person to walk away with a softer heart and a good experience to remember about the missionary who spoke to them. And I am really good at it. I know how to worm my way into people's hearts.

But, that was a little random...

So our third sister is Sister Waldie, from Arizona. It isn't Utah, but it was settled by Mormons, so there is actually a huge church population there. It is actually quite interesting because I replaced Anderson in the MTC and Waldie replaced me, so we have a lot of fun telling stories about our MTC experiences as Solo Sisters with the beloved Despain and Andruska.

I have some challenges to overcome over the next five weeks...but it really is going to be a fabulous transfer.

I just know it.

posted by Ashley @ 2:49 AM

Highs and Lows

Well, the good news is...I have not had time to save for making posts with my email time of late because we have been positively swamped! Kispest had two baptism yesterday from the Sisters' teaching pool. Two amazing women wore white and it was by far one of the happiest days of my life. The day was perfect for them, and I was honored enough to be a part of it.

The first was Mária, a 30-something business woman who devours every peice of doctrine we teach her. She consumes as if it were a fine meal. We aren't talking future Relief Society President, we are talking future general Relief Society President. There are no words to describe her, but if I had to pick one just to give you a clue, it would be "amazing".

Then there is Eta, a very sweet widower who thought the sister who started talking to her at a bus stop was a Jehova's Witness (we get that a lot) but when she learned that wasn't the case she invited the missionaries over to her house that day. She has positively blossomed as she has learned about the Gospel. She was such a timid little thing when we started but now she walks with a confidence that comes from knowing who you are and where you come from and what that means. In one incredibly feeble and frail word to describe her, she too is "amazing".

I have scarcely ever felt more happy than I did sitting next to Eta and holding her hand as she basked in the glow of just having made a covenant with her God and Heavenly Father.

But after the dust settled my mind was free to drift to troubles from the home front...

I have recently learned that my father has been diagnosed with cancer and will be starting chemotherapy soon in treatment of it. I received special permission to call him and once I learned enough to know that there is no reason to believe that his disease is terminal, I was able to refocus on the Work. But now, I find my heart very strongly and very equally torn in two very different directions.

There is part of me who is so proud of the missionary I have become. I know that I know how to be a good, effective tool in the hands of the Lord I Love. I love being a missionary and I love the Hungarian people and being here and teaching them is all I ever could have hoped it would be and a million times more. Words fail to describe this as well and I can not imagine giving it up...

...until I imagine my Dad sick from chemo. He will have to have 18 treatments over just three and a half weeks. He lives with someone that I know will take very good care of him but to say it is likely an extra person there to bear the burden would be a help is to say that maybe it is likely to take a breath several times a mintue would be a help to live. If I were still a nanny, this would not be a question, and I would be there the whole way. If I feel like I should I can call the mission president at any time and tell him I need to go home. But if I did that, I know I would not be able to finish my mission here, if I were able to finish it at all.

I have not made any final decisions one way or another, but my heart is definitely ripped in two.

posted by Ashley @ 3:22 AM