Mission Adventures in England Birmingham: Week 49: You can have these... paperweights?

Yo yo yo greetings from Coventry! Gotta say, this week has been jam packed full of fun.

We got to go on exchange with the beautiful sisters in Westcotes, I got to go with Sister Stewart! Man I felt like I brought bad luck for them seeing as we spent the first hour and a half trying to fix her bike, but we did learn how to fix a flat and put the tire back on and how to adjust the brakes all by ourselves! We also had to go and ask their 6 year old neighbor for a bike pump, and it was a miracle that it worked. Pretty exciting. That night we did get to eat some nice sushi though. We also got to teach a young guy named Jim, and he seemed pretty excited to learn about the gospel, so that was cool. Oh. And we got to bike everywhere!!! Have I mentioned that I miss biking? I miss biking. The bike I got to ride was amazing. Riding through the rain, riding up and down hills, oh it was glorious.

On Wednesday we got a surprise call telling everyone that the rumors could go to rest, and that everyone would be receiving iPad mini's the next day. Wait... what? Yes. The apple product called the iPad mini has entered the England Birmingham mission. What this really meant was that we had to get up early the next day and drive to the mission home to have 2 hours of training on how to set up an ipad, and then set up our own, and then take the rest of the mission's ipads and distribute them to each little band of missionaries throughout the mission.

Sister Thomson and I took our little stack of iPad's and traveled around to 3 more two hour meetings where we gave the the training of how to use and set up the iPad. It was awesome to be able to go around and teach people about it, but it was a long day full of staring at iPad screens and such. That might sound like a great addition into the mission, except for now everyone has them, and we haven't gotten permission from Salt Lake to use them yet. Essentially, we now have some nice ipad shaped paperweights lying around, because we can't even turn them on until we get the green light from the big cheese. Crazy, right?

Another miracle! We taught our friend Tony about the word of wisdom, and when he learned about not drinking tea he told us "oh dear, I have to go call my mom and tell her about this!" He is so cool. He just absorbs the gospel like a sponge. We also met this lady named Sabine from the Congo. we met her walking to our car for dinner. We stopped and chatted, and at first she wanted to just walk away, but after talking a bit about our families and her family and the role Jesus Christ has in them she became more open. It was amazing to hear her own testimony about Jesus Christ. She eventually felt like she would enjoy having us over, so we set up an appointment with her this week. We are pumped!

We have had so many miracles happen. I think one of my favorite miracles was on Saturday. We were finding in city center, and it was time for us to head back for an appointment. We kept seeing this guy walking back and forth, and he looked like one of our investigators named Obi, who is from Nigeria. Eventually, I call his name and he looks around and we wave him down and go to talk to him. "Don't you remember us?" we asked, but he said no. Then looking more closely, I realize that it's not Obi. We start talking and it turns out that his name is actually Obi, and he is from Nigeria and he was willing to listen. So we taught him the restoration right there and after we said a prayer he wanted our number. It was awesome. We exchanged information and then he told us "you know, the only reason I stopped today was because this morning I wrote my name and address on something online, and it told me that I would receive a gospel message today. That's the only reason I stopped. Thank you." God definitely puts people in our path that are prepared! Our minds were spinning after that. Good thing his name was actually Obi, otherwise it would have been kinda awkward chasing him down.

OH. Also Sister Thomson and I need your prayers, we got our provisional licenses to learn to drive in the UK, and we have about 3 weeks to pass 2 tests and get our actual UK license. Hooray for studying about driving in a different country.. It'll be great. The only scary thing is that like everyone fails the first couple of times. One lady in the ward failed the test 13 times, so that's encouraging. It can be done! We'll let ya know how it goes :)

Also, transfers are this week, but we should both be staying (hopefully), so I'll let ya know!

Much love,

Sister Slack