HE WANTS YOUR ADDRESSES PLEASE

Elder Ferguson sent me a quick note today:

He told me another "snail mail letter" would be coming in the mail for us.  
(So maybe this weekend we'll get it if it's like the last one.  Check on Friday or Saturday night to see if it's updated.)

Also...

"Please put on my blog for people to

Send me their mailing addresses.  

I just don't have time to reply to all the emails."

Elder Ferguson

You can email them to me-Amy or email him directly, or mail him.  The address is on the left of the blog. My email is:  amyernie3053@gmail.com

Handwritten Letter came!

I am going to "paraphrase" his letter for you, and just give you the highlights in my own words.  

His computer time is limited, so he is handwriting this letter.  (2 full pages)  Yea!

FYI it takes 5 days to get a letter from him.  Send him your mailing address and he said  he might just snail mail you too! 

I got some of these pictures off of the internet.  I googled England grocery stores and found the images. 

He went on exchanges with some other elders.  (Which means he traded companions temporarily and went to some of their areas to work.)  They have visited with an elderly lady 83 years old, who had been being taught by other missionaries for quite some time with out progressing.  He and the other elder talked to her and asked her to go to church.  His companion asked her to go to church with a question in mind.  She said she would go with the subject of Baptism on her mind.  She did, and now she wants to be baptized.  The other elders had spent a long time teaching her, and now they get to see the fruits of all their labors combined.  They also went on splits with the Zone Leaders and got to teach about faith etc...  The older  couple they were teaching was hard of hearing so it was a bit of a challenge.  He really enjoyed it though.

He told us he was looking forward to going on a church history tour Wednesday, but of course it hadn't happened yet so we'll hear about it later.

He said that they have him helping play the piano for a musical number, "Come Come Ye Saints" the men's chorus version.  The elders will be singing it.  He's really hoping to have time to find a piano and practice.  He's supposed to come up with an intro too, so he's anxious to have time to get it all ready.

Last week he told us he transcribed the background music to a Mormon Message.  If you look up, "The Power to Create" - Mormon Message, that's the one.
http://youtu.be/TJC1sRJ8F0Q
I have to admit I had to look up what transcribe actually meant.  He went on to say that he got permission from his mission president to record it and he would try and send the SD card with that on it sometime.

He told us about the food:
"The food here is funny.  They call graham cracker type stuff digestives, and it's really funny because it sounds like a laxative, but it's not. "

"They have stuff called squash, which is like snow cone syrup, but you can use it for drinks.  You just pour a little into your cup and add a lot of water.  Almost all of the drink flavors and soda and stuff is different.

 Vimto is really big.  It tastes like black cherry kool-aid, but they have different flavors.  It's really good."

They have a lot of cold cereal that is the same, but they call it by different names.
Our Chex is called Shreddies. They have Chocolate Orange flavor.

Our Chocolate Rice Crispies is called Cocoa Pops, and the Snap Crackle Pop guys look different there.

He told about how the houses looked.  He said, "All of the houses are in rows.  They are connected.  This is sort of what it looked like. That's what my flat looks like too."

Pictures only so far...

Today Ryan's email said:
I'm just going to write you a letter so I have more time to email...

However we did get a bunch of pictures I'll share, so I guess the update on Elder Ferguson will come later. I think the pictures are still all from the MTC.  

So if any of you happen to share your emails from Ryan with me.  I'd love to hear what he's up to 
(of course you can edit them to stuff you think we might want to hear if it's personal stuff.) 

To some of you Band Friends & Mr Campbell, I'm thinking one of these pictures will mean a little more to you than to me.  I think it's his ideas for arranging a few hymns.  

Update & Pictures - Letter From Elder Ferguson!

I don't know if I will be able to put it on my ipod yet, but can you send me the file for Moonlight Sonata? I guess they changed the rule, so we can listen to things other than Mormon Tabernacle Choir as long as it isn't a distraction. Send me my recording of it too.

This week we went to the British Pageant again. And while we were there, we got a phone call asking us if we could come again the next day and sing in it. So we did. I guess the MTC had sent out the missionaries one day so they needed missionaries who were out serving to come. So that was really cool.  

(Amy's insert- You can see photos of the Pageant at:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/lovingmemory/sets/72157634842544328/

I did not find Ryan in any of them, but they are cool to look at.  Also I watched a 9 minute video clip of a news report on it titled 3 Apostles visit the U.K.  and it was really great.   http://youtu.be/dsBw0-rGNyw  Now back to Ryan:

Then on Thursday, we had a full mission conference with Elder Holland and Elder Nelson. So yeah. No big deal or anything... Elder Holland hit the pulpit and yelled a lot, but it was really good. The spirit was really strong, and it was a really great experience.

The Church History Tour is next week. I don't really know what we're doing specifically, but basically I came at just the right time. Pretty much every good thing that could happen on a mission is. Right now. So that's pretty great. I guess this is preparation for when I'm going to be called to be an Apostle or something. No big deal... 8D

Anyways, we haven't really met with very many investigators this week because we've been so busy, but we did visit a less active member last night for dinner. He made curry. I had curry once in the MTC, and my companion made some curry a few days before, but there was no spice. This stuff had spice. I almost died. Alan said that it was only medium hot, for which I am grateful, because I have no doubt he could have made it much worse if he wanted to, but it was still pretty bad. He's really funny. He's in his seventies I think, and he always has a perfectly straight face, but he tells jokes all the time. We were talking about curry, and my companion mentioned some curry he had had before, and Alan said that it was a woman's curry. Apparently, Alan only eats Man Curry. Haha, anyways, it was pretty great. But I'm not looking forward to seeing it again. Elder Gabler said it will be even hotter the second time, if you know what I mean... XD

MTC PICTURES:

From Elder Ferguson

Ok, so anyways, this week has been really great. On P-day last week, right after we got done emailing, we started walking to ASDA (Walmart) and a man riding his bike saw us and stopped us. He said he was a less active member, and he wasn't interested in coming back to church yet, but he still wanted to talk to us since he was riding past us. We gave him our number, and hopefully he will call us sometime. Then when we actually got inside ASDA, we ran into another man, who saw us and smiled and said hello. He told us he was also a less active member, and that he wanted to come back to church. We gave him our number, and he called us Tuesday morning, right afterward. We went over to his house, and he told us that he had had a breakdown, (I think he had a alcohol relapse) and he lost all of his stuff (like his BOM) He said that the missionaries had been talking to him while he was in rehab, but the facility stopped letting them come in. We gave him a new BOM and he said that he would have finished it by Saturday. He also said that he would come to church on Sunday, but his mother got sick, so he had to go up to visit her, and he couldn't come back for church. I don't think he read very much of the BOM either because he has been with his mother, but he said that he would come next week. It was incredible that he was prepared for us like that, and we've met lots of people like that this week.

I don't remember if I mentioned this in my last email, but Thursday before last, we met a lady on the bus. We were in service clothes, but we still had our name tags on. She asked us what our name tags were for, and she said that she would be interested in coming to church. She has just moved into the area, and she was interested in coming. Later, she texted us and asked us if our church did food parcels. As it turns out, she is on welfare (a lot of people are here) and she was using the money to pay the rent, even though the government was supposed to pay for that separately or something like that. I think she misunderstood how she was supposed to be using the money they were giving her or something, but anyways, she basically didn't have any food left, so we called our bishop and he brought her some food on monday. We came and talked to her on Wednesday, and she was on a lot of medication. She has some troubles with her liver and stuff, so she is having a really hard time, but she at least has food now, and I think she will be ok financially once she starts using the government money right or whatever. Anyways, she was raised in the Catholic church, and she still says prayers every day, but she was very receptive to the things we taught her (although she was also really drowsy because of the medication) We're going to meet with her again this week, so that's really cool.

We have another investigator named David, who was already sort of an investigator before I got here. He is really funny, because he's in his fifties, but sometimes he acts like a little kid. He had a really hard childhood, and he didn't seem to understand why God would let those things happen to him, but we talked to him about the plan of salvation, and I think he feels a little bit better about it now. I think eventually, he will understand better, and I can tell that the gospel will bless his life.

Yesterday, on the way to church, we missed the bus, so we had to walk to another bus stop. A man riding past saw us and stopped and came over to us. This is different to the first one I talked about. When he got to us he just stopped and looked at us. Elder Gabler asked him how he was doing, and he almost started crying. He said that he has bipolar disorder, and that he has been having a really hard time lately. He said that he came to talk to us because he recognized us as servants of God and he wanted our help. He gave us his address and we're going to meet him later.

Then after church, a man stopped us and asked us if he could ask us some questions about our church. As it turns out, he was really Born Again, but we at least got to tell him about the gospel, even if he refused to accept it. Before we started talking to him though, another man came up to us and asked us where our church was. He has just moved here recently from another country and he wanted to go to church. We exchanged phone numbers and he left, but we haven't called him yet. We've been really busy lately.

On Friday, we went to the British Pageant. It was amazing! They talked about how the first missionaries came to England, and how the church got started here, and then how they all went to Navoo. It was really cool, and the music was fantastic! I think you can actually download it from mormon.org.uk/pageant or something like that.