Day 173: A day in the life of a missionary (with kisses!)

20 fevrier 2010 (Day 173)
I ran twenty miles this week! Hurray for me. So far I have slid down muddy hills, slipped on icy bridges, ran across lots of mud that had salt on it (yes, they salt dirt paths here), and saw two cute boys running. They both ran a lot faster than I do though. I saw one of them today on my run around and around the horse track, he didn’t stay very long though, and for that I was a little disappointed.
I got a lot of things done this morning. My floor got swept AND mopped (very rare to get mopped), I listened to lots of Conference talks and who knows what else. I went off to the market with the intention to see if my vendor friend would maybe want to come to church (Elder Lazarev had asked me yesterday if I’d be willing to sit with some of the investigating people at church, especially the ones I know. This got me thinking that I should ask some of my friends to church.). I probably spent about 45 minutes looking for him today (or at least it felt that long) but I didn’t find him. I also went to the market around 11:30 (normally I’m there between 9 and 10:30) and it was PACKED. It was ridiculous. The market is definitely less enjoyable when my vendor friend is missing. I did get my apples from the usual people (there are three of them, an old lady, and younger woman with dark hair, and this man) that only sell apples. I also found some genie pants for cheap! They are the most awful looking pants ever and the ones I found are practically neon! Genie pants (they are really poofy…think of the pants Aladdin wears) are really popular in France, so I am pretty excited that I found some cheap (in both senses) genie pants. Continuing with my exotic Arabic-ness I got some sort of flat bread. I asked the man what it was called, but I didn’t understand. He was a mumbler. I was hoping it would taste like naan. It tastes more like breadsticks. I also got some Viking bread! It is a special super healthy bread with lots of seeds and such that is sold at the boulangerie by the church. It reminds me of a kind of bread that you could find at Great Harvest, so needless to say, I like it a lot.
I got to the church about 10 minutes to one and the missionaries were teaching someone in the primary room, so I just waited in the hallway. At about 1:15 the missionaries asked me to help teach French at 1 got there. After some time they eventually got the partners switched and Elder Knapp and Elder Maxfield changed to go cut fagots. That would be chopping firewood, but we English speakers enjoy calling it fagots. It was really weird seeing the missionaries in non-proselyting clothing. It definitely gives you more of an idea about their personalities. Elder Lavarez told me too look out for Chinese people while he went in to the primary room. He didn’t come out for about two hours. No Chinese people came. A man did come wondering about geneology though. For that I interrupted the missionaries and they helped him. While he was leaving Elder Bourgeois invited him to the baptism tonight and this old non-religious man got all upset and said that is what he hates about our religion and the Jehovah’s Witnesses, that we are always insisting. Elder Bourgeois said no, that he only invited him and then wished him a good day. Later he said, “If I invited him to have 1 million dollars he wouldn’t say that I was insisting.” It’s true, but I was impressed with how Elder Bourgeois handled it. It was a good reminder that not everyone is nice to the missionaries. So essentially, I was left all by myself in the church waiting for the missionaries. It was kind of a good thing (in that lame sort of way) because I was able to read more of my required reading for French Lit. It was definitely the most I’ve read (and I still haven’t even passed page 100).
After what ended up being a 3 hour lesson the missionaries were done and Tao decided that he was going to be baptized next month, when he finds a good Chinese day. You see, Tao is Chinese and so once Elder Lazarev went in they started talking in Chinese and Tao was able to ask all of his deep questions about the Chinese culture and the religion, about green tea, etc. They played ping pong with Tao for a while and then Tao left. Then the missionaries kept playing ping pong (sometimes I think those boys do nothing, then I realize I probably see them when they are needing ‘missionary breaks’ so I try not to judge). They could have at least invited me to play or apologize for leaving me without knowing what was happening (typical boys). They are goofs. After playing for so long they realized they needed to go get stuff for the baptism and clean out the font, etc. Seeing as I would be late for the baptism if I went home and came back at this point I offered to clean the font. They had a nice little drumming moment (at least 3 minutes) together and then they headed off and I tried to figure out how to clean a baptismal font. I made it up as I went and succeeded. I then made sure that the rest of the meeting house was all set up. I am a monster! I set up all the chairs and tables. When I was done Elder Baker and Elder Horne walked in. Elder Horne is a blondie from Murray and Elder Baker served in Nantes for a while. He has grown up so much! He is so much more confident and comfortable with himself. It was amazing to see the difference in him. He is doing really good though and LOVES his companion. You’d think that they were just two best friends since they were six. Elder Maxfield and Knapp came and I got to turn on the font. I was pretty excited. I should have started it earlier than the other elders said though because it barely got filled in time!
Adessa’s baptism went really well. Elder Lazarev through an investegator on me. He basically said, (or mouthed/hand signaled) “This is Hung, she speaks English come talk to her.” I then got to try to explain baptism and the Holy Ghost to a sweet Vietnamese girl who knows nothing about Christianity. Talk about feeling inadequate! I was just praying that she could feel the spirit and that I could say the right things. She said she liked it and said she was going to come to church tomorrow, but she didn’t. The talk about the Holy Ghost was really great. Adessa’s testimony was…interesting. She talked a lot about some crazy revelations she had and I was thinking about Hung so I wasn’t completely paying attention to what she We had treats after the baptism. Someone bought brownies and they tasted like America…aka sooo good! While we were cleaning up Elder Knapp called me a drageur. That is calling someone a really big flirt in France (mentioned because of what some of those crazy girls said). I got a little offended, but mostly pretend offend. I still found a note in my backpack from said elder saying sorry and that he was teasing. I finished helping to clean up and then headed home with one of the three sets of missionaries (the other two got a ride home) and Paki and Gaelle. Best part of the ride is that I got a kiss. And it was good. It was also from a missionary. Now before you freak out, it was a mint. And Paki and Gaelle got one as well. It was great though because Elder Knapp asked, “Do you want a kiss?” Me: “Yup!” They were called kiss mints and it was blueberry flavored and really really good. I like missionary kisses and I think I need to find some more. We definitely joked about kisses after that one.