The Mini-Mission Begins

We received this picture of Mari from the mission office in Paris. She is with President Staheli and his wife. She will be serving a mini-mission for 5 weeks in the Paris France Mission of the LDS Church. Here is her address:
Soeur Mari Lindstrom
23, rue du Onze Novembre
78110 Le Vesinet
FRANCE

Days 259-266

18 mai 2010 (Day 260)
Today I went and had lunch with Emilien and Aurilien at the Japanese Garden. It was a lot of fun to hang out with them and talk. Poor Aurilien is on this awful diet where you can only eat meat for like 7 weeks. I definitely couldn’t do that.
Afterwards I went to commerce and met up with my Vietnamese friend from IRFFLE, Van Mao. The other week he asked for a BOM so I got him one and he bought me hot chocolate and we talked about it for a little bit. Go little me!
19 mai 2010 (Day 261)
Today Hannah and I met up with Maame to give her a BOM and go out to lunch. We went to this cute vegetarian restaurant and I got stuffed avocados (with polenta and Roquefort cheese) with a salad, toast with olive spread, and ginger lemonade. It was so delicious! Afterwards we did a little window shopping. I found Sister Layton’s broach and it was fun.
For dinner I went with Darryl, Cole, and Cheryl to the best kebab shop in Nantes. The elders found it and it is way good. The man makes his own white sauce and it was most definitely the best kebab I’ve had. We went walking around and saw some churches after and got ice cream. I got a gaufre instead. I love Darryl and Cole, they are so hilarious! We even saw Ian at Buck’s and said hi.
20 mai 2010 (Day 262)
Today was crazy busy. Jane was 20 minutes late to our appointment (20 minutes late when she said she would be in the office for only one hour) and I sent her a text after 15 minutes to see if she was coming or if I should come back later and she like freaked out. But anywho, I got my paper signed and then went off to breakfast at La Cigale with Nana. It was so chic and so good! I’m so glad that we went. Afterwards we did a little shopping and I bought my train tickets and those for my siblings. Had lots of problems with that darn plastic that we pretend is money. I went to a café with Cole and Darryl but didn’t get anything, went and got Bretagne stickers from this cute man, did more shopping, taught English, ate foie gras (look it up), gave away tons of stuff to my friends and went out for drinks (I got Amorino ice cream instead) with my hallway neighbors. I saw Juan at John Mcbyrne’s so that was fun. It was a late night! Luckily Baptiste drove Amadine, Maude, and I into town so we didn’t have to deal with the trams.
21 mai 2010 (Day 263)
Today I missed a lot of things. I have missing money floating around from the whole train think, Hannah and I missed the bus to Pornic, I missed out on the Elders BBQ. To consolidate myself I ate a giant warm chocolate chip cookie for lunch. It gave me a stomach ache and it was so hot today that I took a nap on the tile because it was cooler.
I did wake up though to go help teach Joshue the plan of salvation with the elders. I think it went alright with him, but he really is an interesting character. Afterwards I waited around for institute which we held outside, which was fun.
22 mai 2010 (Day 264)
Today Hannah came with me and we got the last of my missionary shopping done. I definitely would be a lot richer if I didn’t go on this mission, but now I have cute clothes and really expensive shoes! We stopped by the chocolate shop and Hannah tried her first macarons.
Claudine, Paki, and Gaelle invited us to their house for dinner. They also invited Cheryl and the elders as well. We had fun drinking (I got in trouble for only wanting water) and having snacks and pizza. We played loup-garou (it is like mafia) which was a lot of fun. Claudine told me I was getting married June 10, 2011 and that Hannah would meet her future husband in February, lol. Um, we ate so much cake, it was really good though. We all had a fun time and Bourg and Maxfield stole our sunglasses and went down to try to catch things in their mouth that we dropped from their tenth story window….crazy!
23 mai 2010 (Day 265)
Last Sunday in Nantes! Myself, Hannah, Elders Ford, Maxfield, and Bourgeois are all leaving this week so we all bore our testimonies in sacrament meeting. After the meeting there were lots of goodbyes. I was trying to teach Cecilia with Knapp and Anthony, but people kept coming in and knocking and looking for me and it was insane. It still was a good lesson on repentance though. Silly Anthony was being so lovely and was like I will miss you and kept telling me that every time he saw me. Lots of tears were spilt although not by me and yeah.
I met Van Mao with the elders at Facultes so that they could meet him and we could talk. We ended up talking for a really long time. I was with Van Mao for at least two hours. The lesson with him didn’t go super great. I still think that there is a language barrier and he does want to be a catholic priest. The missionaries literally running off mid-sentence to catch the tram was probably my favorite part. I talked to Van Mao for at least 45 minutes after that I think. I finally met up with Debora today and gave her a BOM in Portuguese. I hope she reads it Knapp called around his bedtime to see how it went and ask some questions about Debora. He got scolded by me for that one
24 mai 2010 (Day 266)
Last day in Nantes! And it was spent cleaning. It was intense but everything is now all packed, I caught up on a month’s worth of entries (sorry they suck), and all of this before midnight. I tried to get a RDV with Melanie to meet the elders but it didn’t work out so I ended up having this really funny goodbye to the elders on the phone. Mostly I got chastised for saying have a fantastic life since I will see them again. There is hardly any food in my fridge and my 3 bags are bulging and will be gradually decreasing in size as time goes on. I have a box to go to the post office and am going to try to close my French bank account tomorrow after I check out. I don’t know where I will be going on my mini-mission, but I guess I will find out soon enough!
Hannah and I said bye to Cheryl today and they were just all blubber babies. Especially Cheryl, poor girl still has time in Nantes and now we are all leaving. She’ll be okay though.
Wish me luck and write me! If this isn’t updated yell at my dad!
And I will see you all in July!
Soeur Mari Lindstrom
23, rue du Onze Novembre
78110 Le Vesinet
FRANCE

Days 244-258

3 mai 2010 (Day 245)
Today I had two tests. Talk about crazy stress! I took a two hour long sociology of cultures exam (along with my 15 page dossier). I think I did pretty well on it. We got to use the articles that were handed out in class which was kind of like having a major cheat sheet, especially since I had just written a 2-3 page paper on each of those articles for part of my grade.
I have been most nervous for my phonetics and phonology oral exam. It actually went a lot better than I thought. I learned from my trying to rush to speak in my art exam and took a second to compose myself and answer his questions. I was so glad that we didn’t have to transcribe everything. I ended up getting an 18/20 which is insanely good. He was really nice and helped me to answer the questions correctly. One more test to go!
4 mai 2010 (Day 246)
This morning I went to watch the IRFFLE play, “Les Pas Perdus” (Lost Steps). It was a play staring a lot of my friends from last semester about their little histories in the train station. It was so great, they did an excellent job. Sam, Deysi, ZengChao, and Juan were all in it. It was kind of fun to be on the spectator and not the actor side this time around. Afterwards I grabbed lunch at the RU with some of the girls from Ghana. We actually got to talking about the LDS church and they all had really nice things to say about it. Maame, one of the girls, even asked me for a copy of the Book of Mormon.
I think I might have flunked a test for the first time in my life today. It was that bad. I wasn’t worried about morphology and syntax and since it was the last test I was kind of burned out on studying. Six essays and five tests within a week is just exhausting. I won’t go into details but I was not pleased with my performance and it will be a miracle if I get a passing grade. Today at English lessons Elder Knapp kept trying to ask me how my test went and I just kept not answering. You see, I was going to finish my test quickly and get to the second and last showing of Les Pas Perdus because a whole bunch of people for the missionaries to meet would be there, as well as ZengChao an investigator and Deysi a less active member who were staring in the play! But it took me all two hours to do my test and apparently it was full house and they wouldn’t let the missionaries in to watch the play so we kind of blew a lot of great missionary opportunities.
6 mai 2010 (Day 248)
Tonight was my last time going to the symphony in Nantes. I love going to the symphony and will miss it a lot. Tonight we had a violin soloist. It was nice to go by myself and just mellow out from finals.
7 mai 2010 (Day 249)
Institute lately has been really great because we’ve had a sub…we just have really good discussions, I love it!
8 mai 2010 (Day 250)
Today it had been raining and I went out with Elder Ford and Maxfield to play soccer. The highlight of the day was definitely when I went to do a big kick, slipped, had both feet up in the air, and fell. It was epic.
Tonight we had a ward ball and it was sort of a disaster. By disaster I mean that the music wasn’t appropriate and there were people sucking face during slow songs. In the church building. And it was just the YM, YW, and YSA of the ward and their friends. I had some good talks with Anne and the YW advisor out in the hall because I just wasn’t tolerating some of the music and dancing going on. At first I participated but then the music got rotten. I felt terrible for the poor little beehives! The Ardeches gave me a ride home and I slipped down the hill going home…ha ha. It was great and my jeans are now green.
9 mai 2010 (Day 251)
Today I went to Young Womens. It was fun to be back in YW. Except I was the one talking, lol. I went at the request of the YW president to talk to the ladies about our standards as daughters of God. I hope that it went well because it was hard expressing the importance of what I was trying to convey in French.
On a happier note, I called my mother really really early for mother’s day! The Garon’s were sweeties and had myself and Hannah, Armelle, Fabienne, Rachel (soon to be member), Ines (who just moved her), and all four Elders for crepes. Some of the elders talked for a lot longer than their peers and I just talked for a few minutes to the fam. The crepes were fantastic as usual and I ate too many, as usual. We sat around talking afterwards and played some musical instruments and Joel, Knapp, someone else, and I played Labryinth and I won…woot! I love my Garon family…they are the greatest ever and I had a stellar mother’s day!
12 mai 2010 (Day 254)
Today I sluffed life and went to Chambord with Jessica’s mom, Jessica, and Hannah. We had so much fun and only got a little lost driving there. It is the biggest castle and has the most incredible double helix staircase. It was totally worth dropping everything else to go. They actually kept art work there to protect it during WWII and it is surrounded by over 1,500 acres of forest!
It took a long time to get back to Nantes (we got home at midnight). We stopped and got pizza at this restaurant in Angers. I got lasagna and it was disappointing as was my crepe that came cold. It had great ice cream on it though and Hannah’s chocolate dessert was DIVINE. I love Jess’s mom, she is so cute
13 mai 2010 (Day 255)
Today before going to teach Andrea I took Jess’s mom around Nantes. I showed her around centre ville and took her to the Ile de Machines. She really liked it as well as seeing the river and then I had to leave her in the Jardin des Plantes which was gorgeous since it is spring!
15 mai 2010 (Day 257)
Today Rachel was baptized. I helped her to get ready and even did a “dry run” of the baptism with her. She has a phobia of water so it actually took her a while to get into the water, but she did it and just cried and cried with joy afterwards. After having a snack with everyone in the kitchen I sat by Maxfield and Ford to hear Bourgeois’ piano concert. There were other people who performed, but it was mostly Bourgeois. Maxfield and I had fun playing with the baby in front of us. I wish I video camera-ed Maxfield playing with her doll, it was so stinking cute. We had a cute little violinist and Li Tao and Cecilia tore down the house with their Chinese pieces. The elders got this awesome Vietnamese man that they have been teaching forever to come play and that was pretty neat. It was a nice evening and just really cool.
Oh, I have a new market friend. It is the organic bread baker. He rocks and his bread rocks even more than he does, he helps me choose the yummiest bread ever. I also splurged and got some real fresh goat cheese and it is yummy!
16 mai 2010 (Day 258)
The magical moment today was with Rachel. Her foot was hurting and she got a blessing and it stopped hurting afterwards. She just wept and wept with joy and her faith and testimony after it happened was so special.
Today I tried to be Wonderwoman. I forgot that I didn’t have my jet pack on though so it was painful. Cecilia lost her purse and she needed to get into her room, so the elders were trying to get in. I brought over some tools I borrowed from the front desk and went up to see if I could card the lock. I was going down to get a card to do it with after looking at the door and I fell down the stairs. Bounced actually. Twice. And then fell off the staircase. Other than my pride, my butt, my back, and my elbow, I am fine.
After a minute to chillax (it was painful) I went up and unsuccessfully carded the door. So I then helped Elder Knapp try to take off some boarding. Elder Bourgeois was teaching a lesson on faith at this point in time but we switched spots because Elder Knapp didn’t want the board to fall on my head since it was almost all unscrewed. I finished the lesson which was fun and long story short we ended up having to call a locksmith to get into her room. It was a fun adventure though! I’m just glad I wore pants…

Days 238-243

26 avril 2010 (Day 238)
School starts again this week. It is the last week of classes…how crazy is that. I feel like I haven’t spent any time in my classes and the semester is pretty much over. Hard core studying has officially begun. My visiting teachers came today and gave a really nice message about personal revelation.
27 avril 2010 (Day 239)
Studying all day. Literally all day. I’ve been looking up people and concepts from my notes on Wikipedia. I kind of gave up studying my notes because they were useless. Pretty sure I ate some good pasta. First test tomorrow. I had a pretty fun time studying and watching Transformers 2. I was so engrossed in this studying with mild distractions that Elder Knapp called me back about 3 minutes after he called me to confirm a thing because he thought something was terribly wrong because I wasn’t my usual over-enthusiastic self. I thought that was purty hilarious, otherwise I’d be more offended that he thought that I sounded “under the weather.”
28 avril 2010 (Day 240)
Oh boy I took my French literature class today. The first question was great. It asked about how the 20th century affected literature. The second question was not so great. I had no idea what the answer was to this absurd question so I very badly BS’d my way through that second essay. Pray that I just get a passing grade. To celebrate this epic failure of mine Jen and I went out and got Amorino gelato. It was totally worth it. I think crème caramel is my new favorite flavor. I also taught Andrea again today. I’ve been going over verbs and vocabulary with her the most of the time. She really is so cute and smart, she just forgets stuff sometimes.
29 avril 2010 (Day 241)
The study-a-thon continues. Today me and Jen went out and ate no-bake cookies and sat on a blanket while I taught her about the sociology of art. I’ve got this material down pat. And be proud of me people…I said “no” to someone. The missionaries called and asked if I could help teach and I declined. It was actually quite funny. I have missed the past few times they have called because I’ve been shopping or in my kitchen or what not and so they finally left a message. It was Elder Bourgeois. Screaming. “Why don’t you ever answer your phone?!!?” I then got to call back and say the same thing. It was therefore lucky Hannah who got to go with the Elders who didn’t tell her they were giving the lesson on chastity. And the boys…they act like boys during the chastity lesson and make it awkward.
30 avril 2010 (Day 242)
Today is my very last day of class! And it is also my art oral exam. It has been a pretty insane week. I found out that all my sociology of cultures papers are due on Monday when I thought I’d have two more weeks. So pretty much I haven’t been sleeping and have been cranking out at least one 2-3 page French paper every day this week. I think it might be getting to me. I have had a ton of energy and haven’t been going to the gym this week but I did today. I hopped on the bike and gave Jen a super fast (30 minute) summary of the class all while biking and essentially spewing. It was then that she started worrying for my mental health. It was kind of sad having the last history class. Today we talked a lot about the politics of the president today and such.
I went in to my sociology of art oral exam smiling, and came out smiling. He said I was a very vibrant student and always laughing (not my fault he is funny). The question for the oral exam was “What is art?” which is not an easy question to answer but I mumbled through it and he gave me a 13/20 which was the best score for us foreign students. Now don’t freak out because that is a good grade in France. They never give out 20s, let alone 19s. You are like a genius if you get an 18 and they consider a 10 good.
1 mai 2010 (Day 243)
Being in my room is like having menopause. Sun up. hot. Sun down. Cold. Wind. Colder. No breeze. Warm again.

Days 231-237

19 avril 2010 (Day 231)
Oh blessed Monday mornings. I really should have gone to bed earlier, but I was up talking with you silly Utahns. I cleaned my disaster I call my prison…er room and then I went and taught Andrea English. We went over lots of vocabulary today. I was starving (my stomach was rumbling during the lesson) so I got my SWEET OF THE WEEK, an apricot amadine. It was like an apricot tarte, it was yummy. My lunch was possibly even yummier. I caramelized onions and cooked that with carrots and placed it on a bed of fluffy cinnamon cous cous. Can we say holy wow!
Mother dearest, I studied today. I even enjoyed the studying. I figured I am fine studying everything, just not French lit. I hate it. So I didn’t study French Lit. It was great. I also went on a run. I went for about thirty minutes and saw another rat. I can tell I haven’t run for a while and my foot is still bothering me.
Once I got cleaned up I met Hannah and Jen to have dinner together. We made fajitas with tomato, onion, corn, pepper, rice, beans, lettuce, and chicken. They were delicious! The chicken was so good; I miss having chicken. Poor Jen fell into a sewer grate. Isn’t that awful! She and Hannah were on a walk and one of her legs fell in all the way up to her knee! Jen just started laughing though when it happened; what a good sport!
On the way back to my room (quite late) I saw Katty, the Chinese girl who comes to church with Cecilia who I translate church for because she doesn’t speak French. She ended up coming to my room to get some information about buses and my study materials were everywhere (and I had clothes up drying). Katty got this sort of flabbergasted look on her face and tried to say that it was messy. I just laughed.
21 avril 2010 (233)
Today started very early. I had to meet Elder Ford and Elder Maxfield at the gare (train station) to catch a train at 6:30 am. Luckily the trams were running so I didn’t have to walk there. I brought a nice little breakfast for all of us and we had a nice, peaceful train ride. We met a bunch of the elder others and kept on acquiring more on our way to the zone conference. We first took a train and then a bus. I finally saw Elder Addison Humphrey! Addison went to my high school and so we got to talk a little bit on the bus.
The meeting was really great. I kind of felt a little out of place since I didn’t know anyone but it was really good. Sister Stahlei (mission president’s wife) gave a cute talk about believing and how we need to believe and then there will be miracles. President Stahlei spoke on how we are having New Standards of Excellence in the mission and some tips on how to reach our new standards of excellence.
Our special speaker was Elder Jose A. Teixeira of the Seventy. He shook everyone’s hand and it was great when he got to me because he was like, “Who are you?” That was fun to explain. He spoke on how we choose the mission that we want to serve and that there are no difficult places, only limited faith. He also taught us how we can find while we teach and how we need to apply what we learn on our mission to life. His wife spoke as well (and I may have just credited some of her thoughts to him).
The meeting was fun. It was all in English except for the prayers. They sang their cute mission song and quoted out of D&C. We had a lunch break in between the speakers and got to have pizza and I tried goat cheese pizza. I also met the sister missionaries and some other elders. Everyone was really nice. Sister Elizabeth Smart did give me a bit of a dirty look though when she found out that I was from Utah.
We took a train back into Paris and waited for a while for our train to get back to Nantes. During this time Elder Bourgeois kicked a pigeon into my face and saved me from this awkward old drunk man in the gare. This cute old lady was staring at Elder Bourgeois’ nametag on the way home and so he got the chance to talk to her in the corridor for quite a while about the gospel. Elder Knapp was on quite the spiritual high. Walking from the gare in Nantes to the tram he was just fearless and talking to everyone about God.
22 avril 2010 (Day 234)
Happy Earth Day! I sure did celebrate today. I went out for a morning run and then did yoga on the dock with the sunshine and a slight breeze. A landing duck gave me quite the fright as I was doing yoga, but it was still wonderful regardless. I then cleaned up and got ready to go for a picnic with a bunch of friends at the Japanese Garden. Everyone was naturally late in French style. Gwen (from church) and Emilien (my French pal) came to say hello. All in all we had all four missionaries, Li Tao, Cecilia, ZengChao, Jess, Jen, myself, and Hannah. We all had a really nice time eating and playing Frisbee and heading the soccer ball. The best moment of the picnic was when Elder Mafield told his companion that the no bake cookies were meatballs and so Elder Ford started to put them on his sandwich…the poor kid!
24 avril 2010 (Day 236)
Man is it getting hard to wake up! I did anyway this morning and went shopping. I found myself some new clothes (hurrah!) and then I went and played soccer with the elders. We had a lot of fun kicking the ball around and played a shooting game with Jen, Elder Knapp, and Elder Bourgeois. Jess kicked everyone’s trash with her mad dribbling skills, and Hannah has been improving, lol.
Today was Tao’s baptism. Hannah and I had the chance to sing with the Elders. We sang Beautiful Savior. Li Tao’s baptism was really great. It was so neat when he was baptized because you could really feel the spirit and he was crying. It was so wonderful and I almost cried myself. Li Tao is planning on going on a mission after a year and is going to be a great asset to the church. He is the cutest ever.
I came back from the baptism and decided to go back out to see the Carnival at night and the parade. I ran into Katty on the tram and we went into town to see the parade together. I got some fries for dinner (What?! I was craving fries and it had been a long day). We walked back and forth and saw all the parade together. They definitely aren’t American parades. You can shoot silly string at the parade and everyone has confetti that they throw; it is quite the sight to see!
25 avril 2010 (Day 237)
Today was a really nice Sabbath day. At church all the talks were really good and spiritual. They were talking about getting back to the basics and trying again and forgiveness. I got to translate for Katty which is always a lot of fun. Today I borrowed Floh’s bike and went on the most adventurous ride. I went with the hopes of finding this chateau that I saw whilst on a boat. I didn’t find the chateau, but I had the most amazing ride. I really should have gotten a bike. It felt so liberating to be zooming around in the woods with no one else in sight. There are actually a lot of woods in Nantes and I road along until I couldn’t find the path anymore. It was a perfect Sunday.

Days 228-230

Ha Ha, so I am a major slacker. We will see what I can remember for the past month!
16 avril 2010 (Day 228)
Today Hannah and I were up before everyone else in the house. I sat up in bed for a while and eventually got out to do my yoga. We waited for everyone (everyone being Joel and Anne. Quinten is in an anti-participation anti-familial stage and he doesn’t eat breakfast.) to wake up and then we had leftover crepes…at least Hannah, Joel, and I did. Anne had cookies for breakfast (rock on!). We cleaned up and I practiced the piano for a little bit. I decided that once I get home I am going to practice playing hymns for my mission. It will come in handy.
We had cooked spinach and beets for lunch (mmm) and then we said our goodbyes and took the tram home. Hannah and I were pretty pooped so we sluffed institute…oops! We are so grateful for the Garon’s and their hospitality though. We had so much fun playing games and jamming out with them
17 avril 2010 (Day 229)
Today I taught English to that cute Andrea. Before I did (and after) I checked out the Braderie, this giant carnival/street market. I almost bought some shoes and I had my first real Spanish chichi. I also got to help the Elders teach Lisa and Zeng Chao. We taught Zeng Chao about the Plan of Salvation. Man, Elder Bourgeois definitely has a different style, but it was okay. Today the trams were shut down because of the Braderie so we all got to walk home. The elders stopped at a kebab shop and bought some nasty kebabs, but the man was really nice and offered us some free tea. The Elders had fun talking to some people who called them Jehovah’s Witnesses and Hannah came and met me walking.
18 avril 2010 (Day 230)
Blessed Sundays. They are so much fun. Hannah and I took the tram to church. We decided to walk to the chateau to wait for the tram. I was contently studying Preach My Gospel. This older man walked up and asked me what I was studying. I told him that it was church material. He then said that I was not French, to which I concurred. He then started asking me the following questions in English (to which I responded in French): You are very beautiful. What is you astrological sign? Aries. Ahh. What year were you born? 1989. Where are you from in America? Utah. Utah. U-T-A-H. Have a nice day America. I was laughing a lot after that lovely conversation. I picked back up my book and continued to read when two incredibly drunk/stoned/high younger men came by and asked me what I was reading. I answered again and then one sat down next to me. The other sat down on the sidewalk. The one next to me, who was black, started asking me why God sent three books to the earth: the torah, the Koran, and the Bible. I was trying to answer him and then he started asking me who the present president was, but he was mumbling it so I could not figure out what he was saying. He was quite proud that Obama was black.
In Relief Society the lesson was on prayer. They got into an argument about whether or not you can pray in bed lying down. Katy and Cecilia made it for the investigator class which Elder Bourgeois taught in English about prophets. I translated the sacrament meeting for Katty, which was really neat and fun. The choir sang a song for the closing hymn. Afterwards Katty told me that while we were singing her heart felt big and warm. I told her that it was the spirit and God’s love and that she could feel that all the time. She really liked it. And Cecilia called Elder Lazarev and said that she got an answer to her question and was then asking Elder Knapp after church about how long it takes to be baptized.
Choir was…beyond interesting. I guess the inter-region church people said we need to stop having lots of meetings on Sundays. This apparently includes choir. They think we should do it a different day of the week (ha ha..that is a joke). So the choir director was like we are going to break the rules and keep practicing because we are singing at the stake conference but after that we might not have choir anymore. It was ridiculous.
Hannah and I ate dinner with Jen. We’ve been hanging out a lot more with Jen lately; it has been fun.

Je suis encore vivante!

Wow! Talk about epic failure!
I swear I didn't intend to get so behind and leave you all in the dark.
I am alive and well, life just happened.
Since I last wrote I have been to a couple of baptisms, bought lots of clothes to wear on my mini-mission, wrote 6 papers in a week, hopefully passed all my french exams, have made friends with the organic bread man at the market, been to a church dance, helped teach amis of the church, eaten ice cream, had crepes at the Garon's with the elders and who knows what else.
I am leaving for my mini-mission here in France on the 25th of May, aka SOON! I have almost all the clothes I need but I definitely don't feel spiritually prepared.
I was following the missionary 10:30-6:30 sleep schedule for about a week, but after finals studying crash I decided it was better to let my body sleep until it felt ready to catch up. Mother, you will be pleased to know that I've been getting my 9-10 hours of sleep again at night. I also went on a mad 2 hours a day at the gym streak which also lasted for about a week until my body decided it was too sleepy and I had some more important things to do.
This week I got to go with Jess, Jess's mom, and Hannah to Chambord. It is pretty much the most amazing castle. Ever. It is straight up out of the French Renaissance and has the most incredible double-helix staircase. During WWII they stored tons of works of art from the museums there...how cool is that?
I've sent of 5 kilos of books and I now own all the Harry Potter books in French with the exception of the seventh.
It is insane that life is wrapping up here. I have really mixed feelings about it. I do miss my sonicare toothbrush, my best friend, and I desperately need new running shoes. I've also been craving cupcakes (or fairy cakes as the Brits fancy to call them) and you definitely can't find those here! My jeans have also seen the end of it; they now are growing holes that shouldn't have holes and they are an entirely different color. They have served me well though (since like 8th grade or something ridiculous like that).