January 19, 2015

Dear Family,

It’s weird that I didn’t get to see Hailee’s farewell or Homecoming :( But all well, ilyen az élet. This week was pretty interesting, it was hard, but at the same time it was super fun.

We met with a lot of less active members which was really fun and interesting. One lives in a mental hospital because she has Alzheimer’s. It was a pretty fun visit with her cuz we sang a lot, super funny old néni. We also visited another guy who lives super far away. He is partially blind and has been going through some procedure to try to fix his eyes; so we met with him and he talked a ton about the communist era and why he is so thankful to America... it was super funny and pretty cool. It was a bit difficult because we went with the B's and I had to translate the entire time, so after 2 hours my brain was dead because he just non-stop talked… and in addition, earlier that day we had a super intense meeting that I had to translate for where I kinda had to be a bit bold with some members, while Translating, so it was super hard but a good experience ...  translating skills LVL UP!!! Then we gave him a blessing for his eyes, so hopefully his eyes slowly get better.

We will be meeting with that super cool family later today, so hopefully that will go good. Also we met with B. again (the 13 year old) and in order to get him interested we always end up playing some type of game, like Mario on the board in order to get him to answer questions and it was super funny. My comp is very creative. There’s even this place here where you can custom make shirts so he made a drawing and we turned it into a comp item shirt!! Its super sick, I’ll show a pic of it.

We also met this super cool investigator whose children are members, let’s just call him Joe. He also makes whips and is one of the best in Hungary; but one must first put in an order and then he will get it a few months, so I wanted to ask dad if he wanted a whip. I was assuming that he would so I was planning on getting one for him, but I wanted to ask you for sure if you want one Dad? They cost around 60 to 65 bucks, but they are pretty legit. My comp just got one and they are handmade by a skilled Hungarian craftsman who is also super cool, a bus driver and he is so proud of it!!!

We also got a let in while tracting by this super cool néni who met with the missionaries in the past and loves talking about religion. She had a ton of questions and it was awesome because they ALL were about the plan of Salvation and I just loved sitting on her couch explaining the plan to this old néni. She wants to come to church so hopefully next week we can get her to come. All in all it was a good program.

Other than that, nothing tooo spectacular, just a lot of missionary work, finding, meeting with people, wooot!!

Hope you are all doing AWESOME!!

sok szeretettel

Waldvogel Elder

VEMS

January 5, 2015

Dear Family,

Well I emailed not tooo long ago, so not much has changed, but I did get to meet a lot of the members here in Eger, and there are some super cool people here. It’s a bit colder which kinda stanks. Also I’m serving around the Browns again!!! And he is the branch President, so I have to do a ton of translating which is challenging, especially when Elder Brown sometimes uses ridiculous words that I can’t even understand in English. Ex: percolate . . . ugh. I took AP lit and still don’t understand this.

 So far we haven’t met with a ton of investigators because of the Christmas holiday, literally everybody was busy, but we did get to meet with the S. family and they are way awesome. I got along with them pretty fast; they have 3 boys and the oldest speaks super good English. He is like a genius and is hilarious. The dad loves to talk about what he has seen on TV and about history and stuff, super funny and the mom is just straight up cool. Other than that we have yet to meet with anyone.

Also it was raining the other day but yet it was still freezing cold, so literally all the streets were frozen over with ice, so we just went place to place sliding around. Kinda like a kid in his socks sliding all over the tile floor. That was fun.

Not much else happened this past couple days other than a lot of finding and freezing…

Anyways hope you guys all have an awesome fantastical week full of surprises at every turn!

Sok Szeretettel

Waldvogel Elder 

VEMS 

January 1, 2015

Dear Family,

Sorry I haven't been able to email for a long time, with Christmas, New Years and transfers everything was crazzzzy! But first off, E`s baptism was perfect!! And it was the best feeling ever having the opportunity to baptize her! It’s just super sad now because I left Buda and I won’t see her for quite a long time. She also said that now M. also wants to be baptized and I won’t be there for it as well. Seriously the coolest thing ever to see their progression, in just a couple of months, I have been able to see such a big change in her and she is so much happier; it’s amazing to be out here bringing these people such happiness.

So far Eger is an awesome place and my companion is hilarious. His name is Elder P, and he was trained by the one and only Elder O. (who I flippin love), so I was pretty stoked. Also on Saturday the new secretary came up and it was Elder C!! He is the Irish Elder who I served around in Sopron. We were in a tri-ship for a couple days so that I could train him how to be a successful secretary and it was the funnest thing ever! The office actually became a cool place. We also had quite a bit of success finding too, which was funny because it was at the most random times; like shopping at the nagy piac on P-day we met this cool lady who we talked to for 30min. and she wanted us to come back sometime. Then at Burger King I met this super girl named "K" who surprised me when I ordered in Hungarian and she answered back in fluent American English. We talked to her for a while, but she was working so we just gave her our number and later she called us and we met with her, and she is super cool.

Anyways Eger is flippin tiny compared to all my other cities, especially compared to Budapest. I haven't left Budapest since May; I lived there for around 8 months. At first, I really wanted to leave, but as I got to the train station, I really didn't want to go... I really fell in love with Budapest. I’m even thinking about going back for a semester abroad or something. But Eger is super pretty and a really nice town. We actually went to the basilica here which is huge and it turned out that they were having mass. . . it was very interesting, a ton different than our church, but it was super cool to see!

Anyways hope every bodies New Year was spectacular!!

Love

Elder Waldvogel

VEMS

December 13, 2014

Dear family,

That’s super sweet that you’re going to pick up Hailee... tell her I said "... Hey… Lee", I really hope that you have a good time. I can’t wait to Skype all of you!!! It’s been forever since I have seen Hailee! I’m super stoked. Also I don’t know exactly when we will Skype but we are planning around 3 or 4ish here which is like 10 or 11PM there in Singapore on the 25^th, which is kinda late, for you guys.

Well this week was interesting, we went to the hivatal a couple of times which was a pretty good, made the horrible mistake of going to gringos amigos again as a district after district meeting and we all got sick with some wicked diarrhea. Then we had to go to the hivatal while we still had the runs which was pretty flippin funny now that I look back on it. But my tummy was very upset for a while. But now my stomach is good and my ankle is super nice now, I don’t have to wear my brace any longer!! WOOOOT!

We also had to organize a ton of liahonas for each and every city that has a branch or ward and it was pretty boring so we decided to spice it up and just made a pyramid of liahonas and also took a ton of pictures with them which actually made it pretty fun. LOL

We also met with E. which was super awesome; she will be having her baptismal interview next week, so we are super excited for that. we also met with K. a few times which was sweet, but a bit difficult because we almost get nowhere with our meetings, but he is still progressing, just very slowly, but now he really wants to start coming to church more which is Awesome!!!

Other than this stuff, not a lot new happened… we went caroling once which was pretty fun. So anyways hope yall are doing awesome!!!

sok szeretettel
Waldvogel Elder
VEMS

December 7, 2014

Dear Family,

This week was insane which is why I am emailing today. Work has been going pretty good, the hivatal was insane, and super busy. I was super exhausted and never slept so well in my life than after that day. Also we had an awesome day yesterday!! M. came!! We went over to the K family's house and celebrated like some true Hungarians; we sang songs, made ginger bread stuffs, ate some candy and tons of fruit, Super cool! We also had a pretty fun time while organizing liahonas for all the zones, we ended up making like a little pyramid and also just taking a lot of random pictures. I will totally have to send some next time. sorry I don’t have a ton of time today and not a lot of crazy cool stuff happened, but hopefully something awesome will happen this next week.

Hope your all doing awesome
sok szeretettel
Waldvogel Elder
VEMS

November 29, 2014

Dear Family,

Sorry I wasn’t able to email earlier, it looks like our p-days will for sure be on Saturdays every week. It’s been switching so much not even I can keep tract of it. But other news NEW COMPANION!!! Awwwwwww snap!!! And guess what . . . its Elder Blackman from my MTC group!! We are super stoked and we have already been having a ton of good times together! It’s been super hard though because this week with transfers and all the Christmas packages. But I can’t wait for Christmas; here it’s like the coolest thing ever. There are all these little shops that sell super cool stuff, tons of decorations all over the place and most people are just overall happier.

Work has also been going supa good. We had some super good programs with our investigator E, she had a ton of questions with the law of chastity but we only had like 15 min. so we just talked about it for a while and gave her a little pamphlet that talks about it and then the next day when we met she was like, "I read it and it literally answered all of my questions . . " and we were just like..."WOWOOOOWOOTT" because for a while she just could not understand why this commandment is important. So it was super awesome. We also had another program with our inv. A. who is an eternal investigator and is now just starting to progress. And it was awesome because we decided to talk about and focus on church, because he just would come randomly, and we really just promised blessings and shared our on personal stories and it was awesome. Afterwards when we asked him if he would come... he was still hesitant. But he ended up coming!! So hopefully he will come tomorrow.

Other than that... not to much going on. Just more secretary stuff, it’s always fun seeing the new missionaries and getting to meet them all. Yup, wish there was some more exciting stuff to talk about, maybe I need to break my ankle again . . . speaking of I’ll send some pics of it, when it first happened... but it’s a ton better now.

Anyways have a fantastic week!!!

Sok Szeretettel
Waldvogel Elder
VEMS

November 17, 2014

Dear Family,

So this week was pretty intense. I should probably start off by saying that I sprained my ankle super badly while playing soccer and had to go to the Hungarian hospital; and now I have to wear a brace for 4 weeks and the past couple days I have used crutches. But it’s cool because It could’ve been a ton worse... I really lucked out and learned quite a bit from it. Literally right after I sprained it, I limped over to a bench and sat down and this lady came up and started talking to us and turns out she was a physical therapist!!! AND helped out on a soccer team!! So she gave us some awesome advice and helped quite a bit; it was super sweet! Then this member came up with the idea to sit me on a bike and lead me back to the branch house. This guy was super nice and he just kept trying to cheer me up all the way while he was guiding me back to the branch house. Then an investigator who also sprained her ankle super bad knew exactly where to go and what to say (because she was Hungarian and apparently the hospital people can be kinda dumb sometimes) so she came with us; and THEN we ran into a recent convert who worked at the hospital and he guided me around and helped with everything... I’m just soo grateful for all these amazing Hungarians… they’re truly the nicest people on earth.

I also remember that a while after it happened I said a little prayer in my heart and it was interesting to see that the pain didn’t go down, it still hurt quite a bit, but it was my attitude about it that changed. I also remembered the story of the elder who got egged and instead of getting angry he told his comp to take a picture; so I did the same and took a picture… sadly it’s on one of the other elder’s cameras, but I’m hoping that I can get it from him by next time.

So that’s kinda how consecration week ended… Apparently I didn’t sacrifice enough LOL. But our week was pretty tough considering there was a ton of stuff to do in the office. And my ankle is not working. But on the Bright side we had a super intense stake conference where two 70s came!!!! And the stake presidency for the one stake in Hungary was changed which was CRAZY!!! Because the last stake president was the first stake president in Hungary and has been for 8 years straight! Anyways both 70s were sooooooo awesome and gave the greatest talks I have heard in person for a long, long time. The spirit was just so strong especially as he was calling the new stake presidency; because even I had some doubts, but afterwards I had no doubt that the new president was called of God. Also K. came to conference, which was super awesome, even though he kinda left very fast.

Also E. is doing super well. We just set a bap date with her for December 20th since her birthday is on the 24th. And she is just so ready; we talked with her about baptism because we weren’t too sure how well she understood it, but she pretty much understood it perfectly and really everything else perfectly also… it’s just amazing to see her sheer amount of change!! Other than that we kinda got dogged quite a bit, but we did have some super good programs with some other people that were super awesome!!

Well hope you are all having an amazing week, and that it continues into a fantastic month filled with wonder and amazement

Sok szeretettel
-Waldvogel Elder
VEMS csak az egész idő alatt!!