Week 1 in Plzen

3 Feb 2014 Zdar! It feels like forever since I got to email! Last week was the longest week of my life. But so fun. Well as you can see I got transferred to Plzen! Just got here a couple of hours ago. I'm really excited to serve here though, I've always wanted to, it's the city of miracles! (Basically C Bud in a year) And I'm serving with Sister Bruno, which I'm really excited about, she's awesome. It actually wasn't that hard to leave Brno surprisingly, because this feels right. Plus I know it's in good hands with Sister Senkane, she's a really good missionary. It was a little sad though cause I finally started to know more members better and then I have to leave. But it happens. I know I'm supposed to be here. Plus it's an odd sense of relief to not be spiritually responsible for all of our non progressing investigators--I think it's going to be like that when I get released, a lifting from the responsibility, but really bittersweet. Anyways. I do hope I get to go back for Diego's baptism, he was doing really well. I think that I needed to be in Brno for what I learned from my companions/taught them, more than the people I was able to help. And my testimony grew a lot in the last two transfers, which has been a gift. It really taught me to love the members, they are just incredible. And to love my mission. So I'm excited to serve here in Plzen, it's very likely that it will be my last area, can you believe it?? Unless President does something crazy and moves me for my last transfer. Who knows, anything is possible. I made it with all of my luggage without too much trouble, the elders even came with the car to get it, super nice. I'm super excited about this year though, we are putting a lot of emphasis on reactivation, we get to report less-actives just like investigators now, which is really cool. And we are SOO close to a stake. So we all have plans for our areas of how we are going to get our branches ready to be wards. It's going to be awesome! There's not too much more to say about last week, it was a lot of contacting in the cold, but we had fun with it. We got to explore different parts of Brno cause we were trying to track down some inactives, so that broke up the monotony. We did have this experience where we were looking for this one less-active and she no longer lived there. It was cold and dark and I was tempted to go home and just do some calls, but I remembered President's advice about how we are sent places sometimes to find people that are different than the ones we are expecting. So I followed the spirit and we went tracting near her house. Found a really cool teenager, she wasn't that interested but took a card, and I felt like she was the one we were supposed to talk to. So that was a neat experience. I've been working on putting in the same effort on the good and bad days, which is something that President has been stressing, and I think that's why this last week felt better even though we didn't have too many people to teach. That's my goal for this next transfer-to serve with all of my heart, even on the bad days! I even put that on my planner D&C 4 :) I'll have to show you them when I get home, or take a picture when I remember, cause I've decorated them all haha. The things missionaries do for entertainment.... love you!! Sestra Cooper

Week 18 in Brno

25 Jan 2014 I'M SO HAPPY RIGHT NOW. just got an email about Constantin, this is what it says: "Anyone who helped teach Constantin would be happy to hear this news. Could you share this with Sis. Cooper and Sis. Bateman? He was baptized in C Bud in September after almost a year of lessons, and was afraid he would be all alone when he went home [to Romania] as a non-drinker at Christmas. My Facebook IM exchange just now with him: There are 8 people coming to his home daily to read the BOM, books having being provided by the mission in Bucharest. His wife will be baptized Feb 8, her sister-in-law's sister is also on date. And also his son! American missionaries come regularly to teach, and there is already talk of opening a branch. Constantin is ecstatic! He did not expect to share this gospel this easily when he returned home." I can't even believe it!! aaaaah. So amazing. We promised him that if he just took that step of faith and got baptized that God would provide a way... 1 Ne 3:7. I knew that He would but I didn't think it would be that miraculous!!!!! Constantin has so much faith. And I've met his family over skype before, I'm sooo so happy. I can't even express how I'm feeling right now, just sitting here literally crying with happiness in this internet cafe. This week I was struggling because there's a chance that I will leave Brno next week, and I was feeling like I haven't even made a difference in anyone's life here over the past 4 months. But wow. President read Elder Witsoe's dedicatory prayer this summer, and he talks about how through this mission the other nations of Eastern Europe would be blessed---I didn't know at the time that I would be able to help with that. I just love my mission so much. I don't want to leave. I actually keep having nightmares about having to go home early and then I wake up so sad, and realize that I'm still here and it's ok. I remember someone saying that at the mtc, that if you serve well it will be harder to come home than it was to leave. And I thought, there is no way it will be like that for me--I can't even imagine that. But I'm starting to. Mom and Dad you know I love you so much, I just wish you could be here too and meet these amazing people that I've grown to love. And I had a really neat experience on Thursday that confirmed to me that I am making a difference here too, even if it doesn't seem like it. We were having a singing display and I was really feeling discouraged. No one was even stopping to talk to me, and then this one man was really really mean, and condescending, told me religion is for children, insulted my czech etc etc. So I was relieved when it was my turn to sing again. And then it was time to switch already and I was just praying for help, saying, look Heavenly Father, I'm doing my best right now, and it's not enough. So then I contacted this one lady, and she stopped. Her name is Gabriela. And somehow I just felt the Spirit working through me. All of the sudden I was happy and enthusiastic and I could feel God's love for her. She told me she feels this energy in nature and between people sometimes, and that if I say that that is God she will believe me. And she interrupted me, saying wow I've never seen such beautiful eyes, they're green and brown together! Haha I know that sounds weird but she noticed the light there, that something was different about me, it wasn't me at all. And then at the end of a 20 min conversation about mission calls and heavenly father, and our humanitarian work and prophets in the freezing cold, she told me wow, I can feel that you left something with me, it's really nice. So I promised her that she can feel that spirit all the time. We have a first meeting set up for Thursday and I am so excited. Even if we don't end up teaching her, if something happens, I will always remember that experience--how I was able to be an instrument in God's hands, and teach one of his precious daughters that she matters and that He cares. Missions are just seriously the best. I had no idea when I left how much it would change my life. I know everyone says that, but it's so true. It's just a miracle. And even with all the ups and downs it's been the best thing I've ever done. Ever. The hardest, but the best. It's so worth it. I'm excited about this last week of the transfer--we got a list of less-actives to go to town with, and we are just going to work so hard. I hope that I stay. I don't feel like my work here is done yet. But we'll see, as always whatever happens will be whatever I need. love you sooo much, Sestra Cooper P.S. Oh yeah, I got to play squash this morning for the first time, it's pretty fun. And we are going up to Spilberk again because there is a member here who knights all the missionaries if you learn correct Brno slang haha. I'm excited. the picture: Czech cukrovi--they all bake these at Christmastime.

Week 17 in Brno

20 Jan 2014 Cau! Only have one email left for the transfer! Can't believe it. I really hope I stay. Oh yeah and the next P-day is going to be this Saturday instead of next Monday cause the elders wanted to learn how to play squash, just fyi. It's basically spring here, no idea if I'm ever going to see the typical Czech winter. It's been sooo warm. Not that I'm complaining haha. This week wasn't too eventful, except for the fact that Diego is back! He texted us on Sunday asking to meet! So we'll see how that goes. And we had a really good phone call with Luc, he's still hoping his wife will change her mind and let him meet with us again. I talked to President about it and he suggested we write her a letter, so we'll send it this week. He says he wants to be baptized. So we'll see what happens. We had zone training on Tuesday, that was good of course, but always a little intimidating. President is changing the way we do goals for the next year--we are doing them from the ground up--we all had to look at our branches and figure out what they need and then go find and baptize those people this year. It's awesome but puts even more pressure on at the same time. But we are soooo close to having a stake. SO CLOSE. So we are going to do our best to make it happen, it would be such a blessing for the members here. For example, we don't have a Czech patriarch, so if they want to get their patriarchal blessing they have to go to Austria, get it in German and then wait for it to get translated into English and sent to them. If they don't speak German or English (and a lot of people don't) then they have to have someone they trust translate it for them, or just wait until we have a stake. It's made me appreciate growing up with all those blessings so much more. The exchange was really fun too, and I got to see Uherske Hradiste for about an hour. I love getting out of the city, Czech countryside is soo pretty, even in the winter. Plus the sisters live in one of the apartments they used to hold secret meetings in during Communism. Super cool. It was neat to get to know Sister Graham better too, she's awesome. Oh yeah and we're allowed to read Czech church history stuff on P day, which I just found out about, so I read Martha Toronto's autobiography today! (It took me like 2 hours--my comp was like wait...you didn't read it, you swallowed it! hahaha It was so great to read again!!). She was the wife of the first Czech mission president--he was mission president from 1936 til he died in 1968. They were kicked out during WWII, and then came back built up the mission for 4 years until the Communists got here, and got kicked out again. But he was still the mission president the whole time, and got to visit a couple of times after that. It was so cool to hear about it--the things these members went through...They had to submit a talk six weeks before they could give it to the authorities so they could censor it--and that was while the church was still legal. And all the rationing and everything...being followed and every action reported...It helped me understand Czech culture a lot better. We would have had a stake in the 60s if that didn't happen. And she talks about how it just broke their spirits--it just pressed down on them. It's so sad, but really important to know, and it makes me appreciate them so much more. Perspective helps--the things I go through that are hard are nothing like that. It's really neat too because my mission president's president was one of Wallace Toronto's missionaries way back then. Oh and the miracle that happened this week--we got 6 numbers on Thursday! It was awesome. We were looking for ysa girls because the branch president really wants to help the single rms get married (i know it sounds funny but we have 6 returned missionaries in our branch who aren't dating anyone) and almost all of them were exactly who we are looking for! We were so excited. So we should have some more people to teach soon! love you!!! Sestra Cooper P.S. the picture is from the exchange oh yeah and that guy you met dad, who was a missionary here? He's back for some kind of internship with his wife so he said hi for you :) It was funny cause we got to the building for fhe and the archibalds were like there's somebody from Oregon here who knows you! And I was like...uh I don't recognize anyone...haha. So that was fun!

Week 16 in Brno

Ahoj! 13 Jan 2014 aaah there are only 3 weeks left of the transfer! SO weird. I have no idea what will happen. I hope I will stay but it would be my third transfer here, so who knows. Should be interesting. Today was a good P-day, I finally had time to clean the apartment and organize my closet (we never have time for that!) and then we went to Spilberk Castle again with the district. This week went better-we were able to meet with some new people and our Christmas Eve miracle came to church! That was exciting, she was able to talk to a lot of the members that she knew and seemed to like it, she hasn't been to church in 3 years. And our Jewish investigator went to church in Uherske Hradiste, so that was good, he said he really liked it. Unfortunately he's going back to Turkey in February, but he says he'll look up missionaries this time (cause they are new) so we'll see how that goes. He's really cool, has been an on-again off-again investigator for about 5 years. The sad news is that our investigator from the Congo can't meet with us anymore because of his wife. It's SO sad. She won't even let us meet her, and has some fear of Mormons cause of lies she read online. It's awful cause he said he knows the book of mormon is true... I just hope that she changes her mind one day so that he can come back. He thanked us for the opportunity to meet and said that he always felt the Spirit...He'll make it one day. But, back to good things...yesterday was also good because we got two unexpected referrals at church! So we are really excited to teach some new people. We're getting along pretty well and have figured out how to teach with each other, so that's been really good. I'm excited about this week because we have zone training tomorrow, and we get to do the first 24 hour exchange for sisters in our mission! So that should be fun. The other ones were just like half a day, with all of us in the same area cause we have to travel so much. But this time Sister Graham is coming here and SIster Senkane is going to Uherske Hradiste. So that should be cool, I always learn so much from seeing how other people do things. Oh I did learn something cool in language study the other day--I've been reading a chapter of the Book of Mormon out loud every day for a couple of transfers now and I'm finally in Alma, and it's been cool because I notice different things when I read it in a different language. But this time I noticed more of Amulek's story, I feel like we usually focus on Alma more. But it occured to me that he might have had to watch his family be destroyed by the unbelievers, and maybe that was why it hurt him so much. And then he leaves everything he owns behind and his family and friends reject him. So I just realized how much he gave up for the gospel--literally everything. And the one convert out of that whole city and everything they went through was Zeezrom. So it just reconfirmed to me that the worth of one soul is so great that it was worth it. I thought that was neat, I've never noticed it before. Well that's about it. I did have a nice experience yesterday waiting for the tram to go to church--I just felt such peace. Even though I could have been discouraged by everything I knew that what I'm doing is all the Lord expects and that's enough. I can't really describe it, but it was beautiful. I love my mission so much. Love you!! Sestra Cooper

Week 15 in Brno

Week 15 in Brno 6 Jan 2014 Ahoj! Well this week was pretty lame. We weren't able to meet with very many of our investigators/the other ones dropped us, so that was kind of a bummer. It's just frustrating cause other ones say they are interested, but just never will set up a time to meet, so that's been kind of hard. But we are doing our best, so hopefully things will be better this week. The hardest part is just knowing that we've already done everything we can and knowing that the rest is just up to them--it's out of our control. I just know they would be so much happier if they would just try! gah. That's ok, our companionship is going pretty well, we've gotten to know each other a lot better so that's good. Hopefully a lot of the new people we've found will want to meet. And we are going to dinner at the Vit's on Wednesday, so I'm excited about that, they are an awesome family in the branch. The good thing is that it's still suuper warm here. It's kind of bizarre. Today was sunny and probably in the 40s? It's like spring in Eugene. We are just hoping it just never gets cold! But we'll see. And we did get a new investigator--he's been studying off and on with the missionaries for 5 years, and I actually taught him a lesson my first transfer in Prague! So that was cool. So we are excited to teach him. That's really it for this week...sorry there's nothing really exciting. I'm working on making my studies more effective, so my Czech's been improving, and I'm almost done with the Old Testament, so that's good. Just trucking along! Only have a couple weeks left of the transfer, which continues to blow my mind. Today was one of the elders' birthdays so we went bowling, that was fun. And now I'm just rambling :) love you!! Sestra Cooper

Week 14 in Brno

Week 14 in Brno 1 Jan 2014 Nazdar! Stasny Novy Rok! (Happy New Years!) I can't believe it's 2014. So weird. I really don't know what to say about this week cause it was pretty empty. I'm kind of excited for the holidays to be over so that people will actually meet with us/talk to us. Plus the tram schedules are obnoxious on holidays, it will be nice to get back to normal. The reason P-day is today is because it's a ghost town, so Monday was theoretically more productive...Oh but, the mission tripled the number of lessons during Christmas week from last year, so that was pretty exciting. Christmas was pretty good though, so glad we got to talk. I'm glad you liked your presents! I was hoping you would. It got there pretty fast, like 2 weeks? Anyways. New Years Eve was actually really fun, we got to watch movies since we had to be home at 5 and not leave for the rest of the night. So we watched Wreck it Ralph with the district (that is adorable) and then Monsters University with the Archibalds after. So that was fun, a little weird to be able to watch a normal one haha. But that was cool. And Sister Archibald made an amazing dinner as always. And we did a Secret Santa, I had her and got her a Czech Christmas songbook, she told me she had actually been looking for one the day before and couldn't find one so I was pretty happy to see how excited she was about it. My present was pretty lame, but you know elders....haha. It's fine, just a little kids card game, but hey it's in Czech so I guess that's cool? haha I'll have to show you how to play it when I get home. That is literally everything worth telling from this week. The Bohunice elders are having a baptism on Saturday, which is exciting. I'm leading the music and now organizing our musical number too of course. Haha I really am not that talented, but I'm the most musical out of all of us, so I get put in charge. And my piano playing is getting better at least from helping the elders learn their parts. So that will be fun. Their investigator is from Mongolia, so we are going to try and get our Mongolian family to come! I really hope they do. The dad wants to get baptized but really doesn't speak much English or Czech and is always working so it's hard to teach him. If his kids are there it's easier cause they speak Czech pretty well. So we'll see! love you love you love you Sestra Cooper

Week 13 in Brno

24 December 2013 So this email is going to be really short because we only have a half an hour. But it was totally worth it because we had a total miracle happen on the way here, which is why we have no email time. yay. But to make a it short, we were planning on dropping by this inactive's house later today but on the bus to email I suddenly realized that the stop we were at was right by her house and I felt like we should go right then. I was like this is crazy...but we'll do it just in case. Because we'd already stopped by like 4 times last transfer and she was never home. But we went anyways, she was home, let us in, was super excited to see us (she hugged us right away and I've never even met her) and we were able to share our Christmas video, sing with her, get her phone number and we have an appointment to come back on Friday :) aaaaah I'm so happy about it. Total Christmas miracle! But yesterday we had a mission conference in prague, it was sooo much fun to see everybody. And President is amazing as usual. We had a slideshow from the whole year, a talent show and then we spent an hour and a half talking about the Christmas story. It was awesome. And it was good to see all the elders who are going home at the end of the transfer, cause most of them aren't in my zone so I won't get to see them again, and I actually know all of them this time. Oh yeah and last week we got two of our investigators on date for baptism :) And one of them says he loves meeting with us and wants to meet more often, and he asked to see the font and was asking questions about how it works. Ahhh so great. And we managed to get the number of the missionaries in Italy for Diego cause he's going home for Christmas and he wants to go to church there! Good things are happening. I just love Brno so much. And the members are just amazing. Other really quick thing, we had our traditional Czech Christmas dinner on Sunday at the Rezacovi's house. SO COOL. They served us carp, which wasn't actually that bad (it wasn't really that good either, but I survived. And managed not to swallow any bones. So that was good). My favorite part though, was that they explained to us all the Czech Christmas traditions and we got to do them! So much fun. They put a fish scale under your plate and then you put it in your wallet and it's supposed to bring you luck, make little boats out of walnut shells and light a candle in them and whoever's lasts the longest has the longest life....there were a ton and they were so cool. I'll probably just tell you about it more tomorrow cause I'm running out of time. Oh and we went carolling/tracting to invite people to the Christmas Concert which turned out super well. I'm totally an alto now haha. It's been pretty fun. Today we are going out to visit more people with the Christmas video and I'm super excited about it, and then we are going to have dinner together as a district. Christmas on a mission is the best, we just get to bear our testimonies about Christ all day long :) So excited to talk to you guys tomorrow!!! love you soooo much!!!! Sestra Cooper