Week 7 in Plzen

17 Mar 2014 Ahoj! What even happened this week...? A lot of lessons cancelled, we got some new investigators, but they are kind of shaky. We did make a lot of progress with the family we are teaching though! The mom is really engaged now I think, we just really need to meet more than once a week. But we got to go to the girls dance rehearsal, and that was sooo cute. Reminded me of ballet :) And they came to the branch activity on Friday and loved it. So we are getting there! That activity was actually a huge success, we had 30 nonmembers there! more than members I think. We celebrated Purim, that Jewish holiday for Esther? The kids loved it because every time the story says the name Haman they got to scream and make noise, and then there was food and Jewish dancing after--Kuba invited his Jewish friend to come lead it. Everyone seemed to have a really good time. So that was great--besides I don't know when in my life I would ever get to do that again! And we had Branch Conference on Sunday, all of the McConkies came and it was spectacular of course. Two of the kids spoke too, it was adorable. The spirit was so strong, and one of the elders' investigators was sitting next to me, so I pointed it out and she was like, wow do you really think that's the spirit? It was awesome, I don't think she's ever recognized it before, so that was exciting. It was really interesting too, because Relief Society was on the Ten Commandments, and I was translating for Sister McConkie, which I like doing because it helps me focus better anyway. But I learned some things--we were talking about the sabbath day, and she mentioned how grateful she is that we have one every week. How much we need that day of rest to just focus on the Lord's work and rest up for another week. That is something that I really miss as a missionary--I think Sundays are the longest, most empty days, it's hard to find things to do cause Czech people all go out of town on the weekends. Anyways, then we were talking about honor your father and your mother, and what is the difference between loving them and honoring them? That was really interesting to think about--we came to the conclusion that honoring means respect and forgiveness. Sister McConkie was talking about how she likes to watch her kids sleep because it's like they are healing from all the parenting mistakes, and that's really what it is--that forgiveness, recognizing that they are human and most likely did the best they could. It's hard here with a lot of people here who want to get baptized because often their parents are so against it, and so they have to choose between following God and the traditions of their families. Anyways...so other things. We are making some progress with one of our less actives so I'm optomistic about that! And we did building tours as a district! That was so fun. And we taught 8 lessons total and got new potentials out of it, so that was exciting. That was probably my favorite thing we did this week--I love it, cause the people you teach are actually interested in what you are saying or they wouldn't have come in in the first place. Oh yeah! And we got to do service on Saturday! That was so fun, even though we were working in a garden and it started hailing and pouring rain. But I was just happy we got to go, sisters never get asked because we can't lift heavy things, but I was like we can shovel dirt just as well as elders! Put me to work! haha. It was fun. And we got to know the couple we were doing service for a lot better--she is Czech, he's British and they found the church in Brazil. Crazy huh? Their life is so interesting. So different than anybody else I know, she escaped communism at 19 and their kids live all over, mostly in the states. Unfortunately they are always travelling so we don't really see them very much, but it was really cool. Thanks for making me weed on Saturdays :) I know I hated it at the time, but I appreciate it with hindsight :) So overall it was a pretty good week. I'm trying not to get burnt out contacting--it's just hard when I get really excited about the cool people we find and then it's so disappointing when they never come for a meeting. But I'm trying to just trust God and work hard anyways, and trust that what's supposed to happen will happen. Maybe they really weren't ready right now, but that contact helped prepare them a little bit. Love you! Sestra Cooper

Week 6 in Plzen

10 Mar 2014 Can you believe it's already week 6?? So weird!! This transfer is just flying by. This week was kind of rough, people dropped us, did a lot of contacting, but then some really cool things happened too. So that was weird, it just felt really long. I still don't have my package mom cause it was held up in customs for some reason, but hopefully I'll get it soon, the next time somebody goes to Prague. We have training in two weeks so at the very least I should get it then. The family we are teaching is doing well, at least the girls (they are reading and praying every day!) but we haven't seen them for a week. The mom comes to church and prays and said she'll come to the activities this week too, but she isn't too thrilled about meeting with us and won't read, which I really don't get... But she's like best friends with a bunch of members now, so that's good? hopefully we'll get a meeting soon, she says it's just because her mom is in the hospital, so we'll see. But in our last meeting they all agreed to a baptismal date! So that was exciting. Oh yesterday something crazy happened. We wandered around the city for 3 hours trying to track down inactives, but no one was home or they don't live there anymore. On our way to Lochotin, I contacted this lady, and she said i'm in a hurry bye, but I gave her a card. So we kept going to the next address, (czech addresses have two numbers, one for the order they were built in and one that's actually the street number.) We didn't have the street number, just the other one, so wandered around forever, until finally getting back to where we started, and we eventually found it. Anyways, the point is, that even though I felt dumb for not looking at that door in the first place (I really don't know why it didn't occur to us before) apparently our steps were being guided that whole time. Because when we got on the tram to go home, the same lady was there! She was like hi I really was in a hurry, but what did you want to talk to me about?! And then she came and sat by me and I got her number and she wants to meet. that really showed me that the Lord is in control, there's no way that was a coincidence--that it was the exact same lady, the exact tram she was on and that she was sitting right by the door we got on at?? So cool. Oh! and another cool thing--we were coming home the other night and i was exhausted, but right outside our apartment this lady was standing at the bus stop, and I felt like I should talk to her. So I did even though I didn't want to, and we had a first lesson with her on saturday, and she is SO prepared. She was telling us that she loves the bible, but she always felt like something is missing. And when we taught her how to pray she said wow, i've only ever said otce nas (the lord's prayer) it never occurred to me that prayer is a conversation with God--that feels so good! She said she almost didn't come to our meeting but she was so glad she did. It was one of those moments when I'm just so glad to be here! That's about it, I really can't remember most of the week, i'm so tired all the time but that's status quo. Oh we started running again in the mornings, that was fun. I can't believe you are learning French now Dad! YES. You can help me relearn it when I get back :) haha cause it's just gone. Oh yeah and we went to a castle today. That was fun, we hiked up this mountain for forever, (all of the castles are on these steep hills) but didn't realize we could have worn normal clothes so we are all still dressed up haha. Awkward. Though I did feel kind of like a princess in my skirt hahaha. I'll send some pictures. love you!!! Sestra Cooper

Week 5 in Plzen

3 Mar 2014 Ahoj! Wow this week was so good. I really don't know what happened, but I guess your prayers are working!! It's a miracle. Me and my comp have been getting along just fine and working hard and we have new investigators!! hallelujah. Training really helped her I think, she's caught the vision too and we are just talking to EVERYONE. It's crazy. I'm going to run out of pages in the back of my planner for potentials numbers--I never ever thought that would happen! Of course a lot of them don't answer when we call, but who knows, someone could call them in a couple years and they will be ready. And we have a really cool new investigator from Portugal, she's studying medicine here and she came to all 3 hours of church! That was a feat because we had to translate the whole time (she doesn't speak Czech) but she stayed anyways. We have a second lesson on Wednesday, and I'm really excited. Plus the FAMILY we are teaching is just amazing. I have wanted to teach a family my whole mission. Those girls have so much faith already, I kind of wish we could teach kids more often. So cool. And they are reading in the book of mormon on their own. We are going to give all four of them baptismal dates today :) It's so refreshing to teach people that actually care! Plus we have some more first lessons set up with really cool people this week, I'm so excited. This one contact was really neat--she started out by saying she was a complete atheist, and 20 minutes later she was saying that she would love to go get hot chocolate with us and talk more about the answers to her questions, and that she feels like meeting us really helped her feel inner peace. Miracles happen every day! Oh yeah and the other thing that happened on Saturday--Constantin called! haha I don't know if that's even allowed, let alone how he got our number but it made me happy. He just kept saying over and over I didn't lie!! There's going to be members in my town, my wife got baptized! haha it's awesome. Then he gave the phone to one of the sisters and she told me about all the miracles that led to his wife's baptism--the sisters had just barely opened a new area in the branch nearest to his town 2 weeks before, when he showed up to church and said hi, this is my wife, she's not a member and we've been reading the book of mormon every day together, you should teach her! haha love it. She said they almost have enough members to establish a group in his town, you need two women and 2 priesthood holders, his sister-in-law is getting baptized in 2 weeks, and his brother-in-law and son are investigators too. And then they will have their own missionaries in Cimplung. Just miracle after miracle. Constantin kept asking when I am coming to Romania with my whole family so it looks like we have to take a side trip next summer haha. Love it. He kept saying you can skype in August, you can skype in August! hahaha. OH the miracle with housing?? So cool. I'm so excited to live with Kylie, I can't believe she was praying for that too! God really is good. I just feel so much love. So much. I was thinking a lot about the quote from Pres Monson--the future is as bright as your faith--this week. I'm not trunky, because I love it here and i'm working hard, but every so often it hits me that I really don't have that much time left until normal life again and that freaks me out. It's already March, Christmas was yesterday, and before I know it, it will be over. But it really is true that the future is as bright as your faith. If the Lord can guide my life as a missionary, of course he can guide it after as well. And there are only good things to come! Plus I still have a lot to do here. But my testimony of the atonement has just grown so much. So much. That was one thing I really wanted to learn as a missionary--before I definitely knew that Heavenly Father loved me, and that was so important, but I didn't really have that much personal experience of how Christ fit in. I knew the doctrine intellectually, but it wasn't written in my heart you know? But now I really feel it. And I understand. In Czech there are a couple words for understand --one is rozumet, that's like I understand the words you are saying, but then there is chapat/pochopit, which is I really get it, I understand what you mean, not just the words. It's like that. Predtim, jsem rozumela, ale ted' chapu. (Before I understood, but now I get it.) Missions are just the best. love you!!! Sestra Cooper

Week 4 in Plzen

24 Feb 2014 Ahoj! This week I saw soooo many miracles. First of all, Constantin's wife got baptized :) I just got a picture. So happy. But in Plzen, I decided to take your advice Annica, and just decide once and for all that I will just talk to everybody, and not be afraid about it, instead of having to make that decision every morning. So I did it! It started with the exchange with Sister Donaldson on Thursday, that was SO fun. We went running for the first time since Fall and she's so easy to talk to. We had a goal of getting 6 numbers that day (to put this in perspective, we had gotten 7 numbers in the first two weeks of the transfer). I really wanted to work on tram contacting so we planned a lot of that, and we wanted to teach an other lesson to someone we would find that day. So we went to work, and at the end of the exchange we had not only taught that lesson, but gotten 6 numbers for gospel interest and 4 for English. And I gained a testimony of tram contacting and goal-setting, and spiritual finding. We prayed about who would be looking for us the next day and S. Donaldson said, ok I think it's a YSA guy, wearing all-black with brown hair. I was like ok...we'll try it. But she totally found him, exactly as she had described him! I don't know why I doubted--I mean if God knows everything and we are doing His work, why could He not help us recognize the people we need to talk to?? And so I've really been trying to follow the spirit in finding, and have found the most prepared people I've ever talked to. One of them told me she envied my faith and wished that someone could help her to develop it, so of course I told her that's what we do! And then yesterday I saw this girl in a yellow scarf about to cross the street and I talked to her--turns out she had literally just had a two-hour conversation about faith with a Christian friend and she wants to know how to develop faith in God and how she can believe. She just kept saying, wow that's such a coincidence! It was amazing. To think that I've probably been passing all of these people that the Lord has placed in my path, but because I didn't open my mouth, we didn't get to teach them. In the last 4 days we've gotten 18 numbers. 18!! It's been a miracle. And all it took was an exchange with an inspired sister trainer leader and greater trust in God. Plus I studied Elder Bednar's talk about tithing, and how we should ask for strength to change our circumstances instead of waiting for them to be changed by someone or something else. So I decided that I wasn't going to think of my area/city as dead, but that I was going to do something about it. And it's been so neat to see how it's just exploded. I think Heavenly Father was just waiting for me to decide to be all in, so that he could bless us with success. We met with someone who contacted us the first week of the transfer, someone from october texted us and wanted to meet, someone else met with us the same day we called him...and an investigator who comes to church but wouldn't meet with us is suddenly best friends with the coolest member ever and she got us a meeting this morning! She is so cool and has 10 year old triplets that we are going to teach too, we have a meeting on Thursday. It's been crazy. The Lord really does labor with us!!! I think she will get baptized this transfer, and hopefully the girls too :) I've never taught kids before, but I'm so excited. Good things are happening in Plzen! love you!!! Sestra Cooper

Week 3 in Plzen

17 Feb 2014 Oh jejda....I don't even know what to say about this week. It was kind of train wreck, but that's ok, cause I'm finally feeling better. Really though I don't even know how to describe it, it was probably the hardest week of my whole mission. Lots of depressing things happened, along with the new area/companion/members/district stress. We taught one lesson to a potential who decided he didn't care enough to meet again even though we did everything we could to persuade him, all the other ones cancelled, our rcla came to a lesson so drunk that he couldn't stay awake and the elders had to escort him home, a creepy man gave me chocolate with "ma cherie" on Valentine's Day (we gave him to the elders), we did some tracting and tried to find inactives...And some less active blames my companion for why he's mad at the church. So yeah....it was a little rough. But I learned some life skills? 1. don't contact creepy-looking men or you will be creeped out. 2. I now know what beer smells like. (I'm just glad I had a sheltered childhood) I don't want to smell it ever again. It was so sad. 3. Don't start off a contact/tracting with "we're here as missionaries" because you won't get another word in, it's much better to just start testifying, and then you get in a meaningful conversation. So good life lessons from Plzen.... And some journal entries I will probably laugh about in a few months. The one I wrote in C Bud when I had the worst day ever is absolutely hilarious now. At least we did some fun chalk displays with the district, that was good, I like them better than singing displays. Anyways...the elders gave me a blessing yesterday and I'm feeling a lot better. Priesthood power really is the power of God. I felt the darkness lift the second they laid their hands on my head. I'm just so grateful for the gospel, I don't know how people live without faith. It's something that I've really learned on my mission, people's lives here are really hard. And really sad. The message that we have really does bring so much hope, and the commandments are there to keep us safe! They are so so so important!!! And they protect us from so much heartache. Gah. I wish that everyone could understand that. That's why it's so hard to watch them not even give it a chance, because I know that it would change their lives! Sigh. That's why I'm here, they need it so bad!!! That's why we do what we do. Well all we can do is keep praying, keep working, and wait for the miracles. I know they will come. Just maybe not when I want them to. I did hear about Brno from Sister Senkane, and their area is on fire, so I'm at least glad that the foundation I helped build is solid! This weekend they had a YSA Conference at our building at least, so I got to see a lot of the YSA from Brno, C Bud and Prague that I haven't seen for a while, so that was fun. And the Archibalds came too, so I got to see them. Today we went on a vylet with the elders and saw the historical underground, that was fun. I'll send some pictures. Other good things...I finished the Old Testament! Finally. That was exciting. And we have exchanges this week, I'm going to be with Sister Donaldson! So excited. I haven't really seen her my whole mission cause we are always on opposite sides of the country, but now she's one of my STLs :) So yay! That will be fun. love you!! Sestra Cooper P.S. pictures: the district with our free beer vouchers from the tour....gotta love Plzen. me and S. Bruno in the underground a chalk display we did, that was fun, it's the gospel of jesus christ with hopscotch

Week 2 in Plzen

Feb 10 2014 Ahoj! Well it feels like a month since I last emailed, don't know why the week was sooo long. It's still cold, but not too bad and we still don't have any snow, which is crazy. I can't believe it snowed so much at home!!! I've never ever seen it like that. What is happening to the world? haha. The week was good though. Plzen is a little sketch compared to the part of Brno I was in before, so that's been interesting to say the least... But we have some cool new investigators, so that was exciting. And I just got an update on Constantin: "Hello! I'm Sora Hebdon and I am teaching Constantine's wife Alexandra. She is going to be baptized next week! Thank you so much for sending Constantine back to Romania with such a fire for the gospel, It's truly a wonderful thing to see. He talks about you all the time and says how much he loves you, which is why i wanted to write this message for you .After his wife is baptized, his sister in law will be baptized soon too! He is sharing the gospel like crazy with his whole city. I'm so grateful for you and for all your work in the Czech Republic. The gospel is spreading like fire over the whole world. Thank you thank you thank you!" aaaah I love it. I think about him every time we have a bad day. The elders here just started teaching another Romanian and he reminds me so much of Constantin, both the good and frustrating parts haha. So great. The gospel is just amazing. (ok the crazy thing is that investigator just came into the internet cafe we are at, and he was showing us random things about mormons on youtube, so we showed him how to get to the official website, not all the lies. Miracle!) Other things from this week... we had to take another last minute trip to Prague for visa stuff, but Sister Bruno has hers now, so that should be the last time. That was fun though cause I got to talk to Elder Hansen some more before he went home!! So weird. Everyone I know is finishing their missions and it's so sad! The time goes by so fast. Oh and mom you asked about the Martha Toronto book? Sister Munro gave me a copy but you can download it online. She said to just google Wallace Toronto and you should find the foundation's page with a link to it. So yay! You'll love it, it was so fascinating. It's really cool to be here in Plzen because we have some of the oldest members in the whole country. One old lady was baptized in 1948, which is amazing because almost all of our members were baptized 1991 or later for obvious reasons. So even the more experienced members have only been members for my lifetime. Crazy. Another one got sent to Germany by her parents at age 16 to get baptized in 1964 without even knowing anything about the church before she got there. It's so cool. I'm excited to see pictures and ask them more about what it was like. I gave a talk in church yesterday, which I was nervous about, but I think it was good cause I got to talk to almost all of the members, which was hard in Brno. There's about 30 that come to church here. Oh yeah funny story, we may have hopped a fence this week... Skirts and all. hahahaa. Thank goodness it was winter and we had leggings and boots on. We were looking for this inactive's house, and we finally found the panalak (apartment building) after walking around for forever...but it didn't have a door. (I wish I could show you the picture cause it's so much better, but I forgot my usb convertor) Anyways...It was connected to the other half of the building that was a lot nicer, so we rang a zvonek on that side and this guy came out and was like, asi vedle...(probably next door in the poorer part) So he lets us go through the building to the back and then shuts the door...right as we realize that the back parking lot has a fence around it, separating it from the side we want to be in....So we had to hop a fence to get out. (There are no doorbells on the back part) We were laughing so hard, like are we really doing this?? The adventures of being a missionary haha. I'm loving it, and I'm so exhausted, that about sums it up :) love you!!! Sestra Cooper

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