Dear All,

This has been a busy week as are they all.  This first part of the week we were busy preparing the proposed 2013 budget for the Europe Area.  This is a pretty involved process and takes a lot of coordinating time with the missionary couples in the various countries.  Each must be contacted to learn what projects they want to do, and then fitting that information into a master plan for Europe.  Then the plan has to be approved by the European Director for Temporal Affairs, and the Area Presidency.  Once that is done it must be submitted to the Church Welfare Dept. to be incorporated into their master plan, and then it starts moving up the line to the First Presidency and the Counsel on the Dispersion of Funds.  All this must be done while still doing our normal duties, and fulfilling our normal responsibilities.

Last week I taught Priesthood, which is a very interesting experience, because in our HP group is the Area Presidency and the Area President was in the class  ex- mission presidents, a just released temple president, and many highly educated members.  The lesson was on Pres. Uchtdorf''s talk " The Merciful shall obtain Mercy" form the last general conference.  It was a very interesting discussion as we defined mercy and its several meanings.  We discussed how to really apply mercy and the difficult thing this can be to do.  One of the main conclusions was that to be merciful is as essential for the giver as for the receiver, both need the principle of mercy, for growth, and we are all both givers and receivers of mercy.  When mercy is not extended an opportunity is lost for both parties.

The next day on Monday I gave the weekly devotional for the staff of the Area Office.  Surprisingly I was not stressed about this assignment,but knew what I wanted to say and present.  Many people in the world think of God as their creator (if they believe in God), only a few of those think of God as a Father, and only the Church teaches that as Children of God we have divinity within our spiritual genes, and therefore a divine potential if we choose to live for it.  I had several good discussions centered on that subject throughout the week.  In fact I think I will ask one of the mental health missionaries to present that topic in our Nov. fireside.  He has really thought this topic through and developed quite a presentation on good and evil and their influence in our lives.  It all sounds quite simple and concise, but there is much more to this idea than a quick look reveals.  It is amazing just how much the scriptures contain when you really look thoroughly at a subject, or principle.  The same passage you can understand on several levels.

This week I  thought that I would share photos of Frankfurt and some pertaining to our apartment.

As you can see German engineering has now learned how to built gravity defying structures or this is a new design in rockets just taking off - take your pick.

These blue and purple flowers just stay beautiful all the time.  I think they are perennials that just keep flowering.  We certainly have enjoyed them.  In the window behind them you can see our Wetterhauschen.

It is the last day of September and the geraniums on the balcony still look pretty.  I think I'll bring them in and put them in the stairwell for the winter and see how they will do.  We don't have a window sill big enough to hold them in the apt.

Our tomato plant has become domesticated and is now indoor tomato plant.  It has now grown to the ceiling of the living room/dinning room/ironing room/ laundry drying room.  Now will it produce inside like a good little tomato is the next question (maybe they will be red for Christmas).  I can say that so far it has not had 1 accident on the rug (that's better than most puppies I've knew).
We wish you all a good week next week.
Love, Oma und Opa

Herbst im Deutchland

Dear Ones,

The weather is changing.  The temperatures are dropping at night and during the day.  Dad was worried about our beautiful tomato plant so he brought it into the living room this past week.  You can see it is almost to the sealing and the tomatoes are ripening   We are hoping that we can keep it healthy and beautiful until Christmas.  It will be beautiful with a string of lights, a few ornaments and Christmas presents under it. Maybe it will have red tomatoes still ripening on it, how festive it will be. It has grown a good four inches since we brought it in.
This was a special week for our Brittany.  She turned 16 on the 19th.  We had a quick visit with her.  She was out on a date with her Dad.  She was wearing a pretty new dress and high heels(she said that the heels were not to high)  They family was meeting the two of them for lunch.  It was fun to talk with her on her special day.  Happy Birthday again.
This week we have been very busy in the office.  This was the week of the Area Review as well as the end of the quarter for finances.  We had visitors from all over reviewing our operations here in Frankfurt.  We had Martin Gardner from England who is over employment, Mark from SLC in the Welfare department, and Demitri from Moscow who is head of the Welfare department for Eastern Europe Area.  This review is done every three years.  This team is chosen and they visit all the facilities in the area to see how all is operating.  So we spent Thursday morning being interviewed.  It was friendly and a great opportunity to share information that might be helpful for future operations.  We drove people to hotels and to the airport as well.
It was a great feeling to feel that we had learned enough to be able to participate fully in this review.  We know what we are doing now and can really be useful.  This week we filled out the paper work to request our replacements.  It is hard to think about leaving.  We love it here and we are finally feeling confident about our abilities and skills to do this work.  But we were told that this is how the cycle goes.  So with excitement  we look forward to being with our family and friends but sadness to leave this wonderful experience and all of our new friends here
This week has been somewhat of a recovery week.  We have tried to go to bed earlier and get a little more rested.  Our traveling schedule this summer has been very tiring.  We work all day with our couples in the field and then we come back to the hotel and try and keep up with the office work.  We have been working Saturdays and Sundays here to catch up.
Friday we spent the day in Wiesbaden taking care of military business....renewed my ID card, renewal of our pink card so we can use the commissary and Px, picked up an Rx from the Pharmacy, shopped at Mains Kastel, and other places in the area, then we went to the Px and Commissary.  It was a full day.  On our return home we went for a Bike ride.  We rode downtown to the city center.  It was really fun and we did not get lost and it took us about 10minutes .  The weather is beautiful and cool, the leaves are beginning to turn.  I love the fall here.
Saturday, Dad stayed here in Frankfurt and worked a while in the office.  He went on another bike ride downtown.  He had a great time, got a little lost but found his way back home.  I went with Reingard to visit Ruth and Milo in their new home. The drive was beautiful and the conversation just great. They live in a small commuity close to Koblenz.  Tim has finished his schooling and is  now interning at the BAUHAUS.  He is going into management there.  We had a delightful day playing with Milo,looking at all the baby things that Ruth had collected, shopping at several flea markets for baby clothes for the new baby that will come the 29th of November and  a trip to C&A for some maternity clothes.  Milo, who is 2, and I hung out together while the two ladies shopped.  My german is about on his level so we got along just fine.  In fact, he helped me.  He is really a cute little guy.  A lot like my little Evan.  So I enjoyed it very much.  I loved being with Ruth and Reingard.  We got home about 9 pm and John made soup for us.  So we had a little dinner together and Reingard went home and we went to bed.  We were really tired.
Today is Sunday and Dad is preparing for his Priesthood lesson and will be at the office to do a little more work to get ready for the coming week.  We have our meetings at 2pm in the Frankfurt building.  It is so nice to just walk to church.
We love you all and hope this has been a great week for all of you.  We are thinking of you.
Love,
Oma and Opa

A busy 2 weeks in Hungary and the Czech Republic

16 Sept.,2012
Dear All,
This has been a very busy 2 weeks, but very good weeks. The first we spent in Budapest Hungary which is one of the prettiest cities in Europe. We were there to train E/S Wiggins who came to us from Sandy UT. They lived in Sandy and he use to ride his bike up to snowbird all the time. They are a wonderful couple, highly computer literate, and very enthusiastic to serve the Hungarian people and the Lord. The second week we spent with the Pages in the Czech Republic participating in and helping with a wheelchair training program. The Church has worked with Motivation Romania and WHO and now WHO has adopted the wheelchair training developed by Motivation Romania as their standard for distributing wheelchairs. I have included some of the pictures we took in both countries. We spent very little time site seeing, but did enjoy what we saw. I have included some pictures of Prague which may be the prettiest city in Europe.
For the past month I have been working on setting up a fireside with Elder Nelson for when he came to Frankfurt this past Weds. We returned from Prague Thurs. night, and was asked to conduct the Fireside Fri. noon. It was a great fireside with Elder Nelson, very interesting the the stories he told about President Kimbal and Pres. Monson. After the firside as I was sitting on the stand I had the opportunity to visit personally with Elder Nelson. I mentioned that I had some uncles that I thought he might know. He asked who, I told him Owen Reichman, Hyrum Reichman and Wilford Reichmann. Elder Nelson said, yes I know them, then he said "you have some very good blood in you". I thought that was a great tribute to Grandma and her family, and it affects all her descendants.

This is Elder Robert and Sister Janice Wiggins the first Humanitarian Missionary couple assigned by the Church to Hungary. They are highly skilled people and will do a wonderful job. She is a PhD in education and taught at the U of U and wrote grant proposals for the ED. Dept. She taught teachers how to teach blind children. He has a degree in ME and formed his own co with 2 friends. The co. sold calibrating technology throughout the world. You can see that they have special skills that will be very helpful to the work in Hungary. We spent 4 days training them, and helping them get setup in their apt. We also took a bunch of office equipment to them.
This is a garden project that was started in Veszprem Hungary a year ago. The sister in the blue blouse has fed her family the whole summer on the produce she has grown on her garden plot. She only goes to the store for milk, bread and occasionally meat. The Lord has really blessed the ground and it has produced a lot for the members participating in the gardening project.

In the wheelchair training program the people to be trained are put immediately into a wheelchair for the entire first day of training, so they can begin to understand what a poorly fitted wheelchair feels like, and thus better appreciate how important it is to fit the chair to the recipient. A poorly fitting chair can actually cause damage to the person.
Kim Brown a PT volunteer from SLC teaching the group how to properly assess if a person is in the proper position to be tested for a chair. They teach a 90/90/90 principle. Susan is in the blue with the clipboard
Judd Thalman a PT volunteer for the Church (from Richmand UT.) teaching the trainers. Seated is Elder Dennis Smith a wheelchair specialist for the Church and standing next to Judd is Jakob a translator
Susan is learning to test if there is any sensory loss (neuronal damage) in a potential wheelchair recipient. If there is any sensory loss it will affect if the person is a candidate for a wheelchair and will influence the kind of chair they will receive.
Here a couple of trainees are actually fitting a wheelchair recipient into a properly fitting chair and the proper type of chair. This is the final step in the training process.
At the end of day we took a small stroll around the small town where the training was conducted. As this picture was taken it was almost dark, but we used a special setting for low light, and this was the result
In Czech (in almost all towns and villages in Europe) the town is built around a center square. This is the famous Astronomical clock on the square in the daylight. I just want to show a few sights of Prague as the most important part of our visit was the wheelchair training that we did for 3 days
This is the famous clock tower with the Astronomical clock at night.
This is a picture of the Prague (spelt Praha in Czech) castle at night
This is a front view of the castle from the town square. The castle is actually a block behind the square. Rain in Europe is just normal

A side view of the Prague castle
A beautiful house on the town square
This is the oldest known market in Prague. How long it has been there is not exactly known, but it was first mentioned in writing in 1232 (let's see you top that Walmart ?)
Susan with Jakob (one of the interpreters), Sister Smith and Sister Page in a very old wooden church in an open air museum in the Czech Republic. We took an hour and visited the museum after the wheelchair training one day.
We are grateful for this opportunity to serve a mission and the support you all have given us. We love you all,
Oma and Opa

Bosnia, then back in the office

2 September 2012
Dear All,
Two weeks ago we were in Bosnia visiting and training E/S Winters. They arrive in late June, and in early July they were transferred by the mission president from Croatia to Bosnia. This move has been very difficult and fraught with challenges, but they have persevered and made the move. They have one remaining hurdle to overcome before they will feel settled and can progress the humanitarian work. Part of our fast today is focused on them and their needs.
Fortunately they come with a wealth of knowledge and experience which will be extremely valuable as they travel throughout Bosnia. Bosnia is small country and poor like all the former Yugoslavia countries. We flew into the capital Sarajevo, rented a car and drove the 130 kilometers (about 80 miles) to Tuzla. This short distance required 2 1/2 hrs. the entire drive was on a 2 lane road through the mountains. Bosnia has almost no highways.
We felt good about the training and the time we spent with the Winters, the are a good humble couple. Returning to Sarajevo to fly back to Frankfurt was also an experience. We didn't have a GPS with us because only about 3% of the roads in Bosnia are mapped on the GPS, so a GPS really is of very little help.. Therefore we were depending on the airport being marked as we drove into town- it wasn't! But the Lord blessed us, two or three times as I was driving I could feel that we were headed in the wrong direction. We would pull over to the curb and ask if someone could speak German or English. Each time we found someone who could speak English - very rare in Bosnia. Long story short we made it to the airport just before our plane boarded (boarding was late), I turned in the car key while Susan checked us in, walked to the gate and walked on the plane. Without those promptings and English speakers on the street there is no way we would have found the airport. There were no signs until we were almost at the airport.

Back in the office on Tues. we met with a mountain of work in spite of working in the hotel each time until 11:30 or midnight. Thus this has been a very busy week requiring long, long days and working Sat. and 4-5 hours today before and after church. We did take Friday evening off so we could go to the temple, which was very refreshing and relaxing. I guess I should also admit it, we did sleep in until 8:00 on Sat.
Tomorrow we plan to drive off at 8:00 for Budapest Hungary. If we drive straight through stopping only for gas and at the borders to pay the rood tax we should arrive at the hotel between 6 - 6:30. If we hit any road construction, or there is an accident on the Autobahn then it will take longer. We are excited to be going, the new couple in Hungary is a very accomplished couple and will pick up the training quickly, and the work they will do will be wonderful. The next week we will be with the Pages in the Czech Republic working on wheelchair training.

We are standing here with the directory of the old folks home in Tuzla, Bosnia, our interrupter, and the Winters. We were looking at the needs of the old folks and if we could do something to help. An 86 yr. old man with a cane in the home asked us to help him find a wife - alas we were unsuccessful.

Here we have some local volunteers making cookies with some of the residents of the old folks home. You will notice the tags on the volunteers, here everybody is monitored all the time. The affects of communism is still quite ingrained in the people. Anyway it was nice to see the volunteers doing something nice for the older ladies in the home.

At the end of the week we took a P-day and went with E/S Winters to a restaurant for dinner. Bosnia depends on the rain to water everything, and you can see in the background how dry everything is after 2 months with very little rain. We have found the food in these Balkan countries enjoyable and especially the Balkans salad -Shopjeka, a combination of tomatoes, cucumbers, and onions. In Bosnia they eat a lot of meat especially beef, so the salad is light and refreshing especially when the temperature is close to 100 or above.
We hope you all have a good week.
Love, Oma und Opa

A Warm Week in Frankfurt And Step Forward in Macedonia

Dear ones,
We hope all of you that went to Snowbird had a great time. We were thinking of you all week. We have had a good week here in Frankfurt. Dad had a cold last weekend but is now feeling much better. We took it easy this week and it was good. We have had several bike rides this week to include one to pick blackberries. We have eaten alot and made a cobbler we will enjoy for Sunday Dinner. We have enjoyed our garden on the balcony. It has been warm but nice. This coming week will give us temperatures in the 100F degrees. But it does cool down in the evening and with a fan it is not too bad. You can see Dad with his giant tomatoe plant. We have enjoyed the tomatoes greatly and the wonderful fresh fruit of the season.

Look at the size of this Tomato Plant. It is almost as tall as Dad.

Here is more of the balcony Garden and Below is our beautiful Geraniums. They have really done well.In the office this week,we have been busy preparing for our trip to Bosnia this coming Thursday. We have enjoyed working with our couples. We are doing a lot of training on the phone both financial and with CHaS( Church Humanitarian System Computer program with which we track all humanitarin work ) We have had a great red letter day on Friday. Our couple in Skopje, Macedonia recieved their residence visa. This has taken two years. The first couple who opened Macedonia did not obtain a Visa thier entire mission. They lived between Macedonia and Kosovo their entire mission as they had Visitor Visas which would only allow them to live in the country 90 days then 90 days out. Our new couple, had to go to Detroit to get the paper work needed to achieve this. But it is done and a big milestone has been overcome so that the work of the Church can now begin to go forward. The young missionaries will have their completed paperwork soon so they too will be able to teach the gospel openly.
Our couple in Bosnia has finally begun to get things settled. We are grateful. It has really been a struggle for them. Sister Winters wrote of thier many set backs and problem,"We must put our hand in the Lords, rollup our sleeves and go to work" We are grateful to serve with these valiant missionaries. We are greatful to serve Our Heavenly Father and have the privilege to help in this great work. The Gospel in going forward to all those who were denied the privlege to worship, pray or even speak of God.
Saturday morning we decided to go to Point Alpha just outside of Fulda. Point Alpha was the check point to Keep the Soviets Out of Western Germany after WWII. American troops, The Black Horse Division patroled this area from 1950 to 1989 when the wall fell. I am Standing on the top of the cement Tower that our soldiers guarded. Just below this plateform was the office where communications from the Soviets were intercepted and passed on to Command Headquarters.Here is Dad, Standing in the East DDR. You can see the Tower in the Back ground. We toured the compound with its barricks. One is now used for a restaurant and one is now a museum. We enjoyed seeing the reilics, vehicles, uniforms, weapons, pictures etc and reading the history of the Cold War. We then walked down the cement road that lined the cement fence on the DDR side. We then viewed the musem representing the DDR side . How can human beings treat each other as these did. But as we have studied the Book of Mormon this year, I have gained some new insites. I have seen again who historical events and happenings today demontrate how Satan is trying to rule with Blood and Horror on the Earth.

Here is a view of Point Alpha from the East German side. Dogs were used to patrol the area. A four foot cement fense was placed in a ditch so vehicles could not be driven into the area. The wire fence was 3 meters high made of heavy metal mesh. Then beyond the fence was no mans land. It is always so sobering to see the reality of the past. Those who got out were so blessed. We who have enjoyed freedom all of our lives have no idea what it would be like to live your life in such a restricted environment.

Mespelbrunn Castle

Saturday, August 11th, Dad was ill with a nasty summer cold. We had planned to go with Elder and Sister Wells for a little outing to celebrate our newly assigned vehicle. We now have an assigned car that we share with the Wells. It is great to have the the ability to just get up and go if we want. We do not have to plan everything and go to the great lengths to get a car every time there is a need. Great Blessing for the remainder of our mission.
Anyway, With Dad ill, the Wells invited me to go along while Dad rested at the Apartment. We had a lovey time visiting Mespelbrunn Water Castle. Then we had lunch in an open air restaurant in the village of Mespelbrunn. It is really helpful to have a P-Day activity. It is restful and renewing. Gail and Gwain Wells are from Provo. They are wonderful people. We enjoy their friendship very much. Gwain is a Child Psychologist who was the Department Head at BYU for some years. We are grateful for all the wonderful couple missionaries who have blessed our lives. We have alot of measuring up to do.

We love all of you and thank you all for your love and support.
Oma and Opa Leonard

Training in Slovakia

Dear All,
We hope you have had a good week, and those of you that are at Snowbird have a safe and fun week. We returned last Mon. night from a few days in Slovakia training the Coopers who just arrived in country the end of June. In the office we have been very busy trying to catch up on all the administrative stuff we have to do. To top it off our boss John Mulligan will be gone the next two weeks on vacation and marrying off his youngest son. So we have been really busy with long days.


Lynn and Gorden Cooper just arrived in Slovakia replacing Carol and John Stiles. They come form Boise Idaho both were teachers, she has a music focus, and he is math. They are wonderful down to earth people. We flew to Slovakia to train them, and it went very well. They were very receptive to suggestion and correction, and will carry on the work in Slovakia in a great manner.
This is us with Robert and Ria Van Dallem Ria is Slovakian, but lived 19 years in California. She and Robert married after his 1st wife died of cancer. Ria and Robert's first wife were very good firends, but she didn't know him particularly. Several years after her death Robert's 2 daughters got Robert and Ria together. He is Dutch by birth, but has lived in Slovakia for a long time. 5 months after he was baptized he was called to be branch president. They are a wonderful couple.
In the picture are Susan, Ria (a contraction for Maria), Sister and Elder Cooper, Stephan, Katka, and Maria. Stephan and Maria are married and Katka is their only child. Katka is disabled and can only walk while holding on to something. Some 13 years ago Maria started an organization to help handicapped children because there was nothing in her area to help her daughter. Today she is one of the best if not the best know NGO in eastern Slovakia. Everybody knows and respects her for what she has done to help others. Our Humanitarian couples stated working with her some5-6 years ago, and during that time she has come to really accept the Church for doing good without an alternative motive. She is quite vocal in giving the Church credit for the help it is giving the people, and it bothers her when the people don't acknowledge the Church as the source of help. Both She and Katka have had a priesthood blessing to help them. Last Sat. we had lunch with them, and I was asked to say a blessing on the food. I in turn asked Ria our interpreter to say the blessing because she could say it in Slovak and Maria and her family could understand what was being said. Maria called Ria Sat. night crying she said that Stephan was really touched by the blessing and that they were drawing closer together as a couple because of the Church. We are convinced that if there were a church unit closer to them they would attened church. Maria and possibly also Stephan instinctively knows that there is a God, but living in a communistic country they were never taught anything about God, but I think there is a longing for a relationship with God.
We were also in Sobrance, Slovakia talking with the director and his staff of a hospital (the only hospital in the region) that services 25000 people. We are here in the ICU talking with him and the head nurse (in blue) they are asking the Church to provide funds to buy a special bed with monitors that they need to help stabilize a patient so they can be transported to a larger city with tertiary care hospital. Of all their needs they rank this bed as the most important. Maria also strongly supporting this request ahead of her own request. These people are very grateful for what the Church has already done for the people in their region of Slovakia. The hard point for them to grasp and to accept is that someone is willing to help someone else without expecting something in return. To give as the Savior gave is something they have neither seen nor known. When there are enough missionaries that they can be assigned to this area, they will be warmly welcomed by the people because of all the good the humanitarian missionaries have done.
Here ie a picture of Helene with an 86 year old patient in one of the new beds the Church provided to a nursing home. This bed is quite adjustable and very helpful to prevent bed sores. The good side rails prevent the patients, those that can move, from rolling out of bed, . Helene has been the director of this nursing home for four years now and is very dedicated to helping these older peolple and trying to improve their quality of life. She has a staff of 12 which provides 24/7 coverage for the 12 patients. As you would expect there is a waiting list to get into here, some die before their number comes up. Helene is a mortal angel.
This is an example of the old beds that the patients have been using for the last 40 years. The are not adjustable and moving or rotating a patient is very difficult for both the patient and the staff.

The Church is doing a lot of work to help the Roma (gypsy) communities throughout eastern Europe. Many communities are build up on the outskirts of town on land where the Roma just squat and the city lets them live there. This is typical Roma housing, packed close together and made of anything that can be carried off and used to make a wall or roof. In the summer when it is very hot, it is not so bad, but in the winter when it is very cold it can be terrible. We are working to try and get them into better housing, but one of the problems is the Gypies don't take care of anything,and thus it deteriants quickly. Therefore nobody is willing to rent to a gypsy. Amother problem is that the government pays money for each child you have and for a certain period after the baby is born,. They call this maternity leave money, and you get it whether you had a job or not. Thus there is a high birthrate among the gypies. It is quite typical for a gypsy girl to start having babies in her early or mid teens. Thus you have babies having babies which affects the bodies of both mother and child. On the plane home I read the story of a 74 yr. old lady with a great great grand child. This lady is typical of the gypies of her day, they can neither read or write.
This building (a four plex) is definitely on the higher end of living accomodations. These are 2 girls of a family doing the wash. The washing machine is in front of them and is very small. This building is a four plex with one window in each unit, you can see the doors of both units on this side of the building. These girls belong to a family of 9 children all living and sleeping in 1 room. They rotate who sleeps on a bed and who sleeps on the floor. The mother of all these children is in her early 30's, but looks mid to late 40's. We are partnering with agencies that are trying to bring about changes with the youth. Many want to work, but there is such a social stigma against Rome (gypsies) that it is hard to get someone to hire them and give them a chance. In the larger cities it is easier to get a job, but still it is difficult. WE are working to give the young people a chance to learn marketable skills, rather that just begging or going through the trash looking for plastic bottles to recycle.
This is a statue that show the development of the city coat of arms for the city of Kosice. However the city is several 100 years older than when this coat of arms was created. The first was designed in 1369. You can see it as the small plague on the far left. There were 2 other additions , the last being in 1453 almost a 100 years later. Slovaks are proud of their national heritage.
Kosice is an old city and at one time a very important trade city being on the intersection of two important trade routes. This lovely little church is in the town city at the end of one of the town parks. Behind it you can see the steeple of the cathedral, which I believe is the farthest eastern Catholic cathedral in Europe. Unlike most Balkan countries Slovakia is predominately Catholic -about 90% or more. Most of the other countries are Orthodox and Muslim
We took our bigger suitcase this trip so that we could take a crock pot to sister Cooper. She needs one for some of the young adult and branch functions in Kosice, and in a suitcase was the best way to get it there. The branch is quite small, but is very loving, and the feeling of love is very evident. Small units are typically very close, and we were certainly welcomed back with open arms. to Kosice.
We hope you have had a good week, and a successful week.
Love Oma und Opa

Training New Couples in Novi sad, Serbia and Skopje, Macedonia

Dear ones,
We have had a busy two weeks in Serbia, Macedonia and at the office. We have had a wonderful time meeting our new couples and training and learning from them. We left on July 16th and returned on July 23rd. then spent the remainder of this week catching up at the Office. Saturday we took a Senior Sister Missionary to Schweinfurt to see the post her husband (now deceased) had been stationed at as a young GI.. We had a delightful day with her seeing the p0st and walking around the city of Schweinfurt. The pictures that follow are from our recent trip to Serbia and Macedonia.

We traveled to Novi Sad, Serbia on July 16, 2012. We flew into Beograd (Belgrade) rented a car to travel the 1 1/2hours north to the city. We stayed at the Best Western, President Hotel. We had 2 and a half days to train the Maughans. A great couple. We had dinner the first night in downtown Novi Sad at a Doner Kabob restaurant. We spent Tuesday and Wednesday working. With a little break here and there.
Here we are at the open market with the Maughans carrying our treasure of fruits and vegetables for our lunch and dinner. The couples were so good to prepare meals at home. We had wonderful fresh watermelon, raspberries, peaches and tomatoes and cucumbers to name but a few.


Here is the Plate of Raspeberries we ate for a snack as we trained in the afternoon. 2.2 pounds of Raspberries cost about $3.50. Oh, they were yummy!!!!! It has been said that the Balkan countries were the bread basket of eastern Europe. The ground is so fertile and the produce so good and prolific. We left Novi Sad on thursday morning. It took us about seven hours to drive to Macedonia. We enjoyed the beautiful country side. We arrived in Skopje about 5 pm. I had really worried about crossing the borders but all went well. We stayed at the Karpos Hotel. Named for a Macedonian Military leader. We were picked up by Elder and
Sister Anderson for dinner and our training began on Friday. The Andersons are a great couple. We can see that the Lord is directing this church. You can see how these missionaries talents and abilities are just what is needed. On Saturday afternoon we had the time to do a little sight seeing. Here is a little of what we experienced.


Here is the Site where Elder Russell M. Nelson gave dedicator prayer to open the country of Macedonia for Missionary work in 2010. Elder and Sister Wondra attended along with several other Senior Missionaries.
Here are the Andersons and us at the site of the Dedicatory pray for Macedonia. The First missionaries were Humanitarian. Elder and Sister Juncker. There are now two proselyting Elders and Elder and Sister Anderson are the second Humanitarian Missionaries to serve in this country. Elder Adams was sent to Macedonia from Serbia. He had no knowledge of the Macedonian Language. He could not actively proselyte. He walked the streets learning the language which in a 4 month period he could speak quite fluently. This young man has a gift for languages as he also speaks, Russian and Serbian. His companian came from Albania. Two great young men. Just this past two weeks the opportunity to teach an investigator has come and in another week they will be able to proselyte officially. A miracle in itself. The Junckers worked 23 months loving and serving the people, the Anderson,s in their short time in Macedonia have also been instrumental in the process of gaining official recognition for the Church in Macedonia and to obtain a visa from the government.Here is downtown Skopje. The statue is of Alexander the Great who was a Macedonian. The people call this statue "the man on the horse". On the Hill you see The largest Cross in the world. At night it is lite. The orthodox church of Macedonia erected this to let the Muslim poplutation know that the Christians had an important presence. There is a large Albanian presence in Macedonia also.




Here we are in downtown Skopje on Saturday afternoon. We went to the museum of Military History. Learned a lot about Macedonia. The republic of Macedonia was created in 1991 so it is about 20 years old. It has been part of Greece, Albania,Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria. And of course it was part of the old Yugoslavia.
Sunday we attended Church at home of our Humanitarian couple. There were 17 people who attended church and out of these 17 there were 8 different languages represented. We had two investigators and a family of 6 from the Embassy who are leaving to go to Ottawa. Elder Anderson did a great job conducting the meetings as the new branch President. There was a wonderful spirit in the meeting. Beautiful testimonies were expressed.
After eating dinner with the Anderson's , we drove back to Serbia to Beograd this time to Stay the night at the Zira Hotel before flying home to Frankfurt on Monday.
We loved being with these great couples. We are so grateful to see the Hand of the Lord as these countries are being opened up for the gospel to be taught. There are many waiting for the news of the Gospel. What great sacrifices these pioneers are and will make to accept the truth and be baptized. Then to go forth. Many will lose family and friends and even jobs. But the blessings that await them will be worth every sacrifice.
We love you. We want you to know how blessed we are for the great sacrifices that were made by our ancestors so that we can enjoy the great blessings of this gospel. What a privilege it is to be a Missionary. Each one of you are so special to us. Please take care of yourselves and each other.
Love,
Oma and Opa