I've got a lot to tell.

   Okay so I'm just going to go right into my week I've got a lot to tell.

 

   First of all Bulgaria is awesome and super fun but it is a lot of work especially the first couple days getting used to the time change. The language is way crazy I have a hard time understanding anything but the simplest sentences which makes contacting kind of hard but it's still fun.

 

    My companion, Elder Gardner, is way cool.  He is from Texas and is a great missionary.  He has been out for 22 months so I will be his last companion but he is very nice and patient with me as I try to learn the language. We are serving in Sofia the First Branch and me and my companion are the first and second counselors in the branch presidency.  I don't really do anything but sit up on the stand and try not to fall asleep and then after the meetings I help the clerk with tithing but that's about all.  So, church was cool it is mostly old people we probably had around twenty or so people there and it was alright but I literally had no idea what was going on the whole time.   They did have me introduce myself and bear my testimony, it wasn't very good - it's like as soon as I got up there I forgot all the Bulgarian that I had learned!  That was pretty sweet but I'm sure they don't mind too much. So that was church. 

   Going back, on the first day we got here, we did paper work and some contacting then we went to a park and talked about the history of the mission and stuff.  Then we had dinner and we had shopksa salad and moussika, the salad is cut up tomatoes and cucumbers with like a feta cheese and the moussika was a potato and meat casserole type dish they were both pretty good - although I like the moussika a bit more. Then the next day we had a mission orientation and got our companions and where we were going to serve and since we are just in Sofia we went out and did a bit of contacting and had a lesson with one of our investigators Hristo. 

   Friday was way cool we had a lesson with Sophi, she is way cool and speaks very good English so that was cool and we had a lesson with a recent convert Lyoudmil, he was super nice and a is a very good guy. Then we went and we got some groceries for one lady who can't afford on her own and took them to her. Her apartment was probably one of the sketchiest places I've ever been ( and Bulgaria isn't the cleanest place) there were flies all over and spiders and my companion says he saw some roaches behind me when we were sharing a message with her but she did have a cool cat that could open doors on it's own and she was very nice and patient with my Bulgarian so that was a pretty cool experience.

 

    So yeah, Saturday were were just contacting all day that is a lot of rejection but it is fun.  There are some kind of rude people though, one guy spit at my companions feet and one lady went kind of psycho on me although I had no idea what she was saying so I had to ask my companion and he says she was just all "you need to work and this isn't work" or something like that. 

   So yeah that's about all, Bulgaria is way sweet and I am having a good time! 

 Love you all, have a great week!
      старейшина максуел

I am super excited to go!

Hey!  Sorry this is kind of a later response, we were packing most of the morning! So, I am super excited to go but kind of bummed because Ammon will not be traveling with us the Turks have temporarily been re assigned to the New York, New York south mission (Turkish speaking) because the missionaries are having trouble with the visas in turkey, the missionaries that were there are back in Bulgaria for a bit now too.
Okay so this week went by crazy fast and it was really good, we got to see most of our teachers mission pictures and hear some stories and then they both guessed where we will first serve. For me they guessed Sofia and Ruse.  We will get to see our last teachers pictures and all tonight!

I am super excited to get out to Bulgaria but my luggage is very close to the weight limit but I should be fine, they give us way too many heavy books here at the MTC. I am also glad to get back to cooking and eating real food everything is the same here and they just repeat every few weeks.

I cannot wait until I get to invite the people of Bulgaria to come to Christ.  Hopefully, they will be able to understand me and I will be able to understand some of what they say. I love teaching here at the MTC especially in the TRC, when we get to teach other people than our teachers, and I can't wait to teach those in Bulgaria!

Real quick experience this week: so me and Elder Von, in the TRC, got to teach a RM who just got back like two weeks earlier and it was so much fun to teach him.  His Bulgarian was sweet to listen to and the Spirit was there so strong.  After the TRC we get feedback cards from the person and it is cool to see how the Spirit can guide a lesson to fit a certain individuals needs!

I am out of time but I love you all, have a good week and hopefully I have some good stories for next week!

 

Elder Maxwell

We got our travel plans!!

Okay so this week we got our travel plans!! We leave the 21st, our flight is about 9 so we have to be at the travel office by 6.   We fly from Salt Lake to DC then to Frankfurt and then to Sofia.   It'll take us about 24 hours of travel with a couple hour layovers. And the Turks are flying out to Sofia with us so I'll get to travel with Ammon! It is so close I am so excited!

Also this week, in the TRC, we had a native Bulgarian come in and my companion and I got to teach him!! He was way cool he has been in the US for about 5 years for school and he was converted here so he had never read the Bulgarian Book of Mormon or even prayed in Bulgarian.  We got to share some scriptures with him and teach him how to start his prayers in Bulgarian because he didn't know! That was way cool and he told us a lot about the country too.

We've finished learning all the grammar principles that they are teaching us here at the MTC so now we will just be reviewing and learning vocab and lots of practice! Other than that nothing really new just lots of studying and class, it's a lot of work but I know it is worth it to be able to share the gospel with others and to strengthen my own testimony, there is nothing else that I could be doing that would be better for me than this!

Love to you all,

Старейшина Максуел

Not too much new!

Hey Everybody!

Okay, so this week not too much new, definitely ready to head out - only two more weeks!!!

So lets see... we found a praying mantis at the field and we named him Ivan and kept him in an empty licorice tub for a couple days.  We would catch bees and feed them to him, it was way cool watching him catch them and eat them.  He is pretty awesome but we let him go after a couple days cuz we're not really supposed to have pets. He was pretty big, he ate five bee's in one day once.  He was pretty awesome, I'll have to send a picture of him.

The language is coming along well.  I love teaching in Bulgarian! It is so cool teaching and being able to talk and teach even at a basic level! We have committed both of our investigators to baptism!  (even though they are just the teachers acting as one of the investigators they had, it is so fun being able to get to know them and teach them of Christ and the gospel!)

Well I'm almost out of time but thanks again for the letters and don't worry about everyone else getting more than me.  Some of these people just get ridiculous amounts of mail I think it's going to be tough for them in Bulgaria only being able to get the mail like every two months at the zone conference. But yeah, anyways...

Love you all, have an awesome week!!

Elder Maxwell