Lívia

Hello family and friends!

Budapest just keeps getting better and better.  First of all, the past week I was trying a lot to just speak in Hungarian to my companion, in order to empathize with one of our investigators who tried not to smoke for the entire week.  I can really feel all the practice kicking in!  It's the coolest thing; I really didn't ever think that it was possible for me to start going through the ole' daily routine in another language, but slowly and surely it's happening. (The Hungarians have a really accurate phrase, "szépen, lassan" which means "beautifully and slowly" when they describe something that is gradually improving in a postive direction). The gift of tongues is an incredible thing.  Whenever we're talking with people on the tram or on the bus and they ask us how long we've been learning Hungarian and we tell them "for about 6 months" they almost don't believe us.  It's really quite wonderful.  The more effort I put into the work, into caring for my investigators, and into finding new people to teach, I feel the Lord bless me with Hungarian that just seems to flow right out of my mouth, without even anticipating what I am going to say.  Then again, it happens similarly in English when I'm bearing testimony or focused on the work.  I learned a really cool trick from Lowe elder, an elder in my district. EVERY time he hears a word he doesn't know, he has a small little notebook that he writes it down in and then goes over and over again throughout the next few days.  I'm doing this now, and after just a few days, I stop having to write down so many words, because I understand almost everything that everyone is saying. We had stake conference in Pest on Saturday and Sunday (the Priesthood and Adult sessions on Saturday, and the general session on Sunday).  Especially during the adult session, I could almost understand everything that was said.  It helped that I had a week of trying to speak Hungarian immediately behind me, but I also felt the Lord helping me to learn, not just Hungarian, but more about the gospel.

We met with Vadász Olivia again this week. It was a really transformative teaching. She arrived obviously very distraught about something, but during our teaching and afterwards she transformed into this radiant being of happiness.  That might be one of the coolest things to see as a missionary, in my opinion.  She was asking us all the right questions, like, "I always feel a warm, harmony when I met with you both, and especially when I say the closing prayers, but after a few days, the feeling always goes away. How do I keep it with me?" I definitely know that she is very special to our Heavenly Father because he has given her the ability to sense and articulate certain aspects of her spiritual relationship with God that allow us to help her in a very straightforward, effective way.  It's often hard to help people when they are closed off or beat around the bush, but Olivia is so direct and sincere that there is no doubt that she is searching for the truth. Orosz Árpád (Arpad Russian), a man in our ward, gave her and us a lift on the way to the stake center, and there she started introducing herself to others as, "Lívia", not "Olivia". We asked her, "isn't your name Olivia", and she said, "no, there isn't an 'O', " and then she started laughing. So it turns out that we've been calling her the wrong name for about 4 lessons now.  What the heck, Olivia?? After all this time??

Elder Lowe and I had an awesome splits on Wednesday.  We went into his area and talked to SO many people on the buses, on the street, and had a really solid lesson with Gyöngyi, a church member who lives on this island called Csepel.  One of our favorite ways to get talking to people on the bus is to ask them a question about Hungarian, which allows them to help us, and then usually leads them to ask us what we are doing here and why in the world we are learning Hungarian. On the way into our apartment building, we asked this older lady this question, and got talking with her as we made our way up the stairs.  I asked her, "What's your name?" She said, "Eve, like the first woman." I said, "No way! My first name is Adam," to which she said, "Then that makes us a couple!" and then she winked and skipped right along her way. what. Toward the end of the day, the clouds were looking pretty threatening, but we still went out to do a few look-ups. We were about 20 minutes from the apartment when the deluge began. The fountains of heaven were opened upon us, we knew not where to take shelter! There were also copious amounts of hail and the lightning was about 0.5 kilometers away. Made for some great pictures! though my clothes were thoroughly soaked until morning and I think I got trenchfoot or something from my shoes which were seeping water for 2 days!

Have a great week and Happy Mothers' Day! Boldgod Anják napját!

Adam