i stretna nova godina

We hosted FHE at our apartment on Christmas Eve.  The missionaries usually do FHE with branch members and investigators at the chapel or playing ping pong at a place nearby.  We suggested they do something a bit more spiritual on Christmas Eve.  We made chicken noodle soup and read a Christmas story about service.

Zlatko and Elder Wimmer

Elder Roper and Zayko

The Elders from Tuzla drove down to spend their holiday with us.  We got a late start with FHE and the missionaries needed to return home in time for curfew, so we didn't get the Christmas candied popcorn ready in time for a FHE treat; John and I enjoyed some of it after they left and they ate the rest on Christmas day.  We love making this particular popcorn at Christmastime and it was a miracle that we found marshmallows and Karo syrup at the American Food Store in Zagreb.  We missed eating our other family favorites like shrimp cocktail drink and Scotch eggs, but we enjoyed at least this one Christmas comfort food.

The stockings were hung by the TV with care...

We made stockings for all the missionaries.  Nothing fancy but they all received a pair of socks, a notebook and pens, a can of Pringles chips and some candy.

Our awesome group of missionaries

Elder Thompson, Sister Landon, Sister Fritch, Elder Wimmer, Elder Christiansen, Elder Lee, Elder Roper, Elder Thygerson (floor).  This group always has a good spirit and they work well together.

New socks on the feet of our awesome missionaries

The sock designs are burgers, fries and shakes (in case you can't tell).  We found the socks when we were in Paris and thought it would make a fun stocking stuffer.  They loved them so guess it was a good idea.   We ate dinner about 2 pm - menu was Springfield ham (thank you embassy friends), funeral potatoes, baked beans, deviled eggs, fresh veggies and dip and BBQ meatballs.  Everyone pitched in to clear the table and do dishes.  Facetime and Skyping home started shortly after and continued until 8:30 pm.  We played games and ate stocking candy and Pringles while waiting turns to call.  After the missionaries left, we had our turn to talk to family.

Wednesday afternoon we flew to Budapest.  John's cousin and his wife are serving a humanitarian mission there.  We received permission to travel outside our mission to "consult with the welfare services couple serving in Hungary."  Never in my younger imagination did I think I would be living in Europe and wandering around countries like Hungary and Bosnia.  What a blessing to be so privileged!

Budapest is an amazing city.  Population is about 2 million.  I was expecting it to look more like Sarajevo but we didn't see any physical evidence of past wars and war damage.  It is a thriving city with beautiful buildings and architecture.  There are decent freeways, much less graffiti and litter around the city and not as much smoking on the streets.

In one of the Christmas markets

We went from no Christmas decorations and atmosphere to overload.  Everywhere we went was a Christmas market.  Lots of good food everywhere.

Budapest has the prettiest manhole covers we've seen

St Stephen's Basilica with market stalls in front

St Stephen's is named after the first king of Hungary.  His "incorruptible" right hand is said to be housed in the reliquary.  We didn't see it but we weren't sure where the reliquary was or why we would want to look at it, anyway.  The church is one of the two tallest buildings in the city - 96 meters (351 feet).  The other tall building is the Parliament building.  There is currently a city regulation prohibiting construction higher than 96 meters.

Inside St Stephen's - at the front of the main room/hall

We went to a Christmas Gala Concert one evening with the senior couples serving in and near Budapest.  They were all very nice to us and included us but we still felt like the outsiders.  It is interesting how we bond with those we serve with - and it was evident that all these couples were close.  We feel the same about the couples we associate with in our mission.  The concert was excellent.  They performed a lot of classical pieces and traditional Hungarian music.  It was a combination of symphony, ballet and opera.  The theater was very old and we wondered how appropriate a venue it was but the sound was good.

Theater walls in the balcony where we were seated

Concert stage

A treat we really enjoy is chimney cakes.  We have seen them here and several other countries nearby so we're guessing it is a Balkan or Slavic thing.  It is a yeast dough rolled and wrapped around a cone, then cooked over hot coals and coated with cinnamon sugar or other tasty things.  You pull it apart and devour it while it's still warm.

The long sticks rotate so the dough cooks evenly

The perfect treat on a cold windy day in Budapest

Outdoor ovens are popular - this one is cooking pizza

Yummy food everywhere; how do you choose just one thing?

I was fascinated with the potato pancakes cooked like scones or fry bread

The street behind our hotel was decorated with lots of lights and huge ornaments suspended in the air.

The lights on the building changed colors every few seconds

Huge ornaments hanging over the street

We saw several of these orange or lemon slice adorned ladies about town

We don't see hot cider or wassail anywhere but mulled or hot wine is very popular, especially at the outdoor markets.

Hot wine for a cold day

Basket ride for the littles - mini version of the teacups at Disneyland?

We walked to the Shoes on the Danube memorial.  It is a memorial to the Budapest Jews who were shot by militiamen between 1944 and 1945.  The victims were lined up and shot into the Danube.  They were forced to remove their shoes first, as shoes were a valuable commodity at the time.  It contains 60 pairs of iron shoes, each modeled after an original 1940's pair.  Very touching.

Shoes on the Danube Memorial

Another cool place we visited is Fisherman's Bastion.  It was built between 1895 and 1902.  I haven't had time to do more research on the history to understand it totally, except that a bastion is part of a fortification built at an angle to allow defensive fire in several directions.  The castle and bastion are built on one side of the Danube on the hill.  The views of Pest are spectacular.  I did learn that Buda is one side of the Danube and Pest is the other side.  I did not know that Budapest is actually two separate cities.

St Stephen in the center of the bastion

The walls and turrets have been rebuilt more decorative than defensive

View of the Parliament buildings from the bastion

Small section of steps climbing up to the bastion

Or you can ride the funicular up the hillside

We love bridge walking so opted to walk across the chain bridge spanning the Danube

The beautiful Blue Danube River in Budapest

When we visited Belgrade and saw the Danube River, I didn't think I'd have another opportunity to see it again.

Heroes Square was our last tourist stop

Heroes Square is the largest square in Budapest.  It was laid out in 1896 to celebrate the thousandth anniversary of Hungary.  Archangel Gabriel stands on top of the pillar, holding the holy crown and the double cross of Christianity.  The seven chieftains who led the Magyars tribes to Hungary are on the stand below.  Statues of kings and other important historical figures stand on top of the colonnades on either side of the center pillar.

We returned to Sarajevo on Saturday.  There was a baptism scheduled Saturday at 5:00 pm that we very much wanted to attend.  We boarded the plane and were informed the flight was delayed 40 minutes due to some situation in Vienna, where we change planes.  We only had an hour layover and knew we would never make it through passport control and security in time for our connecting flight to Sarajevo.  We called the Elders to tell them we would not be there and didn't know when the next plane to Sarajevo would be.  When we were finally in the air, the usual 45 minute flight took only 30 minutes.  The flight attendant announced that Sarajevo passengers should wait at the bottom of the stairs when we deplaned (is that the correct term?).  We happened to be the only two on the plane needing the Sarajevo flight.  A gate attendant met us at the steps and whisked us away to the terminal in a van.  She took us to passport control and spoke to them - he took our passports and stamped them without hardly looking.  Then she escorted us to a private security booth, called a security officer to come and walked us through the drill.  She then drove us directly to our plane and we boarded.  The flight departed a few minutes late but we arrived at our original time - this normally 55 minute flight was done in only 45 minutes. 

John and I are looking at each other in amazement through this whole experience.  How can this be happening?  We know it is another tender mercy from Heavenly Father.  We needed to be at the baptism.

Begić and Elder Christiansen

Begić is a sweet man who recognized the truth from the moment the missionaries met with him.  We wish we could speak to him to know him better.  He speaks no English and our language skills are very limited.  His wife is very ill with cancer right now and was hospitalized this week.  She had some surgery and they didn't know if she would pull through or not.  So with all that happening in his life and being so concerned for his wife, he decided to go forward with the baptism.  We are very happy for him and hope he will become a good leader in the branch.  He told the Elders he wanted to become an Elder so he could get his own name tag.

Begić and the missionaries after his baptism

Begić was confirmed in Sacrament meeting today.  He is a wonderful addition to the branch.

This was very long but so much happened this week.  We had a great Christmas and a fun break in Hungary.  We are truly blessed; we have good health and are happily serving in the Adriatic North Mission.  We are blessed with amazing family and friends, whom we love with all our heart.

Stretan bozic

Today we had a lovely Christmas Sacrament meeting.  Almost everyone in the Branch participated.  We had music, scriptures and counsel from general authorities read to us.  Our second hour was a big lunch with turkey and lots of other good food.

Hard to tell what all the food is, but it all tasted good!

The Primary children with antler headbands

Iris, Holly and Tim

Holly was in charge of the dinner and did a super job. Her husband Tim came to church with her for the first time today.  I sat by him and discovered that he spent his high school years living in Hamilton, MT.  His mother worked for the NIH lab at the time.  These small connections seem to make our world a much smaller place.

How many of you received a personal Christmas greeting from the First Presidency?  We did - as personal as the same letter that 70,000 other missionaries received anyway.

Christmas greetings from the First Presidency

We learned this week that the Church membership in Europe is approximately 480,000 and weekly attendance at Sacrament meeting averages 100,000.  That was startling to me but it is probably not any worse than other parts of the world.  The Area Presidency is very concerned about declining member activity and participation.  Member retention is very bad in our mission as well.  There are about 1600 members in the 5 countries and only 200 average weekly attendance mission wide.

Look what we saw outside the grocery store entrance on Saturday.  I'm sure Tupperware is still around at home but I never hear anything about it or get invited to the home parties anymore (not complaining about that).  I don't know if it's new to Bosnia or if I've just never noticed it.

Tupperware booth outside the grocery store entrance

Thursday we drove to Tuzla to have a contract signed with the Children's Home where we will help renovate 4 bathrooms.  The Elders met us there to help translate and we accomplished the task without any problems.  We treated them to lunch before we returned home.

The smog and pollution has been very bad the past two weeks.  It gets trapped here like the Salt Lake valley inversion, only worse.  The air quality index has been in the 300-400 range for days (below 50 is okay, I think, and over 100 is getting into the bad range).  Tuzla has extremely poor air quality due to the coal industry and other factories in town.  I took a photo on our way out of town that explains part of the problem.

Pollution in Tuzla

This is a coal-fired thermal power plant and is the largest power plant in Bosnia and Herzegovina.  The plant burns 330,000 tons of coal annually.  Wikipedia says that the World Health Organization ranked Tuzla 2nd among Europe's most polluted towns.  No surprise that there are many respiratory problems here.

We love this time of year when we are more focused on the Savior, his birth and Atonement.  We testify that he lives and are grateful for his love for us.  We are grateful for the blessings of serving a mission and love where we have been called to serve.  We see goodness and kindness and love among the people here.  We love you, our family and friends. 

Stretan bozic i sretna nova godina or Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Busy, busy, busy

It's been a week full of adventures.  And now I'm too tired to write about all of it!  We left Sarajevo at 6:00 am on Monday and drove to Zagreb for Winter Zone Conference.  The triplets in the back seat did much better this trip and we only made one potty stop and one stop to fill the gas tank.  The roads were clear and we made good time.  Zone Conference started at the mission office with scripture trivia and other activity stations.  We practiced singing the traditional Croatian Christmas songs that are in the hymn book, then went caroling in the city square.  We never made it to the gazebo to sing with the group - one of the young sisters became quite ill and we drove her to the mission home and put her into bed.  I stayed with her while John drove a few blocks up the street to check us into our hotel.  The rest of the zone arrived at the mission home about 7:30 pm.  A talent show filled the rest of the evening.  We helped Elder Thompson write a poem on the way to Zagreb.  He called it "The Night Before Transfers" and did a good job with it.  Not to brag or anything, but the lines I suggested were the cleverest and got the biggest laughs.

Bosnia and Slovenia Winter Zone Conference

Zagreb is recognized as one of the top 10 cities in Europe for Christmas decorations.  They do go all out, but Temple Square is still my favorite.  We went back to the city square on Tuesday evening after everyone else had gone home, to see what we had missed the night before.

Christmas Market in Zagreb

Outdoor ice skating in the market area

Christmas on the square

Father Christmas?

Getting ready for the New Year

We walked around for a couple hours and ate dinner on the square.  We stayed at the mission home Tuesday night with some other senior couples.  We stayed an additional night in Zagreb so we could close a project we have been working on since we arrived last January.  LDS Charities renovated a space and installed 5 commercial washers and dryers at the Zagreb Refugee Reception Center.  The space is managed by the Red Cross, who was our partner in this endeavor.

Tomislav (Red Cross) by the laundry space

Equipment room behind the machines.  Yellow boxes are detergent pumps.

There are about 300 residents currently at the center; there is capacity for 500 and they have housed as many as 700 at this facility.  The building is an old hotel.  When we started the project they had one washing machine, like we would have in our homes.  The Red Cross was trying to accommodate as much laundry as they could for the residents, but with only one machine, it was impossible.  The new machines are operated with tokens; each resident is issued a certain number of tokens per week.  If they lose the tokens or don't use them, their laundry privileges are taken away.

The first refugee to try a machine

Once the tokens are inserted, you select the cycle, temperature, etc.  The detergent is automatically pumped into the machine based on the cycle selection.  Having the dryers should eliminate some of laundry hanging all over the building to dry.

Visual instructions for all languages to understand

The refugee residents are from many countries.  The instructions are written in only 3 languages but the visual instructions are meant for all to understand.

The official presentation picture 

After the ceremony at the center, we stopped for a short visit with another partner, then picked up our trio of Elders and headed to Sarajevo.  We arrived home about 6:00 pm.

I had to stop last night and go to bed.  Now my mind is a little clearer and I can go on...

Thursday all 5 Elders were back at our apartment for transfer announcements.  They always predict what they think will happen, who will go where and what companion they will have.  They are rarely correct.

Elder Daines and Elder McNeil - the anticipation is a killer

Elders Thompson, Christiansen, Shepherd.  They look happy.

Elder Thompson and Elder Christiansen will stay in Sarajevo, but each with a new companion.  The other three are leaving and we will have a set of Sisters back in the city.  One is coming directly from the MTC.  So we will have 6 missionaries with us, the 4 Elders all in one small apartment.  On Saturday we bought a mattress and bed linens and extra pillows.  We also bought comforters for all the beds.  When we did apartment inspections on Saturday we were appalled at what the Elders were using for blankets and sheets.  There is no room for four beds, so two will sleep on mattresses on the floor.  We think this will be temporary for one transfer period, or we would be looking for another missionary apartment.

It started snowing Friday and didn't stop until Sunday.  The roads were pretty treacherous for awhile - they aren't really good at plowing neighborhood streets and keeping sidewalks clear anywhere.  The snow created a beautiful winter wonderland for us!

Looks like a white Christmas for us

Vedad (downstairs neighbor) and John clearing the driveway

We had to shovel four times to keep the driveway clear.  It was perfect snowball and snowman making snow.  Now it's just cold with more snow predicted.  I made meatballs last night (preparation for Christmas day lunch) and put them on the deck table overnight.  They were frozen this morning so I could bag them and put them in our tiny inside freezer.  There is no room to lay them out to freeze individually so they aren't all stuck together.  The freezing weather worked perfectly.

Elder Evans served in Sarajevo for several months.  He completed his mission in October and his parents came from Australia to pick him up.  They have been visiting family in England and traveling through Europe since October.  They arrived in Sarajevo Friday afternoon and we met them for dinner.  They are delightful people and we had a nice visit.  They attended church on Sunday and were our speakers.  We love when people visit and agree to speak (so we don't have to have so many turns at speaking).

Andrew, Kaylene and Benjamin Evans

Our car left Sunday after church for transfer moves.  We won't see it again until Thursday.  We had only two Elders here for dinner last night.  Elder Lee transferred from Tuzla to be our district leader and Elder Thomson's companion.  It was pretty quiet with just the two of them.

So now we're stuck at home and will forced to be productive and hopefully get caught up on our paperwork.