Family,
This was among the shortest weeks of my life. Just flew by.
We spent Monday and Tuesday in Lyon, got back Wednesday morning. Did groceries and planned for zone training. Thursday was my first zone presentation. Elder Castillo and I presented to the zone certain training that the Assistants and President gave to us in Lyon. I got kind of nervous right before, but as we started it became really natural and fun.
Then we had our exchange with the assistants thursday night and friday which was a blast, and Saturday we got to play some soccer with members from the three Bordeaux wards, before celebrating Elder McBeths birthday Saturday night. Now despite all this we had some cool missionary experiences and got some good missionary work done.
We spent Monday and Tuesday in Lyon, got back Wednesday morning. Did groceries and planned for zone training. Thursday was my first zone presentation. Elder Castillo and I presented to the zone certain training that the Assistants and President gave to us in Lyon. I got kind of nervous right before, but as we started it became really natural and fun.
Then we had our exchange with the assistants thursday night and friday which was a blast, and Saturday we got to play some soccer with members from the three Bordeaux wards, before celebrating Elder McBeths birthday Saturday night. Now despite all this we had some cool missionary experiences and got some good missionary work done.
Wednesday after returning from the Talence chapel where we had prepared for
zone training the next day we saw an absolute miracle. We were on the tram ride
back and there is this African man standing next me on the phone speaking in his
Nigerian language. When he gets off the phone he looks at me and I say bonjour,
ca va? with a big smile. He looks uninterested and says, "you speak english
right?" I laughed and said yes. He then inspected my plaque and railed on the
fact that I was an "elder", telling me that the Bible says you cant be an elder
unless you are older than 40, married and have kids. I just kinda took it in my
stride and let him explain himself for about 3 minutes (how he made that
explanation longer than 30 seconds beats me, people seem to have a way of
talking a lot, but not really saying much #poorwordefficiency) before
responding, "you believe in the bible? thats great so do we!" He then asked if
we had a church in the area and i said yes, then he asked if we had time to give
him a tour now, and I looked at Elder Castillo with big, joyful missionary eyes,
and then said yes.
So we talked until the uncomfortably long tram ride dropped us off at the church stop. His name is, wait for it ... VICTOR HUGO BENJAMIN. I type it in all caps to express the gusto with which he exclaimed it. We gave him a tour of the church and after sitting in silence in the chapel for 10 minutes, we said a prayer hand in hand (he gave us his evangelical amens and hallelujahs during it). After that he said thank you and that this is the reason he met us. He gave us his number proactively so we could call him. He did not come to church yesterday that stinker (as mom would say). But I'm excited to see what happens. So we will see. Believe.
So we talked until the uncomfortably long tram ride dropped us off at the church stop. His name is, wait for it ... VICTOR HUGO BENJAMIN. I type it in all caps to express the gusto with which he exclaimed it. We gave him a tour of the church and after sitting in silence in the chapel for 10 minutes, we said a prayer hand in hand (he gave us his evangelical amens and hallelujahs during it). After that he said thank you and that this is the reason he met us. He gave us his number proactively so we could call him. He did not come to church yesterday that stinker (as mom would say). But I'm excited to see what happens. So we will see. Believe.
We have a member that we got to see this week, his name is Fr. Darguence,
he just had a huge operation last week so we went by to check up on him. He was
a personal bodyguard of Charles De Gaulle (leader of the french resistance
during WWII and the first president of France-he is worshiped here) at 18 years
old and then several other big french political figures. He was special forces
police and also a bounty hunter. He showed us his house and his souvenir room
and all his lifes accomplishments. This guy was huge. I mean huge. He sings like
an angel and is Spanish Basque but speaks perfect French. He his old now and soo
cool still rocks the big mustache. He is on my picture to do list so I can show
you.
Quickly I will lay out the organization of the wards and sectors here so
you are no longer confused.
In Bordeaux there are 3 wards. Eysines, Talence, and
Lormont. Eysines and Talence meet in the Talence chapel and Lormont meets in the
Lormont chapel. The missionaries in the Eysines ward are part of the Bordeaux
zone. The missionaries in the Lormont and Talence wards are in the Talence zone.
Elder Castillo and I are the Talence Zone leaders, but serve in the Lormont
ward. Bordeaux itself is split into 3 sectors, 1 for each ward and the Lormont
ward is the eastern third of Bordeaux and out into the countryside with a
million little villes.
All in all it was a fun week. I'm excited to settle down and work in our
zone and our sector. Our zone is so great. The missionaries are wonderful. The
mission is really the best experience ever.
Beaucoup d'amour,
Elder William Montgomery
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| Pic of us contacting |
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| The cake we made during dinner for Elder McBeths Bday |
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| Maybe one of my favorite comp pics yet |
