France - Week 5 (St. Brieuc)

Here's our letter from Elder Davis! :)

Bonjour! Comment allez-vous???

I can't believe I am about to start the last week of my first transfer. I seriously feel like I landed in France yesterday. Time flies when you're a missionary.

So this last week was pretty good. Last week (during P-Day while I was writing my last email home), we had an investigator randomly come to the church (where we write our emails) and say he wanted to talk to us about the church! That never happens! After we picked our jaws up from off the ground we gave him a tour of the church, a book of Mormon and set up another appointment. This investigator (his name is Jean-Claud) is the hitch hiker Brother Banks picked up off the street. He is so legit! He knows the Bible like the back of his hand and is just dying to learn more about the Book of Mormon. Keep Jean Claud in your prayers.

This week I went on an exchange with Elder Joshua Wallace from Orange County California. Elder Wallace is an awesome missionary who went to BYU Hawaii for a year before his mission and is studying music. He wants to write positive, clean music after his mission for Disney (he loves Disney because Disney Land is right by his house).

We had a great time on our exchange and saw a mini miracle during it. After a lesson with a less active member (it was about 8:30 at night) we were on our way home in the dark and pouring down rain. We wanted to get home ASAP because of the weather, but for missionaries the rule is to not return home before 9 pm. It would have been easy to just justify going home early, but elder Wallace and I decided to contact people on the street until 9. I'm so thankful we did! Even though it was raining we talked to two awesome people back to back. We got their phone numbers and an appointment with them for later in the week. To me this is a miracle because all that day for probably 3 or so hours, we contacted a bunch of people the same way, but nobody was interested in us or what we had to say. Obedience brings blessings.

On Thursday we went to Paris for a zone conference. Elder Kent F. Richards of the 2nd Quorum of the 70 (a leader of the church) was there and gave a great message. Paris was awesome, but I still didn't have time to see the Eiffel Tower or anything! Oh well, I will eventually. At the zone conference I saw Elder Manivan from Mays Pond WA! He's doing well!

 

Oh I had KFC when I was in Paris for Zone conference. It pretty much tasted the same as American KFC. That was my first time eating American fast food here in France. It’s basically the same, you just get less food for more money here. Oh and on Friday a member fed us lunch (Sister Kefford feeds us every Friday afternoon). This week she fed us rabbit stew so that was another first for me. It wasn't too bad, but I wasn't a big fan of all the bones that nearly choke you to death. I'd recommend it though haha.

 

Yesterday we had district conference (like stake conference but for a small "stake"). A different general authority (Elder Donaldson of the 70) talked to us and that was great. The whole 2 hour meeting was in French and I probably understood 90 - 95 percent of what was said. My French and French understanding is really improving. My religious vocabulary is pretty good, it's just the regular everyday words that I still need to work on along with pronunciation/my thick American accent haha.

Sorry, no pictures this week. I don't have much more time to write today because Brother Banks from our branch is taking us to the driving range for our P-Day. We are super excited for that. Talk to you next week!

Love,

Elder Davis

France - Week 4 (St. Brieuc)

Here's our weekly letter from Elder Davis!

3/18/13

 

Bonjour toute le monde!

I hope you've all had a great week! Life is good here in Saint Brieuc and we got to teach a lot of lessons this past week. We're keeping very busy which is great; a busy missionary is a happy missionary.

So... Where should I start... Well, it snowed a ton last week which is pretty crazy. Western France doesn't normally get a lot of snow, (especially in March) but it snowed for about 30 hours straight! The snow was really wet and slushy so that was no fun to walk in. What's funny though is (since France doesn't normally get a lot of snow) everything was cancelled and shut down because of the snow! Seriously, it snowed a lot, but there was probably only an inch or so on the ground. Yet all the stores were closed, nobody was on the streets and worst yet, all the buses got cancelled! I guess it only takes an inch of snow to stop everything for a couple days around here. Wimps! The snow was cool, but it did cause a few of our lessons to fall through... But c'est la vie.

I had a couple more Kebabs this week. But I still don't know what the meat in it is exactly. None of the other missionaries know either, we are all too scared to ask because we might not want to know. I think it’s lamb or horse meat. Basically there is a huge thing of meat (about the size of a small fire hydrant) spinning in the restaurant over a heater and then when you order a Kebab they shred off some pieces of meat and put it in a bread thing with onions and fries and your choice of sauce. It’s hard to explain, but sometimes it’s best to not question and just enjoy your food :)

This week I got to go to Vannes (a city about 1-2 hours south of Saint Brieuc) for an exchange with Elder Zollinger. This is elder Zollinger's last transfer so he is getting ready to go home. It was great to work with him for a day and learn from his experience. During our exchange a part member couple (she is a member of the church, he isn't) fed us lunch. One of the things they fed us was pig intestines. Call me crazy, but it wasn't too bad! It was all smoked so that’s mostly what it tasted like. I probably wouldn't want to eat it on a regular basis though.

We had an interesting experience earlier this week. We were walking on the side walk, kind of in a hurry for an appointment, and some random lady comes up to us and started telling us that she was interested in our church and (before we could even ask) she gave us her name, number and address and insisted we come by to talk. That was super cool because that rarely happens to missionaries.

 

Unfortunately though, she turned out to be completely crazy! We went to teach her a couple days later and she was unbelievably drunk. Just completely wasted out of her mind. She kept offering us what she called "water" (which was really a dark colored beverage that in no way resembled water and was clearly alcoholic). She was super offended that we wouldn't accept her "water" and told us a bunch of crazy stuff. She insisted that she is a world renown teacher and told us to go back to our lives and "never come back to her castle". Ha-ha looking back it's kind of funny, but it’s also disappointing because she seemed so normal on the street ha-ha.

Let’s see, what else happened... Oh, I gave myself a haircut the other day. Everything went well until I was doing the final touches and the electric clippers I was using broke and took a huge chunk out of my hair!! So then I had to cut the rest super short and now I look ridiculous. I'll send a picture.

Joelle, probably one of our most solid investigators, got back from a 2 week vacation the other day so we got to see her. She is so awesome. She reads her scriptures more diligently than most members do. When she isn't reading the scriptures, she is reading the Liahona (Church magazine in French) or LDS.org. She wants to get baptized, she just wants to make sure she is 100% ready so pray for her!

Oh another miracle happened this week. Brother Banks was on his way to church (he lives about an hour from the church building) when he saw an older guy hitch hiking. Brother Banks said normally he would have just drove right past him, but something told him to give the man a ride. He did and found out the guy was super nice and needed a ride because his train got cancelled (aka he is a normal person not a crazy hitch hiker). Turns out the place he needed to go was right by our church building. They ended up talking about the church and the man explained that he is new to the area and has been looking for a place to go to church. Brother Banks got his name and number and everything so we were excited about that. What's really cool though, is at the end of church, this man just walked into the church building and said he wanted to learn more about us. We were able to talk to him a little bit and set up another appointment for later this week. Moral of the story, follow the promptings of the spirit! Brother Banks is a British man and barely speaks French, yet he felt inspired to pick this man up and was able to (in his broken French) explain a little bit of our church.

Anyways, life is good. Missionary work is tough, but I'm enjoying every second of it. For those of you who will be going on missions, prepare now! There is no time to prepare once you are out here. Know your scriptures, diligently study Preach My Gospel, and really gain a strong testimony. Missionary work is unlike any other experience you could ever have. I have already learned and grown so much and met amazing people. I'm thankful for the chance I have to serve here in Saint Brieuc!

Je t'aime!

Elder Davis

 

Pictures!

 #1 Goofy looking picture of me and my new hair cut, but its the only picture I took this week with me in it.

 

#2 View outside our appartment window of the whimpy snow that shut down Saint Brieuc.

 

#3 Buildings and cars that look like this are everywhere in France

 

Sorry only a couple pictures this week. I didnt really take any exciting ones.

France - Week 3 (St. Brieuc)

Here's our most recent letter from Elder Davis!

 

3/11/13

 

Hello everyone!

 

Life is good here in Saint Brieuc! This past week was pretty tough, but despite all the ups and downs, missionary work is awesome. Last week was "vacance" here in France which means pretty much everyone gets out of school for the week and gets out of work and goes on vacation. So lots of our investigators were out of town and we couldn't see them at all which is always a bummer.

I'm pretty sure this past week we got no-showed 8 or 9 different times for appointments. It's frustrating because there isn't anything we can do about that. Oh well, Elder Adams and I are really excited for this upcoming week. Everyone will be back in town and we have lots of lessons scheduled.

 

Oh, last week I went on my first exchange. An exchange is when you spend 24 hours with a missionary other than your regular companion. Elder Adams went to Rennes (about an hour south and east of Saint Brieuc I think) and Elder Lerdahl (one of our zone leaders) came to Saint Brieuc from Rennes to work with me. It was kind of an interesting experience because Elder Lerdahl has never been to Saint Brieuc before so I was responsible for getting us to appointments and what not. One of the miracles of the week was I didn't get us lost which is very easy to do here in France!

 

On our exchange we had a lesson with a blind man (I cant remember if I told you about him already or not). His name is Claude Franchard and the lesson was awesome! The spirit was so strong during the whole lesson. We had a great discussion and its really amazing to me how much faith and desire he has to follow Christ. The lesson was going so well and the spirit was so strong that I invited him to be baptized... And he accepted! We set a date for March 30th so we are excited for him and hope that he will continue on the path that he is on.

 

Oh, on our exchange we went out to eat. We got these things called Kebabs. I've never heard of them before my mission so I don't think they're in America. They're super good though, google it!

 

Lets see, what else happened this week... Since a lot of our appointments fell through Elder Adams and I spent a lot of time porting (port is the word for door in French, so "porting" is going door to door in a neighborhood and talking to people about our message). Porting is really fun! Sometimes it's a little intimidating, but you meet all sorts of people and have all kinds of different experiences.

 

Oh, some of you have been asking me about Elder Pymm (serving in the Everett Washington Mission) and his sister, Sister Pymm serving in my mission. Turns out Sister Pymm was in my district the past couple weeks (she has since been transferred) so I got to talk to her a little bit at district meeting. Small world. Get this though, so sister Pymm got transferred, and the sister missionary who took her place is Sister Kohlert, Damon Robert's Cousin!!! It's crazy haha, I haven't seen her yet but she's in my district so I'll see her every week at district meeting. Once again, small world.

Let's see, what else... this week we had to give up the car to the missionaries who are serving in Vannes so we've been doing a lot of walking. It's keeping me in shape that's for sure. Especially because Elder Adams is so much taller than me I have to walk much faster than normal to keep up with him haha. Elder Adams is awesome. We always have a good time with whatever we're doing. Whether we're walking around in the pouring down rain or contacting people on the street or whatever, we always have a good time. Our goal as a companionship is to speak only French whenever we're out of the apartment. That's really helped my French.

Anyways, life is good and France is awesome. I love and miss all of you. I hope you are all keeping busy and finding joy and success in all the things you are involved in. If any of you have a few thousand bucks laying around, I'd recommend taking a trip to France!

 

Please write :)

Until next week,

Elder Davis

 

 

Pictures!!

 

#1 Another awesome lunch

 

#2 Close up of the mini missionaries sister Kefford made for us. She is super talented. She even got the hair right!

 

#3 Me and Elder Adams with our little missionary twins Sister Kefford made for us.

 

#4 Me, Elder Adams, Sister Monique Kefford (nicest woman in France; feeds us lunch every Friday and made those little missionaries for us) Jean-Christophe, a return missionary who is in our branch

 

#5 Me in front of an old Cathedral. theres a bunch of buildings like this scattered all over Saint Brieuc and France

 

#6  Brother Banks and I. He is from England and has the most awesome british accent ever. His French isn't super great, but he is always helping us with our lessons. If everyone in the world was like brother Banks, the world would be translated. He would do anything for anyone. This picture was done on a day we were doing service at his house so that's why we aren't in shirts and a tie. Brother Banks and Sister Kefford are our favorite people here in Saint Brieuc!

 

#7 Elder Adams and me. The sign says "the laughing horse" in English.

 

 

 

France - Week 2 (St. Brieuc)

Here's the second email Elder Davis sent us from St. Brieuc during his second week there!

3/04/13

Hey Everyone!

Thank you for all of your emails and letters. I love and miss you all.

Elder Adams and I had a really good week. We taught a bunch of lessons, found another investigator (someone interested in learning more about the church) and have worked our hardest each and every day. Last Thursday I had to go to Paris to do some things for my residency in France. Now I'm all legal! Unfortunately I still haven't seen the Eiffel Tower... But I’m sure I'll have a chance soon! We had a lot of meetings and other things to do this week for legality and what not so we didn't have as much time as normal to do missionary work, but we still were able to teach lots of lessons.

Oh, some really exciting news! One of our investigators (Jean-Pierre) accepted our invitation to be baptized! We still need to teach him some more things, but we are so grateful for him and his faith and his desire to follow Jesus Christ. We now have 4 investigators that have accepted the invitation to be baptized. We are excited for them but still have some work to do to get them ready for this important ordinance. Please pray for them! They have righteous intentions to follow Jesus Christ and join His church, but there is also a lot of opposition that needs to be faced before it can happen. I know Heavenly Father loves them and that the gospel has already/will continue to bless their lives.

Overall we had a good week. When we went to Paris I got to see all of my old missionary friends from the MTC. They are all serving in various cities and countries (some are in Belgium and Luxembourg) so we don’t get to see them very often. But seeing them again was incredible. To some extent, I felt like Ammon in the book of Alma (Book in the Book of Mormon) when he is overjoyed to be reunited with his fellow missionaries. Their testimonies and spirit definitely strengthened me.

My French is getting better and better. Yesterday in church I got to share my testimony and I understood almost everything that was said in church. Oh, I also got to lead the music in Sacrament meeting so that was a fun new experience. For some reason they erroneously think I have musical talent since I can play the piano a little bit. Looks like they are going to keep me busy with various musical assignments!

To answer some of your questions:

We don’t get fed a lot in our mission. Since there are only about 30 active members in my branch, and they all live so far away, we usually only get fed 1 meal a week at a member’s house. That’s ok though because Elder Adams and I have had lots of chances to cook for ourselves. We often cook Ratatouille (Just like the little Disney movie) which is really good and easy to make. We buy baguettes often and put various things on them. We try one new French cheese each week. Last week was camembert (spelling?) which smells disgusting but tastes surprisingly good. I'll send some pictures of some other things we eat. Elder Adams is actually a really good cook so often he cooks and I end up doing the dishes haha. But sometimes we switch off.

Our apartment is really nice. Its small but we have a washer and dryer which are awesome. The only bad thing is the hot water in the shower doesn't normally last for 2 showers so whoever takes the second shower in the morning usually freezes to death ha-ha. Oh well, it wakes you up!

I can’t remember if I told you guys this already but we do have a little European car. It’s called an Opal I think. But we only have it until Wednesday then we have to give it to some other missionaries. When that happens we'll have to take the bus and walk everywhere. No bikes for us!

Overall I love Saint Brieuc and I love the people I am serving here!

Everyone that I talk to in France can't believe that I chose to leave my family, my friends, my home, my country, my language, school, sports and everything else regular 19 year old guys do so I could come to a new country and teach people things in a language I don’t know very well. Nobody can understand why I would "give up two years of my life". For most people, that does seem very strange. But the reason I chose to do it is because of the miracle and the blessing the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been in my life. I have seen the difference the Gospel makes in people’s lives. I have seen the difference before my mission, and now I get to see it every day on my mission. The Gospel has blessed my life in more ways than I could ever begin to describe. I chose to leave all those things behind for two years of my own free will because I know with all my heart that the message I have been called to share can change the lives of the people here in France. I literally see miracles, big and small, each day. I testify that the Heavenly Father knows and loves each one of us. I know families can be together forever. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God. And I know that we have a living prophet on the earth today. (Someone who speaks to God as the prophets did in Biblical times such as Noah, Moses, Abraham, etc.)

I love you all! I pray for many of you individually each night. Please write :)

 

J'taime,

Elder Davis

 

Pictures!

 

#1 Me in front of our little car

 

#2 Me and Elder Adams. Like my skinny tie and his scarf? We're turning into Europeans haha

 

#3 Hey mom! Look who did the dishes! We don't have a dishwasher so we wash them all by hand

 

#4 Speed limit on a French freeway. You never see numbers that big in the USA! 

 

#5 Our apartment

 

#6 Flying over Paris, right before we landed. Tons of people live here!

 

#7 It's great to be a missionary :)

 

#8 Dad, there is this little optical shop close to our appartment. They sell glasses and what not, along with telescopes, microscopes, magnifying glasses, etc. Sorry the picture is blurry. I think they have eye doctors in there too but I'm not sure. Maybe you should start selling telescopes ;)

 

#9 I don't know how to spell this but Elder Adams made quiche for lunch. basically straight vegetables

 

#10 What we had for lunch one day. Couscous and Ratatouille and a baguette! Cheap, easy, and delish

 

#11 Hanging out in a freezing cold train station. We take lots of trains.

 

#12 There is graffiti everywherrrrrre in France. Lots of walls look like this one. This is by our church building.

 

#13 Me in front of our church building

 

#14 Me and elder Adams again. We took this picture as he was writing his email home so that is his "focused" face haha

France - Week 1 (St. Brieuc)

Hi everyone! Sorry, I know it's been a while since the last post! I've kinda gotten off track these past couple of weeks, but no worries, everything should be back to normal now! :)

I decided instead of making one super long post with all the recent things going on, I'll just make a couple separate ones...so here is the first letter we received from Elder Davis after his first week in France. He flew out of Utah on Tuesday, February 19th, and arrived in France on Wednesday, February 20th. He wrote this letter on his first P-day (Monday), February 25th.
 

2/25/13

Hello everyone!

I am writing you all today from the beautiful city of Saint Brieuc. This email might be kind of weird because I have to write on a French key board and all the letters are in weird places and have French accents and what not. But anyways...I’m doing really well. Saint Brieuc is a fairly large city and we live pretty much in the middle of it. There is a mall next to us and a bunch of other tiny stores. There’s a bunch of little French bakeries everywhere to haha so we love buying French bread. We walk everywhere! I have never walked so much in my life. We have a car but we don’t really use it unless we have appointments several miles away. When we don’t have appointments we spend a lot of our time outside of the city in the tiny French neighborhoods knocking on doors.

My companion is awesome. His name is Miles Adams from Fallon Nevada, he’s 20 years old and he’s 6 foot 4 (so I hate standing next to him). He has been in France for a little under a year and we get along great and he is a big help to me. His MTC companion was Elder Ryan Lavering so I thought that was cool. Elder Lavering is from Snohomish (I think Lake Stevens) and he is serving in Congo right now.

The church building here in Saint Brieuc is pretty big, but the branch (group of people who attend the church) is very small. Yesterday in church there were only about 30 people there. I really love the members of the branch though. Since there aren’t many of us, it is an intimate little group. In church I was able to play the piano in Priesthood meeting since I was the only Priesthood holder who could play. That was a cool experience. In sacrament meeting I was asked to introduce myself and share my testimony. Again, the members are all awesome. They welcomed me into the branch like I was family. Some of them are from England to so it was nice to be able to speak some English with a couple of them. The only bad part is everyone in the branch lives so spread out. Many live an hour away from the building which makes it hard to get them to attend lessons with us.

Alright... so as far as missionary work Saint Brieuc is doing awesome. Just before I got here elder Adams and his old companion baptized a lady named Dayana. She is a solid member and has been at church ever since. One of our investigators named Joelle came to church yesterday and she is awwwwwesome. The members love her, she loves the members and she wants to get baptized... but she knows it’s a big commitment and wants to make sure she is 100 percent ready to commit. I know the church has already blessed her life and I know she recognizes that. The only problem is she is going out of town for a couple weeks on Wednesday; we just hope and pray that when she returns we can pick up where we left off! She’s so awesome. We are also teaching 2 African families. One just moved to Saint Brieuc from Belgium. Benjamin and his family are solid and want to come to church every week. Jean-Pierre and his family are solid too, but his wife isn’t as excited about meeting with us as her husband. Anyways, we love them and their families and just hope and pray that they will be able to come to church and continue meeting with us. Their families are so awesome. We have a bunch of other investigators... some a little better than others, but we are working as hard as possible to find people and teach them.

Last night was the first time I went trackting in France. You could say it was an eye opening experience. Not a single person talked to us for more than 45 seconds. What’s sad is they don’t know what they are saying no to. As a missionary, I feel like I am trying to (figuratively) shove diamonds into people’s hands. Yet they refuse to accept it. If people knew the blessings and strength and peace that come from the message we are trying so desperately to share, I think they would be a little more receptive. But it’s ok; there are tons of people here to teach.

Oh I forgot to tell you about my first couple days in France. I was exhausted for the first couple days (I’ve never really experienced jet lag until now). We landed in Paris, then right off the plane we went to the city of Paris and started talking to people about the gospel. It was an extremely humbling experience. Parisians speak so fast. We did that for a little while... didn’t really have any success/ but we did get to go see Notre Dame and that one bridge that is covered in padlocks (if you have never heard of that bridge in France just Google it). Unfortunately I didn’t get to see the Eiffel Tower. I couldn’t even see it from the airplane but I’m sure I’ll see it eventually. Our mission president and his wife are awesome. They have the thickest French accents ever so their English is funny. They took us out to an American restaurant for dinner haha. Then we slept in the mission home that night. The next day is when I (Wednesday) met my trainer elder Adams. Then we took our 4 hour train ride to Saint Brieuc and we’ve been working here ever since.

Sorry this email is so out of order haha. It is hard to write about soooo many things in so little time and on this weird key board. I’ll get used to it though.

I’m so thankful for the chance I have to serve here in Saint Brieuc. I know there are people here waiting for me to find them. The church is true. God is our Heavenly Father and he knows and loves us individually. I am a witness of Jesus Christ and I know that he lived and died for us. Death is not the end. We can live with God and with our families after this life because of the atonement of Jesus Christ. The Book of Mormon is the word of God and it testifies of Christ. If you are an active member of the Church are invite you to find someone you can share the gospel with. Recommend them to the missionaries serving in your areas. If you are not an active member of the Church I invite you to go back to church, read the book of Mormon, pray to you Heavenly Father. He loves you and wants to bless you. If you are not a member of the church at all, I invite you to talk to some missionaries. Young men and women like me who am eager to share something with you that will change your life.

I love you all. Please pray for the people here in saint Brieuc

Talk to you next week!

Elder Davis

Elder Davis' mission actually has a Facebook page called "France Paris Mission Poznaski" and is updated regularly with all sorts of info and pictures of the missionaries serving in that mission. Here are some pictures from that page that were posted of Gavin and his group that he flew in with.  

 

#1. All the French missionaries after just arriving in France!

#2 All the French missionaries at the mission home

#3. Elder Davis in the mission home

#4. Elder Davis meeting his companion Elder Adams for the first time

 

 

#5. Sorry this is sideways...I'm still trying to figure out how to fix it!! Anyways, this is Elder Davis with his mission president and his wife. President Poznaski and his wife sent an email to our family right after Gavin got there, which was really neat. He also included this picture. 

 

More Pictures that Elder Davis sent...

#1 Calling home from the airport

 (It was so nice to talk to him before he flew straight to France! We talked for over an hour, and his french sounds awesome!)

 

#2  Me and Elder Cutshall getting ready to take off for France

 

#3 Me eating dinner at an American restaurant my first night in France

  

#4 A member fed us on Thursday. This is me eating Sister Kefford's home made lemon meringue pie

 

#5 The only picture I have of Elder Adams while we were making dinner