March in Valence, France

Letter to Dad: March 7, 2016

Things are going well out here! Valence is a lot different from Annecy

but it still pretty good! We have had to come here and learn a whole

new bus system again  and a whole bunch of members less actives and

everything which is always an interesting thing to adjust to an area

like that and especially with a blue, it's sorta like we are white

washing and I'm training still haha but it's cool. But this week was

pretty cool, something funny that happened this week that I think you

will appreciate is that we had a member who is named cheefy come and

invite us fir food one day and wanted us to come over to the church to

eat it so us not wanting to deny a free opportunity to eat some good

food because he is a pretty good cook, accepted and showed up. We had

a nice slow cooked meat meal with vegetables and everything with this

grape juice that was very good as well. The grape juice here is super

good btw! Haha but we left not thinking much of it, cause cheefy will

feed the missionaries pretty often and it's never anything weird or

out of the ordinary. But the next day elder Wilkey goes to the

bathroom and comes out and tells us all that he was peeing green...

And like half an hour later another elder goes to the bathroom and he

had he same thing!! So we started like laughing and just thinking

about all the things we could have eaten to make us that way because

we had no idea! And I went a couple hours later and then we found out

that I was peeing green as well as elder Steadman! So like we were all

just wonder what the heck was going on.. And so we called a couple

other missionaries in Grenoble and asked them what was going on with

them. And they didn't have it and we could not figure out what on

earth did this to us! But a day later we got a random call from cheefy

and he was just busting up laughing and asked us how everything was

and if our pee was a different color! He had put some chemical in the

trap juice and used it to dye our pee green!! Hahahaha he got us sooo

good! It was a classic joke and got all us just wondering what was

going down! But all said and done Valence ain't Annecy.... Haha I miss

it.

But we only have three more weeks until transfer calls! But I talked

to president and asked him I could have three weeks early for hand

surgery before school started that would put my return right around

July 10-13 somewhere around there! He said he would seriously consider

it just because it is medical and he normally won't let anyone go home

unless it is medical so we should be finding out what his thoughts

are. That would only be a few days before I would normally be

returning anyway.

EBS

Playing a little basketball at Pres. Brown's home.

Letter to Mom March 14, 2016

I am super excited to hear about the new boat! That is going to be so

much fun! I am super jealous that you guys will have it for a couple

months before I will be able to come back and use it with all of you,

but maybe you will just have film some of it so I can feel like I am

there with you guys haha it isn't worldly at all though! I am glad

that we are able to go boating and spend time together as a family, it

is one of the things I have been able to look back on and remember all

the fun morning trips, lake Powell trips and Monday nights where we

would spend time together on the boat.

As for water, I am no longer near even a little bit of water. I guess

there is a river that runs by a city that is sorta close to valence

but not really! It's weird to think that this is one of the only times

that they haven't put me by the water. Valence isn't that big of a

city, and so I'm pretty sure that I've already seen everyone there.

There are some cool things, like a fountain and one park that is

pretty cool I guess. There isn't a whole lot to see there and there

are tons of high school kids, so like we don't have anyone to really

contact when high school is in cause they are all super young. But

whatever. The ward is pretty cool. And the Annecy Amis are doing well

we call them a few times a week so we still have contact with them and

things are going pretty well, but it's not the same as actually being

there and everything. So our friend we met in the park is from the

reunion islands and he is doing well, his name is Mustafa and we have

been seeing him like almost every day. Haha it's pretty awesome

actually.

This week we have had a bunch of stuff to do though we went on. A

bunch of exchanges and everything, it's always tiring to take a bunch

of trains but I'm learning to like it. Haha trains are pretty cool, I

stayed in valence for all the exchanges and Elder Wilkey was out in

the other cities. But we taught a couple lessons over Skype to our

Amis and they were pretty good, except for the fact that my front

camera on my new iPad isn't working so we couldn't really see them at

all haha we had to use the back camera and so yeah it was sorta odd.

But whatever it was fun to teach them and see how they were doing. So

this week we actually have a visit from Elder Christopherson so we

spent all of p day here in Lyon again we just sorta wandered around

and took pictures of stuff. It was a zone p day type of thing which

only a handful of people showed up to... But this week was pretty calm

otherwise not too much crazy stuff went down.

Love you all have a good week!

Elder Palani Thangaraj 

Letter to Dad: March 21, 2016

Sounds like the temple dedication was success! I am excited to go see

the Provo temple once I get back, it will the first time for me, I

didn't even see it under construction really. But I definitely didn't

recognize any those Jazz player except for my man Okur! Haha he's an

oldie but the other two I had no idea. I had to ask Elder Kahn here in

the apartment who is in his first transfer to explain to me who they

were and if they good or whatever. Haha I am so out of the loop I

don't even recognize the Jazz players anymore! It's crazy! It hasn't

even been that long since I have been gone and already there are a ton

of new faces! I can only imagine everything else that has changed and

I'm gonna have to get used to all over again! But the trip to Maui

sounds like it will probably be super fun! I am jealous of the sun and

beach time that you are gonna be getting! I wanna have some time to

chill on the beach and everything, but I will have my time soon enough

I'm sure. But once I get back me and Nate are gonna go exercise at the

sports mall or in our basement so he can be the best lacrosse player!

I wanna see him do super well and he's gonna have to start now if he

wants to be super good by the time he is in high school. 

But as I explained to mom this week wasn't super eventful, because I got sick

and wasn't really able tom,eave the house at all during a few days!

The coolest thing this week was our mission conference with Elder D

Todd Christopherson who came to visit and speak to our whole mission!

I got to see a bunch of old friends and listen to an apostle answer

all of our questions, even though a lot of them were pretty lame. Haha

sometimes I am not positive what is going through people's heads and

how they under stand everything but whatever, it makes for funny

stories later right?! Haha But aside from being sick this week things

are going well here, it is the last week of the transfer!! So we will

see what happens, I do t think I am wanting to stay here in balance

for much longer. It is too small and I need a change already. Haha I

only have three more transfers so I think is the next city will

probably be the last one! Hopefully that is! It's weird to think that

I might be finishing in the next place I get called to, but also

reassuring cause I don't really like moving around too much. I have

done pretty good amount of times in my cities and I'm proud of that.

But I am doing well after the Annecy attack haha I just don't like

being in communities with a lot of Arab people, or homeless people or

Eastern Europeans anymore, and buses are still odd but it's getting

better! In 5 months I won't have to ever take a bus again in my life I

don't think so it will all be good. I am not positive what has

happened we are still waiting for our lawyer to call and tell us a

little bit of what happened. I will let you know as soon as I find out

what happened to them. Love you hope you have a good week!

EBS

Letter to Mom: March 21, 2016

Sounds like you guys will be having the most fun week in a long time! One that you have earned from the sounds of it! I am super jealous it seems like you guys just keep popping around the USA for vacations haha and all my comps are always jealous of you guys! But I am also jealous you got to watch the temple dedication of the Provo temple! I have seen a bunch of pictures of it and it looks like an amazing temple. I will have to go see it with you guys once I get home! I am super excited to actually go to the temple and not just talk to people about it. That is one thing that I am missing out here. It is strange to be not allowed to go to the temple during these two years, but I will appreciate it more once I get back. But as for the boat you could ask the Giles family that just moved back to America this week haha they were the family in Annecy, and I know they love boating! 

This week started really eventful and ended pretty eventful but in between it didn't really get to busy. I was sick with the flu and it quickly turned into super bad intestinal stuff and had bad diarrhea and what not for a few days. We went to Lyon on Monday and spent p day out there just sorta looking around and having a good time with the other missionaries that we could find. And that night we stayed with Elder Huntsman and Elder Haws and that was super fun! They are two of my favorites. We were there because he next day we had a mission conference with Elder D Todd Christopherson who came to speak to our mission. It was a super cool experience to have an apostle come and speak to us, he did a question and answer thingy and frankly a lot of dumb questions were asked. Haha but whatever. Sometimes people just don't put things full circle in their heads before they come out and it is so obvious hahaha but they have good intentions so you can't blame them too much for trying! But that night we went back to valence and that is when I started to be sorta sick and I went to bed the second we got home. I slept from 6-6:30 the next morning! Straight 12 hours of sleep! It was AWESOME 😏 first time I've ever had so much sleep! But the next day I just stayed home cause I was really sick and spent a lot of time in bed just like reading and sleeping. And the next day I tried to stay in bed as long as I could cause I was still sick but we had a rdv with our dmp so I got up and we went to eat at his house and have a meeting, I tried to not eat too much but he is Tongan so like avoiding eating at his house is like avoiding fire as a fireman. Tongans and food just coexist and compliment each other. He is super cool, he is professional rugby player and HUGE! He invited us to his game this coming Saturday so I will send you videos and pictures from that! But we directly went to another mangez-vous with a recent convert and ate again!! Now the last thing you wanna do when you have stomach issues is eat, but as a missionary sometimes you just gotta bite the bit and go for it so I ate again! The next day was super rough and I couldn't even move probably from the event of the preceding day and so I spent another day in bed, but another elder in our apartment was also sick so we stayed together and Elder Wilkey and Elder Steadman went out and worked for both of our sectors which was cool of them. Then Saturday I was feeling better and we got invited to go play basketball with seta who is another professional rugby player in our ward and his rugby friends at the church so we showed up and played ball with them for a couple hours, they loved it! They are all super good athletes, but basketball is not their sport... Haha we had to explain that you have to dribble the ball and can't just run with it and like taught some of them how to shoot. But they are solid muscles so they could just run through us small white boys. (They were all islanders) 

But as for Mustafa, he is doing well Elder Wilkey taught him on exchange this week and he is making good progress! The other investigators I haven't really seen or talked to this past week, we did one skype with our ami George and he has been keeping the word of wisdom which is super sick!! I'm stoked to hear he is doing so well even without us there to be on him. I was looking at Nate's scar pictures and his scar looks relatively small. Is there a reason it is not half way up his arm like mine is? Haha mine is like 6 inches and I wanna know if my second one will be like Nate's or if it will be another 6 inch scar. 

EBS

Noel from France

December 14, 2015:
Letter to Mom,

This week we had not too many appointments fall through so that was

pretty refreshing considering that normally it is full of them and

nothing ever ensues up happening how we would like it to! But this

week we met some really cool people and were able to make some new

friends we doubled our teaching pool I think, we were at 3 and now we

are at like 6! Haha so progress is being made! We had a cool

appointment with a guy named Alexis who actually contacted us when we

were walking in the park talking to people, he came up and asked us

about our church cause he really wanted to come see ours and see the

differences between them. So we took his number and set something up

for later in the week! And actually we met him and had a good lesson

and gave him a tour of the church which is actually just like an

office space in Annecy, but we also taught him and he accepted to come

to church. So we waited and waited at church and finally 5 minutes

AFTER church ended he walked in! He has accidentally slept in and so

he missed all of church haha but he said next week he will make sure

he is on time cause he really wants to come. And we also met a refugee

named Yohannes and he speaks English, we are teaching his as well now.

He is super cool and he actually showed up to church just as Sacrament

Meeting was finishing, I translated for him for the rest of church. We

are going to be seeing them again this week too so let's hope they

want to keep coming back! But this week I will be going down to Nice

again to pick up my legality and I will be staying with Elder Huntsman

for the night! I am super excited cause I has been super long since I

have seen him. But yeah that was a little bit from my week! We also

had an exchange this week but I stayed in Annecy and all we ended up

doing was like contacting people and teaching an English class at the

end of the night so it wasn't that interesting, but it is weird being

with people that don't speak French that well, it makes me feel like I

know a little bit more what I'm doing and I love just talking to

people. Haha they love talking to people with accents like me 😊 I can

fool people who aren't French into thinking I'm French but not the

French people yet so I gotta keep practicing! But anyway that was my

week! Sorry I don't have pictures! I will take some this week

hopefully.

EBS

Letter to Dad,

As for skyping, I am pretty sure we will be at President Giles house

at this moment of our day, we had thought that we could do it at

around 6 or 7 that way you will all be nice and awake and ready to

talk about all the cool things you got and all the stuff you wanna

know about France and all the stories I have maybe not shared with you

yet (that one might be tough to remember for me) but I'm not positive

what time that would be there but that's just what we had thought of,

we also have an hour to an hour and a half to skype so we will have to

be efficient with our time. Haha

As for the work here, it is going pretty well we are talking with a

lot of people and trying to find new Amis so we don't have to just go

contact and talk to people all day in the cold weather. We have found

three new Amis in the past week and that doubled our base of Amis and

so it is going pretty well. We have gotten some praises for work, but

I feel like there is so much more I can do that I don't because we

have to be in at dark unless we are with a member (because of the

attacks in Paris) and literally ALL the members are with the sisters

so we end up just at home at nights. 😐 so boring! So we need to find

a way to get the sisters away from the members so we can jump in one

of these days and teach with them or go to their house! I have been to

two members houses since I have been here in Annecy.... Haha but I've

asked like 30 people so let's hope we can get a better ratio soon. The

sisters took like one ami, but they are trying to give him back

because he just talks about his 21 year old son and how they NEED to

meet him and so yeah they are trying to give him back to us. Haha so I

guess they just give us what they don't need... But this week idk how

much actually service we did out side of our normal service at this DI

organization type thingy, but we saw one of our new Amis named Patswa

and it is a real hard time for him right now. His wife is wanting to

leave him after 26 years of marriage and he doesn't really know why,

and he is getting probably kicked out of his house by the French

government who is giving everything to his wife and so it's just a

hard time. But we went to see him and we talked with him about it and

we just testified of gods love for him and we couldn't give him the

solutions to his problems (way over my knowledge level) but we just

shared the importance of faith in God and staying close to God through

trials rather than pushing him away. And he was so touched. He didn't

accept our invitation to come to church that Sunday, but something in

him seemed really profoundly pondering what we were saying and

accepting it. Afterwards he wanted to take pictures of us and thanked

us so much, but we are seeing him again this week... So idk why he did

that haha he is my favorite guy. He is a mechanic in Switzerland so he

makes good money as well (which I wasn't expecting at all). He kinda

looks like you too! But shorter. Anyway that was my week! I will see

you guys really soon! Like two weeks or so? Love you! Have fun be

safe!

EBS

December 21, 2015

 Sounds like you guys had a super fun week in Hawaii! I will for sure have to go back with you guys! If that is something you will still want to do once I am back. But I don't have a lot of time today we were preparing for our Mission Conference in Lyon and finishing a bunch of stuff before that so I will probably explain most of the past week over Skype.I have had a crazy week, it went by really fast mostly because we were in Nice for two days! On our way to Nice, we had road problems and ended up getting to his house at like midnight which was super late, but our gps tried to take us through Italy so we had to back track a lot to come back onto the French roads and stuff. Luckily we caught it before we ended up in Milan Haha. I was able to see Elder Huntsman and do some stuff with him at the legality place and a little bit after at the church but then we had to get going cause it's like a 6 hour drive back to Annecy. We actually didn't even make it the whole way cause it was too late and we ended up in Valence and you know who's house we got to stay at? Palani! So we had a sleepover there haha then got up and finished the rest of the road in the morning which was about another two and half hours. 

The members are coming slowly but surely, I think it was the elders a few transfers ago that kinda ruined the members cause they would stay super long and the members weren't too crazy about him so now I inherited that rep just because I'm an elder or something. But whatever, we are working on changing it. But our Amis are doing well!

We have Yohannes and Alexis who are doing really well, Alexis actually has a date to be baptized in January. We also had our branch Christmas party and I was a wise man in the nativity haha which basically means I got to tie a scarf around my head and then pretend to give s gift to a baby doll in front of a bunch of people, but it was pretty cool still! There were a ton of Amis and so we got to get a bunch of numbers and talk to a bunch of people.

But everything sounds like it is going well! I am excited to see everyone! But I have had a busy week and a busy day getting stuff ready to go to Lyon and have Christmas conference out there! I will get to see all of my friends! That's always fun! Oh and I bought a new Christmas sweater today, it was a good buy I think. You'll see it in pics probably before Christmas but yeah I like it a lot. So thanks for that you guys 😊 So I will be Skyping you at around 9:15-9:30 so everyone including Nate will be wide awake. I added you on skype and so all you have to do is login in and accept me. That way all should be working smooth and we can be efficient haha cause nothing is worse than a bad Christmas skype to the fam.  I will see you and talk to you soon! I love you all! 

EBS

Pictures and Comments below from Elder Palani Thangaraj about Mission Conference in Lyon:

"Pretty fun Christmas week out here in France! 

The week started out with a mission wide Christmas conference in Lyon.  It was way chill seeing all the homies and to just hang out for a few days.  We hung out at the Confluence (where the two rivers in Lyon meet up), played at the park for a while, had our conference at the aquarium, played minute to win it, and watched lion king. It was a nice time."

Wishing all a Merry Christmas from Annecy, France!

Christmas Morning: Opening package from home 

Family back at home missing our missionary son! Merry Christmas Elder Schettler:)