Week 25: Food, food, and crazy old men

Here's Ralph's e-mail from last Wednesday:

Hey everyone! Hope your week has been good. I've decided to start getting a little more descriptive so that my emails are a bit more entertaining, so hopefully I do a good job.

So Wednesday after we finished talking, Elder Potter decided to go shopping, so we went to all sorts of sports stores (which I had no interest in whatsoever, and we also ran into that member who took our picture and sent it to you guys), and then we went and taught Alex, and then went home.

Thursday, Elder Potter went and got a haircut in the morning while I sat around and twiddled my thumbs for about an hour, then we went over to the Hermana's and helped them move out of their apartment to one just up the stairs. It was a tiny little Chinatown closet apartment too, so we had to take a lot of stuff apart to get it up, getting the couch up took us pretty much an hour on its own. So that took up a lot of the day, and we went to lunch with the ASL and Sisters afterwards to this really good dumpling place (got 15 a-little-bigger-than-eggs sized dumplings for under $5, I feel super fat), and then Elder Potter and I went over to the Chinatown chapel to get some weekly planning done. We started heading to an appointment with Andre, but on the way there he postponed it due to him having thrown out his back, so we went back to the chapel and did some more planning. After our planning, we had an appointment with Isaac, so we walked up the east side to get there. We were a bit late (we'd tried to take a train initially, but they were being really weird service wise so we ended up walking quite a ways), so our appointment was pretty short. We showed him that Because of Him video that's been going around and talked about it, and then traveled over to Union Square to go treat ourselves to a dinner at a place called Max Brenner's. This place had super nummy food, and the whole place smelled like chocolate (they're apparently famous for it), so we had some nice dinner (I got some kind of chicken wings with waffle fries, Elder Berryman got an enormous sandwich, and Elders Potter and Kroff got some amazing macaroni and cheese), and then we all had milkshakes for dessert (Elder Potter got chocolate hazelnut, Elder Kroff coconut cream pie, Elder Berryman cookies and cream, and I got banana hazelnut).

We then traveled home from there, and ran into some crazy old man who talked to us kind of like this "My brothers, you don't need to pray for me, because you already prayed the prayer, cause God knows the heart and prays the prayer. So don't pray the prayer because you've already prayed the prayer when you think about praying the prayer," and this went on for about 15 minutes. So after that, we finally got home.

Friday, we did personal study, and then traveled over to Andre's for a lesson. We taught him about a lot of the commandments, focusing mostly on the 10 commandments (with a little bit of the law of chastity thrown in), scripture study, prayer, sabbath day observance, and following the prophet. He had a knowledge of all of these already and is keeping them and says he will continue to keep them, so that was good. Andre is super solid doctrinally since he's been taught a lot over the years, and I think it was just mainly getting him over his word of wisdom problems that was needed, which he also has been doing. We also talked about moving up his baptismal date again, and he said he prayed about it and was willing to, so his date is now set for May 17th! We then headed up to church for a lesson with Vlad, but our lesson with Andre had run a bit long, so when we got there (about 20 minutes late), Vlad was already offline. We managed to reschedule for this Thursday though.

So instead, we finished up planning, did some online proselyting, and then had an APF at Union Square. It was a pretty big one that we'd been planning for a while, so I'll break it down a bit. So, it was another chalk drawing one, where we drew out "Faith is Like a Seed," and then the process of a seed maturing into a tree, and on the bottom area just a bunch of random spring stuff (this was soon intermingled with random stuff random people were drawing as they stole our chalk while we weren't looking, but it was still good), so I was one of the people drawing because apparently I'm good enough at art to be worth it, so yeah. I drew pretty much the whole 2 hours, while some of the other people in the zone contacted. There were a few members who came out (mostly from the YSA ward, though an Area Seventy was there, Elder Gary S Price), and Jason came as well so it was cool. I think we then went to Subway for dinner and then went home, but I'm not exactly sure at this point, so I'll just say that's what happened.

Saturday we had personal study, and then went to correlation meeting with Brother Barrett and Brother Hanlon, and we talked a lot about how the members can get involved in the Spanish work (so much Spanish discussion), and then we went to lunch with them at a place called Giovanni Rana's, where I had probably the best pasta ever. So, cool story, apparently Brother Barrett is in charge of the food stuff for all of the public schools in New York City (possibly all of New York, not entirely sure), so he's been working with Rana's to make a deal to use their pasta in public schools (makes me wish I'd been going to public school here when that happens, sigh), so not only did we not end up having to pay the check, they also gave us free desserts, but also took us on a tour of the facility and gave us about 4 pounds of pasta to take home. For free. So we've been living pretty well the last few nights for dinner. After that, we went back to the church for an interview with Elder Marshall and talked about our area and stuff. Elder Potter then worked on his mission experience a bit more, and then we traveled up to a baptism. So that lasted a while, then we stayed at the church and organized our referral information, and then went home and cooked ourselves some of that pasta we'd gotten.

Sunday, we got up, I got ready, did a little studies, and then we went off to church. We got there a bit early to help set up, due to it being a special "Come and See" Sunday, in which we have an hour and a half long sacrament meeting, and then a dinner afterwards (so none of the regular block meetings). So we set up in the gym for afterwards, and then went to the main meeting. Andre was supposed to come, but wasn't showing up or responding, so we figured he'd skipped again. We got to bless the sacrament, and then waited outside in the lobby for Andre to possibly arrive, as well as friends of two of the members. One of the member's friends came, but there was no sign of the others, so we went back into the chapel. After the meeting we went upstairs and had dinner, and we also helped a member get his instrument out of one of the bishop's offices, and then went back up. While eating, we got a text from Andre saying that he was stuck in a bus about 30 blocks away, and so the story goes that he'd been stuck in awful Easter traffic on a bus for about 4 hours. Ew. So he got there just as the dinner was beginning to wrap up, but he still got there, and was able to meet Brother Barrett, Bishop, Brother Winder, and others. That one guy Alan also came again, so we got his information so we can refer him to the New Rochelle Elders.

After the dinner was done, we helped clean up and then had a lesson with Andre, answering some of the questions about the things he'd been reading in the Book of Mormon and such. After that, we traveled downtown a little and looked up a few of the referrals we had (mostly addresses that didn't even exist, but hey, we tried), but we saw some interesting things while we were out and about. We saw some guy getting tackled to the ground by five police officers, got yelled at by some random person in a taxi about we're trying to take away their birth control, saw two performers in the subway have a sort of turf war (one was a little old man playing a violin with a microphone attached, the other was a drummer and they were both trying to drown out the other), and then saw some crazy old man trying to chase down some poor fast food delivery guy on a bike. Fun stuff. After all that excitement, we then went home and had dinner.

Monday we got up early, got ready, and went to a "specialty training" that was being held by President Morgan. There'd been a mission president training in Washington DC over the weekend, so this may have been part of that. The theme of the meeting was "Focused Faith Generates Power," and so we discussed a lot about faith and how we exhibit our faith. The first speaker was one of the AP's Elder Kerr, and he talked about the resurrection and Easter and examples of faith in his life that stem from the belief in the resurrection. We then heard from Sister Morgan, who shared a scripture (Moroni 7:33) and then expounded on it for a little. That was then followed by President Morgan, who talked about the faith that we as missionaries should have. He used the missionary purpose as an example, and talked about that if we're inviting others to come unto Christ, wouldn't it make sense that we should already be there? He also talked about how our faith is exhibited in our goals we set and the plans we make. The goal that he's set for us as a mission as well is by the end of May to have had 100 baptisms. Eek. That's apparently about 40 higher than the highest the mission's ever had in that period of time, but if we do what the Lord has asked us we can achieve that and more. It was really invigorating and got us all really excited for the upcoming month.

After that, we went to lunch at Steak & Shake and took our food to Central Park and enjoyed seeing grass again, and then Elder Potter and I headed to my doctor’s appointment. After that, we did a survey based on the training we received in the morning, and then worked on the less active list for the ward, putting in our information and sorting out which ones we need to go visit again. Afterwards, we went out and did some lookups, then picked up my medication from a CVS pharmacy, and then came home for dinner.(more pasta).

Tuesday, it was Elder Potter's 21st birthday, so he'd received a large amount of balloons in the mail so we blew all those up, and then we did our studies. We then went and helped someone get out of a treatment center (they needed an escort to show up just for formality's sake, so we came and dropped by and got him to his bus), and then we got taken out by one of Elder Berryman's friends from back home to Max Brenner's again (so much chocolate, I had the mac and cheese and a caramel milkshake this time), and then we went over to the chapel to do some online proselyting (mainly planning online events, we got new training saying we're supposed to do about 3 per week, each focused on conversion, retention, and reactivation respectively and to have target audiences as opposed to kind of a blanket invitation), and then we went out and did some lookups (none of whom were home, one of which had moved, and so on).

We then went to dinner at the Smith's (the one who's grandfather's name was Ralph, don't think he's related though), and had some nummy pulled pork sandwiches as well as chocolate banana muffins (and they gave us bread made out of the same stuff, yumyumyum), and then we went to a place called Magnolia's Bakery (apparently super famous for its cupcakes), and we all had some red velvet cupcakes (we as in us and the zone leaders) (they were also quite rich and delicious and fluffy), and then we came home.

Today, we got up, did our laundry, then headed over to the temple (Elder Potter, since he's going home in a week, gets to go with all the other dying missionaries to a temple session with President and Sister Morgan, and then go out to lunch afterwards), so now I'm upstairs emailing!

Hope everything is going well for all of you, training calls are tonight (hope I'm not training), and we'll find out Saturday if I'm leaving/staying as well. Woohoo. I'll have hit 6 months as of next Wednesday too. It's so crazy to think that I've been out for this long already, I'll never get used to how fast time goes out here.

I heard about Max's call to Las Vegas Spanish, hope that goes well and congratulate him for me! Also got Papa's letter saying Jacob's call is pretty much on its way as well, so we'll see where he ends up.

Anyhow, talk to you all later!

Elder Ralph Smith

Week 24: Stake conference and the Statue of Liberty

Hey everyone! Hope everything's been going well. Things have been pretty good over here, though weatherwise life has been strange. Anyhow, onto what I did this week.

After emailing, we went off to the park and played some frisbee stuff, had food, and so forth. We then went back to the temple and waited for Elder Potter to get out of his play (he went to go see the Broadway version of Les Miserables, since it's the end of his mission), and then came back to get changed. We then went out for groceries and came home for the night.

Thursday, we did our studies in the morning, and then went to 15th street chapel and had a lesson with Vlad. We then had lunch, and then did a bit of weekly planning, and then went to my doctor's appointment, and then we went to the Farnsworths for dinner. We then walked home from there (got a pretty good tour of the city in the process and talked to several people).

Friday, we did our studies, then went and had a lesson with Andre, and then had lunch, did a little online proselyting, and then had a lesson with a media referral named Stephanie. After her, we had a lesson with Joseph, and then we went home for dinner.

Saturday, we had studies and then went out with Andre and walked his dog with him while teaching him. He's given up on his Word of Wisdom breaking habits, so we asked him to pray about moving up his baptismal date! We then had an APF at Union Square where we talked to people about what they think of Easter and Christ. I got mildly sunburned (thankfully mildly), but it went pretty well. We then had the priesthood leadership and adult sessions of stake conference, and the stake presidency gave some good talks, as well as President and Sister Morgan. The visiting authority was Elder Gordon Smith of the 6th Quorum of the Seventy, and he was also formerly a US Senator from Oregon, so he had some pretty interesting and funny stories. After conference, we went home.

Sunday, we went to conference in the morning, and then we had lunch/correlation meeting at Bro. Barrett's apartment.  We then went to an appointment with Anthony and co. and talked with them about service and general conference, and then went home for dinner.

Monday, we did studies and had district meeting, lunch, and then a lesson with Vlad. We then went and did some less active lookups, and actually taught one whose name was Millie. We then trekked over to the west side to check out how we would get to the Statue of Liberty, and passed through a really pretty park to get there. It was also around 70 degrees so it was super nice out, which was fun. We then went home for dinner.

Tuesday, we headed down to the same place we were Monday night to pick up the tickets for going to the statue, and then went up to the 15th street chapel and did studies. After that, we had another lesson with Vlad, did some online proselyting, had lunch, met with the ASL and Spanish sisters, got mail, and then went to dinner at the Gibbons, after which we went home.

Today, we got up and headed to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, which were both really cool and I took lots of pictures. I'll see if I can get to a computer to get those off at some point. Anyhow, hope you guys are having a great week and I'll talk to you later!

Elder Ralph Smith

Week 23 - Fun with Justin, Jordan, and General Conference

Hey family! Hope everything is going well. Anyhow, onto my week.

So on Wednesday, after emailing we went to Chinatown and bought some fun looking fake designer glasses as an apartment, and then we went up to the temple to celebrate Sister Jensen's birthday. We then went off to Central Park and wandered around the southern part of it near what's called the Pool of Bethesda. We took lots of pictures, and then we went to our dinner appointment, which we were about 10 minutes late for and the member had already left, despite us calling him and saying we'd be a little late. Sigh. So Elder Potter and I ended up just going back to our house to have dinner.

Thursday, we studied, and then went to the church for our lesson with Vlad, and then after that started preparing materials for the APF we were doing that afternoon. We went as a district to a place called Tompkins Square Park and did some contacting there for about an hour and a half, then Elder Potter and I headed off to a lesson with Andre. On the way there, he called us and said he wasn't able to meet with us today, so we went over to a train station, and headed over to the west side for dinner. We got there a bit early, so we went to a nearby library and Elder Potter was able to help out with a Portuguese online event. We then went to dinner at a place called Blue Smoke (it's with the YSA member again), and had some barbecued stuff. We went from there to home.

Friday, we did our studies, and then went to the 15th street chapel and I went on a split with Elder Marshall. We then went back to the apartment and dropped off his stuff, and then went back to Union Square for lunch with (drumroll please) Justin Heftel! He's been doing well, is having fun at college, so it was great to see him and be able to talk with him. After lunch, we called some media referrals (and actually got an appointment with one!), and then went and checked to see if Karlyn and Aleta were home, which they weren't. We then went to dinner at Sis. Foreman's, and while we were there we got a call from President Morgan that there was someone in the CCU who needed a blessing, so we immediately went over there and gave her one. After that, we went home.

Saturday was fun, as we had general conference. We did studies, went and unsplit at the chapel, grabbed some lunch, and then went up to 87th to watch conference. I loved the talks, I have lots of notes that I'll send in a separate email just so you guys can see what stood out to me, but I think some of my favorite talks from Saturday were Elder Holland's, Elder Anderson's, Elder Hale's, Elder Zwick's, and pretty much all of priesthood session (poor Pres. Uchtdorf not getting to fly the President's plane). Watching conference here was interesting, since the times are 12-2, 4-6, 8-10 for the Saturday sessions, so Morning Session wasn't even in the morning and we got home super super late. Anyhow, in between morning(ish) and afternoon session, we watched the World Report as well as everything else they showed (they showed a cool video which talked about the testimony of John the Revelator, which was done by the same actors and such who did the Bible videos), and then in between afternoon and priesthood, we flew (I wish literally) down to the financial district for dinner with the Cannon's, and then ran back up to the chapel (thankfully not literally) with equal speed. After priesthood, we went home for the night.

Sunday, we got up and did our studies, then went off to conference. I liked a lot of the talks from the Sunday sessions as well, including pretty much all of Sunday morning, and President Packer's, Elder Corbridge's, and Elder Aidukaitis'. In between sessions, Sister Yamada made us lunch, so we stayed at the church and ate lunch with the people there. After conference, we went on a mini split with Elders Fronk and Longo because they had two places they needed to be at the same time, so Elder Longo and I went off to a dinner appointment with some of their members, and then we unsplit and went home.

Monday, I did nothing. Literally. As in, Elder Berryman was sick, there was zone meeting which Elder Kroff had to go to, and thus I was elected to stay home with Elder Berryman all day. I got some sleep in, read some of Jesus the Christ (again), watched pretty much every church movie in existence, slept some more, and so forth. Then towards the end of the day, I started getting sick. Whoopdeedoo.

Tuesday I was coughing up a storm, but we went out and did stuff anyhow, so we went to church at about noon to go pick up mail, had lunch, did some online proselyting, got weekly planning done, and then went to dinner at the Winder's, after which we came home.

K, so, a bit of a story. I think you guys have heard me talk about my friend Jordan before (the one from my group of friends at home). So, last P Day, I got an email from him! He was interested in how I was doing, and then started asking questions about what I do. This eventually led to him asking what we believe, so I gave a shortened version of the Restoration lesson, and then didn't hear back, so I wasn't sure whether he was just not interested or what. So, I got a reply at church yesterday, and he found it super interesting, but even cooler than that was this weekend, missionaries knocked on his door. While he was with a friend who's a member (who didn't refer him either). And they'd just happened to go back home to grab something when they stopped by. So yeah, he now has a Book of Mormon and wants me to keep teaching him, and I may get the opportunity to Skype into lessons when the missionaries over there do them. Super super super super super super cool!!!!!! He said he's been praying a lot in the last few months for guidance in his life, and it seems like he's taking this as his answer (which it is!). So yeah, fun stuff going on.

Today, we got up and did laundry, and then came here. Anyhow, hope you're having a good week, and I'll talk to you all next week!

Elder Ralph Smith

Week 22 - Comings and Goings

So as you heard from me last week, I got a new companion named Elder Hansen. Well, as of Friday, Elder Hansen went home with medical issues. So anyhow, storytime I guess.

So, Wednesday we played basketball/ping pong at the church, thus why I had wifi for so late into the day, and then afterwards came home and changed, then went over to Alex's and taught him a little. We then had to run up to Roosevelt Island for dinner with Bro. Brown. After that, we took the tram over the river, and then went home.

Thursday, Elder Hansen and I got to talking and I found out that he's already been home and came back (due to his medical issues), so had originally come out December 2012, went home about March, and then came back in October. So that was the situation he was in, and recently he started having problems with it again. So we talked about that for a while, and then went and taught Vlad (didn't go quite as deep for once), and then afterwards had lunch with the ASL and zone leaders. We then traveled over and had a lesson with Andre, we read Ether 12 with him and had a super solid discussion about it. We then went and talked with the zone leaders about the problems that Elder Hansen has been having, and I had the opportunity to give him a blessing as well. We then went out and got supplies and groceries, and then came home and started ransacking the apartment to get it into better shape. We then had dinner and went to bed.

On Friday, President Morgan called, and told us that they'd be picking Elder Hansen up at 1:30 (it was about 11 at the time) to take him to the airport for a flight at 4. Welp. So we went back to the apartment, he started packing while I tried to find something to do. Anywho, Elder Hansen finished packing, then we talked for a little while, then the zone leaders came (they were my companions until my new one arrived), and then President and Sister Morgan pulled up and we loaded his stuff in and sent him on his merry way. We found out from President Morgan that my new companion would be Elder Potter (at least I know him), and that he'd arrive around 6. My only concern with being with him was that he goes home at the end of this transfer, meaning I'll probably stay here for yet another transfer. So after we sent Elder Hansen home, we went to teach a lesson to Njod (pronounced Najood), the zone leaders' soon-to-be convert. We then did a bit of online proselyting, and then went back to the apartment to wait for Elder Potter. He got here, we all talked for a bit, he unpacked a little, and then Elder Potter and I went to the chapel to go teach an online lesson to some people in Brazil (well, he taught and I gave input which he translated every once in a while), after which we came home.

Saturday, we did our studies and then went and helped with the Spanish Area Proselyting Focus (APF), which went pretty well. We were advertising for "Clase de Engles Gratis" (if that's how you spell it), and so we went tracting looking for Spanish people who didn't know English so that we could teach them English. Woo. We did that for several hours (oh, did I also mention that it was pouring rain the entire time), then met back at the 15th St chapel, went and got lunch, and then we went and did weekly planning (finally). We went from there back into the ever-increasing pouring rain to head to our dinner at Yolanda's. We ate too much food, and then came back home.

Sunday, we got up, did our studies (which now also include language studies for Elder Potter), then went off to ward council and talked about how the Spanish APF went. We then had church (fast Sunday shtuff), and then in Sunday School we talked about the Exodus, and then in third hour we were combined due to it being the 5th Sunday and we had a big group discussion on prayer. We then went upstairs and had lunch (Fletcher made us two loaves of bread, yumyumyumyumyumyumyum), and then we met up with the Hermanas and Elders Fronk and Longo and talked with them for a bit, then headed off to dinner at the Hanlon's. After that, we went home for the night. Oh, and it was my 5th month mark.

Monday, we did studies, and then went off to interviews with President Morgan, which went pretty well, and he told me that unless the Lord says otherwise, I'll be getting transferred at the end of this transfer, which'll be interesting. We also talked about how I'm doing, which was really great so that I could get a little of what I've been feeling off my chest. After interviews, we went to Steak and Shake for lunch, and then Elder Potter and I went down for a lesson with Andre. We talked with him about what had happened at church, and then helped emphasize the importance of prayer in overcoming temptations (since he wants to quit using certain things, and needs all the help he can get). After our lesson with him, we went to dinner at the Secrist's, and then went home.

Tuesday, we did studies, then went to district meeting, where we discussed the goals and plans our district should have. We then had lunch, and then had our interview with Elder Marshall. After that, we took Elders Fronk and Longo to go do service for Andre, as his apartment is super cluttered, so we helped him get stuff cleaned up a bit. We then called a bunch of referrals, and then stuck around for ASL class since it was happening right where we were, and then we went to dinner at the Egan's.

Today, we did laundry, and then studies, and then came here. So yeah, that's my week, things look like they'll calm down for a bit. We're going to go wander through Central Park as it's a super nice day today (high of 63!), so that'll be fun.

Anywho, hope you all have a great week, and I'll talk to you again later!

Elder Ralph Smith