Elder Teagan J. Pitcher ... Serving in the Copenhagen Denmark Mission
Elder Pitcher
"I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me." (Phillipians 4:13)

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

November 18, 2013

It is so crazy that I have already been out here this long. It makes me feel like I almost don't have enough time here to do all of the stuff I would like to as a missionary. Here is my update that I should have sent you last week.

So last week I got on a plane, slept for the entire travel time except for getting told by this Indian guy that we didn't believe in Christ, and also when it was time to eat.

Denmark is incredible! We got into the city, almost went the wrong way on the gågade (walking street with shopping malls and stuff) because our Mission President's wife accidentally started to drive on it (which is normally ok, except when there is a big Soccer game riot going on like there was) but she flipped around and then took us to see the Kristus.

Absolutely beautiful!

Then I stayed the night at the mission home, and got introduced to my trainer the next day. Elder Francis who is just awesome. We get along so well, and he helps out so much. We actually first met before at the Kristus church which was cool, I kind of got a preview of my trainer before hand.

Funny thing was, after meeting him, I got my hopes set on staying here because it seemed like a great area, and he was a cool guy. I even told the Mission President that I would like to stay if it were my preference which is kind of cool.

I then got to do loads of different things for the first time; like give out a Mormons Bog to a Muslim guy (which there are a lot of here, and it's interesting too, because I've seen they are a lot more receptive to the message than the Danes are).

We had an awesome appointment with Amy W's Uncle, who I didn't know was Amy's uncle until yesterday at Church where I also talked with Amy's grandparents in broken Danish. I can't believe I didn't catch this so much earlier. She even told me that they were all in this area!

We also have been talking a lot with this non-active pro soccer player from Nigeria named 'F' who plays for FC København in the champions League. We got to share an awesome spiritual thought with him, and his friend 'S' (real name) and actually taught 'S' the first lesson. They both came out to a week activity called CUV which is basically like Young Single Adults, and I got to play ping pong with them, and they both are amazing.

'S' doesn't seem to be very excited about making any commitments,and has told us that he isn't really that interested, but we will see.

I guess there is also this young African girl named 'E' who plans on getting baptized here within the next few weeks, so I might get to see my first baptism here soon!

Then there was our appointment with the 'B' Family. Wow! They are this active Family from Ghana, and they love to feed the missionaries. We weren't allowed to leave until the food was gone. And there was a lot.

They have a Little boy named 'D' who can speak English, Danish, and this African language that they all speak, and he switches between them all of the time. He's the funniest Little kid, and he and I are reading the same Little Disney comics to understand Danish better. Ha ha.

The sister missionaries brought an investigator named 'M' who is also from Ghana, and knows the 'B's well. Any questions he had were answered by the 'B's as we sat back and ate, because there was no way we were going to get a word in in such a boisterous conversation - hahaha :) I guess that's just the culture though.

It was an awesome time, and the atmosphere was so much fun.

We have such an awesome Ward here. We go away from every eating appointment feeling like we couldn't eat another bite without bursting. Part of the dining etiquette here is to always take seconds, so that also makes it a Little bit harder to shove that much food down.

We had our Thanksgiving day the other day, as part of our Zone conference, and we even had a turkey bowl as part of the fun, and I played QB for my team.

It was freezing cold, and raining in typical Danish fashion, but that wasn't about to slow down all the fun we had.

Then, later in the evening was our Thanksgiving feast followed by a fun skit for a talent show where I was the girl with a RM on a date to Olive garden and my companion was my thoughts (it went well, lots of laughs), and then to finish off the evening was another eating appointment with the most beautiful newly wed couple I've ever seen.

So with full tummies we rolled ourselves over. These people will have model children guaranteed. They made carne sade, and of course I had two helpings. ... ugh, it was so good, but I was SO full, and then on top of that, with beads of sweat dripping down my face, I had to give the spiritual thought. But, I got complimented on my spoken Danish, and that alone made it all worth it. 'Du snakke meget godt Dansk!' was enough to make my day:)

The Danish people are amazing, and they are so encouraging of when you actually try to speak Danish. They are a wonderful people with a beautiful language.

So that was last weeks update, hope you liked it. Now for this week, I've been on two splits so I haven't been in Frederiksborg as much, but I have still had some good experience with an Elder Christensen, and an awesome family named the Molebecks that we got to go visit while up with the Zone Leaders.

We played soccer with them, and ate tons of food, and had a really great spiritual thought. I think their daughter actually leaves for her mission to Idaho next week.

After that we had a long bus ride back to the train station, where I got to sit and listen to this adorable little baby laugh her head off because of the faces that we were making at her, and because she was laughing, we were laughing, and pretty soon everyone on the bus was laughing right along with this little baby. So funny, it was awesome to get a good laugh in.

That is pretty much it for now, but I hope you all are still having fun even though your pride and joy isn't around;)

Love y'all
Elder Pitcher

Questions and Answers

What do you think of your Mission Pres and mom? What are they like, and do you see them very often, living so close to the mission home?
Mission President and Mom are the bestest. Super fun and helpful.

Where is your companion from and what is he like?
Elder Francis is really helpful with everything, and has a lot of good advice. It's good because me and him can share good jokes we get along so well.

Did you get a coat? Do you need heavier boots, etc?
I got a coat, and I've heard boots won't be necessary, and nobody buys them :)

How is the work going? How do you contact people?
Awesome, lots of people to try to talk with. We get lots of rejections when talking with people on the street, but we still have a lot of people to talk with that are less active, or are still investigating.

What is your ward like?
The Ward is Huge here. But that's just because it's Copenhagen, and the people are awesome. They love having us, and always try and help us out.

How is the language coming?
Good. As good as it can for only being here for two weeks I guess. I give all of the spiritual thoughts at dinner appointments, and I speak as often as I can so it's getting better. I'll send a picture of my language study from Disney comic books also. They help with the context questions. haha