Loving every minute! (1/25/16)

Sunshine all week!

We went on a fun hike.

This was a pretty exciting week! We were blessed that it stopped raining, we had sunshine all week! It is pretty warm in the day but it gets really cold at night. Anyway, so last week we went to meet with this family.. They weren't really interested in the Gospel but they were really nice people so we just talked to them for a long time it was nice! Their uncle, was like crazy smart. He was really really good at math. He shared some riddles with us, and I have heard all of them before so I would act like I was thinking about the answer for a long time then I would answer and he was like "wow you are really smart!" but I really just knew the answer from when I heard them before.. Sneaky :) 

Our car is still in the shop from when we got in an accident so we have to walk everywhere.. So we walked to this members house and it took us an hour

This is the girl I baptized

and the guy we were trying to meet with wasn't even there!! It is hard to coordinate with people when no one has cell phones. But it was actually fine we were able to have a lesson with his wife and his parents so that was great. Then we walked an hour back to get home, it was actually really pretty. We were away from the city so we could see all of the starts it was super pretty!

I'm wearing a traditional Albanian hat

The next day we went on a really cool hike with some of the youth and we cleaned up trash and stuff in the forest! It was fun to see everyone serve then play games then share some spiritual thoughts afterwards.

These are the most intense bumper cars ever!

On Saturday I was able to baptize this girl that the Sister Missionaries were teaching. It was such an amazing experience! My first time baptizing someone. Except it was challenging because the water barely came to my knee so it took me a couple of times to get her all the way under. But the Spirit was there and it is so amazing to see the church strengthen. 

The language is coming slowly but surely! Everyone asks me where I am from and I try to throw them off and tell them that I am Albanian but no one believes me ha. But I am learning every day and I know that the Lord is always right there to help me with that and everything else. I love the work so much! 

Thank you for everything love you all!Elder Farnworth 

This is a typical building that we tract.

Because I miss my Mom, it says "kisses from Mom"

I am truly blessed with the best mission ever...(1/18/16)

The youth here are awesome!

This week was good. Except one day I made the mistake of assuming that it wouldn't rain and not taking an umbrella out and then it did rain and I got drenched! Head to toe! It rains so much here, I will never make that mistake again. But this week I had such an amazing spiritual lesson with this investigator named Besnik. He is such a great guy, at the beginning of the lesson he said he was unsure if he was going to be baptized or not, but at the end of it he said that he feels the spirit so much and he cannot deny it so he said he wants to be baptized. It was so amazing! Such a great experience. 

I spend most of my money feeding stray dogs!

I got really close with a lot of the youth this week! We have some amazing youth in Elbasan. They all have such great testimonies and they are all really faithful. But anyway we were doing a YSA activity and a ton of them showed up and brought friends! It was so great. We had a lesson but before I sat everyone down and wrote my name on the white board and was teaching everyone how to say it because it is impossible to them. Farn-worth haha. But then I was trying to explain the game to them in Albanian, and I thought I was doing a good job and that everyone was understanding but everyone just laughed after I was done explaining and was just like uhh.. what? So I was like dang it haha. My Albanian still needs some working on!

 

I have officially picked up the "shaking my head for yes" and "nodding my head for no" So I am pretty much full blown Albanian. ;) Oh yeah and we played soccer on Saturday it was way fun.. they youth get so into it! But none of them are really that good ha. There is this one kid who is like a little Messi though he is amazing.. he reminds me of Trevor Greenlaw playing basketball. It is just so much fun here, every day is such an adventure! I truly am blessed with the best mission ever. And it was a bonus that I didn't get in any car accidents this week. 

Love you all!

Elder Farnworth

Old habits die hard... (1/11/16)

Car Accident

You know.. my habits of getting in car accidents! That's right, I got in ANOTHER car accident. It was so crazy. We were driving to a Zone Conference and we need to pull a U turn and the Sister Missionary that was didn't see this car that was coming so we got T boned. It was crazy! I was in shock that it happened I couldn't believe it. Then the police came, took pictures on their iPhones, asked the other guy how much he thinks he needs to fix his car then he said 6000 Lek (which is like $60) so we gave him that then the cops told us we need to move our cars. So we took our car to a garage to be fixed in Tirane and then took a bus back to Elbasan. It was such a crazy day!!

Our District-We are very small

Anyway besides that I had a great week! We did a lot of street contacting. We got a list of less actives from our Branch President which we were really excited and grateful that he got that for us.. But then every single number on the list didn't exist.. so that was kind of a let down. So we had to do a lot more tracting and street contact to keep us busy. We teach English Classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays it is so awesome to help people with that! Then we are able to share a Spiritual message which is always great. 

The members are all so great! We have soccer games every Saturday and they bring a lot of their friends and we are able to teach them afterwards which is great! Oh yeah and it is impossible for Albanians to say "Farnworth".. So all of the youth call me Elder Hipster ha. Everyone here is just so nice I am so great that I can always be with these amazing people though! 

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On Sunday we had most of our investigators come to church so that was a huge blessing!! And I got really close to a recent convert that's named Xhoni. He is such a cool kid he always wants to come tracting with us and stuff. Then Sunday night we had dinner with our district and a senior couple serving here and I made the best spaghetti ever for it. It had like peppers and stuff in it it was delicious. Just call me the Chef Farnworth ;) 

Love you all!! Have an amazing week!

Elder Hipstar

Beautiful Sunsets in Albania

Flooding in Albania!  It has been raining for seven days straight!

Watch out for the holes in the sidewalks..(1/4/15)

Us on that castle this morning:)

Think of the craziest place every then double it and then you have Albania. It is literally so crazy but so amazing, I love it! 

The people are so awesome and so humble it is great. I can just write so much about it but I will try not to make it too long. So I am coming at you LIVE from a sketchy internet cafe, I love it so much. Elbasan is so cool! There is like a castle in the middle of it and my apartment is right next to it and it is so so pretty!! We climbed up to the top of it. I will attach pictures of that :) So a few nights ago we did like these traditional Albanian line dancing with music that sounds like that weird crazy Indian music you know? It was so cool though I loved it. The members made fun of my dancing though... I was just owning it though, it was hilarious. This member took a video of it and sent it to me but it is too big of a video to send home to you guys :( Teaching is interesting. Sometimes I really feel like I am doing good then sometimes they just do not understand a thing that I say. Saturday morning we organized a Soccer game and the church (I had 3 goals) and we had a lesson with this kid after and he is going to be baptized on the 30th so that was cool. :)

The castle by our apartment

 I taught most the lesson the spirit was so strong! It is so awesome. Albanian is such a cool language!! Then when we were walking back home from the church I was talking to some other missionaries and I didn't see there was a HOLE in the side walk and I fell in it!! Well I caught myself but still it was so crazy and so funny.

The kitchen

Our main area

Sunday was so great! our church building is super nice! And like way bigger than I thought. All the old ladies there like pinch my cheeks and are like "so cute" it's funny. Then the rest of the members were just reminding me of my terrible dancing, haha. then it was like a race to the microphone when it was testimony meeting. Every old lady just got up and shared testimonies. Some were pretty funny, some were like super spiritual. Then I went up and gave my testimonies and like all of the people that I met before were like trying to make me laugh it was so funny. But the spirit was so strong in the meeting, it is just so amazing to testify in Albanian I love it!

My bedroom

Me and my comp really get along. He is such a nice guy and he helps me with the language so much! I already told you he is from Albania so that is cool and just so much help! Except he shakes his head up and down for "no" and it throws me off every time! Everyone here does! I try to as much as I can just so that I can get used to it hahaha, what is Albania. So crazy I love it. Anyway I love you all! Have a great week!

 -Elder Farnuërth

My bathroom!  Guess what that thing next to the toilet is.
My comp told me this is a nice shower for Albania!

Yep that is a washing machine!

I FINALLY MADE IT TO ALBANIA! (1/2/15)

Well.. I FINALLY MADE IT TO ALBANIA!!!! So exciting!! I love it so much :)

So first I will talk about the traveling, it was crazy, and long.. it was crazy long. I couldn't really sleep for any of it so that sucked. Austria was pretty cool mom, although I just stayed in the airport... and spent like 8 dollars on a water bottle. But anyway, the plane ride from Austria to Albania was so sketchy! It was really shaky, then it like dropped like 15 feet and everyone screamed. I though we were going to die! But once I got here it was so great. I was so happy! I talked to this lady on the plane from Kosovo, she was super nice and I got her number so that was pretty cool! I gave it to some Elders serving in Kosovo.

 So when I first got to Albania I went to the mission office, well first let me tell you about getting to the mission office. Driving in Albania is NUTS. If there are 2 lanes, there are really 4 lanes haha and if you are trying to change lanes or go through an intersection it is pretty much a game of "chicken". It kind of scared me but made me laugh. My mission president is such a spiritual man and he is so nice! He is from Switzerland and just has such an amazing attitude I love him! 

So my first night I went street contacting which was interesting but really really great. I thought I was being warm.. It didn't feel too cold but after like an hour my hands and feet were frozen! Humidity. Then we had dinner at the mission presidents house and we slept in a hotel. Then we woke up and went on a hike to where Albania was dedicated for missionary work and it was so cool!! Then we read the dedicatory prayer given by Dallin H Oaks in 1993. It was awesome! Then I met my trainer, Elder Lesi (Leh-see) He is Albanian and is the nicest guy ever!  I love him so much. I can tell he is going to help me a ton with the language! My first area is called Elbasan which is super pretty!! But anyway, Elder Lesi is so nice, he was converted three years ago so he has tattoos and stuff but he is such a cool guy. So after I met him we went street contacting and I was thinking that Elder Lesi was going to do most of the talking, but no. He made me do all of it! If I would look at him he would translate for me but he would not respond to the people we talked to. It was cool! People here are so nice it is so awesome!

Then we drove to Elbasan and it is so pretty!! But we had to be inside by 4 PM because I guess it is a thing for people to shoot fireworks at each other for New years.. I was kind of bummed I couldn't be apart of that.. So we just chilled in our apartment, it is really nice! Then we fell asleep and woke up at midnight to see the fireworks. It was crazy!! Fireworks were everywhere. There were these fireworks getting lit off below us so they would blow up like 10 feet away from us so that was pretty scary but so cool! I have videos of it I will try to send them to you. They might be too big. But yeah it is just so crazy here! I love it so so much I am so excited to serve here :) I have pictures that I will send you on Monday because I didn't know I would be emailing right now.. I am currently at a senior missionaries house, Elder and Motra Orton! (Elder Orton graduated from Jordan High School in 1966) they are so nice. 

I am so happy here! This place is so rad.

Love you all!
Elder Farnworth