010 to 020

Sup homies, So this week was a really good week. We found lots of people and even got to set up a baptismal date with a couple investigators so that was super cool. I´m sad I don´t get to stay and teach all of the people we found, But elder dial will do a good job. I´m getting transferred to the city of amsterdam! I don´t know how many of you have heard of it but it´s a little city in north Holland that is famous for a lot of things that may not be appropriate for missionaries. But I will be moving there on Wednesday so exciting stuff. It did make this last sunday a little sad. I had to say goodbye to a lot of people I have really gotten to be friends with. But so goes it. Missions seem like they are just a whole lot of goodbyes sometimes. Sorry for the short emails lately, I always end up procrastinating this until last minute so I have not so much time. But I will send some pics from last week to make up for it. 

Tomorrow is P-Day (Explained) 11/20/17

So last week I forgot to explain my title, so in case anyone was wondering. Elder Dial and I have this saying that every single day we just say that time goes so fast tomorrow is basically P-day. So we always say that and it´s always funny on sunday because then tomorrow is actually p-day. Anyways this week was good. We found four new investigators so that was nice. Also we just talked to tons of people. I honestly feel like we did way better this week at being missionaries so that was nice. But other than that this week was pretty normal. Anyways I don´t really have anything else to say haha. have a good week anyways

Tomorrow is P-Day 11/13/17

Wow this week went by really fast, so we started off doing a service project on monday for about 6 hours, then tuesday to wednesday I was on exchanges with the zone leaders So I was in rotterdam south for 2 days, it was fun. Everyone always says south is the more ghetto part of the town but I honestly don´t really feel like it´s any different from where we live. Then thursday we got to go through the temple! That was super cool. It was awesome to go through it in dutch. I actually understood about 90 percent of what was going on so that was nice. then after that we had zone conference and it was good. It always is good to go to those. It helps me stay more motivated. Especially with how cold and dark it has been lately haha. Then on friday we were on exchanges again with our district leader. It was funny so elder dial actually went with the district leader and I just went with his companion who just got here from el salvador, So we were walking on the street trying to talk to people and after a while he just looks and me and was like "Elder, this is hard. No one here even stops for a second to listen to us" It kind of made me laugh because I felt like after a while I´ve just kind of gotten used to how the people are here, but I do remember when I first got here how it did kind of suck, but once I really got into it It becomes totally worth it when we actually find someone who is willing to learn. Also I gave a talk on sunday, that went ok. I didn´t have as much time to prepare as I would of liked so I feel like i could have done better. Oh well though there is always next time. Also this week I repainted my bike and stuff so I´ll send some pictures of that. 

Peace out, Elder Harding

Nov 6...No Group email.. portions of Mom and Dad's emails

So haha, elder Dial got hit by a car. That was crazy. We were riding bikes home and it was dark and the roads were wet, so I was riding behind and elder dial was riding in front and he was going kind of fast because he just bought this sweet race bike. It looks a lot like dads but it has automatic sram shifters, I have no idea how it works but it´s cool. anyways we both have lights on our bikes so the car totally could see uus because they are really bright but this car comes flying by us and then just pulls over right in front of elder dial and slams on its brakes. So elder dial brakes but can´t stop because the roads are wet and he slid sideways then just smahsed into the back of the car. He didn´t even fall over though. He like rode to the front of the car and glared at the guy then drove off hahahaha. He´s ok it was just crazy though. I´m glad it wasn´t me because I don´t have any breaks on my bike so I would have died haha. It´s cool though.

So normally fast and testimony meetings are awful in our ward. Basically everyone just gets up and tries to show how much better they are and tell everyone they need to repent. It´s hard to watch honestly. But this week was really god. Honestly it was the most spiritual fast and testimoney meeting I´ve ever had. Everyone just was up there talking about missionary work and how much it has blesed them to have the gospel. It was cool. I even went up and bore my testimony. (I know shocker) I also have to give a talk this week so I figured I´d practice haha.

Lately we have been having a difficult time finding new people to teach, we have 2 people who are progressing and doing well but other than that we don´t really have a ton of people. We had tons of potentials and stuff but now we have kind of sifted through all of the lazy people.  So now we should have more time to go finding which is nice because we have had zero finding time lately. But the 2 people we have who are solid are Erwin and Ray. Erwin is a dutch guy, kind of a recluse but he can for sure talk for hours. It´s hard to teach him sometimes because he gets off on weird tangents and it is hard to bring it back to the gospel. but he is sincerely interested and does want to progress further. Right now we are just having  a bit of a hang up with smoking. His excuse is that he thinks prescription drugs can be just as bad as smoking so he doesn´t see why he should quit. He also said he doesn´t know that the word of wisdom is an inspired law, but it was good he said that because then we challenged him to live it and pray about how he feels to see if it is insprired and we totally caught him where he couldn´t just argue his way around us. So we will see how it has been this week haha. Ray is a Chinese student who has been meeting with the missionaries for two years and he has finally decided he wants to get baptized. but then his parents were super not supportive and told him he just needs to finish his studies then leave back to china and get a job. But we are working with him still. It´s hard to tell him to just not listen to his parents but really if he actually wants to get baptized and fully understands what it means that should be more important to him tna anything else. 

te amo, Hijo

It's Dark

So this week we had the time change, before it wouldn´t get dark until around 6-7 in the evening. Well now it gets dark at around 4. So ya that is not my favorite to be honest. I feel like I never see the sun anymore haha. But this week was pretty chill. Just kind of a normal missionary week. My companion and I did a service project where we got to cut down a tree and then cut it into tiny pieces. That was pretty fun. Also we got to do a skype lesson with one of our investigators to soem chinese members in another city. It ended up being a really good lesson for him and I think it helped him a lot to realize what the gospel does for people. But ya sorry it´s kind of short this week but here is a before and after picture of the tree we cut down and also a picture from zone p-day a few weeks ago that I just got

I hear the ocean is quite nice this time of year

hello, This week was pretty interesting. Week had quite a few ups and downs. So, on tuesday we had an amazing lesson with this couple from india and they were asking all of the right questions and felt the spirit so strongly ( or at least I did) and then later that night we got a really solid referral. So tuesday was great. Then wednesday we had two lessons planned. both of them went not so great. One was a word of wisdom lesson with a chain smoker who has been making tons of progress but does not think he should quit smoking if we are still allowed to take prescription drugs because they are both bad for us. The other was with a newer investigator, he has a crazy story but anyways he doesn't really like dutch people. Our joint teach happened to be dutch and he kept talking bad about people from Rotterdam the whole lesson. We didn't realize our investigator had such a strong distaste for Rotterdam people. But ya that lesson did not go to great. Then on Thursday Elder Dial got a package from his gf back home so he was all happy about that, then later that same day we had to use the computers and he checked his email only to see that she'd broken up with him that same day. That was rough... Also directly after we had a lesson with our guy on baptismal date. Well he said his parents in china were super against it and he didn't want to worry them a ton... so for the moment he isn't on date. We will work with him though. We did have stake conference this week though. It was actually really cool. It's fun to see so many members there and stuff. Plus the talks were all really good. It is a little different than stake conference in Utah, Dutch people are very direct haha. It's kind of funny sometimes. Also yesterday we got caught in the pouring rain in the middle of the city with just our bikes haha. We got soaked. but it was all good. Anyways haha that was this week. Oh also last monday we made mussels haha, we saw them on sale for 3 euros for 2 kilos. So we thought why not. I had no idea how to cook them haha but we just put some garlic and oil and butter and other spices. Also a non alcoholic beer. Then we boiled them for a tim until they all opened. It actually turned out pretty good. I was surprised at how good they were haha. Also neither of us got sick or died. so that was exciting haha. Also one day this week we jsut randomly saw this bright green parrot looking bird flying around by our house. so that was cool. Itried to get a picture of it but idk if you can really tell. anyways until next week

Sincerly, Elder Harding 

Heeft Uw wat tijd om iets kort te lezen?

So this week has been good. So have all of them. We have finally started pick have the work pick up and ended up¨teaching a lot this week which was super nice. I love it whne we can get some good teaching in. The transfer ended this week and it looks like I´ll be staying in Rotterdam again. That means I´ll do 6 months in my first city. Pretty crazy. So funny story. We have been doing this cool thing lately where we go around with a page from the book of mormon and ask people to read a little bit then answer a few questions. It works really well... if the person will actually read it haha. We had one guy he other day and we asked him if he had a minute or two to read a short piece out of a book. All he did was look at us and yell "Bibliotheek" then walk away. That means library ps. But it was just funny to see some of the responses people give us other than no time haha. Also there was a Europe conference this last sunday from Elder Ballard. I don´t know if anyone of you guys saw it but it was really good. He talked a lot about miracles. Miracles have not ceased. it is so cool that our heavenly father blesses us with Miracles still in this day. So ya, Miracles still happen to us. Anyways I hope you all had a good week

Hasta luego, Elder Harding​​​​​​​​