Bonjour

Bonjour! 

I hope everyone had a great week. Belgium has been awesome.
This week I was able to master the metro map. Haha. After I sent out
emails on Monday, we went to the grand place for some sightseeing. It
was so beautiful. Then we got some Nutella covered Belgian waffles.
They were absolutely delicious. 

Monday evening we had dinner at Sister Noël's house again. She is a super nice lady. Tuesday morning I stepped on the scale and to my surprise I had gained 10 pounds in 10
days. Haha! So I need to lay off of all the pastries I have been
eating. By the end of the week I had lost 5 of the 10 lbs, so I think
things will be back to normal soon. 

Tuesday was a fairly busy day. The General Young Women's President, the General Relief Society President, and Elder Kearon of the 70 came and talked to our zone. It was nothing
short of amazing. One of the main points they had was to not give up
on investigators. I could definitely feel the spirit they brought when
they were talking.

On Wednesday, we spent the entire day deep cleaning our apartment. We swept, we mopped, and we washed every little corner of our apartment. Thanks mom for teaching me how to do those things. Haha. 

The park outside our apartment

Thursday, I went on an exchanges with Elder Rafanomezana. He is
from Marseilles but his parents are from Madagascar. Thanks to Jessey,
we were able to talk a lot about Mada and have a good time together.
That evening as we prepared for bed we took part in a Paris France
mission tradition. It is called the flan suck. Flan is a desert
popular here in Europe. It is kind of like Carmel jello with a thicker
consistency. Anyways they come in these little jello-like plastic
cups. When you open them up, you flip it over on a plate and they plop
right out while maintaining the shape of the cup. The flan suck is
when a missionary sticks his mouth over the flan and enhales it in a
matter of milliseconds. It is quite amazing. I wish I could send you a
video. Well my first flan wasn't too good but by flan 3 I had become a
pro. 

Anyways, on Friday, because me and my companion are new to the
area, we went through the area book. In total, we went through more
than 350 investigator sheets, and got rid of 257 super old ones from
before 2010. 

Saturday was nothing but contacting. Every missionary's
phones haven't been working for the past couple days. We can't set up
any meetings or confirm anything so it has been a lot of contacting. I
think someone forgot to pay the phone bill at the office. Haha. 

Sunday we got some pretty big news. They are switching up the ward structure.
Previously there were 2 wards in Brussels split based off location. As
of next week there will be one ward that has all the French and
Spanish speakers and one English ward. The English ward is going to be
part of the Antwerpen Stake so it's now out of my mission. Sunday
evening we ate at a member house they were really awesome. Other than
the dad, they all only spoke Japanese, so it was a little hard to
communicate but it was still fun. 

And today, we got groceries, and Nutella covered waffles again. We went to the capital building (I think) and it was super cool but there was a slight problem. A while
ago they were going to refurbish the outside, so the set up
scaffoldings on the outside. Well when they finished the refurbishing
the scaffoldings had rusted on to the building, So they couldn't get
them off this beautiful building. It's quite a shame. 

My companion and I were only able to teach one lesson this week. The work is
hard here. Her name is Janet and she has been facing some trials as of
late, so we hope that she can really latch on to what we are teaching.
Anyways this week I have gained a strong testimony that Jesus is the
Savior of the world. I know without a doubt that he performed the
atonement and was resurrected. His sacrifice applies to everyone who
ever walked on this earth. I love yall. Have a great week!

Elder Hein