With fresh challenges come new beginnings. I started the month of February with a new companion, Sister Basker. (Get the word play of the title there? Yeah, sometimes I can be clever.) We were both right about the same place on our missions, having come to the country only about 6 weeks apart from one another. Both of us could speak the language, but definitely needed practice and to feel more confident. Both of us were excited about and ready to work, but had developed different approaches for how to do that. Both of us were ready to find some sun and shine.
2 Feb 1996
Hey, it’s for real now. Sister Basker is my new companion. I think it will be good. It definitely will be for our language because now we have to understand.
I can’t forget my 10 tolars for spomin. It was so cute. We went over to Jelka Komel’s daughter’s house and her kids just kept peeking their head out. Then as we were leaving the kids came running after us and handed each of us ten tolars to remember them by. It was little odd, but Tonja, Jelka’s daughter, said to take it, and that it would make them happy. It’s only worth about 7 ½ cents, anyway.
We went to a big basketball game with Maja and Elder Reynolds and Elder Yockey. It was funny. The guy who got us the tickets was totally enthralled that I was from Phoenix, and then he was totally picking up on Sister Basker. Poor girl! She didn’t know what to do. But, he was a nice guy and didn’t really know any better.
We pretty much got everything moved over from the Šiška house now. We have so much junk now. Joj!
We found this cool little place to eat tonight. We were going to visit Anka, but when we got there we realized our appointment wasn’t for 45 minutes. Right across the street though, was a cute little kind of fast food place. Then we went up to Anka’s, waited for about ½ hr, and left a note. She called later and said our appt was an hour later. Dang! She so awesome though, and understands. Lucky us!
5 Feb 1996
I’m so happy, I got 3 letters today!! It had been two weeks since I heard from home. Everyone sounds good, though. Mom described Emily’s wedding. It sounded beautiful. I hope they took pictures and will send them to me. Maybe this will be a good enough reason for her to write me.
I also got a letter from my cousin, in France. She sounds good. She was asking a lot of questions, not about the church, but about missionary work and what exactly I am doing here. She said she’s seen missionaries over there and if she gets up the courage, she’ll go introduce herself. That would be awesome!
This morning we went to visit Saša G and her children. It’s so sad to see their living conditions. All 4 are stuffed in this one bedroom of her parent’s apartment. They might get an apartment of their own soon though. Some kind of govt housing. I hope they do. It would do wonders for her self-esteem. She is so nice. I can’t imagine being 23 years old with 3 kids and single. (It’s amazing how many times I’ve seen this exact situation since my mission. What I could imagine for myself is often so different from other’s reality and choice.)
We’re resting now after lunch. Sister Basker is sick and getting worse. She needs to rest so much.
I think I’m going to call Silvija. It’s been almost a week since we’ve seen her and she didn’t show up for the baptism or church on Sunday. I hope she’s home.
9 Feb 1996
Wow! Today was my lucky day! I got a letter from Dad. It was weird. He quit his job and didn’t really seem to even care. I mean I have to agree with him, his volunteer work is way more important than the bank, and he could always get back into real estate. It was also weird because Mom hasn’t said anything about it in her letters which came before, but were postmarked after. Everything sounds like it’s ok though. Dad’s been working on geneology with Monique and they all seem to be happy.
We had DDM this morning then we went and helped Dusan (Jelka’s son) write an application letter and resume in English to a company in Germany. That was fun. My mind hasn’t worked like that for a long time. He’s cool too. Seems a little shy. I hope someday he is interested in the church. We need more young guys in the branch here. We have so many young women and no one for them to marry.
Then we went to Milka’s house. She is so sweet. I love her already and I’ve only met her twice. She is older and is sick and can’t leave her house in the winter. There is something so cool about her, though. She says she can’t get baptized though because her brothers won’t let her. She is divorced and has no job, so she is fully dependent on other people. She says that they have no problem with us coming and teaching her though. I think if someday she realizes the need, she will find a way to be baptized.
She was so funny though. When she found out that I study art, she almost flipped. She wants me to paint her a picture. I told her I don’t really know how to paint. She insisted though. By the time we left, she said anything I do for her would be fine. I told her I was a photographer. Next time I go over there I think I will explain that it is with my eyes and the way I see things that I express myself, and not with my hands so much. I mean, I like to draw, but I can’t really very well, and I can’t paint at all. it’s from behind a camera that I work. So here’s what I will do. I’ll write home and have Emily go through my portfolios and photographs and see if there is one of AZ landscapes, especially cotton. For some reason that sparked her interest, and have her sent it to me . If there’s not, then go through my negs and print one for her. If she doesn’t find one, then I’ll probably do an ink drawing or watercolor. I’m not sure it would come out very well though.
Tonight we have an appt with Silvia. I hope it goes well. I think we will read the Tree of Life with her and then watch the cartoon.
10 Feb 1996
Today was pretty cool. At least we had a lot to do. We met with Silvia. She is so cool. She totally has strong faith in God, but I don’t think she’s really found the importance of one church yet. We keep telling her to pray, or rather asking her, but she won’t. She always says she will but she doesn’t.
11 Feb 1996
Ok, well I guess I got a little distracted yesterday and didn’t finish writing, but today is a whole other story.
We had some very interesting things happen today. First was at church. It was fun because a bunch of kids came with Andraž, he’s from Vienna, but is Slovene. They were all on a big youth group trip skiing and they came to church in Ljubljana. Poor Andraž had to translate the whole time. It was funny. Then after lunch today, we went to our Russian family, whom we haven’t seen for about a month, and then only at the door. We left a Book of Mormon when they were not home. So today, about 2-3 weeks later, we went back. Oh wow, I love this family! The little boy answered the door, which is good since he’s the only one that speaks English. I asked him if they got the book and he said yes, but they had only read ½ of it. He felt so bad about that. I was ecstatic! We said we have a friend that speaks Russian. We are going to call Marko, the one that was just baptized, because he speaks Russian, to go with us. I am excited about this!
The other thing that happened was while we were tracting. We knocked on only 2 doors, then the 3rd one answered. I was a house full of guys, so we were giving one of them the survey when another one walked by and started talking to us in English. He said he had lived in the States for 8 years. We got talking and then they invited us in. I was kind of nervous in my head, but inside I didn’t feel wrong about it, so we went in. They were very nice and basically we only talked to the one who lived in America. The other wasn’t interested and so he left. We talked to him for a while, or rather we tried to talk, but mostly listened to him turn circles around himself. He kept asking us why there was so much bad in the world and why God would let it happen. We would try and give him answers, but he wouldn’t accept them. I really don’t understand people sometimes. They say they have an open heart but when they hear the truth, they won’t accept it. Finally I just bore my testimony about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith as he was blowing smoke rings at me. He was very nice for being such a jerk. He said he was very impressed that we would come here and do missionary work. He gave us his address and telephone number, and said if we ever needed anything then to just call. He even offered us a ride home. No way was I going to accept it, though, after he just asked us, “Let’s put religion aside ladies. What are your plans for the rest of the evening?” We told him we would take the bus home. I left feeling awful. I don’t know what else we could do. We left him a pamphlet and said that the address of the church was on the back of it. I hope he reads it. I doubt we’ll ever see him again, but boy did he leave an impression on my mind. That should make him happy. It wasn’t the kind he wanted though. He said I would always remember that guy I met in Slovenija. Well, he was right. I won’t remember him as being wise though. He will be a very sad part of my memory. To know that there are people who are out there who, I think would like to know answers, but aren’t willing to open their ears or hearts to hear them. His mind is already made up about this world. I really hope someday he’ll see that there is real beauty here still, through Jesus Christ.
(Tracting was a big part of finding in Slovenia. Yep, we knocked on a lot of doors. There was one point, earlier in the mission that we had a 4 hr mission tract. That meant that every companionship was knocking on doors for 4 hours straight, or until someone let us in. If the 4 hours wasn’t up when we were done, we’d just keep knocking. Well, during that particular tracting experience, we knocked doors the whole time. 4 hours of knocking without anyone letting us in. I still have callouses on my knuckles. For some reason, however when Sister Basker and I were companions, we got in every time we went out to tract. I remember being incredibly grateful, especially because it was still freezing outside. The reason for this door knocking luck, I never quite figured out. There were some fun stories to come out of it though.)
16 Feb 1996
Monday was pretty cool. We had an appointment with Jelka Komel. She’s so cool. It’s amazing what these members are expected to do. She’s been a member of the church about 6 months and she is one of the Sunday school teachers. Some of these lessons are about deep doctrine. Wow! She doesn’t know this stuff yet, and boy is it a learning experience for her. It’s kind of scary, because there’s a lot of false doctrine that could be taught, but luckily we do have some members who know. We as missionaries should know too, just sometimes, ok a lot of times, we don’t understand. Just another incentive to learn the language better.
We also had a discussion with Silvia that night. We taught her ¼ of the 4th. It went ok. I’m never very sure how well things sink in with her, but she’s so excited to still meet. We’re supposed to have an appt with her tomorrow, maybe. I know we just need to get the Spirit into our meetings stronger, and identify it. She might go with the YA group up to Austria this weekend for a dance. That would be awesome. Nataša is going with them too.
We had an awesome appt with Nataša yesterday. She pretty much will be baptized by March. She said so.
Ana is another coolest investigator. We met with her on Tuesday and taught her a 3rd, all about the apostasy and restoration. It was awesome! She’s for sure going to be baptized too, pretty soon. The only problem is that she’s going to England in April for school and she won’t be back until sometime in July. So she’ll just have to get baptized before she goes. Then she can enjoy how huge the church is in England.
Wednesday was cool. We got to go see Netopir, or Der Flieder Maus by Strauss. It was so cool! It was also in Slovene, so the Fryers and the Smiths didn’t really understand much, and well, I couldn’t get it enough to translate. I could follow, just translating is hard.
My family was so cool this week. I got letters from all the kids under age of 14, and from Bobby’s kids and Mom. It was so cool! It made for great mail days.
I’m so happy the sun is shining beautifully today, and it’s only 8am. That makes 3 days in a row!
Wow! This is exactly the middle of this book. I hope I get through the 2nd half quicker than I did the 1st. I need to write so much more than I do. I also need to study my discussions today. I want to pass off the 3rd by Sunday. I want the 4th done by Zone Conference on the 27th. That’s only 11 days. I’ll probably be training in May, and I don’t want to still be doing discussions. If I’m really pridna, maybe I can get them all done by my year mark. Oh yeah, this is my one year mark of getting my call. Cool, eh!
I have to write just a little bit more. Today was such an awesome day. First we had DDM. It was great. Elder Reynolds led a testimony meeting. It was so cool, and the Spirit was so strong. Then we got a letter from Sister Groberg. She’s doing awesome. It was such an uplifting letter. It made me realize just how short my time is here, and to appreciate it more. It made me cry. Sister Basker just said a very weird thing. In two weeks it will be March and that means a whole year of my mission. Wow! Sometimes I want to be home so bad, and sometime I never want to leave Slovenija. There is definitely nothing that can replace this place. I love it!
19 Feb 1996
Oh, today was so beautiful! Ok, well not beautiful. It was raining, but to me it was great because I thought it was a sign of spring. It rained all day. Our appt was cancelled with Nataša, so we went over to Fryers and gave Sister Fryer a perm. Then it took so long we stayed for dinner. Service hours, right?! Elder Tingey and Clawson came over too for reimbursements and stayed for dinner, as well. While we were eating it started snowing. Huge disappointment! Then we went to meet with Ksenja and that lasted about an hour. When we came out the whole world was white. It was amazing! Well, so much for spring coming. This is an incredible winter.
Yesterday was really cool. We went to church and Mateja came. Yay! I knew she would. So in in YA we had a talk. Wow! It was so needed. She was about to give up on church all together, but we, Katja and I with a lot of help from the Lord, convinced her not to. At the end she gave the prayer and she thanked God for the “novo upanje (new hope)”, which she had received. We’re going to meet with her tomorrow with Katja. I hope it all goes well. She is so awesome! She for sure will be baptized. We just need to go slow with her right now.
After church we went to Mojca Bolta’s house to pay rent. Only one small problem. I forgot the rent, and realized it after we got there. She said it was no problem, and we went in and had a nice visit. Her daughters are coming by on Wednesday to get the money. She’s so cool! We got a big lesson on pust and krofi. Anyway, it was pretty cool.
Friday is Sister Basker’s birthday. We’re going to lunch with a bunch of people. It will be fun. She’s having some freaky allergic reaction right now. Probably to the perm stuff that we used on Sister Fryers hair today. Poor girl, her eyes are all swollen and she itches everywhere. Lame! Poor Sister Basker is laying there with cotton pads soaked in soda water on her eyes, and she has to drink some too. I feel so bad for her. Her eyes are almost swollen shut.
I hope I get good mail tomorrow.
20 Feb 1996
Today was kind of a funky day. Sister Basker woke up, really didn’t sleep, and was completely broken out into hives, and swollen totally up. It was freaky. So we called the elders to come over and give her a blessing. The Fryers called us and Sister Fryer said we should call Pres. We had Elder Reynold do it when he got here. Elder Yockey was so cool. He brought us M&M’s. He said he didn’t have time to bake a cake. It was cute. After that we went to the doctor. She got 2 shots that cost 9000 tolars. Then we came home, she slept, and I called Maja. She came over and stayed with Sister Basker and I went to our appts with Katja. She’s great! I’m so proud of her. She is learning a lot!
One of the appts was with Mateja. I’m so scared for her though. She’s at such a critical point of not going on. I think she will, though, with a lot of help from us, Katja, and hopefully Jelka, but mostly herself. She’s got to want it so badly for herself that she doesn’t question and give excuses for why she doesn’t get baptized. She’s so cool, but man, you can already tell that there’s a gleam missing from her eyes. I’m sure she’ll find it again soon.
Well it’s getting late. I better go to bed. Man, when I came out here I knew it would be an adventure, but wow man. What a ride it is! I love it!
22 Feb 1996
Despite the obvious trial of Sister Basker breaking into hives and blowing up like a balloon, and us being inside today, today was an awesome day. Tanja Uzar got her mission call! She’s going to London South, England Mission, and reports on the 18th of April. Yay! Plus, I got 4 letters today. 🙂
26 Feb 1996
We had zone conference today. It was really cool. Elder Tingey was practically crying when he bore his testimony. Elder Reynolds had a really good talk about following the Spirit. He was almost crying too. Then President Swensen was too cool. I want to know the scriptures like he does. It’s amazing! He also gave a suggestion to us to study the Book of Mormon by subjects. That is so cool. I was looking for something to do. Pres. must’ve been inspired. That is one thing I know that he is. Oh yeah, I finally passed off the 3rd D yesterday.
28 Feb 1996
This morning was so awesome! We taught a 3rd discussion to Lepa, all about the apostasy and reorganization of the church. I’m so happy. I think she’s finally starting to understand that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the only true church on the earth. She already thought it was the best one, but she didn’t think any of them were true. We committed her to pray about it again. She’ll come to church on Sunday and I’ll follow up on it. It was just such an awesome discussion. She grasped everything. It made me see how much it helps to have our investigators regular church attenders. Plus, she was so attentive. We remembered to say a prayer at the beginning and not just the end, and it helped 100 fold. I’m not sure what we’ll do with her husband, but I guess we’ll deal with that when we get there.
Other than that we got dogged by Ana because her feet were tired after work. I believe her, but what an excuse. Then we met with Silvija tonight. It was an awesome, spiritual meeting, in which once more she said she would not be baptized. She’s sticking with the Catholic church. I still think she’ll be baptized, it will just take a little longer than anticipated. Besides that, Sister Basker made some awesome chili and then beat me at 3 games of skip-bo. Oh well. This morning was full, da best!
29 Feb 1996
Yes, this is for real. It is the 29th of February. Why? Because it’s Leap day!! This calls for a party, and that’s just what we had today, a party.
Today was seriously one of the best travel p-days ever. As usual lately, we switched our p-day. This time so we could take a trip down to Piran with Maja. It was Maja, Elder Reynolds, Elder, Yocky, Sister Basker, and me. We started out around 9:30 and headed on down to the coast. It was so beautiful!! I’ve never seen that much water be so blue before in my life. I was so upset when I remembered I had b&w film in my camera, but then happy for it later.
We got there and first we climbed the old lookout tower. Man, it is amazing how short people were in old times. The doors are always so small in these old places. We all hit our head at least once. Anyway, then we were walking down to the waterfront and we were going through these little Mediterrenian streets that were so cute. So the elders were taking a picture one place and Maja and Sister Basker another. So I walked down a little way to where I thought Sister Basker and Maja were and turned the corner, but they weren’t there. I looked down another corner and they weren’t there either. Holy cow, is that a weird feeling to be by yourself and not know where your comp is and having just passed by a construction crew. Yuck! I was basically freaked. Just then I heard Elder Reynolds come skipping, literally, along. So, I knew the elders were coming and I felt much better. Just then a little old lady, dressed in traditional “babica” clothing came out of a building and Elder Reynolds was like ,”Wow! I want a picture of her.” but he wouldn’t ask, so I did. It was great! I don’t think she ever met an American who spoke Slovene before. They have the coolest accents there. It’s almost Italian but speaking Slovene. Anyway, she was so proud. She showed us how she had just cleaned and put fresh flowers into a little church where they only have mass once a month. They were getting ready for it now. She was so cool. Then Sister Basker and Maja came from where they were shooting and we headed on down. When we got down there, it was so cool. Piran is a penninsula and we could look across the sea on one side and see Croatia. and then turn your head and without even moving an inch, see Italy. Then it was such a clear day that we could look straight out and see a faint top of a mountain in Italy. The weather was beautiful. We were actually wearing short sleeves. Then we had lunch. Maja and the elders ate squid. Sister Basker tried it, but I refrained. With Sister Basker about with allergies last week, I didn’t want to have one this week. Shrimp, squid, what’s the difference? They both come from the sea. Then we all went over and bid our last farewell to the Adriatic. There’s nothing like it. We were there for about 4 hours, but it felt like 5 minutes.
Then we were off. Where to? Who knows, Hrastovlje? Cerknisko Jezero? …? Well, whatever takes the least amount of time. We had an appointment in Ljubljana at 6:30. That was Hrastovlje. Just to fill in why there, well there’s a church there that was built in the 12th century and in the 15th century was painted in Frescos all over the whole inside by the Istrian painter Janez iz Kasteva (Johannes de Castno). The frescos are stories from the bible so that paupers can understand them. The famous one is called “The Dance Macabre of Hrastovlje” or “Mrtvaski Ples iz Hrastovelj. It’s got a child, then skeleton, then pauper-skeleton-nobleman-skeleton, then so on with a traveler, doctor, bishop, cardinal, queen, king, pope, to grave. It’s very famous here. I’ll have to buy a post card. Oh, I almost forgot the best part of this place was trying to find it. We totally passed it because it didn’t look like a church. It looked like a fort. Then we went back through the village and there was a little old man carrying a bushel of something on his back. I wanted a picture, so I made Maja pull over. I jumped out of the car and asked if I could take his picture. He asked me why and I told him that I was from America and this wasn’t a normal scene there. Oh, he was so happy. He asked how I knew Slovene and I said I learned it here. He asked if I was of Slovene descent. That’s a very common question. I said no. He said in that case, for you, of course you can take a picture. He was so funny. He would throw in a few English words every once in a while. Then I started to come back and the whole car, practically, yelled at me to ask where the church was. He pointed to the “fort”. That also got his attention. He came over and explained that he was a soldier under Musilini and served in Africa. There met some American soldiers who taught him English. I was very impressed that he remembered as much as he did after over 50 years. Then he told us how to get to the ladies house with the key to the church. You had to see these houses and village. It was all built out of rocks plastered together and the streets were barely wide enough for a car. If one came the other way we would have had to back out of the way. ok, so the lady with the key was probably in her 80’s and she insisted on bringing the key up and letting us in. Very smart actually. So we drive up and she walked up the hill. We didn’t even think of giving the poor lady a ride. I feel bad about that now. She was so nice. She was probably in charge of that church her whole life. It was great. (I don’t know how I don’t have a picture of that amazing church. I found one. It doesn’t show the fresca I mentioned, and looks like it was an accident. When I looked at the contact sheet/negs, I saw that the film had been jammed and I had several double exposures that didn’t look like anything. I have found images of this church and painting online, though. It’s pretty incredible. Do yourself a favor and look it up.)
Then we started back on down to Ljubljana, stopped and got some ice cream once we got there, then on home. Thank you, Maja! What an awesome tour guide.
When we got home we found the coolest thing in the mailbox. It was a tape of Sister Purser’s report and a talking letter on the other side of the tape. Yay! But we had to be at the church in ½ hr, so we ran upstairs. Ok, we took the elevator, but we hurried. We threw on some dresses and ran out the door, grabbing Sister Basker’s tape recorder and our new tape on the way. Well, our appointment didn’t show, which is really upsetting. We have to meet with her this week, but that’s another story. So, we were listening to the tape and Bojana came in just in time to hear the end of the letter part, and all of the report. The 3 of us just sat there and cried. It was so awesome. I don’t think I’ll ever hear anything about the former Yugoslavia without letting a few tears go. But when it’s the work along with it, look out for the flood. Then the last story was about her last night here. Four of the members and one of our investigators came to sing to her a farewell. As she talked a little about each of them, she especially pointed out a little story about Bojana. I’m so glad she was there to hear it.
When Bojana was baptized her mother pleaded with us not to let her do it. She threatened all kinds of horrid things. But then after she was actually baptized, her parents told her not to come back as a member of the church. They are very strong communists. So when we asked her what she was going to do, she said, “I guess I just won’t go back.” She has so much faith. She was willing to give up what was closest to her. Because of her faith, the situation has now become better. She does visit her family but not as often. They live in another town, and I think feelings are still very tender. But it’s mending. (I believe Bojana is very close to her family again, but honestly not sure of their situation. I know that she is still one of the most faithful people I know.)
So, as is said in this last 10 pages of writing, today was incredible. But, now it’s for sure over. It’s very late and I should have been in bed 20 minutes ago. This day had to go on paper though. Well tomorrow should be another great one. It for sure won’t be Piran. P-days go so quick. But then so do missions and I won’t get another opportunity like this ever again.