Week 19 - Joyeux Noël!

Famillyyyyyyyyyy:

Hey you beautiful people that i'm related to! 

The sun is shining through the window into this internet cafe and Rasheed the internet cafe man is bustling around and the sound of clacking keyboards reminds me that P-day has once again come around. And we're going to a chateau today! Chenonceau! 

It was so good to see your faces on Thursday and SO cool to get to see Reese for a little bit too.

This week I don't have a whole bunch to report, other than by the end of my time in Tours I will probably have this city and all the bus lines memorized. Our focus recently has been to track down members from the ward directory that we have never heard of/no one in the branch knows, which has been like a giant scavenger hunt and I love it. We have yet to actually find any of these people, when we find their address we usually discover that it either doesn't exist or their name is not on the sonnerie [list of names next to the doorbells on the ground floor of apartment buildings]. Can't remember if I already told you guys this or not... sorry if I already did. It's been a really fun/sort of difficult way to figure out map reading/bus line skills. Tours. It's the best. 

Christmas was wonderful! Our mission gets to watch a Disney movie (preferably with the family we are with for Christmas or Christmas Eve, but that didn't exactly pan out) so we watched Frozen! Four times. Well, Soeur Anderson watched it four times, I took a nap through the last one. We got done porting [tracting] on Christmas Eve (we don't go back out after dinner) and we made some dinner (soy chicken and rice, so festive) and watched Frozen. When it was over it was like 7:30 so we watched it again in French. Then we had a little Christmas devotional, sang hymns in English, watched the life of Jesus Christ bible videos from the nativity (we just got them on DVD and they're the best) and read a talk from the Ensign about Christmas. It was great. I wrote in my journal a little and played Nat King Cole in the background - O Holy Night and Silent Night (Il faut) [a must] so beautiful and such a wonderful time of year. 

Christmas day we got to sleep in! Slept until about 9:30 so that was probably the best gift I received, didn't know if I would be able to do that still haha. Then we opened up our presents, made some brioche French toast and watched Frozen again. Took a nap, ate LOTS of candy and junk food (bought myself some Nougat Pillows cereal for Christmas) and then headed to the Djemais and talked to you guys! After the call I went downstairs and we talked and ate French Christmasy stuff - foie gras! [goose liver]. Elder Oviatt and I gave the spiritual thought, which was a very unique experience to say the least. The train we took to Amboise (where the Djemais live) was a Harry Potter train- with the compartments, so cool! Christmas was wonderful, in summary. 

Pretty much other than that we've been just porting up a storm trying to bring Christmas cheer to Tours. Old men love us- we keep finding new amis for the elders which they're thrilled about as you can imagine.... Missionary work is so weird. But it's the best. 

Hope you all have a great week and remember that I love you so stinkin' much.

Soeur Hansen

PS I'll send Christmas photos next week after I get them from the Djemais' camera.

[Here is a picture of the Chateau de Chenonceau where Maren will be going today]

Christmas Skype

Conference call with the two missionaries!

Merry Christmas!

Joyeux Noël!

Feliz Navidad!

Week 18 - Christmas Conference with President Teixeira

FAM! Joyeux Noel!

This week was great! Soeur Anderson is still absolutely awesome! And I get to see you guys in 4 days! This week has been really long, not going to lie, lots of time spent walking little French neighborhoods offering to sing Christmas songs for old people. Not as successful as it might sound. The French continue to be probably the most entertaining group of people I've ever had the pleasure to be around.

We had exchanges this week and went caroling with the elders and our DMB [branch mission leader] again in ville! Much better this time having 7 voices instead of 5. The STLs [Sister Training Leaders] were super good sports about it- they got off the train and we just got started! We sang in the gare [train station] and in a mall (until we got kicked out...) and then we went to a cathedral and got permission from a nun to sing in there. That's Frère Kehli for ya. Pretty much one of the coolest experiences of my life. Soeur Barton got a picture that she hopefully will be sending me today so you can post it! 

Wednesday saw "M" - one of our less actives, we're basically her visiting teachers. Her daughters are SO cute, I'll try to get a picture soon. 

Maren is by the mission president who is standing in the doorway

Thursday we had our Christmas Conference with President Teixeira! It was SOO good and super motivating and just powerful. I got to see Sr Hopkins, which was super weird, it's only been a week but it felt like SO long since we were companions. I also go to see a bunch of people from my MTC group and they served us a really nice meal. SO FUN! Made getting up at 4:30 to catch our train totally worth it!

Friday we had some great planning coming off of the conference and this little old lady called us beautiful. So, day made.

Saturday we got to go share our Christmas message with a member in our ward, Marie-Agnes the RS president who's also been EVERY other possible calling multiple times. Super fun.

Sunday we had chuch and "A" came! and she brought a friend with her! This lady is so great. She's always fun to teach, but it's a little crazy usually. After church we had lunch with some members at the church because they live really far away. I HAD DUCK! It was really good but also when I think about the fact that I ate duck I get a little sick to my stomach. And we had tiramisu as well and it was AMAZING. Basically the French are just wonderful in general.

We did some porting and found an awesome new ami- [friend] doesn't talk much but super friendly! 

 "Soeur Anderson's cat posse"

"Our new ami! lolz i'm so funny"

Love you guys so so much! 

Joyeux Noel encore!

Soeur Hansen

"my first gaufre [waffle] and I look like the virgin mary but whatever it was raining."

"Têtes de choco" [chocolate heads]

Week 17 - New companion Sister Anderson

FAM! 

First things first- I got my new companion! Soeur Anderson is AMAZING. She's from Spanish Fork UT and we celebrated her one year mark on Thursday! She just trained Soeur Walton so basically we just talk about how we love her so much. 

Tuesday I GRADUATED FROM 12 WEEK! [Training] It was probably more satisfying than graduation from college will be. It was amazing. That night we had a little goûter [meal - literally "taste"] with some members- they made crêpes because we're American and they're French donc, il faut. [therefore, it is necessary]

Wednesday we headed into Paris bright and early for transfers! I was in Paris for about 2 hours and only left the metro to make a call but I was in PARIS! Got to show Sr Anderson around Tours and basically just walked and walked and walked everywhere. It was great. She's amazing. 

Thursday celebrated Sr Anderson's year mark with Tours Religueses, they're HUGE and SO good, I think chateaux and religeueses are the only things anyone in the mission knows about Tours. 

Religeuses

With "A"

Friday we had the Soirée Noël [Branch Christmas Party]. Out of the thousand people that we passed by last week to invite, only "A" ended up being able to come. "A" - oh goodness, I will never forget her. I just need to like film a conversation with her so that you can understand the endearing human being that is "A". She is so funny. But I got a picture with her finally so you can see what she looks like! We also may or may not be celebrating Christmas with her on the 24th for part of the day. That should be interesting- she bought candles and a baby Jesus figurine for it. 

Saturday we had an exciting day of porting lined up but got a call from the elders that we were going to do some caroling en ville [in town] with Frere Kehli. As you can imagine I was THRILLED at the prospect of singing in public in front of the Hotel de Ville [city hall]. It ended up not being too bad, mostly just because so many of the French can't sing so they think we're amazing singers. It's so funny, they're so genuine when they compliment us on our singing and I just can't even get over it. We also got Chi-chi (churros but the French have to be all French and call it something else) with Nutella and it was manna from heaven. SO good. Seriously one of the best things I've ever eaten in my entire life. Sr Anderson has as bad of a sweet tooth as me so this is going to be a fat and delicious companionship. I am so excited. 

Sunday church was great, as always. Love our branch. The heater wasn't working so we were in our coats and freezing for three hours but it was great. I translated for Sr Taylor for one of the talks but it was this old high councilor who Sr Anderson said was hard to understand for her too so I just did what I could and Sr Taylor and I had a nice little conversation about how Mary had privacy in the stable that she wouldn't have had in the inn. I love our branch. Seriously so much. They are all such gems.

That night is when it gets good. Just wait. We went up to Tours Nord [the northern part of the city] to try and find a member from our repertoire [directory] that I've never heard of, and then we were going to do some porting. Come to find out the address 10 bis DOES NOT EXIST. Like anywhere. Which is pretty much on par for our repertoire but I love it anyway. So we did some more porting than we were planning which was great- got some Ferrero Rocher chocolates from a super nice lady and sang for a couple people but then ahh the BEST. This lady asked if we could come back in like half an hour so she could finish getting her kids in their PJs so we did. SO CUTE. They had five little boys- we were like "this is crazy, no way they're all your kids" but yeah, a 10 year old, 7 year old and triplet 5 year olds. Seriously the cutest family I've ever seen. We sang for them and then their 10 year old sang Ave Maria like an angel, he's taking voice lessons. And we sang "Il est né, le divin Enfant" with the two older boys. And oh my goodness probably one of the greatest experiences of my mission. They're Catholic and pratiquant [practicing] but were SO nice and still a miracle family. One day, one day. 

It is so fun to hear little kids speak French too, like after about 6/7 years old because it is stinkin' adorable and I can understand them and it is so fun. Ahh we were floating walking out of their house! 

Thanks so much for everything family- you're amazing and I love you and good luck on finals and have a merry little Christmas and I'll be home in my dreams... lol trunky music that we skip. 

LOVE you, stay sweet

Soeur Hansen

Christmas lights "you never see this in France!"

Branch Christmas Party

Branch Christmas Party

"my first grève" [labor strike - a fairly common occurrence in France]

Week 16 - Sister Hopkins Transferred

FAMILY!

Well, surprise surprise I'm staying in Tours. But my beloved Soeur Hopkins will be leaving for Evry, and Sr Anderson will be coming down from the North to join me! She's super nice- I met her at the Cook Conference a couple weeks ago because she's Soeur Walton's trainer! So apparently she already knows all about me. I'm super excited to get to learn from her but it's going to be super weird to not be here with Sr Hopkins. But she's acutally going to be with Sr Walker [Maren's MTC companion] so it's sort of like a crazy big extended family over here. Sorry if you didn't follow that but yeah TRANSFERS! 

That means that on Wednesday we get to head into Paris again- I am so spoiled. It was a really good week which can pretty much just be summarized into Thursdy. 

We were going to have our branch Soirée Noel [Christmas party] on Friday so we went around to our amis (especially the ones that have kind of stalled out and stopped progressing or we had lost contact with) to bring them invites and pray with them and ALL OF THEM WERE HOME WHEN WE PASSED BY it was probably the most productive day of my entire mission. We went to just invite them and let them know we were thinking of them and it was so beautiful to see them light up knowing that they were just loved. 

It gets better. That night we planned to pass by Stephanie, who we ran into on the bus last p-day (she's an old ami of Sr Bradley and Hopkins who had a baptismal date a while back) and she told us to come by last Thursday and Saturday and Sunday because she wanted to come to church and get baptized and we were SO excited - but then she wasn't there when we showed up on Thursday and we figured that she'd just changed her mind or something. anyway back to this week- we passed by to drop off an invitation and as we were heading back out of her bâtiment [building], who do we run into but Stephanie. And she was just like "come up come up, you don't have any other rendez-vous right?" and we were like "what is happening I thought you didn't want to see us..." anyway long story short she had been talking to her sister-in-law (who is a member that lives in Metz who was the one that originally got her to take the lessons) that day about some of the tough stuff going on in her life and her sister-in-law (a champion who I will love forever for this) told her to get in contact with us and then we SHOWED UP THAT NIGHT! It was a miracle and we were able to just tell her how much her Heavenly Father loves her and is aware of her. 

She has a real desire to change her life and be happier but I know she's got a lot ahead of her so we're praying like crazy for her.

Other than that this week has been a lot of Christmas door-to-door offering to sing Christmas Carols to old people that don't really want to be bothered. It's really fun to get to see so many French people though since we've been going through neighborhoods instead of bâtiments. I've decided they're honestly the most awkward group of people on the face of the earth. In like the most endearing way possible but seriously, they don't have any idea how to handle it when someone knocks on their door (or most of the time rings their doorbell from outside the gate like 15 feet from their door) they either say something like "c'est pourqoui?!" [what's it for?] or "c'est qui?" [who is it?] or just awkwardly laugh and close the door without really responding when we offer to sing/pray with them. At least we don't get yelled at! So yeah the French are the best. 

Other highlights from this week- MANGEZ-VOUS! [Dinner appointments] Basically the best thing of my life. They really encourage the members to have us over during Christmas time so I'm probably going to gain like 1000 pounds. Worth it. We had crepes last sunday, fondue with the Djemai's and raclette on Saturday. 

The Djemais, from the Tours branch 

The Djemai's are amazing and I love them so much. We're going to their house for Christmas and I am SO excited. They gave us Ferrero Rocher [chocolate] and told us we were amazing missionaries and basically just made us feel like the most successful soeurs on the face of the planet. 

Keepin' it real here in Tours- let me know if you guys want to hear about anything that I've been leaving out. 

Love you so much! Thanks for everything! 

Soeur Hansen

"Our district - with each of our number of transfers."

After we taught Stephanie

"We decorated that christmas tree thank you very much"

Daughter, Mother, Grandmother (Sister Bradley) 

Tours branch

Week 15 - Thanksgiving and a Mangez-Vous

Family! Hey! Happy December! 

I honestly don't even know how to summarize this week. Sr Hopkins and I were talking last night about some things we did at district meeting on Tuesday and we were both like "That was this week?" It feels like this week took about a month to be honest. 

Monday -- we just got a bunch of stuff done and then went to a birthday party! We went to one for this family's daughter, Anya a couple weeks ago and then it was Kateryna's (the mom) birthday. Her husband isn't a member but he's really nice so he invited us to come. It was just the five of us again. Really yummy cake! 

Taking pictures of Thanksgiving meal

Tuesday -- we had Thanksgiving district meeting!!!! Elder Peterson did a Thanksgiving themed formation- using the acronym "Turkey" but he couldn't think of anything for the K so he went with "Konsecrate" we were all like "uhh... keep the commandments, keep the law of consecration?" like there were other options here, but we stayed with Konsecrate. 

Then we had our meal! I can't call it dinner because it was at 11 am but it was super super good! Sr Hopkins and I spent all our extra time Monday night and Tuesday morning getting the stuffing and mashed potatoes made. SO GOOD. 

The Bourges elders brought dessert -- brownies and apple crisp -- and the ZLs brought a rotisserie chicken from Carrefour and carrots. They were adamant about bringing carrots. And we all brought apple juice. We all bring our own drinks every time and we all brought apple juice. Spent the rest of the day being pleasantly full - didn't eat dinner. 

That night we had soiree familiale and only Sr Taylor and Julian came, so we looked at about 1000 pictures that Sr Taylor brought. Some of them were SUPER cool, she and her first husband lived all over the world and she has had a really incredible life. And the rest were of dogs. She bred dogs for a while so she has had a lot.

Wednesday -- crazy busy. Running all over Tours. Met with "B", the ami who stopped taking the lessons a while back, she told us she wants to be baptized but she has some questions. We tried to help and just be there so she could feel the spirit but when we got home we realized that "B" had read more of the brochures than we have... Probably should get around to reading those commandment ones we just don't really use them a whole lot.... yay missionary work!

Thursday -- we sort of forgot that it was Thanksgiving until a member texted us to invite us to come to this activity that she was hosting for the neighborhood where she works. We got there on time but they were running a little behind so we had to leave before they actually served dinner but they didn't want us to leave without eating so we just scarfed down some food in the kitchen like a bunch of animals. But I had turkey and pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving! I didn't realize it was pumpkin pie until like a couple bites in though, I was just like "okay this is on my plate I am going to eat it" and then I was like "I think this is pumpkin!!" and then it started to taste like pumpkin. I wish I would have taken a picture- I think they took actual pumpkin pumpkin and somehow made it so it was like a light orange color. Texture kind of like jello. Safe to say it wasn't Dad's. 

Friday -- meant to do planning but ended up walking alllllll over Blvd Grand Sud trying to find a package that got delivered but we weren't home so it went to a pick up location. And no buses ran anywhere near it. We took the closest one and then walked for EVER. by the time we found it- at a gas station, which is apparently a safe place for a package pick up place, it had taken like 2 hours. Then we kept walking because we didn't want to turn around and walk all the way back to where the bus had dropped us off, and we ended up almost walking on to a freeway on ramp but rerouted and wandered through a neighborhood, and the kicker was that we could SEE our apartment building in the distance. We could literally SEE it but there was a freeway in the way of us getting there. We MIRACULOUSLY found our way through this neighborhood without getting lost and ended up about two bus stops away from chez nous. We looked at our map that night and realized that we'd walked about 5 kilometres. Chouette. 

Saturday -- actually did our planning. And we've started doing our Christmas contacting! Basically the same as regular contacting but when we go porting we offer to sing Christmas carols! 

Sunday -- Primary program! We sang "Ces mots d'amour" [Love is Spoken Here] with them so they could do the boy/girl parts and Marie-Agnes (the member who invited us to the activity on Thursday who is the RS president but used to be the Primary president) thanked us so genuinely, she told us it was a dream come true to have them sing the song the right way. Such a sweet moment. Another member also told us thank you for participating and told us that we have strong spirits and also told us something about our souls. Not entirely sure what he was telling us but he calls me "la viking!" because of my last name. I will never forget him. 

During Sacrament meeting President Mayima read a letter from President Babin asking the members to take advantage of Noël to invite the missionaries to share a Christmas message with them and their friends and also reminded them of the way Christmas works- we can spend the day with a member family and just encouraged them basically to just remember that we're away from our families and it's hard. It was really sweet but also made me super homesick. 

That night I had my first Mangez-Vous!! [dinner appointment] We had crêpes and bourguignon (beef and potatoes and carrots and it was AMAZING) she taught us how to flip crêpes by tossing the pan and I felt so cool. We shared a little Christmas message with her and her husband and their friend who's from Angers but he's a member and was visiting them. It was great. 

We were at the church that evening to meet the office elders who were delivering these books that we are using for our Christmas program- it's a little story written by Elder Anderson called Room in the Inn, but I haven't read it yet... but its supposed to be good!! We ran into Frère Djemi there- he'd forgotten something at the church- the Djemis are AWESOME they moved here about the time that I got here and he works for the church and their daughter is the only young woman and is also the pianist and is super cool. He invited us to come to their home on Wednesday and then when we were leaving he was like "hey do you have somewhere to go for Christmas yet?" and we were like "pas encore..." [not yet] and he gave us this big smile and said "we want it!" Answer to prayers, we wanted to go there so bad. Well, Sr Hopkins won't be here but it feels so good to have that set up.

Sorry that this email is like a thousand miles long but love you guys so much and thank you for EVERYTHING- you are the best. 

Soeur Hansen