CANADA IS SO SICK

8/7/17

oh my i can't even exaggerate how amazing it is here. right off the plane i loved it here immediately. it was kinda weird getting off and everyones speaking french and all the signs and basically every things in french haha but its so cool. i was able to practice a bit by talking with this catholic priest guy in the airport, super cool conversation and respect both ways and it was awesome! then we met president phillips and his wife and kids and they're such an amazing family! i couldn't be happier with the leadership we have here. then we got our trainers and area assignments the next day and that was super exciting! i seriously lucked out big time with my trainer, Elder Johnson he's from san diego and he's the coolest guy and he's been speaking french since he was little so he's been able to teach me a ton about the language and his patience has been so awesome. he's also been here for like seven months so he's familiar with the area and the people and everything! i lucked out big time though, hes got the same sense of humour as me and he's all about star wars and everything, and he appreciates good food and he knows how to make it too! we've been getting pretty creative with our meals. he also very much appreciates good sauce for EVERYTHING which is SO awesome cause I always go all out with sauce for everything. the other day we made bagel steak sandwiches with this awesome cheese stuff and i made this epic sauce with random things i found in the fridge haha couldn't tell you what they were, my french is still a work in progress, but it was so good. we've made some pretty fantastic pasta too. but yeah its been so awesome! 

okay this area is seriously soooooo cool!! we're in rive-sud or Lamoyne which is on the south shore right outside of Montréal and its amazing here. its a french speaking area and a french ward, but there are seriously a million different cultures and nationalities everywhere! second day here we showed up at the door of one of our investigators and Elder Johnson asked me how my spanish was right after knocking haha it wasn't great but luckily the guy was pretty good with french too. I've had to ask at almost every door what language we'll be speaking. right after i get french all the way down i need to get on my spanish and creole and maybe some others apparently. we have Books of Mormon in almost every language in our apartment cause honestly theres everything from Arabic to languages we've never even heard of. We have the most amazing family we're working with that got baptized right before i got here and they're seriously the greatest family. the Mouhe family, they're from the Congo and their native tongue is this language called Songo, if you try to look up the language itself you'll probably find like seven sentences about it cause literally no one put there speaks it. they know french but they're having a hard time with it and the father Dannay can't read, so Elder Johnson and i go to their house every other day and we get with their family and read the book of mormon together and after each verse Elder Johnson and i explain whats happening. it's seriously so fun and i love the family so much. they've got seven kids all under 14, Kudji, Marie, Nadège, Nadga, Moulie, Louise, et Bienvenu. seriously the most amazing kids. first day they all got so excited since i was nouvelle and they when i told them my name they thought it was the funniest thing ever. they replaced the day part with every word they could think of. hallidaut halliouah hallijune literally everything haha it was fantastic. every time i see them they get excited and immediately look at my plaque and start laughing again. a lot of people actually have a hard time with the name which surprised me. you don't pronounce the H is french so i guess i can understand somewhat why, but still, people just stare at my plaque and they give up immediately. and every single person gets so lit up when they get it down cause apparently theres this french singer with the last name halliday and they freak out thinking I'm related to them haha and then get so disappointed when I'm not. i think ill start saying i am to potential investigators to get them to listen to us. we'll see. so i remembered how dad always had treats in his scripture case so i started doing the same and that has actually saved some lessons when the younger kids have some bonbons to look forward to if they're reverent in the lesson. quite a few of our investigators and appointments have had crazy young kids haha so yeah, just a little tip to you guys, have some treats on hand always. 

we've been crazy busy since i got here. we've had 15 appointments just this week and each one has been so incredible. i wish my french was better, but its definitely improving! we have quite a few investigators and a lot of potentials so far. we have a few that we're planning on giving a baptism date to this week, Rahina for sure and Joseph Smith if we can meet with him when he gets back in town. yeah haha his name really is Joseph Smith and we're teaching him the restored Gospel. super awesome guy, he's said he wants to be baptized, we just need to get him a date and finish the rest of the lessons with him. but yeah haha no one takes us seriously when we mention we're teaching Joseph Smith. but yeah there are a lot of people interested in the message we have, a lot more than i thought. a little miracle the other day, we were walking the street back from an appointment with Angel, and this guy is riding his bike towards us and so we did the usual wave and salut! deal and then he slowed down and hopped off his bike to talk to us! haha Elder Johnson and i looked at each other and were like alright sweet! usually bikers just ride by and give us a little head nod at most but then this huge black guy stops and is like yo whats up! and we were so stoked and told him who we were and what we do and he was like yo that sounds awesome! so we were like whoa okay haha and we taught him the whole restoration lesson right there and he thought it was the coolest thing ever, especially that we have prophets now and he said he wanted to hear more and he took the Book of Mormon and said he'd read it and gave us his number to call him! haha Elder Johnson and i walked away and did a high five and yeah that was super cool. i cant tell you how many miracles have happened since i got here. at least ten times a day we'll look at each other and say "Elder, that was a miracle." seriously its amazing here. and the positivity makes it SO fun. i think the only time we're not laughing is in a serious lesson or when we're sleeping or praying. everything is so fun and i enjoy every second of every day here. i can't even imagine not being happy here haha. 

the weather is seriously incredible. when i got here the first day it was actually like hot which was weird. it was like 34 and its actually so humid, which is so weird haha I'm not used to humidity at all. its like breathing just wet or i don't know. but then the other day it was sunny and literally out of nowhere it just started pouring rain, like insane rain and since then its been like 23 and cloudy and windy and every time i step outside and almost cry cause its so nice haha. it feels like it does in Gilbert during christmas time. so we've been playing christmas music in the car. apparently it only gets colder from here haha so that'll be sooooo awesome I'm so stoked. Elder Johnson has been telling lots of stories of the cold and it sounds amazing. everything just freezes and it gets sooooo crazy ah I'm so excited. 

but yeah thats basically been the past few days! each one is full of miracles and I'm soooo so grateful to be here. this really is the most amazing place on earth with the most amazing people and i love everything so much. this gospel is so true and getting to share that with these people has been the greatest privilege I've ever had, i couldn't be more grateful for this incredible opportunity. love you all so much!!! 

 didn't take many pictures cause i forgot my camera at the apartment almost every day but here are some i took today and yesterday and a quick episode of Cribs with our tricked out apartment. also our amazing breakfast this morning of german pancakes. also this neighbourhood that belongs in a horror movie, cause the parking numbers are disgustingly perfect for that and the houses are all ancient and there are random black broken umbrellas just drifting around haha its fantastic. also theres this place Tim Hortons thats literally everywhere, we pass by three like every two clicks haha its so annoying.