Monday September 28, 2015 Gera, Germany

Well hi!! I can't believe that It was in the 90's this week there! It's been like 50 or 60 here! Quite nice actually!

Well, a quick rundown of my week! It was actually really fun, and some funny things happened. I don't know if I remember them all, but there were funny things!

Montag: We got to go to the Bauerfind's house for FHE! They have 2 little daughters that look like my cousins! They were so cute and we got to have a real good spiritual fun FHE. Even though we aren't allowed to play games with the members. So...we just did a craft instead, which was fun! Bruder Bauerfind thought it was dumb that we couldn't play, mostly just because it was his uncle (pres. Kosak) who made the rule! Ha! He was mostly joking, but yes, our mission does have a lot of rules.

Dienstag: We had our weekly Bible read with Frau Dhillion. We had Gemeinde Abend and then Gemi-Co. nothing too special. But we found out that we are going to be taking care of Frau Dhillion’s devil bunny again this next week. I'm the one who does that because Sis. M. refuses to touch the thing! It will be an adventure!

Mittwoch: ah! We got to go to Jena again for zone training meeting! We had a thema and it was on the blessings of the temple and how we teach it to investigators. This is my FAVORITE topic of missionary work! I love it! So that was fun, except that I have to speak German in front of a bunch of missionaries. That’s more embarrassing then speaking in front of members for some reason. Then we did studies, and then we had a joint teach with Michael and Lucy and Bruder Krause. Michael likes Bruder Krause. We actually found out a little about why he won’t make the step to get baptized. His family doesn't support him very much. So we will be working on that with him.

Donnerstag: We got to have skype interviews with president! That was fun! He's making a lot of effort to talk with us personally every month, so skype it is! We just don't have internet in Gera so we had to drive all the way to the church! But it was fun! We then ate lunch with Pascal and Sch. Meckel. Things are going better with her and we are excited about her progress and that she is now helping her kids also! We then did service at schw. Sorge's garden. Which, by the way, people here have garden hauses that aren't by their house. So we did some work for her, and then some work for her garden neighbor! He really liked us and Sis. M and I made it fun and pushed each other around in a wheelbarrow! Later in the week Schw. Sorge gave him one of our cards and told him to call us when he needs more help. Yes! Way to go schw. Sorge! Then...Claudia fell out! :( I was looking forward to her lesson! She's praying about a baptismal date right now. So she's making progress!

Freitag: Weekly planning! Went to Werdau to drop cookies off by a member, it was her birthday. P.S. I can make some DANG good cookies. I'm SO pro at them now! And I can make them fast! I have the recipe memorized! You should be proud mom! Then it was Sch. Siegel’s birthday and she wanted us to celebrate with her! So we did! They have a huge dog, like as big as me and he likes me! So I get to play with him! Then, we had the Meckels! Lucy helped us a ton with that lesson and the kids paid good attention!

Samstag: We met with Aja! One of the Meckel daughters. She is doing WAY better now! I guess she had had some trouble in school with being mean or something, but her mom said she's doing way better now! Michael fell out! Sad, because he's also praying about a baptismal date! We found a single mom of 5 kids this day! Oh we are SO excited to meet with her this next week! Pray that everything goes ok! And...we got to meet with Lucy! We talked about the signs of the times, and also patriarchal blessings!

Sonntag: CHURCH! My favorite part of the week! I sat in the back with Sch. Morgner (less active) because she had pants on and was embarrassed. She didn't have any tights and so naturally she couldn't wear a skirt without tights! Germans…And...this day Lucy got her blessing!! We were so happy for her!! :) Also, we ate at sch. Dörlitz's. She had forgotten that she was feeding us until Samstag abend. And somehow she still had enough food to feed an army!! Our first portion was good I was thinking ok, I can eat 2 plates! That will be good! But...after I had just eaten a rouladen, potatoes, and brussel sprouts she brings us BOTH out a steak! A WHOLE steak! And not even a good American one! Gosh...I couldn't finish it all. I still felt sick. We had to go home, take off our tights and sit on the couch for 15 minutes or so before we could go out again. Problems of a mission!

So, these last few days we have been studying about the 12 tribes. All of the history and everything. It’s cool because I get to know about some of the history through the Auslanders! They know about all of that stuff! I just find it very interesting how everything that it says in the scriptures about the 12 tribes has come to pass, or is coming to pass in the moment. I've been thinking about the scattering of Israel a lot too, with all of these refugees’s leaving their homeland and being scattered. It’s very interesting. I'm just glad that as the church, we don't need to wonder or fear what the future holds for us! Enjoy your General Conference weekend! Love you all!!

Alles Leibe, Sister St. John

Monday September 21, 2015 Gera, Germany

Well, I’m glad to hear that this week was pretty normal and that everyone is now eating healthy. I’m still here, eating all types of carbs you can imagine! Potatoes, pasta, bread, and all of those in every form you can even imagine! I liked the picture of River dressing up as me! I miss that hoodie...hopefully it’s still in good shape when I get back! ;)

My week was SOO long for some reason!! It just felt like a really long time.

Montag: We got to eat kind of American food! Actually, they had really good donuts! They don't beat Lucy’s homemade donuts, but they were still pretty good!

Dienstag: We did some finding. Wahoo! We did some apartment buildings. We call it klingeling! Cause a doorbell is called a klingel...anyways, not important. But, a door actually literally got slammed on us. Usually they just cuss over the sprach box, but this time the lady came all the way down to let us in, took one look (at our cute smiling faces) said something rude about church and slammed the door. We can't help but laugh at the angry Germans sometimes! Then…we planned to have Sandy. But, he didn't show up! LAME. So...we went and grabbed the car drove it kind of by Frau Dhillion’s house and met with Frau Dhillion. She loves to travel, so she talks a lot about traveling. Which is also one of my favorite topics, seeing as one day I will travel everywhere...except for Asia. I wouldn't really mind not visiting there. She gave us a huge atlas to take home so I could study where countries are because I was confused at where everything in the world was. Does that sound like me? Probably! Then we had Gemeinde Abend. The 3 old ladies made me eat SOOO much because they forgot to celebrate my birthday! So they made me eat the WHOLE bowl of Quark! (Yogurt pudding stuff!) Then at Gemi-Co Bruder Krause had cake there because he also forgot my birthday. I can't even describe to you my prayers at that time...just bless that this food can FIT without me throwing up... :)

Mittwoch: Distrikt meeting! The sister’s train fell out. (if ever traveling Europe, I suggest renting a car) so we picked them up in Zwickau and started distrikt meeting late. The Elders were in a mess this day because Elder Timmerman was waiting to pick up his trainee in Freiberg. He was Elder Schofield’s last companion! So, Elder Timmerman has a REALLY good area! Their area has had 6 baptisms in 2 transfers and they were ALL found through members! Elder Timmerman has been in this area for almost a year. He told us how he turned the program around from hating the missionaries to getting 6 baptisms through the members! Crazy, and sounds impossible, but it’s possible! So, we learned and talked a LOT about member work and HOW we can do it! It was awesome and it's like I was trapped inside a box of missionary work and now it just opened into a whole new world! Really! You mean we SHOULD be friends with the members? You mean we can do more than 1 service project in a week? You mean we can just stop by the members to say hi? And it won’t be wasting our time? Wow! So...Sister Medley and I found our motivation! MEMEBER work!! After this great learning experience, we went home to Gera and taught the Meckels. They aren’t doing too great. We couldn't get in contact with them for like 2 weeks. They weren't at church and their home life is just not so good because they don't live the gospel principles. We are going to really start our focus to be back on them! They need our help and I think we are still here to help them! I love those kids!

Donnerstag: We decided to use our motivation and go visit some members! I made some cookies mittwoch abend (Wednesday night) and we went to Meerane and just randomly stopped by some members that we haven't really had a lot of contact with! They were all SOO excited!! We even got 2 new appointments for next week because of it! Later that day we taught Claudia. Lucy was there and was AWESOME! We taught her some more of the Plan of Salvation, or rather, Lucy taught her, and then we focused a lot on baptism. We re-invited her to be baptized. She said yes! My gosh she is so prepared! She also said yes to come to church on Sunday and to a fireside this week on Wednesday! What the?! This NEVER happens! Sometimes I think it's too easy...like there must be a catch! We will see! She is really starting to love us though! She is 19 so about our age.

Freitag: We taught Michael, talked about his temple experience and really focused on the blessings. He told us he wanted the blessings, and he said he knows that he needs to get baptized, he just still doesn't feel ready. Then we visited Sch. Kretchmar! We had printed out a pic of us and wrote a note on the back so she would remember us and put our pic with all of her other black and white pics! Then, to Sch. Dörlitz's for lunch, where we had to eat up to our eyeballs! Then, to Sch. Sorge's garten for some work! Then, we picked up the Hohenstein sisters because they were sleeping over with us for what we did on Samstag.....

Samstag: Zone Service Project in Jena! Probably my favorite city in the zone! It actually has mountains! So, we were split up into companionships and Lucy came with us. She’s our third comp. and our group got to go to a building in Jena and paint!! Wahoo!! It was cool! We got to know a few people and get them to know a little about the church in a casual way. Something funny about this day was that the zone leaders went to go pick up trash, but it actually ended up being fishing tires out of the river, so they came back like soaking wet up to their mid-torsos! Kind of funny! We "hung out" (as much as you can do as missionaries) and then studied all 20 of us 20 year olds just up and studied for 2 hours! What group of teenagers do that?! Missionaries amaze me! Then we went to this slide show and party where everyone knew that we were missionaries and talked to us about America! The Zwickau sisters ended up having to sleep over with us because trains are stupid! But that was fun too!

Sonntag: Claudia and her boyfriend came to church! And so did Sch. Meckel and Fynnlay! SOO good!! It was Ernte Dankfest! (Harvest festival) and so we ate all together as a ward after church! Then we went by on a less active and did weekly planning. Good day!

Well, not much time left. But God answers prayers! He really knows just how to answer them! I have been praying for motivation for a while and this week just did it for me!! Love you so so much! Pray for the Meckels for me if you can!!

Liebe Grüße, Sister St. John

Monday September 14, 2015 Gera, Germany

Hallo!! Well I'm hoping all is well and you forgive me because I have to write my email today at McDonald's, on my iPad. It's harder than you think!

First off, we indeed did have transfer calls. We were informed that we will be staying together!! WHAT?! We will be spending 5 transfers together, 7 months, or 29 weeks, or 203 days. It is sure a good thing that we are best friends! We were though, a little disappointed because we REALLY felt like this area needed some new motivation. Like we both, needed a little more motivation. We thought that having one of us leave and another having a new comp would really help us. However, I've learned that God never enacts us to take the easy path, so ironically he left us together! We really are so so happy! We love working together! I remember when we were in Stadthagen, we found out our area might be closed. I cried a few times because I didn't want to leave sister medley. How ironic! I'm so glad that I came on a mission! Even if it was just to meet her!

This week:
Deinstag: we taught Michael. Things are going better with him! Then Frau Dillion. She always makes us good fresh peppermint tea. Then, we found this area of HOUSES! Real houses! Not apartment buildings! So we went dooring! Everyone was young families and much nicer than the old people! We WILL find a family there, I can feel it!

Mittwoch: district meeting. Then by on a less active. She owns a bier garten! She invited us for lunch and so we got fancy German food! Mmmmm! But, while we were there, we found out she had never been baptized, but it was actually her daughter that was baptized! And she lives in Berlin. So...we will send the records over. Then we taught German and English. I don't know if you've heard, but there are many many refugees coming into Germany, in large amounts. We haven't seen a large effect here yet, but we should soon. Many planes and helicopters fly over Gera often, and there is lot of policemen in the trains. Very interesting. And, it's not dangerous, and the refugees are allowed to be here, so I don't know why they have to monitor everything. Then we
had gemeinde abend. That's always fun!

Donnerstag: this day was horrible. Everyone was rude and like everything fell out. Awful! However, our last appointment was with Claudia. She's 19, and a friend of our less active! She was there for a lesson and she cried during the lesson because she felt this spirit! Golden! She asked for a Book of Mormon! We met once, and then kind of lost contact. But...we saw her at our less actives house and made another appointment out. Our lesson this day was amazing! I haven't felt the spirit in a lesson like that in a long time! She had already read the BM and said she prayed about it. She said she felt something deep in her heart that told her if she kept reading it, then her questions would be answered. She said when she reads she finds answers! My gosh we were SO happy! What a good thing to end the horrible day on!

Freitag: we did some finding. Ate lunch and had a lesson with Lucy. Then weekly planning.

Samstag: transfer calls! And we had the great opportunity to visit the Freiburg temple and have the sisters there explain some more about temples to some of our people. Lucy and Michael came with us! On the way there, Michael went to the bathroom and then we came to our stop. Unfortunately, he was still in the train...he missed the stop. Had to get off on the next in-the-middle-of-nowhere stop. Had to wait ½ hour until the next train got there to take him back! So...we arrived late! But, while there, it was amazing! Just the feeling of being on temple grounds! I SO needed it. It just reassures to me that this is true. The peace I felt there that day was unlike anything the world could give. Michael even said he felt peaceful! He actually FELT something! That's progress! So, because we were late, we missed our train back! No problem, we will just take the next one. Wrong! Problem! The next one takes like 4 hours and gets us home at like 12 PM! Not ok! So we call zone leaders, they call AP's. We get on the train to Zwickau and Lucy asks Alex, a member if he could come pick us up in Zwickau like 45 minutes from Gera! He says yes! But then the AP's call us. They were pretty mad that we missed our train. You know...not punctual in Germany is like the worst sin! So the AP's were mad, then Alex was mad because he missed his date for that night! Sorry! But, luckily, we made it home on time! Before 9:30! The world is stressful, and the gospel is true. Period.

Sontag: my birthday!! Everyone at church was so nice and they even announced my birthday from the pulpit. You know how much I enjoyed that...then we had an eating appointment with my favorite food! Oh yeah! And someone in the ward asked if I was turning 17! Ha! He was serious! I'll enjoy that compliment one day! Then, we went finding, met with Lucy. Who, by the way got bishops permission to get her patriarchal blessing! Yay! Then we went home, ate some cake and leftovers from the eating appointment!  Unfortunately we are using our iPads today because the other place is closed, so...I can't send you too many pics! But I will next week! We were pretty creative for the candle!

Today a treated myself to a new shirt, skirt, and boots. Thank you h&m! We will now go to an American restaurant, eat some beef, and a milk shake and my birthday will be almost complete. I do miss the favorite chocolate cake though!

Thanks for all the birthday wishes! Remember when the world is stressful, you can always go to the temple. We have enough close to us. Even if you just go sit on the grounds I know it will help! Love you so much! Have a great week!

Liebe Grüße, Sister St. John

 We had a photo shoot for my birthday!

 Us with Lucy & Michael at the Freiburg temple. It's all under construction behind us. 

 Our district

You can see our comp unity. Working together is key!

Monday September 7, 2015 Gera, Germany

When the road is closed…

Well for starters...this email will not be nearly as exciting as your email to me! Wow! Concerts, weddings and all sorts of fun! The concert looked like fun! I can't believe we saw her like 9 years ago and she was 16 and very very country. Still love her though! And Katelyn’s wedding! She looked beautiful! And it looked like fun!! 

As of for me...this week was not as hard for me as last week. Which was good. I don't know if I could do another one of those weeks for a while. 

Montag: I already explained was SO fun! And SO hot! (See previous email)

Dienstag: We taught Michael, and Frau Dhillion. We then got to go to Leipzig for interviews with President! Which I was kind of nervous for because they were going to be in German. But, we got to drive the car, so that was fun! It was actually kind of cold this day, and pretty rainy. Before our interviews President had us fill out a yes or no exact obedience list. Wow...did I feel like a horrible missionary after that. Going to bed exactly on time. Waking up to the minute. Being to Personal study on time...ya…to say the least I realized that I was NOT being exactly obedient. And I hadn’t really my whole mission. Gosh dang it! So, the interview was really good! I'm glad I can speak some German!;) We actually talked a lot about personal progression and obedience. He read a quote about having the Spirit with us requires EXACT obedience. EXACT. No exceptions. No justifications. I have been denying myself these blessings my whole mission. Why hadn't I realized this before? At the end of my interview he offered a Priesthood blessing. Wow, was that exactly what I needed! Mission presidents are called of God! So, then, on the way driving the car back to Gera...the little windy German road that we had been driving on for 15 km was closed. Lucky for us, our navigator helped us out and redirected us through some other little German towns. Beautiful to say the least! 

Mittwoch: Distrikt meeting! We taught German and English! We had like 10 people there! Crazy! They are all from Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. Some of them told their stories of why and how they are here. Most of them walked for a long time. And most of them are here so they don't have to fight in the war. We then had a joint teach with Michael and Bruder Krause about the blessings of the Gospel. There are many, and it was a really good joint teach! 

Donnerstag: Did I mention before that it was rainy the whole week after Monday? Well, we went and drove the car, which has some brake problems, to go by on some less actives in some towns in our area. So one lady was there and invited us back the next week! Good! Progress! No door slammed in our face! (Which hurts more emotionally than physically by the way) But...this is where the adventure starts! Going back to Werdau to give the car to the Elders. Another road was closed!! And so we had to go a different way all the way around Werdau! It was actually kind of funny because we were kind of joking about a road being closed because of what happened on Dienstag! So...it was kind of funny! We finally made it to Werdau, and took a train back to Gera. Had 2 lessons fall out, so we did some Klingling...door to door. Not my favorite, but hey, when it's raining there’s nothing really more effective to do. We then went and had Gemi-Co   with Bruder Krause and the Elders. I like those meetings because then we are ALL on the same page! 

Freitag: Lucy this weekend was in West Germany at a young single adult activity. She had the opportunity this day to go to the Frankfurt temple and be baptized for her Grandma. What a miracle! Really! It’s the last weekend that the temple is open and the Frieberg temple is already closed! She loved it! She said the temple is a place where you can just feel God’s love for you! Isn’t that true? She also had a lot of fun at the activity! It was like a big youth conference! I was a little bit jealous! In the meantime Sis. Medley and I were back here doing missionary work. The first person we talked to that day actually listened and was actually interested. He wanted to learn more right then! On the street he told us he was a little skeptical because he thought it was too good to be true. Ha! It is true! So he bought us some hot chocolate and we taught him the first lesson, gave him a Book of Mormon and made another appointment for the next week! Wow...what a miracle! Sis. M and I had been being exactly 100% obedient. Amazing how you can see immediate blessings from just doing what you are asked! Heavenly Father loves us!

Samstag: We met with Michael! And Kim the 16 year old who loves America! Then we went to Werdau to go by on another less active. Luckily we caught her at home. She said we could call her, but she was busy right then. Again...progress! So...then we go to get on a train to go home. The train is packed full of police. Weird, but we ride it to our connection anyway. We sprint to our connecting train because it was going to leave. Turns out we sprinted for nothing and we waited an hour on the train, till another came. We got on that one, got off to get our other connection and then...the guy at the station told us that nothing was coming that would take us to Gera. Awesome. So we go back to the other station with the next train. Then the guy on that train says nothing is going back to Gera. The group of people with us were furious! But we just kind of laughed, called the Elders and asked if we could take the car. Luckily they said yes. So, it’s about 9, we need to be home by 9:30. We would have made it...except for...our road was closed!! Ha! So we got home about 15 minutes late...:( 

Sontag: Church is always great! The peaceful feeling is always much needed! We then got to eat with the Elders at Sch. Dörlitz's house! That’s always fun...and really filling! Then we got to see LUCY!!! We were so happy she was back! 

Well...the lesson that I learned this week was that when your road is closed, God may just have the scenic route planned for you! Take advantage of the different sights you will get to see in life, laugh your way through it, and thank your Father in Heaven for what you have learned and seen! Sometimes it will be a little bumpy, and sometimes you may have to off-road, but make it a memory! 

Love you so much! Have a great week!! Enjoy the beginning of Fall there! 

Liebe, Sister St. John 

Me...teaching English to all of the auslanders by preaching the Gospel! #ilovemyauslanders

Monday August 31, 2015 Gera, Germany

Well... Not a lot of time because pictures took a while! But, I wanted to do something different anyways today for my email. 

This week was...hard. I wasn't really home sick. But I missed the family. I just wanted them to be with me. Some weeks are just hard. Sometimes I try to hide it, but Sister Medley knows me too well, so we talk about it. I feel like I’ve been on my mission for a long time. And I kind of have. But I still have 8 months left. That’s also kind of a lot! I just feel like I’m in a missionary rut! But, I have to get through it! Nothing changes if nothing changes! So, this week I've really been trying to focus of some of the little things that make me want to keep going. So I'm going to talk about those. 

Meckel family! They have my heart! Those 3 kids. They can't remember my name so they call me the "little Sister". They have been praying and reading on their own. They pray as a family. They come to church, even when their mom can't come. They are troopers! They love primary and they talk about feeling the Holy Ghost. Seeing them change has been amazing! They weren't like that before. 

Michael. He's German and stubborn. But, we had a lesson with him, and he cried. We talked about Jesus and he cried because he felt bad for making Jesus suffer. We had him commit to live ALL of the commandments so Heavenly Father could bless him. I'm happy we got him out of his shell a little bit. 

Lucy. We got to teach her some temple prep lessons because she gets to GO to the temple this next weekend! Pray that she gets there safely! Satan works in evil ways! But I love studying about the temple because I learn so much about it, and my testimony grows stronger. Plus, Lucy is the best member missionary ever! And Lucy is just funny! She says the funniest things! We started to keep a quote book of her. I will have to send you some sometime. 

Lutz. Lutz is a less active. He came to church and then surprisingly that night was taken to jail!! WHAT?! But...he was released this week so we went over and talked about the temple being the goal. He has the desire, he just has to do it! It’s like dad says...you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. 

Schwester Dörlitz. The poor lady! Her husband died 6 years ago and she misses him! They knew each other from when they were teenagers and they have been together since. She likes to have us over so that she isn't so lonely! She is such a strong lady and we love to go over there. She likes us to play the piano and sing for her. Also, we helped her learn how to write and read emails on her laptop. Oh! And at her house she fed us candy and cake and stuff. I was probably allergic to something because my lips got all tingly and swollen! It was SO weird! But then it went away, so not a big deal! It was funny trying to talk though, because they were kind of numb. 

Church. I LOVE church! However, I was a little frustrated this day. There were only 3 members driving to church this week. And...with all the other members and our investigators they didn't have place for us. So...we took a train at like 6:50 in the morning to get to church on time. Little did we know that someone canceled and so there was actually room for us. AND a member came that said he wasn't coming. I was tired and a bit frustrated. OH! And, Bishop called on Sat. and asked Sis. M and I to give a talk! Oh gosh. It was like the scariest thing I've ever done! A talk in GERMAN! I just read a bunch of quotes, so I think it went ok. But...besides all the stress. Church is peaceful! Sacrament is like my one hour of peace, true peace form the week. Oh, and there was a BYU professor there and his wife. They are here doing research and found our church. They were very nice and had a daughter serve here in Germany. At the end of church he shook my hand and gave me 20 €. We aren’t aloud to take money, but he made me. It was actually a blessing because we were really low on money this month because of all the trains we had to take. And that last train to church made us pretty broke. But that 20 euro saved us and we could buy actual food today! 

Well, I can't remember a lot of the funny things that happened, but they did happen. I do laugh a lot! I do have happy times, not everything is stressful. The work is going good! I'm loving Gera and the people! I love Sister Medley and I'm so happy that I get to have her as my companion for so long! I love this Gospel! I KNOW that it blesses families. I know that it’s right and true because I've felt it. I feel it every time I talk about it. I've been rejected way too many times...but I KNOW that I KNOW that it's true! 

I love you so much! Have a fun week at your concerts and everything! Tell Katelyn congrats for me! I loved her invitation! Send me lots of pics! 

Liebe Sister St. John

The MTC Crew. Everyone besides me serves in "West" Germany.

MTC Roommates...Sisters St. John, Israelson, Seare, Garcia

Our 10 month mark!

 We went to Weimar today for P-day! its the town 5 miles away from the concentration camp that I went to! It's very beautiful and there's a small castle thing there! 

We bought huge water bottles because it was HOT!

 

*From Mom: I asked Cassidy a few questions this week about the area she lives in. Here are the questions and her answers...

 

*Is Gera what we would consider a small town, kind of like Spanish Fork, or is it bigger?

Gera is probably more like Provo. just laid out very differently and without a University.

 

*What is your favorite thing about where you live?

I love how pretty it is here! Its very green, and very German! Markt is beautiful!

 

*What is your least favorite thing about where you live?

I don't like that there are some hills here. It makes walking more like hiking.

 

*How long does it take you to get to church? Do you take a train/bus?

It takes us an hour by train to get to chruch. we go there by train every Wednesday for Distrikt meeting. But usually the members drive us there on Sunday. We share the car with the Elders, so most of the time we drive it back from our eating appointments on Sunday and have it for half of the week. We don't use it while in Gera becuase we ride the bahn. But we try to visit members and less actives in the smaller cities when we have the car.

 

*In Germany do they have stores like Walmart where you go to get everything? Or is it always more separate shopping? Like where would you go to get say...pens and pencils?

We buy food at one store, and pens and stuff at another. They don't really have everything together. Walmart is like 5 times bigger as the big stores here. 

 

*Can you send us a picture of the outside of your apartment building? And also maybe one from farther out of the Markt?

Pictures for mom of markt and where we live. There's a white building, kind of center. Not the one with the tower, but the other pic (below). We live in the white building. Our room window is the very top circle window right in the middle.