April 18, 2012

Elders Evans, (Alex) Bauer, and Hodges

Elder McGrath with Alex

Elders returning home (Hodges, Thurston, Slack and White), with Sister and President Watkins on each side

Alex by the Madrid Temple

Family,

So transfers weren´t that bad since there were only a few people that were leaving Madrid to go north, vice versa, and to the [Canary] Islands and back. We also have a little more than 10 new missionaries here and it´s been fun!! So of course, I mentioned that this transfer wasn´t that big at all right, and that it would be easy!! Well...then we found out that Hermana [Sister] Watkins, who helped us out a lot last transfer, wasn´t going to be in the office at all this past week. So Elder Forrest and I had to try doing it all without her help, which by the way, was almost a nightmare at first, but I got the hang of it after a while. Friday rolled around and it came time to go over transfers with President Watkins before we sent it out and all was well. We then had to send it out at 9:30, but the problem was that we weren´t going to be in the office at that time so I set the Microsoft Outlook to send it to all of the zone leaders at 9:30 automatically which was cool!!

Saturday we had to come to the office to check on some flights for people coming in from the Canaries so that they could get their tickets. One of them is Elder McGrath, my first companion here in Spain!!! We coordinated who would do what that day and Elder Forrest and I decided that we would do everything as far as driving people here, there, and everywhere is concerned except for one flight on Sunday, which was during a baptism of our piso [apartment] companions, so we handed that one off to the assistants to the president. Sunday we got The “Beast” (aka the Furgoneta) and drove to the baptism in it so that we could go from the baptism to the airport if necessary. We ended up dropping the other two companionships off and going to the airport to pick up Elder Sepulveda, who was in the islands for two transfers. He was being sent off to...VALLADOLID!!!!!! So I got to tell him how cool it is up there and stuff like that!! Eventually we loaded the Furgoneta with his stuff and drove to the Madrid Chamartin train station to pick up two of my favorite Elders from the León Zone, Elder Evans and....ELDER HODGES!!!!!!!!! It was amazing to see them both again!!! Unfortunately, the reason that Elder Hodges came to Madrid is because he was going home Tuesday, but I´ll be seeing Elder Evans around since he´s serving in Madrid!! Yay!!!! We then dropped them all off at the Barrio 6 & 8 piso [the apartment for the 6th and 8th ward elders] and went home.

Monday we went to the stake center at 10:00 am and I saw Elder McGrath for the first time since October general conference!! It was good to see him again!! We then had the meeting of the group going home, and among that group were two great Elders that I will really miss, Elder Thurston and Elder Hodges. After the meeting we went to the security place there on Temple Square to get more keys for the stake center and the CCM [missionary training center]. We spent about half an hour there and went to get more diesel in the Furgoneta before we went to get the other missionaries going up north to the train station. We dropped them off with plenty of time to spare and then went to the office for a bit. At 8:30 we went to get Elder Rose from the train station and then went to the mission home for the farewell dinner of the four missionaries. The four going home were Elders Thurston, Hodges, White, and Slack. After a while there we took Elder Rose to our piso in our little Corsa. When we got to San Sebastian, we had to get gas, and this guy came up to me while I was getting gas. He was poor, and with nothing, except his car, and his car, was out of gas. So before filling up my car, I filled up his little container that he brought, with gas for his car. Afterwards, we spent a good amount of time talking to him about what I´m doing as a missionary and all sorts of stuff like that. I gave him a card and off he went to his car, with the container of gas. When we drove away, he gave us a friendly wave of appreciation and it felt good!!

Tuesday we left at 9:15 to get to the CCM at 10:00 for the meeting of the new missionaries. I spoke of the usual – residency and whatnot – and Elder Forrest spoke about the JP Morgan-Chase card and how to use it. Before the meeting though, President Watkins had a surprise, about three missionaries were coming into the mission, but didn´t show up on the transfer charts when we made them. So he quickly assigned them somewhere and it confused everyone a bit, but it´s okay, all is well. We dropped three people off at the airport in two different terminals in the Furgoneta and it was a fun, but stressful day! We then went to the mission home to drop off some bags of the ones that went to the Islands and went to the office pretty much right after. We had a lesson with Alberto, an appointment with a dentist for Elder Forrest because he had something in his mouth that worried him, but it´s all good! We then went into the office for a while and did a few things, and had a lesson with Javier and that was all for that day.

Today is P-Day and we went and played soccer in Pavones, but I sat out most of the time because it was too cold for me to play without feeling like trash, haha. We then ate at Dominoes Pizza and that was it. What is the weather like? Take care and I´ll talk to you soon!!! Love you all!

Elder Bauer