Easter 2019

We hope that you have had an enjoyable and joyful Easter, ours certainly was.

Before that, though, I want to tell you that we've put our emails into a blog for ease of reading and sharing and commenting, if you like.

Just follow this link https://steweva.blogspot.com/

Postings are shown with the most recent at the top with older ones following. You get the idea.

Working backwards from tonight, we ended the day with a Polish Easter dinner. A young woman (19) is being taught by the missionaries and she attends all our meetings and activities. She plans to get baptized, but she hasn't decided she is ready yet. For most young people, attending our church causes a lot of friction within their families. It's not that their parents or grandparents are active in their church, but they hold on tight to that tradition. This girl invited the four of us missionaries to her parents' home for dinner. We were a bit apprehensive that they might say "It's nice to have you at dinner, now our daughter doesn't want to talk to you any more." It turned out to be quite the opposite. We had a lovely meal and pleasant conversation. The father lead most of the conversation and his manner is typical of Polish men, very serious. He told us he respected the young missionaries and us as retired people for taking the time from our lives to serve other people. He mentioned that very seriously several times during our meal. He does not feel a need for religion himself, but he trusts that his daughter and son are wise enough to decide such things for themselves. He said that he did not know anybody who would do what we do for 2 years, whether old or young. It makes him believe there is still good in the world amid all the bad. He also made an excellent observation that he sees that our church differs from the one he knows in that they focus on traditions and ritual, while ours goes deeper and connects with our inner feelings.

FYI, food was a traditional soup made with white kielbasa and boiled eggs, followed by pork roast, duck (my new favorite meat), red cabbage salad, and then lots and lots of pastries. After eating all that and as much of the pastries as we could stuff, they made us some herb tea, then took our dessert plates to give us clean ones to start again with the desserts. It was awkward getting out of that, but their daughter helped them understand that we were just topped up.

Dessert round 2

We saw many families Saturday walking to their churches with baskets of eggs. The eggs represent new life and they take salt to represent the preservation of life. The priest blesses these with holy water and they have them as part of their Easter meal on Sunday. It was great to see so many families together and people taking pans of food on the bus, etc, to grandmothers house or wherever. It's like our Thanksgiving with food and family. Plus all the stores, even the Zabka (like 7-Eleven) on every corner were closed. Love that.

Before that dinner we served soup for the homeless. It was also the traditional soup plus lots of pastries. We do the preparation of it on Saturdays. It was sweet to see the little cakes wrapped individually and tied with a bow for each person. The dainty morsels in their stained hands was a juxtaposition that reminds you that they too deserve an Easter treat and the respect to enjoy it like anybody else.

Before that we had an Easter "munch and mingle" at our branch. We had salads, eggs, and pastries. Are you getting the idea that pastries are a big deal at Easter? It's pretty awesome.

We had two surprise additions at our Sacrament meeting today, the mother of another young woman investigating the Church came with her daughter and a man who had met with the missionaries a year ago but then got sick.  Nobody knew these two people previously, so that was nice. Stewart spoke and Jean sang "Did Jesus Really Live Again?" as a solo. We wanted everyone to have the words to the song in their language. We printed copies for speakers of Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Czech, Romanian, and English. It's crazy to think that for 12 people we need that many languages and the lingua franca is Polish, of all languages. It's a linguist's dream. 😁

Going back to Friday, we find that visa problems don't elude us even in Poland. We spent much of the day as companions to a sister who had to come back to Gdansk to be sure she wouldn't be deported. Two elders and a sister from her MTC group had to leave the country last month . They are now serving in Chicago and hopeful that after 6 months they can return to Poland. It was great to be with her again. While waiting for her number in line to come up (3 hours) we were able to visit the art museum nearby that, as luck would have it, houses the painting I've been dying to see since we arrived: Memlings The Last Judgment. It was more than I hoped for. It has a remarkable history and survived WWII and many other wars and occupations since the 1400's. Its iconography and their interpretation are interesting to compare to our own understanding.

Sister Bridge pointing out some of the interesting bits in The Last Judgment

Detail from left panel showing Peter's greeting, sentinel angels, 

people before being clothed as they enter heaven.

Now skipping back to Tuesday and I'm sorry for this long edition. The elders had an invitation from a community center in their neighborhood to share about America and our church. The people who run the center invite residents to come learn about new cultures. The elders had spoken with them on the street a while back and asked how they could help. They've helped them with flyers and other projects and now this. There were about a dozen ladies there. We had two extra elders in town on exchanges also. They loved hearing about America, asked a lot of questions about our Church and the elders handled it with aplomb. The Elders read some bits from the Book of Mormon and six of the ladies took copies, at which point we ran out and one lady will get hers delivered. Two of them asked if they could attend our meetings. You know the answer to that. It's pretty rare to have such a positive exchange.

Monday, being p-day, we had a chance to visit Malbork castle, about 40 km away. It's the largest brick castle built by the Teutonic Knights and was very impressive. We enjoyed being there with our elders plus the elders and sisters from Bydgoszcz, about 2 hours away and in our district. Do you know what a Hyundai i20 is? Probably not, but we hear that one can hold 8 adults, but that can't be true.

Like a scene in a video game

Imagine sorting all those bricks. 

The castle was never taken in battle for 500 years, then came WWII.

Another example of Poles' knack for rebuilding.

The old drawbridge mechanism still in use. 

Yes, another bridge.

14 April 2019

(Can't think of a catchy subject line, so the boring date will have to do)

We had more new experiences this week than we can count.

All the old missionaries in Poland gathered in Warsaw for a 3-day "conference" or mutual support or group therapy, what have you. All the branches are spread out around the country and so it's nice to see how other missionaries are doing what they do to help the work move forward with their little flocks. There are 5 couple besides us and each is about 3 hours away from any other. Warsaw is 4 hours by car from Gdansk and we took a very pleasant 3 hour train ride to get there. Warsaw is the national capital, it's very crowded and busy and there's lots to see and do there.

We enjoyed a Chopin piano concert in a restaurant where the composer himself played. He preferred to play for small groups instead of in concert halls and it was great to be just feet away from the pianist. The young man was just amazing and his performance was full of enthusiasm and passion. Some of Chopin's works are emotional roller-coasters and we loved it.

We visited a museum of Jewish history in Poland, which was interesting and at the same time depressing, of course. The 12 of us visited other sites, including the old town which is another beautiful tribute to the Polish people's respect for their history and their rebuilding prowess after WW II. While we were standing together deciding where to explore, we heard some girls scream and Jean ran to where a crowd was forming. Turns out some members of BTS (google K-pop if you dare) were dancing on the square. She got some video right up close. When she showed it to our president's 14-year-old daughter and her friend, they literally screamed and started crying. That's pretty much been the reaction to everybody she's shown it to. Whatev.

We walked a lot and saw a lot and discussed where to eat a lot, then ate a lot. It was exciting and new. Contrast that to us joining the mission president and his family for breakfast and scriptures on the last day. There are lots of things in the world that are fun and we enjoy them, but the things that last are the ones that are quiet and bring you peace. That was our most salient takeaway from the week.

Peace to you all,
Elder and Sister Bridge

Pics

Polish Spring countryside at 150 km/h

Title this either "Tomb of the unknown soldier" or "Unmoving blue jeans and white sneakers" 

(He just wouldn't move out of my shot!)

The flowers in foreground are the colors of the Polish flag

Note the senior missionary holding her phone up high with her mittened hand.

Soup for the homeless on Sunday. I told you we help a couple of groups prepare soup and sandwiches for the homeless. Today was the first time we had room in our schedule to help the Sunday group serve it.

I hope you can see enough detail and I can set the scene for you. There were about 100 or 150 in line for soup (hard to count because they get back in line until the soup is gone). The folks also hand out new socks and underwear each week after serving the soup because many homeless people have no way of washing those in the winter when fountains aren't running. I happened to notice off in the corner some of our group standing by a seated older man. He won't go to a doctor for his feet though he should. Some people don't trust institutions. A young lady was washing his feet. Away from the handout crowd. Out of sight. Avoiding notice. She does it for him every Sunday.

I had to turn away for a long time, there was pollen or something in my eyes.

Conferencetime

We have a new perspective of General Conference, being in a different timezone, with a different language, very limited ways to view it, and disconnected from regular communication with SLC. For 17 years I watched conference after the fact because I was working during the event to make it happen in all the languages. I grew a little complacent about the spiritual feast it is, viewing the talks as only items on a checklist. This time, however, it was an easy thing to work through the technical difficulties, watch it at odd hours, and switch between English and Polish.

Saturday at 18:00 we connected via the internet in one of the rooms in the office building where our "chapel" is. We ordered pizza for those who wanted to come. We had the usual frustration with getting the TV to connect, so those watching in Polish viewed it on our little laptop while Jean and I and another sister watched on the computer in another room in English. We had 4 members, 4 investigators, and 4 missionaries there. The young Elders have to be in their apartment by 9:30 so we and one of the members (20 year-old young man) watched the afternoon session in our apartment, that finished at midnight.

Sunday we got the chapel TV hooked up so watched the Saturday afternoon session as our church meetings (8 people plus us 4 missionaries). We then had the Elders and two of the young members over to our apartment for dinner and watched the Sunday 6:00 session live together, with the young man staying again to watch the late session until 0:00.

That's the logistics, but the important thing is that it was so inspiring. Every talk seemed relevant and uplifting and powerful. We had some good conversations about the talks. The young man mentioned above has absolutely no hope that his parents will ever accept what he has done by joining the Church and, of course, no hope that they will ever accept the restored gospel themselves. After the late session Saturday and the talks by Elder Anderson, Elder Held, and especially Elder Wada who told a little story about his mother coming to sacrament meeting after 31 years, he said "Wow, before this I felt I was alone."

Love Elder and Sister Bridge

Pictures:
First, some of you don't know me well enough to know when I'm joking, I see now. I love irony and incongruity and sometimes it's not obvious or funny to others besides me. I need to clarify that those Nazi Christmas ornaments are NOT something we would, or even could, buy. They are in the museum on display and they highlight the stark difference between what was being portrayed to the public and what was really happening in Germany at the time. I got feedback from a few people that made me realize I was not explicit about that.

This week a bank, which started a food bank (confusing, right, at least I was), held a food drive and we helped them for a few hours by standing outside a grocery store and asking people to buy items for the poor. The girl in the banana outfit was one of the organizers. 

Some people had the attitude that the poor don't deserve it any more than themselves. 

One lady brought her purchases to our cart and made us count out loud how many items she added. 

One lady put in a small sack of flour (1kg) and said "I've been hungry before too."

One picture gives you a sense of the scale, taken from the back of the chapel at St. Bridget's church. St. Bridget is a Swedish saint and my middle name, McBride, is derived from "the followers of Bridget." Apparently they've got some of her bones in there.

Some interesting details of the alter piece that I hope you can see in the other picture are that the grapes are amber, a famous feature of this area on the Baltic, and donated by ordinary people. Also, at the feet of Mary you see "Solidarność" (Solidarity). Father Henryk Jankowski was head of this church during the 1980's and assisted in brokering negotiations between the striking workers (led by Lech Walesa) and the government. The connection between the Catholic Church and the people of Poland is more than religious, it is their culture and history. Even long-time members of our church still have connections to the Catholic church. This is an example, that they feel that they would not have regained their independence and eliminated the rule of communism without the church's help. Also, Pope John Paul II (from Poland) spoke in support of the movement. He is revered everywhere in Poland and you see his image all over. Under Mary there is a monstrance with his heart (at least part of it) and his blood.

Springtime

Like you, certainly, we're happy to see more signs of Spring. It's hard to care about other people's weather, but we've had three nice days, like it or not. Our mission president and his family came to Gdansk this weekend. The mission home is in Warsaw, about a 4-hour drive. They are remarkable people and great leaders. We really love and admire them and are sad they will finish up in June. They came in part to go to the WW II museum. They took their 14-year-old daughter with them to the museum and Sister Bridge and I took their 10-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son to a children's museum. We had fun, there were a lot of interesting exhibits, and it's in an old fort at the top of a hill in the city. Apparently the children considered us to be as fit as their parents (40), so we were pretty beat by the end of the day, even Jean. President Turek is Polish, Sister Turek is German. Their kids speak Polish with their dad, German with their mom and with each other, and English with us. It's pretty amazing and fascinating. We also got to have Primary with the three of them today while the adults had a doctrinal, um,  argument. Primary is the best, I wish we could do that every week, but you do need children for that or it's just weird.

Nothing profound is coming to mind tonight, so I'll just comment on the two attached photos:

1. Jean is always looking for new and interesting Christmas ornaments. 1 million is not quite enough. How would you like these on your tree? Just brings the warm, peaceful spirit of the season, eh? 

We snapped a picture of these in the WW II museum.

2. We're also always looking for interesting bridges, cuz, Bridges. This one has locks, much like the one in Paris, where lovers lock their love for each other and toss the key. 

The little house behind was picturesque, I thought. Caught it while walking in Gdansk.

A little yeast

I wish we had time enough to write and that you had patience enough to read all that we experienced this week. Most of it is just great new experiences, so I'll try to boil it down to something that might be meaningful.

The young missionaries have transfers tomorrow. Because this mission has relatively few missionaries, they do transfers every 9 weeks instead of 6. In Gdansk we have a set of Elders and a set of Sisters and us. One of the Elders is transferring far south and another will replace him, one Sister completes her mission, the other Sister is transferring out and no Sisters will replace them. Because they have been with us from the start, it's very sad to see the 3 of them go. We've grown very fond of these great young missionaries. Saying goodbye is a constant part of missionary life, but it is still difficult. We have them over for dinner on Sunday evenings and it was sad for this to be the last time for 3/4 of them.

We have decided to be less American and leave the car parked as much as we can. This is not a big deal if you read and understand the language. We snapped a picture of one of the city areas we ride through daily. Wrzeszcz, you're right. We're getting to where we can actually read that word, but imagine trying to pick that out of the announcement over the crackly speaker along with Następny przystanek (Next stop). It's a fun challenge. We're glad to have our previous experiences to give us a head start and ease the panic.




Took a tram to meet the Elders to do service and they told us to take either tram 2 or 4 or 8 from the station and which stop to get off at. Easy. Lot's of options. It was during the evening commute and we got on #8 with lots of other people. We eventually noticed on the phone map that we were not going to the area that had our stop, so we got off as soon as we could. We were now standing in the middle of an industrial area, the sun was down, and it was looking pretty sketchy. We called the Elders to say "go on without us." We were stuck. We could see from the phone map that we needed to go back the way we came, so we waited with the drunks for another tram going the opposite direction. We caught one, rode two stops and got off in the middle of a maze of overpasses and tracks. Despite the interesting graffiti which we'll have to photograph in better light, we had no idea which way to go to find the right tram going the right direction. A young guy and girl got off at the same time and they looked like they would speak English and they did. Relief! They were kind to walk us out of the maze, show us where to find the right tram, and which way to ride. We got to tell them why were are here. We find so many times that the Lord puts people in our path just when we need them. We really felt blessed. (and the service work was done by the time we got there, so bonus!)

We celebrated the RS birthday in the branch on Saturday. Jean was the keynote and we and the other missionaries provided the refreshment. It was well attended, 10 people besides us 6 missionaries (see attachment 3). Almost all those who came Saturday didn't come Sunday to church. I guess they figured they'd done church already this week. :) Jean gave a great talk about Christ putting great value on women and, with a missionary interpreter, it came across really well.

A few things I'll have to write about in the future are: WWII starting in Gdansk, the Solidarity museum, old-town Gdansk (really old, like 1,000 years old), the largest surviving brick cathedral, Memling's judgement painting, new foods, senior missionaries, dentists. I won't take time here so will wait for a week that's less eventful, if that happens. I just have to share a glimpse of the old-town, which, with our young friend as guide, we discovered is just walking distance from where we hold church. It blew us away. We were transported into the game Settlers of Catan.




















Been thinking today about one of the parables from this week's reading, where Christ compares the kingdom to a little yeast that a woman mixes into 60 lbs of dough. There are so many people around us who will probably never hear about the restored gospel from the missionaries. In our little branch carries on and it could become discouraging. But knowing that the Lord knew this is how it would be affirms to us that it'll work out alright, that it's not news to Him. So we'll keep figuring out where He guides us to and try to share His love and His hope where we are. Paths diverge and cross, missionaries come and go, and this is not their church. We all just do what we can to help it rise.

Love you all,
Elder and Sister Bridge

It's Gdańsk aight?

(That slash above the n makes the "a" nasal like "ai" so it's like saying "Gdainsk," the name of the city where we live. There's your language lesson for today, you're welcome. For more fun with Polish spelling, check this clip from a 1969 Polish film: https://youtu.be/VqQsVl9UJGo )

Many more good times this week, and I'm not just saying that. It's pretty amazing how new things happen and stretch each of us and make life exciting. That's why we're living this life, right? I read recently that new experiences make our memory of time seem longer. For example, when you're a kid you're learning and experiencing so much every day that when you think of summers as a child, they seem like they lasted forever. When you're in a routine, memories of days and weeks tend to run together and we remember time as flying by. If we want more "time" in this life, newness and challenges make it feel that way. So, sorry if this message comes across as being full of undue excitement, but it's just a blast being here and seeing and feeling and failing and trying and meeting. Now there's your psychology lesson to go with the language lesson. OK, no more lessons.

What stands out from this week is first, that we met a young man, university student, who is a church member but hasn't been attending for quite a while. Filip is just great. He loves to talk about Poland and Polish and though he's struggling with things in his life, he's just so interesting and likable. We spent quite a lot of time over two days with him and we tried to help him and he helped us and it's very rewarding. As is common for many Polish people, he works in Germany for about three months, earns enough to live three months in Poland and attends school during that time, then goes to Germany again as needed. Jobs elsewhere in Europe pay better than in Poland, but the cost of living is lower here, which is nice for us. Being the frugal (Sister Bridge would say "cheap") person that I am, this really makes me happy.

Second, with the young Elders we help at a Catholic church each Friday with a group of young people to make soup and sandwiches for homeless people. The food is different every week, whatever they can get, and we all pitch in and slice veggies and bread and put together meals in whatever form we can. On Saturday we went with the Elders and Sisters to the house of a lady and her friend who do something similar. The missionaries found this opportunity from an ad they saw. After doing the food prep work, we had time to sit and talk to the lady and guy about why they do this.

About three years ago, the lady was in the town center and saw a homeless woman and felt like she should help her. She helped her get what she needed which took just a minute and she felt like she wanted to help her more, but didn't know how. The woman said "If you want to help us, feed us." So, the next Sunday, when she made a pot of soup for her family, she made another pot and took it to the same park where she had seen the woman. She found her and about 5 of her friends and fed them. From there she got her friend to help and it has grown to where she and her friend, along with the help of volunteers like us and some people in their neighborhood, feed about 100 people each Sunday, rain or shine, never missing even for holidays. They also give them socks and underwear each week because they have no way to wash them. The man, her friend, told us "We don't just make the soup and sandwiches and give it to them, we sit down with them and talk and eat the meal with them because they deserve that."

What beautiful dignity. And I think of the song "There, but for fortune, go you or I."

Love to you,
Elder and Sister Bridge

1. A finding activity with the Elders and Sisters (plus two Sisters in town on an exchange) near a train station. We had a white board that said "Write what food you like to eat with your family" and used that as a way to talk about families and family history. Cold and fun out there, though we're limited by our language. Talked to a Finnish couple in Gdansk for the weekend. That was a shock and sweet.

2. Sister Bridge sweeping up after Elder Asendrych already swept. 

Note the large pot of soup in the background.

Poland gets real

You can possibly imagine how happy we are to be writing this, actually and truly, from Poland! We really flew here as scheduled and did not get stopped at an airport or at immigration. Those were real concerns, just expecting that something else could delay the beginning of our mission in earnest. But nope, we're really here and loving it!

We arrived Tuesday afternoon after an uneventful flight (the best kind). As we left the plane in Warsaw we were both looking at our phones to see if we had a message from the mission office and walked right out of the airport security without our luggage. We tried to find a way back in and while searching we heard the question "Elder Bridge??" and turned to see our mission president and his wife. What a great first impression, right? He figured out who to call and we eventually got our baggage. It's just not the way we envisioned our meeting.

President and Sister Turek are sincerely wonderful. They are barely 40, if that, and have three children aged 7, 10, and 14, so a young family which would be a challenge. They, however, take it all in stride. President Turek is from Poland and Sister Turek is from Germany, a town not far from the Polish border. They were living in Germany when they got the call. The mission covers a large area, but has only 52 missionaries. This makes for a close mission family and everybody knows everybody because they've probably served together. Each city with missionaries has a set of Elders and a set of Sisters or a senior couple with some exceptions. We have been assigned to Gdansk, a famous city from WWII and farthest north in Poland on the Baltic Sea. We are lucky to be with pairs of both great Elders and great Sisters.

When we arrived at our apartment on Thursday the Elders helped us shop for some basic food. Friday the Sisters went with us to secure our temporary residency permit and apply for our long-term residency. Being a government process, this took us all over Gdansk and all that day. They were good sports to stick with it until we got it done. We had heard that "everybody speaks English" and now know that was a lie. ;)  OK, they do, and we shouldn't use government paperwork as a measure of one's language skill. Even in English we can't navigate all that. We could not have done it without the Sisters' help, that's what we're saying.

After that we went with the Elders to make a meal for the homeless at one of the many Catholic church buildings. There's one group that we help every Friday and another we help every Saturday. These are great people who really care and who are just pleasant to be around.

Today was our first Sunday at our new branch and it was sweet. With us 6 missionaries there were about 20 people there including 5 non-members, a very good Sunday they tell us. Of course the meeting was all Elder and Sister Bridge, which was good for us, though we know a total of 3 Polish words: Hello and Thank and You. Well, as now we're talking about it, we aren't sure about the Hello, so make that 2 words.

Our Polish training so far is from when we cornered an office Elder for an hour while we were there to teach us the alphabet and pronunciation, which, we are often told, is really easy. Uh-huh. How many ways can you say "sh"?? Really? And what do you do with "drzwi"? (door)

Our plan is to spend time with either the Elders or Sisters weekly and at least get to where we can read, then we'll go from there. We're getting some things slowly and maybe we should wait more than 5 days to judge our progress.

We went with the Sisters to a sweet lady's apartment who's been a member longer than anybody in Poland, probably. She lives on the attic floor of a little old building (see the street picture attached), is 92, and speaks surprisingly good English. We learned of some of her many trials through her life yet has a cute attitude and is so funny. She speaks her mind and likes to laugh and make you laugh. Her apartment is a single small room with a bed and a coffee table she set out with some cookies and herb tea for us and the Sisters. She treated us like we were royalty in her humble home which she pays for with her monthly income of $500, then leaned smiling out her open window for a long while as we walked out of sight down the street.

We love being missionaries.

Our love to you,
Elder and Sister Bridge