I'm not a Bleu anymore! Starting Transfer 3 in...

I hope everyone has had a great week in Salt Lake.  Sounds like it's been pretty rainy!  Same thing here.  It rained everyday last week but it makes running in the mornings more fun.  This week consisted of teaching our awesome families, transfer predictions, an exchange with Elder Wilson and some Belgium Chocolate.

Last Monday we started our P-day by going to the Nehaus chocolate factory.  It is an outlet store with boxes of chocolate open in front that you can sample.  It was delicious but within 20 minutes we were stuffed and ready to move on to the next thing!  We did some shopping and even found a 1Euro store.  (Probably like Dollar Tree)  It amazes me what you can buy for 1 euro!  Then we went to the Gare to get personalized Belgium license plates.  Mine has Elder Player on it and is pretty cool.  We taught Kingsley and Marsella and, as always, it was awesome!  That night we made over 100 crepes for District meeting the next morning. I don't think any of us will want to make crepes for sometime now!

Our final district meeting on Tuesday morning was a "Harry Potter" transfer theme.  We even drank polyjuice and entered the "Chamber of Secrets." (aka the basement in the Louise church)  It was awesome and Elder Wilson has been a great district leader with some fun things but always a great message too.

The next day we had a rendezvous with a man named Seth.  The sisters are teaching an amis in a shop and the lady there asked if she could have some extra pamphlets.  They left her some with their number on it.  A few weeks later they received a phone call from Seth saying he read them all and wanted more.  So they taught him, gave  him a Book of Mormon and then he came to church...all in 3 days.  We are teaching him now and our first rendezvous was amazing.  He said he's had friends in churches but none of them made him feel very good.  He hasn't prayed in recent years but when he started reading the Book of Mormon and the pamphlets he felt something and wanted to start praying.  At that moment the spirit was so strong so we asked if he'd be baptized and he accepted!!!  People are ready to receive this gospel and the Lord is putting them in our paths!  Also, we had a rendezvous with the Mulunda family. Half way through they invited us to come and eat with them so we sat down and I ate my first meal of fufu, along with frites, fish and other stuff. It was awesome and all their kids are trying to learn English so they practice with us and then help us with our French.

Frere Fraikin took us to lunch on Thursday and brought pics of his motorcycles and his Ferrari.  Frere Fraikin hasn't been active for some time but we invited him to a special stake conference with all of Southern Belfium and he came.  It was such a good sight and was like he had never missed a week!

Another highlight was the Sonan family.  We met them while porting on exchanges last transfer.  Henri, the husband, said, "My wife is really liking your stuff and wants to bring the kids to church."  We couldn't have asked for something better and so we taught about church and she's excited to come this coming week and bring the children.  Henri left for Chicago this weekend until December and asked if we could get info for him about church there so that he will have some connection there.  We can do that for sure!

Saturday was the last exchange with Elder Wilson.  He is an amazing teacher and I love being able to watch and see new ways and new ideas to help me improve.  We finished the night with transfer predictions.  We dressed in our boubous and sunglasses and predicted away.  We'll see if they come true!

Sunday was a special stake conference for all of Southern Belgium.  At least 30 missionaries were there and all the wards.  Bishop Davies, from the presiding bishopric, spoke about the blessings of children and that nobody is perfect.  There were so many people and not enough chairs for everyone so all the missionaries stood in the back the whole time.  Even every piano bench was in use.  We had the Sylvestre family there and Driz and Jean-Pierre so that was great!  Last night we got some phone calls.  When you are training or a district leader you get a call from the AP's.  If you are called to be a Zone Leader or an AP you get a call from the President.  During dinner Elder Wood got a call and he's training and our new District Leader. Later we realized we had missed a call and realized it was the President.  He asked for Elder Davis and asked him to be a Zone Leader in Liege.  He will be awesome and I'm so glad that I've had such an awesome trainer! Elder Wilson is off to Versailles.  I'm staying her in Bruxelles with Elder Eldredge and I'm excited to see more miracles happen here.  I'll meet Elder Eldredge on Wesnesday.  My address is still the same:

     Les Missionaires
     Elder Chase Player
     11, Ave des Gloires Nationales
     1081 Koekelberg
     Belgium

Here are a couple of quotes I found and think they apply to all of us.  I hope we can have goals and with our actions and ambition they can lead us to success.  Thanks for all your support and love!
   
      Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.
   
     My dreams are worthless, my plans are dust, my goals are impossible.  All are of no value unless they are      followed by action.  I will act now.  Action is the tinder which ignites my dreams, my plans, my goals into      a living force.  Action is the force which will nourish my success.

The WTC of Belgium

The Neuhas Chocolate Factory

Our Last District Meeting

Love...Elder Player

Rain + No Umbrellas = Wet missionaries

Bonjour!

Bonjour a tous!  I hope you've had another great week!  It's been a week with lots of different things going on and some that I don't think I'll forget!

Last Monday the Campells, who were dropping off Sarah for her study abroad in London, came and visited. Jim served in the Paris, France mission and wanted to see the mission again.  We had lunch and showed them a little of Bruxelles!  We went to the Grand Place, tried some frites, a meat triette, and of course, some Belgium Chocolate.  It was so fun to see them and spend some time with them.  On Monday evening we had a rendez-vous with Nosa.  It went great and we left in such high spirits after hearing him bear his testimony.

Tuesday we had our weekly district meeting that went great and then we had steak for lunch and a cinnamon cake we made for dessert.  Delicious!  We had a rendez-vous with Mike later and taught him more about the restoration and asked him how his reading in the Book of Mormon was coming.  He finds it so interesting and wants to read more and more.  We talked to him about the ward and how the church is a family.  We both bore our testimony of it and the blessings in our life.  The spirit was so strong.  When we asked him about baptism he said, "yes" and so we set a date for September 29th.  Super exciting!

Wednesday was a normal missionary day but on Thursday Frere Fraikin treated us to lunch.  He gave us lots of advice that I'm writing down for when I get home.  After, we decided to make the trip to do some porting in an area known as Crainhem.  All four of us that live in our apartment went out together.  We split the streets and started knocking on doors.  On the sixth door we met a young man who said he didn't believe in God anymore.  We asked if we could take 10 minutes to tell him a little about our church and how it has blessed our lives.  Than a miracle happened...he said, "come in"!  This was a super nice neighborhood and his home was one of the nicest homes I've been in since I left.  We had a great lesson and left him with a Book of Mormon and hope we can go back this week and meet his whole family.  That evening we had two more lessons with the Mulunda and Sylvestre families.  They are both so awesome and we love them so much.  We are sure that they will be ready for baptism one day!

Friday we taught the Johnson family.  The are preparing to go to the temple to be sealed.  They have 4 daughters and their spirits and smiles are always fun to be around.  We received some news about Nosa that we didn't want to hear.  He isn't being baptized anymore.  After a week of trying to make sure everything was set we found out that his marriage wan't legal.  This was hard to hear and the branch where he lives was really sad too.  He still had a great attitude about it and has a strong testimony of the gospel and I believe he'll be ready down the road.

Saturday we had exchanges and I was with Elder Wood!  He's awesome and such a great missionary.  We had fun, did lots of porting and taught Kingsley and Marsella.  We went to teach them about temples but Marsella asked a question that had been on her mind all week and the Plan of Salvation answered her question perfectly.  It's amazing how things work out and plans change but if you follow the spirit it will always be better than you planned!

On Sunday the craziest thing of the week happened.  We had told the Sylvestre family that we would go to their church since they have come to ours a few times.  They offered to take us right after our meetings to their meetings.  We hopped in their car and made our way to their church.  It was a Russian church, not sure what denomination, but boy was it an eye opening experience for me.  For the next three hours we sat on a wood bench and tried to listen to a young girl who was translating for us from Russian into French.  There was a baby blessing and a marriage blessing.  This is where they are given permission to get married and then given flowers from everyone.  There were 10+ prayers where everyone would kneel and yell their prayers out loud for about 5 minutes.  Somehow they all stopped at the exact same time.  Elder Davis and I kept looking at each other like, "what are we doing here!"  There was about 10 or 15 songs, some solos and some by the whole congregation.  They even had an accordion that was playing along with the piano.  After three hours we walked out and I realized I  felt so many different emotions.  Mostly shock and sadness.  I hope that one day all of these people will be lead to the truth.  We have the authority from God and the Holy Ghost to guide us.  I know the church is true without a doubt.  We are so blessed to have the truth in our lives and I'm so lucky to be a missionary and invite others to find this out for themselves.

Today we aren't sure what we are doing but it'll definitely involve a baguette and some cheese for lunch and maybe some frites.  This is our last week before transfers and most likely one of us will be going.  It'll be crazy because every companionship in our Zone will change.  I don't know if I'll be going or staying but I'll let you know next Monday.  I love Bruxelles and I'm so thankful to be here and to be able to teach the gospel to the people here.  It is truly amazing.  Thanks for all of your love and support....till next week!

Kurt - A priest in our ward that
has gone porting with us!

Anthony - A Priest in our ward that has
gone porting with us!

Sunset at the Basilique
It's getting dark earlier and earlier!

Love,

Our church building with
3 different languages...Dutch,
English and French

The Sylvestre Family

Elder Player

Last Monday with the Campbells

Bonjour et Happy Labor Day!

Tons of corn in Brussels

Cool bridge on our way to a mangez-vous!

It's weird to think that it's a major holiday back in America today and just a normal day here in Europe.  I'm sure I'll get used to that with Halloween and Thanksgiving in the coming months! It's been a great week here in Bruxelles and there is so much I want to say so I better get started.

Last Monday, Elder Davis and I went and got boubou's. They are African clothes and very comfortable.  It helps to make us look legit.  After we got those we had interviews at the other chapel in Bruxelles. It was my first interview with President and Soeur Poznanski since my first day here! I love them! They are amazing and so caring and Sister P. speaks french and makes it beautiful.  All the missionaries love their interviews with her! You can just tell how much they love us and I'm so grateful for them!

Tuesday was my first zone conference, and once again was awesome!!!  President and Soeur Poznanski are such inspired leaders for our mission! Soeur Poznanski told a story and showed a picture of a family. In our mission we do a lot of porting and street contacting and often missionaries feel that it isn't effective. She explained that from that family was her and that was how they were introduced to the gospel. She was just a young child, too young to be baptized.  Do you think those two young missionaries thought, "one day that young girl will serve a mission, and be teaching missionaries." She also told a story of a lady on her mission that she taught but she was not baptized. Thirty years later they were in a ward and ran into the lady again, still not baptized, but later that week she received a call from that lady and was told that she wanted to be baptized nearly 30 years later. Right now people might not accept us but we have no idea of the impact or seeds that we are planting. It was amazing! President talked to us about how the Lord is preparing a way for us just as he did for Nephi.  After their instruction, the Zone leaders, and district meeting, I once again received a spiritual confirmation that this church is true and I love being a missionary!  There is nothing better I could be doing with my life!  After Zone Conference we had a lesson with a member's sister. When we got there her daughter and kids were there too.  So while Elder Davis taught the lesson I was having kids jump on me and was trying to keep them entertained with the 5 pictures in our Book or Mormon. The young boy, 2, was named Nice and he could tackle me like no other. He even kissed me 3 times, against the rules but there was no stopping it!  So I made a couple really good friends in that rendez-vous and gave the little girl a Book of Mornon.  With eternal perspective in mind you never know what that could lead to. We also taught the Sylvestre family again.  They are so amazing!   They always have dessert and drinks for us and beg us to stay longer! We love them so much!

Wednesday wasn't as exciting but I was doing my personal study and through lots of cross referencing I came upon Joshua 23:14. It says: "14 And, behold, this day I am going the ^away of all the earth: and ye know in all your hearts and in all your souls, that not one thing hath failed of all the ^bgood things which the Lord your God spake concerning you; all are come to pass unto you, and not one thing hath failed thereof."  For me this means that we have to be able to leave this life, or a mission, using all the things the Lord has given to us, and having no regrets!  The scriptures are so amazing especially when you really start studying them.

Thursday we had lunch with Frere Fraikin (that's the correct spelling now). He brought pics of his family and all the missionaries he's seen in his life.  The missionaries used to live with his family when he was young.  After, we had a lesson with a guy, Mike, I street contracted a few weeks ago. We called him up when a lesson fell through and asked if we could meet with him in about an hour, and he said sure!   So we met him by the WTC here and after we taught him, he accepted a soft invite for baptism.  That means, if he receives an answer, he'll be baptized.  President really pushed us to do that at our first lesson so we did it in every lesson this week and most accepted!  So, after Mike we made our way to a mangez-vous (dinner appt) with the DeLigne Family.  They are an awesome young member family. They are Belge, so fun, and they speak beautiful French.   We hope to be able to show people the difference it makes teaching someone in their home verses a non-member's home. The bad news of the day, but also good news, was that our mission conference was canceled due to Paris getting another stake. Elder Oaks will do the reorganization while he is here.  So, the words by President Kimball in 1976, "one day France will be covered with many Stakes", is coming true in the next few weeks. Yes, French people are ready for the gospel, and yes we are a baptizing mission.  Let's cut down the stereotypes of our missions, wherever we go because people are ready everywhere, even in France and Belgium.

Friday was another great day and started off as every day the last four weeks with a run at 6:30. It's a nice way to start the day!  We were able to go give a blessing to a member's friend.  I hope I don't ever have to go to a European hospital, but the spirit was so strong during the blessing.   The lady was so thankful and I did the annointing in French.  Woah!  We had a great lesson with Kingsley and Marsella and they had both read in the Book of Mormon.  I just love everyone we are teaching!  Saturday we had an early lunch.  We had a Burrito Fete with home made tortillas!   Delicious! we got frudged (stood up) a few times so we went porting for about 4 or 5 hours for the day. Nobody let us in so we went home for dinner. Our last lesson of the day with a less active member who was not home when we got there.  We had about 10 minutes till the bus came and we decided to keep porting. At the third door a women invited us in!   What was happening?   We went in and it was a young family from Brazil with a 5 month old son.  We talked for a while and they invited us back.  I can't wait to teach them again this week!

Yesterday was amazing!  After a rough morning with no investigators at church and being quite hungry, we had a lesson with Bithos. He's the one who has a published book coming out soon. Though his wife didn't want to listen, he was asking questions like, "What do I need to do, to be baptized?"   Well, we can help you with that! He accepted the soft invite and has read a lot of the Book Of Mormon.  Hopefully, this week we can get a date for a baptism.   We had one of the priests from the ward with us.  His name is Kevin and he was awesome.  After, we went home we broke our fast and ate lots of mac and cheese, blt's, and peanut butter bars we made for Sylvestre for his birthday.  After our huge meal, we went to Sylvestre's and gave him our treat!  We were relieved that the table wasn't set because we were so full and they always want to feed us but then he said, "Will you please eat dinner with us?"  Of course, we said yes but we were looking at each other like "oh no!"  We ate a authentic Ukranian/Russian meal and it was good, even though we were stuffed.  We taught about the Plan of Salvation.  The spirit was so strong and he kept saying, "I want that for my family!"  He started tearing up- it was amazing. There are still a few things to work out, like marriage, but they will be baptized!  We love them so much and when we said, "we have to leave", he asked if we could be friends on Facebook and skype. We said, "of course!"   On the way home we received a call form the Relief Society President in Genk.  That is where Nosa lives. She was calling to ask questions about Nosa and how they could help with food, or needs. I can now see how amazing that Branch is and I know we made the right decision to wait to have Nosa baptized after he moved. This coming Sunday Nosa will be baptized and we are hoping we will get permission to go to it in Leuuvan (spelling is questionable). It made us so happy and was the best way to end the week!

I'm so thankful to be here and have these amazing experiences!  My testimony is growing so much and I know this church is true! I'm so thankful for all of you in my life!   Until next week! I hope you have a great week and Au Revoir!

Love- Elder Player!!!!

Random Fact - They don't refrigerate eggs or milk here.  I don't know how that is possible but it's what they do and it seems to work!

Our African boubous - very colorful!

Kevin, a priest in our ward, and me!

End of the World Conference

This week has been another great week here in Brussels.  We had some fun and interesting things happen.

Last Monday after emailing and shopping we made our way to the Atonium.  It's so close and we wanted to get some pictures.  We had our usual frites (fries) and got patches at the Grand Place.  A lot of missionaries get patches in each of their areas they serve in.

Tuesday we had our usual couple of "no shows" but we had a great district meeting.  During the meeting a family we ported on exchanges a couple of weeks ago called and asked if we could meet with them later that evening.  They are the Sonal family and have 2 children.  They are interested in finding a church that is family friendly.  I think we fit into that category.  We learned that Henri, the dad, has a PhD in BioChem and works in Chicago doing research.  He is here in Brussels most of the time and they all speak French, Dutch and English.  We are hoping to teach them again this week and they said they would read in the Book of Mormon's we gave them.  After that we went and taught another family we met just walking to the metro last week.  They have 2 children that are super cute and are from Romania.  They speak French but were so excited when we said we could get them a Book of Mormon in Romanian.  They seem super interested and were awesome to teach.  Their children are 3 and 8 months old.  We taught them again on Saturday and they had us skype his dad who lives in the Ukraine because he liked Moroni 10:3-5 so much.

   Behold, I would exhort you that when ye shall read these things, if it be wisdom in God that ye should read them, that ye would remember how merciful the Lord hath been unto the children of men, from the creation of Adam even down until the time that ye shall receive these things, and ponder it in your hearts.  And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.  And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things.

I love that scripture!  we finished the night by teaching Kingsley and Marsella.  We got to know them better and found out that Kingsley is actually a prince because his father is a king in Africa.  We asked him how many people he was a king over and he said about 100,000.  Pretty impressive!  We came home and baked a cake out of a cake mix that Elder Davis was sent for his birthday.  We made frosting out of nutella, speculos and chocolate frosting.  Not very healthy but delicious.

Wednesday we decided to try something different to reach people.  We put on our street clothes and offered to do service.  We knocked on doors and said, "We are here as missionaries for our church and are here to give service."  We explained it was free.  We thought people would jump on that, but not so many.  One lady, named Jozey, took us up on it.  She was older and a widow.  She had started to paint the back of her patio but never finished it.  We spent three hours and finished it up.  She was so happy.  She didn't even know our names but hopefully she will look at the contact card we left on the table.  You never know.  After a day of "knocking and talking" we had dinner with the Curtis family.  They have such smart children and it's so fun to be around a young family.  Best of all, we ate well!

Thursday was a bit tough but we made it fun.  During lunch we had a balloon from Elder Davis' birthday box. We made a big water balloon.  It was great and, don't worry, nobody was injured!  After a long day we had a miracle.  I called Nosa to check up on him and he told us he has a baptismal date for next Sunday!!!  We were so happy and left that night to do street contacting with a lot of energy.

Friday we went to lunch with Frere Fracken again.  We had tons of food...salad, main course, dessert and a drink.  He insists and always has good stories to share.  He even gave us advice on marriage.  We had a lesson that night with a family in the ward that is preparing to go to the temple.  We did a family home evening with them and made chocolate chip cookies.  We talked a bout temples and sang.  It was super fun and I've never seen two dozen cookies disappear so fast!  I cut my own hair again (something I said I would never do) and I didn't butcher it, phew!

The weekend was good and quite entertaining.  Saturday we were invited to a conference for the "end of the world" by a friend.  Hoping he'd come to church we went to his conference.  It was at a very nice hotel.  Upon arrival they escorted us up to the front.  10 priests from different countries spoke and took questions at the end.  We were the only two white people there.  During intermission they asked up to speak about what our church believed.  They loved that we came to their conference.  On Sunday, the Sylvestre family came to church and Kingsley and Marsella.  It was a great meeting and after, Sylvestre asked if we could teach them again really soon!  He brought his nephew that is 22 and we are going to start teaching him too. We had dinner with the Glover family.  It is always fun to hear their stories about their missions and how they met.  He's an accountant at Deloitte so I had fun asking questions about that.

This week we have our zone conference.  Tonight we have interviews with President and Soeur Poznanski with zone conference on Tuesday.  It should be a great week with vacances (vacations) ending and our new families we are teaching.  I know we will see more miracles happen.  I'm so grateful for all you and all that you do for me.  Thanks for your example and support.  I hope you all have a great week, whether at Snowbird, school or at work!

Love...
Elder Player

The Grand Place

The Atonium

Elder Wilson and Elder Wood with our
birthday balloon!

End of the World Conference
Our Amis and a Priest

Week 14 - Vacance, Members and 3 Month Mark

Bonjour Toute le Monde...

Another week in Bruxelles and my 3 month mark.  We heard a lot of, "We'll be back in a couple of weeks?" but it's still great to be a missionary!

After shopping last Monday we went to a row of high end shops.  Tiffany's, Louis Vuitton, Hugo Boss, etc. It was crazy, since we couldn't afford any of it, but they treated us like we could, which was fun.  We grabbed a Kebap on our way home with some frites and were off teaching for the night.  We taught the Johnson family.  Once again he had food for us, even though we know they can't afford it.  He had been in the hospital earlier that day but was still taking care of us.  Amazing!  With our durums and soda we were off to our next lesson with Kingsley and Marsella.  We used a story from the Ensign about going forward with faith even when you might not receive an answer.  Heavenly Father will always step in and guide us when we most need it.  They liked it and realized that they need to move forward with faith and do their part.  That was great to hear.

Tuesday we had a lesson with Bithos, who has a book that is coming out in a few weeks, titled, "Le Dieu de Mon Pere".  (The God of my father)  He was really interested and has 3 children who are on vacation.  He took a Book of Mormon and when we talked to him later this week he said he'd read a lot of it and had questions.  Hopefully, we'll talk to him more this week!  We had the usual tombes vour, or fall through appointments, but we had dinner with the Hatch Family that made up for it.  Brother Hatch works for Nato and is the controller for the national missile defense sector for America - Ya, crazy!  As we were driving from the metro to his house he asked, "Have you been here before?"  We replied, "No."  He told us he lived in a chateaux.  It was amazing!  It has a lake, private road and lots of property.  The government owns it and they live in it.  Sounds like a good deal to me!

Wednesday we received a call and were asked to go give a blessing to Brother Johnson.  He still wasn't feeling good and they were leaving for Switzerland that night.  I gave my first blessing and it was awesome! I'm so thankful for the priesthood and the power it has.  After that, we went contacting with a priest in the ward.  His name is Raphael Wendo and he is 16.  Both of our appointments had fallen through so we knocked on doors.  Kurt, another priest went out with us this week too.  The priests here are awesome and we hope we can help them want to serve missions.  Who knows how many lives these 2 missionaries will change.

Thursday was quite uneventful and everything fell through.  People here go on vacance until the middle of September so it's hard to catch them home.  We had an awesome district meeting about acting on promptings of the spirit.  Never question if you get a feeling to talk to someone.  We've been working on that this week!  On our way home, the bus got stuck in traffic because of a car accident.  We ended up walking back and it took about an hour.  Thank heavens it wasn't raining.

Friday was our first time with Frere Fracken.  Frere Fracken is a member and a retired Belgian marine.  He lost his arm in a helicopter accident.  He's taking us out to lunch every week and always has some great stories to tell.  The rest of the day was contacting and then a lesson with Kingsley and Marsella.

Saturday and Sunday involved a church tour, dinner with a member family and two referrals from them for family in Paris and London.  We gave a Book of Mormon to her.  They fed us a great dinner of fried rice with squid, fish and something else I couldn't identify.  It was amazing.  Church was great and I've come to realize what an awesome ward we have.  It's different, having two plus languages, but everyone is great and the families are so fun to be around.

Elder Davis and I have watched people carefully this week and have asked, "Do these people look happy?"
It's sad to see that many of them do not.  I know the gospel can give you that happiness and light in your eyes.  The gospel is so amazing and I'm so grateful to have it in my life!

Today we are off to see the Royal Palace and next week we are planning on going to a chocolate factory. Thanks you all for your letters and emails.  I love hearing what's going on in your lives.

Some quick facts...
$5.06 for a gallon of gas
We can shop for a week for four of us on 80 Euros ($107)
McDonalds and Quick are the only fast food places here

Till next week...

Love, Elder Player

The Hatch Family Chateau

BMW of Brussels

Frere Fracken and me - he takes us to lunch every week!

Raphel, Elder Davis and me with our BOM's.
He's a 16 year old priest in our ward

Bruxelles, Eiffel Tower and Lessons in a Day!

Last Monday we went to see Auto World.  It was awesome and had cars from the beginning of time, including the chariot that took Napoleon to his wedding, to current day Lamborghinis.  As we were leaving the car show we heard someone yell, "Elders!"  We turned around and it was a couple from Canada doing a European Tour.  They were in Brussels for the day and were members and wanted to talk to us.  We had a nice visit and said goodbye.  After we started to walk away he called again and said. "Go buy something on us today!"  He gave us a 50 euro note.  That made our day and is honestly a miracle over here from what we've heard!  We had a nice lunch at a cafe, it paid for the car show and bought us lunch in Paris on Friday.  Sweet!!!!

Our 50 Euro note from the Canadian Couple

Arc de Trimophe

Eiffel Tower in Paris

The Seine River

Lamborghinis

Tuesday we decided to try some new finding ways so we went hospital hopping.  We went around to different hospitals to see if we could put our name on a list for someone who wanted a blessing or religious help.  I guess nobody does that here but it was still a good experience and now we know where the nice hospitals are!  We came upon the Royal Palace while traveling and the "5th Avenue of Brussels" so that's what we'll check out next Monday.  That night we had 3 lessons and a dinner appointment with the Vulz family from Germany.  It was delicious!  Our last appointment was with Tereza, who cleans Bogaerts house, and we got to meet her husband!  They live in a very nice place and her husband, Vincent, is a policeman here.  We left them with the Book of Mormon and said we'd come back and talk more about how we received this book.  They said yes that they would start reading and to come back Saturday night for dinner.  Oh ya, we jumped at that!

Wednesday was raining all day.  We've learned that when that happens people don't go outside except us. All of our African investigators go into hibernation and cancel appointments too.  Not sure why but it happens every time it rains.  We had an awesome lesson that night with a man who we talked to on the Metro.  Emmanuel is married with 3 kids.  The discussion was going great and then while talking about the role of Jesus Christ  I thought I was saying, "he was born for us"  but I guess I said "Jesus was naked for us!" Quite embarrassing but we all laughed and moved on quickly.

Thursday was DMP meeting and we met with Kingsley and Marsella.  They're great but just aren't doing anything to get married or find an apartment.  It's disappointing because we can't keep teaching them if they stop progressing.  We're praying for them every day!

Friday was very exciting!  We had to go back to Paris to get the correct stamp to validate my Visa.  We weren't sure how long it would take so we got tickets to get there about 9:30 and come back to Brussels at 4:30.  We woke up and had our run around the park and then were off.  We made excellent time and were done by 11:00 with the Visa so we had time to see the Eiffel Tower and some of Paris.  First we went to the Eiffel Tower, which did not disappoint, and I was super excited to see!  It is so big!  We left right before the bomb threat, when they had to evacuate everyone, so we were lucky!  We made our way to the Royal Palais that is by the big opera and has views of the Eiffel Tower.  We walked down the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe.  They have an eight lane roundabout that was crazy - it's an accident waiting to happen.  The Champs Elysees has some of the biggest brand names in the world so we did some window shopping.  It was awesome and Elder Davis even got some cologne for his birthday.  We made our way back to the train station.  We got a sandwich and chocolate croissant and headed for home.  That night we had a lesson with Nicholas and Patience and their daughter.  They had lots of questions but laughed at the Joseph Smith story.  It broke our hearts but we bore our testimony's and I think it's the strongest testimony I've ever born.  I said simply, "If you read this book you can know it's true!"  They accepted to read and I really think they will receive an answer.  It was great!  So in 16 hours we were in two countries, I became legal, we saw some of Paris and taught a lesson.  Great Day!

Saturday included teaching Bogaert and watching the restoration  on his Big Screen TV, that was huge and had surround sound.  It really got the point across!  That night we had our dinner appointment with Tereza and Vincent.  They had a relative over, Marsel, who is 93 years old, hard of hearing and reminded me of, my friend, Sue Smith.  I loved talking to her and it was good practice for my French.  Tereza made us a delicious meal with chicken and mushrooms, rice, stuffed tomatoes, potato and bacon mini quiches and chocolate mouse for dessert.  We talked with them and found out they had started reading the Book of Mormon.  We set up another appointment and I can hardly wait to talk to them again.  We had a party for Elder Davis that included light, glow sticks and delicious cake.  Elder Davis turned 20 - he's getting up there!

He's an awesome companion and we get along great.  We are going to make the most of this transfer because who knows what will happen next transfer.

I love and miss you all and hope you have a great week!  The church is true and remember - You can always count on the Lord!

The Champs Elysees

Till next week...
Love, Elder Player

Week 12...Porting, Exchanges and Transfers start NOW!

Hope you've had a good week back in Salt Lake and other places around the world!  It's been a good week here in Belgium.  Today marks the beginning of transfer day so everybody here is on the the computers waiting to get the new list of changes.  I'm pretty sure I'll be staying here unless something crazy happens.  I'll let you know!

After emailing last Monday we went grocery shopping.  It was like a game show.  Two of the Elders were out of money and the other two had about 30 Euros between them.  We got out our calculator and added up every single item as we put it in the cart.  We almost spent the exact amount we had to the centimes.  It was actually quite fun and definitely made you realize you are poor when there is a 5th Monday in the month. After we went shopping, I got a short sleeve shirt for a great price,  we went to Leonidas for chocolate. They wear white gloves and wrap it up and everything.  If you are ever in Belgium be sure to come to Leonidas.  Be sure to ask for chocolate with no coffee or alcohol because that's pretty common here.

Tuesday we had district meeting and since we had a few extra minutes we watched a Mormon Message called, "Mountains to Climb".  Pretty amazing.  Take a minute and watch it.  It shows how the Gospel helps us in times of trial and is always there when we need help!  After district meeting we went porting.  It was a rainy day and we were hoping some kind soul would invite us in but sadly that didn't happen.  We taught Kingsley and Marsella and they are great as usual.  Then, that night the first exchange started.  I was with Elder Wilson for all of Wednesday and it was great!  All of our appointments fell through but we had fun contacting.  Since it was  "my day" I got to set the pace.  On the tram to a passback I saw some houses and said I wanted to go there after passback.  Not sure why, but I did.  After the passback we stopped there and the first door we knocked on was a family.  Dad from Chicago, Mom from Belgium and two kids. Sweet!  We are hoping to see them this week and teach them because they were super excited and had seen stuff on TV about us.  It was almost time to go but I saw a door with some Christmas stuff in the window.  I thought it'd be a family so I said, "We've got to go to that door!"  It wan't a family but a sweet older lady named Madame Dubois.  She has been asking herself questions that relate to the Plan of Salvation so that was awesome!

Thursday we had another exchange and this time I was with Elder Wood.  We met some cool people and did lots of contacting.  I love to see how other missionaries work and you get to know other missionaries too so it's great!

Friday, Elder Davis and I were back together as an equipe.  It was a pretty normal day.  We taught Emerson and Nosa called to tell us his wife had her baby and was doing well.  He should have a baptismal date in the next month!

Saturday and Sunday involved lots of contacting and porting but you never know who you'll meet or talk to. We were grateful yesterday was fast Sunday, not only to fast, but because we were out of food.  We had 87 contacts that we've talked to with potentials so our goal was to get 13 more on Sunday.  That was a lot, but we did it with finding four numbers we hadn't put in the phone yet.  We met some really awesome people to teach his week too.  I'll be going to Paris this week to get my stamp so hopefully I'll get to take an Eiffel Tower picture.

The work here is going great and I love being here and learning from others.  It's Elder Davis' birthday next Sunday we we're going to have quite the party Sunday night.  Today we're going to the car expo to see Lamborghini's and probably some frites (fries) and a gaufre (waffle).  I love to hear from you and know what's going on there so keep writing!!  Thanks for all your love and support!

Till next week...

This is our district.  The numbers indicate how many transfers!
There are a total of 16 transfer days during your mission!