October 8, 2016: Visit to Bornholm

Kære Familie, October 9, 2016

We had an eventful week between our language lessons and our visit to Bornholm. We are on our way back to Copenhagen. We have an hour and 20-minute crossing of the Baltic Sea from Bornholm to Ystad, Sweden, and then another hour and 30-minute drive to our apartment. The crossing on the sea was a bit rough on the way out. Many people lost their breakfast and others just laid down on the seats to calm their roiling stomachs. Every seat was equipped with a vomit bag. It was so rough that you really couldn't get out of your seat to walk around. Reading or typing seemed to make it worse. So we both finally gave up trying to do anything and just laid back and closed our eyes. Unfortunately, we couldn't really enjoy the sea and the view that way. We had an 8:30 a.m. crossing on Saturday which meant that we left home about 6:30. But we arrived in Rønne, Bornholm at 10:00 so we had the whole day to explore. (The crossing going back home was much smoother.)

The Halls are the senior missionary couple on Bornholm. There are also two elders serving here. They live in the same apartment complex and do many things together, including nightly planning. Elder Hall is the branch president and the elders serve as his counselors. The Halls are from Rigby, ID and are a wonderful couple. They had an itinerary planned for our sight-seeing which was a lot of fun. It takes about an hour and a half to drive around the whole island. There were small villages, but also a lot of open spaces for farmland, dairy farms, and sheep. There was also forest areas near the coastline in many places. Bornholm was a bit of paradise. The day was cool and cloud-covered. We had sprinkles of rain on and off, but we didn't let it dampen our adventure. We saw very beautiful sandy beaches as well as majestic rocky beaches. The waves crashed over the rocks in great swells.

We saw a lot of fish smoke houses, so we stopped at one for lunch. We shared a plate full of different kinds of smoked fish. Now, lest Clayton stop reading now because he doesn't believe me, I have included pictures. I will say it wasn't the best lunch I have ever eaten, but it wasn't too bad. Dad, of course, liked it. The Halls were of my opinion. But we were on an adventure and we wanted to experience the culture. The salmon was the best. The other fish were two kinds of herring, a fish cake, and smoked shrimp. I thought I would like the shrimp--but after pulling the head off and seeing some fish eggs spill out, I lost my enthusiasm. I did eat a few, but they just tasted like smoke. After lunch we got some ice cream and bought some chocolate marshmallow balls at a chocolate factory for a treat later. That made up for lunch.

Bornholm has lots of old churches. These old churches have small well-kept cemeteries around them. The tombstones are pristine and look like they could have been placed yesterday. There are 4 round churches--these were the ones we visited. They date back to the 1100's and Viking days. We were only able to go inside 2 of the churches; the other two churches were closed. They were built for worship, but also for strongholds against enemies. The walls are 2 meters thick. In one church we climbed to the top of the church through a hidden staircase in the wall. The staircase was purposely built with uneven steps and got narrower near the top in order to slow the progress of any invaders. The chapels inside the church have seats in 'the round' and services are still held today. There are also old frescoes painted on the walls of the central column. There were two rune stones which are stone grave markers for old Viking warriors and religious leaders.

Our last stop was an ancient ruin called Hammershus. It is Scandinavia’s largest medieval fortification and was built in the 13th century. We walked around and explored this impressive structure. It is always fun to imagine what it was like when people actually lived here. It is undergoing some extensive renovation as the country is trying to preserve history. They are also building a huge visitor's center nearby that will explain the ruins. On one side of the castle was a huge ravine and looked like it could be a moat. On the other side was steep cliffs leading to the sea. We could wind our way down the cliff side, thanks to some stairs. There were large rocks in the sea, making it difficult to land a ship. We could totally picture the Swiss Family Robinson fight with the Pirates being filmed here.

We also drove to a spot on a beautiful beach where the elders baptized the most recent convert. It was a beautiful spot. Pretty cool to be baptized in the Baltic Sea. In the winter the baptisms are done at an indoor swimming pool. They have to rent the pool to assure that no one else is using it, and they have to do it early in the morning—6 a.m.

As for the ward, one lady brings her dog to church each week—he stayed in the basement during the services. The American woman played the piano; one of the YW led the music. Only one brother was needed to bless the sacrament, and another brother passed it. With only 18 of us at church, you can imagine that it doesn’t take long for the sacrament to be passed. Sacrament meeting is only 1 hour long and then we have combined RS/Priesthood meeting for the last hour. The RS and the Priesthood take turns giving the lesson. The American mom is the YW president—she has 2 girls and her 20-year old daughter is her counselor. They will be coming to Copenhagen later this month to spend three days at the temple doing baptisms. It is a stake activity, so I’m sure there are other activities planned. It is a big deal to come to the temple and doesn’t happen very often.

Sister Hall teaches Primary to the 10-year. They are doing their Primary program in 2 weeks. I wondered how they could possibly do this, but they are doing a lot of congregational singing, and Sister Hall will ask the young man specific questions about what they learned this year. Brother Hall and one of the missionaries are doing a violin/piano musical number of “If I Listen with My Heart.” Singing time is with the IPad. The young boy enjoys picking the songs they sing and following along with the pictures. She is helping him earn his Faith in God award which means learning the Articles of Faith. They are learning together—he has to pass each Article of Faith off with her and she has to pass it off (in Danish) to him. She doesn’t speak Danish either, but her husband helps her a lot with the pronunciation. They plan to take Danish lessons like we are.

The elders are having a wonderful experience as they learn the workings of a branch. One elder conducted the meeting. They are involved in counting the money, planning activities, and reactivation. None of their new converts were in church today so we didn’t get to meet them (one is in the hospital; one was sick). They have had 3 baptisms this year—very unusual. But hopefully they can grow the branch. It will be the only way to increase the numbers. There are more members, but many are inactive. The Halls try to visit the members. They are very positive and love the work they are doing. They were very gracious hosts and really made our visit fun. The members were so welcoming to us as well. The two elders translated our talks for us. We really put them to the test, but they did a great job. They said it is much easier to translate from Danish into English than the other way around. We were the only speakers.

The original plan was to leave for Bornholm on Friday afternoon, but when we booked our ferry tickets, the afternoon ferry was full. We could have gone earlier (8:30 a.m.), but we would have missed our language class. We didn’t see the sense of taking the late ferry which wouldn’t get us there until 10 p.m., so we just went on Saturday morning. We wanted to attend their ‘institute’ class on Friday night (which consists of two of the new converts, the 20-year-old girl and the two elders), but I’m sure we will get another chance to go and visit. Because we were home still on Friday, we were able to attend the stake’s production of “The Garden” by Michael McLean. All the music was translated into Danish, so we didn’t understand much, but we were impressed with the staging, the professional lights and sound. A few of our Young Adults were in it so we wanted to support them.

Well that is all for tonight. We have company coming tomorrow for three days. The Yates are coming to spend some time visiting Copenhagen. Their daughter and new granddaughter are coming for a visit. It is a surprise for Sister Yates whose birthday is a day before mine.

Kærlig hilsen, Mom

Kære Familie, Sunday, October 9, 2016

The weather has turned cold this week. We have dropped about 10 degrees a week it seems over a short period of time. It is dark by 6:30 and is getting light by 7:30. We have seen heavier coats, scarves and some gloves and hats on everyone riding bikes or walking. I have worn gloves while running in the morning and used my stocking cap one morning. It is really cute to see little kids bundled up and riding in the basket on the front of a bike as mom or dad peddles them to preschool. I also love to see small kids riding a very small bike next to a parent in the bike lanes. If they can do it, then why can’t we? (We don’t have bikes!)

On Wednesday, we walked to the Frederiksberg mall to buy me a winter coat and got one for mom instead. It is down filled and should be very warm. They did not have my size in the coat I wanted. We did buy 3 sweaters for me so I can have some layers and something to wear indoors against the chill of winter. I tried another store on Thursday but finally was able to purchase my winter down coat in the 3rd store I visited I Friday. It should be plenty warm and the question may end up being, do I need a 3rd coat for the in-between days, which may be the most frequent we experience. I guess we should model the coats and send a picture. They both have husky-like fur around the hood. I don’t think they would be liked in the states but the style is very popular here for both men and women. The fur around the hood unbuttons so I can remove it if I don’t like it. Mom looks very cute!

We had our first 3 Danish lessons this week at the Sprog Center. It takes us about 15 minutes to walk there. Our teacher is Annemette and she is very patient and kind. She speaks very clearly which is a wonderful help to us. The class had 11 students Monday, which was about a perfect size, but there are supposed to be 20 in all. Our classes are Mon, Thurs and Fridays from 8:45 to 12:15. Thursday and Friday we had 15 students I think. They give us 2 breaks of 20 min and 10 min so we will have 3 hrs. of actual class time. Based on this week's experience, the class will be very good for us. She emphasized pronunciation and though it seemed to move a little slow, she is warming us up. We worked on the alphabet pronunciation, and basic introductions of name, country and the language we spoke. She corrected several things I have been saying wrong for 4 months and the various sounds started to finally make sense as she gave us objects and pictures to go with the sounds.

The class is very international. We are the only Americans and the others are from Portugal, France, India, Germany, Costa Rico, Spain, Hungary, Argentina, Philippines. We connected a bit on the breaks with the other students, who are all much younger than us, so I think the overall experience will be great.

On the 2nd day, the teacher split mom and I up so we did not sit or work together. We just continued that trend on Friday and picked different seats so we could experience different partners, since we work a lot with the person sitting next to us. We are supposed to do some homework every night but it has been hard this week to get very much in. We are making some progress with pronunciation. She is teaching Copenhagenisq, so more of the words are slurred and run together. This has been a bit confusing as it is sometimes quite different than what Duo Lingo has been teaching us. Her explanations have made it easier to see why we sometimes understand some people much easier than others. Those from Jutland tend to pronounce every syllable and thus they will be more clear. It is in Copenhagen and on Sjælland that they slur things together a lot more. I would prefer to learn the "clean" way to speak but we will be picking up "bad" habits in this class and speaking like the natives from Copenhagen.

We had our 3rd Interview with President and Sister O'Bryant. They report that they hear good things from the stake about us. Their biggest concerns seemed to be whether we were enjoying our mission, finding the work satisfying and are we busy enough. No concerns on those scores. It is sort of nice, that with the senior missionaries, the focus is not on what we are doing, whether we are converting people, but rather on whether we are happy. Of course, it is understood that we are self-motivated and will be doing all we can to accomplish whatever it is that the spirit directs us to do.

Their spiritual training was about D&C 76 and those who will inherit the terrestrial kingdom. He read the parts about being valiant in our testimony of Jesus and said that he thinks that means taking advantage of the atonement in our lives by repenting and striving to be better every day. Being valiant means that we are honoring our baptismal covenants by obedience, taking upon us the name of Christ and always remembering him. If we are doing these things, then we are repenting as soon as we recognize a sin of omission or commission and we are using the sacrament as the means to cleanse ourselves. Hence, we are being valiant to covenants and our testimony of Christ and it is growing week by week.

The institute lesson this week was on eternal marriage and it generated quite a bit of discussion and there was an undercurrent of discontent with temple marriage. Some of the youth expressed that getting ready for a temple marriage was too hard and that getting married civically first made more sense in many cases. It could also be a testing period for success and compatibility if marriage was approached that way. They have seen and experienced too many divorces and it has cankered their thinking and urges to get married at all. The missionaries were translating for us (never a totally 100% capture of what is being said and sometimes quite watered down) but we were both getting quite anxious about the comments being made. Mom spoke up once and tried to correct some thinking and then when the lesson was wrapping up, I requested 5 min for some more discussion. I felt impressed to go back to the plan of salvation with a quick drawing of the pre-existence, earth, and the 3 degrees of glory, with exaltation as eternal families only existing in the highest degree of the celestial kingdom. My challenge to them was that they were valiant in their first estate, they have been saved to live in this, the last dispensation, and prepare the world for the second coming of Christ. They made covenants in the preexistence and here on earth to be faithful and obedient. Why would they risk all of this by not preparing themselves and searching put an eternal companion that would be their equal, so that they could go forward together towards their goal, the very object of our Father's plan for our eternal exaltation? I also urged them not to make it too complicated and to not put off the effort too long. They needed to date often and to marry their best friend; someone who would lift them occasionally and vice versa, so that 1+1 would be greater than 2 as they were better together than either of them could be apart. I then mentioned how wonderful mom is and that we have faced many problems together and I was so grateful that I had a partner to share the experiences with. Life is so much easier when you are equally yoked and can invite the spirit of the Lord into your marriage and your life. I think I got a little passionate and I hope I was not too strong but I tried to make the case for God's vision of eternal marriage and that they were very blessed to have that knowledge as they approach the most important decision they will ever make.

During refreshment time, a couple of the youth thanked me for jumping in with a better perspective of what a wonderful marriage could mean for them, so I am hopeful that it helped them. The lesson was taught by the sister teacher and I think she did a good job, but I suspect that Brother Andersen would not have let the discussion wander in the direction that it did. I don’t really know, but I got the feeling that the teacher’s marriage has not always been rock solid so I don’t think she was teaching from the perspective of a strong foundation built on a rock.

Have a great week. All my love. Dad.