Now let me tell you about my mission, I am in the Confederation Park area, which is east of Down Town Calgary. My mission has the more cars than any other mission in the world. But we get to share one with another area!!!! Which means we get to walk next week. But I'm Ok, I am excited to start street contacting. I am the second transfer after they just purged the area. Which means they pull out all missionaries here and replace them with completely new ones. So the work is kind of in it's beginning stages.
Now about the work. To be honest, it is really tough here. There are a lot of other faiths here, and people seem to confuse us with Jehovah Witnesses. (already been in a bible bash with one) And there is also a lot of anti Mormon websites and books that get passed around up here. So that's a real problem. The average is about two baptisms for each missionary. In this area a lot of the investigators are very flakey, they often will show some interest and then not come to appointments or don't answer our calls. That is because a lot of them already have other faiths. And this place is so diverse. There is an Asian restarunt on every corner, and none of our investigators are white. So as you can imagine the language barrier is a real problem here as well. And I'm sorry, re reading that sounds kinda negative. But I am positive. I can't wait to work this week.
Anyway, just wanted to leave you on a positive note. So one thing we do here frequently is a lot of stop by visits because we have a lot of part member families. As we were leaving one we walked past this little boy and girl who were walking their dog. We say hi, and start to walk away and the boy (probably around 7) says wait are you missionaries! And we say yes. Anyway they knew us because they go to church with their grandma but what struck me was what he said as we were leaving. As we say by and start to walk away he turns and asks us a question. He said "do people say mean things about your church?" And we kinda look at him and said yeah, unfortunately. But everyone, the amazing part was what he said next. He says " I know, it is because they don't believe in Christ. But don't worry, we do." Now I know it is simple, but what he said was pretty powerful. That little boy bore his testimony in the very face of opposition. And it wasn't anything special but the simplicity of him saying that he believes in Christ regardless of what others say can help us. That simple belief is all we need, it is how we build and how we grow. We have to have faith in Christ because I know that he loves us and can help us with anything we are going through. And I mean anything. I love this Gospel and am so happy to be here serving the lord. I only hope I can give that same hope to others here in Canada.
In a letter to Dad: The flight was ok. The cool part was flying into Seattle. It was sunny, believe it or not, and we flew right over downtown and turned so we got a great look at the space needle and surrounding things. I didn't have my camera out though. Plane was empty, like almost only missionaries. My companion is Elder M from Springville, Utah. He has been out for 18 months. There are a lot of missionaries here from Utah.
I love my mission president. When we talked he asked what I loved to do. I said skiing, flyfishing and stuff along those lines and he says, "Elder Ollis, I love those things too." He is a cool president and only wants us to be successful. Only problem is he is a hardcore Utah Fan. :) The interview went well I think. He asked me if I had a goal of baptisms. I said, "that isn't why I came on a mission, I came to build Zion." But mostly it was a kind-of get to know you interview.
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