Footprints in Finland: #75 Zone conference/Splits in Oulu

This email is already long enough so we will just jump right into it Haha.

Tuesday night we traveled up to Oulu for good ole Zone Conference. When we got there Elder Koch and the Kokkola elders and us went to the church to set up chairs and tables for the conference. It didn't take too long...so we headed back to the apartment to meet the rest of the elders and had some rootbeer floats and were just chatting. It was a ton of fun getting to see some elders again. We chatted and then we got a text from our friend John in Vaasa who is our Northern Lights guy. He texted us that the lights were out and sent us some pictures. They looked way cool in the photo but we could not see anything from Oulu so that was a bummer. Those guys are tricky to catch:)) And of course we kept up the Vaasa-Ptown tradition of sleeping outside on the parveke. And wow I had the best night's sleep out there. I was so comfortable and didn't die of heat cause well we were outside... but it was great.

Wednesday we got up and had the usual zone conference breakfast... burritos... and got ready and went to the church for zone conference. It was good having your Brozone back together+the Oulu sisters. The Tampere STLs were there as well cause the STLs always come up to have splits with the only sisters in the north. Therefore the Brozone. But it was a way good zone conference. Talked a lot about the new handbook and policies since in the new handbook it's not as detailed as to what we can and can not do. So that was pretty much talked about the whole time and we did some role plays for contacting people and getting them privacy notices and working on new ways to contact people. We found out we also have time now to work on family history... but not really sure what to do with that half hour they give us... cause I know nothing about it:). After zone conference we took photos and chatted with all the missionaries while we waited for the trains. That is probably the best ,cause you get to see and talk to other missionaries the whole day Haha. But we had splits with the zone leaders after so our time of seeing missionaries was not over:)). After zone conference we went to De Max with the zone leaders, the Tampere STLS and the Oulu sisters. When we sat down after ordering I was listening to the music... cause it's like normal people music and I kept thinking to myself "wow this sounds like country" and then "wow this sounds like Florida Georgia Line but I couldn't tell cause I didn't know the song"...well after a few seconds of thinking I put it together that it was indeed country music. Of all places in Finland this place played country and I believe it was all the new stuff as well.. but I don't know. Now maybe you have heard the song I believe it's called 10,000 Hours by Dan and Shay ft. Justin Bieber. Well that's a song I heard about and some place heard the very beginning of it and then got away cause i didn't want to spoil the song. I told myself I will wait till I get home to fully enjoy it and also not be frustrated that I can't remember the words. So as long as they didn't play it I'll be good. Not even kidding you... the next song was that song. I immediately went into a panic and plugged my ears cause I told myself i will listen to it at home to fully enjoy it. Well let's say those like 3 minutes were the absolute worst cause I wanted to listen but I made it. So now I can enjoy that song for the first time, on a good speaker, and I can also binge all the other music I've missed right after:)) You may think I'm weird for doing it and I most definitely am but it was worth it. Well after that rant we had some good pizza and went out for a contacting activity in the center. Got a few potentials from it and had some good conversations with people. Then we headed home and played a lot of UNO and chatted and told stories. And then us and the zone leaders spent the night on the parveke as well and yet again I had another great nights sleep and this one was better than the night before.

Thursday was a way busy day. So we got up and did studies and then me and Elder Murtonen got ready for a run cause we were going with a less active member running and Elder Koch and Roylance were going to the university to do some contacting. So we met this member and he's from The Isle of Man. That sounds pretty sick if you ask me. But we started our adventure of 10 kilometers. Probably the fastest I've run in one go since high school... so it's been a minute. We had a great run... talking about work, the marathons he's run, Finnish history and lots of other stuff. We were running in neighborhoods, by a lake, in the woods... it was pretty sick. It was also cold enough to where our home boy started getting some good sized icicles hanging from his beard. I was lowkey jealous that I didn't have any icicles. But I don't have a beard so what do you do? But we had a great run and met the other elders back at his apartment where he cooked for us. He's a chef here in Finland so we knew we were getting good food. He made this thing he called Eggy bread and this bacon mushroom thing. Now I'm not a big mushroom guy. Like at all. And this guy took these huge mushrooms and only cut them into fourths. But I tried it and wow I was impressed. If everyone could cook mushrooms properly like he did.. wow everyone would eat mushrooms. It was wayyy good! He was a way cool guy and also believed that Bacon can solve the world's problems. Especially in the middle east. I'll let you figure that one out. But we headed back so we could get cleaned up and do some studies. We read in Swedish for language study and it was the funniest thing listening to Elder Koch read Swedish with a German accent Haha. He lived in Germany for a few years before the mission but is from the states. Elder Murtonen was really good but he's a Finn so he kinda already knows it Haha. But then elder Murtonen went to a lesson and wow that guy spoke some crazy hardcore spoken Finnish so it was a bit hard to follow. Good thing Elder Murtonen is a Finn himself so the language is obviously not a problem for him Haha. But this guy was jumping around from the Qur'an to the Ark of the Covenant in the bible and all over the place. But still a good lesson. The we rushed back to make some quick tacos and get to our train. And that night we just traveled back to Jakobstad and that was our night. Funny story from the day the guy we went running with.. he said "Elder Love, you ever considered being a doctor? Cause your name just fits it perfectly Dr. Love" I was proud of the attempt but I was really looking for something original..... but it seems even on this side of the world the jokes are the same haha.

Friday was a pretty quick day. We were gonna go tracting in the morning but instead it was a bike maintenance morning cause Elder Roylances front wheel got stuck again and wouldn't move. So that took away our morning and then we moved to lunch and studies and then began weekly planning. So bam we were already into the night and we went to do some follow up and then went to the first sähly night for the branch. That was pretty much out whole day.

Saturday we got out and had a good tracting block in the morning. We talked to a Jehovah's Witness who was very nice to us and we chatted for a little bit. But a good morning. We came back for some good ol lunch and then did our studies and prepped for some lessons we had scheduled that day. We went to meet with our friend Thure. We taught him about the plan of salvation. It went really good. He was way surprised to hear about the kingdoms of glory and when we taught him about the Telestial kingdom he said "that place is going to be packed" so that was pretty funny and we had a good time with him. He told us it's gonna take him a while to understand it cause for 58 years he's been only believing in heaven and hell. After our lesson with him we went to get some dinner and then go teach our friends Tom and Niina. They no longer have a baptismal date. We are gonna need a lot more time working with them. But our lesson with them did not go through but we went to do some more follow up. We tracted the night out and studied some good ol Swedish when we came home.

Sunday was a good day. We woke up to some more snow which surprised us. We actually got quite a bit so that was fun. But church was fun. Our friends Thure and Jenni came. And we had a good chat in Priesthood about Elder Oaks talk from conference. Then we went home and studied and went to teach a less active member. And wow this guy drives me nuts sometimes. How are you supposed to teach a guy who is so throughly convinced that he doesn't exist. And he also let on that fact that he doesn't belive that this existence he is living in isn't real either. But we talked about patriarchal blessings with him and it went surprisingly well. And that took a long time but we came home and had a pizza. And then went out and visited some members and dropped off some pamphlets for them to cause they are bomb member missionaries. And then studied some Swedish. So that was about our day.

Monday we had a good day. The morning was spent with our member Veli Lehtinen cause he's building a house.... so we were helping him and his son haul a ton of wood to his new place they are building. So that took a little time...but it was coming down with snow the whole time so we got a lot of snow on us as well... but it was way fun. They fed us lunch as well which was way nice of them. We did studies and went out tracting. Came back and made some burgers and I attempted to make onion rings from scratch. I would say for the first time trying it was not too shabby. I had to alter the recipe cause it was way bland but by the end they were pretty good. Just missing a few things but we will sweewhat happens with that when I try again haha. And then that night we put together a spiritual thought for the ward. So a busy and quick day.

It's been a pretty great week! We have gotten lots of snow as well so that's way exciting and also kinda crappy cause I suck at biking in deep snow that sits on a layer of ice Haha but it makes it fun.

Have a good week!

Elder Love out

1) Morning in Jakobstad....taken from their apartment

2) Austen on his way to Kokkola

3) "yummy smoothie"

4-6) Elders at the Oulu apartment....Austen sleeping outside on the covered patio

7-8) Pizza with the other missionaries in Oulu

9) Sunrise in Oulu

10) His 10km run

11) zone conf

12) The three of them had the same trainer

13)Austen:)