Baby... you're a firework.

Yesterday we had official stuff to do in Budapest... and by we, I mean my companion.  We didn't get back in a timely manner so look.  Emailing on Tuesday again. I promise my PDay is still Monday.

I don't feel like I have much to say... so maybe I will express my week through pictures.

  

While I was in Budapest, I got to play tourist.  The sister that I was with is in her 5th transfer, so no one had to translate anything, we just walked and talked and if someone talked to us, we replied.  This is me being Katy Perry.  You can kind of see the lions that she walks by in her Firework video... and you can kind of see the castle...  And I am a firework.

But, don't be afraid mama, I am still doing missionary work, and I am somehow working cats into it!!

That baby kitten was  born on May 1.  So tiny.  They have three of them.  They haven't named them yet.  I told them they should name them fekete, fekete, and fekete.  (Google translate that one.  I am so funny.)    But that is our newest little investigator.  His name is Robi and I just love him!  He makes fun of us for not speaking Hungarian very well, but he gives  the best high fives of anyone I know, and he promised to pray on Thursday!  He is really sweet.  Yeah.  I am really excited to work with him and his family.  And their cats :)

I  am loving Szeged, but I will be honest when I say there are some serious ups and downs.  My companion had the great idea of fasting today, and I thought, I love eating, and I went for it.  I will admit, I am SOOOO thirsty.  Speaking Hungarian all day on the street and all day in programs sure does make one thirsty.  And we sang a lot today now that I think about it..  (Took the ukulele to a program.  It was a big hit.)  But, once again, fasting strikes again!  I have seen God's hand so much today, and I have felt His power behind the words that I am saying.  New missionaries are always right, we just have to be brave enough to run along with their crazy ideas sometimes :)

I keep having old guy hit on me, and I hate that, so if  there are any ideas how I get uglier or be less cool (which I am on slightly cool right now... so i don't want to loose all of that) I would be super interested in hearing about it.  The advice I have gotten thus far hasn't been productive.

Big shout out to Elder Robbins, who finishes his mission tomorrow.  Scary!  If anyone sees him, tell him I say hi.

Oh.  I reached my 11 mark yes
terday.  Scary.

Sok szeretettel,

Kennedy nővér

Turns out I ate brain this week.

Dear family,

Hi!  So, turns out there was a holiday yesterday... so we had to wait until today to email.  Look at this huge cotton candy I got yesterday!!  There is a big ol' festival going on in Szeged this week, and so we got to kind of check everything out.  It is a wine festival... so when I said we checked everything out, I mean we only checked out the food.  Look at this cotton candy that is bigger than my torso!!  I bought the small.  It was like... 1.75 american dollars.  I love Hungary.  She made it over a flame too.  Who needs electricity?

This is me and Sister Maxfield, loving life as always.  Our apartment is kind of interesting.  We sleep in a loft.  This is us sitting on the couch in my closet.  Still have fears of writing couch and coach wrong.  Turns out that doesnt go away with time.  But I love Sister Maxfield.  She is a super hard worker.  She got called like two months before she was supposed to enter the MTC and they asked her to go on in TWO WEEKS!  She quit her job and came, and now we are having the best time in the whole world.  Working hard... or hardly working.  Just kidding.  We work al the time.  We are exhausted all the time.  That is why I look so tired ALL THE TIME NOW.  People always ask if I am tired... awesome...

Yeah, so let's get to the important things.  I ate brain.  We went to this restaurant after District Meeting with like, eight other missionaries.  One of them goes home next transfer, two more the transfer after that, so I just ordered what they all got, because it was cheap, and they speak Hungarian so they know what is good.  Right?  Wrong.  We got this super big bowl of yummy tomato soup and some rice, and some deep fried something.  It was like a cordon bleu, only in the fact it was breaded and fried, and then it was a meat, and then it had something inside.  I thought it was like ground liver and insides.  I didn't love it, so I didn't finish it.  One Elder started talking about how it looked like brain, and we just laughed.  Ha.  Who would order brain at a restaurant?  Answer.  10 silly missionaries that don't speak Hungarian.  We got the phone call a couple hours later after someone looked it up in the dictionary.  Awesome.  Hope I don't get some weird disease.  But so far, so good.

We are meeting with some incredible people.  We have had a lot of success using the area book and talking to people on the street.  I will tell you about two awesome people we are meeting with.  One guy met with the missionaries clear back in 2008, and one of my MTC teachers met with him.  Crazy.  He has had three strokes, and he is only able to communicate with us through blinking.  It is really hard, and I have to think SOOOO hard about speaking Hungarian, because I really want him to understand.  His wife isn't a member, and has never met with the missionaries, but we are really trying to help her around the house and all that jazz.

Welp.  Turns out this email didn't send last week... sorry.

Sok szeretettel,

Kennedy nővér

Happy Mother's Day!

Dear family,

What a crazy week it has been!  We will start with the important stuff.  I opened a city with my new companion... SISTER MAXFIELD!  I love her, and we get along like peanut butter and jelly (that expression doesn't work here, because no one uses peanut butter... but it makes sense to you.)  This is a picture of us two right after we were "assigned".  Ha.

We are really getting along well and we are super happy talking to strangers all day.

So yeah, now I am in Szeged.  There was an article in the last Ensign about a guy fom Szeged.  Coooool. 

Want to see something gross?  It's my backpack mark,  I am going to DIE in the summer :)  Ewww.

I am trying to think what else I can write about...Calling on Saturday was supe great!  I really liked that one.  I really like my mom.  I called some of my "moms" in the mission on Sunday, and it was kind of nice sending my love to a few of those special ladies I get to serve with.  Women rule.

I will share a little experience from Sunday.  On Thursday, one of the Elders here told me I would be speaking on Sunday.  I kind of freaked out because it was my first talk, and hey!  Talking to a bunch of strangers in Hungarian is terrifying, so I was being sassy about it all, and Sister Maxfield said she could give the talk!  Naturally, I accepted immediately, because if she can do it, so can i!  And, she gave a great talk on Sunday.  I got up after her and just said how afraid I was to follow up after her because she already did so well and I don't want people to compare my language skills to her :)  The people all laughed... But, I was a little serious...  The talk went really well and a lot of people liked it.  We talked about Joseph Smith and the first vision.  Sister Maxfield talked about how we need faith and such, and then I talked about what we really learn from the first vision--that God knows us all individually (by name), that God speaks today, and that He answers our prayers.  It was really good.  I really liked preparing it.  During Relief Society a lady told me about how when I told the first vision that she felt a feeling come over her that she hasn't felt in a really long time.  It just started at her head until it filled her whole body.  It was really incedible how she talked about it.  It made me feel like I was really being an instrument for the Lord.  She also told us about some family problems she was going through, so her being able to have that strong feeling was specifically just for her--for her to have comfort.  Again proving that God knows us all perfectly.  I love it.

God truly loves us all.  We truly are his children.  I know it.  Do you?

Sok szeretettel,

Kennedy nővér

This wasn't supposed to happen...

So... it is transfers.  That is why this is getting back to you on Tuesday.  What a way to start a day.  We were all feeling pretty confident in me staying.  I thought, how silly would it be if I actually left.  And last night before I went to bed I thought, I am going to Szeged.  And then I thought, that is silly.  And, I went to bed.  Welp.  I work up early because I was so excited about transfers!  Tooooo nervous.  Normally the APs call, but if you get a call from President Smith you can expect to be training.  So.  President Smith called us this morning.  That wasn't supposed to happen!  Sister Larsen answered the phone and really all I heard was that I was leaving :(  I just started to cry... I am not ready to go.  I had 4 transfers in Kecskemét and only 2 here.  Very unfair.  I even told President Smith that this wasn't supposed to happen.  But, it is.  I actually stopped listening while I regained my thoughts and stuff...  But he repeated himself and filled me all in.  So.  Ready for the news?

I am training!!  I am opening Szeged, an area that hasn't had sisters for a couple of transfers.  I will be in the same city as the zone leaders--two elders that were in my district when I was but a wee new missionary.  I am really excited.  They are some of my best friends!  It is seriously going to rock.  I hear the branch their is solid, and it is my first branch, so that is exciting.  It is one of the prettiest cities in Hungary, and I am really stoked for it all.

This is a pretty picture of me and some pretty flowers.  We need to always be finding as missionaries, and I am kind of tired of starting conversations, so I will just kind of ask people questions.  For instance, the other day I met a girl with this huge rod pierced through her ear.  So, I talked to her.  Turns out she is a goalie for a competitive water polo team and she is going to go to the Olympics in a couple years.  So cool.  I am way glad I talked to her.  She might even come to English class!  So, I was on the HÉV, and I met this lady with tulips (my favorite flower in the whole world), and I asked her how they were called.  She said they are tulipán.  So pretty.  Similar to English.  Helpful.  And then I was just making small talk with her and I told her that they were my absolute favorite flowers and she gave them to me.  GAVE THEM TO ME!  She was telling me how she teaches piano and she got them from a student, and so, yeah.  They are mine now :)

So... there is this thing here called rain.  It is super crazy.  It just started lightly raining, and then it fell.  It was like... literally the whole sky just dropped on us.  Luckily we got to a tunnel just in time, but we waited there for awhile, and the wind was blowing and we were trying to share one umbrella.  Wow.  it was super crazy.  So, we gave up and just ran home!  We were pretty close, but we had to wait for a light to turn green, and a car splashed me pretty good... not fun.  I looked cute that day... but then.  It rained.  RAINED!  Yeah.  can't get over that one.  i don't like how humidity feels on my skin... and the rain.  Too wet.  Didn't like it.

We talk to crazy people all the time.  Not like we go and seek them out, but they come up to us and just start talking.  A lot of time they ask us for monies.  A lot of time, I dont really know why they talk to us.  A couple of my favorite memories...  This homeless guy comes up to us, speaking perfect English and starts talking to us about how he lived in Denver Colorado, and then starts singing, What shall we do with a drunken sailor, what shall we do with a drunken sailor...  Ha.  It was really funny.  He knew all the words too.  Very impressive.  Another guy came up to us asking for money.  It was like... the first week of the transfer and he was asking us for money.  I explained to him that I wouldn't be able to give him money, because I can't give money to people.  He told me that he isn't a person.  I said, really?  What are you?  He said he was a fish.  Ha, that was really funny.  Luckily we were able to leave right after that and I didnt have to explain why we don't give money to fish either.

I feel like I worked really hard and that I am leaving my sweat and tears here in Buda.  Leaving is really hard.  I get really excited to go and then I get really scared and sad.  I don't really know what to expect.  The hardest thing is leaving the people that I have worked with.  I mean, I found them!  I taught them.  I love them.  And now... I leave.  But, Sister Behunin is coming in my place--and the beauty of that is that I know what kind of missionary she is.  It is really important for me to remember that it doesnt matter what I do.  I mean, it does, but it isn't my work.  It is the Lord's work, and we all put in a part.  Just like in the costume shop.  Very rarely could I look at a costume and say, hey, I patterned it, i mocked it up, and then I sewed every piece of it into fashion fabric.  That is crazy.  We all are teaching these people.  We go into new areas and we don't know anyone and we start from the ground and we love them and we work hard and then... we leave!  And that is how it goes.  Transfer to transfer.  I am starting to really understand it now.  It is so crazy.  BBLAH!  Missions.  I love mine!!

Happy Cinco de Mayo.  Celebrating in style at a random taco place here.
Technically it wasn't the fifth of May, but whatever.

Christ lives.  He loves us.  We can be all that God wants us to be, but only through His sacred Son.

Jó étvágyat!

Sok szeretettel,

Kennedy nővér