This is my life

I heard that song, the Billy Joel one, at a train station this week.  It made my day.

Sorry for the delay this week, but we found out on Saturday night at like 9 PM that we were getting a mini missionary for three days and that our PDAY had to be moved.  Oh.  Okay.  We got one on Sunday night, and then they gave us another one.  Uhhhh..... okay?  It was actually super fun, but I was more than ready to have them gone by the end of the three days.  I spoke nothing but french (mostly) all day from Sunday evening to Wednesday night.  My brain hurt a lot and I took more advil those few days than I have my whole mission.  French isn't as hard to slip into anymore.  Last night we had three RDV's right in a row and so I spoke nothing but french from 4 pm to 7h30 pm, and i didn't even think about it.  I have found that I don't really think about it now when I have to speak french.  I have dreamt in French, but it's still not super natural.  Alas, my life here is moving on.

BEFORE I FORGET: Melun might be getting whitewashed.  There are 6 sisters going home this transfer, and Soeur Smart is going home for a little while for some trial and legality stuff, so there are Four sister cities getting shut down and there will be one trio.  Our apartment is big enough, and has been used before, for three people.  Melun also used to be an elders only ville.  Soooo... president told me to get the area book in order, becuase he might close melun down to sisters and send elders in.  It breaks my heart to think of that because my mind was already set on staying here until christmas.  But I may get shipped out of here.  Yikes!  So, if you are thinking of sending mail, be aware that my address might be changing in a week and a half.

Part of the reason I'd be sad to leave is really rooted in last night/ yesterday.

I've written about Solo, our golden ami.  He's the one who's malagash and believes everything and kept all his church books from TEN YEARS AGO.  Well, a couple lessons ago, I invited him to baptism.  He said he'd think azbout it.  But if he does it, he wants his whole family to do it, and we hadn't met his family yet.  He's trying to wean them off their old church so that we can meet them and start teaching them.  SO the next lesson we talked about Authority, and he told us that he has decided to be BAPTIZED!!!  He says that he prays about it and thinks about it, and when he lays in bed at night he feels like it's the right thing to do.  WHAT??!!!  THIS IS FRANCE!!!!  PEOPLE DON'T DO THIS!!!  AND THEN he said that he wants his whole family to be baptized "the way Christ was baptized, so we can be sealed together forever." Oh my goodness!  But here's the catch, and this is why I haven't mentioned this before: he wants to wait until his wife and youngest daughter are back in France.  Right now they are in Madagascar, overliooking the building of their home.  He said she "should be back before the end of the year."  Sad.  Neither of us will be here, with my luck.  But it was super exciting.  THen this Monday, having a little bit of time because all of a sudden we were two companionships and not just one, me and my mini went to his house to just pop by.  Two of his kids were there.  He let us in and asked us to explain what we do and who we are to his children.  Then we prayed and he asked for more books that his kids can read about the church.  And that it's school vacation, so all of his children will be at our rdv on thursday.  Okay!  We went yesterday, and they were all there!  Two lovely young adult women, a twelve year old boy, and a four year old girl came in and greeted us all, and sat down.  He asked us to explain where our church comes from and our basic beliefs.  We did, and answered some of their questions.  They all want book of mormons in french now, and they are going to move their schedule around to come to the baptisma on Sunday (we have Three eight year old getting baptised on sunday, as well as our ami, Gaütan).  And then Solo announced to his family that he has decided to get baptised in our church, and that he wants all of them baptised together, once they have heard the lessons.  Everyone was like "Uhhh, okay."  It was amazing!  So, at the end of the year we may have a new family in the church!

That afternoon we had a RDV with Blaise, an african young man who had just moved here from Strousburg (that's the geneva mission).  He's not always easy to get ahold of, and he is ALWAYS at least an hour late (except for churc; he was nearly an hour early), but he finally got there.  We read through Mosiah 18: 8-11, and he declared that he needed to be baptized.  He wanted to make sure that his parents wouldn't hate him for doing it (because he doesn't want to break to commandement "honor thy father and thy mother"; seriously), but then he wants to be baptized "the way Jesus was".  He said he loves being active in the church (which is amazing because he's not even a member yet) and that this is what he wants.  We gave him a "Principles of the Gospel" manuel on Sunday, and by yesterday he had read all of it except the part about marriage (because "that doesn't interest" him yet.  Teehee).  He read through the law of chastity (which he hasn't been taught) and the law of tithing (which he hasn't been taught) and said that he accepted them.  I believe next week we will be setting a date for his baptism.  And he's coming to the baptisms on Sunday.  Ohhhh!!!

Then we had Joseph, who gives me the creeps, but soeur lee keeps setting appointments with him.  I will NOT be doing that if I stay here after she leaves.  He got a smack down from our member who knows his bible SUPER well, which I personally believe was good for joseph  because he's always saying that he is like Jesus because he does nothing but goo and gets nothing but trials.  Oh give me a break.  SO did Job, and he didn't complaina as much as you do.

Then we had gautan.  Hahah, I forgot to explain something.  We had NO members for these RDV's the night before, which is bad because we can only teach a man if there are at leat three girls or three boys; we can't be two and two in a building or room alone.  So we both prayed really hard and found some last minute additions.  Soeur Monga came for blaise, but then we found that our second member for Joseph didn't show, so we asked her if she'd stay, and she said yes.  Then it was gautan's lesson and we told her she could leave because our other member showed but she said "Is it okay if I stay?"  Yes!!!  It was alazing with gautan because we're all so excited for his baptism which was postponed and the spirit was trong and all I can say is this/

I am so lukcy to be here.

God lives.

He loves us.

And he watches out for us.

I love you all!!!  Please pray for the work here in the France Paris mission!!  We are trying to have a miracle here, but I am out of time so I will explaiun it next week (which also will be a wednesday or thursday but not monday).

LOOOOOOOOOOOVVVVVVVVVEEEEEE

Soeur Kacey Barros

You're still you

Hey, first off. Send this to Kit.  I don't know how but her email has dissappeared from my list, and I can't remember it.  SOOOO tell her I love her and that I will add her as soon as I can.  

SECONDLY:  Welcome Claire!!!!  The 12th?  Vraiment?  How did you all manage that?  And sadly, she has mine and dustin's chin.  Actually, i don't hate it.  But how do you congratulate someone on their chin?  Someday I will learn the art.

Oh.  My.  Gosh.  It is WINTER here in FRANCE.  Two weeks ago I bought winter boots for €60 (which is apparently a super good price).  Then today I was forced to buy a winter coat for the same price (which is also a good price because it is long and thick and warm; photos will be sent).  This week it got super duper duper cold and I was wearing a jacket and a sweater and socks and tights and boots.  I had been mercilessly mocking Soeur Lee the day before for pulling out her winter coat in october.  The next day she smiled at me and said "Are you ready to give in and buy a winter coat?"  I sighed (and shivered) and said yes.  So after going to the Louvre today, we went and did some quick winter coat shopping.  I hope this is the last of my winter clothing shopping.  

This week has been a bit of hell, I must say.  We spent our Pday in town just in Melun last week, and ti was nice.  We spent a couple hours visitng Fontainbleau, but nothing huge.  Tuesday we managed to fill up with RDV's, and Wednesday I had district meeting.  Of course, we moved district meeting from Tuesday to Wednesday because there was a public transportation strike, and the greve, or strike, was still going on on wednesday.  Guess what.  It's still going on now.  And guess what else because of that?  You can't buy gas for your car any more because THEY ARE OUT!! (some of our elders are stuck in paris because they can't buy gas).  I HATE SNCF greves!!  SNCF has a stinking MONOPOLY on all the public transpo, except the metro.  But we don't use the metro out in Melun.  We use SNCF.  SHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTT!!!  Our goal was to teach 20 lessons this week, which is usually pretty manageable.  our actualy number: Ten.  I hate greves.  Plus it's been freezing, so we have been walking everywhere, and I didn't have a winter coat until now.

BBut I have little to no time left, so I'll just sum up my week as follows:

Met a rabbi in traning.  he answered all our suestions.  Such an interesting religion it is...

Went to mass because all of our transportation is down.

An old man with 7 teeth hit on me and so i explained what missionaries are and that we are all single.  A woman sitting next to us asked us about our church after he left.

I love Melun.  I'm glad  get to stay for a while.

Vive France!!!

love, Kacey

I often go walking...

Life is like a river.


Oh heck, I have no idea.  That's just what I'm saying today.  Conference was AHHHMAZING.  I loved President Packard's talk.  But, I just describe how conference went down.  Don't worry; I have visuals.

Conference for us is broadcasted differently because of the huge time difference.  We watched the RS broadcast at 4 PM this past saturday.  Sadly, it hadn't been recorded in English.  So we suffered through french.  Which is a shame, because, if you look at photo ONE, that is what the room looked like.  Yup, completely empty except for us.

Then, the saturday morning session was live, at 600 pm here.  BUT, after I fretted for two hours, we got to watch THAT in English!!
Photo two illustrates our snacky private "english room".  I got homesick watching something in English and knowing that half of you were watching the same thing at the same time.  Ahhh...

The next morning we attended the RS broadcast again (in french again) while the men watched the recorded priesthood session.  Then, at 2, we watched the saturday afternoon session.  And at 6 pm, we watched the Sunday morning session, which I watched the last half in french because we had an investigator show up.  And I don't get to watch sunday afternooon because it's at 1000 here.

I loved it though.  SO many answers to prayers.  Sorry my letter is short again.  I'll attach more photos of me jumping last p day.

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVVVEEEEEEEEEEE

EEEEE


Soeur Kacey Barros