Quite the Adventure!

Hello my dear family and friends,

I hope you have all had a fantastic week! Mine has been quite the adventure!! The most important thing I have learned this week is that I have been so blessed my whole life and I never even realized it! There are few members of the church here in England and it is very different than what I am used to. We have a congregation of about 80 people and it's a lot different. Things that would never fly in our ward (like a young man with hair as long as mine passing the sacrament) are much more accepted here because they don't have much of a choice. I hope that you all will not take for granted to blessing that you have living in an area with so many members.

Well, it has been a marvelous week! We met with Robert, who is another chinese investigator and he has decided to be baptized this Saturday! It's going to be awesome. I'm so excited for him. The poor guy came to church yesterday in sweat pants and a tshirt because he doesn't have any slacks or a white shirt. He told me in sacrament meeting that he hopes he can buy a suit after he gets baptized because he felt out of place. He is so excited to get the priesthood eventually and is really intrigued by that.

Matt is doing really well! On Saturday we taught him the restoration. There is a lady in our ward named Hong, who is from china, who came to be our translator. Matt speaks good English but it helps to have someone put it into chinese terms to help him understand. He has promised to read the book of Mormon and find out if it is true. We showed him a clip of President Monson after the lesson and told him that he would be speaking to us at General Conference in a month! I am so excited for that.

We weren't able to meet with Elaine last week because her son had a football match and she cancelled on us :( I was very disappointed. But we got in touch with her again and we will be going to see her on Wednesday.

We stopped by a less active's house named Flora this week. Oh my goodness. I love this woman! She is from Iran and is unmarried, in her 50's probably. She was converted a couple of years ago by some Elders and she hasn't been coming to church. Well, she invited us inside her home and inside behind her couch is a BIG american flag. My companion told me to stand by it and pose for a picture. There is a tradition that goes with visiting Flora. She has had probably 40 missionaries in her home and she LOVES it. She has every one of them take a picture in front of the flag and sign their names- where they're from, birthday, how many siblings, in a book. She loves missionaries! She made us hot chocolate and gave us cake and then she invited us to stay for dinner! Haha. She made us what are called Kebabs. They're not like the kebabs on a stick though.  It was lamb meet on a quasadilla with cheese and apple sauce. Haha weird combination, i know. I was choking to down to be honest... Haha. So that was my first weird food experience. Anyways, Flora explained to us that she hasn't been coming to church because a lady in our ward has been spreading rumors of her and she has been offended. We both felt that it wouldn't be best to explain to her not to be offended and that she sould come back to church because it's a cultural thing for her. And she is the most giving and kind lady in the world that I feel Heavenly Father will understand and give mercy. She loves america and hates living here in England, but she is waiting for some of her family in Iran to move to the US before she comes too. I feel so bad for her because I can tell she is just so lonely.

Well, I wish I could tell you more but I am being booted off the computer so I love you all so much and hope you are doing well!

Love,

Sister Jensen