18 August 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

Thank you so much for your email! It's always super nice to hear from you and to hear how things are going back home. It sounds like you had quite the week!

That's awesome that you had the missionaries over this week! I actually met some of the missionaries going to Minnesota when I was in the MTC. I can't remember their names, but if they were in the MTC in about February I might have met them. I met three of them at that time, so I don't know how many total were in their group. That's awesome that the picture made it into the paper! {Mom and Rachel got their picture in the local paper.} It's always awesome when stuff like that happens! Do you know what's crazy? There's a sister in my district that is from Minnesota and she has actually met Loren before at EFY. {Loren Olinger, Jacob's friend from MO who is currently preparing for his own mission.} Small world huh? Wait, so Matt's {Matt Walker from the Buffalo, MN, Ward.} on his mission too?? Where did he go? There's tons of people from our stake that will be heading out soon. It's crazy to think of all the youth in my age group that will be going out! That's amazing! Do you have any contact info for him? That would be awesome to get in contact with him.

 In our mission we have between 60 and 70 missionaries. In Kosovo, we have about 14 missionaries and 2 senior missionaries. In Prishtina we have 6 missionaries. Prishtina is a district by itself, so I'm responsible just for the missionaries in Prishtina. The missionaries here are really awesome and we all get along really well. They all work really hard and I'm grateful for the opportunity that I have to be their district leader. 

This week I actually conducted an exchange with Elder Clawson. It was really awesome to be companions with him again for a day. We had an awesome time working together again. We had a lot of lessons scheduled for that day, but a ton of people chose to cancel their appointments with us, which wasn't very fun. It was kinda weird because I was the one leading on the exchange, so it's almost like our roles last transfer were switched. I'm super glad that I got trained by Elder Clawson and that I have the chance to be in the same district as him. It's really awesome getting to serve with him again!

This week we tried some new finding ideas. Normally we will street contact or tract, but we came up with some new ideas to find people to teach. Back in Durrës, Elder Clawson and I were thinking of ways to get more people to talk with us. We came up with the idea to just sit down in some chairs in the city square and have a sign that says, "Ask us what we do." We said it kinda jokingly, but this week we actually tried it out. We sat down in a row of chairs in the city center and we had a sign that said, "Ask us what we do." A TON of people came up to us and asked us what we do. It surprised us a ton how well it worked! We actually had a lot more success with that than with the other methods we use in contacting. We have some other awesome finding ideas that we are going to use, but we haven't used them yet. I'll let you know how they go when we try some more out. This week we'll actually be starting our English course, so we've spent a TON of time handing out English course flyers. I hope that it turns out really well. It was really interesting, because we'd be giving out flyers, but when people saw that it said, "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" they freaked out and threw them away, ripped them up, or burned them. But people here usually freak out when you use say "Jesus" and even when you say "Church" people freak out. It's a very different world here. But the work is still progressing here. I'm really glad for the opportunity that I have to serve here in Prishtina! I really enjoy it here! I know that God is working with the people here and He's preparing them to hear our message. I'm very grateful for the opportunity that I have to be a missionary and to talk with people about the Gospel everyday! It's a really awesome experience! I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world!!

Send my regards to Grandma and Grandpa, the Princeton Ward, and the St. Cloud Stake. I know that covers a lot of people, but you have permission to say "hi" to them from me anytime. Thank you so much for your love and support!!

Javë të mbarë! Ju dua shumë!

Love, Elder Watson

Our "ask us what we do" activity.