Oh man, the weeks just get crazier and crazier. Exhaustion has reached an all-time high. Seriously. It could possibly go down as one of the top 10 exhausting weeks ever spent as a missionary. Instead of dividing up into categories of things that have happened I'll just run you through this mad chaos from day 1.
Day 1-Monday
Well. It was a monday, pday, I emailed you guys. We learned to knit. No you cannot see the scarf I am making. It has been burned and will never see the light of day. Kidding, it's average. Throughout the rest of these days you'll have lunches, dinners, hours on airplanes, hours in airports and other such random down time that was often spent practicing our knitting skills. It's super manly. If you saw the Norwegian socks and mittens that people can knit here then you'd wanna learn as well. The day ended with a lesson at our Indian restaurant and some delicious food. We slept.
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| Elder Childs and Elder Shanklin |
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| Knitting at the airport! |
Day 2-Tuesday
We partied. Hard. Sister Robbins had a birthday. There was cake. I couldn't have it. Fun times. Our teach did not show up so we went out and hit the streets for a little bit. We met a way cool lady that we were able to teach on the street. Sadly we were have not been able to get a return appointment with her yet. She did however call Joseph Smith adorable.....compliment? Sure why not. We should have had an investigator come to choir that night but she didn't come. However we still got stuck singing in the choir. I was sure they would kick us out once I started singing but Elder Childs drowned me out so we had to stay. Elder Collard gave me a haircut that night in preparation for MLC the next day in Oslo. He's never really cut hair, but at this point I didn't really care. It'll grow back before I'm on the dating scene again. He did well though. To bed.
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| Birthday Time |
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| For Sister Robbins |
Day 3- Wednesday
Woke up at 4 am to catch a train and then flight to Oslo. We had a meeting with President until 4 o clock in the afternoon. Great meeting. Solid food. Sister Evans takes good care of my allergy. She rocks. We took the van with the APs back to the airport and then enjoyed a solid 2 hours with the Stavanger ZLs waiting to catch our flight back to Trondheim. Lots of knitting and weird looks. We got back at 9 and then took the bus into Trondheim sentrum arriving at about 10. A quick dinner and then off to bed.
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| More time at the airport |
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| Elder Ellsworth and Elder Duncan |
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| So much leg room |
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| Elder Shanklin and Elder Childs on another plane |
Day 4- Thursday
Wake up at 4 am....again. Catch a flight to Bodø and then a connecting flight to Tromsø. Chill in the airport for a couple hours waiting to catch the plane to Alta. That thing was little. You got a free back massage during take off though because the plane shook so much. Elder Childs says sometimes they make people move seats so that the plane is balanced out weight wise. Yep. Got into Alta at about 12. Ate lunch and stuff and then headed out to do some teaching and finding with those elders. We taught a really interesting man who insisted we be very strict with the people we baptize or it will "damage our beauty". Thanks bro. Enjoy some time with Elder Naumu and Palmer doing missionary work. Get back to the apartment and go stand out in the cold looking for the Northern lights. No spectacular light show but we got a clear night sky with millions of stars and solid appearances every now and then. Enjoy sleeping. On a 1 inch pad.
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| Bright and early ready to catch a plane |
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| Pretty small plane! |
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| Elder Shanklin, Elder Palmer, Elder Naumu, Elder Childs |
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| Cute little Norwegian house (I think the Elders live here up North) |
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| That is one tiny car for the missionaries |
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| Elder Shanklin in Tromso |
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| And again |
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| A Norwegian Vehicle |
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| A view in Tromso |
Day 5-Friday
Wake up at 5:30. Take the same flight pattern but reversed back to Trondheim. At this point I've concluded that every 8 hours of sleeping on a plane is equal to about 1 in a bed. Plus you can't move your neck past 45 degrees for a week. We arrived back with half of our Friday in front of us. Luckily on Wednesday we received six days notice of a zlt meeting that would be happening on Tuesday. We would spend Friday doing our weekly planning and our Zone Leader Training planning. With a scarce few minutes to proselyte.
Day 6-Saturday
Finally sleep in until the usual time. Cross fit. Get huge. Try and find people to save all day. It wasn't turning out too well. By the time conference came around at 6 o clock we were looking the same as we were on Friday. We did however enjoy a great member visit with some delicious pizza rolls. She made some Gluten Free ones for me. Angel. Conference was sweet, we optimized our time and rushed out as soon as conference was over to contact from 8 to 9 but had no luck. Sleep.
Day 7- Sunday
Sleep to the usual time again. Missionary Coordination meeting with Ben. Conference Priesthood Session right after. Beg the sisters to bring over some food for lunch in between sessions. Success. Enjoy Conference. We do watch it in English unless we have an investigator come who only speaks Norwegian which is rare. Very rare. Which is nice because focusing on conference in your non native language is difficult. After that session we went out and watched as God worked a miracle. We were able to find a cool girl, bring her back to the church and tally her up as a new investigator. Nothing overwhelmingly amazing but definitely a miracle to help boost our week up. Something we were grateful for. We made some mango curry as a district with me being the headchef (no really, i was). Conference at 6 followed that and then conference again at 10 later that night. We got permission to stay up and watch it in the church. So that was awesome. Even though exhaustion may have hit me half way through that session to the point where I stopped retaining information. Off to bed. We made it.
Clear Eyes
Full Heart
Elder Shanklin
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