1st snail mail from Malta!

It's been quite awhile since we had any snail mail from Elder Nielsen so it was a really fun surprise to find a letter with this unique postage stamp in our mailbox recently!

It was great to see his handwriting again too! He said he was grateful for the things he had been taught, that being a missionary is so awesome, he loves how the Lord has blessed our family while he's been serving, and he still loves Malta! He also wrote that they are all praying for approval from Church HQ to have the Book of Mormon translated into Maltese and working hard to see a meetinghouse be built on land that has been purchased for that.

He shared this in Maltese...


And an added bonus was this photo he enclosed with his letter!

This is what he wrote on the back of it:

This is out in the countryside in Italy or as it's called there "La Campagna"

A phone call from Malta!!

This sign actually said "BIG BROTHER ON MISSION"

and it hung in Parker's car window while Elder Ryler was on

his mission; then I adapted it so Ryler could hang it in his car

while Elder Parker is serving

Tonight we got a call from Malta!! It was Sister B, of the senior missionary couple serving in the same area as Elder N! She had called us to get a phone number for Ryler so that she could call him to relay a Happy Birthday wish from his little brother in the mission field!

Mission rules allow for just 2 phone calls per year from the missionary to the family, usually one at Christmas and one on Mother's Day, so of course we didn't actually speak with Elder N. but he was right there in the same room!

This will be Ryler's 3rd birthday in a row that he's spending away from our family (last two were in the mission field), he's also in the thick of finals week with a huge project due right on his birthday so I'm sure getting a birthday phone call from Malta will be totally unexpected and such a major highlight for him!

It was a short call but Sister B took time to compliment Elder N. on learning the Maltese language and told us what a great missionary he is, then she signed off saying they were about to begin their district meeting.

Birthdays are a pretty big deal in our family so this really means a lot. What a thoughtful thing for the missionary couple to do and what a fun surprise for all of us!
Hebrews 13:1

April 7 Easter in Malta

Elder Nielsen said for email they go to the same place in Sliema (Sleeeema) each week because the rates are awesome. The owner is from India, and his wife and their newborn baby are always there with him, they are trying to make friends with them.

The Maltese spaghetti they had last week had olives and hot dogs in it! He said he really liked it!

He said our estimate for the location of Swaatar (the city he is living in) is correct! (see previous post)

Update on the translation of the Book of Mormon into Maltese: “We are so excited to hear what the First Presidency says about this! They say it will take about a month so we will see! We are all praying like crazy! The next step after that is getting the team organized from the membership here and then getting things going! I don’t know much after that! lol! I will keep you posted!”

After a great lesson on the Atonement with Elizabeth, she fed them a pie of cheese and lima beans. He said it was delicious, actually really really good! His companion Elder Jones had told him about this pie and was hoping for it so that worked out great when she had it for them!

They had another great lesson with Dorothy and her husband Stefan and their 3 year old son who actually knew, when they started watching the Restoration film together, that it was about Joseph Smith! Dorothy has quit smoking! She told them that nothing will stop her from getting baptized!

They watched a Good Friday procession: “That was very interesting! They do 14 steps of the death of Christ in parade form. How it worked is there would be tons of kids all dressed up in Catholic attire carrying plaques of the scriptures that described the scenes that would follow and then would come a giant statue being carried by up to 10 men followed by people wearing these hoods and all carrying chains, they were called the penitent sinners, there was music and drum beating; and they got the story right…it was interesting.”

They were able to contact people who had previously been investigating the gospel but stopped and were excited to get an appointment with one of them to return the next day!

They watched General Conference live online with a projector in their Chapel! He didn’t tell us too much about it because he knew we’d be watching the following week! ;o) He said it was the best Easter weekend ever and summarized this way “This week has been absolutely awesome! I have loved every second of it! I really love being a missionary! It is so fun! Man I really enjoy it!”

In addition to the standard LDS scriptures and the Preach My Gospel guide, missionaries also study these 4 books which are now referred to as "the missionary reference library":

Our Search for Happiness by Elder M. Russell Ballard

Jesus the Christ by Elder James E. Talmage

True to the Faith

Our Heritage

The missionary reference library is intended to aid full-time missionaries in strengthening their testimonies, increasing their knowledge of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and in preparing to teach.

When Elder Nielsen's older brother began his mission in 2007 I made it a goal to read the missionary reference library too and as of today have only read 2, am working on the 3rd and keep leaving the largest one until last - Jesus the Christ. This is a very deep book of nearly 800 pages and I am only on Chapter 2! It is a lot to take in, I keep a dictionary handy and I have to really concentrate as I read it but I love it already, its a wonderful way to study the life of our Savior. So you can imagine how happy I was to read this in Elder Nielsen's letter last week...

"Oh yeah i forgot to tell you, I finished reading the book Jesus the Christ!!! It was the coolest book!! I loved it! I learned a lot and man i learned that i don't know a lot! It was great though! I love my Savior! I am starting to begin to understand what the Atonement means! There is so much behind it! I love sharing it with everyone! It is so incredible! It is the greatest news ever!!!"

I thought that deserved a post all its own! Jesus the Christ was written by Elder James E. Talmage, he was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the LDS Church from 1911 until his death in 1933. The book is a doctrinal study of the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. It is available for purchase at the Church's distribution centers or online. You can also download MP3 audio files and listen to it for free by clicking here.

Apr 1 Baptismal date & translating the BoM!

We learned a little more about Malta with this week's email. His address goes to the city of Mosta but they are actually living in a city called Swatar (soo-wah-tar...rolled "r"). As near as we could tell, it is close to Msida but is not shown on the above map of Maltese cities, but you can see where three other cities are that he has mentioned (black arrows) and our best guess for Swatar (green arrow).

We were surprised they had a Burger King there and asked if he had seen other US restaurant chains and he said "there are tons of American restaurants here! Pizza hut! KFC! BK! McDonald's!"

He said the birthday package arrived safe and sound and sent these pictures showing us how he enjoyed some of the contents...

party blowout fun and displaying the
traditional gift for each letter of the birthday age

typical humorous antics

his artistic creation in the corned beef hash

(a favorite birthday breakfast request)

his artistic decoration of the birthday cookies

(surprisingly, these were still edible!?)

They enjoyed a delicious pork roast dinner that a new member and her 90 year old Mother made for them. He was so happy to hear that this new member is studying the scriptures and Preach My Gospel! He said they had fun teaching her and then eating with them.

More fun with Brother Foster, they are working together on a presentation about food storage/72 hour kits for a local trade fair. They are really excited about getting the name of the Church out there and being able to answer questions people may ask at the fair. On a side note, he said they found out Brother Koster also did a lot of the work on the Adams Family house.

He had good news about the Maltese lessons: "It was really great this time because things are starting to click! i feel like I'm back in the MTC again but that is ok! I know that the Gift of Tongues is real and that the Lord will help me! I am already seeing that! We are praying and conversing in Maltese now! COOL!!! I can't believe how neat this is! I am so honored and humbled to be a part of this! I love it!"

They had a lesson with a man from Jamaica.

They set a baptism date with Dorothy for April 24th!!!!

Big news on the Maltese language... "Gilles Francios (yes from France) came to talk to us! He is one of the heads from the Church's translation department! We had a really cool meeting with him! He is a really great guy! He really wants translation things to happen here! it would help the work so much! SO MUCH!!! Pres. Beresford has a great saying! He says that the field is white and having the Book of Mormon in Maltese is our sickle! It would the hugest thing here! We don't have it in Maltese right now! And it goes before the First Presidency next week! (they are going to be talking about us!) so we talked about that and how the work here would explode if we had that! Also the cool part is that he treated us to dinner and we had this meeting during that, he is a cool guy! Anyway this restaurant was FANCY!!!!!!!! HOLY COW!!! the guy came and put my napkin on my lap and they had live minstrels that played what ever song you requested and i ate SNAILS!!!!!!!!!!!! WHOA!!!!! they were actually really good!! HA HA!! it was really neat! This place was like the kind of place you see in movies! It was awesome being there and talking about how we can get the work moving along here in Malta and how we can get these things taken care of! Also while Bro. Francois was here he interviewed some of the members that would be the translation team. he challenged us to go convert the team as well! So we are actually using that as a way to talk to people about the gospel!! THE WORK IS MOVING FORWARD AND NO UNHALLOWED HAND CAN STOP IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is so neat to be here at this time! I LOVE IT!!!!! Everyone is so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!! understandably so!!! "

They had a wonderful experience with a new investigator: "we met a guy we had talked to on the street awhile ago. We walked back to his house with him and met all his friends as well! The cool part is he is from GHANA and so are all his friends! We ended up being there for about 2 hours answering all their questions and taught them the most in depth and powerful (because it wasn't us teaching) Restoration lesson ever! We watched the film and they were all just shocked (in a good way) after! We now have all three of them as new investigators and they are really excited to have us back over!! WOO HOOO!!!!!! We left them all a Book of Mormon to read and they were all so excited about them! I LOVE THE GOSPEL!!! I love watching the light come on in people's spirits! It is so cool!! We are so excited to work with them!! it so cool!!!!!!! "

On Monday they helped a member from England move then had FHE with him, he treated them to a dinner of traditional Maltese spaghetti and Elder Nielsen said it was really tasty.

More great news with Dorothy, her husband is now also investigating the Church!! He speaks Italian and Elder Nielsen spoke with him in Italian and he told him that he spoke it well and really had an Italian accent from the Calabria (a region in Southern Italy)!

He concluded with more excitement and enthusiasm than ever... "today was awesome too! We had a great appointment with Rose! She is so excited about the gospel! She said the she loves that there is a prophet today! In the end she prayed and it was AWESOME!!!!!!!!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE hearing people pray for the first time! It is incredible!!!! After that we met a member named McKyle from the Middle East and had some pday fun with him! He is awesome! It has been a FANTASTIC WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!! oh man it was the greatest!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!!!! IT ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I couldn't be happier!!!!!! This is so FUN!!! WOO HOO!!!!! You want to be happy? Do missionary work!! I am so excited about the work here! Everyone is catching on and getting the vision! We are going to see some awesome miracles here if we work hard and do the best that we can and stick to it 100%, the Church will grow here so much! I love being a missionary! Life is just so darn great!!"

Signs

In our family we have a tradition of "collecting" pictures of signs that we enjoy, here are 2 that Elder Nielsen has mentioned since arriving in Malta...

When I asked him if this was a big enough problem to merit a sign, this was his reply:

"Ok so yeah horse bathing here is a problem lol! There are tons of horses here everywhere! They have carriages here as taxis and stuff! but we just take the buses they are cheaper! I took another pic today of a sign of things that were not allowed in a park it went like this:

no dogs

no balls

no food

no high heels!"

Maybe its just us, but we found that kind of amusing! lol

Mar 25 1st Birthday in the Mission Field!

He began this week's letter with...

"I AM 20!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT THE HECK!!!!!!!!!!!??? this is wild!!! i am so excited though!!!! i had a SUPER AWESOME BIRTHDAY!!!!! I am no longer a teenager! YESSS!! lol! this is so cool!!!! I love it!!!!! I love being 20!! I love being a missionary on my birthday! What a cool way to celebrate!"

He described the events of his first birthday in the mission field:

"MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh man i had such a good day!!!!! It was so awesome!!!!!!! Everyone in the house was so nice and kept wishing me happy birthday and saying really nice things and doing really nice things for me! I treated myself to a bigger breakfast than cereal and made an egg sandwich! It was really good! Then we pretty much spent the whole morning at the church! First we had a correlation meeting with our Branch Mission Leader and the Branch President (who is President Beresford). Then after that we had district meeting, then after that we had Maltese lessons! That was really fun! The Beresfords got me a really nice card and a chocolate bar. Our teacher brought me a cake and even some really good food! They all sang to me and we had a great time! Then i got a package!!!!!!!! WOOOO HOOOOO!!!!!! It was the Easter package!!! it was SOOOOOOO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! After that we went and spent some time working in Valletta and Elder Jones treated me to burger king! That was really really nice of him! i had told him that we usually go out to eat on birthdays and he randomly treated me to BK that was super cool of him! It made my birthday!! Also i got to talk to the mission home and they all wished me a happy birthday! And the main news was that my b-day package had arrived at the mission home (there was a problem at customs which is why it's late) but the office couple who are coming this weekend will bring it so that is super cool to look forward too!! I AM SO EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOT WOOT!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was a super super super super good birthday!!!! I had so much fun!!! i loved it!!! Everyone was so nice and i had such a good day!!!1 I am 20!!!! what the heck!? this is weird lol!! But i love it! I actually do feel different this time! Wild huh!? well it was an awesome awesome awesome birthday!! You can all rest assured that i had a great time! "

We actually sent the Easter package after we sent his birthday package but we're glad he at least got one of them and we appreciated his great attitude when he said that way he will get to celebrate his birthday twice. He said he was happy to get our family's traditional Easter Story Eggs (scriptures and symbols in plastic eggs) and plans to use that in lessons with Dorothy and Joe. If you would like "The Easter Story in Eggs" click here for one version of it or contact me (via the tab on the right edge) for our version.

He confirmed that Malta does observe daylight saving time and will change on March 28th.

He is still adjusting to using English again...

"Speaking English is so weird! I gave a talk in church and it was really weird! After speaking pretty much every Sunday in Italian for a year it was a change! lol!"

He said the highlight of the day on Friday was dinner with a couple from England who are members. They wanted the Elders to feel at home so they made tacos for them and then they had a lesson about sharing the Book of Mormon with others.

One of their potential investigators turned out to not be interested so that was disappointing for them.

He spoke in Church on Sunday and said thanks to the speaking assignments he had before his mission with the Clearfield Stake and after speaking in Italy a lot he is not as nervous anymore.

After Church they had lunch with the couple missionaries and their grandson and his wife who were visiting Malta. The grandson is a recently returned missionary that served in Idaho and he and his wife were just married. Others were there too and all were British, he said it was fun: "You should try hanging out with a bunch of British people some time! Its a riot!"

They have FHE every week with members and investigators and he says it is really fun, they play games, have a treat and of course a lesson by the missionaries. This week they did the whole FHE in the dark because the power was out on Malta but they had candles so it was ok.

They are teaching Rose about The Plan of Salvation and the blessings of Temples and they are really excited about her interest.

Each week they spend time providing service to others and this week they helped a member sand his boat. He said "That was really fun! I like working with boats! It was great! "

He closed this week's email with...

"Well it has been a really really really awesome week! i feel better and i had an awesome birthday! One i will never forget! I'm a missionary! And I'm 20!!! COOL!!!!!!! Have a great week!!!!! Love, Your 20 year old Son/brother Anzjan, Anziano, Elder Nielsen"