Hello everyone,

Well, it has been another rather busy week and lots of good things happening here in Toulon, which is great. Our week definitely had some interesting aspects to it and some good surprises thrown in as well.

On Tuesday, we had a District Meeting in Marseille and I was able to see my MTC companion Elder Wahlquist, because he just got transferred to Marseille. It was good to see him and weird to think that the last time we had seen each other was six months ago! After the district meeting, we headed back into Toulon and unfortunately, one of our rendez-vous had been cancelled and we confirmed another on the train with this young couple who is very promising. We contacted the boyfriend on the street and he said that his girlfriend is actually a less active member and how they had just been mentioning how they should start going back to church and then we met him on the street. It is very interesting how often things like that happen. When we talked to him on the street he gave us everything, his phone number, his address, and we fixed the rendez-vous. We confirmed on the train but when we got to his apartment, two hours later, he wasn't there, no one in the building knew him (but that's fairly normal), and we tried all of the names outside of the building and he wasn't there. We tried calling and there was no answer... So we were a little bummed about that but we ended up meeting Manon (the young member) and Laura (her really good friend) and we had a good lesson about the Family Proclamation. That evening we met Rudi and had a good lesson with him. He struggles so much right now without his family being here with him. He is going through a lot but we can see the little bits of progress that he makes. It is slow but we can slowly start to see changes in his life. We just pray that it will continue and that he will continue to make good choices.

Wednesday started out by going to Horacio's house (the older less active member) and we had a lesson with him. He had us stay and have lunch with him, which was interesting. He kept trying to tell us jokes and we honestly could not understand him. It is like I had just gotten back into France for the first time. He just has a very thick portugese accent, it is like he eats his words. We had a nice rendez-vous with him that we only kind of understood.... Haha! In the afternoon we met with a guy named Allen, who was a contact from the street. We met him at his work which is the interesting "Zen place" where people can come to eat vegetarian meals and get massages and such. He was just a very calm person, very zen-like (go figure!). He accepted everything well, he definitely had his own beliefs that were a bit different but he willingly accepted a Book of Mormon and said that he would read it. Afterwards, we headed to the church for our meeting with the ward missionaries and then went to meet Julien and Jacira. She is the Brazilian less active and Julien is her boyfriend. We talked about baptism and he said that he wasn't ready yet but that is ultimately his goal. Unfortunately, Jacira likes to talk too much and so it is often difficult to see how Julien is truly feeling and what he is thinking. In the end, we fixed another rendez-vous and they said they would be at church on Sunday.

Thursday was a little bit of a long day. We met with a muslim student in the morning and had a good rendez-vous and then fixed a rendez-vous with him for Saturday to meet with four of his friends also. Of course we were ok with that.... just as long as it didn't become a Muslim-Christian Bash. The rest of the afternoon was a bit of cancelled rendez-vous and contacting all the way until English class. Of course "gray haired lady" was there, there is never a week that she misses it and she brought multiple maps of the area of Toulon. Half way through Manon and Laura showed up too and listened as the other lady talked. After the class, we stayed with Manon and Laura and had a little lesson that was really good.

Friday was a normal morning of weekly planning and then a rendez-vous ended up getting cancelled so we went to visit a member in the ward. Her name is Danielle Dubois and she honestly has the most incredible story that is so sad but incredible at the same time. Danielle was baptized in Marseille when she was twenty and just two years before that she started having a sickness that basically started deteriorating her body to the point that now, she can no longer speak and doesn't have too much control of her body or muscles. She communicates using a board that has letters on it and she points to the letters to spell out words. It is honestly very sad but what is incredible is how much faith Soeur Dubois has. She is constantly teaching her nurses and everyone about the gospel and there have been several people over the years who have been baptized because of her example. She loves the Savior more than I think anyone else I have ever met. There is such a spirit in her small little room in the nursing home, where you can see pictures of the temple and of the Savior everywhere. It is very sad to see one of God's children have to suffer like she has for so many years of her life but I am certain that she doesn"t have any feelings of resentment or feelings of being wronged in anyway. It is absolutely inspiring. We spent a little bit of time with her but it wasn't us who helped bring her the spirit it was her who brought us the Spirit. After Soeur Dubois, we went to the church and saw Hasina and watched the Joseph Smith, Prophet of the Restoration movie with him. We then went to the Wutrich's house and had a lesson with them and Laura of the importance of the prophet to help prepare her for General Conference.

Saturday was a very interesting day. The rendez-vous with the Muslim guys and his friends ended up getting cancelled because they were out of town. We ended up taking a boat across the bay to La Seyne -Sur-Mer to find an old ami, he wasn't home so we did some contacting and headed home for lunch. After lunch we went to play Basketball and Laura and Manon and Laura's little cousin came. We then hurried home and got changed because we had a rendez-vous fixed with Gianni, who is a young guy that I met with Elder Meservy and that we taught but weren't ever able to see him again because he has school and lives a ways away. So we fixed the rendez-vous and then bought train tickets to get to his town. We took the train to La Sanary-Sur-Mer and called him and told him we were at the gare. He said he was on his way so we waited there. He called us about fifteen minutes later saying he was there and asking where we were.... well after a bit we realized we were actually in the wrong town! He lives in Le Cyrn-Sur-Mer and I don't know why but I thought it was the town we were in. So we bought tickets to go to his town which were two more towns away and the train was going to take 45 mintues. So we ran to the grocery store to buy something, of course the lines were super long and so we explained that our train was leaving in 15 minutes so a guy let us go in front of him to the front. Of course the lady who was in the middle of checking out, two items didn't ring up and then she had tons of coupons!!! We ended up running back to the train station with a couple minutes to spare and made our train. We got to the right little city and met Gianna, his friend, and his little sister and then his Dad came and picked us up because they don't live right in the city. So we drove a little bit and basically went into the middle of nowhere to this very very large modern house with a HUGE porch along the side the looks over the hills and green forests! We decided we want to convert the whole family!! His parents were very nice but we didn't have the opportunity to teach them. We taught Gianni a bit but he has a hard time feeling like there could be a possibility of God. He has had a very easy and quite comfortable life. We explained pray and challenged him to pray. We had to then hurry back to the train station so that we didn't miss our train so that we could get home on time. Thankfully we made it and made it home on time. It was a bit of a crazy day, that's for sure.

Sunday was the time change so we sprung forward and thus got an hour less of sleep... I know, it is quite sad. Haha. On top of that, it was a very cloudy and rainy day. Unfortunately the only people that were able to come to church were Laura and Rudi but it was great because Rudi was fasting and he wanted to pay fast offerings!!!! He said he started his fast on Saturday night and that helped him overcome his temptations because he was fasting. I was very thankful that he was able to make those good choices. After church, we went and had a rendez-vous with Benedine, a less active member, and then stopped by Anthony's house. He definitely still has a very difficult time focusing on anything but we had a nice simple little lesson. After Anthony, we met back up with Rudi and watched the Joseph Smith movie and I think that really helped him understand everything that he did so that the church was restored for us and helped answer some questions and concerns he had. And to top off the evening, Rudi had Ben and Jerry's ice cream that we ate.... YUM!!!! Haha I couldn't not mention that small detail!

Voilà, that was my week. It really was great and I am truly greatful for all of the experiences I had. I hope that each one of you have had a great week full of happiness, and maybe a couple disappointments to help you grow and progress. If life was always a piece of cake, what would we learn? Thank you so much all for you love, support, and prays. It truly means a lot to me. Have a great week, bonne semaine! Au revoir!

Elder Kirkpatrick