Week #72 - Avignon

Mom and the rest!

Wooooooowwwwwiieeee!  I really enjoyed the videos of you and Sambo, it reminded of that one time we went 

to the Provo beach resort and tried to do that surfing thing, and I rocked it like no one else and was better than 

anyone. (no he didn't:)  how's Sam's bum?

Right now the people I want to room with are Bobby and Jacen, so I'll talk with them and you can talk with their

 parents!  I know Jacen will be home before school, but I'm not actually sure what Bobby is doing yet

My tummy is a lot better, thanks :)

I GOT THE PACKAGE.  thank you thank you thank you, it came at the perfect time, cuz the Mistral just started

 picking up again, and boy has it been cooooold.  thanks thanks thanks.

Elder Beck and I are making a CD together with an ami, and so, that should be fun!  We've been working on the

 music all week, and we're gonna be recording tomorrow, so I'll let you know how that goes down!

I probably could go, but, eh, french dentists are weird.  All french people think rootbeer tastes like dentist stuff, 

so I figured the french dentists just use rootbeer instead of real stuff, so it might be better to wait till I get home :)

So THIS WEEK

Essentially, we did a lot to prepare for the CD we gonna make this week, so I'll just tell you everything that 

happened between.

First, on monday, that's when we had a rdv with our ami André and we fixed a day to record the CD with him.  

We spent just about the whole evening doing that, so yup.

The next day we went out to Orange to visit a famille from Chile and two boys from Barcelona that they have 

staying with them and had and FHE with em.  They have a less active son that really likes the guitar, so Elder 

Beck is working his magic with him, and we have FHEs set up with them every week for the next little bit.

After the music stuff on mercredi, we were supposed to have a rdv with Jean-Personne, but he actually was in 

Paris, so he obviously wasn't there, so instead we headed into town to talk with people, and we actually met 

some real neat guys.  We met this guy and taught him the plan of salvation, and also met this woman from

 Algeria who is actually a comedienne, so that was cool. When I saw her hair from a distance, I was like "she's 

gotta be a comedienne," and she was.  Ha yeah.

Then we had district meeting in Marseille, that was awesome.  On our way home to drop off some things 

before going to a dinner rdv, we met one of our old amis named Yapo that we've talked with on the phone a 

lot, and this was my first time seeing him.  It was cool.  He has this amazing idea for ice cream that he wants 

to sell in America called "Yapo's" and I would buy it from the sound of it.  then we had a delicious dinner with 

Sr. Protano and Jean-Jacques.

The next day was fun, too.  Weekly plannin', and talkin' to strangers.  We went to the poste to pick up my 

package, and met some people while waiting in real long line, and also they almost made me pay for the 

package, and then something happened and they just gave it to me and we ran.  didn't actually run, they 

just let us go.  Sweet.  then that evening we met up with Louis again, the less active Chilean boy, and played 

the guitar with him and watched that Mormon message about what's-er-bucket from Neon Trees.  That was 

cool, he really liked it.

Then the miracle day.  We had nothing planned, so Elder Beck and I the night before decided to go to an outer 

ville, and the first one we both thought of was l'Isle sur la Sorgue, about 30 minutes away, so not too far.  We 

get out there with some passes we planned out, only to have forgotten our map...so on our search for the office 

de tourisme, we ran into two Americans from D.C., so that was pretty neat.  We then found the map, replanned 

the passes, and decided to pass these less actives.  On the list were three less actives, one of them who had 

said she was not interested, and it was noted that the other might be dead....and the third one lived way out in 

the mountains, so we picked him.  The thing was, his street wasn't on the map, so we chose one that sounded 

kinda similar (it started with the same letter...:) and went to it. After a real long walk and seeing pigs n horses n 

livestock n goats n stuff, we found the road, wasn't his, but we met some real nice simple French farmin' folk 

and that was fun.  Now the real miracle.  On our walk back in, we took a different route trying to be a little 

quicker.  We got almost back into town, and this car pulled up and stopped next to us.  the driver rolled down 

the window and said, in english "Are you american?  Are you mormon?" and the answers were yes, so, she 

said "I'm gonna pull over and let's chat!" turns out she is mormon, too, and she's from New Jersey.  She moved 

to Cote d'Ivoire first, then to france.  She helped build the church building in Marseille, so that's sweet, and 

then she's been moving around a lot, and now she's not on the ward list.  She still reads the BoM, and we 

exchanged numbers so we can eat with her and her husband.  It was at that time that we knew there was a 

reason we came to l'Isle sur la Sorgue!  Very good evening.

Dimanche was the usual.  Church.  Except, we got to sit in with the youth and help with the lesson "teaching by 

the spirit" so that was real fun.  Then a rdv we were supposed to have fell through, and that was it.  It was a fun 

day, though, anyway, you know, cuz I'm on a mission and in france.  Cool.

today is potentially my last pday in Avignon (transfers come up this week, I kinda hope I don't leave yet, though!) 

so we're definitely gonna go to the pont and y danse!

Also I don't know what's up, but I haven't been able to upload photos for the last little bit, and it's getting kinda 

frustrating cuz we took some goooood photos recently.  Whatever.  I'll try again later.  Next Week :)

LOVE YOU ALL

And thanks again for the Atonement book.  It rocks.  I'll let you know what I learn from it :)

love,

Elder Max Liechty

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Week #71 - Avignon

Mom!

It was CDs (He sent us some French CD's for Christmas) that I wanted disguised as a gift :)  KIDDING, they were just, like, 2 or 3 euros or something and I was, like, DEAL, so I bought it and sent it home.  It's for YOU but I'll probably download it onto iTunes when I get home :)

Thanks :)

1. Pdays are okay.  They're kinda  a bummer cuz we live 30 minutes outside of Avignon, so we have to work around bus times to make sure we can get out n back and get groceries and clean and everything.  And Avignon as a ville is really cool, but there's not so much outdoorsy stuff to do, but there is the Pont d'Avignon that we're gonna danse on!

2. (Do you have a hard time falling asleep...he's always been a big complainer about noises) I would, but Elder Beck brought a boatload of earplugs, so I use earplugs these days.  Alright.  I've been having a tough time sleeping lately, though, getting reeeaaaallllly reaaaalllly sweaty (this doesn't need to be shared with everyone :)), cuz the other elders all like sleeping hot, but I'm a cold sleeper.  So, we're trying to work things out.

3. My ear hasn't caused me any problems so far, still if I cover the good ear everything sounds kinda muffled, but, like, I can hear so it's cool

4. (Engineering still as a major?) Yeah right now still thinking about it, thinking more and more about AIRPLANES, too, just because those are sweet.  So, like, yeah.  I think that's what I'm still planning on?

5. (Asking about vinyl records) I think Bobby has some and I have the rest BUT ZACH CAN'T HAVE 'EM.  They're mine.  He can boorrrrroow them.  If I have them, they'd either be in Sam and my room, or in the guest room with the basket of CDs if that still exists, or they might all be at Bobby's.

Also, that's such a hipster wedding gift.

6. No responsibilities 'cept sharin' the good word (Any responsibilities at church?)

7. (Would he mind moving upstairs when he gets back)  Hmmmmmmm.  I might not mind it that much....it's just that it's a lot harder to drag yourself up the stairs after watching TV all night on the new couch than to drag yourself down the hallway......but then again who knows, maybe I won't be into that anymore!  If I was in Zach's old room, would I still be allowed to use the new and improved downstairs bathroom?

8.  (What are Manifestations) More like marches than gatherings, no speakers, just a bunch of people

Well shoot, maw.  I forgot my planner again, but this was a really cool week, so I'll do all I can to remember what in the world happened.

Lundi after pday, we visited Jean-Personne, our main man, at his store and taught a lesson about the Book of Mormon.  It went well, and he was suuuper proud of the prayer he said at the end, and I'll admit it was pretty good.  Other than that, we went to the bus station to figure out times to go pass the referral we received last week.  And that.  Was. The.  Night.

The next day was the miracle day.  So we planned all up to go pass our referral out in this little village called Pernes-les-Fontaines (that we totes have to go to again and take pics cuz there's FORTY public fountains and over 100 private fountains in this tiny little town!  Provence, that's where I am right now, is known for it's fountains for some reason), and it was pretty difficult to get to it.  We had to take a bus to a bigger village, and hope that another bus would go there, because they weren't selling times in the bus office last night. We got there, found that there WAS a bus going that we could catch, but it was gonna be tight.  So we did a little work in the big ville, Carpentras, and then hit up Pernes, walked all the way to this guy's house (turns out he lives on the out out out skirts of Pernes), and miracle HE WAS HOME: wooooooooooooo.  He was home, we gave him the LdM he asked for, taught him about it, and he said we could come back no probs.  Mom, it's not every day you receive referrals in France!  This is the second one I've received my entire mission.  Sweeet.  So then anyway it took so long to get out there that we missed the bus we were gonna take, caught the later one which shooooulda worked, but it came late, and we missed the connecting bus home......But whatever.  We called a member that lived out there, and he came and got us, and this other guy we met at the bus stop that had also missed the bus.  That was real neat, cuz had we not missed the bus, this guy woulda been stranded, cuz he's not from around here, but we DID miss the bus and the guy was NOT stranded!  Cool miracle.

The next day we actually went to Carpentras again because we had a lunch rdv with some Tahitians.  We went out a little earlier so we could work in Carpentras a little, and we got caught up talking to three really neat homeless guys for an hour.  Then the rdv destroyed me.  It was sooooooo much food, and since then I have been in pain and I don't know what's up.  It's alright, though, because it's starting to subside :)  it was delicious, however.  Now, I cannot for the life of me think of what else we did that day, but I imagine we hit the streets and contacted a bunch of people before goin' on home.

Now, these next few days weren't nearly as cool as those other ones, but they were still fun.  I think.  I'll tell you what I remember.

Thursday we had a rdv with our friend Hassani we had just met.  We watched a talk by Prez Monson and talked about living prophets and the restoration.  It was really neat, and Hassani was eatin' it up.  Well, he was really participating, so it was cool.  After that, from what I remember, we went porting in an outer ville and met lots of real neat people and it was fun.

The day after was weekly planning, and then a dinner rdv with Sr Protano and fils, and then to the church to do guitar/spiritual thought with a less active boy that we're gonna do work with in the next little bit.

then was Samedi!  I cannot for the life of me remember what we did.  We had plans to go to a members home, but he cancelled due to bad weather, and so I think we went to do some passes, learned a couple people don't live there anymore, and talked to strangers on the bus and in the street.  OH YEAH.  I met this lady on the bus who was holding a bunch of shark movies, and I went NUTS, and then on the same bus was this lady whose ex-husband was a mormon.  I never know what to do in that situation, cuz it's happened before. "oh, why did you split?" "oh, what did he do? Was he a bad mormon?" you know?  So I just kinda brushed it aside after aknowledging (sic) it and talked about her current famille instead.

Up next comes dimanche.  We got to see Etienne this day, and that was cool.  Had a good rdv with him about the gospel of Jesus Christ and missionary work, and then we're still working on his hours at work so he can come to church, and he said he's gonna go straight up to his boss and say "hey" and get him to change the hours, so that would be cool.  We also met a guy from Sri Lanka and another guy from Portugal that day.

So that was the week!  Here, Martin Luther King, Jr. day is not celebrated, but this drunk homeless guy was shouting at the other elders the other day saying he's related to Obama, MLK, jr, Malcom X, George Bush and all those guys, so that was pretty funny.

Tell e'eryone I love them!

Love,

Elder Max Liechty

Week #70 - Avignon

Moooooooooooom!

So, about the Paris stuff, we're fine down here :)  We heard all about it, not only from the zone leaders n Prez, 

but also everyone in the streets this is all they're talking about.  There were some manifestations, but that's 

about it.

Hey, check it out, it's a real good thing you haven't sent the package yet, because I thought of something. 

In my last interview with Prez, I was expressing the desire to learn a lot more about the Atonement, and 

we talked about this book called The Infinite Atonement by Tad R. Callister, but it's not on lds store, so I

was wondering if you could maybe find it at a Deseret Book and toss that in?  And did I tell you about the 

face soap, too?  I might need some more.  Speaking of which, I had a dream that we went to this one store 

and they had shelf fulls of it, but it was just a dream and that still doesn't exist here.

So, let me tell you about this pretty awesome week.

It starts on monday.  We hit town briefly, and then we hopped on a train to Toulouse!  Yay!  When we got to 

Toulouse, I felt like I was home.  I like Toulouse more than Bordeaux, I decided.  If I ever get the chance to 

work in or move back to France, it'll probably be Toulouse.  Anyway, we headed over to the apartment, and 

on the way there was this guy who looked like Sylvester Stalone.  I told him that, and he was SPARKed out of 

his mind, and he was a pretty cool guy.  That was about that day, in the apartment it was us, all four Toulouse

Elders, the Aix ZLs, too, and also Muret showed up out of surprise.  That was fun.  Packed like sardines.

The next day was eventful, that meaning we got our legality done and now I have a really cool looking card 

that makes me legal in France!  Yes.  Then, we were supposed to catch a train shortly thereafter, but the legality

process took a million years, so we missed that one, so Elder Olsen (my zone leader and former district leader 

from Toulouse) and I explored Toulouse briefly, and found a really cool Bible store.  Then we got on the train 

and on home we went and back in Avignon we finally were.

The next day was really cool.  We had nothing lined up, so we set plans to see some miracles, and boy did we 

see them.  We met some really, really cool guys on the street, and also got a lesson with Etienne just passing 

by his home cuz we were in the area.  There was also this fella who we stopped and talked to who wanted all 

of our brochures, but we didn't have all of them, so he took our number and is supposed to call us to get the

rest.  That was kinda funny.  We also met this guy on the bus with whom we fixed a rdv for this sunday, but 

he was in Paris at the manifestation, so we refixed for this week.  Still a cool guy.  Then we passed by the guitar

place to see our pal Didier, and it was really easy to talk about God with him, so we'll probably be going back 

again.

The next day was also pretty cool.  We prepare a few pass backs and tried to find some people (no success 

unfortunately) but the first guy we contacted off the bus was real neat and we actually taught him the 

restoration right then and there.  That was fun.  After our failures to find anyone, we got an english class 

with Natalie and Josué, and it was just as much fun as usual.

The next day was pretty boring and too quick.  We had weekly planning, and then we were off to Aix en 

Provence for our zone conference the next day.  They have the smallest apartment in the world, but it was 

pretty fun over there.  Aix is a real cool city, and the chapel is probably one of the coolest in the mission.

So then samedi was zone conference itself, really fun. We learned all about how to become more delightful 

people.  We talked about Joseph in Egypt, and how in every situation he was in, he tried to be as happy and 

delightful as he could, always trusting in God, and he always somehow managed to rise to the top, even when

he was in prison he rose to the top and ended up running the prison.  So anyway, we want to be as delightful

as him.  Then we headed on home, we were supposed to have a rdv, but it fell through.  Here's a funny phrase 

I learned: "Poser un lapin à quelqu'un."  It means to not show up to a rdv.  Directly translated it means to place 

a rabbit in front of someone.  I think that's HILARIOUS.  So I'm glad I got to use that that night.  We passed

Jean-Personne instead, and had  a nice little rdv with him.  Then we bought some kébabs for dinner and the

guy working there looked like Ringo Starr and also loved missionaries, because they used to come to his

place all the time, but they haven't for a while.  So I think we found our new place :)

Then rolls around dimanche ALREADY.  This was a very fast week, cuz we were allllll over the place.  But it was

a cool day, church was sweet, Jean-Personne came to church again (he used to come all the time, but during

the holidays he was out and about or working, so he couldn't, but now the holidays are over!).  After that, we

went out to pass some more less actives, actually found one for real and were able to teach him!  He's mildly

special needs, so it looks like I've found myself another Frère Déjean or Fr. Handy!  Yes.  I was actually looking

for someone like them in this branch, because those two have been my favorite members.  After this frere, we

went into ville to do some passes, but there was a manifestation, so we steered pretty clear of centreville, so

instead we passed André.  Cool thing I just realized: we tried to pass this other lady for a real long time before

going to André, with no success.  We had a bunch of cool things lead to us finally getting into her apartment 

complex, but we couldn't find her, so that was a bummer.  But it turns out THAT was so that we wouldn't miss

André, who had just gotten back home right when we came to his house.  So that was neat.  He was at the

 manifestation, and he was worried about the state

 of the world, so we turned to Ether 12:4 again, just 

like old times, and let him know there is hope.  That

 was the day.

So that was a really good week, I think.  We have

some fun things lined up for this week, hopefully

not too many people pose us rabbits :)  I still love 

that.

And I love you!  My favorite family.  Have a great

week

Love,

Elder Max Liechty

Goofy picture of Max in Toulouse

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Week #69 - Avignon and New Years

Marseille

Marseille

Momma!

New Years was fun.  We didn't do much, cuz we're missionaries.  We left glasses of water next to our beds and set an alarm for 0h and woke up and took a sip and crashed again, but that was about it.  Here in Avignon there were no fireworks, or at least in our little corner.  And YES, I have heard of that movie, in French it's called Invincible, and I'd heard of the book n stuff too, Mr. Birrell told us about it.  It sounds siiiiick.

The shark cards.  I want them.  I mean, like, normally some other missionary will have the face cards, and maybe it would be best to keep them mint condition back home, so....I'll let you decide this one :)

Is JEN conference for Jazz Band?  Is it not in Monterey this year?  Wut?  I don't even know anything any more.  I'm so ooooolllldddd.

So get this, this week was pretty fun.

Lundi night we were out trying to pass some less actives and ancient amis, and it was BUNS COLD OUT.  It was so cold.  The wind was all up in our grills and it was just cold.  We didn't end up finding either of the people home, we knocked some doors, talked for a little with some people, but most of them said it was just too dang cold to keep the door open for us.  Welp.  It was fun, anyway, and I've heard that every time you contact in the freezing cold your wife loses ten pounds.  that's just what I was told, I'd have no idea.

The next day was fun, we went to have lunch with a member, she's a single sister with a bunch of kids, so all four missionaries went over, and it was very, very fun.  She's tahitian, so she made a boat load of food, very tasty, too, and she was so happy to have us over.  It had been a real long time since she had had the missionaries over, and so she teared up a little bit just while we were sitting there.  That was cool.  After that, we went to go pass some people, don't remember if any of them where home or not, i don't think so, but we got to meet some neat people in the streets.

Then comes NEW YEARS EVE.  We were actually in Marseille for the day (that's the pictures) because of district meeting, and that was fun.  We did a white elephant gift exchange, I gave away this sweeeeeet lion tie I got for 2 euros and a lion king book for 50 cents, and in return I got some tasty chocolats, peanut butter, and.....finger nail polish....I used it to paint a bunch of stuff on my desk, but not my fingers, don't worry.  That evening we went passing some pals again, and it came to the mind to pass this guy we hadn't seen in a real long time.  We passed him, he was home, and we had a good rdv with him!  It was really, really cool.  His name's Eric, and he's super into Bob Dylan and other 60s music, so he's cool.  that was neat.  It's actually even more neat, because normally the missionaries would pass him on friday because he doesn't work, but we had been gone the past four fridays and hadn't been able to pass him!  turns out he had been pretty dang busy the past month or so, so he wouldn't have been able to see us anyway.  So that worked out nicely!

Then we got ourselves NEW YEARS DAY.  It's already 2015!  Wow!  Can you believe I started my mission in 2013?  Nuts.  So that day our DMB invited us over to eat, and it was tasty tacos.  That night we were out contacting, and we met two really, really cool guys.  One named Aaron from Florida (aw yeah, good ol 'murican), and the other Florian (if I remember correctly) who wanted to go get Dr. Peppers with us, but everything was closed cuz it's New Years.  But he was cool anyway, we had a nice discussion, made a friend, so it was worth it.

And then that night.  that night was what we might call "the purge."  We though the cockroach problem was dying down a little, but NOPE.  the other elders got home just before us and found a million and went on a killing spree, followed by a cleaning everything in the apartmet spree.  We set up all the cockroach traps we had and killed anything that moved.  It was fun.

Next up was vendredi.  We got to see Jean-Personne and talk with him a little.  He's doing alright, still doesn't really want to live the commandments.  Then that night we got to see Natalie, we teach her english, with Josué, a member that helps us and also is learning english.  Basically we spent this whole lesson talking about english idioms, like "stick in the mud" and "beating a dead horse" n stuff like that.  Natalie loves to laugh, and she's kind of a lonely older lady, so we just have a real good time with that.

Then on samedi we had a birthday party of sorts for a member at the church.  It was really neat, because in attendance was her less active little brother and also a nonmember family friend who was currently living with them.  Both of whom I'd met before, and it was really really cool to see them again.  That was about the whole evening, too.  Really fun, and I'm glad the less active brother and the friend were there, cuz they had a good time, and it was at the church, now when they think church, they'll think "good times" and want to be baptized or reactivated or whatever.

Then dimanche was a reeeeaaall good'n.  After church we went out to pass some friends, and we actually taught a lesson with a guy on the street, and he said when we're in avignon, he'll probably be there, so we can call to meet up anytime.  really, really cool guy.  Then we got to see André again, too.  Played some guitar with him, talked about changing and new years n stuff.  He also invited us over another time to record some songs, because he's got some stuff for that, so we might just do that some time!  Whooo!

Now today, we're headed out to TOULOUSE!!!! wooooooo!! back on home.  To do legality and finally be legal in france again.  Well, I'm legal, I just don't have the cool card that says I am.

Hey.  Have you gotten my package yet?  It has the SD card in it, soooooo I hope you get it!  aye aye aye!

I LOVE YOU ALL AND HAPPY NEW YEAR

love,

Elder Max Liechty