A lost letter!

Last week, causing great worry in my mom, we did not recieve a letter from John. Knowing it was transfer week and that the electricity can be flaky out there, we tried to not worry too much about it. Well, with John's letter this week he sent last week's that did not get sent somehow.

So, here's the letter for January 4, 2010.

Dear Family,

I'm sorry I couldn't write yesterday. I found out that on the 3 month transfer week, P-day is on Tuesday. Well, I am in a 3 person companionship for the next few days. One of my companions will be training and they don't arrive until thursday. The other will be taking Elder Anderl's place as branch president. I, however, must give my new companion, Elder Shields, a slight tutorial on some of the branch president stuff.

I was feeling rather empathetic of dad the other day. Specifically speaking, I am the branch clerk, and so filling out tithing reports and all sort of paperwork reminded me of the fact that dad was ward clerk for a while. However, I am sure it was a lot different because we don't have computers. Everything is done by hand.

Well, Elder Anderl is gone. I really enjoyed serving with him. He was one of the greatest missionaries that I have worked with. I simply wish that I was better at learning things, because it if frustrating that I cannot remember every detail about our time together. I know that I could have learned more, but I am thankful for what I have learned and what I remember.

I have had the opportunity to use your voice recorder. It has been busy today with transfers, so I wasn't able to grab it but I have a few things to send to you. The Gjika family says happy new years. I recorded that for all of you, but it is in Albanian so just know that they are wishing you well. I will send that next week.

Sister Gjika is officially an Active member now! She is a great woman. We hope that her husband, who is less active and used to be the branch president, will see how much the gospel is blessing her life, and will desire to become completely active again. They did, however, come to church as a family on Sunday! It was a precious sight to see.

We have not heard from Algida since she has returned the gospel principles manual. I expect a call any day now.

Florian, we have determined, is not at the moment ready for baptism. He still has much to learn, even though he has been taught nearly everything.

Oh! And New Years was AMAZING! I got some video of it, and I have a few pictures from another Elder who was in Lushnje. I mean, the world was BLOWING UP AROUND US! I can’t help but think that the Rawlings would have really enjoyed it. It reminded me of the time we went to their house on the 4th of July, except like, with 10,000 times more fireworks! We came in at 4:00pm, and we stayed up till midnight (with permission of course). We went on the top of our palati (apartment) and we saw the world begin exploding! People were shooting fireworks out of their apartment windows, shooting roman candles out of their windows! A man lit a GIANT BATTERY of FIREWORKS RIGHT IN FRONT OF US! Elder Anderl said that his thoughts when that happened were, “you know, I could probably die right now…” Big fireworks were exploding like 10 feet away from us. And it all got more spectacular as it approached midnight! It was spectacular! There is nothing like an Albanian New Year! That was more fireworks than I have ever seen in my entire life, not to mention in a single moment!!!
Well, we continue to work with Edi on his smoking problem. He has everything down except for that.

Well, the Gjika family invited us over for new years lunch. It was good. We had Qofte, stuffing, salad, turkey (which we saw her kill the day before. My companion got a video of her chopping off his head with a knife! It was flapping about with its head cut off for about 3 minutes, and her five year old daughter was having a hoot and a holler, laughing at it the entire time. Then she tried to cut off a leg, and it started flapping everywhere again and she couldn’t cut it off all the way yet. Eventually, it was dead.) It is a tradition to kill and eat turkey on new years. It is like out Christmas. She put some of the turkey stomach in the stuffing. It wasn’t bad, but knowing it was stomach made it difficult to eat. Then on Sunday she cooked us grilled fish. She took the fish, sliced to and cleaned out the guts, then grilled it over charcoal (scales, head and tail and all!) Then she served it to us, with lemon too. It wasn’t too bad, but it took a bit to get over the fact that it was looking and smiling at me. It also took a bit to get over the fact that I was eating the scales too!

It will be interesting training a new branch president. Elder Shields has been in the country for 1 year now. He is Branch president and District leader. It is interesting because 6 of out group, because of how large it is, it going co-senior this transfer, at 3 months in the country! Also, Motra Hiland is TRAINING the new sister at 3 months! I know they will have special experiences.

Well, I love all of you. It was wonderful to see you on Skype and talk with you! Ihope you get better Dad! Congrats Anna on your …productive night at work! And cool beans Ammon for being able to get through New Years! I just got the Christmas card from Linda, Grandma Nevins, The Browns, Sister Jensen, The Maloneys, and The Family. Thank you all for your kind words…And I’m sorry that I took away from your Christmas…. Thank you for the Package, I know that you sacrificed for that. Love you all, and have a HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Love, Elder Fredrickson