Missionary Style Christmas

Hello Hello Hello! Merry Christmas from across the sea. 

Life is sweet, and I love all you hooligans.

This week has been pretty majestic, and the Christmas vibes in the flat are getting pumped! We had a deep Jesus the Christ group study this morning, next to our fireplace and our beautiful Christmas branch, then cleaned the flat, while listening to our traditional and epic "Spirit of the Glen" bagpipes cd.....quite majestically. It may sound lame, but...we are having good times here. I will definitely miss the missionary style Christmas though. Instead of hanging out at a large member

family's home this year, we have decided to spend it with some of the single members of the ward. So on Christmas, I will be at our big ol' Romanian friend, Andrei's flat for when we Skype. His flat is pretty meager, and we are not too sure about the internet connection, but we are praying that it will work out. I will Skype around 3 (my time), but if the connection is rubbish, then we will go to another family's house later that night for backup. So we will see what happens, and I will email you the deets when the time comes. I am so excited to see your faces though. I miss you all.

Other things that happened this week:

*We went to the Temple as a mission again. Again, a very unique experience.

*We had a baptism for Elder Candland and Mongie's Chinese investigator, Guowei! (it sounds exactly like Nacho " Go away...read some books!") It was a very intimate but powerful baptism, and we all know he is going to be a powerful leader in China. He returned to China yesterday, but before he left, he fed the four of us a traditional Chinese meal. It instantly brought back flashbacks of Wrexham, and made me remember how much I love the humble, Chinese people.

*For a ward activity, we had "A Night in Bethlehem". It was actually...super legit. They transformed the chapel into the old Jerusalem setting, and we all wore "traditional" Jewish style clothing, and sat on the floor instead of chairs, and had an amazing Nativity program. It was..a pretty sacred night. Even though people were obviously in costumes, and the props weren't professional...it had a very special feel to it all, and the true spirit of Christmas was very strong. It will definitely be a time I will never forget.

Other than that, Elder Schofield and I have been having some good adventures (we got lost on a different route to the chapel, and ended up walking around in a circle in a forest at night for an hour), and we have been teaching our friends John and Serafim, and they are incredibly progressing.

Thank you mum for the food, and thank you everyone for your love and support and humor. You are the best family I could ask for. Too true. I love you all, and until I see your faces on Thursday, peace out and

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Elder BA

Guowei the man!!!!

 Night in Bethlehem. You have to trust me...everyone else's costume was actually legit. We had to improvise... and cut up a duvet cover. More Nephite than Jewish if you ask me