Small town on the way to Braunwald; Charlotte, E. Harris & E. Nilsson riding the cable tram up to Braunwald; Diana and Robert in the same cable tram.

This is our buggy ride in Braunwald with the driver smoking a cigar all the while.
May 27, 2009 WEDNESDAY

This morning we had been asked by Elder Ehlen to help a family move from his ward, the Altstetten Ward, to our ward in Schwamendingen. Gabriella Rodriques is coming back into activity and her husband, Julio, is currently not a member but is investigating the Church. He speaks mostly Spanish, but can speak some German. Elder Ehlen wanted to make sure they got a rousing welcome so we recruited Peter and Daniela Martin to help too. Daniela speaks Spanish so she was especially helpful in being able to talk to Julio in his own language. Elders Harris and Nilsson also came to help as well as two young men and a sister from the Altstetten Ward. They have a little boy who is about a year old and today he was a little sick with an ear infection and possibly lung congestion. Half the time she had him in a backpack strapped to her back while she worked. We helped carry mattresses and other a bunch of other stuff down to the cellar and/or to a van parked outside. Once the van was filled, the missionaries and the two young men went with Julio to unload it at the new address while we washed walls, windows and floors. The Rodrigues had lived in the apartment for five years and it required a lot of deep cleaning, especially the bathroom and the kitchen. By the time we had everything cleaned up, it was time to go to our next appointment. We worked there from 10:00 until a little after 1:00.

On our way back to catch our tram we passed a “brockenhaus” pronounced “broken house” which means second hand store. We had passed it a few times while riding trams and thought one day we would stop in to take a look. This time we were on foot so we decided to stop in. It was chuck full of all kinds of things, but nothing caught our fancy, so we just looked and then left. We caught our tram, went home, changed, had a bite to eat and then left to visit Sister Gianati in Bruettisellen. This is the third time we’ve been to her home. The last time we were there we promised we’d bring our laptop so she could watch “The Testament” video we gave her last Christmas. She is a sweet elderly member who doesn’t have a very good understanding of the Church, the doctrines or the Book of Mormon. As we watched the DVD she got confused when it switched back and forth from the Nephites/Lamanites and Jerusalem/Christ. We answered her questions as we went along and, when it was over, went into more detail about the Book of Mormon. She loves her bible, but said it is so hard to understand, that some things didn’t make sense to her. We explained that the bible has been translated so many times that some things are not as clear as the original must have been and she readily agreed because she had already come to that conclusion. She said she had her triple combination, but hadn’t read in it much. She just wished there were just one church instead of so many to choose from. She has a neighbor upstairs that’s Jehovah Witness and she says she has fun “fighting” with her. We challenged her to read the Book of Mormon and read to her the promise of prophet Moroni in Moroni 10:4-7. We also asked her if we could teach her the missionary lessons so she would have a better understanding of why it was necessary for Joseph Smith to be called as a prophet to restore the true Church on the earth again, the Plan of Salvation and the other doctrines of Christ. She promised to begin reading in the Book of Mormon and to pray to get a testimony. We had such a good meeting that we didn’t notice we’d been there for three hours. We had a prayer and slowly made our way out the door and came home leaving her with her two cats.

We had arranged with Sister Frioud to visit her this afternoon, but we spent too long with Silvana to be able to do it today. Diana called her as we were riding back home in the bus and rearranged the appointment for tomorrow at 2:30. We got a call from Elder Ehlen asking us how the Rodrigues move went. We also got a call from Elder Nilsson asking us if we had gotten over to the Rodriqueses to see if they needed any help on the other end of their move. We hadn’t so they were going to call them and then let us know if we should come to help again. We didn’t receive a call so we assumed they didn’t need any more help. Later on Elder Norris called to make his mid-week check on us to see if we were still alive. We are, but after the heavy work today and not being used to it anymore, we feel as if we are dead. We hope all will be good in the morning.