E. Middleton is in the gray suit; Pres. Dietmar Matern, S. Hutcheson, E. Hutcheson, S. Larson, E. Larson, S. Silvia Matern; Elder & Sister Larson with E. Vincent.

JUNE 16, 2010 WEDNESDAY

It is rare that I sleep through an alarm, but this morning I did it. However, Diana woke me up with plenty of time for us to get ready to go to the temple. We caught the bus at 6:48, rode to the bahnhof and caught the 7:07 train to Zurich where we had to change to a train that took us to Bern. When we got to Zurich, we recognized a temple sealer on his way to the temple. We said hello to him and then we ran into Sisters Robinson & Sjoberg. Not only a few minutes later we ran into the zone leaders, Elders Talley & Anderson. We all got on the train and rode to Bern together enjoying each other’s company. The missionaries talk non-stop when they get together. When we got off in Bern to catch yet another train to Zollikofen, we recognized more missionaries one of which was Elder Eschweiler who was in our first district after we got here. When we got on the train to Zollikofen, we saw Brother & Sister Klaumuenzner and when he saw us, he came back and talked with us until we got to Zollikofen. It was great to see everyone
coming together from all parts of our mission for this temple experience. Every transfer one third of the mission have this opportunity along with the missionaries that die (go home) the next week. Those who we know will die are Elders Eschweiler, Middleton, Bentley, and Holzapfel.

The first session we attended was a sealing session. Martin Hedinger from our Schaffhausen Branch asked us to bring some names to the temple to have cards printed out and we were able to get four couples sealed and two children sealed to parents for him. We left the cards at the desk and just before the sealing session, I decided to go see if we could do any of them in our session. I made the mistake of going to the desk in temple clothes and was admonished for it. Fortunately, Brother Locher followed me down and said he’d find the cards, but I needed to go back up to the sealing room. He found them and brought them up. He was our sealer for the session. Others in the session with us were Elder & Sister Hutcheson, Elder Bentley, Elder Conner and one whose name we can’t remember. Brother & Sister Hartmann, a Swiss couple, completed the session. The second session was an endowment session.

In between session we had lunch during which we got to see Martin Neidhart from the Schwamendingen ward. We also got to visit with the missionaries, the Hutchesons and the Klaumuenzmers. We got to ask Sister Klaumuenzner some questions about de-registering when it comes time for us to go home. There is too much up in the air about the reorganization of the mission which takes place July1 for her to give us any definitive answers. During lunch Diana was able to give Elders Eschweiler and Middleton a Swiss flag as a parting gift to remember us by. After the endowment session we gave one to Elder Vincent because this was probably the last time we would see him before we go home.

The ride home was a reverse of the morning’s ride, but without anyone accompanying us. We got home a little after 6:00, but we had one more thing we wanted to do tonight. Sister Gardedieu’s birthday is on June 18, but we’ll be in Geneva so we wanted to take a gift to her tonight. We got it and rode the bus out to Schleitheim, but she wasn’t home. We left it hanging on her door with a note attached and then came back home. We got home about 9:00 and are pretty tired after a long day.

One more thing of note is the reduction of American missionaries being allowed into Switzerland. Sister Klaumuenzner said that only ten new USA missionaries will be granted visas for the remainder of this year divided between the Geneva mission and the Zurich mission. Next year there’ll only 20 allowed in and the next year 20 more. After that, none will be allowed in. The reason, she said, was that Switzerland only allows a finite number of foreigners into the country and preference is being given to European Commonwealth nations. Missionaries from these nations will be allowed in so the missionary work will still go forward, but without the help of missionaries from the USA. So sad.

Sylvain called a little after 9:00 just wanting to talk. He gets lonely out where he lives in the group home and wants to hear a friendly voice occasionally. We usually talk about his progress working in the 12 steps to recovery program workbook and the things he has discovered about himself. He used to come here for the counseling sessions, but he lives so far away and isn’t allowed to leave without a chaperone, so now we do it over the phone.

Our tender mercy for today is that we were asked to be the witness couple. That was a special treat for us.