JULY! Worth waiting for.

I know this July posting is a little late coming, but July finished as our big Young Single Adult Conference for Eastern Europe began here in Hungary.  We were so busy for a while that posting pictures for July was just not possible.  July was a wonderful month though, and I hope you enjoy these pictures from the month, and find that they were worth waiting for.  You'll have to wait for a timely posting for the month of August before I show you some pictures of the conference though.

I have been told by a reliable source that the way I caption pictures can be confusing.  Since I go chronologically from top to bottom, I have sometimes captioned above a picture and sometimes below the picture.  This month I will try hard to only caption below the picture that the caption is meant for.

 And so, here is the first picture.  As we have mentioned before, there is agriculture all around us.  I really liked the depth in this picture of a field after the straw had been rolled into bales.

 This month we said goodbye to the Bagozzi's, the office couple who has helped us so much for this last year.  They became very good friends and we will miss them a lot.

 Our young adult group did a fine service project this month for an animal shelter.  Actually it was for dogs only.  Any dog is accepted and cared for no matter how old or sick it is.  No 'putting a dog to sleep', as the euphemism goes.  We stuffed straw.

 We filled holes and cleaned up debris.

 We cared for some doggies.

 And we raked up leaves.

 Here's a picture of the whole group.

 Our little branch in Békéscsaba had a convert baptism this month.

 It was held in an outdoor swimming area.  A very memorable setting.  We selected the most secluded spot but, although you can't tell in this picture, there were curious swimmers watching on.

July saw the arrival of a new mission president for the Budapest Hungary Mission.  President Lowell Smith and Sister Lynne Smith are pictured here, just right of center, in this picture of our first zone conference with them.  They are from Sandy, Utah.  They will be a great blessing to the missionary work here in Hungary for the next three years.

Pioneer day, as you may know, is on July 24th, and on the 21st our Szeged branch had a fireside in recognition of that historical event.  We consider all of these Hungarian saints to be pioneers and we asked our speaker, Bishop Mecséri from the ward in Kecskemét, to not only talk about the early Church pioneers, but to talk about Hungarian Church pioneers.

 It was a good event followed by visiting and refreshments.

 Of course, July 24th is also Andrea's birthday!  A couple of our sweet young adults made her a birthday cake.

 Then our missionaries bought her this fancy cake for her birthday!

Here's a picture of them, with the flowers that they also got for her.  The missionaries are: Sister Hardy, a brand new missionary, Sister Kramer, the soon-to-go-home Elder Nealy, and our zone leader, Elder Velasquez.  Not pictured are the two cakes I bought her, not knowing she would get so much attention from her other fans.

 We took a morning this month to go and see a museum in a neighboring city, Hodmezövásárhely, about the difficult times of communist oppression in that area.   Lenin in presented here sitting on the side of the building just outside one of the windows.

It is a whimsical, if not simply disrespectful, remembrance of him. 

Here is the outside part of a series of statues representing the military oppression of the time.

And here are the bottoms of the same statues as seen in the interior of the museum.

 Statues like this of 'Ivan' were erected all over the Soviet Union.  The Soviets thought it would depict an image of unity with the locals.  Instead it was a symbol of tyranny to them.  They were torn down when communism finally failed.  This one that used to stand in a public area in the town, was rescued from the scrap heap to be displayed here.

It has become a tradition for us to take the young missionaries out to eat when one of them is leaving us.  We pose here after a farewell lunch for Elder Nealy who was not only leaving Szeged but it was time for him to make the big trip home to America.

We finished the month with an annual Multi-branch activity that we helped with.  I was chosen to give the opening remarks, not because they love to hear me talk but because the mission president couldn't make it.  The theme was Elder Cook's talk in last fall's conference titled "It Is Better To Look Up".  You might remember it.

 After my talk, translated for me as I spoke, we had a bunch of games/activities which were each attempting to stress some aspect of the theme.  Here I am in charge of a water balloon toss. (It's better to look up.)  Andrea was in charge of a dizzy rely (repentance) and I'm sorry I don't have some video of that because it was really funny.

 After the Games we had a lunch.  We had about 100 people there.

 I just had to take a picture of some of the kids.

 After that, helium balloons were passed out.

 And then launched.  That comes from a mention of an activity like this given in Elder Cook's talk.  It's symbolic of releasing our cares and concerns into the hands of God. 

I think the whole activity had the chance of helping these members have a happier, more positive attitude and outlook; except for one small boy who suddenly realized that he was not going to get his wonderful balloon back.  He cried bitter tears.

June is bustin' out all over!

Yes! The title of last month's blog came from the lyrics of "June Is Bustin' Out All Over!" from the musical "Carousel".  Kudos to my Sister Charlene who was the only one to respond to that question.  I was counting on her.   She and I listened to LP's of musicals over and over when we were kids.

For those of you who have noticed my seasonal picture out our apartment window, here is the final one for summer.  Yes we have now been here for all four seasons.

And the shots below are of how Hungarians like to have a summer outdoor activity.  It's not a BBQ, it's a bogrács.

That's the name of the huge pot that you'll see hanging over the open fire.

While a huge pot of Hungarian Gulyas (goulash) cooks in the bogrács, which takes about four hours to do right, everybody can play games.

Somebody has to stir the gulyas.

Evelin, an investigator, had the young adults decorate these boxes as an activity.

Zoli displays some of his handiwork.

This is the Szeged primary in its full strength.  Unfortunately, it's a good-bye party for two of the boys who are moving.  They are two of our most regular primary attendees.  So the primary just got chopped in half.

Here are the primary children and their primary staff.

Andrea and I, and the real flat Jackie (in Andrea's right hand) took a trip to a real castle in Gyula.  It is the only standing castle remaining in our area of South-East Hungary.  Looks cool, huh?

A group of school kids were having a tour of the castle where they got to go around dressed up like they were in the 14th century.

Here's an interior shot with me,

and an interior shot with Andrea.  After that, our camera battery went dead.

We're always taking pictures of missionaries when we're at the end of a transfer period and know we will be loosing some people we've made good friends with.

Sister Papritz, next to Andrea, completed her mission and we were sending her home.

Also Sister Barnhart went home at the end of this transfer.  In mission lingo, "She died".

Try to count how many birthday cakes Andrea made this month.  Well, actually in one day.  There's Ágota.

There's Viki.

There's Elder Moffet.

The answer is four.  Oh, that wasn't fair.  We didn't get a picture of the one for Zoli.

Here we are having a 'welcome to Szeged' lunch for our new missionaries,  Elder Velasquez and Sister Hardy.  Sister Hardy is a Greenie (brand new to Hungary).  Elder Velasquez was born in Canada, but most recently has lived in Cuba and he is a Boxer with Olympic aspirations.  I feel very safe with him.

A high note this month was the baptism of one of our young adult investigators.

Nik (Nikoletta) was baptized after about two years of investigating.  That is why there are so many missionaries who came to her baptism.

After the baptism we had a gift giving moment for her at the start of our Young Adult activity.

I think she is glowing.

Remember those boys who were moving?  It's because their divorced mother, one of the sweetest people we've ever met, was getting married to the branch president of another city.

What a wonderful couple they make.  

In Hungary, all marriages must be done civilly.  If you're not married by the government, you're not married.  After that, you can do a church wedding if you want.  This couple plans on being married in the Freiberg temple soon.

Elder Snyder serves in Székesfehérvar where the wedding took place.  He is one of Andrea's adopted missionary sons.  She adopted him because he is one of Nathan's friends from his BYU marching band days.

Speaking of Nathan, here's an update photo of him.  He and his companion are flying high this week because they just had a family get baptized!

Here is a photo that we have waited ten months to take.  When we arrived in Hungary the fields of sunflowers were all dead and waiting for harvest.  We knew how pretty they would be when the next summer arrived.  Which flower do you think is prettiest?  That's right, the one right in the middle.
See you next month!