Monday, November 29, 2010

November 29, 2010

Well, no letter today!  It is sad because transfers came out and I don't know if he is staying in Kerava or had to move on to some other place.  Plus, was so anxious to hear about the baptism.

I guess we will have to wait until next week.

BTW, he did send pictures however - crazy kid!

HOLD ON.........just got an email from Lori Peck and her son, Vanhin Peck, will be Brian's new companion in PORI - it is about 3.5 hours northwest of where he is now.  I guess he is off the hook for stiffing me with a letter today.  THANK YOU LORI!!  So grateful to be connected to the BEST missionary moms.  She also tells me there is a webcam there - woo hoo - we will be doing some spying on him FOR SURE!

So stay tuned, I am sure we will be receiving a letter on Wednesday.

Monday, November 22, 2010

November 22, 2010

Hey Family,

I am absolutely amazed at how fast you got the package here wow. Yah, FedEX is horrible here for me. It was a forty minute quest away today in order to get my package. Well worth it. Thank you so much. Wow! There was a ton of stuff. Don't wory about grabbing anything else. This is great. Thank you. Some of the stuff is a little questionable like the hardcore techno song of the Pirates of the Carribean haha. Thank you though


H's baptism is this Saturday. Elder Hybarger is baptizing her. Elder Baccile is speaking at her baptism about baptism. I am giving her the Holy Ghost on that Sunday. It's pretty exciting. She has her interview with Elder Groberg (baptismal candidates need to be interviewed by either the district leader or zone leader before baptism) on Thursday. She is a sculpture. I know she has done some huge sculpture that is in Rovaniemi. I don't know too much about it.

Christmas. I have been thinking. Shipping will cost me a ton. I'm not too sure if if is worth it to send the gifts to you by mail. Plus, I don't trust the mail service after the last package I tried to send you all. i think it would be best if I just save the money that dad gave me and I can give you twice as much next Christmas and I can be there for it. I am thinking about sending chocolate again though because that is alwasy nice. I'm pretty bummed about it but I think it is best. What do you think?

Everything has gone electric here so no worries about the carbon monoxide. I'm good. That carbon monoxide thing was a pretty big deal when I first got into the country because 2 missionaries died from carbon monoxide poisoning in Romania. Pretty nuts stuff. But I'm safe  so no need to panic

I love the picture of Scot sleeping on the couch. Nothing has changed haha! How is he doing? How's Ellie? How's Gram? How are you two?

Transfers. I want Elder Baccile and I to stay together another change but I'm not sure. If anything, I think I stay and he leaves but I said the same thing about Lappeenranta so I have no idea. We will see. I will find out on Saturday so I can let you know next email. We will see about his jacket after change calls.

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you all had an awesome Thanksgiving. What did you eat? We are supposed to be in charge of the meat but I'm not sure what we will do. I will take pictures. It should be fun. I will try and do something fun for a Christmas card picture. I'll keep my eyes open for something really fun. 

I haven't been driving much. It's icy and I don't even trust myself on ice in an automatic. Ask James Breidel to tell you about a little scare that happened to us when we were drving for a basketball game and it was snowy. I may have to start driving though if Elder Baccile leaves and I stay. Should be exciting!

Update. I got a letter from Elder Pond. He wears his Ellie bracelt every single day. He says some people stare at him all the time and they all the members in Kuopio ask him about it. Cool. He seems like he is having fun up there with Elder Gorringe.

That's cool that the Emmelkamps are coming out. Where are they going in Finland? I would love to go to Turku and meet this guy. Hopefully one day I can but I think I iwll be in Kerava for a long time. Keep me posted on there travel situation.

Tell Todd and Abbey that I will write them soon. I haven't had time due to Elder Hyrbarger going home soon and him having to get all kinds of stuff before he leaves.

That's all I have family. I love you all and I will talk to you soon.

Love,
Elder Behnke



Monday, November 15, 2010

November 15, 2010

Hey Family,

Things are going great. H is coming along great. Her date is pretty solid. We want to try and get her to the baptism in Marjaniemi this upcoming weekend. We just have a few things left to talk about with her. We need to check up with her coffee stopping and go over a couple more commandments but it is going very well. She will be most likely baptised on Nov. 27 like we have planned. Great!


I forgot to tell you about the singing in church. It went well. It is so awesome to sing the same primary songs I sang as a child in english in Finnish. It's really cool. It was father's day here so we had the entire priesthood cookies. We made way too many cookies so we ended up making the entire ward cookies. It was fun. We have also been making banana bread for some of the ward members and they love. Finns have never even heard of banana bread. The ward loves us for our baking talents! :) 


I have been doing tons of service lately. Every other day we have been cutting wood for H so can can have fire wood for the winter. We have been cutting trees down in her backyard and cutting them up. Her tools aren't the best. She only has handaxes and some flimsy saws but we are doing it! My grip on my hand is dead! I'm really pumped about getting to chop wood for service. It's great.

I haven't been taking much pictures but I will try to take some more.

Christmas.  "Dad and I really don't need anything so if you could get by with not getting us anything" Well, nobody NEEDS anything. I'm getting you presents!!!!! I will try to get small things because shipping will destroy me. Thank you very much for the money so I can participate in Christmas this year!

I go the package. SWEET! The chocolates were downed in like 2 days. I looks like you all had some awesome times at the packer games. Awesome! Thank you for the pictures.

I don't have anything else. Thank you. I'm super low on time. I will write you more next week with pictures.


Mother.....You have done a lot for me lately, but I'm asking you if you can do me another thing.

We have a cd player in the car and we are completely burnt out of Enya and the music Elder Hybarger has and he is leaving soon. Can you burn me some cds so we have something to listen to more of in the car. Plus, chances are I will be in Kerava for a long time.



Love,
Vanhin Behnke


PS:  that picture of Ryan Kissinger on Halloween was SWEET!  He is a stud, great costume!

Monday, November 8, 2010

November 8, 2010

Hei Fam,

I really love the attached pictures I have been getting lately. Looks like Scott and Dad bought some new beanies SWEET!. That's the one thing I have too much of out here is beanies. It looks like they had a good time.

I haven't received any mail recently. I have no idea when I'm going to get this package. They called and said that they would deliver sometime between 11:00 and 6:00. Great. :)

I have learned that I am really good at stalling cars at stoplights. So I got that going on for me :) Why would anyone nowadays by a stick shift. It's way too much work. Driving should be a luxury. But it's going well. Needless to say, I don't drive much. 

We ended up never going to play pool but went shopping (looking around at things we could never afford) in Helsinki instead. Everything is so expensive here. Speaking of that, Do i have permission for shopping for Christmas presents for everyone? I have got the verdict from anyone about that.

Hey! We have a baptismal date. She is around 50. She is a pretty big time artist in Finland. I guess she has done some great projects from what we have heard. Her date is scheduled for Novmeber 27 so hopefully it stays on that day so Elder Hybarger can be here for it. We helped her do service the other day. I GOT TO CHOP WOOD!!! Finally! I have been wanting to do that for service for a long time. It was fun. We got to use this sweet tool called a vesari. I think it is called a bell hook is english. Maybe? That thing was awesome! We would cut the logs mostly and then we would give them to Elder Hybarger and he would lift them over his head and smash them a huge rock. Yes! 

How is everything going there? What's up? What are the Thanksgiving plans? What are the Christmas plans? It's only early November but the Christmas time season started here already. Christmas lights were even going up my last week in Lappeenranta. 

I want to get a Turkey Bowl going on the P-day of Thanksgiving week. I think it would be sweet.

Scott: Yes, there is an October in Finland and Yes, that was a dumb question :) haha. In order to avoid questions like these, this is why I clarified that the coins I sent you all weren't real! hahaha. I love you Scott :)

I love you all. I hope all is well.
Talk to you soon

Vanhin Behnke

p.s. Is Favre and Moss really on the same team?

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

November 2, 2010

Hey Family
I'm in Kerava. It's crazy that I'm in my fourth city already. Elder Watson is still in Joensuu!


Kerava is ok. It's nothing compared to the beauty of Savonlinna or Lappeenranta. It has a bunch of gold roads. I feel like Dorothy of the Wizard of Oz. I have a car though! So now I'm rolling around in my Opel. I learned how to drive a stick. I stalled twice at a stop light and couldn't get the car going and there was a huge line of cars behind me. Then, the light turned red and I was still there hahaha.


The 3 some is good. Elder Baccile is awesome and Elder Hybarger is way cool too. Elder Hybarger is crazy awesome at Finnish. With Elder Schoof, he said everything pretty simple and never used anything that I didn't know. With Elder Hybarger, I'm like a greenie all over again. He is crazy awesome. I'm going to learn so much! For our threesome, we are going to have a Tri-Wizard Tournamnet like in Harry Potter and compete in something every p-day. the 8th of November is bowling. Today, is pool. It's going down!


On Sunday, I wanted to do something fun going into this dinner appointment. In Finland, they always tell you to take more food if it tastes good and they always keep telling you to take food. So I decided that we were going to have to take more food everytime they offer us. We are NEVER playing this game again. We were dead. I have never eaten so much mashed potatoes in my life. Elder Baccile looked like he was ready to die. It was pretty funny when we would finish our plates and then she would say "take more!""ALRIGHT!!!" haha. Elder Hybarger was laughing the whole time and we were all ready to throw up. We ate so much food. It was pretty sweet that we are all so competetive that we couldn't give up.


Halloween isn't really celebrated here. Stores sell things but there really is no trick o treating. The ward here is pretty big. It's about 60 or members. I like it. They are really nice. We went to primary this Sunday and sang songs. Us 3 are going to be in the primary program the following the Sunday haha. It should be fun.


The thing that Scott set to me in Finnish makes no sense haha. It translates to something like this:


To strike astray you lots (lots= as in the casting of lots in the scripture sense). To make love to you a small amount neighbor.


Thanks Scott! I like it and I think I got the real meaning out of it :)  A little dose of how hard it was adjusting to Finnish that Finns speak.  In the MTC I learned, for example, how to say a statement like this:
I come from the building= Minä tulen talosta
Finns says it in a lot of ways, 1 common one is this: Talost mä tun

It's hard! :)


I love you all. Talk to you soon.


Vanhin Behnke