Getting Settled in St. Pölten

Hey family!

This week was pretty great! You all seem to be doing a lot of work and having fun. It has been pretty similar over here. We had interviews with president miles on Thursday so we got to go to Vienna for a little while. It was awesome! We get to go there each week for district meeting and I will work there on an exchange this week. It will be the biggest city that I will have worked in. I'm pretty sure that like 80 percent of Austria's population lives in Vienna, so there are always people to talk to.

Parker's new district.  His companion, Elder Buckley, is on the left

Because of general conference, yesterday was my first time at church here. The branch is pretty great even though I think there were about

25 people there yesterday. The members were all trying to invite us over for easter but I think that pretty much everybody in the branch will be eating at the same place. One of our members invited all of the part member families and us to an Easter lunch. It is going to be really fun because we are setting up a soccer game for one of the boys peter. His mother is from salt lake but she married an Austrian. He speaks English pretty well but it is a little funny because he uses German phrases and idioms all the time. We understand him but it would be tough without knowing German.

We are meeting with a guy named L---- each week. He is from africa but he is here to get an education and return to Nigeria to get a position in the government. He is really awesome and he keeps all of his commitments and believes the gospel, but he just doesn't have enough money, after his school fees, to come to church. He lives in a town called Krems which is about 45 minutes away with a train from St.

Pölten. But we are hoping that we can somehow get him to church. If he could come he would be ready for baptism but I guess it will happen when it is supposed to happen.

We have a really great member, Bro. Bauer, who is really excited about missionary work, and he spends every friday with the missionaries just driving them to lessons and being in all of the appointments. He even makes out appointments for us sometimes. A few weeks ago, at a service project that we did as a ward, Bro. Bauer set up an appointment with a man who is a wilderness tour giver. He wanted some help cleaning up a park. He told us that he would need us for about 4 hours so we went with bro. Bauer to go clean up trash. We actually only cleaned for about  20 minutes and then he told us about every plant and insect or bird or whatever there was for the next three and a half hours. We carried our trash bags around waiting for him to show us where to clean but he just wanted to look at frogs. We tried to bring up the church a lot and we had some good conversations but pretty much the only thing we got out of that time was a free drink, fun facts about grass, and a brochure for more nature walks. We had a good laugh with bro. Bauer afterward, and planned to have the next "Bro. Bauer day" be much more successful.

So It was a great week! Elder Buckley and I are doing great. Tons of fun all the time and we are working hard. I love being on a mission! I hope that you all have a good week! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge