Old mission reports number 5

Dear Family and Friends, this is our 5^th mission report. Just delete if you are not interested.

Balint, the 11 year old boy who reads with Sister Dukelow, was baptized on 25 Nov. His mother has only been a member about 5 months. They really enjoy reading the church magazines in English. We had them over for Family Home Evening and they had a good time.

Friday evening, 8 Dec, we came home and found that the extra single bed which was taking up space in our guest room was gone. We had asked our landlord to remove it when we first moved in late Sep. On the floor we found a coin from the communist era. It was 1 forint about the size of a quarter and made from aluminum with the date of 1989 on it. Interesting!

Several times as we have been walking to the Mission office or returning home we have seen a boy riding a unicycle on the sidewalk. What balance he has! Also we have seen a BMW scooter that has a roof over it. In fact, we see interesting cars—some very old, in good condition and some in not so good condition and some very beautiful, modern and large cars. It is just amazing to walk down the street and see the wide variety of cars that are parked next to each other. Some are brand new and some are 40 years old.

We always wear our badges on our coats and we always try to smile and say Good Morning or Good Afternoon or Good Evening depending on the time of day. The other evening we were going to visit a less active member with a couple and we were greeting people and the Hungarian sister said, “You are so brave to say Hello.” Our reply was, “Why not say it. We want to be friendly.” I guess it is a cultural thing. We have a lot of people stare at our badge trying to read what it says. Sometimes we offer them a pass along card.

One evening when we were on the metro and it was very crowded, a lady made a man scoot over so Sister Dukelow could sit down beside her and then she started speaking in English as she wanted to practice. We gave her a pass along card and an invitation to the Christmas Concert and she seemed very happy to get them but she didn’t come to the concert. Elder Dukelow was waiting in the VW dealership and an older woman struck up a conversation with him in German, thinking he was German. He was able to give her a pass along card.

The reason Elder Dukelow was at the VW dealer was to get a new key made for one of the mission cars. This was another strange encounter with Hungarian bureaucracy. Elder Dukelow asked politely to have another key made for the car and the service person asked for justification. Elder Dukelow replied because he needed a third key. This was not nearly good enough; the man demanded a good reason for having a third key. Finally a woman who spoke English advised Elder Dukelow that new keys need to be justified so Elder Dukelow explained that sometimes the person who uses this car carries away the key and the reserve key is always locked up so we need a third key. That did the trick and the third key was ordered but then he had to take in both keys to get them reprogrammed with the new key. That reprogramming did not go as planned but this is Hungary and we just enjoy the unique adventures we have every day.

Elder Dukelow bought Sister Dukelow a very fancy carved wooden red Christmas Tree. It is about 24 inches tall. We took it to the office so we could enjoy it each day. He also bought a 36 inch artificial tree for about $2.50 and we added some straw stars to it so it makes our living room look Christmasy. We have also added some pictures to our living room so it looks a lot more like home.

Two weeks ago two missionaries traveling early in the morning passed a big slow moving 18 wheeler truck. They could see the lights of oncoming traffic far in the distance. What they did not see was a huge tractor that was driving in the light fog without lights and they ran head-on into this vehicle. Both elders walked away from this collision without injuries (see the attached picture). We consider this a true miracle because if one looks at the car these elder probably should be dead or seriously injured. The paperwork involved in selling what is left of the car has taken considerable time.

On Thanksgiving day we went shopping and found four varieties of peanut butter in the large covered market on the Pest side of the Danube. This huge market is also a big tourist attraction. We also found maple syrup in a Chinese grocery store in the basement of the market but we are not yet willing to pay eight dollars for a pint of syrup. Thanks to our daughter, Gwyndolynn, we have maple flavoring and can make our own syrup.

On our Thanksgiving shopping trip Elder Dukelow bought a large print Hungarian Bible at a used book store for $8. The Bible had not been used and was probably from some other book store’s old stock. We also bought several other items we had been looking for on the Buda side of the river without success.

As you all know Christmas is coming and so are the many packages for the full time missionaries. Some days the office hallway and sitting room are very full of large and small packages. We let the missionaries know they have a package and then we try to send it with anyone who is going that way. During the week before Christmas we will be having zone conferences so all the missionaries will be coming in. Hopefully all the boxes will be here before that time and everyone can have theirs to open on Christmas Day. A sister in Utah wanted to do something for missionaries that might not get a package from home so it has been nice to see that they are being looked after.

Another group of Saints in Utah wanted to do something for the Hungarians and it has been decided to make dental hygiene kits. There are a lot of people who have dental problems here and so it is hopeful that these kits can be given to those who can benefit from this project. Maybe we can find an orphanage that can use them or send them to Romania where the orphans have a very difficult life.

Warm weather is always welcome and we surely have enjoyed lovely weather since we have been here. True, there were a few cold days, but then the warm weather returned. We have had very little rain. We really like our nice matching LL Bean rain coats that are light weight and keep us dry when it does rain. They are about knee length and come with a hood. We do have to be careful to line up the zipper just right. So far we haven’t needed a warmer coat. These gray rain coats look like the cheap old nylon rain coats that were quite popular during the Communist era but ours are rip-stop nylon and Gore-tex.

Finally we have our official pink driver’s licenses! We did have to turn in our VA license but if we ask nicely and in time and return the PINK license, they will give our VA license back to us when we leave. What would take maybe an hour at a state side Department of Motor Vehicles took us three different days, three different places, and a total of about 12 hours and then we had to wait for them to mail us the licenses. But that was not the worst: one day Elder Dukelow and a group of eight missionaries had to wait 8 hours at the foreigners’ registration office to get the missionaries residency permits renewed. It should have taken about an hour if the people working in the office had processed the permits quickly as they had in times past. It was a major bad day.

Last Saturday we went to the BIG stores to do our monthly grocery shopping where we buy meat, canned goods and juice. We also went to a McDonalds for lunch—our first time—and were pleasantly surprised at how good they tasted and how American it was.

Our professional musician missionaries are about to wrap up their Christmas concert series. These Elders have made a huge impact where ever they have performed and usually to packed audiences. The Christmas concerts have added bell ringers to the program as Sister Gasser, the mission president’s wife, and Sister Low, one of the senior missionaries were bell ringing buddies in Bountiful, Utah. It will be nice to have our weekends back again without concerts.

This past weekend (9-10 Dec) we traveled to Szombathely, the oldest city in Hungary, near the Austrian border. This time the train ride was uneventful. They have a very nice congregation there and a beautiful chapel. We stayed at the Vadasz (Hunter) hotel and restaurant. Elder Dukelow picked it because it was only a five minute walk from the chapel, not because it has the best restaurant in town. The hotel only has eight rooms but they are very nice.

The food was delicious and beautifully presented. Elder Dukelow had cream tomato soup (mostly cream) followed by half of a roast duck that came with a 12 inch tall aluminum foil fancy decoration wrapped around the duck’s leg. This duck had been a very tall animal, not at all like the short fat Long Island style ducks we get in East Coast grocery stores. The femur was at least six inches long as were the individual segments of the wing. Sister Dukelow had pasta with forest mushrooms. She asked for the salad buffet but was very surprised to find all sorts of pickled cucumbers, cabbage (red and green), peppers, and yellow tomatoes, also corn in a cream sauce, beets, and sliced boiled potatoes. Two types of creamy salad dressing were available. Where was the lettuce? (Remember, Sister Dukelow, you are in Hungary—salads are very different here.)

Our goal is to have family home evening with different families or people every week so we can get to know many people. Last week we were invited to the family of a counselor in the Stake Presidency but because of work he is out of town Monday through Thursday. His wife is Hungarian but he is German and they have lived many years in Germany but about 4 years ago they were called to serve a mission in Hungary as the CES-Outreach couple. They have two girls. One is finishing up her schooling and plans to go on a mission in about a year. The other girl served a mission on Temple Square and is now working. Both live at home. (It is very common for older children to live at home until they get married—maybe in their 30s or even older). It was an interesting evening with German, English and Hungarian being spoken as we had a lesson, sang songs and played a game. We even had a pumpkin cake--that was made from scratch—starting with the pumpkin!

Tomorrow night we have an invitation to go to an American family for Family Home Evening. The husband runs the International Law Enforcement Academy here in Budapest.

Many, many people smoke here in Hungary. It is wonderful to find that many hotels do have no smoking rooms and we have even noticed some restaurants have no smoking areas. Yea!!!

Hungarian women love fancy boots—high pencil sized heels and sharply pointed toes! In all fairness, there are many practical comfortable looking boots too. We have seen women roll up their jeans or buy pants that come just below their knees. We think that is for several reasons: show off their boots, it is in fashion and it is easier to take off and put on their boots.

In the last week of November we finally received back a car that had been in the shop for three months with a defective motor. Someone (no one takes the blame) decided rather than having the VW dealer work on the motor, it would be much cheaper for the friend of the fellow who does our car body repair to rebuild the motor. What a big mistake that was. The car seems to run fine but it still has a nasty tick in the motor. Amazing to Elder Dukelow was that the car was able to drive approximately 1,000 miles while the motor was being rebuilt.

When Elder Dukelow was trying to settle the disposal of the wrecked car, he was asked to produce an official invoice. He went to the local Office Depot and asked to purchase some of the blank invoice forms that are kept at the customer service desk. He was told that in order to purchase these forms, he would need to return with proper identity documents, an official document describing the legal status of the church in Hungary, a tax exempt authorization, and a stamped document authorizing him to purchase these forms. He has not been back.

Friday a week ago, the heavy Budapest traffic came to a complete stop in all directions with total gridlock. Apparently a prisoner had escaped and the police believed the man to be dangerous. To prevent him from leaving Budapest, the police stopped all traffic. The man was not found. He probably took the subway and left the area. Sirens were going all day and all cars on the major streets were stopped and searched.

Elder Dukelow is in charge of the cell phones used by the missionaries. The land lines phones in Hungary are expensive to install, operate, and are not transferable when we change apartments. Elder Dukelow has the ability to go on line and look at the individual cell phone bills that list each call, the number called, the start time, the duration, and the cost. He can also rearrange this data to rank all the calls by cost. This has resulted in several admonishments to missionaries who abuse their phones. The missionaries are very surprised when Elder Dukelow asks them about specific long phone conversations and gives them the particulars of those calls. Those missionaries with exceptionally high bills will be asked to pay for those charges.

The mission gets all the publications delivered from the Area Distribution Center in Germany. The Budapest Stake is now starting to receive some of their own material but all the church magazines still come to the mission for the Saints in Hungary. Elder Dukelow has the fun job of boxing up the magazines and trying to find a way to get them to the individual congregations. Not an easy task. We are still waiting for the big 2007 curriculum order to arrive (we hope soon). The order form was filled out on 28 July but Elder Dukelow cannot find a trace of this order being sent to the distribution center. Each month we also get a big shipment of 700 or so Books of Mormon. About 90 per cent of these Books of Mormon are in Hungarian but we also need to order in the languages of our neighboring countries as well as some unusual languages for people our missionaries are teaching such as Arabic, Persian, and Chinese.

President Gasser has assigned missionaries to areas that have previously not been worked. Most of the elders opening the new cities are very excited and honored to be selected for these assignments. There are still many cities in Hungary that have never had missionaries living and working in them even after 17 years of church presence. The missionaries that opened new cities on 1 November have been having great success.

Hugs and kisses are common every where among friends, both men and women, and even among people on first meetings. Men kiss their teen aged sons in public, women “air kiss” each other on both cheeks, but men don’t kiss women they don’t know. The common Hungarian greeting for a man to a woman is, “I kiss your hand. (Keszet csokolom)” But we have not seen any hand kissing like they do in Germany.

This will probably be our last report for 2006. We wish all our readers a very Merry Christmas and a Healthy and Prosperous New Year.