Week 5

This has been a week of change. It began Monday with our farewell party for our outgoing temple president and matron. The Apels concluded their three wonderful years of service.  The wives of the missionaries and the recorder prepared a dinner of Hungarian goulash and all the trimmings as well as a program and gift giving which headed the agenda before we heard from President and Sister Apel, and then their successors, President and Sister Husz. We have been very grateful to have had this one month under the Apels’ leadership but now look forward to working together with the Huszes.

Elder Chidester, (released as 2^nd counselor) had made a long golden trumpet (on the order of Moroni’s) for President Apel and formally presented it to him, which brought quit a laugh for everyone. The idea had developed because of President Apel’s habit of always going out the front door of the temple to watch for patrons to arrive and invite them in.  Now, as he is leaving, he could continue—like Angel Moroni—to proclaim the good news. The trumpet came complete with a sign for his neighbors (he lives next to the temple) to disregard the noise while he is learning to trumpet.

Tuesday morning we began under our new presidency’s direction and, as such changes always are, it was interesting to observe as we worked together. I like how  I feel when working with the Huszes, as I did with the Apels. It is just different. Both good. But different. I really enjoy Sis Husz. It is especially nice that she speaks English having studied at both Oxford and Columbia and seems happy to use English with us in friendly way. 

Sister Husz grew up in Vienna and during the war endured living in a city divided in four sectors--she was in that controlled by the Russians.  From those experiences she came to understand what our Eastern Europeans endured for many more years, living under difficult political times.

She and President Husz have known each other since they were 13 years old, growing up in the same ward, after they each joined the Church at young ages. 

The Hungarians were back for another week of service and they are a delight. I especially enjoyed being able to greet them with “Jo reggalt” (Good morning) having learned that phrase among others with the help of my free Byki Hungarian language program, found online. They were wonderfully responsive to my tiny effort to learn a little Hungarian and willingly helped me and John with the pronunciation of temple language I had been memorizing in their difficult language. John and I both love the sounds of this interesting language, though some words are an incredible challenge to wrap our tongues around. Try saying elhalálozot just for fun. Ah me!

Thursday morning President asked to meet with John and me in his office. Because I knew he had been meeting with each missionary couple I didn’t think it was anything more than a “get acquainted” chat until he told us that he had a special assignment for us—to serve together as the trainers for the temple workers. This is a new assignment that has in the past always been handled by the temple presidency personally.  He then said he also had a second assignment for us—to do the daily scheduling for what the individual ordinance workers would be doing. This too has always been done by counselors in the temple presidency and the assistants to the matron.  Of course, we are willing to do whatever we are asked, though we are both a bit stunned by these new assignments and have been very content to just serve in the background. Although I have served as a trainer in both the Salt Lake and DC temples, I have yet to figure out how to do so with workers who speak only German, Hungarian, Czech, Slovakian, Polish, or Romanian. We will have to figure that one out! But we know the source of these calls and so know that the help is there for us to find the answers we need to for these tasks.

Our fun outing for the week was to go with one of the other missionary couples to see a nearby medieval castle—Schloss Kriepstein—built in the early 1700s. Wednesday was a beautiful fall day and we enjoyed the drive and loved the fairy tale castle, as it seemed to grow up out of the rocks. We didn’t see the interior but drank in the ambiance as we walked around the outside, crossing a bridge to see in the river below the reflection of the towering structure surrounded by golden leaves.

Saturday the Hungarians had all gone home and the temple was once more thin of patrons but for a small handful who came, one couple to celebrate their 56^th wedding anniversary. On days like this the workers swell the ranks of the attendees and enjoy participating in sacred activities with the few who do come.

In the afternoon the president let us leave a little early in order to take advantage of a ride with another missionary couple (who lease a car) to attend the Saturday afternoon session of our stake conference, to be held in Dresden.  John and I had planned to stay over for a couple of days to see Dresden, if it worked out that we could go, so had packed a small suitcase the night before just in case. We arrived in Dresden early and sought out a delightful pension (B&B) just a few blocks from the church, left our suitcase, and returned in plenty of time for the 4:00 pm meeting. We enjoyed the session, thanks to a good interpreter translating into English for us, and afterwards ate dinner at a delightful restaurant on a lake, just across from the Church on Tiergartenstrasse.  Our friends returned to Freiberg, leaving us in Dresden for our two-day get away.