Dear Family,
First of all, on February 9th, we celebrated the 43rd anniversary of Jane calling me from Provo to Moscow, Idaho and asking me to marry her! It was on a Sunday and I must have been day dreaming, but the good news, I said, “Yes!” Second of all, happy 7th wedding anniversary today to Anne and Dee. We loved the fact that Dee was on his knees again today, this time, helping Hannah give her first talk in Primary, and what about? Choices. The very same topic that her Grandmother (Nema) taught the children here in Miskolc today! Both Anne and Dee made the premium ultimate choice of being married in the temple seven years ago. Congrats.
For those who saw the pictures on Facebook of the snow that fell last Sunday
night while we were asleep, today we have no evidence of snow! The past
two nights we actually were thumbing our noses at Murphy’s law and did not put
on our windshield cover, hoping that leaving it off would result in snow and
ice on the windshield that needed to be cleaned before going to church this
morning. That logic didn’t work! No snow. They keep telling
us that if January and February are mild, March will be nasty. That is
why we are hoping for snow in February! |
| 2017 |
One year ago, yesterday, I spent the morning chipping the final remnants of ice from off of the driveway at the old house. Memory of bad experiences are funny. To us, the memory of the 24 inches of snow over night, the block roads due to the snow, the fog and the very nasty pollution smell that came with the fog, the piercing bitter cold, pouring hot water on to the gate lock (before Scott introduced us to WD-40, which solved the problem of frozen locks), the frozen water pipes, the broken water heater and looking for a new apartment/house to live in, to us, those experiences lasted at least 40 years!
Before starting to write this letter, I looked back at the calendar. We arrived in Miskolc on Monday afternoon, January 9th and on February 18th we moved into the “apple” house. Six weeks! I had to go back and look at the calendar twice to make sure that I was not missing something. How could six weeks turn into 40 years of unlivable torment! Memory. I guess with the black mold in the kitchen, the ever dripping water under the counter in the kitchen, the extreme hot or very cold shower water, the drain pipe that needed to be place from the washing machine into the toilet when clothes were washed, the extension cords all of the bathroom floor, the brilliant red paint on the walls and couches and the totally family friendly neighborhoods that all other neighborhoods seemed to have other than our two block neighborhood next to the scrap metal yard, makes six weeks seem a lot longer a year later!
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| Our first home in Hungary |
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| Notice the sign on the washing machine as a reminder to put drain hose in the toilet |
But they will always be nice
reminders of how something that started out so discouraging soon changed to where
the joys and happy memories that we will have the rest of our lives proves the
adage, “One must experience the bad to enjoy the good.”. There is a long
Sacrament Meeting talk in that, but not for this letter.
Now the problem is the time is moving too fast. Only six more months and
we will be in tears leaving a country and the people that will always have a
piece of our hearts. We need time and the calendar to slow down so that
we can get all our work done.
This week after waiting for about two months, both our Lions Club project (a
machine that will test eye disease for anyone over two months old) is finally
getting to the point that we can order it. The interactive board (a very
large touch computer screen) for a Roma community center so that the children
can have access to the digital age of education is also getting ready to
order. With those two projects, the only two projects we have left that
is not completed is buying beds for a home for mentally disable adults.
This home is on the Hungarian/Austrian border, which means about 3.5 hours of
drive time one way. The project has been slowed due to the travel
limitations. We hope that we that we can order the beds in about a week.
The other project, will take the full year to be completed. This project
is a “micro-grant” project. The organization we are dealing with had 9
Roma villages that are to get EU money and corporate money to train the Roma
how to come together and select a project in their village that will improve
the living conditions for the village. LDS Charities will fund the
micro-grant to get the project started. (not too large of an amount for
each of the nine villages, but substantial in total funding) Then it is the
hope that the community will start to do internal fund raising and expand their
project. A year ago, a village decided to raise money to replace 30
outdoor toilets for the very very poor (Most Roma are poor.) Once the
project ended, over 130 outdoor toilets had been replaced with the majority of
the funding being raised by the village themselves.
We are turning our attention to new projects for 2018. We have contacted
the Rotary Club in Hungary and they have a project that sounds very rewarding.
Even though child molestation is very low compared to the United States, it is
on the rise. A child protection agency has a desire to build a clinic in
Budapest where the molested child would be taken by the police or emergency
personnel to be examined. In the EU, children are not forced to testify
in court if they are examined under certain conditions. This location
would meet the EU’s legal requirements.
The site needs an instrument that does non-invasive gynecological
examinations. This can be used for all females, regardless of age.
We are hoping to be able to fund this acquisition of this examining
machine. It reduces the feeling of being violated again by the examining
doctor. We are thankful for such a machine but would be even more
thankful if the need of the machine was fully eliminated. But we know
that will not happen until the Savior comes.
We love you all. But the feeling of homesickness is not there. We
don’t long for anything. Face time, Skype, Zoom, whatever app we use,
gives us face time with the grandkids. We don’t know how we would feel if
that was not an option. What we do know is that we as a family have been
extremely blessed. I, intellectually understand the scripture: “I say unto
you that if ye should serve him who has created you from the beginning, and is
preserving you from day to day, by lending you breath, that ye may live and
move and do according to your own will, and even supporting you from one moment
to another—I say, if ye should serve him with all your whole souls yet ye would
be unprofitable servants. Mosiah 2:21.
What I didn’t fully understand, how this is exponentially increased when out
here to service for others in an attempt to try to show the Lord our
appreciation for all that he has given us. Every day, prayers are
answered almost before you can say, “Amen”, doors are opened, access to people
made available, family back home are being taken care of, friends with health
issues being blessed, friends with employment issues finding jobs, impressions
to do things for others, lessons taught that visually reach teenagers, old
curmudgeons hearts are softened and their appearance in primary and teenage
Sunday School attest to their appreciation as to the work that your Mom and I
are doing in the branch. Blessings don’t stop to allow us to feel that,
“Wow, we finally did something and we were not blessed for it! We finally
are paying Christ back!” That will never happen.
What have we accomplished on our mission? We have come to a deeper
understanding of the debt to our Savior Jesus Christ that we will always
have. The magnitude of His atonement I simply can’t comprehend. The
only thing that my mind can understand is that His atonement works. It
has, it is, and it always will work for me. To this I bear testimony.
And because of that we bear testimony that He lives, He knows you personally,
He understands the heartaches, the disappointments, the pains, the sorrows that
you have. Why, because all the emotions, all the hurts and sorrows that
you have in life, Christ paid the price for those, so that you will have
unimaginable happiness, you will be able to forgive others and have others
forgive you. You will, because of His atonement, know that you have
become as gods, “Knowing good from evil.” You will feel of the unbound
love that He has specifically for you and that He will be your advocate with
His father, our Father in Heaven, specifically for you. And that is what
I have come to a fuller knowledge this last 13 months in Hungary. And for
this, I thank Him with all my heart.
Dad
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