Week 17: 4th Transfer = 4th New City!!!

30 July 2013

Hello.

Well. Transfer calls came again this morning.......Can I just say: no matter how prepared I think I am for them, it is ALWAYS a punch in the stomach, without fail. Let's just say, when I got the call this morning, I literally asked if they were joking... multiple times. Also, I thought they were going to call back in five minutes and say Just Kidding! Here's your real call. They haven't called back yet, so I'm pretty sure that they were being serious, even if it hasn't sunk in yet. I told you all that my guess was that I'd stay in Buda for another one, if not two more transfers, sooo... obviously that isn't happening. I'm leaving once again. I'm opening up a new city to sisters in Veszprém! That's in the *Southwest of Hungary; you can probably look it up on a map. Also... my companion is Sister Fowers from my MTC district!!! We both thought we'd be companions at some point in our mission just from our experience in how well we work together and stuff. So, I'm super excited about that. But I am so angry! Haha. Don't worry, I'm not really showing it and I'm not angry at anyone in particular, even President or the Lord, because I know that it's what is supposed to happen. They've really been struggling out there, so we're actually replacing a companionship of elders. I just REALLY, really hoped that I'd get to stay in Buda for a long time. It's fun to see new cities and I'm super excited, don't get me wrong, it's just not super fun always being the new kid. But, Hey! That’s the way life is, right? Or…at least my life anyway...ha. Everyone was shocked when I did two “one-and-done’s” and was serving in my third city in my third transfer. Well, they all had one coming for 'em. Surprise! President wasn't kidding when he cracked those jokes. Actually, I'm really interested to see what happened, because when the AP called me on the phone and I asked him 500 times if he was actually being serious and then I think he felt really bad and so he was trying to tell me all the good things about it and it was just funny, cause we're good friends and I just told him that I was super excited, just in shock and processing it all. Hahaha i think it scared him. Plus, he said something along the lines of "Hey, you're super lucky! This just barely changed; it wasn't going to happen like this." So that's why I'm really interested to see what happened and what was originally supposed to happen, because it sounds like it all changed last minute. But, yeah, so Fresh is staying in Buda and getting my last companion, Sister Perkins! I'm sooo mad that I have to leave my investigators here. They are the best people ever. Oh well, what can you do! Also, Sister Broadhead will be in my same district because she is opening up a new city to sisters too! A lot of companionships, mostly elders, are opening up new cities or whitewashing, because so many new elders came in this transfer! We got two new sisters and like 9 or 10 elders and we're only losing 1 sister and 2 elders, so it's a lot! They also got rid of all the sisters in trios, so that's why the four of us are opening new cities!

Hm. I feel like I had a lot to tell you all. But ya know, I'm still in shock, so I don’t really know what else to say. The Buda life has been great though. I'm sad that it's ending. We have just recently found soo many golden people and all of our investigators are really too cool to describe in words, it's SO cool to watch their conversions and help them realize things in their lives. I can't even think about it really, because it just makes me mad that I'm leaving once again. Oh well. I'm SUPER excited to go see the west and serve with Fowers, because she's hilarious and super hard working!

I hope you all have a great week! I'll write you next week... from Veszprém.

Love,
Sister Butterfield





PS: *It's actually in the Western part of Hungary, it's just a part of the Southwest mission Zone!

Pictures from Hungary

Sorry it's taken forever to post these, but here are some recent photos from our favorite Sister Butterfield!

"caving! the one that my head is coming out was called "the birthing canal"... it was an interesting one... but not the hardest.. the hardest part was "the sandwich" thats when i almost died.." 

"Me, Fresh, Judd, and Hatfield (the DL) in our caving suits"

"Hansen and I. the only other 19 year old in my district!"

"Judd and I with our mudd stripes!"

Sister Butterfield's legs as the bruises started showing up after their caving adventure.

A note Sister Butterfield's companion left for her in the bathroom. 

Most of the people in Sister Butterfield's district, minus one elder, the APs, and secretaries.

Sister Butterfield and her district on the boat transport

Sister Butterfield and her district leader

Week 16: Six Month Mark!!

Hi! 

Well, I hit my 6 month mark tomorrow! Fresh and I are trying to decide what we should do to celebrate! We're a third of the way through! We get home a year from Wednesday according to our current return date! Crazy! I kind of feel like I'll be home for school this fall, so that's weird. haha I still have a long way to go, but it's flying by! Also, we hit our 4 months in the country mark on.. this coming Friday! Oh! and, tranfers are next week, so I'll be emailing on Tuesday instead of Monday! Weird! We all feel like this transfer just started, but we're on week 6 in our planners! Yikes!

Hm.. news for this week... We just went caving in the biggest tunnels/caves in Hungary. yeah.. i was super excited for it... and then it was like the most terrifying thing i have ever done....I never knew that I m slightly claustrophobic... Also, I almost got stuck, cause we had to go at all these awkward angles and pull ourselves up and slither sideways and backwards and stuff, and so then i almost lost it. It was super hard, because we did the most "extreme" path they had. We all have bruises everywhere and scratches even though we had body suits. Luckily, I have really, really good elders here and we all helped push each other through and up. The rocks were just all really slippery and most of our shoes were crap, so trying to pull yourself upwards while laying on a rock almost horizontally... yeah, luckily I had one of the elders behind.. underneath? me.. haha we all bonded on that excursion.......

hm other than that... Hungary.... all i have to say, is that it smells like poop everywhere (literally). Also, Hungarians don't wear deoderant. so. yeah. Enough about that. and they have the cutest babies EVER here! But i still dont want one. hahaha (at least not for a very long time). 

I have a ton of greattt pictures to send, but I dont really have time right now.. so maybe next week? We went on a transportation boat last week and got some cool pictures! haha I reallíy love my district here! Everyone's so great! Probably only like half of us will still be here next week :/ 

That crazy rude investigator that we had called to meet again, so we had the APs meet with him... Let's just say, they ended up kicking him out of the building within the first five minutes.. haha they told us that we were way too patient with him. He was awful! and he like flipped out on them! yikes! haha good thing he's gone though! He's only tried to call us once since then and we didn't answer...

Hm, we had so many great, great programs this week! We have some really solid investigators with a lot of potential and I love it! There are a few super cute girls in their 20s and ah! I love them! I really hope I stay next transfer! I had a dream last night that President transfered me out of Buda and I was SO upset with him. I'm pretty sure I told him no in my dream and freaked out. hahaha.... hm.

I cant think of much else to tell you all about! This transfer is so great! I mean, of course there's always hard things, but I really have loved it and I can't believe the transfer is over almost! Yikes. When I talk to you next week, I'll know whats happening to me.... :/

Love you all!

Sister Butterfield

Week 15: Sister Butterfield (not butterfly)

Day 174 (AKA July 15, 2013)

Hey!

So i actually had a lot to tell you all about this week, but we have less emailing time this week, because of stuff that we have planned. So... I probably won't be able to tell you all about it! So much has happened this week though! Also, for the first time in my whole life, I filled an entire journal!!!

I don't know if I ever told you about any of our investigators here... We have one that we put on bap date a few weeks ago, so his baptism will be next Saturday! We're excited for that!

Also, we met with John (We'll call him that for privacy purposes) again this week and he is so golden! He is the one that we taught on my very first day that Fresh and I were alone and B was on splits. We had a first lesson with him on our own and it went sooo well! We met with him a second time and he is SO SO golden! This time B was with us, so it was her first time ever meeting him. He came with some questions and we pretty much told him all of the commandments and he thought they were all great! The only one he has a problem with is Law of Chastity (welcome to Hungary), but he loves that we have it! It was the coolest thing ever, because he told us that he was living with his lifepartner but that when he told her that he was meeting with missionaries, she said that she wanted to too. He also said that she would love the Law of Chastity, because she really wants to get married to him, they've just been trying to save up money for it! So great! Also, he asked how long one usually has to wait before joining our church AND asked for a Book of Mormon to take to his girlfriend! The only downside is that he works sooo much, so he never has free days to meet with us, only once every two weeks! But he's SO cool!

Hm, we also met with the guy in his late 20s that told us we were all sinners and tried to expain to him the Law of Chastity and that was awful... He pretty much took over and tried to teach it to us and told us that if we're going to teach people something, we better make sure that we understand it and are living by it first. Also, he told B that her skirt (which went mid-calf) was too short, but that Fresh's was good and that shes good because she sits quietly in the corner. Ugh. He also told us that it's much worse for a woman to break the law of chastity than a man. gah. The nerve of some people. ha. we were so upset after his lesson. Needless to say, we will never be meeting with him again.

Hm. Something random, you should all try dipping boiled eggs into fry sauce. Sounds weird, I know, but its so good! I don't even like boiled eggs, but I do like that!

Missions are interesting I decided. It's weird how they work. My mindset and thinking have changed a lot in the past 6 months, as well as ideas and thoughts on the future. Don't worry, I still don't want to have kids any time soon, even after being comps with Fresh who really, really wants them. haha But, I wouldn't mind getting married. Later, don't worry, I'm still a missionary. hahaha. It's also interesting being comps with someone who is dying (going home this transfer) and experiencing her freakouts and mini meltdowns about going home. They're quite entertaining actually, Fresh just laughs for days at them. Our apartment is crazy too, it looks like a hurricane hit, because there's so much stuff that has to get done before she goes home. I don't think I've laughed so hard in a long time.

Also, I miss American food, especially Cafe Rio, and beef. THey don't have beef here, i think its like nonexistant. Also, I still call Fresh and I greenies or other people in my group. LIke I'll refer to other companionships and be like oh yeah, "Sister Fox and her greenies" etc. But we're all probably going senior or cosenior next transfer, so i should probably stop that. haha

Interesting fact, for some reason everyone here knows the word Butterfly in english and what it means. This might be hard to follow, but Butterfly means Pillangó, so people always think that that's what my last name means. However, Pillangó in slang also means hooker or prostitute..... So... thats a fun one for me... Also, I have never felt so degraded or.. hm whats the word in English.. itemized? sexualized? in my whole life, even from living in South America and being the only blonde. There are some nasty creepers here, but mostly actually just the homelesss people, especially if theyre drunk. I got called "pillangocskam" this week, which means "my little(diminuative like "-ita" in spanish) hooker." so. yeah. yuck. When it's not people that are physically threatening, the elders get a huge kick out of it. We tend to get the weirdest ones when it's just Fresh and I though. Luckily the elders will show up to table with us though and kinda help us out. merp.

okay, i cant remember too much else. Hope you're all doing well! Buda's great, but super weird! I love it! Miss you all!

Love,
Sis Butterfield (not Butterfly)

Week 14: Homeless Crazies

July 8, 2013

Hey!

Man, I don't even know what to start with! This week has been good! We had quite a bit of time on our own and it always goes super well! We've never had a problem in programs on our own. However, we always seem to attract the crazies when we're tabling on our own! Without fail, we get the weirdest people. Last Monday, Sister Behunin had been gone for less than half an hour, but we went out to get our working hours for the day and table. We set up the table and this weird guy came and stood right in front of our table. I looked down and saw that he wasn't wearing shoes, so I could tell that he was homeless. Normally, I would have offered him an English class flyer, because that's why people come up to our table. (We have a plastic table that we set up and tape a sign on it that says Free English Hour, and then we put pamphlets, BoMs, passalong cards and english class fliers on.) Anyway, he just stood there and stared at us intensely, one at a time. Luckily, I was filling out passalong cards so i looked down at them and tried to pretend like nothing was happening. Sister Fresh just tried to stare at the table. hahah. We started talking under our breath a little bit, because it was literally 5 minutes that he just stood there and stared at us. Then he walked around the table towards us and said something about our name tags. Mine was artly under my hair, but Fresh's was on her scarf, so he reached over and grabbed it, trying to pull it off her scarf. She just froze up stood there looking at me. hahaha So, I took a step closer and told him no, it's hers and he kidn of freaked out and took a step back and was like well, if no, then no! and mumbled something and walked back to the front of the table. Then, he reached to our sign andyanked off some of the tape holding it. Then... still silent, he raised his foot up towards me (I thought he was going to kick me), but then he moved it on top of the table. So we were just like Great, this guy is going to set his foot on our Book of Mormon. But, he just slowly hovered it over the whole table, doing a fankick and then put his foot back down. Then, he just stared at us again. We just stared back, trying not to laugh, and then he says (in English): "I have your families' address. Sok sikért!" (Good luck!) and walked away. We almost died laughing silently, but then he came back and stood like 10 feet away from the table and started yelling things towards us in Hungarian about our families. So yeah, let me know if any crazy homeless people show up in America at your doorstep.... ha.

After that, we decided to pack up and go somewhere else, so we went to another main place where we table. Then, this other homeless guy came up and just stared at me and started talking to me. I don't know how to describe him, but he just looks like he's going to kill you every time he talks. He was talking about Christ and how he would kill everyone for Christ and asking me if I would kill everyone and going on about crazy things like that, looking like he was going to kill me. Luckily, the secretaries came out to table right them and saw him, so they came up and stood on both sides of me, trying to get him to go away. All of the elders here are seriously my favorite. They are the greatest and i feel like I'm best friends with all of them hahah. There's another homeless guy who always threatens us sisters and we had some crazy stuff with him this week, so we won't be tabling there for a long time. If we do, it will always with the elders. Luckily when we ran into him a few times tabling this week, the elders were always with us and physically protected us. Luckily none of them had to hit him or anything crazy, but we do know thtat he has a knife and a bad temper and nasty comments, so we wont be going back there. It's just a bummer, because that's the place that's coolest in the summer.

Hm. other than that... we went to the stake presidents house with most of the elders for dinner yesterday and it was SO cooL! It was really far away, but luckily us Sisters went later, so we got a ride with the APs in their car! (: But anyway, it was this really rendes neighborhood that almost (almost) looked like Northern Utah with like little parks and real grass and happy families walking around or playing outside together and nice houses and holy cow, i didnt know that that existed in Hungary! Plus, their family is so solid and happy and loving. All their kids (the oldest is 18) were born in the church, and it seriously is just amazing to see. We all left and were talking about how stunned we were. haha

I can't think of too much else to say about the week. This transfer is flying by! I'm a little afraid of what will happen next transfer, I'm afraid that I'll still be in a trio, but it'll all work out. I love you all!

Sister Butterfield

Week 13: Hungary or Alien Planet?

HI! meep.

Things are so good this week! I'm sad that I'm missing the fourth of July and Katie's birthday this weekend, but we might have a party here. One of the secretaries likes to bake and is planning on making a cake for it, so I guess that makes up for it a little bit! (: There are so many missionaries serving here in the city and I love it, they're all so cool! I hope I'm here for a long time and I have a feeling that I will be! I think I'll be here next transfer, but I wouldnt be surprised if I'm not; President already made a joke about me leaving again, so I guess anything could happen! But, next transfer is only 5 weeks long and then the next one is 10..... it's going to be a nightmare. and then all transfers after that will be 9 weeks instead of 6. I think that my MTC group is just a group of guinea pigs, but hey, I don't mind it. I think it's fun, you can never guess what's going to happen next! 19 year olds one day, 9 weeks transfers the next, iPhones the next, boyfriends the next? ha. Just kidding.

But really, this week has been SO good. My companions are just goofs and we talk WAY too much. It's kind of a problem, but a problem that I like to have. I have laughed so much more in this last week than probably my whole mission put together, not counting the MTC, because that was the life. We really just laughed our way through the MTC and everyday was a party, laughing until we cried and then still some more. haha But this has been a good week and a good transfer, it's a really good change. I've had really great companions the whole time, but they've all had really hard missions and companions and they just needed someone to talk things out with, and if anyone knows me, they know that's what i do best! (: haha but its still emotionally draining, so even though they were really good transfers, i wouldnt really say that they were hilarious or SUPER funny, so I've needed this transfer. It just took a bit for me to feel better and well, we had a night of talking things out and now we all just are doing super well. Buda is just such a convenient place and I love it, I wouldn't complain if I stayed here another! I don't know if I'd love to stay for a third, because that would be 21 weeks in Buda, plus 6 in Kispest, that means 27 weeks of my mission spent in the city, but hey, whatever is supposed to happen will, I'm just excited to see more cities and the west and everything. I really love everyone serving here in the city though, all 5 elders and the APs and the secretaries and everyone are just great!

Also, our first day alone last week was so good! We managed to live through it and have a SUPER good program, we were nervous because it was our first time ever meeting with him and we didnt want to ruin it, but it was great!! This week, Sister Behunin leaves tonight and will be gone all day tomorrow and then come back at night, but then the next morning after studies she has a 4 hour long leader meeting, so we'll be out alone, and then shes with us for most of thursday but has to travel again that afternoon and will be gone all day friday.. so ya know, we'll be on our own a lot this week.. Its a little nerve-wracking but its good to not be the junior and have to figure things out on our own. We've had some great programs and new investigators this week! and also, they have YOUTH SPEAKERS here every sunday!! I think I'm on an alien planet right now. haha I dont know where I have landed myself, but its so great!

We're going to a hummus bar today too for pday, before Behunin leaves on splits! If anyone has any fun ideas or like a bucketlist thing of things for us to do while we're working or.. i dont even know, we're trying to make this a memorable last transfer for her before she dies and goes home in exactly a month from today.

I hope that you all have a good fourth of July! Love you all!
(woah, almost signed that Megan, that was weird)
Sister Butterfield (: