Elder Coleman Thompson: 2 Weeks of Emails!!

DEC 19:

So it's now been a week since I took the train up to Newcastle - and
it has been a way eventful week!

To start off, I got to Newcastle on Monday - and we have a car, but my
new companion Elder Charman (from Kent) doesn't have a drivers
license! So I watched a ten minute video about safe driving habits and
then got in the car on the opposite side of the road and started
driving! It was pretty scary for the first day or so, but now I'm
basically a pro.

I've gotten a bit of a taste this week of what is involved with being
a Zone Leader. On Thursday we had President Kearon, the Europe Area
President, come and visit our mission and speak to the missionaries,
and the meeting was in Billingham for the North Zones. To get there,
our Zone took a coach from Newcastle at 7:30 in the morning.

Then on Wednesday evening at like 5, the Assistants called us and told
us to get all of the teams to sleep over at a missionary flat as close
to Newcastle as possible. So we had to call all of the teams and get
them to leave their areas ASAP and get over to Newcastle that evening,
it was stressful but it worked out in the end.

Also on Friday we had a special Mission Leadership Council for all of
the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders with President Kearon,
and I was in Huddersfield! So we had to drive from Newcastle to
Huddersfield and back! Which is like 2.5 hours each way... so long
story short I'm pretty good at driving in England now after that.

Things are pretty hard right now though in terms of missionary work. I
don't think the members of the Newcastle ward have particularly liked
the Elder's they've had in the ward recently, and so we had no
Christmas plans when I got here, but I've sorted that out not to
worry. Hopefully in no time the members will love the Elder's again!

We have one investigator to work with here - so I'm really going to
push Elder Charman and I to find more people to teach.

I definitely have my work cut out for me here. We don't have many
people to teach, I got put into a new area right before Christmas
where the members don't get along super well with the Elder's, and I
have to learn how to lead a Zone of missionaries - but it's ok. I will
have to work really hard, but I know it will be worth it.

Love you guys!
DEC 26:

This week has been pretty busy, but I'm going to try to make this
e-mail a bit shorter than usual, so I'll just give the main
highlights!

On Tuesday was the Mission Christmas Social in Billingham and that was
sweet! I sang a little as well!

On Thursday night we went Christmas Carolling at the hospital in
Newcastle! It was amazing, there were people that cried... it was
really touching.

On Friday the AP's came on exchange with us here in Newcastle, and we
went with them to visit some missionaries in the zone - and that was
amazing. I learned a lot.

On Christmas Eve we drove to Leeds to pick up all of the Christmas
packages for the Elder's and Sister's serving in the Sunderland zone!
We left Newcastle at like 5:30AM so that we could go all the way down
and back in time to deliver them all! It was cool - we felt like
proper Santa's haha.

And then it was Christmas yesterday!! I was able to speak with my
family and it was so awesome! I miss them so much, but there is a lot
of work to do here - and I'm excited to keep working!