This week we had zone conference. I got there and Sister Bakker said,
" are you excited for your musical number?!"... And I said "what
musical number?". So we winged it together. Luckily, Elder Clawson is
a mad pianist and Sister Bakker a crazy good singer.

Some highlights from the week:

We met Roberto's wife! The only way I can describe them is "Latin
Lovers". They're in the middle of getting a divorce, and I'm pretty
sure we walked in on a more intense conversation. We had brought an
adorable member with us, Marie:). She's visiting her Sister from Utah,
and she is the best. Any way, she was expecting to teach the word of
wisdom with us, but instead she played with the two children as we
tried to teach charity to Roberto and comfort his wife. BUT, now his
wife loves us and said she's going to invite us over for Cuban food:).

In other news, WE SET A BAPTISMAL DATE WITH PIERRE! It was just the
funniest and coolest experience. Once upon a time, there was an old
man in a muggy apartment complex in the streets of Mülheim.
*bzzzzzzzz. The Sisters are here. Rapidly he dresses, or so rapidly he
thought. (10 minutes later--kind of like spongebob, and we're still
waiting outside his door) *bzzzzzzz. Shoes on to protect his feet from
the molded carpet, Pierre is ready to answer the door. Smiling,
greeting, laughing. Lights turn on "Und Es gab licht! (And there was
light)", Sister Johnson muses. Readily reaching, Pierre with the Book
of Mormon in hand retorts, "nein, hier ist licht!(no, here is
light!)", caressing it all the while. And then we knew, and invited
him to be baptized, and he said yes:). Now he and Roberto are getting
baptized on the fourth of November! Just before the end of the
transfer!

We met an adorable Persian family:). I met the mother with her little
son just chilling on an escalator and then we ended up talking and
walking together for 5 minutes. We had just received Persian book of
Mormons, so I offered to bring her one. I just can't describe how much
I love her. We went and dropped the book off yesterday and invited her
to a Persian party on Thursday (teaching with the Della corte's and
two other Persian families and Schwester sahebi). I'm really excited
to be teaching an entire family:).

We went to an Affen park today (monkeys). We all smell super bad.
Shout out to Schwester Nowak. She is our mother away from home:).

I ate food at IKEA. Who knew they had food?! It's the Costco of
Europe, just not as good and way too confusing. It took us ten minutes
to find our way out, haha:).

We had three people ride with us to church yesterday. We were all
tired, so when our stop came, we all slowly moved to the doors, but
then the bahn halted forward. Pierre fell backwards onto me and then
we had to take a reverse bahn to get back to the church. And then we had
three others there as well. It was a hectic Sunday, but I really think
it was an answer to a lot of the members prayers. They've been doing a
month long fast for us missionaries and the work here in Köln, and
it's really starting to go crazy. There is so much power and strength
that comes from fasting. The scriptures promise us the power of God as
we fast, study, and pray. And for me, this week as I fasted, this
power came in the form of the ability to be happy, even when I didn't
want to be. I know God loves each one of us, and I know he has
wondrous plans for us all. I love you!

Sister Johnson