WEEK 43 First week in Switzerland!

 At dinner with the Austin couple!

Hello everyone! :) such a crazy, fun, confusing week! It was such a
great week and it's just so crazy to be serving with one of my best
friends! So to explain, we are the zone leaders of the Genève Zone
which includes sectors in France and Switzerland! We actually live in
France in a Ville called Ferney Voltaire, which is a 30 second drive
from the border of Switzerland. We have the biggest zone in the
mission and we have 12 exchanges planned in the next 5 weeks! It will
be awesome. It's honestly so fun! So here is a recap of the
week...haha this is weird because a lot of you who receive this email
receive elder Barnes' as well. Voilà la semaine!

Monday: so on Monday, I got off the boat in Toulon and took a train to
Lyon, where I picked up Elder Barnes!! Haha it's honestly so crazy
that we are companions! So, from Lyons we took a train to Geneve where
we got our car and drove to the apartment. Haha thank goodness for GPS
systems or we would've been so lost. So we got to our apartment at
about 6:00 and basically cleaned up the apartment from the last elders
and then before we could even put our stuff away there was a member
here named Soeur Ischola who invited us over to eat dinner with her
friends who live below her! It was so cool. We talked about the family
and gave them a family proclamation. Their son was about 17 years old
and was really awesome and asked great questions and we are going to
try and work with him soon. It was also great to be back on public
transport too. Even though we have a car, we just dropped it off at
the church and were able to do some contacting on the bus which is my
favorite! Haha Monday was just a crazy day and we had no idea where
anything was (basically the whole week we had no idea).
Tuesday: So on Tuesday we continued cleaning and unpacked our stuff
and made area book calls to try and schedule some rendez vous for the
week! For lunch, President Coppel (stake president) took us out to
lunch and we talked about what we can do to help the work in this zone
progress. President Coppel is such a good guy and it was so fun to
meet with him. It is going to be great to work with him for the next
little bit. We talked a lot about how the members can't be afraid to
share the gospel, which is so true. I can't wait to help the
missionaries out so much when I'm older. The members here are awesome
though. After that, Elder Barnes and I returned to our apartment and
finished cleaning and doing stuff. Honestly, not a lot happened on
Tuesday because it was jut a lot of house work etc.
Wednesday: so we had our studies and then we made area book calls
again to fix some things and then we went to the church for a RDV we
had fixed, but the person didn't show up! So we contacted by the
church and the first guy we talked to we ended up talking to forever
and it was a great conversation. He had a lot of problems about other
churches and it was just so clear how all of these problems resulted
from the apostasy. We taught him about the apostasy but he didn't
accept anything at the end. After that, we went and visited a member
named Alex in the hospital. He went to Africa for a few weeks and
ended up catching malaria, so we met with him and introduced ourselves
and we read Alma 36 with him. He's such a great guy. So Wednesday
night we went to dinner with the elderly couple by where we live. The
Austin Couple! They are so awesome and I love them a lot. They are
huge BYU fans but promised to cheer for Gonzaga too ;) we went to a
really good pizza place in Ferney Voltaire. So then Wednesday night
there was a knock at the door and it was Elders Booaka and
Miranda-Gaspar from the Lausanne zone and apparently they missed their
train home so they slept in our apartment as well. They are so funny
haha I'll send a picture home.
Thursday: Thursday we had to wake up early and help people get their
luggage to the Gare (train station) and buy tickets. Then at about 10
we had the sisters in our ward get back from Lyon because Sister Fagg
is training and we got a brand new blue in our ward! Soeur Kelley. So
we met them and bought bus passes etc. haha it was a crazy morning at
the gate. Then we were supposed to have a RDV at the church but it
fell through so we tried to plan a little bit for the zone. Then we
drove to the institute building here in Genève (yes they have an
institute here!) and did some contacting around the institute before
we had a meeting with our DMP (Ward mission leader). So we went out
and while we were contacting we started talking to someone named
Francois and we had the coolest miracle with him! He told us he had
been searching for the truth at this moment in his life and that he
wanted answers. Elder Barnes and I taught him the restoration and he
loved it. We gave him a Book of Mormon as well. He is from Orleans
which isn't in our sector but he said he would contact the
missionaries there! It was really cool. Haha it's soooo fun to contact
people with one of your best friends. Then we had RCM and met our ward
mission leader and he is sooooo sick haha honestly. His name is
fidalgo and he served a mission in England. He loves basketball and is
such a bro! So then we contacted a mom pushing a stroller and set a
RDV with her this week which will be awesome :) then we went and ate
at the Bentele family's home! They are soooo sick. She made the best
pizza as well it reminded me of moms home made pizza. The members here
are awesome.
Friday: so Friday we woke up and went and met with the sister training
leaders in Annemasse and talked about things we are going to do in the
zone this transfer! Then we had a way cool miracle! So President Brown
sent out a text to the zone leaders the night before saying that he
wanted all of the ZLs to have a new person engaged to baptism before
MLC on Tuesday (which is actually tomorrow). And so we got a referral
from the Geneva Spanish elders the night before, and so we went and
passed him and we had a cool lesson and engaged him to baptism! His
name is Sultani and its for March 19th! Then we had another RDV at the
church but it fell through so we contacted a little bit and then
planned a little bit more for the zone! Then we went and had dinner
with the Stake mission leader Frere Volpicelli and he helped us out
soooo much! He went over a ward list with us and went over every part
member family we could work with. We are going to try and work with
part member families a lot. Honestly there are so many here so we have
a lot of work to do! We had raclette as well which may be my favorite
French food!
Saturday: Hahaha so Saturday morning we had to go and put some
curtains up in the sisters apartment. After that we contacted a little
bit. Then Saturday night there was a baptism in the ward of a daughter
of a member! So we went there and met a lot of the ward. The ward here
is so awesome. Haha and then after we went and ate chicken with the
Spanish elders.
Sunday: Sunday we went to church! Again the ward is so awesome. I made
the dumbest joke and everyone laughed hahaha elder Barnes was so
bitter ;) church was just great! Then we met with Elder Fisk, who just
finished his mission here in Genève and he explained the sector to us
and helped us out a lot. Then we contacted to Genève Lac and then came
back and did zone numbers!

Thank you for the support! I am loving it here and serving with one of
your best friends is incredible. Haha we just look across the bus at
each other while we are contacting and think, "How is this possible??"

2 Ne 31:20 I love my Savior and know he lives!

Elder Wade

2 Nephi 31:20

 "Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father: Ye shall have eternal life."

  Us in front of Swiss chocolate :)

  A little view of Genève 

Elders Booaka and Miranda gaspar

Sorry I didn't take a lot of photos this week!

Week 42 Dream transfer and a broken heart...

First off I want to let the Wells family know they are in my thoughts and
prayers. Sadie was an incredible person and she touched the lives of
countless people, including mine.

Wow a very emotional week for me as a lot happened. So we received our
transfer calls and I have been transferred to Geneva, Switzerland as a
zone leader and my new companion is....Scroll down to the bottom of
this email right now and click on the picture to see :) This is not a
joke. It's so weird that we were saying goodbye on his porch the day
before He left thinking we wouldn't see each other for 3 years and now
we are going to be companions. It's so crazy and I know that we have
some work we need to do together in Geneva.

I don't have a lot of time today as we been taking trains and already
have some work to do in Geneva, but I want to talk a little bit about
my experience serving the people of Ajaccio on the crazy island of
Corsica. My heart absolutely broke last night as I said goodbye to
some people that have absolutely stolen my heart over these last 4
months. Saying goodbye to Marie Rose, Sylvia and Noel was unbelievably
hard for me. I love them so much. I have watched their lives change so
much over these 4 months I can't even begin to describe how big the
change has been in their lives. The funny and cheesy thing is that
every missionary at some point of their mission says "I went on my
mission to change people's lives, but in reality they changed mine." I
fully figured out what that statement meant as I said goodbye to those
3. I have seen them make so many big changes to their lives and we've
seen them be baptized, but they have changed my life way more than I
could have ever changed theirs. I love them so much and they will
always have a special place in my heart. That whole group will always
have a special place in my heart...the church is so small on the
island but the members there are so strong and faithful. I grew so
close with them while I was there and they will forever be my Corsican
family. And by family I mean, family.

Leaving an area that you love so dearly not only means you leave the
members, but also the people you are teaching.
Micca, Immanuel and Samuel are incredible. When we said goodbye to
them, there were tears all around and cute little 7 year old Samuel
was just crying his eyes out. Micca talked about the change in his
life over the last few months since we found them and it has been
incredible. We were over at their house 4 times this past week and
they are amazing. On Wednesday we ate pizza and taught the plan of
salvation and they loved it. While we were eating, Micca was drinking
a beer and he asked us why we didn't drink. So we just told him that
it was something we were going to talk about with him a little later,
but then we just taught the word of wisdom on the spot...at the end of
teaching it to him, he stood up and walked over to the trash can and
threw his half full beer in the garbage and said "I'm done drinking."
It was incredible. Then on Friday we gave Micca "The Family: A
proclamation to the world" and talked with him about how he needs to
get married before his baptism and he said he will. They will be
baptized. They want to be baptized so bad and I'm so happy for them.
It was so hard for me to leave them and I love them so much and I am
so grateful that the gospel is blessing their lives so much right now.
We found another family this week and I want to tell the story...so
you guys remember that guy that we showed the video about dads to? We
went and visited them this week and they told us the background from
their side of the story of the day that they met us. So, the day we
showed up at their house, they decided to try and make their
relationship work for the kids. They were both just looking for
something to help them and they both were at the lowest points of
their life. So, that day we prayed to be led to someone and we drove
25 minutes out of Ajaccio and ended up finding them. So they loved the
gospel and the mom (Chrystelle) is so amazing and wants her family to
be strong and we testified that through the gospel they can be. So
that was so cool.

I am loving my mission so much and I am so grateful for the people
I've met, the places I've been, the experiences I've had, and the
people I'm serving. I am grateful to have served with Elder Johnson
for 3 transfers and Elder Hall for 2. I love them a lot. Thank you for
the support!

Elder Wade

Week 41 Chopping Wood

We saw an old guy out chopping some wood so we stopped the car and

helped him haha he was honestly so funny

Hello everybody! This email is going to be a little different than
usual because my companions both just got each other really sick this
week and weren't able to do a whole lot. But here are some quick
details from the week.

So on Thursday we had Zone Conference in NICE :) I love going to Nice
and Conference was so great. Some cool things got announced as
well...so first off, Switzerland is now open to American missionaries!
Before, all of our European missionaries went there because of some
legality things, but right now it's free game! Haha I wouldn't mind
serving there one day. Secondly, Elder D. Todd Christofferson is
coming to our mission next transfer!! I am so excited for him. I know
you can't really choose a favorite apostle, but he might be mine! So
I'm super excited about those two things. Also it was good to see a
bunch of people whom I love so much at conference as well. Oh yeah
also we showed up about 10 minutes late to conference because there
was a huge storm over the Mediterranean while we were on the boat, and
so we got delayed a few hours. Haha needless to say it's pretty much
impossible to sleep when the boat is just getting rocked like that and
we were running off of very little sleep.

Update with Micca and Emmanuel and Samuel! After 2 weeks we finally
got to see them yesterday! Satan has been working really hard on them
but after we saw them last night, we got everything under control
again. They are doing great. We told them about transfer calls this
week and they said they needed to be baptized before transfer
calls...so they really want to be baptized :) but they need to be
married still. It's been so amazing to see how far they have come
since we met them a few months ago. Please pray for them. We had a
great lesson with them and we reminded them of the incredible
experiences we've had together and the spirit was there again. He said
he wants to feel like how he does when he meets with us all the time.
They will be baptized one day for sure. We are going back tomorrow
night to teach them and we told them we want to start seeing them more
often and they agreed. So voilà! I love them so much.

I love it here. I love the members here so much. They are so faithful
and strong and such great examples to me. There aren't a lot of
members and so it's really easy to get close with them here and it's
such a blessing. I'm grateful that my mission thus far has taught me
how powerful love is. I didn't know I was able to love some of these
people as much I do. I am so grateful to be on my mission and learning
and growing.

We are working with some more people but I don't have a lot of time to
write about them today!
Transfer calls are this week so we will see what happens next week!
Thank you for the support!

Elder Wade

 Bonifacio again...it was super windy

Frere and Soeur Antoni! They left to Taiwan for a month and so we took a pic

Porto Beach

The real week 40.. Riding around the Island with friends :)

 Selfie with Simone!! :) haha it's the only one I have with her. She is so funny.

Hello family and friends! Another great week haha. It was a grind it
out week but sometimes those are the best ones! Voilà the recap.

Tuesday: so we ported and ported and ported haha. That sums up the
whole day. But at night we had a RDV with Francoise and Joseph and we
went over the Book of Mormon and we committed them for baptism on
March 19th! So that was cool :) Francoise is sooo great and she's an
incredible person. I'm happy for them. Also Marie Rose helped us teach
them which was awesome :) she's only been a member for 2 months and
she's already helping us teach :) Then we saw Sylvia and Noel after!
Wednesday: we ported and ported and ported and ported and ported haha.
Then we saw Soeur Antonetti and her daughter Melissa! I wish we could
engage Melissa more but she isn't very interested at all and we've
been trying for 4 months. But we are still working on her!
Thursday: Thursday was honestly so cool and we had an amazing
experience. So instead of porting in main Ville Ajaccio, we felt like
we should drive about 20 minutes out of Ville and go port this random
village. So we had honestly been porting for about 5 hours and we had
some sketchy experiences (read 2 Nephi 5:4 and that will tell you all
you need to know hahah) and we were about to head back for dinner and
we ported one last little patch of houses and the first door we
knocked on and a man opened up and we could hear a baby crying and he
said he couldn't talk then, so we fixed a time to come back. So we
kept porting and then we were about to leave and we walked past the
guys house and he was working out in his shed and so we just walked up
and talked to him and we started talking about how amazing and
important families are and so we showed the Mormon message "père
terrestre père céleste" and halfway through he just started crying. So
we talked to him about how he loves his family so much and that these
feelings he has for them can last forever. He expressed to us about
how right now his family isn't doing too great and he may be getting a
divorce. We testified of the atonement of Christ and because Christ
sacrificed himself for us, he knows exactly how we feel and he can
help us and we testified that Christs church has been restored to the
earth. We asked him if he would pray and ask God if he's really there,
and if what we said was true. At the end of this conversation, with
tears in his eyes, he promised us that he would pray for the first
time in 40 years and truly ask. Honestly it was a special experience.
It was cool to think that on the random island of Corsica we were led
to a man who specifically needed to know that there was hope and that
God is there and loves us.
Friday: Friday morning we woke up and drove to Bastia because we did a
service project in the mountains above Bastia for a members friend.
Haha so I don't think I've ever taken any time to explain, but
Corsicans are sooo freaking funny and crazy. Like they are known for
being crazy and for being free spirits and it's so true hahaha some of
the daily stuff we see here is just so crazy that it's funny. I love
Corsicans so much. Haha anyways, after the service we had a big
barbecue and then we did an exchange with the Bastia Elders and I went
on my first exchange in Bastia with Elder Hansen and Elder Szuch. I've
been here for 3 transfers and we're the only companionships on the
island and so we only do exchanges with each other and finally I went
to Bastia! It was great! We went and passed some less actives and had
a good time together. They are such great guys and it was so fun
working with them. The Ajaccio and Bastia equipes are super tight and
this is the 3rd month we've been together and so we are all great
friends. Just a great day. Then Elder Szuch gave me a haircut as well.
Elder Szuch is a freak athlete and is thinking about playing soccer at
Gonzaga after the mission now :):)
Saturday: Saturday was a little different day. As I've explained in
the past, Ajaccio is a lot different because we do lots of things to
try and strengthen  the members here because there are so few and the
missionaries have only been here for a little while, so lots of the
members rely on the missionaries for different things. So we had a lot
of weird things come up with members that we had to take care of. But
long story short we had to go pick up Frere Colonna for a big BBQ for
our group Sunday afternoon. So we went and picked him up and dropped
him off at Soeur Hermoso's house for the night. Haha honestly on a
side note Soeur Hermoso takes care of her super old mom (selfie on the
way) and Frere Colonna and her were the funniest together. They were
soooo old and so cute and funny. Haha anyways...after we went and
ported! Great day
Sunday: Sunday! So we went to church and it was great. We had 12
people in all. Since the church is still super new here and all of the
members are pretty good recent converts, some of the lessons get
pretty interesting and sometimes we need to clarify things up haha.
Ahh I love the people here so much. So then after we had a big BBQ at
Marie Roses house! She is doing so great. The gospel has changed her
life so much and it's been so fun to see the changement. So we
contacted a little and ported a little and then had a few RDVs that
fell through! So voilà!

On another note, Corsica is soooo beautiful. Every day I just get
blown away with how beautiful it is. We went to another very beautiful
place today but I'm too lazy to try and get the photos off my camera
right now so I'll do it next week!

Alma 41:10. I love this scripture so much and my mom would tell me it
all the time :) there is no happiness like the happiness that comes
with living the gospel of Jesus Christ. I love him and will never be
able to explain my gratitude for what he has done for me.

I love you have a great week!


Elder Wade

Alma 41:10

Do not suppose, because it has been spoken concerning restoration, that ye shall be restored from sin to happiness. Behold, I say unto you, wickedness never was happiness.

  The cap of Corse! Look up Corsica on a map and you'll know what I'm talking about

Porto!

 Selfie with Simone!! :) haha it's the only one I have with her. She is so funny.

  Driving to Bastia and the clouds were so cool up in the mountains

 Service project painting with elder Szuch haha I love him.

Exchange!