25 Feb 2018

It’s been a couple weeks since our last Blogpost, but the time goes very fast here and we are busy all the time.  This is a good thing, by the way.  I remember talking to Marel about us going to Leeds, Yorkshire, England - way up in the north to work in the Institute and her saying she hoped we weren’t just sitting around inside this big, empty building while it rained outside day after day. 

First of all - it doesn’t rain as much here as it does in Oregon although it is bitterly cold here a great deal of the time.  We have very heavy, warm coats and we wear them.  We go shopping a couple times a week because we cook dinner every Thursday night and our “guest chef” volunteers from the YSA) cook every Wednesday night and we supply the ingredients.  Most of the time we spend inside the Institute and it is anything but empty.  During the day students come and go and use our library or the lounge quite a bit for studying.  We have our regulars who come to Family Home Evenings on Mondays, lunchtime class held in the lounge while they eat sandwiches, Friday breakfast class held while they eat  mostly pancakes - sometimes crepes or French toast and Friday Night Movies. (last week we watched “Chariots of Fire” in honor of the Olympics.)  The three main classes are held in three different classrooms upstairs and include those core students as well as students or YSA from other Stakes around Leeds - some who live an hour away.  The largest class is taught on Thursdays by Brother McMorn, the director - The Book of Mormon -  and usually has around 40 students -  many of whom have dinner first and stay after for different activities - this last week we had Karaoke - that was fun. Everyone’s favorite song was Queen’s “We are the Champions” so that’s familiar.  There is also a small class on Thursday called Mission Prep with high school students from around the area who are preparing to leave on missions  also taught by Brother McMorn.  We teach the Wednesday night class on Jesus Christ and the Everlasting Gospel and those students are mainly core students from the Institute - usually a dozen or so.  It’s a perfect size for great discussions and we’ve gotten to know this group very well.  

Occasionally, we go on field trips with other senior missionaries. Last weekend we went a couple hours north to Durham where we toured the amazing 1000 year old Durham Cathedral.  Our guide Brian was fabulous and gave us great background information of this beautiful, historical edifice and the people who built it.  We also saw a performance of “Magic Flute” presented by University students in Durham.  The voices were beautiful and powerful, the direction was interesting and modern (using cell phones for example) and we enjoyed the experience.  We hear they’re doing some Gilbert & Sullivan next term so we’ll be back.  We also enjoyed walking around the city center of Durham City.  We meet with the Leeds Missionaries once a week and they drop in at the Institute whenever they’re teaching YSA. 

All this to say that we are certainly not bored - ever!  We’re both speaking in Sacrament Meeting tomorrow, I’m helping find accommodations for a Mandarin speaking Conference here at the Institute in April, we are hosting a Fireside speaker coming in tomorrow night -( in May our fireside speaker will be none other than Jeffrey Cannon so everyone’s pretty excited to hear from him and we look forward to seeing him too. ), we also have meetings with students, missionaries, institute staff and visiting YSA who have just moved here and are looking for a place of refuge and friends.  Last week we had a visitor who is looking at colleges for next year and stopped by to see what our program looks like.  For now - it’s going on midnight and I’m off to bed.  Enjoy the pictures.   How’s its going over there anyway?  I see you had several snow days last week.  I was really missing home because I always loved snow days.  It’s supposed to snow here this week, so we’ll see what happens.  

Love, Sister & Elder Edvalson  (pictures: ice sculpture of Dumbledore, us in front of the Cathedral, students playing Twister (some things never change) and making Valentines