Week 89, Antibes, France

South of Cannes

Bonjour,

I just wanted to let everyone know that I am very well and safe. (Anders told me, in a personal letter, that they received a call early Saturday morning from the mission office.  It was the first they had heard about the Paris terrorist attacks.  They were advised to stay in their apartments until further notice. To be honest he seems a little oblivious to the whole thing.)  

I loved speaking with the people here in Antibes this week.  One man stopped to talk with us and we had a great discussion with him while sitting on a park bench. One thing that really impressed me about him was his appreciation for the importance of family. He is a single guy, about 30 years old, who doesn't believe in God but he sees that the family is what is holding society together and believes that laws should protect families. I was able to express my gratitude for families and how my religion and belief in God's plan helps strengthen my family.

We also had the opportunity to meet a nice young couple who lives not too far from us in Juan les Pains. They are married and the wife is a member of the church but her husband is not. We got in contact with them in the beginning of the week and then they came to church on Sunday. I went to their house Sunday evening and we actually ran into them randomly earlier in the week. I am really exited to be seeing them more. Today we went on a really fun boat ride to some islands by Cannes for our p day. It was awesome. I hope you all have a great week

Love 

Frère Bake

FFF of the Week - People walk a lot more in France and the cars just stop for everyone without any problem.  

Pday boat trip to islands south of Cannes

Elder Orr and I

 

This is a picture I found of Juan les Pains




 

 

Terroist Attack in Paris, November 14, 2015

14 novembre 2015

Dear Families & Friends,

Please be assured that all of our missionaries are safe and secure. Given that France has closed all of her borders, and even though we know of no terrorist sights within our mission, pending further information I am advising all of our missionaries to stay in their apartments and avoid public transportation.

We will keep you informed as all information becomes available.

Love,

President and Sister Brown

Week 88 Antibes, France




I found the Statue of Liberty! in Nice

We started this week with a trip to Aix for a missionary conference which was fun. It has been 6 months since I was there and I was able to see some of the city and the church building again. I really miss that place. I had some good times there. I do not know if I can say which city I have served in that is my favorite because I have loved them all but Aix is one of my favorites. In the conference, we learned a lot about planning and organizing which I think is very important so I was very happy to learn more about that. I also got to see some missionaries that I have not seen in a very long time like Elder Frost who was in the MTC with me. After the conference I went to Toulon to do a companion exchange with Elder Lithgo. He is a cool guy.

 

I am looking forward to meeting a lady who is a member and just moved here with her husband; he is a non member and from Australia. She contacted us because she was excited to find out that there are missionaries in Antibes.  We will meet them on Saturday. 

We went to a guys house who lives with his really old mom and her English husband. We were able to give the Mom the sacrament because she can't come to church on Sundays. Theuy fed us raclette which is my favorite food. It was Elder Orr's first time having it. We ate it the real Swiss way where we had the meat first with onions instead of with the potatoes and cheese. It was really good.

 

Today we went to Nice with all of the missionaries in the area to have a fun P day. We played Frisbee and went on a fun hike and then went downtown to have ice cream. yeah!

Love

Frère Bake

Fun French Fact of the Week- The beaches in Antibes and Cannes are really nice but in Nice they are just rocky and I am pretty sure they import a little bit of sand to put in some spots. If we could go on the beach I would stay in Antibes. Plus we have big yachts!

 

With Elder Orr and a family from Antibes

The beach in Nice

 

 

Sea Wall in Nice

Elder Frost and Elder Shaw - Friends from the MTC

 

 

 

 

View of Antibes

 

Elder Orr and I

Elder Orr's 3rd Kebab in 24 hours

Anders thinks he can get a job as a French model after the missionary gig is up.

Nice Zone

 

 

 

On an exchange in Toulon with a member

View from his apartment

Conference in Aix

 

 

 

Week 87 Antibes, France

Bonjour,

Another great week in the Cote d'azur! On Monday we had the perfect p day. We went on a hike to the top of a hill overlooking the coast and then went on to Cannes and had family home evening with a family in the ward; the Family Gentile. I have some pictures to send from this too. We visited and met a lot of really great members like Fr. Sabbe. Fr.Sabbe is the coolest guy in the world. He is super old and he just joined the church 3 years ago. A lot of people here in Antibes like to say that they are too old to change or believe in God but Fr.Sabbe is proof that it is not true. We did a lot of door to door contacting too this week which is always fun. Really it is! On Thursday we had the district meeting in Cannes and we talked about how we can better use The Book of Mormon in our teaching. Then we had nachos for lunch.

 

On Halloween day we went to a man's house who lives in a very nice town called Grasse. We ate lunch with him and were able to teach him about the temple. Since last year the French people have got a little bit better at Halloweening, but they have still not quite figured it out. The kids just walk around in the middle of the day for about three days with their costumes on. I don't get what they are doing.

 

I am always amazed at how easy it is to get people to open up and talk with us.  This week we were visiting with a lady who talked with us about her son. She genuinely appreciated what we shared with her even though we are only kids ourselves.  I love being able to tap into the promptings of the Spirit as we serve people.

 

Sunday was a lot of fun. We taught the Sunday school class for the new members and I feel like it went very well. The Sister team in Cannes is teaching a really cool guy named Anthony who we have gotten to know a little bit and he normaly sits next to us and church. After church we had a brake the fast meal and I got to know some of the members a little bit better. It was a very good week and I am looking forword to many more miracles to come next week. 

Love

Frère Bake

fff of the week- the 2nd floor of buildings is called floor 1.





 

Week 86 Antibes

Bonjour!

Antibes! I had a great time this week getting to know the area a little better. Today my companion and I went on a hike along the coast of Antibes. It was beautiful.

I do not have much time but I would like to share an experience. On Friday I went to Nice to do an exchange for the day with Elder Burton. We had a lesson with a really great man named Kevin.  As we were teaching him a lesson about the importance of having prophets today I felt strongly that I should share my testimony about living prophets. A scripture we read reminded me of how I felt when Elder Anderson visited our mission.  I told him that when Elder Anderson from the quorum of the twelve apostles came to Nice in the begining of my mission it was a very special experience for me because after seeing and hearing him testify the spirit testified to me that Elder Anderson and our prophet today, Thomas Monson are really called of God. I explained that everyone can know this for themselves throught the Holy Ghost. I am really happy to be in Antibes. It is a great place and I feel that there are a lot of good things to come.

Love

 

Frère Bake

Nice Zone

Week 85, Antibes, France

Cannes Flood Clean Up

Bonjour

This week we went on a big trip to Lyon for the conference with the new missionaries. We were planning on leaving Thursday because the conference was Friday morning but then they called us Wednesday morning and said we needed to leave that afternoon! So we packed up really quick and headed off. I still feel like I have bearly seen Antibes. We got to Lyon at the same time as the Elders from Toulon and all four of us were wearing t shirts. We immediately regreted it because it was very cold in Lyon. We made jokes the rest of the trip about how much nicer it is in the cote d'azer. We had to go early because my companion had to do his legality papers to be legal in France. I got to see a lot of other missionaries who were training new missionaries and some old companions. I had not seen Elder Walters in a long time and so it was great to see him again.

Elder Fisk

 

Elder Taylor

 

Elder Walters

 

 

 

Miracle of the week - We had some time to go out and talk to people in Lyon on Wednesday and so Elder Orr and I went out in the cold. This was really our first time out talking to people together and we did great. We had a nice conversation with a man who shared with us that he had recently turned his life around thanks to the help of God. He said that he had been a big smoker and drinker and he even showed us a picture of what he use to look like. Then he explained how he started to have more faith in God and changed his life. He is much more happy now and doing well. It is cool to see how this man recognized that it was God who helped him change and he could not have done it all on his own. I think it is also cool how we can get people to open up to us and share personal things with us and then we can to the same. I have seen that as we share our testimonies more they are a lot stronger.

 

The conference on Friday went very well. I learned a lot of new things and set some good goals on how I can inprove. Even though President Brown shared some of the same stories as the last conference which I went to with Elder Wilson, I still learned new things because the spirit was able to teach me the things that I needed. 

 

So just two weeks ago in Cannes there was a big flood that caused a lot of damage to people's homes and killed about 20 people. It is very interesting coming to Cannes at this time but it is a great opportunity to serve. On Saturday we spent the day cleaning with a lot of the members and missionaries from Cannes, Nice, Saint Raffiel and other members in the area. The branch president from Gap even came. It was fun to see him and some other members I have met before. We were mostly loading up garbadge bins with the stuff that was in peoples underground storage and garage areas. It was some hard work but very rewarding. It was cool to see that so many people had come to help. Even people from Cannes just showed up to help people that they did not know. 

 

Church was great. I got to meet a lot of the members in the ward. The primary president asked us to come to primary to talk to them about being missionarys. So we live in Antibes but we go to the ward in Cannes. Also at church there was a couple on vacation that is from Norway and they told us that they were from a small branch that is the most northern branch of the church in the world!

je vous aime tous

Frère Bake

 

 

Week 84, Antibes, France

Antibes

 



Streets of Antibes

So I am on the road again! Well I was on the train yesterday for a
really long time. I am in Antibes now with Elder Orr! He is awesome. 
He is from Utah!

Last week seems so long ago now. I don't really remember a lot of details
of what happened but it was great!
Miracle of the week
I got a chance to see everyone for the last time and ended my sojourn
in Agen with a bang! We had one of e best weeks of the transfer with a
lot of great lessons and were able to meet a lot of new people for
Elder Wilson to work with. I am going to miss Agen a lot and all of the
great people I met there.

One of the fun things we did was go to Mezin
and hunt mushrooms with the Somsons. It was so awesome! Mr. Somson
is really opening up to us and the idea of us teaching him.

On Saturday night Brother Zambos called and asked if I could give
the lesson for the first class on Sunday! So I tried to put some stuff
together and then the stake president decided to drive all the way
from Bordeaux and visit! Quel pressure! It was a little rough and my
French went out the window but I got through it.

The train to Antibes was fun. First we went to Toulouse where I got the
really good kebab there with cheese in it and said goodbye to Elder
Wilson then I went to Marseille where I got some chicken nuggets at
Mac Do's (McDonalds) and met my new companion Elder Orrrrrr! Then we went to
Antibes. This morning we ran to the beach. It is awesome!

Love you all

Frère Bake

My new companion, Elder Or