This week...

we did quite a bit!

I started writing in my journal again, haven't done that for about 6 months. not good... but yeah i so i started doing audio journals. My camera also records just voice so that's what i do! just takes a few minutes every night to get everything pretty well documented.

Today was a pretty cool pday. The Stockholm Marathon was today and it was way intense! we saw them start and finish and a couple places inbetween. I didn't like it because i thought they were racial profiling because if you just took the first 15 winners they were all the same race. I couldn't believe such a free and equal nation like Sweden would allow such an event. Especially when it disfavors the common blonde blue eyed swede. Some dude from Kenya won, of course.

I'm just kidding about the previous statement about racial profiling. It was actually way awesome to see them run. They owned!!! this dude ran so freaking fast. he beat 2nd place by 7 minutes. he got around 2 hours and 25 minutes to run 26 miles. I was blown away.

BUT this was the most impressive part. a 70 year old man got under 3 hours!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! UNBELIEVABLE.

We had a lot of member dinners this week. And we went tracting a few times, and did a lot of office work. One time we were tracting in a really really nice area in Täby. It is the nicest area in Sweden (richest) well anyway there were these 2 teens putting in their front yard. We talked to them for a few seconds, got the first little bit and they wernt interested. They had enough of god like the rest of them, well anyway then i asked them if i could try to hit a few, so we did! it was pretty cool. I showed them up. They were a little drunk, but they thought it was cool. It was so funny! when i was putting i could hear the dad in the house talking on the phone and then he said "haha the Jehovah witnesses are playing golf with my son!" and went on, he thought it was really funny. They complemented our Swedish big time also. That was cool. well we talked to them for a little more and gave them a Book of Mormon. it was pretty cool.

The assistants were on a really long trip. like a week. So was President Anderson. They had zone conferences in Göteborg and also Malmö. But now they are back.

I read a really interesting thing called "as a man thinkith" it was really interesting. Oh and I've also been studying chiasmus. They are really interesting and show alot of the author.

OH YEAH! I hit my one year mark last thursday. Yep i've been on a mission for over a year now... Pretty crazy!

This was at the very beginning of the Stockholm Marathon. 18,500 participants!

This is the finish line! In the same stadium where they held the 1912 olympics or something like that when the olympics were here in sweden. This is about ½hr after the winner came by. it was pretty intense!

Back to Uppsala. I'd been there about 8 months before on splits many times. it is a really cool city. That is the biggest cathedral in all of scandinavia.

here is my one social comentary picture. Taken in the Domkyrkan in Uppsala. Hope you enjoy the dark humor of the picture!

Love you all!
ÄA

elder.riley.j.adamson@gmail.com

May 23rd 2009

Hello everyone,

Life in the office is pretty awesome! so every day we work in the office until around 5pm and then go out and tract or eat dinner with members or something missionary like! We do all sorts of stuff in the office. Basically if any missionary needs something they ask us, and so we deal with that. And we also make orders for missionaries and from Germany, we also send out referrals and books of mormon to people who want them in the mail, and we also make stuff for the mission. Right now we are kinda working on this new thing that will be a website to help missionaries have the supplies they need. and we do just about anything else you can think of... that office people need to do. Records... and letters and all sorts of stuff. Its pretty fun, and i'll probably be here for a total of 4 months so i better like it!

Me have some pretty fun P-day. My comp and i have these bike cards, and also the train/bus cards so we just own everything in Stockholm. We have tons of fun! I wish i showed you a map of our travels on last pday. We went to stadshuset in stockholm. It is the big important goverment building there. It was pretty cool. I'll attach pictures. Then we went to the smallest street in all of stockholm and then we went to the palace and then shopping and wandering around all of stockholm. It was pretty cool.So when we went went out after we were done working in the office we went tracting/ran by less actives mostly. We went to this one member who was way cool, she is from Iran and has a super strong testimony. It was really cool. She's had a hard life but just holds onto the gospel! We also went to alot of members houses for dinner. they take really good care of us here! I think we had 3-4 dinners at a members house. One of them was with the stake president. That was pretty cool.

We also ran into a past missionary who was here about 2 years ago- him and his wife came to visit.

Alright time for pictures...This is the Stadshuset(city hall) building. We got a tour of the inside of it! pretty cool.

This was inside the city hall building.

This is the smallest street in Stockholm. And my companion in the middle of it. It is in Gamla Stan in the very old part of Stockholm.

Oh this is in the Stadshuset- they have a gold room of icons they worship-- see that american flag and Statue of liberty. I felt a good warm feeling as I saw that.

This is peter and the Dragon. A super cool statue in Gamlastan.

Swedes and guns... They are terrified of them. See this kid.

Love you all! you guys are awesome!!!!

Äldste Riley Adamson
Box 2087
183 02 Täby
Sweden

elder.riley.j.adamson@gmail.com
rileyadamson.blogspot.com

Transfer Week: Welcome to Täby

Ok everyone, I have kinda alot to say this week!

Well we got transfer calls on Tuesday, and Wednesday we packed up and visited people. We had lunch at the Wennerlunds, that was awesome, and then after that we emailed, and then we went by my favorite family the Erikssons! They are so great! They gave us some food, and the little girls gave me goodbye love letters and I got to say goodbye to Jonathan, my favorite buddy. That kid, i'm going to miss him. He is this crazy little kid. Well then we headed over to Hässelholm to say goodbye to Erica, our previous investigator.... but she wasnt home.... So that was not fun. She called us the next day so I got to say goodbye to her on the phone.

Then that night we stayed up until 1:00 AM packing.... That wasnt fun. I have so much junk i've collected over the last 7 months. Well i crammed it all in my bags, and took a short nap, woke up at 4:30 and headed for Stockholm. When we first got to "the Ring", that is the place where all the missionaries meet, we had like 15 minutes before we were suppose to be at the training meeting. Because some missionaries were not so smart, I wasnt there at the meeting, but that was fine because i got to chill with Elder Langston and some other missionaries. AND Elder Fryer. he was my companion in the MTC. The coolest kid ever. he is down in malmö now, he's just been avoiding me my whole mission. That was the first time i saw him in almost a year. Anyway he is doing good. Me and Elder Czuba went to lunch also, we went to Pizza Hut. one of 3 in sweden. AMERICAN PIZZA is so freaking goood! Swedish pizza is really weird. If you guys know what Kabab is, then you know what i'm talking about. well its these really thin weird pizzas. maybe i'll take a picture sometime.

After that I meet my new companion Elder Drake, he is way cool, from Ohio. He's been the secretary for 3 weeks so we have lots to learn! It'll be really good.

Awesome things about my new job. We have a car!! We have computers, we have a huge apartment, we are with President Anderson alot, we learn alot about the mission, and we do alot of stuff! we have a dish washer, an American microwave, we work with the Johnsons (the office senior couple) and Täby is a pretty awesome place! oh and we get our letters and packages very first! I'm really excited! although i got to learn how to drive stick, it'll be good. I kinda know how because i rode dirtbikes my whole life, so it'll just be switching everything around. I'm excited though!


So last p-day was super exciting. It was on Saturday. Well we started off with a little service, helped a guy move an organ to his sisters place, then we drove it across stockholm to Hägersten or somewhere down there. Then we came back and then went to Skansen, this huge outdoor museum type zoo thing in the middle of down town stockholm. it is a big island that they gave to this museum. Sweden is super 'green' and enviormentally friendly. It's kinda annoying sometimes. Well that was super fun, we were with the APs just messing around for a few hours seeing what they got there.

well then we left and went and saw the Young Ambassadors from BYU preform in the middle of down town stockholm. it was pretty awesome! they only preformed for 20 minutes, it was kinda a preview to their big show later that night. So I was watching them and realized i could know them! And I did know one of them! Her name is Megan, so one day when i was at byu at this seminar or something she came up to me and asked me what elementary school i went to. it turned out that she was in my 6th grade class but then moved to saint george! and so at byu we were friends a little bit. Well and then we both ended up in stockholm. So that was cool, we got to talk for a few minutes. We went to their preformance later that night and it was pretty cool knowing someone down there.

Anyway so then after that we got these bike passes and cruised around all of stockholm on these rental bikes!! it was so fun! pretty crazy though. If anyone comes to sweden they need to do that! It was really fun! well we went all over the place. I'll attach some pictures. The bikes are pretty good quality, and you can return them to any of these stop things all over stockholm. It was pretty intense. Bikes on real cobblestone roads was a little crazy. And stockholm is pretty hilly.

Thats another awesome thing about the office. We have a car, but also bus/train cards for all of stockholm. So then we took the subway home! After that we hopped in the car and drove to the Young Ambassadors show. I WAS BLOWN AWAY!!! THEY ARE SO FREAKING GOOD!!!! They really have some talent. You guys need to see them. I dont know if they have their stuff online but i was blown away. They could sing and dance anything. Well i was completely impressed. They sang ABBA stuff and just about everything... And then after I got to talk to megan quickly and then time to go home and sleep!

It sounds like they were on a pretty cool tour. Denmark, norway, sweden and Finland. Pretty cool. And they sang I'm a child of God in swedish. It was pretty impressive!

Pictures from our bike trip in Stockholm. It was an AWESOME DAY! that is a piece of Gamla Stan in the middle of Stockholm. it is actually on an island. it is a pretty cool place!

This is my companion, Elder Drake. That is the swedish parlement building or something like that. Its called the Stadshus.
This is the Young Ambassadors in Kungsträdgården down town stockholm

This is me and Megan Knell in Stockholm Universities Autitorium. Pretty crazy seeing people i know from home!

Love you guys!

ÄA

--
Äldste Riley Adamson
Box 2087
183 02 Täby
Sweden

elder.riley.j.adamson@gmail.com
rileyadamson.blogspot.com

May 13th 2009

Alright!  

So we got transfer calls yesterday, and Äldste Langston called me at about 9:00 am and asked me if I wanted to know where I was going.  Apparently President had told someone where I was going.  So I told Elder Langston to tell me, and he did....  I'm going to the Office to work as a Secretary!  Pretty exciting!!  I'm actually way excited.  I think it will be super fun and my type of work (not saying tracting is not)  But it will be pretty awesome!  We live with the Assistants in the office, they are pretty cool, and so is my new companion I hear, Elder Drake.

Important Notice.  My P-Days are now on SATURDAY!

So my next pday is in about 2 days.  I'm super excited to be a secretary now.  We have a Big Blue Van, and we do all sorts of cool stuff.  I'm really excited.  The only down side is that I'm pretty old in missionary age to go to the office, but that is completely fine for me.  I'll probably be there 4 months, and maybe 6.  We'll see.

Alexander was Baptized!!!

It was kinda a frustrating day.... but super awesome!!  Alexander was baptized, but also Jolanka (she wasnt baptized in the proper order last time so they needed to do it again.)  But everything went good.  It was pretty awesome to see elder Langston again.  He was a great companion.  He is now going to be a zone leader in Stockholm South Zone.  he is an awesome missionary.  One of the most sucessful too.  he's had ALOT of baptisms during his mission.  In 3 months they had 3 baptisms, and when he was in Kristianstad 5 of our investigators got baptized adventually.

Me and Bo and Birgitta Wennerlund (awesome mebers here in K-stad)

Our District!

(left- goodman, Balhorn, Dixion, Jensen, Clark, Dees, Mathews, ME)

Familjen Strandberg and Me.  They are awesome members

My Sister went SkyDiving the other day!!!  this is a link to her video on youtube!  Pretty intense!  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bln2_8X19gU  When I go home I gotta do it too!  I'm going to do a ton of fun stuff when I get home.

I have quite a few friends who are in Europe right now.  Kami is doing an internship in France, and Allison is in London.  Pretty cool.  They are kinda closer, haha.

Everything is going good here!  I'm excited to head to the office!  Early tomorrow morning we are traveling!  our train leaves at 5 AM tomorrow!

crazy!

Love you all,

It was awesome talking to some of you for mothers day!  Cannot wait for next one in 6 months haha!

Äldste Adamson

May 4th 2009

Happy Birthday MOM!!!! Her birthday is coming up in 2 days! the 6th!



Ok i have like 9 minutes and alot to say



Transfers are coming up, so i will not email next monday, but on wednesday!



I've been in Kristianstad for 7 months now, so i'll probably be transfered, but my companion might go zone leader, so then we might have to double out, but more likely i'll stay then and probably train. Transfers are really big here. Alot of missionaries really get into them. We are a pretty small mission, and transfers are 2 months long, and so that is alot of time to think. It is good though!



MOST IMPORTANT!!!!

Alexander is going to get baptized this saturday!!!!!

and Jolanka also, she was already baptized but needs to have it done again because they didnt have a council for her because she wrote herself out like 15 years ago.

And Äldste Langston is comming back down for the Baptism!!!! I'm very excited to see him, he was probably one of my favorite companions ever. He is awesome, so that will be super cool. I'm not sure who is doing all the dunking but we'll see!!



Ok so we had valborg! that was pretty cool! everyone has a huge party and lights a huge fire.

This better work.....

well this is a video from valborg. I have 1 minute left so it better upload....

I'm going to call home on Sunday! expect calls people!

I had a really cool experience with a less active kid. It went really well! he said he wasnt sure how he could figure out which church is true but we helped him figure out he needs to read and pray! HE DID IT!!! he read and did everything right and got an answer! i hope he realizes his answer. He is an awesome kid, and came to church and fit right in. It was so awesome!!!

love you all!

ÄA