Letter dated 17Feb2014

Dear Family and Friends: This morning we got up to a clear sky and a really bright sun! It's really warm, 50 degrees, and all the snow is melted. I wasn't expecting it, but this is the warmest winter I've ever been in! The weekly English class that we teach to Somalians is a lot of fun. Most of their names are Mohamed, and so usually the conversation practices go something like this: "Hi, where are you from?" "Somalia. Where are you from?" "Somalia. What is your name?" "Mohamed. What is your name?" "Mohamed...." It's super funny :D The work is going really well. For example, tonight we have 3 lessons planned, which is more lessons than I've ever had following a preparation day. We have a lot of potential investigators at the moment, included Jenny whom I mentioned knocking on her door two weeks ago. And on Wednesday, Elders Johnson and Smith, also in Eskilstuna, contacted Toma, who's from Syia, and invited him to the church. He came in and we watched The Restoration film with him in Arabic! We couldn't really say anything else, but he said he'd read from the Book of Mormon every day when we first showed it to him, and our mission leader speaks Arabic! We started meeting with a less-active member named Christian who hasn't been to church for several years. But he said that right before we came to meet him the first time, he knew that we were about to come. He seems really ready to come back to church! It is sweet to see the ways that the Lord prepares people to receive the gospel's blessings! Pictures: Sunrise. Äldste Bybee and I. Äldste Jones, who was in Eskilstuna for the day, and I riding a train in the luggage compartment. Well, I love you all! Have a great week, I hope it warms up a bit in the US and Ireland :) Love, -- Äldste Daniel Schindler