Elder Joshua Winfield August 2015 - August 2017: 20th

Well... what a week! I'm now here in Sremska Mitrovica where it will all finish I guess.... kind of sad. But regardless it's been an awesome first week of the transfer.

So Monday was my last day in Banja Luka, we just emailed and I had to finish of packing etc.... after all of that I had to find a magnet as I get one for all the cities, I eventually found that then Parko and hole came down and then me and Parko left off to Tuzla where I would spend the night.

Tuesday was pretty busy we first had to leave really early with all my stuff, I was with elder Hardy who was going to Beograd, we ended up arriving in Sremska a little earlier than expected so we got some lunch. After all of that it was just waiting for Lerohl and my new comp Sorensen to arrive. Eventually they came and yeah we unpacked a little and just did the normal "Beginning of the transfer" things. We had English class to teach as well, seeing as no one came for the beginner class we all just joined the advanced group. After that we went with the Senior couple here, "Elder and Sister Decker" he actually served his mission in New Zealand dad so you might know the same people... he likes his sports, obviously not aussie footy but that's alright ;) I'll convert him! Anyways after that we visited a member's place where we had Institute, it was an awesome lesson! Better than what I could ever do anyways but yeah that was great, after that we went back home and it was already pretty late so we just went to bed pretty much straight away, I was wrecked from the day anyways.

Wednesday was fun, we had to go to the police station in the morning to get my short term visa, I'm not going to bother getting a work visa seeing as I'll leave but yeah anyways so I got that all sorted and after that we had some lunch and did some planning for the transfer. We have some good goals so I'm looking forward to the work :) We also cleaned the apartment as it always needs a good clean, missionaries aren't usually the best at cleaning but yeah I guess what can you expect from a couple of 18 year olds. We also went shopping for all of our food, I can't wait to not have to cook so much haha, I like it but yeah its annoying because all of the equipment sucks... when I have good equipment it's a lot better but yeah.. After all of that it was just dinner etc and some good old contacting!

Thursday we had to go back to the police station for Sorensen seeing as he is changing address so that was fun as always.. after that we had district meeting, it was fun we have a cool district so it makes things a lot easier to do!!! After that it was lunch and just the normal things. We then did a bunch of contacting, it was so hot...... I forgot about summer! haha there weren't really many people out either and I don't blame em. Anyways after all that we had English and we had one student for our beginner class, she doesn't know a ton but tries hard so that's cool. After that it was just dinner and some language study...

Friday was pretty busy we had a decent amount on.. First up in the morning we visited a recent converts place to translate for the senior couple who is teaching the little daughter guitar, that didn't take too long so after that it was just contacting and a little snack really. After that we were going to a members house as it was Ada's birthday, we decided as a district to all buy a gift each, (you know just something kind of stupid) but yeah it turned out well haha it was really fun though! I missed going around there! After that it was just contacting in the heat as usual, good fun though, I swear I never sweated as much as I do now, I think it's just the white shirts but eh I don't know.

Saturday was pretty blank, we had a lot of contacting to do so we just started in the morning to avoid the heat! We actually bumped into a couple of Australians of all people, I haven't really bumped into that many so it was pretty surprising seeing as Sremska is a little smaller than other places I have been in but yeah they were 7th dayer's.... but it was still fun to hear an aussie accent, it has been so long! After that we had lunch and did some studies (Just the usual...) after that we had some more contacting and then we had to clean the church and prep for an activity we were having, we watched kung fu panda 2! haha that was great, I hadn't even seen it so I mean it was good. We had a decent amount of members and non members too which was cool,. the Decker's made some great chips for us all too. After that it was just cleaning up all the church and heading back for the apartment!

Sunday was church! It was cool to see all the members again, I'm surprised they all remembered... I mean it has been like 8 months and I was only there for 8 weeks but nevertheless it was great, I had a talk which was based on an awesome general conference talk. I butchered my reading... for some reason I couldn't speak the language, just like a cat got my tongue.. oh well doesn't matter everyone understood :P just hurt my pride a little! After church we had the elders over for lunch, they just made a mess in our apartment... oh well, they ended up sleeping over too! but anyways doesn't matter, we did some contacting and found a couple of people who seem decently interested, we will meet with them this week. We also bumped into another Australian/Serbian....... he just moved back from Australia because he was born here, it was the same for the other lady too. Anyways but yeah that was about my whole week, we had the other elders stay at ours for the night because they had to leave early in the morning for some things....

That was about my first week though! I'm super pumped to be here, it's going to be a great last transfer.

Hope yous all have a great week :) sounds like everything's going alright.

go the tigers :)!