All Poland Conference

Since we've been here on our mission, I have been teaching English classes. This is my English class in Poznan. From left to right is Pavel from Russia, Veronica, Jacek, Slavic and in the back is Bolok and Marian. I teach an advanced class and they are great. They speak wonderful English so we are able to do some cool things.

Friday, the 2nd of march we headed for Warsaw for an all Poland conference. We stayed at the Pickett's. We were able to go over to the Armstrongs another American family in the Warsaw II Branch for dinner in honor of Aleks Modzelewska who was leaving for the Mission Training Center in Provo. She will be serving a mission in Romania. She is a vibrant, lovely girl and will be a great missionary. We are so excited for her. She's been a member of the Church forr about a year and a half.




This is a group picture of the Armstrong family, the Staples family, the Picketts and us with Aleks. These are three great families. They moved into the Warsaw II Branch when we were there and Ross was the Branch president. Both the Staples and the Armstrongs are connected with the American Embassy in Warsaw and Mark Pickett works for Marathon Oil.

Mark and Jackie with Aleks.

This is a picture of the All Poland conference. Elder D. Todd Christofferson, who was the presiding General authority is from the Quorum of the Twelve. He was there with his wife and our Area President, Elder Kopiche and his wife were also there. It was aa truly wonderful conference and a great experience for the missionaries, members and investigators.

Random pictures!

We finally had our first snow of the winter season in February. Now it has been snowing on and off a little each day. So it now truly feels like winter in Poland. This is the view from our apartment.

Wintewr also brings it's own set of challenges. When our Elders arrived at our Chapel Thursday afternoon, they found that our YSA/Institute/classroom had been destroyed. Apparently 2 floors above had a hot water main break and fotr about three hours early Thursday morning hot water had gushed out and destroyed their insurence office and our room below them.
What a mess! The furniture was ruined. The sofa which looks fine was filled with water, the coffee table had standing water on it and in it. Even our bookcase in the corner of the room was filled with water and all the books, games, and other materials were ruined. The pictures on the walls were filled with water and the room was like a sauna with the smell of mildew already. So after the insurence adjuster and our landlord took a look, reovations began. The ceiling, walls, and floor came out and now there are drying machines running night and day to dry the sheet rock and cement.





Fortunately the Chapel and the kitchen were fine so on Sunday we were able to hold our Church services and have our refreshments afterward. We had cookies, hot chocolate and juice and everyone wanted to see the damage that had been done.








One thing everyone likes to do is stand around, eat and talk. I think that is universal.

Random Pictures and the Wonderful Malls in Poznan

It's Family Home Evening Night, Institute and FHE activity. It's as cold as a "Pirate's heart". It's about -10C and I'm amazed that anyone in their right mind ventures out in this cold. Jola is getting ready to teach Institute.

It is also Marta's birthday so we celebrated that as well. We bought her a cool string bracelet with her name engraved on the heart. She is awesome. She teaches Gospel Doctrine, is in on any discussion the Missionaries need her on and is preparing herself to go on aa mission as soon as she is 21 years old.

The pictures above and below are Mall pictures. The Malls in Poland are wonderful and far surpass the Malls in the States. The Mall pictures you see above and a few below are pictures of the Mall in Centrum Poznan. the Mall is in a renovated brick building and is huge with 2 seperate areas seperated by a beautiful Atruim. The Mall is beautiful in design with attention paid to every detail so it is pleasing to the eye. These pictures don't do it justice.

The picture below is of part of the Atrium that is open during the summer months with tables and seating outside so shoppers can listen to the musical performances. One of the above pictures is another view of the Atrium.
The mall seen below is right across the street from our apartment and is also great on a slightly smaller scale. This the view from our balcony. Below you will see the parking garage. they have a unique system here. Every parking stall has a geen light above it if it is empty and a red light if full and at the end of the row a lit sign telling you how many parking spaces are available in that row. Also in the garage is a full car wash and detail place so you can leave your car while shopping and pick it up when you are ready to go home.




Below is the inside of the 1st floor, there is also a billboard of the community of Malta where we livee. As you can tell it is all apartments. There are no private homes here.


The food court is on the top floor and has every kind of food you can imagine including even Kentucky Fried and Mcdonalds. the seating area looks over Lake Malta which right now is frozen so at any given period you can see ice skaters.


These pictures are up in the food court. Salad and Company has, besides salads of all kinds, baked salmon and creamed spinach which is soooo good. There is a fountain on the first floor which lights up as it shoots forth water, you can see the blue lights. On the main floor is a booth called Szatnia. that is where you can check your coat and packages while you shop so you don't have to carry coats and sacks all over the mall.






The Grycan store is an ice cream shop and their ice cream is so good and so rich. The Piotr I Pawel is a store like Whole Foods in the states and their Cukiernia (Bakery) has all sorts of wonderful pastries. Piotr has really good fresh fruits and vegetables. We buy apples there almost every day along with a fresh loaf of bread. Our treat in the afternoon is a sliced apple sprinkled with sea salt and some slices of sharp chedder cheese.
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The Super Apteka is a big Pharmacy plus cosmetics.

The Malls are so great that even though I hate to shop, I love to walk through these malls. It's not just Poznan, Warsaw had great Malls too. so, sometimes we just wander through, pick up dinner at the Food Court and at the end of a busy day, it's a good way to finish out.