Fun tidbits from a letter to Kristen sent last week...stay tuned for today's email with some GREAT news!

I'm doing fine here, still in Segovia! They didn't move me. This is my 4th transfer here now, but I don't mind. I am truly beginning to love the people here, even if the work is a bit slow from time to time. For some reason, not many Spaniards want to talk to us. I think it's because they're scared of us. That's why member missionary work is so IMPORTANT! If members did more referring of their friends to us and then helped us meet them and teach them, the Spaniards would love the gospel! They're good people! They're just scared to even talk to anyone wearing a black name tag.

To explain the "lisp" in Spanish here: they still use the regular "s" sound too; the "th" sound is given to certain letters. For example, "cielo" vs "sielo". The first will be pronounced "thielo" because it has the soft c. The second will still be pronounced "sielo," even by the most Spanish of Spaniards. The letter "z" is also always given the "th" sound. For example, "pez" is pronounced "peth." Tho I hope thith lethon helpth your underththanding increath! :)

Hold to the Rod

Elder Jonathan Ogden sent this song home.
The tenor is Elder Ogden. The bass is Elder Knorr!

Gobble, gobble, gobble! Thanksgiving coming up in the Mission Field!

Hello family and friends!

Despite raging rumors and whispered wishes of where I would go for the next transfer cycle, I ended up staying here in Segovia, again! This marks the beginning of my 4th transfer here, as well as the beginning of my 4th transfer with Elder Zollinger. This has a few specific significances: first off, I'll be here for Thanksgiving and Christmas! As you all probably can imagine, Spain isn't huge when it comes to celebrating Thanksgiving (go figure) but they have some great Christmas traditions and I can't wait to experience as many as I can! I also eagerly anticipate the arrival of my Christmas package and am already steeling myself against the inevitable urges I will have to open the presents early. I think I'll be able to do it!

As for our investigators, we still have Alfredo and William, the dynamic father-son duo who would both probably be baptized by now if it weren't for the fact that they're leaving to Colombia for the holidays so soon. We've done all we can to prepare them in the way of testimony building and exhortations to continue daily scripture study and prayer. That's all that we can do. We've also considered sending their information to the elders in Colombia and, of course, I'm a bit nervous in doing so. I just hope that those two elders who get the reference appreciate how golden these two men are. If Dad was still down there serving, I would have no reservations in sending him the reference :) but I'm dealing with an unknown here so I have a few insecurities.

I love you all and I thank you for your continued correspondence! I'm doing just fine here in Spain and will keep working as hard as I can until my time is up. The Church is true!

-Elder Knorr

Fall has Fell in Segovia

Elder Zollinger and I haven't quite fused into one individual, though we've started to speak in perfect unison at all times. This makes it rather difficult to contact people in a normal, natural way, but our companionship unity is better than ever! ;)

The weather has gotten rather cold here in the past week. I'd equate it to the early autumn temperatures we experience in Utah. The funny thing is that when it gets that cold here, Spaniards act like it's reaching lows from the movie "The Day After Tomorrow"! One day Presidente Galera marvelled, "Elderes, saben que llego a dos bajo zero esta manana? Dos bajo zero!!!" ["Elders, do you know it's going to be two below zero this morning? Two below zero!" - that's Celsius, which equals 28.4 degrees Farenheit.] It was apparently very, very cold for him at two below zero. I've personally experienced much lower temperatures than that in Utah Valley, and I can't even tell my companion, who comes from Idaho Falls, a single thing about coldness as it often reaches 20 to 25 below F out there! So we both silently chuckle at how cold the Spaniards get with a light breeze in bright sunlight. I've been dressing warmer just in case though, wearing my coat so that I don't catch a truculent gripe [pugnacious cold]!!

THANK YOU SO MUCH for the Thanksgiving package (which I received about a week ago). I was very pleased with all of its contents. Oh, where do I start? First of all, thank you for the Christmas music! We've started playing it every day and it's really getting us in the yuletide mood! I'm already seeing in shades of vivacious green and incarnadine red. There was a disc of MoTab music, Come Thou Fount, but since I already have all that on my current MoTab disc, I gave it to Elder Zollinger, I hope you don't mind. And thank you so much for the entire General Conference! The first thing we did was listen to the session that we missed and enjoyed it thoroughly, geeking out especially over Jeffrey R. Holland and D. Todd Christofferson's talks, then we reviewed many others and have been greatly uplifted and edified. Then, there was the food. Food, food, food! We got all the fixings necessary for a fine Thanksgiving dinner, which we will no doubt prepare and consume in the near future. Then there was a bag of caramels, a bag of pistachios, a bag of candy corn (fun!), and a bag of Reese's Pieces. Yummy beef jerky was also found, along with MANY, MANY pouches of Stephen's hot cocoa mix. I think this hot cocoa mix is an incredibly good idea and would not mind getting more of it in my next package. I've already enjoyed two of them, and plan on enjoying the rest of them in the near future. :) There might have been more contents that I am forgetting. In any case, all the contents were well received and I thank you all so very much for the package. It was great!

I've been taking lots and lots of pictures in the past couple of weeks, preparing for an imminent CD of pictures. I've been thinking on how and when I will be sending it home and decided that I'll probably be sending a small Christmas package and I'll just include it in there. Is everyone ok with that plan of action?

Transfers are coming up, and I'm pretty sure that I'll get moved this time. To where exactly, I'm not sure. But a move is likely coming, so be advised. I don't like having to move all of my stuff; it is quite a hassle. I do, however, look forward to the adventure of seeing a new place and doing missionary work in a new location. There are both good stresses and bad stresses involved with transfers.

Also, I'd like to inform you all that today is 11/11/2009 and I caught 11:11 AM on my wristwatch as we did a bit of hiking in Cercedilla. It was very cold up there today! I made good use of my scarf, beanie, earmuffs and gloves, as I'm sure you'll all see when I send pictures home. We summited a small mountain there and the view was beautiful! I was sure to take a good amount of pictures this time and I predict that it won't be long until I have enough to justify the disc. Maybe the first week of next transfer I'll do it?

Thank you all for your letters of love and support. Still working hard out here in Segovia! Not too many people who want to listen, but we do a lot of contacting anyway. And that's life! Write back soon.

-Elder Knorr

Month 8...

Wow. Who knew the time would fly so fast? I don't feel like I've been out this long... it's just snuck up on me! I've been having the time of my life though. It just impresses on my mind the importance of making every day count.


I laugh to hear about the "shrine" you've got of me. :) I'll try to take some pictures that will work well for a life-size cutout.

It is currently week 5 of the 6 week transfer cycle, so in a week and a half we'll have them again. Elder Zollinger and I are pretty sure someone is going to get moved but, as usual, we really don't know anything so it's all wild speculation at this point. I wouldn't mind staying in Segovia at all; I've grown to love it here.

As for my current whereabouts: I'm in Madrid again, within a minute's walk of the Temple. Since today is Preparation day and tomorrow is Zone Conference, we decided to come up early and spend the day here. We'll be staying in the Barrio 6 piso, and you know what that means... Elder Ogden!!! Yes, we'll be having a grand ol' time today and tonight and tomorrow. I'm quite happy about it. We spent an hour or two already playing some futbol in the pit, taking some pictures and making some audio recordings. No doubt we will take and make more.

I'm also excited for zone conference because that means we will soon receive mail again (finally). The cycle seems to be that we receive mail about once every three weeks, so I've resigned myself to that. But that will change, of course, if I get sent to a new area closer to the center. I can't wait to see what letters and packages are awaiting me. :)

The Swine Flu (or as they call it here, La Gripe A) is a commonly talked-about topic. I have been fortunate enough to avoid not only it but also almost every other sickness, and have been in good health this entire time. If I have been sick, I haven't really noticed at all, for which I am very thankful.

Alfredo's family continues to progress well. He and his son William are our only progressing investigators right now but they're both doing really well with their reading and church attendance. They're just good people, that's all there is to it! I don't worry too much about not seeing success as I'd like to see it; baptisms isn't the gauge of a successful missionary. Obedience and hard work are, so I focus on being as perfect as I can in those and leave the rest to the Lord. After all, the only baptisms I've participated in on my mission thus far were of the Mejia boys, neither of which I found or really taught very much. Someone else did all the work there. And with things going the way they're going now, it looks like I probably won't be the one to baptize Alfredo or William either. That doesn't matter though. All that matters is that they get baptized and stay strong afterwards. The details of who gets to do the ordinance is just superficial.

We set a goal last week to push ourselves and make 200 contacts. The normal standard is to do 15 a day, thus getting 105 by the end of the week, but we wanted to put forth a special effort to find, so we doubled it. We worked hard all week and... we got 201. :) There have been whispering rumors that I'm going to get transfered to the office. To these I respond "I'm too young to die!" :) Nah, I'm just kidding, I'd love to serve in the office and do the work there. We'll see what happens with the mazy ordeal we call transfers this time around.

Now, I just want ALL of you to know that I'm very grateful for the letters and packages you've sent. I thank you ALL for your diligence in writing me, especially those of you who are more diligent. ;) And I very much enjoy receiving the letters, packages and pictures that come through for me, and I will gladly receive them for as long as they will be sent. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Well, I need to get going now. Thanks for the email correspondences you sent me this week, I enjoyed them very much. I hope you all do well this week and keep smiling, no matter what!

-Elder Knorr

Excerpt from Halloween Letter...

I love Halloween. Spaniards don't understand Halloween. They think it's some kind of devil worship holiday and they think America's insane for celebrating it so much! It's so funny to talk with them about it! And it's also kind of funny how in-stride we take all of the demons, ghouls, and goblins back home, isn't it? Anyway, fun stuff. I plan on having some kind of Halloween celebration, even if it just involves my companion and I eating candy and telling ghost stories on the eve of the 31st.