1135 kilometers... (705 miles)

Whew...this last week has been a crazy one, possibly the craziest of my mission...give me just a minute to catch my breath here...

Okay, so here goes...I'm gonna try to summarize all of this as quick as I can.

Monday we finished up P-day and then went out to our lesson with our Malagash friends. We kept it kind of to spiritual thought level because the husband was going into surgery in two days and we didn't want to overwhelm them with too much. Cool little lesson where they invited us to come and eat with them sometime when the husband is doing better. :)

Then Tuesday came and we had exchanges with the Elders from Quimper (cam-pair). I was with Elder Faura, from Tahiti, who knows Elder Perry a little. It was kind of great to be back with a Tahitian for a day. It made me miss Elder Perry a little bit...we had a good exchange, got a few phone numbers, but nothing big. We ended the night with a crêpe fête (as usual) and...

(awkward gap because I'm going to the next day)

...Wednesday morning we headed off to Quimper to do the exchange with the other Elder (Elder Meissner from Austria/Germany for me). A really quick day with lots of hot contacting in a really beautiful city. One of the prettiest I've been to here in France. Now, this next part is what really threw a wrench in the usually smooth-running machine of missionary work for this week. La grêve. The SNCF (the train company here) was having a strike this week. And apparently a pretty big one. So, due to that, we had to head out from Quimper really early, grabbing a kebab on the way out of town. 

Then the next morning was Zone Conference time! I don't know if you could tell from the pictures, but a certain group of Lorient missionaries wasn't there for the first half of it. Again, due to the grêve, we weren't able to go like we had planned. But, miraculously, we figured out a way to go! 

24 Hours of Le Mans Race Poster

That morning, we caught a train to Le Mans (like, the 24 hour Le Mans race, yep) and then another train to Angers (where the conference was) an hour later. LONG train rides, but we finally made it right at lunch time! Angers, by the way, is BEAUTIFUL! The prettiest city I've seen in France, possibly ever. So well maintained, and just beautifully done. I definitely want to go back there. 

Final Zone Conference with
President and Sister Poznanski

So anyway, we had our little conference, pretty much just said goodbye to the Poznanski's, and headed off, all the way back to Lorient. This time, taking a bus to Laval, then a train from there to Lorient. We finally made it home around 10.

Friday, finally, was going super smooth right up until the Brest Elders called us asking if we could come on Saturday to do a baptismal interview (the district leaders do baptismal interviews to help them be unbiased). So, we tried to figure out if we could go to that and still make it back to Lorient in time for our rendez-vous with Theo, our Tahitian friend. And, because of the grêve, that ended up taking up the rest of our day...

So, Saturday came, and it was crazy. I'm gonna do this one kind of hashtag style. Music Festival all day today. Started in Lorient.

He's Got a Ticket to Ride

Train to Quimper. Train to Brest. Watched a ballet performance in the gare there. Did baptismal interview. Went to chinese buffet with the other Elders. Watched a music performance for a few minutes while waiting for our bus. Took bus for 2 hours to Quimper. Hour and a half correspondence.

Music Festival in Quimper

Watched music fête stuff in Quimper. Bought a crêpe.

Wedding Crashers

Walked in on a wedding in the cathedral there. Caught train back to Lorient. Talked to some drunk bums, got hugged by one of them.

Photo with Theo

Found Theo, rode in his Alfa Romeo to the music fête in Lorient. Watched some people play Muse (Knights of Cydonia). Went to MacDo. Never wanted to eat again. Watched some more stuff and met Theo's friend. Talked about what we do. And...I'm getting annoyed with this one phrase thing. So, yeah, we met him, Gilles, talked, he liked us and bought us a drink (like, juice). We hung with him for a while and left him with a pamphlet before we had to go home. On the walk home, another drunk guy came up and put his sunglasses on me so I kind of like, danced to the music for a second with him and all the people there. I guess he thought it was pretty cool...? It was just another crazy little moment to end the night. :) All in all, the craziest, busiest day of my mission so far.

Then, Sunday was pretty much a totally normal day. :) We were finally able to go porting as a companionship for the first time in the entire week! Kind of a nice, relaxing end to the week.

So, there you go. :) Sorry, we had a little complication come up, so it took a little longer than usual to get it to you guys this week. Have a good week of band camp Tyler and Kevin! Just know that I'm probably sweating just as much as you this week. :)

Elder Bigler

Frenchism: At least in Lorient, the sun goes down around 10, and it gets officially dark by 11. And we go to bed at 10:30!




An Update from Adam on the City of Lorient and the surrounding area


So, the city is kind of cheap looking...as they rebuilt the entire place after the war, they needed to do it fast and cheap, so there are a ton of apartment buildings and all of that, plus a lot of bums. The bus system is pretty great, on the other hand, and the centreville, the heart of the town where all the shops are, is pretty cool. My comp (Elder Humphrey) is great! He's from Kaysville, like about 40 missionaries in our mission, and he's pretty into cars (but mostly motorcycles). He's super chill, and we find ourselves having the same opinions on a ton of things. We're really similar people. He's in his 9th transfer, so he's been out about 3 months longer than me. The apartment, despite what mom seems to think, is actually quite nice. Way old, and it's been a missionary apartment for a long time so there's some good cleaning that needs to happen that we've been doing, but it's roomy and well furnished. We had 4 crêpe pans when I got here, but we gave 2 to the sisters. We even have a little keyboard and some antlers! Lots of sports equipment, and a track and soccer field are right next to us. The area is interesting. Bretagne itself is like...almost it's own country. They have most things, like signs, written in French and Breton, their old language which no one really speaks anymore. There's a lot of celtic stuff around, and they wave their region's flag about as much as the French one. The area is super fun though, and it's a huge blessing to be by the ocean for the summer. :)