Great Week

I am doing great.
Things with my companion are getting
better and I am working on not being
so prideful. I feel that that is one
of my biggest weaknesses so this is a
great chance for me to be more humble,
and learn to work with others,
not just on my own.
This week went by really fast,
and a lot of great things happened.
Our zone versus zone football game went
very well, although our zone lost both
games. It was way good though.
We actually do have some pretty good
athletes, two other football players and
a couple of basketball players. I was
quarterback most of the time and I feel
like we had more fun as a zone because
everyone had at least a couple of catches,
including the Frenchman in our zone, and
I think all but 2 had a touchdown which
was great. It is so nice being able to
spend time with other missionaries.
Our zone blitz went very well as well.
I went out with my good buddy Elder
Trejo who is the same age as me in the
mission and is from Texas and is one of
my favorite missionaries in my mission.
Since I have the only "carte bleu,"
mission credit card, in Lyon, I usually
have to run errands all the time buying
train tickets and other things so
unfortunately a large portion of our
time was with that. But, we did teach
a sweet lesson together with a recent
convert, and I shared the story out of
Matthew 14:22-25 I believe, and
paralleled it with 2 Nephi 19, towards
the end of the chapter where Christ
tells us through Isaiah that the Lord's
hand is always there for us.
That is one of my favorite
images in the Book of Mormon.
Zone Conference went way well.
Our mission president implemented
the new member lessons we are teaching,
and I was able to give a demonstration
with my companion for the two zones
which went well.Wednesday night I was
up in Grenoble again to pick up my
carte de séjour, and it was such a
great time. I went with Elder Trejo
and we had a great time with the
Elders up there; we ate stuffed crust
pizza hut pizza that we got hooked up on
with a deal thanks to one of the other
elders, and we just chilled and talked
about the mission; good times.
I went on a great exchange with
Elder Hamilton in St. Etienne this
week as well, which went way well.
Elder Hamilton was my former zone leader
and a huge football player guy, the
other one in the mission.
It was way good! It is a struggling
city, but we were able to have 4 lessons,
which is one shy of how many they had
in the first two weeks of this transfer!
But it was in one of these rendez-vous
that the best part of my week happened.
We were with a man named Jean Marie,
a man about 35 from Barcelona Spain,
who speaks French as well as I speak
English, and English as well if not
better than I speak French. He
was married right after college and
was living in Kentucky when his wife died.
He decided to devote his life to God, and
entered a catholic monastery where he
literally became a monk, one of the 500
catholic monks on the earth I believe,
at least in this group. He went 8 years
wearing nothing but brown robes, going
to church everyday, praying, and
meditating until one day, after 8 years,
the leader of the group told him he
wanted to go in to the real world and
do go for others. He was infuriated,
and with only 2000 euros given to
him by the church and his robes,
he bought a computer and started his own
enterprise and now, just one year later,
is close to making one million dollars
this year, which he will give entirely
to building houses for needy people.
He give thanks only to God for his success,
and is the most humble, spiritual person
I have ever met. He is one of my heroes.
It was such a spiritually building
experience and it was a testimony that
there are many people whom the Lord
has prepared, and who are often times
closer and more spiritually understanding
than members of the church,
who are just waiting for the gospel.
He refers to himself as the "Mormon Monk,"
and hopefully he will continue to
grow in the gospel. I love being a
missionary.
This week will be good.
We are having a little zone meeting
here tomorrow and will be talking more
about these member lessons which will
be good. I will be going to
Clermont Ferrond tomorrow night as
well for an exchange with Elder
Bellamy which will be a great experience.
So I am very excited for this week.
But way good news, Elder Bednar,
apostle of the Lord, will be visiting our
mission and we will be having a
conference the 13 of February in Geneva
where he will speak to us for 3 hours!
I am stoked!
The weather here is good and it has
been rainy but no snow; bummer, I know.
Just cold rain and a wet right foot. haha.
I think I will look for shoes today,
and I would love to get these ones resoled,
but the salty water I think has
ruined the leather.
Have a great week.

Elder Clayton H. Welch
P.s. happy birthday pops!

Busy

This week was really great, as are
all weeks as a servant of the Lord.
I had the opportunity to go to Geneva on
Tuesday for the Zone Leader council. It
was amazing. We road with Frère Mocellin
again, but we actually took the train
back. I sat next to this sweet guy from
England on the way back who was a
teacher of English literature and so we
had a good time talking about good books
we had both read. It is nice sometimes
just having the chance to speak to
someone in English; especially now that
I speak only to my companion in French
when we are outside. Its good though,
speaking french keeps you really focused
on the work. But at zone leader council
we talked about the new member
lessons, and it was great! I stopped at
the American store on the way to the
gare (train station) and bought a root beer
and a mt. dew which was sweet,
because you can't buy them anywhere else.
This week I had the opportunity to set
another baptismal date with a man named
Frederick Pernet. He is a little socially
awkward, but very wise, and even
studied at the Lyon Biblical School for
6 years. We started teaching him when I
first got here and we asked him to be baptised
the other day after sharing the
story in Mosiah 18 with the people at the
waters of Mormon. But he will be
baptised the 22 of February.
Hopefully I will still be here. We also have a
baptismal date for March 1 with a man named
Vincent Desportes who is a sweet
french guy who is way rich but very
spiritually receptive and can't wait to be
baptized so that he can be a home teacher!
This rest of the week went well and
everything is going well for me. I am doing
well with my companion and I am just
realizing places in my own life where I
need to improve. But, I do have a quote
of the week for you from him. I
mentioned something about girls, and he
told me that he is not going to kiss a
girl until AFTER he is married. Wow.
That's honorable. I just hope his wife
doesn't suck at kissing! haha.
This week will be way good. We are
having a 2 zone blitz, so 24 missionaries
here in Lyon tonight working on finding
people to teach. We are trying to get
people excited about the work, and we have
zone conference tomorrow, which will
be a great chance to work more together
and listen to the President of the
mission. Today we have scheduled a zone
vs zone football game, American
football, which shall be rad!
I am going to Grenoble again this week
to pick up something for my legality so I
am stoked to get to go back, but I don't
ever have time to look at anything. But
it is great to travel.
Other than that I will just be working
hard at serving the Lord, teaching people
about this great gospel, and bringing
others unto Christ!
Last week I did buy a new suit, new
french shirt, and two new way rad ties.
Thank you soldes. I hope I didn't spend
too much money, but I got a lot of way
sweet things. I will have to send you
a picture of my new suit. It is dark
blue with blue pinstripes. I do actually
need to buy a pair of new shoes, so I
hope you don't mind if I do that.
One of my two pairs has a whole in them
and the treading is completely gone
and I slip everywhere.

Have a great week!
Your loving missionary,
Elder Bubba

A few of Elder Bubba's pic's-He looks great! More to come.

The look as they pass a brothel each morning.


This one is honor of Aleece's love of Marmouset's.


A beautiful view of Switzerland.



Singing in the snow;)

Brady Bunch:)

It has been really cold here this week,
which I normally don't mind, but really
cold with NO snow is a killer.
When I was in Grenoble there was snow
which made me soo happy! I love snow,
and Grenoble is such a beautiful city
that I was so excited to be there.
My medical visit went great and I passed,
all they did was give me a physical and
take an xray of my lungs. Everything is
going well with the adjustment of
my companion. I am not going to
lie, having someone who is "happy"
all the time is not as great as you
would think, haha. Its like being in
the Brady Bunch movie; seriously. I mean,
he is a great guy and a great missionary,
but seems a little clueless about the
world and is almost too happy, if that
is possible. But its alright, there is
something to learn from each companion
and there is a reason why we are together.
The Lord has called us together
so I know there is a reason for it.
We had a great night last night!
After church we went and gave a
blessing to one of the sister
missionaries amis and then we
went out to go porting (door to
door) before our rendez-vous
just 40 minutes after.
The first door we knocked
on the man let us in, he was a way
nice Muslim student, and we taught
him and his friend. Then, we went
to our rendez-vous of someone I
contacted over a month ago and him
and his girlfriend were way sweet
and from central Africa! They
were so involved in the lesson
and they were soo receptive!
We will be seeing all of them again
sometime this week!
Tomorrow we will be traveling to
Geneva for Zone Leader council
which I am stoked for!
I love zone leader council.
It will be a great chance to listen to
the Mission President and the
Assistants and receive personal
revelation.We have a lot of really
great rendez-vous planned for
this week which I am very
excited about! We are pretty
much packed until Saturday.
It will be really great.
The seasonal sales, or "soldes,"
started this past week so I think
I might check some of that out today.
I would still love to go buy a suit.
Thank you for allowing me to do so!
Have a great week together and do
something really fun
in honor of me.

Elder Clayton Henderson Welch

Sorry we haven't posted-Here's 3 weeks of news!

Jan. 5, 2008
Quoi de neuf? I am doing so great!
This week was great for me. We had
a zone meeting up here in Lyon
which went well. My companion and
I taught on "All Glory to God!"
It is really nice being able to get
together as missionaries and spend
a short moment together. For New
Years Eve some of the members held
a little New Years Eve party at the
institute, a building in downtown Lyon.
It is great, there are classrooms, a
kitchen, and big room for dances and
ping pong and what not and a couple
offices. They had a little dance,
and no,I did not dance, they didn't
start that til after we left, we played
games like twister which is weird as a
missionary, and we ate food and hung
out. A member made some great
homemade pizza which was really great.
We had our ami there, Frederic, and it
was a great time. It is a lot easier
to get amis to come to activities than
it is to get them to come to church.
Other than that, we had a good week of
teaching and finding. We are teaching
a Chinese couple, Shang and Ying, and
I love them. They are not married yet
but they live together. They are both
students here and are really focused
on their studies, as are all Chinese
people are. Well they are friends of
some Chinese members here and they
asked us last time about the word of
wisdom and this week we went over and
taught it. It went really well and the
only concern they had was coffee and
tea for when its late and they are
studying; especially because it is just
a couple weeks before Ying's finals.
After I promised some blessings from
the Lord if they obeyed it and chose to
drink something like juice or water when
they got tired, they both accepted it
and are going to study for their finals
without coffee or tea! It was so great!
They have such amazing faith and I know
the Lord will bless them for it. We are
actually trying to fix a little party
for the Chinese new year with them,
January 26 which should be fun. We had
a bunch of other great lessons and I met
some really cool people.

As for this upcoming transfer, we received
transfer calls this morning from our mission
president. As expected, my companion is
going to a small city in Switzerland called
Sion, which is literally translated as Zion,
and I will be staying here. I will be
getting Elder Waller who is actually coming
from Metz, France, my birth place. He is
going onto his 12th transfer, but it is his
first transfer as a zone leader. But he is
a way good missionary and I know I am going
to learn so much from him. He is way
obedient, really good at French, and
literally always happy. I am stoked.

This week will be pretty normal aside from
the changing of companions on Wednesday,
and also that I will be going to Grenoble
Wednesday night til Thursday to work on
becoming legal in France. I have to do a
medical visit, which is required in France,
so I will be there for a couple of days. It
is a great start to the year and I know
that 2009 will be the best year yet! I
loved your goal "to be happy" mom! That is
actually my goal as well! Good luck on that
and just remember that if your ever not
happy, change it. haha I don't know if that
makes sense, but that is what I am trying.



Dec.29,2008
Not to much has happened since I talked to
you last. It was a pretty good end to the
week. For Christmas night, after I got
off the phone with you, a couple of
Elders here in Lyon came over with some
"steaks" which were terrible haha, and we
ate and played a little game of risk. It
was fun, but it was nice to get back
focused on the work after the crazy week.
On Saturday night we attended a stake
single adult activity with one of our
amis and had chili and watched a little
talent show. It was a great time. We
actually had a great Sunday as well. We
ate with a young couple in the morning
and headed over to church all together and
then after church we went over to this way
French member from Paris's house with a
couple other single adults and had a way
good meal with sushi, jambon, lamb, and
rice and finished off of course with bread
and a tray of like 8 cheeses and this
desert they all eat at Christmas called a
buche (sp?) which is like an ice cream
roll cake. It was way good. And then
last night we stopped by an American
couple who are members here because they
wanted to give us a little bit of cheese
cake which was way good. So it was a way
good day.

This week was actually cold. Yesterday
morning it was way chilly and it snowed
a little bit on Friday morning, but
melted almost instantly. We don't really
have too much planned for this week. It
is the last week of the transfer so I am
pretty sure this is the last week with my
companion. He is really old in the
mission so he is probably going to a
little city for a couple of months to
'die.' I will let you know next week what
happens. I am pretty positive that I am
staying here in Lyon.

Dec. 24, 2008
I am so glad that everyone has arrived
safe and is all together. That makes me so
happy. Its like in "Into the Wild" when
Chris McCandles discovers at the end, that
the family truly is the most important
thing. I love you so much and I am so
grateful for all that you do.

To respond to some of your questions:
You mentioned you stopped people with you
trainer. Is that someone different than
your companion? hah, yes. My trainer
Elder Current is a missionary here in Lyon
as well. He isn't a zone leader but a
missionary in the suburbs of Lyon and he
was at the singing activity and he wanted
to go out contacting together. How did
your exchange with the AP's go this past
week? SO good. One of the AP's, the one
I did the exchange with, is the other
former snowboard instructor in the mission
and he even had his own long boarding
company before the mission! He is probably
the most rad missionary I know. How about
the half-mission conference? It was way
good. We talked a little bit about the
member lessons, but our mission president
said that is was really just for us to get
together, to celebrate Christmas as a family
and to talk about Christ. It was an amazing
experience. I got your letter you both wrote
me with your testimonies in them, and I can't
tell you how amazing of a Christmas present
that was to me. I think I cried for like 10
minutes, haha. But tears of joy. Thank you
soo much.

Speaking of presents, thank you again for the
12 days of a Christ centered Christmas; they
are amazing! I loved the statue. You know me
too well. I mailed you an envelope with
pictures and a CD with pictures on it over a
week ago. I hope you get them soon!

I am still playing the Harmonica, but not too
much. I just have no time. I have been really
busy, but its all good. I actually end up
just reading if I have any free time now.

For Christmas Eve we were going to go to a
families home, but they all got sick so
tonight we are going to the church to celebrate
with all of the single adults in the ward!
Tomorrow we are spending a bit of time with a
sweet family from Ghana; I love Africans!
Joyeux Noel!
Love,
Elder Clayton "Bubba" Welch