In the afternoon we walked across Hyde Park to go to church. While walking across the part it started to rain again (shocker) but it was beautiful! I can't even describe Hyde Park. One afternoon I will go and just take a TON of pictures so you can briefly see how beautiful things are there. I saw a giant pond called the Serpentine with swans floating on it. As we continued to walk, I saw the Albert Memorial across from the Royal Albert Hall. It's something that I wanted to see SO badly because it's Victoria's monument to Albert. To me, it's a great symbol of loyalty, devotion, and true love. Have you seen The Young Victoria movie? It's beautiful. The monument itself is huge and it took my breath away.
We arrived at the ward slightly soaked but happy to be there. The ward usually meets in the Hyde Park building but it's under construction so we met in this conference center. Our group basically doubled the ward when we got there. The Britannia Ward is the only singles ward in Europe! What's I found really interesting was that only about 10% of the ward is actually British. There were lots of Americans and people from all over the world that we got to talk to. Since the chapel is under construction, church was only two hours... woot! Then a nice young man from the ward helped about 12 of us girls find out how to use the bus system to get back to the Centre. I'm sure he was hoping to get to know us all a little better but that was our only visit we will make to the singles ward.
We had a yummy dinner after church and then the Mason's invited a group of us up to their flats. They try to get to know each of us better and a way they do that is by splitting us into small groups and each Sunday they have a group up for dessert with their family. I had ice cream and cookies with Matt's family and played two truths and a lie. It was fun to get to know them all a little better. I've never really gotten to know a professor outside of class, much less talk to my professors, so this has been a really interesting experience to live with professors and their families, spend lots of time with them, and still take classes from them.
My favorite part of today was our fireside after dessert. As I've mentioned before, we get church callings while we're here in London. Our group is assigned to the stake south of the Thames and the BYU theater group has been assigned to the Hyde Park stake, north of the Thames. I found out from the fireside that I will be serving in the Crystal Palace Ward. I have no idea where it is, I just know I have to take the tube and then a train to get there. I'm also going with I think 5 other students and it will be fun to serve with them. We got our ward assignments tonight and we all thought we'd also get callings, but I guess we wont' know what our callings are until we get to the wards. I'm so excited to serve in whatever position they need!
Our fireside was done by one of the bishops from the Stake we will be serving in (I forgot what it was called). He was very funny and informative. He explained a few of differences between Americans and the British and he said that understanding these differences will make our trip so much easier. Americans have a concept of big is better, British have a pride in their history (a.k.a. OLD). They also have certain ideals about personal space and service that are so different from ours. Imagine Utah with like 250 something more million people than it has now. He asked us to imagine how our concept of personal space would change. It would be drastic right? Britons, on the bus for example, will avoid all contact with other people. They really respect others personal space. So when we, as Americans, try to go out of our way to be customer service friendly it comes across as very forward and generally makes the Brits uncomfortable. He gave us some great tips to help our conversations and make things more comfortable for all of us.
The bishop also talked about a couple of other topics including "getting stuck in" and the usefulness of our testimony. This is a long story but it's really cute so I'm going to tell it. So when this bishop was 18, a pop-up came up on his computer. Normally he ignored them but this one interested him. It was a picture of a three masted, 20th century ship and it said "Do you want to sail around the world in this?" He thought, "Yes! That is exactly what I want to do!" The boat went from a port off the coast of southern England, to the Cayman islands, then across the Atlantic to Bermuda, and up to New York City. He excitedly ran down the stairs to tell his dad about this trip and his dad went straight to the price page on the computer ("No vision, my dad," said the bishop). The trip was about £5,500, or between $8,500- 9000. His dad gave him a proposition. He told him that he had £1,000 pounds saved up to give his son to put towards his mission or university costs. He would give him that money to spend on the trip (which would only cover the cost from England to the Cayman Islands) if he would promise that that's all he would do. The promise was made and the bishop got ready to go.
He got on the ship and was assigned to a crew. The crews had shifts that were four hours work, eight hours off, four hours work, eight hours off. That schedule would repeat each day. He decided that he was only going to have this chance to travel on the ship for one week, and it was a once in a lifetime opportunity, so he decided to "get stuck in." He didn't sleep for three days straight. He worked a SIXTEEN hour shift, and took eight hours off and still didn't sleep. It finally got to the point where he would fall asleep while he was walking and so he made a hammock on top of the ship and slept for 17 hours. He woke up and started his twelve-eight work schedule AGAIN!
When they landed in the Cayman Islands, he said it was the saddest day of his life because he had gotten "stuck" and didn't want it to end. There was a party that night for everyone on the boat but they had to pay for dinner. He tried to duck out of the party because he didn't have any money but one of the guys on the ship said he wanted to talk to him. They guy was a multi-millionaire and said he saw his work ethic. He asked the bishop why he was working like that and the bishop told him about his desire to enjoy every single minute. The multi-millionaire said he got the impression that money was an issue for the bishop and so he had taken the liberty of buying his ticket for the rest of the trip. The bishop was like OKAY! His boss and parents were understanding and so he went on this adventure across the Atlantic for the next two months. He got to swim in the middle of the Atlantic ocean twice, learn about knots and all that ship-type stuff that he loves, and have so many amazing experiences.
When he landed in Bermuda, that's where his future wife got on the trip. Oh yes... favorite part... that night that he met her on the ship, he wrote in his journal that he met the girl he was going to marry. Little did he know, the SAME night she wrote in her journal that she met the man she was going to marry. And they were right! Neither of them found out that the other wrote that until their fifth wedding anniversary. I think that is the cutest story ever! :) Anyway, he continued sailing to New York where his trip ended. His point of this entire story was that you have to "get stuck in" what you're doing. When you do, like he did, you will have amazing things happen! Things that you might never expect. I'm planning on "getting stuck in" London and doing everything I can here that I can't do at home. I want to meet real Brits and do amazing things each day. I think that I can accomplish this and I am inspired to do it!
He also talked about our testimonies. He said that many of us think that there is a large gap between ourselves and Molly or Peter. We may feel that we can't serve in these wards that are 99.9% converts because we struggle with this or that or don't understand this or that. He said because we have ALL grown up in the church that we have a lot of knowledge about the church. A testimony and conversion are two different things. Our knowledge about the church that we have contributes to our testimonies. No matter where we are, we have something to contribute and share. I know that I can contribute and share what I know and what I believe, even if I'm not the most qualified.
So that's it for today! Sorry it was so long, it was just such a wonderful day. As a preview for this upcoming week, we will be heading to the Cotswolds and Stratford tomorrow (a day trip up north) and I'll be seeing four plays in four days! I'm living the good life over here in London and loving every second of it!
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