Dear all,

We got transfer calls on Saturday, and fortunately neither Elder Burton nor I are leaving. All the begging I did to President paid off. Six more weeks of Filipino food, inside jokes with Elder Burton, and really, really chill members. Life is good. 

The not-so-good thing is that it continued to dump snow this week, then it got warm and dumped rain, and then it got cold again and all froze. So everything is covered in at least 3 solid inches of ice, and then more snow. So it is slick everywhere. 

While on exchanges with Elder Smith this week, we helped a Persian family get their car out of the ice, and they turned out to be interested in meeting up. We'll see if it actually happens, though. Elder Smith still has all the contact info for them. 

A sort of less active young man who we've been working with named RJ turned 18 this week. His mom was going to be working all day, so we got the Young Men's president to invite him over for dinner and a bit of a party with a few other members. Elder Burton and I got him a Miles Davis album because he likes jazz and we wanted to help him get cultured (we consider ourselves to be very cultured). We ate lots of cake. 

Last night, we planned on having a ward family home evening for members who might not be able to have one on their own. We invited a lot of members, and had people prepare snacks and everything, but in the end no one showed up. We hung around to have a correlation meeting with the ward missionary, and then ate even more cake for Sister Drake who was turning 20. It was her first birthday in the field, and it seemed like she was very appreciative of all the cake.

That's it for me. Love you all

Elder Hadden

P.S.  I have fancy boots with crampons so it's not too bad

The Storm

Laval at sunset from the northern edge of the island.

Dear all,

It's been interesting this week. On Saturday, Elder Burton and I attended two baptismal services, one in the Mandarin Branch and one in the Montreal ward. Even though we really didn't teach either of them, it was still good to see. The guy in the Montreal ward, a Nigerian man named Souleimon, even asked Elder Burton to baptize him since Elder Burton did his baptismal interview. Good times all around.

Shortly following the baptisms, a big old storm rolled in. Sunday morning, the wind was howling, it was -23C, and snow was swirling around everywhere. Elder Burton and I hauled our way over to church at 9:00 for a very small sacrament meeting. Elder Burton gave a talk, not because the speakers didn't show up but because the bishopric planned on having the missionaries speak anyway. They cancelled church after sacrament meeting to let everyone get home and safe as quickly as possible. 

We spent the rest of the day running around the city to a couple of dinner appointments (one with the Filipinos and another with a nice sister from Ukraine and Cedric as a chaperone) and called it a day. The metros still worked fine since it doesn't usually snow underground, but walking around was quite the adventure. 

The following day, it was again -20C and snowy, and Elder Burton and I decided to take a huge tour around the outskirts of Montreal to pass by a few unknown members. In the end, we spent probably six hours bussing and walking for miles and miles around Montreal suburbs. I felt like I was on some kind of arctic expedition. We were very, very happy to get out of the cold at the end of the day. 

In other news, the art museum last week was massive and we got a sensory overload as we rushed through it. It had a much more impressive collection than I was anticipating. Everything from super abstract contemporary art to a piece from ancient Mesopotamia. Very, very cool. We don't know what we're gonna do this week because we have effectively run out of cool and nic

Outside of church during the storm.

Elder Burton hiking through the park
to take that cool picture of the Laval sunset.
Note snow over boot tops.

e things to go and see. We have to do some digging. 

Love you all,

Elder Hadden

Where Montreal Began (and more Filipino Spaghetti)

Cemetery from Ville Marie

Dear all,

Again, another very normal week. Elder Burton and I sat down and did a lot of record keeping, and in the end took over twenty names off the ward list. It was very tedious, but we got something solid done.

In addition to removing names, we're working on sending letters to a bunch more so we can take them off in a few weeks. Or just get in contact with them again. Whichever ends up happening. 

We took the sacrament to Brother De Guzman again on Sunday night. He and Brother Brao told us mission stories from their missions in the Philippines. Afterwards, we ate dinner with the Braos and Sister Constantin (another Filipina sister). As always, it was a grand old Filipino party, complete with Filipino spaghetti. They invited us to an even bigger Filipino party next week. It's gonna be good.

Last week, Elder Burton and I went to the Pointe-à-Callière museum, and were pleasantly surprised to find out that it was actually really, really, really good. It's build on the excavation sites for the first European settlement in Montreal--Ville Marie--and they have all the dig sites open to public view. It pretty much just walks through the whole history of Montreal based around one very small area of the city. The museum was well designed, the lighting was great, and the sound design was incredible. Super good. 

We're going to the Musée des Beaux-Arts today. 

Love you all,

Elder Hadden

The town of Hochelaga, the native camp that Jacques Cartier discovered on the island & then could never find again.

An Expo '67 Passport

An Olympic torch from '76

Selfie of us on the set of "La Petite Vie", a very influential
sit-com that only people in Quebec know about.

Set from "La Petite Vie". If you want a feel for Quebecois culture, look it up.

Selfie of us on a pirate ship

A piece of the American pavilion from the Expo
(this is part of the big sphere we saw on Jean Drapeau)

Weird shepherd's pie. They love shepherd's pie for some reason,
except they call it ''paté chinois''

Hochelaga

La Petite Vie

A Very Normal Week

Dear all,

It's been a very normal week. No holidays. No parties. No crazy adventures. No foxes. Just wandering around Montreal in the cold looking for long-lost less-active members.

Speaking of the weather though, that has been pretty interesting. So far, this winter has been very, very mild. It keeps swinging wildly between about 33F to about 10F. There's just been a lot of freezing and melting, and a ton of ice everywhere. It's been super ugly. But yesterday it finally managed to make its way down to below 0F with wind chill and dumped a bunch of snow all over the place. So right now, Montreal looks beautiful and not like a dirty ice apocalypse. The temperature is still just about freezing, but at least it looks nice outside. 

Artsy picture of a snowy Montreal street

We're actually teaching someone who is not already a member of the church now, too. His name is Elijah and he's a Bible scholar from Nigeria. The English YSA Elders found him, and we volunteered to teach him since all the other teams in the ward are super busy and we don't really do all that much. We have had one lesson with him and the YSA Elders so far. He was pretty excited about the idea of having more scriptures, and thinks the Book of Mormon is some really good stuff. It will be fun to actually teach someone again. 

Elder Burton and I are planning on going to the Montreal Museum of Archaeology (or something like that. I really don't know what it's called) today. The museum we went to last week was a total bust. It was super expensive (20 CAD, the same price as the War Museum in Ottawa which is massive and beautiful) and all it was was a couple of lame exhibits for kids. If it was free, it would have been fun. But it was not free. Elder Burton described it as a ''lame museum for plebeian kids.'' Hopefully the next museum will be better.

That's all for me,

Love you all,

Elder Hadden

1. Cedric the King at his dinner.

2.artsy picture of the University of Montreal.

3. Artsy picture of the Olympic stadium.

4. Artsy picture of down town.

5. Artsy picture of a graffiti blue Jay.

6. Parc La Fontaine in the snow. 

Epiphany 2019

This is Sister McGee.  My husband and I are senior missionaries serving in the office. We see these two elders often.  They were in our apartment tonight for dinner. We had an absolutely delightful time with them.  We were joined by Cedric De Concordia, a member of the Mount Royal High Council who kept us in stitches all evening, and Sister Puzey who works with us in the office.

I made a shepherd's pie and Sister Puzey brought copper coins, a delicious dish of carrots in a sauce, and a spinach sauce.  (Sorry, I don't have photos of those). Because today is Epiphany, we finished the meal with a Galette des Rois or King's cake, a pastry filled with frangipane (almond filling), and brownies (because Elder McGee is allergic to tree nuts and one of our guests is lactose intolerant).

These two elders are wonderful. They are hard working and lovely to be with.  Thanks so much for sending them to us.

Hope you have a wonderful New Year

Sister McGee

Pictures:

1:  Sister Puzey, Elders Hadden and Burton, Cedric De Concordia, Sister and Elder McGee

2. Galette des Rois

3. Brownies

4. Shepherd's Pie hanging out in the oven

Happy New Year

Dear all,

This year for the New Year I went to bed at 10:30, woke up at 3:30, threw up, went back to bed, and felt fine in the morning. It was a wonderful celebration. I would highly recommend it for anyone. 

In a more positive note, we spent a good chunk of New Years Eve with the Young Women's president, going around and visiting all the young women she didn't know. Since we're so skilled on passing by less active members, we got in contact with pretty much every family in a few hours. It was cool to spend some time with her and get to know her some more, and she was really, really appreciative of our help. 

Elder Burton (where IS his hat?) and Elder Hadden freezing.

Last week for P-day, Elder Burton and I made an expedition out to Parc Jean-Drapeau where they had the 1967 World's Fair. We expected to see a bunch of stuff from the Expo, but what we actually found was a totally deserted island complete with a forest, an old fort, an abandoned amusement park, and several wild foxes. It was pretty creepy, and incredibly cold, but we got some good pictures and had a good time. Pictures included.

In other news, They announced last week that the Canada Montreal Mission will be combined with the Halifax Mission in July of this year. So I'm gonna end my mission in a massive and probably very disorganized mission including all of the Maritime provinces, Quebec, and eastern Ontario. I could end my mission by serving in Newfoundland, and I think that is pretty darn crazy. The Maritimes sound wonderful, but I didn't think I would have the possibility of going there on my mission. We'll see what happens. 

Love you all,

Elder Hadden  

Pictures from the island of Jean Drapeau. The big ball is the American pavilion from the Expo. The amusement park is called La Ronde. It's fully operational in the summer, but looks really creepy in the winter. 

Jacques Cartier bridge

I was very proud of the fox pictures. 

Mission Changes

Four newly created missions have been announced by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, with 12 existing missions being dissolved into neighboring missions.

These changes will take place July 1, at which time the Church will have a total of 399 missions worldwide.

The new missions are:

• Democratic Republic of the Congo Kinshasa East
• Guatemala Antigua
• Peru Limatambo
• Philippines Antipolo

The 12 existing missions to be folded into neighboring missions — including seven in the United States — are:

• Argentina Posadas
• California Irvine
• California Long Beach
• California Rancho Cucamonga
• Canada Halifax
• Florida Tallahassee
• Georgia Macon
• Idaho Nampa
• Japan Sendai
• Korea Daejeon
• New York Utica
• Virginia Chesapeake

The mission changes were announced in a Wednesday, Jan. 2, statement, which noted a leveling off in the number of full-time missionaries since the 2012 age-change announcement. The number reached 88,000 at its height and has dropped since to today’s 65,000.

Parents of missionaries serving in the affected missions — whether created or dissolved — will receive additional information from their mission presidents. Information about new mission presidents will be announced later in January.