And She's Off

Hannah made it to the Czech Republic. Here is her first letter from the mission field.

Missionary work is incredible!!!!!!! Well I arrived in Prague on Friday afteroon. President and Sister Slovacek picked me up from the airport. I went out to dinner with them and then went to bed. I slept a good 12 hours and woke up at 7:00 on Saturday morning ready to roll. Saturday morning I had several interviews and meetings with people in the mission home. At around 11:00 I met my first real companion, Sister Waite. She is incredible. We get along very well and I have learned so much from her. I will write a little more about her later. After I met her, we went on a walk around Prague. Prague is a beautiful city. We went on the walk with two sisters who are serving in Prague. They are great. We did some contacting in Prauge, but the part we were in was mostly just tourists, so we got a phone number of someone in Zurich (which is another funny story).Saturday night we took a train to Brno (not where I will be serving) and spent the night with the sisters there. On Sunday morning we had district conference in Brno. I met a lot of the members of the church, but I don't remember a lot of them. I will learn. Sunday morning was hard for me because there was so much Czech that I did not understand. I was a little overwhelmed. But it got much better as the day progressed. I am already growing to love the people here. After district conference was over, we took a bus to the city that I will be serving in, Uherske Hradiste. It is a city near the Slovak boarder. There around 25,000-30,000 people here. Our apartment is amazing, the people are amazing, and my companion is amazing. Everything is great!!!!!So yesterday after we returned to Uherske Hradiste we had a lesson with a part member family. The parents are LDS but have been inactive for a while, and they have a 10 year old daughter who is preparing for baptism on March 21. We tuaght them in Czech, but both parents new English so they helped me out a lot. I was grateful. The lesson went great.

Then last night we taught Ken. He is actually from Mongolia and is here going to school. He is learning Czech and speaks pretty good English, so we actually are teaching him in English. While we were in Prague we picked up a Mongolian Book of Mormon. He was really excited for that. He had read everything we asked him to, and then he told us he wanted to try and read all of the Book of Mormon by next week. We told him that would be okay. Then we taught him most of the plan of salvation. After that we felt like we needed to teach him about baptism and receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost. Then both Sister Waite and I felt like we should ask him if he wanted to be baptized. So we did. His answer was "of course." It was so cool. The first date that came into our mind was March 21 because we already have a baptism planned for that day, so he commited to that day, but we might move it up. We will see. We just want to make sure that he understands what we have taught. Missionary work is incredible!!!!

okay, my companion, sister Waite, is what everyone should hope to have as a first companion, or as any companion at all. She is incredible. Well most importantly (not really) is that she loves BYU. Both of us right now are wearing our BYU sweaters. And we have a favor to ask. We need the BYU fight song. However you can get it to us would be great. :) Sister Waite works hard, is always optimistic, and loves the gospel. I am so excited to work with her. She was here last transfer and the members love her. It is so neat to see.

I love you all so much!!!!! I don't want to make this e-mail to long, but I have so many more experiences I could share just from the last couple days. The Lord is definitely involved in missionary work.
Love,
Sestra Hill