Äldste Nathan Sirrine: May 14, 2018 Stockholm!

Probably the most famous street in Sweden.

By the water.

Stockholm is built on 14 islands, so it's everywhere.

Only a few days have gone by, and I'm already loving Stockholm! It may very well be the most beautiful city in the world, so I pretty much feel like I'm living in a postcard. Our area covers downtown Stockholm, so I'm still just trying to wrap my head around how many people and

View out our apartment window

buildings there are here... I constantly feel like a salmon swimming upstream. There's also a lot of tourists here, so that combined with the warm weather and street vendors sometimes makes it feel like I'm a tourist myself... The area is really nice, and the church rents our apartment from one of the members here (it's not even a whole apartment, it's just the maid's quarters) so it's really small, but it also happens to be on the most expensive street in all of Sweden. Accordingly, on our 5 min walk home from the Tunnelbana stop (like the subway system, but a lot nicer and way cleaner), we walk right past a Ferrari car dealership, and in there are several Ferraris that park on the

A cool church by our apartment

streets nearby along with Lamborghinis, Porsches, Teslas, etc... Yep, it's certainly a slightly different kind of area than my last two. Also, fun fact, the Israeli Ambassador lives one floor above us, so sometimes we see his body guards standing outside our building. I haven't met him yet, but I sure want to.

Being with Elder Baggett has been an absolute blast. If you ask any of the members here, they're pretty quick to tell you he's the funniest missionary they know, and they're not wrong. He's been in Stockholm since Jan 1, so he knows his way around the city pretty well which is super helpful as I'm still just trying to get my bearings... He's also from South Jordan, Utah, so it's been pretty fun to share stories and know where they took place.

street the YSA center is on

The ward here is fantastic. There were about 80 people in church in Sunday which is really nice because there are plenty of members to get to know and work with, but few enough that it's easier to develop meaningful relationships and interact with all of them. Every member I talked to on Sunday was absolutely amazing, and it turns out President and Sister Youngberg are in our ward! It's kind of weird to be in an area where your mission president comes up to you on Sunday and says, "Hey we saw you out street contacting on Friday!" Remember the primary song "If the Savior Stood Beside Me"? Well that's pretty much what I'm feeling right now.

Not only has the weather has been warming up (it's about 75-80 degrees this week), but missionary work is as well. We've been

Quite literally the only drinking

fountain in Sweden. They just

aren't a thing here for some reason.

meeting some really cool people and we've got a couple awesome investigators we're working with here that I can't wait to meet this week. It's been pretty interesting to see how my different areas and companions have been divinely tailored to me. Sometimes it's difficult to see in the moment, but looking back, I can see exactly why I was in each place at a specific time and what it was the Lord wanted to teach me. With this knowledge, I am incredibly grateful for the chance to be in Stockholm with Elder Baggett, and I look forward to learning that which the Lord would have me learn.

Äldste Sirrine