About the area Burton Upon Trent it is the brewing capital of the UK there are two areas here Burton A which is us and Burton B which is Elder Smart and Elder Mortenson. We have most of the town and they have a sort of smaller suburb called Swadilocote. It broken up in to a couple of different section you have town which has a shopping mall and other big city stuff then there are a bunch of other areas around it called Stapenhill or Horninglow. There are about five others as well. Anyway we live in the section called Branston its about a 10 min walk to town. We go there at least every day to walk around and talk to people. We also go out to some of the other areas as well knocking doors and checking on less actives. I get turned around a lot because none of the roads make sense and I mean none of them. We have to look up the streets in the index then find them in the square of reference it gives us then remember all the little streets that we have to take to get there because there are only about three main roads that lead around and if you get off of them then you are pretty much lost. Also in the UK they spell things differently they don't use z's if they can help it. They spell tires like tyres and some other weird spelling. Also the accents change with every part of town you are in. You have those up on the hill that talk all proper and then down lower in the valley that talk with slurring all there words together so that's a little hard to understand, but I can usually get it. The hardest thing to understand is the different terms they use here. Some words from back home that are not appropriate and which ones are, but then there are also words here that aren't bad that would be cussing back home. Then just a bunch of other words I had never heard used in the context that they use them here so they may not be speaking a different language but sometimes they might as well be because I always have to lean over to Elder Montague and ask him what there talking about.

 

So this week we didn't have anything really exciting happen. We taught Jonathan and Michael a couple of times but Michael doesn't seem to be progressing so we are trying to reevaluate where we are at with him and work from there. Jonathan's baptismal interview is this Thursday so everything should be on the up and up with him. Last night we met a couple that when we knocked on there door it was like they were expecting us it was cool they had previously had the missionaries over last year so they kind of knew some stuff. They are headed to Florida for holiday next week but they invited us over for dinner when they get back at the end of September so we were excited about that. Other than that its been pretty normal mission stuff. 

Love Elder Blake William Poll  

 

                                           Elder Poll with President and Sister Rasmussen

 

Elder Poll at the Preston England Temple with his MTC District.

Thanks for all you help and support. So I got to the mission home and we had a few short interviews with President and Elder and Sister Gray the we had lunch then a meeting with all the trainers then at the end they told us who we were going to be with. and the whole meeting I kept looking over and I kept saying in my head any body but the Hispanic kid I can deal with just about anything else but I'm horrible with language barrier stuff and then they read off elder Poll and elder Montague and that was the kid that I thought was Hispanic and I was like crap this first few months will be a struggle. we didn't say anything to each other until we got outside then I found out that he is from Ogden' Utah and that we know some of the same people and we just kind of hit it off from there so far it has been great Brother Dimetia picked us up from the mission home He said that he served in the Scotland Edinburgh so I asked if he knew an Elder Lubeck and he said that they had served in a lot of the same areas but never as companions but he really liked him and so I told how I knew him and I was happy. He dropped us off at our flat (it looks nice on the outside but is really quite rubbish). then we changed out of our suit and went to a teaching appointment with a 19 year old named Jonathan we were on our way over and I got all the details and how I was supposed to invite him to be baptized on the 6th of September. so we got there and everything went really well I felt like I should pop the question so I did and he said that he wasn't ready so we asked him to pray about it and he said that he would, then last night we called him because he like us to and him and elder Montague talked about the baptismal questions and he thought that he could do that so he said put it on the calendar. So I have a baptism set for the 6th of September for him. Thursday we had district meeting and so we went straight to the bus station and rode it to Lichfield and I met our district and they are awesome. Saturday was a lot of tracking and I met Micheal who is our other investigator he really wants to be baptized but we haven't taught him everything yet so he will probably be baptized when we finished teaching him next Saturday. Saturday night I forgot to tell you the we went over to Brother Demitas for dinner he is a chef for a living so as you can imagine the food was awesome then it is holiday here so tracking Saturday night was a no no so we just chatted with john dimetia and shared a spiritual thought then he gave a lift home. On Sunday we went to church and the ward building is so small that the chapel is also the cultural hall when all the chairs are down. but it was a good, Sunday we had Michael out to church with us with the Kennard's. we had a member teaching appointment with brother and sister Galiker he is recently returned missionary and we told him a little about our experience with Michael and he wanted to hear us give the same lesson that we gave Michael then he gave us some pointers and that was good.Thank you all so much for all of your letters and support.

 love elder poll

 

 

			I don't have a lot of time today we are transferring this morning to our missions, but I'm alive and doing as well as I can trying to get adjusted. Happy birthday mom and Katie I love you all so much and i pray for you every night please let everyone know that I am doing well. Some how I keep becoming the leader of every thing from zone leader to transfer leader but i will keep you posted. I'm scared out of my mind and not sure what I'm doing here but I will give it my best shot. love you all so much i pray for you i know the Lord will bless you and keep you safe till we meet again love Elder Poll

Elder Poll arrived in the mission today. We are excited to be working with him.

He will be serving in Burton on Trent with Elder Montague. P-day is Monday.

More photos will be available in several days on the mission picture blog:

ebmission.blogspot.com

President and Sister Rasmussen

Things have been going ok I've been sick the last couple of days but I'm sure I'll get thru it. For those first couple of days I was very home sick that satan was able to work on me pretty hard. My companions name is Elder Barton he is from the Salt Lake. We got made zone leaders here and we are over all the two week missionaries. He isn't going to my mission though he and most of my disrict are going to scotland \ireland. but the majority of the elders here are going to my mission and about 15 of them are from various parts of Utah and Idaho. There are also a few from other counties as well. please send me your prayers and I will keep sending you mine Love Elder Poll