June 20

June 20

This week was pretty typical, maybe a bit slower than the normal week. We have been doing a lot of knocking and a lot of contacting. We found a cool neighborhood by the centrum that we have been doing a lot of work in. We did not really have very many teaching opportunities this week. In fact, it has been raining a lot this week and it seems that the attitude of the Dutch people just dampered with the weather. But it will brighten up soon. It is going to rain for 15 consecutive hours today. 

This week, there was a demonstration for gay pride or something in the streets. We were heading out, and there were police trucks, motorcycles and vans everywhere, but we thought they were just maybe doing a blitz because they were just sitting around at different corners waiting. But then, we heard a couple sirens and a few whistles around the corner, so we peeked out into the street, say a rainbow flag, and decided to leave the area. It was over pretty fast. There were several police vans with maybe 6 cops in the back, and also some policemen were riding horses. They must have rounded up every cop in the Netherlands. 

Another significant event was that we were belling up some apartment building, and a man came down after the first bell. He said he had no interest and then closed the door. So we pressed the second button, and he came down again and this time got in our faces and started yelling at us and yelling in angry Dutch. It is almost always impossible to understand an angry dutchman. We left building after that because we were confused how we could have belled him up twice and didn't

There is a church an old church here in Breda that Marriott converted into a hotel. They kept as much original artwork and framework as possible while still making it look modern. This is the ballroom. It has the original 16th century floor tiles, all individually taken out and hand restored, then places exactly back in their places. Also, they restored a little artwork at the top of the main arch. The pillars on the side are all original. It is an incredible hotel, just finished about a month ago.

want to make him mad again. But yesterday, Elder Dearden and I were in the neighborhood and we continued belling up the building starting with the third bell. And the guy came down again. He was so mad it was funny. I did not understand half of what he said, but the other half was pretty nasty. We kept asking him what number his apartment was so that we would never bell it up again, but he wasnt telling us. He finally told us what it was after he finished telling us that the next time there would be blood. Crazy man. 

Here is an outhouse I used the other week. You have to pay to use bathrooms here.

Also, we were riding home fast to get to an appointment from our dinner appointment yesterday, and we had to ride through a group of elementary age kids who mad fun of our helmets and tried to nail me with a water balloon. Luckily they missed, but our appointment ended up falling through, so not the greatest week. But it will pick up this week because we are going to work even harder.