"Cabin Fever! Ahhhh."

January 15, 2018

This was quite the transfer week

On Monday, Elder Hansen and I had no set plans with the missionaries in Elche, so we had an Elda morning. We went to the Colombian panadería that he was always a big fan of, and hit up what is by far the hottest spot in The City of Shoes: The Shoe Museum



Elda's claim to fame is its shoe-making.



Even on a Monday morning, the place was packed with one man at the front desk, one cleaning lady, and two Americans who were more than willing to pay the 3€ entry fee. The experience started with a five-minute long "How It's Made" type of video on the shoe-making process from the drawing board to the shoebox. It was even in English! How considerate. We then had free reign of the four massive wings dedicated to varying aspects of these wonderful footskin protectors we call "shoes." 



The first was the history of shoe making machines and the great technical strides that have taken place over the centuries. The second was dedicated to all kinds of shoes (big shoes, sissy shoes...shoes that climb on rocks...) throughout the centuries from all over the world. We even saw the Pope's shoes and replicas of the royal family's shoes. Yeah. I know. 








The third wing consisted of the more artistic side of footwear. Shoes from movies, a little art exhibit (that actually had nothing to do with shoes--but whatever), shoe sculptures, all types of foot molds for the various models of special shoes, and a replica of a cobbler's workshop from the good ol' days of shoe making. 

Art. From Shoes.


The fourth wing was a library with more shoe art scattered around every corner and pillar. Of course, what shoe museum can really be considered a shoe museum, without the world's largest (and smallest) shoe? Now I know some of you are saying to yourselves, "Whooah there! Hold your horses, buckaroo. Elder Jensen, you don't mean to tell me that this hidden gem of Spain, with all the magic and wonder it contains as it is, also somehow managed to gain possession of THE Guinness World Record holding shoes for both the largest ANDsmallest categories at the same time, do you?" Well I'm here to tell you: You bet your sweet bippy they do! And you know that they had that massive (and puny) mass of leather craftsmanship displayed kind of to the side of the hallway connecting the two wings on the second floor! 



Words simply cannot describe what I've gained from that tour. I'm a better man for it. I give it an A+ and fifty gold stars.

After our Preparation Day ended, we had a couple visits with members for Elder Hansen. Oh, by the way, transfers were this week. I should probably mention that. Elder Hansen is now in Alcázar de San Juan in Castilla la Mancha! My new companion is Elder Costas. He was born in Bolivia, but he's lived in Barcelona practically his whole life. He has roughly six months in the mission (same group as Elder Cobbley for those who have followed along during my Badajoz days) and has been in Alcázar his whole mission so far. He's excited for the change of...well, everything. It's actually a little funny, he really just traded places with Elder Hansen. ANYwho, yeah we had a couple good member visits Monday evening.

On Tuesday we had district meeting and bid Hermana Lake farewell. She's home now. That's weird. Our evening consisted of Elder Hansen having a couple more goodbye visits. They were nice. The members are cool here. 

Wednesday was chaotic. Elder Hansen's travel plan was bus to Alicante from Elche, then take a train to La Mancha. Plain and simple. We got going a little late (morning packing never goes as quick as people say it will) but we were fine and got to the bus station little before 8:45 when the bus was leaving. Only...the bus, in fact, did not leave at 8:45. It left at 8:35 as it was scheduled to leave in the first place. I did not know this. I had been told 8:45. I planned on 8:45. 
SO the office's change of plan, because we have a car, was drive to Alicante to the chapel, park there, get to the train station via tram, and ya está. Only...the zone leaders called us just as we were about to get to the chapel after driving through city traffic to tell us that the original plan would take too long and to drive to the train station instead. Now, I've only been in Alicante one other time, at night after a long day of driving to drop off a pair of missionaries near the train station. In the confusion and literally impossible odds of us catching that train already, we found parking at the main TRAM station. Not the train station. My bad. 
The tram station is a couple blocks away from the train station, so we just ran with Elder Hansen's luggage to get to the train station but, I mean, it was already too late when we found parking. The train was missed and so we just chilled in the train station with the zone leaders a couple other missionaries waiting on their companions to arrive. The next train headed for La Mancha left at 5pm, but Elder Costas arrived at 2pm. 


So I left Elder Hansen in the hands of the zone leaders and took my new companion to the car. Elder Costas had been very sick since the previous Saturday mainly in the throat area. The first thing he let me know very quickly and quietly (he could barely speak and it was noticeably painful for him) was that Elder Scott (mission doctor) told him to stay inside and recover for the week. Also not to drink anything that was colder than room-temperature. We drove back to Elda pretty much in silence on his part, which was understandable because talking hurt. We got back and our house arrest began. I set up his bed with sheets and quilts while he got a little situated with his stuff. When he climbed in bed he said in English, "Thank you, Mother." That made me chuckle. 


Someone call the cops, because it must be illegal to have this much fun!

The following days consisted of a lot of de-cluttering/cleaning, studying, a little bit of cooking, and staring at the ceiling. One morning after writing in my journal, I looked at the clock and was shocked to realize that I had been writing for over an hour and a half! Elder Costas has made some good improvement. He was normally pretty quiet in the morning and the day, but toward the evening we would talk a lot more. He's a fun guy, but also pretty quiet. Granted, he hasn't been in the greatest speaking conditions lately and he's been opening up. I thought there was going to be some drastic change in communicating and whatnot because of the whole "being with a native-speaker" thing, but the transition was almost instant and pretty smooth.

The past couple of days were pretty nice, but we would like to get out and about now. Saturday especially was pretty killer. I had some pretty nice whiskers started because, why shave if I'm not going out? The same went for Elder Costas. He was feeling well enough to go to sacrament meeting. You've gotta renew those baptismal covenants somehow, right? It was nice to stretch our legs and get some air on Sunday.

That brings us to today which is pretty tranquilo so far. We'll be working again this week. We're excited to get to it.

Have a good one!

Elder Jensen :)

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