Knocking on Death's Door
Man, this title would be so much better if we had actually gone dooring this week. #BigSchade
Well, on Tuesday Sister Akre had a Skype-in Doctor's appointment with a family doctor back home, and in the process her doctor chewed her out for working so hard and not letting her body recover while she had the flu (which Sister Akre hadn't brought up, but like... Apparently the extra pale skin and redness from the fever gave it away). So after talking to our families, we went home instead of going finding so that Sister Akre could get to bed early to try and sleep everything off.
Wednesday morning, I sneaked out of our bedroom so Sister Akre could keep sleeping and read "Jesus the Christ". At around 9:45 or so, Sister Akre came bursting out of the room looking like a bat had attacked her face (what's the actual saying, there?) and said, "We have 10 minutes before we miss the bus! We gotta go!" Not asking questions, I panicked a little and got ready in 5 minutes, haha. Turns out we had an appointment with Schwester Caminada and the Elders that I had forgotten about. We thought they would just be moving furniture around for her, and because they can't do that alone with her we had to come too. But when we got there, it was a meal appointment (tasted great). We gave an awesome spiritual thought, and I forgot how much I miss appointments with another pair of missionaries, because we were all able to bounce off of each other's ideas and wrap things together with a nice little bow. I loved it. :) Then at the very end, the Elders moved a chair and a table so Schwester Caminada could sweep underneath the rug that the furniture had been on. We were impressed at the amount of dirt that fell through the rug, and Schwester Caminada was very pleased with herself for knowing that that job needed to be done. Then the Elders moved things back to where they were, Schwester Caminada handed each of us a postcard, and we went on our merry way. It was so sweet, but you could just see that Sister Akre was NOT doing well. I'm pretty sure a three-course meal isn't what the doctor ordered for the flu, haha.
But, Sister Akre being herself, somehow managed to have us not go directly home. We missed our stop on the tram, and she figured we may as well get some finding in by riding the tram to the end of the line and back. Well, yet again God blessed Sister Akre for pushing through her pain, because she found the wife of the less-active whom she had honestly forgotten existed, and I had never heard of. It was a good experience!
We headed to Lörrach, although I'm not really remembering why... Oh wait no, I remember. Our money hadn't come in when we planned to go shopping in the morning on Tuesday, so we ended up not buying anything, and decided to use our dinner hour on Wednesday to get our food for the week (since by then, we had money again). On the way, we were sitting on the train and it started pouring rain (Yay!). Sister Akre was teasing me, saying we should go play sport outside. I said no, and she asked why. Very slowly, I responded with, "Weil ich nicht nass sein möchte." Which like, I didn't think was very funny. But the lady sitting across from us just absolutely burst out laughing. (Round #2 of finding through making other people laugh?) We had a great discussion with this woman about the Bible and church and her religious culture back home. In the end, we had to run off the train, but we left her with one of our cards and I hope she calls us one day. :)
On our way home, a Texan stopped me and asked if I spoke English. I don't know how she knew, but I gladly responded with a yes and helped her figure out where her train was (which was right where we were standing, because we were heading in the same direction). We had another great conversation with her, and I shared my freshly bought raspberries. We also let her use our Hotspot to call her friend and let her know she was going to be an hour later than she had expected because she had missed her first train. So we made a best friend, and when our train finally came I um... may have dropped half my raspberries... 
But our pal swooped in and saved my skirt with a receipt (blocking me from any stains I could have gotten by sitting on the raspberry smears). We explained a little bit of what we were doing, but in general just helped this woman to feel like she had a friend in the world, since she had felt very lost with no way to get home.
When we got off to catch our connection, we stood on the Gleis for a while, waiting for a train to leave so our train could come in. But everything was at a standstill and nothing was moving, and it was getting to be the time of night where we were starting to worry about whether or not we'd be able to catch our last couple connections to make it home in time. We'll, a sweet soul, who I'm sure was led by the Spirit although he probably didn't know it, directly approached us and told us there had been a mudslide and the tracks needed to be cleared before anything could start moving again. Then he walked away and I lost track of him in the crowd. We decided to bail on the train and ran to catch our bus. Good news: we ended up making it home, with time to spare!
Donnerstag, 8th:
After yesterday, Sister Akre was wasted, and I actually convinced her to stay inside all day. I had fun just kind of dinking around the apartment (I'm so grateful for my talent of entertaining myself). She slept for a long time, waking up periodically to throw up. Towards the afternoon, she went a bit stir crazy and started rolling around from the couch to the table and to the couch again (not on the floor, on top these things)(like legit, it was a scene from the exorcist, haha)(she also doesn't really remember anything from this day). So we decided to take a quick walk to the post office to drop off a letter for Elder Gilmour, and by the time we got there Sister Akre's energy had been drained. So heading home was a party, since she basically just fell forward and caught herself with her own feet the whole way home, which meant we were speed-walking and she didn't even have enough energy to speak. She was glistening with sweat from the effort of even just standing, and when we walked in the door she basically passed out in her bed again.
A little bit later, she woke up and came and layed down on the couch. She talked about how depressing life would be if there wasn't a God, and I agreed, but said, "Good thing there IS a God!" She sat silently for a little bit, then stood up and took a shower. When she came out, she said we should go finding. We didn't go finding. She sat on the couch and started to type something on our phone, then I heard her sniffling and asked if she was okay. She said she was just texting President to ask if she could call her mom, but then she started sobbing and hyperventilating a little bit. Terrified me to bits and pieces. While waiting for President to respond, we called the Elders (pretty sure we scared Elder Gilmour, too, considering Sister Akre was having what seemed like a panic attack) and asked if they could give Sister Akre a blessing, and we decided to do it the next day. We talked with them for a few minutes, because Elder Gilmour was making Sister Akre laugh, and that seemed to help a bit. They needed to go, though, so we hung up. But then by that point President had given the okay, so I took a shower while Sister Akre talked to her mom. When I came back out, Sister Akre seemed basically normal and fine. Gotta love the power in a good mom talk. :)
The rest of the evening passed without incident.
Freitag, 9th:
I woke up the next morning and again snuck out of the room. I had started to get things out to make breakfast for myself when Sister Akre came out and handed me the phone. On the screen was a recipe for homemade chicken noodle soup. I looked up at her (and would've raised one eyebrow, if that was one of the talents I had been blessed with). She just smiled and asked me very sweetly if I would make this comfort food for her that she was pretty sure she would be able to keep down (since everything else she had eaten she had thrown up). So, I started making the soup while she took a shower, but then she came out and asked me why I was following the recipe. I just looked at her again. "Because.... That's what you do with recipes?" She laughed and said, "No, silly, this recipe makes enough soup for 7-8 people! Of COURSE you wouldn't follow the recipe! Plus, it's not like we have a whole chicken just laying around." So she helped me figure out the steps I could skip, and I ended up making a half-decent chicken noodle soup. I just ate that for breakfast, and was quite impressed with myself. Sister Akre did indeed end up keeping it down, and was so thrilled she ate more. That was a dumb decision, because then she felt sick from overeating, but she still managed to keep it down. I was so proud of her. 
We then went Tramming, because Sister Akre refused to have another day where she was stuck inside. We basically just found on the way to the Pratteln church. When we're on trams to find, we sit apart from each other but still within sight and enough sound that we aren't breaking rules (this is called split-contacting, I'd like to educate those Elders who think if they're on opposite ends of the city they're still within sight and sound, but like, no, please take the proper safety precautions (I had a dream about the importance of sight-and-sound last night, so like, it's important)). Anyway, this guy came and sat across from Sister Akre, which I thought was weird, because he was already on the tram and like... culture-wise, you just don't move once you're already on the tram unless you're standing to leave or you see a good friend or you stand to avoid someone. And like... He didn't leave. I've never seen him before. And he was approaching, not leaving. When we got off at the stop for the church, he followed Sister Akre off and they kept talking. I followed at a safe distance behind, and started to wonder if I needed to pull out the phone and call someone to help, because Sister Akre looked behind at me and appeared very uncomfortable. She stopped walking just outside of a Lidl, and said she was planning on heading into the store. The guy said, "oh me too!" At this point I walked up, and Sister Akre said, "Actually, we have a church meeting we need to get to, so have fun in Lidl!" She handed him a pass-along card, and he said he might come to church one day, and then he turned around and headed back to the tram. So far, he's texted us once and stayed out of our lives. But apparently he sat by Sister Akre because he thought he had seen her before in Ghana. She just laughed and said, "No."
When we got to the church, Sister Akre took a nap, then we watched "Legacy" in German because we found it in our apartment (and inside of the DVD case, we also found "The Help" and "Sherlock Holmes". Those we did not watch).
When the Elders finally came, they gave Sister Akre her blessing, and then we found on the way home. Again, I just love the Priesthood. Plus, you know God watches out for us because some people came to clean the church so we didn't even have to feel guilty about being alone in a building with the Elders.
When we got home, Sister Akre called our mission nurse, who got very concerned about the high Fevers Sister Akre has been running. She gave us some instructions and said she would check in on us in the morning.
Samstag, 10th:
The mission nurse called as we were on the way to a Relief Society activity (against the instructions we had received last night). She was glad to hear that Sister Akre's fever had broken.
We got to the FHV activity early, and it was a little awkward because Sister Akre felt like junk and I didn't know anyone too well, and kind of was just in my own mind so neither of us talked much. But by the end we had a couple good conversations. We bailed early because Sister Akre handed me the phone with a little message saying she was feeling super grumpy and sick and just wanted to leave, so we left.
We did some Finding, and also ended up going to a shopping center because Sister Akre was feeling unusually hot again and needed to cool off to prevent a fever, so we got her some refrigerated waters and into air conditioning. We figured we weren't going to get any more missionary work done, and considered going home, but Sister Akre asked if she could find me a cute outfit for Zone Conference. So we did a little bit of retail therapy for her and I got a couple discounted dresses from an H&M, etc. By the end of the day, she was no longer grumpy, but still felt exhausted. So when we got home she went to bed pretty quickly.
Sonntag, 11th:
Before church we headed to the hospital in Lörrach to visit Bruder König, a member who's had to have a couple of hip surgeries. It was awkward because I've never met him, and like... Idk, what do say once you've moved past, "We're sorry you're in pain, we'll pray for you and tell everyone at church hi from you"?
So we left pretty quickly and went to church, again finding on the way. At this point we were close to hitting our minimum of 12 hours and Sister Akre wanted to be able to say she had done 12 hours of finding while she had the flu.
Church was good. I sat next to a less-active member from England in FHV and she was quite kind.
And if you'd like some tea (using my newly learned modern slang), our Bishop's son is now back from his mission (he left May 22nd). When we asked his siblings about it, they all said they didn't really know why, and when we asked him he said he'd tell us later. So. That's the tea.
We got a Ride home from the Egens again.
We packed for staying overnight with the Preinach Sisters (since Pratteln and Reinach are now combined) and again found on the way there. We were going to try and hit 13 hours, and could have, but the Preinach Sisters demand that we come over and eat the dinner they prepared for us. So we made our goal of 12 hours, despite Sister Akre being on the verge of death all week.
We had a fun evening with Sister Frome and Sister Curran, and I lowkey wish we could stay with them more often, but as it was we had to get permission from President so it probably won't be happening again for a while.
Montag, 12th:
Zone Conference! The entire Linz Distrikt, sans Sister Spratt (and Elder Larson and Elder Weingärtner) was reunited, complete with Almdudler and huge handshakes. Man, I missed these people. They're legit my family. 
️ I made a lot of comments and felt like an attention hog, but had such a good time. I gave the closing prayer, and I got to fulfill a dream of mine in doing so (I've secretly always wanted to give the closing prayer in a meeting, and then after saying "amen" turning around and shaking the hand of the presiding authority - I don't know why - so I got to turn around and shake Präsident Brown's hand). Basically, Zone Conference was a dream. Plus, I finally gave Sister Meisenfelder's Tschüß book to her and she said it made her cry, so. 
Dienstag, 13th:
Today we had our trip to the Temple, but this time was super special because Präsident Brown, Sister Brown, their recently-returned-from-his-
Tonight, we're going to a member appointment at an expensive Japanese Restaurant (we have to pay for ourselves), but it's a buffet, and Sister Akre has been craving Asian food, so it'll be fun. It's also going to be an experience because it started out with just like, us and a couple members and the Elders, then it turned into 14 people or so. So it's going to be a lot of members, and 6 missionaries. 
Favorite new words: Esp, amistad - friendship / Deu, K. O. - An adjective to describe when someone is totally exhausted (or knocked out, like in video games), but it's fun because even the older generation uses it. It's just interesting to hear a grandma saying, "Ich bin für 2 Stunden dorthin gefahren, und jetzt bin ich total K. O." / Schwyzer Dütsch, g'si - the equivalent of gewesen, but I'm not actually sure how to spell it (obvs). Ex: "D' Spiegeli war dor' g'si, Mama." (An actual sentence I heard a child speak. And can I just say, little kids speaking Swiss German is one of the most precious things to hear. They're so sweet!) / Basler Deutsch, Sali - hello (I think it comes from Arabic/Persian (Salam or Salaam however it's spelled))
Favorite funny story: So when I made the chicken noodle soup for Sister Akre, the recipe said to cut the homemade noodles a little smaller than you'd think. I thought, "yeah, okay, makes sense," and cut them to about half the size I thought they should be. Well, good thing, because if I had cut them any bigger I think I couldn't have called the result "soup". As it was, I've been referring to what I made as "breadstick soup," because those noodles expanded like crazy. But it tasted good anyway, and the breadsticks were fun. 
Favorite spiritual thought: God loves us so much. I feel like I've used this one before, but really, it's worth repeating again. He loves us enough to give us the Priesthood, the Temple, and even random guys in train stations letting us know we should take an alternate route to get home. 1 Nephi 1:20 "...The tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance." There are so many tender mercies in our day-to-day lives! I challenge you this week to write down a list of the tender mercies you see at the end of each day (this can be in your journal or just on a piece of paper). At the end of the week, I promise that you'll be able to feel God's love for you just a little bit stronger than you could before. ️
TLDR: Sister Akre has risen from her death bed, I'm a master chef, I love my friends like family, and I love the temple.
Much love to everyone!
Liebe Grüße,
Sister Hamilton
Pics:
Linz Distrikt reunion, with a candid
ELDER BUSS
Sister Mansell
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