#38 "Christmas" (By Grandpa)

Dear Grandchildren,

Talk about a tizzy. Last Tuesday, both Grandma and I were minding our own business while trolling the internet for important information when, Zing! Suddenly, all of our requests and internet connections were being sent to the main website of the local, government-run internet company. We couldn’t look up anything if we had wanted in the worst way. Grandma said, "Call Murat." He is the person at the relocation agency who seems to know about these kinds of things. I called him. He asked, "Have you paid your internet bill?" I answered, "No. I haven’t seen an email statement, as promised." He said, "Go to the main internet office and call me so that I can explain your problem." So off I went. It is just over a mile walk, and I was pretty sure where to go. I found the place and called the fellow just before I talked to a nice young lady sitting behind a very official looking desk. He explained to her what had happened. She then spent four or five minutes madly typing on her keyboard and then led me to the counter where she said I would pay my bill. It turned out that we were more than six weeks behind in our payments. I gladly paid. The fellow surmised that the email notices had gone into a spam file. (I have occasionally had trouble receiving emails sent from computers in Turkey.) As I walked home in triumph, I called Grandma. She said, "I still can’t get the internet. The system keeps flipping me to the internet company’s webpage." So dejectedly I walked back. Just as I was about to walk through the door, Grandma said, "O, I am finally in the internet." I stopped, felt the relief washing over me, and walked back to the apartment. We now have a plan when we shall pay each month. No more crises. I hope.

For the first time in six months, I climbed on a bike and went for a ride. It felt good. But lest you or I become too excited, this bike was not one that I would purchase. It is a bike supplied by the city for commuters and recreation riders. It has big fenders, one riding gear, and a little basket on the front. Its only adjustable feature is the seat’s height, which is not my height. With the help of a friend, I learned about the bike system here, purchased a biking card, and loaded it with 50 lira worth of rides — 2 lira for each hour or each ride, on a fleet of bikes that are parked every half mile or so for 15 miles south of our part of town. So I put on my riding gear (I have yet to buy a helmet, so I rode slowly), walked to the closest bike park, put my card against the card reader, punched in my password (a set of numbers), heard the latch click, pulled the bike out of its stall, and jumped on. I almost fell off. Or at least, I was really wobbly for the first fifty feet. Regaining my balance and dignity, I rode off for a six-mile ride. It felt really good to get a different exercise from walking. But the one gear and the lack of hills meant that I hardly worked up a sweat and did not breathe hard the whole time. After I get a helmet, I shall push the pace a little harder.

Christmas night, Grandma and I hosted a branch Christmas party. She was sure that the maximum number would be eight or nine. I was thinking that we could be surprised. So when it was my turn to buy some food items, I ramped up the numbers a bit. Sixteen came, including seven who were non members. A couple of people, a father and son who met YVs in Australia, came because of an invitation from our YVs. We played a game, ate a light meal, visited, and generally had a good time. The non-member wife of a member came without him (he is in the States visiting his family) and she was wonderful involving people in conversations, as was the less active wife of another member. The only people who didn’t speak Turkish were Grandma and I. But we knew what to do — we kept the food coming.

I love you and pray for you.

Grandpa Brown

PS.  We are headed to Istanbul again. We have become regulars at the airports. You would think that the airport screeners would just wave us through as their good friends. But new screeners keep showing up instead of the former ones. We are going to a zone conference. This one will (again) involve a member of the Council of the Twelve. (In our first six months, we shall have seen two members of the Twelve and two of the Seventy.) We shall have more to say about this experience next week. The plans for this set of meetings have been kept rather quiet and we made our plane reservations only a couple of days ago.

We were eight in our sacrament meeting this morning, with one investigator and one woman who had not attended since last August. One person was connected through Skype. So we totaled nine. The two women with six children did not join us via Skype because of sickness that began on Christmas day. I felt sorry for them. But we hope for better next week.