August 8, 2016 Rennes

Wow! So much has happened this week, it's going to take forever to tell it all! It's been a crazy ride so far, and it doesn't look like it's going to slow down anytime soon!

For the last couple days at the MTC, there's nothing much to report. We took some super cute pictures and said goodbye to the Lyon folks, then headed off to the airport around noon. It was a rough time trying to get 27 new missionaries all together and organized,  but we managed. 

We had a while in the airport before the flight, but it didn't take long to get around to all the missionaries that Elder Bednar was on our flight!!! We all shook his hand and said hi as we passed by first class. So. Cool.

The first day in Paris was crazy exhausting. We went to the chapel in Paris instead of the mission home because there were so many of us. In between interviews with President Babin, we all went contacting for the first time. I got to go with Sœur Romney, which was way awesome because I knew her before the mission. I found out later that the first person who takes you contacting is called your "dad". Contacting in that part of Paris is really difficult because there are so many tourists and people who are really busy or really not interested in talking to you. The Paris chapel is right across the street from Le Centre Pompidou so we just meandered on over to Notre Dame and took some pictures :)

The sisters all slept in a hotel while the elders slept in the mission home. It was the cutest little place, with the perfect amount of space for 2 people in each room. The next day we went to Consecration Hill. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera so I couldn't take a picture of the beautiful view of Paris. We had a chance to write in our journals a little bit and then went back to the chapel to meet our trainers!

This is my trainer, Sœur Liard. She's training me in Rennes! According to missionary talk, that makes her my "mom" and Rennes my "blueville" because new missionaries are called "blues". She's Tahitian, and she speaks about the same amount of English as I do French, but we make it work. Most of the time we speak in French, especially outside the apartment and while we're doing missionary things in the apartment- studying, planning, things like that. For my sanity and for her to practice, we try to speak in English the rest of the time we're in the apartment.

There are two other sœurs in the apartment, Sœur George and Soeur VanAuker. 

They are so cute! Because this is the first transfer with two sets of sœurs in the apartment (last transfer it was just Sœur VanAuker and Soeur Liard) they have all the old amis and Soeur Liard and I have, like, 2. That means we have to do lots of contacting, because we have lots of time and no amis :(

We certainly have had a lot of adventures in this apartment. The hot water heater has been off and on broken since April. We haven't had hot water since a while before I got here, so we either take cold showers or Tahitian showers, with a pot of boiling water and a bowl to mix together hot and cold water. Luckily the senior couple let us come in shifts Friday and Saturday to shower and wash our hair for Sunday. The repairman came Friday morning for the third time to try to fix it and ultimately concluded that it cannot be fixed. We have to contact the landlord to try to get a new one. Unfortunately, in the process of testing out the water to see if it was getting hot, he filled the (clogged) sink with water. SO we hauled buckets of nasty water from the kitchen and dumped them in the tub, and then took apart the plumbing with some help from the senior couple. It was so nasty, but we managed to get it fixed.

Next item on the repair list is to have the elders come over and help us put the beds together in the second bedroom. Right now we're sleeping on mattresses on the floor. Not ideal, but not terrible. So, ça va. Life goes on.

Rennes is the coolest town. It's largely a university town, so it's a lot like Cambridge. There are a lot of students, a lot of immigrants, a lot of old fancy buildings, and practically everyone takes the bus. We live pretty near the center of town, and we take the bus everywhere. There's one metro line that we've taken a couple times. I think it must be relatively new, because it's way cleaner than you would expect for a metro line. The ward is relatively big here, about 130 people in the little chapel. However, that covers nearly the entire city of Rennes. There really aren't many members of the church here in France. There's construction going on at the chapel right now to expand it and make more space for the ward to grow.

The members are really kind and welcoming. We've already had a couple dinner and lunch appointments with the members in the ward. Because meals here take longer as a cultural thing, we are allowed to take an hour and a half instead of just an hour for dinner and lunch appointments. We ate with a couple members this week, and we have a couple more next week. I had the opportunity to meet the ward a lot yesterday at church. They were all so cool! I think I'm getting better at doing the bises with people. It was a little weird for me to do with people I had literally just met, but really it's only slightly more intimate than a handshake. I got the opportunity to introduce myself at church last week because it was fast and testimony meeting. It was a little tricky to understand the teachers in the other meetings, but I was at least able to follow along which scripture or general conference talk they were reading. The other two sisters with us were doing translation the whole time. There are actually a lot of English speakers in the ward! A lot of the members are native French speakers but speak English well, and one of the bishopric members is from Utah and moved to Rennes with his family about 3 years ago. Their whole family is totally bilingual. There is another American family with 8 kids who just moved here a month ago! They are all learning French as well. So I'm not the only one who's lost sometimes :)

And finally, I have already had my first baptism! That right, I'm starting off this mission strong!! Of course, it was actually the other sœurs who taught her, but I got to meet her a little and be in the pictures ;) Her name is Joy, and she is so cool. Because she's still learning French, they did the service and everything in English. Her mom came to the baptism as well, and we got to meet her a little bit. She came to church yesterday as well for Joy to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Joy bore her testimony as well, and it was so cool to hear from her. Her mom was definitely touched by Joy's decision and testimony, and the other sisters are going to meet with her on Saturday to teach her!

This is all of us at the baptism- Sœur George, Sœur VanAuker, Joy, Sœur Liard, and me. Joy is wearing the dress her mom made for her to be baptized in. She is so beautiful! We spent P-day with her today. We had some awesome kebabs, took some fun pictures, and did a little bit of shopping.

Okay, I think I've finally covered everything! Wow, it seems like forever ago that I was sending emails at the MTC! My email address is still the same for sending emails to me- rogers.rachael@myldsmail.net. For this transfer and until I change areas, you can also send me letters at

Sœur Rachael Rogers
2 Rue Moliére
35700 Rennes France

but if you want to send a package it's probably better to send it to the mission home,

Sœur Rachael Rogers
131 Boulevard Cannot
78110 Le Vésinet France

Je vous aime tous! À bientôt!
Sœur Rogers