General Conference

We really enjoyed General Conference this weekend (even though Elder Wheeler came down with a cold on Sunday). We were able to go tho the Ossington Chapel for all of the Saturday sessions (including the Priesthood Session). Sister Wheeler went to the chapel for Sunday morning since she was to practice a piano duet with Maria (who didn't show up because she wasn't feeling well). Elder Wheeler stayed home and watched the session on the internet. Sister Wheeler returned home in time for the Sunday afternoon session on the internet. Can you believe, Sister Wheeler actually caught a bus to and from the chapel by herself (and lived to tell about it). It was raining and she had to wait for the bus for 15 minutes.

No rest for the wicked, though, Elder Wheeler was awakened from a rest with endless sirens. We don't know what happened, but here is a picture. When anything happens, they send out multiple fire trucks, ambulances, and police cars. Most of them had left by the time we took the picture.

Streetcar emergency

We mentioned our zone conference we had a couple of weeks ago. The pictures finally came in so you can see President and Sister Scott, from Eden, Utah on the second row.

Ossington Zone - and visitors

Next week is election time. There are posters on almost every house. We don't understand Canadian politics, but here are some of the campaign posters. Elder Sitton mentioned seeing a Communist poster one time and thought is was a joke. No, Elder Sitton, they are here in Canada.

There are a lot of advertisements attached to power poles all over town. The missionaries but up flyers for ESL on poles like this. When the ads are removed, the staples stay in the pole.

Staples in power pole

Watch out, big brother is watching you!

By the blog you may wonder if we do any missionary work. The answer is, "we don't know", We work in the mission supply room each Monday (even if there is little to do), We prepare an institute lesson on Tuesdays then teach ESL Tuesday evening. We have zone and district meetings on Wednesdays. We have our institute class on Thursday evenings. Friday is our preparation day when we (hopefully) get to see sites Toronto. We have ESL again on Saturday mornings and church (with extra meetings added in) on Sunday. Meanwhile Sister Wheeler has Portuguese lessons on Monday and Thursday. You have seen pictures of most of these activities so there is nothing new. In between the scheduled events we may teach a lesson to investigators, visit less active members, help the Elders and Sisters, and ride around on the bus and subway talking to people who don't want to talk to us. Elder Germann in zone meeting talked about the "walk of shame" when you sit down by someone on the bus who completely ignores you, you then get up and move to another seat on the bus (if there happens to be one) and try talking to someone else.

On Monday we got a call from Elder Gay (the CES missionary) who wanted help giving a blessing to a girl from their ward at Mt. Sinai hospital in Toronto. She has sickle-cell anemia with a poor prospect in life. She has to have a transfusion about every two weeks. After the blessing we went to a small Greek restaurant for a late lunch. There was even stuffed cabbage leaves that Elder Wheeler could eat.

Some of the ward members like to hang out at the church when other activities (like ESL) are going on. Victor is a new Spanish convert, Kelly a lifelong member. We wish the new Portuguese members could integrate so well.

Victor and Kelly dancing the salsa

 On Thursday we had plans for lunch with the Spanish sister missionaries and Maria (who is working with Sister Wheeler on a special piano number). We searched out the 17 restaurants close by, but ended up having a very nice salad (and pizza the Hermanas brought) in our apartment.

On Friday we took the subway to the end of the line (at least to the next to the last stop) to see Montgomery Inn museum. We got there about noon and it didn't open until 1:00 PM so we found a nice fish-and-chip place that was able to accommodate Elder Wheeler's diet. We get free museum tickets for certain small city museums. 

Sign board

Sister Wheeler at the inn

Inn parlor

Inn tavern

Community bed room

While we were there we learned that they were going to have the Toronto Early Music Fair at the Inn on Saturday where they would be performing Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque music. We caught the subway between conference sessions and were able to listen to a sample of the performances and make it back to the chapel for the afternoon session of conference (4 PM). There are a lot of nice activities in Toronto that we don't know about nor have time to attend. 

Sine Nomine ensemble plays medieval music

Lawn bowling club of Etobicoke by Montgomery Inn

Another week has gone and we are now in our fifth month (according to the 18-month calendar Andrea gave us for our mission). We were told to find out our talents and use them for our mission. Elder Wheeler says he is a good muddler, so we are muddling along.