Mother's Day phone call

Dallin's trainer, Elder Bryant from Evanston, Wyoming. The city behind him is Tampere where they are currently serving.


You can read more about his companion on his family's blog happilyforeverfromwy.blogspot.com.


The following are notes we took from our call with Dallin on Mother's Day. He told us a lot about his missionary service.






Phone conversation with Dallin Paul Quinn
10 May 2009 Tampere, Finland

Our phone call with Dallin on Mother’s Day was awesome, he sounded so great! He and Elder Bryant are working hard, when they get a few minutes they enjoy talking about Wyoming cowboys.

Elder Bryant is a district leader. There are only two zones in the mission (Helsinki and more of the northern part of the country). Dallin gets to travel a little with Elder Bryant and really enjoys that. He was excited to visit the cities of Turku (zone conference) and Vassa (for splits) next week. There are only about 57 missionaries in the mission. All Dallin’s mail is sent to the mission office in Helsinki and then they slap a sticker on it that day and send it on to Dallin. The mail is very efficient there.

The country is beautiful with a lot of pine trees. He has seen a few cold days that he has worn his coat, one day both layers of his coat and he was still cold!

The people are great! He said they dress a little more ‘out there’, with fluorescent colored clothes (and hair). Everyone has a cell phone including children, and the technology is amazing! He said the Elders quorum president was reading from a conference talk off his phone. Each companionship has a cell phone.

They get around the city mostly walking or riding the bus with a pass. He said they got on the buss the other day and it was beeping at him. He couldn’t understand that the driver was trying to tell him there was no money left on his pass(that is when it's nice to have a companion who can speak the language).

The big questions, how is the language? He loves the language, but still understands very little of what people are saying. He said at church today he caught a word here and there, but didn’t understand one complete sentence. (He read some scriptures in church and said it was very entertaining). But he is being patient and studying hard. He said he and his companion speak the language all but two days a week, although he doesn’t get through a day without saying something in English. He said the other night his companion was speaking Finnish in his sleep. Dallin looks forward to that day:).

He said they have plenty of money for their food and needs. He thought they got around $180 or $190 Euros a month, which is (I think) about $250 dollars. He loves the food and told us about the amazing crackers, breads (rye) and raspberry soup-like dessert with vanilla cream.

They eat with the members about once a week and had just had an amazing Mother’s Day meal with the counselors family, the Peltola family. He thought the ward had about 80 active members and most of them could speak English. Some only speak English.

The go to church in an old factory because some kids set fire to the chapel last year and burned it down. Dallin’s house is right across the street from the hole in the ground where the old chapel use to be. There are plans to build a new four story chapel to be complete in 2010.

He said they usually track about two hours a day, from 6-8 pm. Many of the people live in apartment buildings that are four to nine stories high. The rest of the day, when they don’t have appointments they walk thru the city and say to people, ‘excuse me’. Then they start to teach with something like, ‘we have a Heavenly Father who loves us’, then whether they get a response or not they testify thus inviting the spirit in to testify. He said this is a great way to find the elect because they will feel the spirit and be interested.
He said he loves testifying because that is what he is good at and learned in the MTC. Sometimes he can tell what they say back to him:). He said he knows, 'NO and I’m busy', in Finnish.

He told us a little more about Petri, the man who stopped them and asked for something to read about the church. He is about 30, single and lives in a different city so they only get to meet and teach him about once a week.

The lady, Leila is in her 70’s and Dallin said she needs some hand surgery but will then be baptized.

Dallin had a few questions for us. He was concerned about Swine Flu and the economy. He also asked about his friends who are serving missions.

Dallin was very upbeat and happy. He says he eats good and exercises every day (he hasn’t gained any weight). He loves being a missionary and sharing the “good news’ with the Finnish people.