Marvelling Over Manchester!

Current number one reason why I love this city!

1. I am emailing from Central library in Manchester: this library is over 500 years old! It looks like a castle and a museum had a baby together and this beautiful, breath-taking, magnificent building was the result!! Stained-glass, marble columns, statues and crests everywhere! There is a chamber choir singing music in a chamber of the library down the corridor. The music is echoing everywhere and is hauntingly beautiful! I love my life!!

I am at awe at the architecture of Manchester! This city is gorgeous! I can barely handle how much I love it here!

So I don't have much to write. Things have been a bit uneventful as my companion has been dealing with lots of illness. We have spent lots of time in the flat doing nothing, so I will just write as much as I can about my experiences in Manchester and the random quirks of my day-to-day life!

Deep Questions of the Soul:

It always seems that Harry Potter weaves himself into at least one of every 5 of my emails! I was holding a wand in a member's home and suddenly Hagrid burst through the fireplace on his motorbike and declared: "Sister Martin, yer a witch!"

Just kidding......I wish! (Nerdy childhood dreams!!!)

After I had pretended to do a couple of spells on my companion (Ridiculous!) I wondered out loud. Could a wizard commit suicide, or would the wand not allow him to do it because the wand chooses the wizard (is the wand like your friend/soul-mate because it chose you?! Would it let you do something like that to yourself?!) You may laugh at my weird ponderings, but you have to admit that now you are curious too!!!!

Likening the scriptures to.....Twilight?!

We were playing a game with our district where we randomly would flip open to a page in the scriptures and we would have to relate the scripture we found to a favourite movie. My Tongan friend decided to use Twilight. I was doubtful at how this would work, but I was very impressed when I realized that the concept of Vampires and eternal life fit perfectly together!

Mind. Blown.

I'm still not a huge Twilight fan, but I had to give her credit for finding the link between eternal life in heaven with our resurrected bodies and perfect vampires that never die.

Canadian Invasion:

This week I got really excited when I started noticing Canadian poppies appearing around the city. (English poppies are different. They wear paper ones, whereas we wear the nice velvet ones with the pin in it). I asked someone if they had gotten it from Canada and she excitedly replied- these are new ones! They just stared selling them!!!!

I laughed and felt proud! I told her how those are the poppies I have been wearing my whole life. She was amazed and said that everyone has been thinking that they are these brand new models that have just come out! That was my 2-second patriotic moment of the week! Seeing the Canadian poppy all over the city :)

The Curry Mile:

This is my new favourite part of Manchester! So on Oxford Road in Manchester, there is a famous part of the street known as the Curry Mile. It is literally a whole mile of nothing but Indian curry houses and Indian clothing and jewelry stores. There has to be at least 60 curry restaurants in that one mile! So crazy! Something unique I thought you would find interesting!

I wonder how these curry shops stay open though with all the competition! That may be the new 8th mystery of the world!

Lame joke of the week:

What do dinosaurs make their hot dogs out of?

Jurassic PORK!

:)

Your weekly kick in the trousers:

Next time you are complaining about being too tired to go to the gym, just think of this next thing that I am going to tell you!

There is a 94 year old lady in our ward, and she must be the strongest old lady I have ever met. She gets up and down from her chair faster than me!!!!!

This lady climbed Mount Snowdon (the highest peak in the UK I believe) 2 years ago!!!!!

Seriously! That would be like a 92 year old going out and doing the Grouse Grind!!!!

Some food for thought next time you are too lazy to walk 5 seconds down the road to pick up your milk from the corner store! Amazing!!

My new rapper name:

Yes! I know! I had a whole discussion a few months ago about what my rapper name was. But I have an even better one now.

I can't believe it took me all these months to realize how perfect this name was for me:

So all the elders constantly joke and call me Eminem (pronounced like the candy M&M). For those who are not educated in the rap world, Eminem is a famous rapper. Famous mainly because he is probably the only white person ever to have a rapping career.

My light bulb moment of the week. My first name starts with the letter E.

My new rapper name?

E-M&M

(EMM= the acronym for the England Manchester mission)

Yup! That just happened! Let your mind be blown!!!!

:) 

Anyways! That is all I have to say today! I'm off to go shopping and take 2 trillion pictures of this beautiful city!!!!!!!!!

I love you all!

Hope the time goes quickly for you and slowly for me!

(Gulp! It really did go quick for you! Where did my mission go?!?!?)

Love Sister Martin :)