Some People We’ve Learned to Love in Germany

Among the great blessings of being missionaries, we number the opportunity to work with people who become real friends. We have appreciated our friends here in Germany so much that we have decided to dedicate a few Blog posts to them.
Our friends fall into three main groups: First are the members of our ward with whom we worship weekly. In our ward there are people born in 23 different countries. Some of them have come to Frankfurt to work for the church. Among these folks we have some really good friends, and we will post a little information about several of them.
The second category includes those who, like us, are here as missionaries on a temporary assignment filling some need. None of these are spending all of their time teaching investigators, but none are involved in unimportant work.
The third group includes several church service missionaries – people who are called to spend a little time each week in service in some special type of assignment. The ones we have come to love are all involved in Genealogical work. Some are assigned to run Family History Centers, providing help to those who are trying to research their family lines. Others are called to provide support to anyone who is having trouble using the Church’s resources – particularly the computer programs like FamilySearch or Indexing. We’ve had assignments to work with these people on several occasions, and we have developed a friendship that we value very highly.

Some Friends from our Ward
On New Year’s Eve we invited Damaris Schwock (pronounced Dau-ma-reece’ Shvock) to our home to have dinner with us. Her children were with their father, but we enjoyed the evening with Damaris. She was born and raised in Mindanao, Philippines, somewhere close to Cagayan de Oro. She met her husband-to-be, a German, in the Philippines and married him there, but then they moved to Germany. They had two beautiful children, a girl named Janine—who is now 13 yrs. old, and a boy named Yannic—who is now about 10 yrs. old. Later the marriage ended in a divorce and Damaris has had to raise her children mostly by herself, but she is doing it well. She is now working for the church in the Finance Center.
At some time in their life Damaris and her children were introduced to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Damaris was baptized, with the children following when they were old enough. They are very pleasant people, very active in our ward, and are a great asset to the Lord’s Kingdom.
At dinner Damaris told this interesting experience she and her children had. About 3 years ago she was planning to take her children to the Philippines to enjoy Christmas time together with her family. She called her family to find out if she could buy presents for them in the Philippines when they arrived. Her family informed her that there were so many people in their town that were out of work and hungry that if she would bring money to buy some food to share they would be very happy.
So the thought caught in her mind and Damaris asked people at her work and her ward if they would be willing to donate some money to be used to buy food for the hungry people of her town in the Philippines. They were able to collect more than 360 Euros, which is about $600 U.S. dollars, to take with them.
When she and the children arrived in the Philippines they went to the Bishop or Branch President of the town and asked how they could use this money best to buy food for some of the poor in the area. It was worked out that they could buy enough rice, canned goods and other foods to feed 120 families a good Christmas meal. So the food was purchased then Damaris, her children, many ward members and missionaries got together to divide the food into 120 packets. The group was then divided into four groups to go out and carol to the families and give them the food packets. It turned out each group would have 30 packets to deliver to needy families.
Sister Schwock’s group was assigned to go to the poorest Shanty-town area. The plan was to have the group go up to a house, sing two or three carols then give them the packet of food. However, the people in the Philippines have the same problem with caroling groups that we have here in Germany and even in Ohio. Most caroling groups are asking for money. Damaris saw these poor people scurrying around in their small, sometimes cardboard or tin houses looking for any small coins to give to the carolers. She felt they were offering their very last bits of money. But when the carolers said “no” to the money and then gave the family a bag of food instead, many of the people had tears in their eyes. It may have been the first good food in days or weeks.
Damaris also told us of the very deep concern she had for her children. She was so happy they loved being a part of these efforts to fix up and give away so much food to many people who needed it, but she had foolishly forgotten the danger she put her children in. They were technically foreigners in Mindanao and so could easily have been kidnapped and held for ransom in that Shanty town. She kept her children very close to her and Heavenly Father protected her and them for their generous efforts to help so many of His children in need. They experienced the great joy of freely giving.

Sister Erika Vollath (pronounced Foe-lot) is a lovely, kind and very intelligent member of our ward, who must be in her 80’s now. She is a widow and a dedicated temple worker in the Frankfurt Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, serving there three days a week. After her husband’s death she moved to Friedrichsdorf so she could be close to the Frankfurt temple and attend often, eventually becoming a temple worker.
The day after New Year’s Sister Vollat invited us (Elder & Sister Howlett) along with four Senior sister missionaries attending our ward, to come to dinner. She served a delicious traditional meal of Bratwursts and sour kraut, with bread stuffing balls and potato meal dumplings. There were multiple desserts including a fresh fruit cocktail mix with almond meal cake. It was a very beautiful meal on precious china with beautiful silverware. However, the best part of the evening was the “Germutlichkeit” or socializing and “table talk” after the meal. The Germans very much love this time after their meals to just sit and enjoy talking together, as we did that night. Americans seem to usually be in too much of a hurry to just sit and socialize like that.
Sister Vollat speaks very good High German and understands and speaks English quite well. She is one of the teachers for our missionary German language class. In this time of social conversation we talked about many things, but we soon got her talking about her life. She was born and raised in Austria in a good Catholic family. Though her father never went to church he was a very good Christian and taught his children to believe in and follow God.
During her discussion she also told of how on Christmas Eve her father would always decorate their Christmas tree with white ornaments, white candles and fiberglass angel hair. The children would be invited in with “oohs and aahs” and they would all sing carols together, after which her father would read the Christmas story from the book of Luke. They then opened their presents, on Christmas Eve. It was a very special memory for her.
As she was growing up and going to Parochial schools, she used to be the “Conscientious Objector” in many of the discussions in the religion classes. She said one day her religion teacher was speaking about the Holy Trinity - the three in one God. She raised her hand and said, “I don’t believe in that!” The teacher said he would talk to her after class, but when he did, he couldn’t convince her that God was the Father & the Son & the Holy Ghost all in one. She knew it didn’t make sense. Sister Vollat was and still is a very interesting soul.
Later she married Colomann Vollat and he became very well trained at working in Public Affairs for different companies. Eventually a company in Munich, Germany convinced him to move there and work for them. The Vollats now had a son and the family moved from Austria to Munich, Germany where her husband did very well financially.
It was in Germany that the family was found by missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints while they were tracting, and when Sister Vollat heard the Gospel she knew it was true. Her husband, however, had reasons why he did not want to join the church nor did he want his wife to do so. After a time of refusals and her praying about it, she finally went to her husband and told him that if he wouldn’t let her join the church then she would just have to divorce him and let him go on alone without her. He considered that challenge and finally decided he did not want to lose her, so he allowed her to be baptized. Her son in time became a member too, and his father came to some of the church activities and enjoyed them, but never joined the church. After her husband’s death, Sister Vollat, her son and her son’s wife went to the temple and did the temple work for their husband/father. An LDS friend told Sister Vollat after the temple sealing session, “Now you are really married!” They were very happy to have this work done for their beloved husband and father. She and her son have also done the work for her parents and many ancestors. So, we see with prayer and determination, one can accomplish many goals.

Another couple who have become dear friends are Anna Marie and Evert Koning. They were born as citizens of Holland, but both were born in Java when that country was a Dutch colony. Shortly after we came to Germany we told a little about our experiences in the Pacific, and Sister Konig wanted to talk to us about them. In the conversation, we learned that she had been in Java (one of the long islands stretching across near the equator to the North-West of Australia) during the Japanese occupation. As many of you know, we have been interested in the events of that time because of a book we read in Tonga called “A Town Like Alice” that tells of women and children who were Japanese prisoners during that war. That book, by Nevil Shute, told of a party of women who were never put into a prison camp – just kept marching across the country. In the story, a prisoner of the Japanese who was from Australia tried to help them, and was crucified by the Japanese for it. When all of the Japanese guards died, they settled in a little village and became workers there – no longer the privileged wealthy, but the ones working in the rice fields. This book is one that is on a list of most-recommended books in English. We really enjoyed it.
Because Anna Marie and Evert were both children at that time, they had both been in Japanese prison camps. We were very interested to be able to talk to people who had lived through those times. After the war with Japan ended, the local inhabitants of Java rebelled and became independent of the Dutch, so the survivors went elsewhere to live. Both of the families in this case went back to Holland, where these two eventually met and married. They later learned about and joined the church after which Brother Koning was hired to work for the church headquarters here in Germany. (All of this must be another beautiful story to tell!) They raised their family in the church and most are very active members, with the Konings being a great asset to our ward and stake. Their son-in-law, Sascha Shilling, is a very caring, spiritual man and was the bishop of our ward when we first arrived. He is happily teaching Primary. His wife, Joyce, grew up while the Konings were living in a Church housing community, where most of the American general authorities lived with their families while their fathers were serving in the Church here in Frankfurt. Joyce became friends with the American children in the community, so she learned to speak very good American English, in addition to her fluent German language. Her parents, Brother and Sister Koning, also get along well in English, German, Dutch, and even a little Javanese. They are very special people and have a wonderful family.

During December Sister Koning loaned us some books to read. Two were historical books covering the Japanese prison camp era. One of these is titled: As I Have Loved You by Kitty de Ruyter. It is the true story of Dutch family that survived, The mother and children eventually came to America, and the daughter, who authored the book, joined the Church. The book was a written version of talks she had been asked to give to church audiences. The second book also told of the same events, but was written as a history book. It is titled The Forgotten Ones-Women and Children Under Nippon by Shirley Fenton Huie. A search on the Internet will shows that there is a lot of historical material available covering this era. The Konigs also loaned us a book, which is the 1970 PhD dissertation of Gilbert Scharffs called Mormonism in Germany. It chronicles the beginnings and growth of the LDS Church in Germany up to 1970 and is very interesting, though quite out-dated now. It explains a lot about why Church members acted as they did during the first Mission period when Elder Howlett was in Germany. Our conclusion is that the more you know about the people you are working with, the easier it will be to be effective.

Another very interesting person in our ward is Herr Professor Doctor Karl Gottfried Brun-Otte. He is currently our extremely talented ward organist, who enjoys adding a few musical enhancements of his own to all of the hymns he plays. He is now a freelance musician, composer, instructor in organ, piano, violin, flute, singing and electronic music to name a few. He has a long list of places he has worked, including several universities and institutes and is very well educated and a philosopher with a burning desire to learn. As a young man in our ward put it, “He is a genius!” However, he is also a very interesting person to meet and talk to. He is “large in stature”, with a beard to match, and he dresses very well in his three piece suits each Sunday with his tailor-made, colorful and unique ties which each must be 8 to 10 inches wide. Brother Brun-Otte also has a booming voice, and when he speaks he always turns the microphone away from him because everyone can hear him well without the use of the Mic.
He used to be a Catholic priest and has told of the time he and another priest were assigned to attend the open house of the Frankfurt Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as representatives of the Catholic Church. He did not want to go, but the two were obedient to the assignment. As they completed the tour of the temple, having learned about the extensive work being done for the dead, this other priest, who was elderly and Brother Brun-Otte’s superior, turned to him and said that they were in the wrong church. His superior stated that he, himself, was too old to make a change now, but since Brother Brun-Otte was still young he ought to investigate this church. This is what Brother Brun-Otte did and he has now been a member for many years. In response to a promise he made, he went to the temple and did the work for the other priest with whom he had filled that important assignment.
He is a gifted organist and has even traveled to Salt Lake City and played the Tabernacle organ. Though he is an older man now, he recently married and is very happy with his new bride.