This past Saturday was the groundbreaking for our new Chapel in Wettswil, Switzerland. Our ward currently meets in an office building that houses a business school here in Zürich. It has actually been really convenient for us since we are about a 10 minute walk from our apartment. Anyway, back to the groundbreaking. We woke up on Saturday morning, opened our apartment curtains and were shocked at the snow storm. Just the week earlier, things had started warming up and blossoms had started to appear on bushes and trees. So, needless to say we were shocked at the sea of white before us. The new chapel groundbreaking was at 10 that morning and we were not sure if it would still happen considering the abysmal weather. There was at least five inches of fresh snow on the ground that hadn't been cleared and we thought the chances of things going as planned were small. Even still, we got no email or phone call confirming a cancellation, and we were up for the adventure, so we headed out. Besides, Nathan was in charge of the cleanup after the ceremony, so just in case we thought we better go.
One nice thing about the amazing trains here in Switzerland is that they run in any weather. So, we boarded our train for the twenty minute ride to Wettswil. The snow was so heavy and continued to get worse as we headed for our destination. There was a total whiteout. We could barely see 30 feet out our passenger train windows and thought for sure that no one would dare drive outside in this weather. And, indeed we saw very few cars on the road.
When we got off the train at our destination in Wettswil it was another 5 minute walk to the future building site. We laughed almost the entire way as we were getting pummeled with snow (despite our umbrella) and the level of it had risen to what appeared to be about a foot. We thought there was no way anyone would have show up.
But of course, we were wrong. As you can see from the pictures below. The event still happened. They had a microphone, chairs, and a table set up. The talks were given, the groundbreaking happened and refreshments were eaten in a parking garage nearby.
We all agreed that perhaps the Lord made this a day that none of us would forget.
Yeah, well the ground was pretty hard that day and the digging did not go very deep!
