Made it to Albania

My parents received an email from the mission president in Albania informing us of his arrival.

"As you can see from the attached photograph, your son arrived safely here in Tirana. He's shown here with my wife and me in our living room following dinner in the mission home in Tirana. He is a bit tired, wrinkled and overwhelmed by the cultural shock of landing here. Everyone's luggage arrived at the same time they did!! (which is highly uncommon). He seems excited to get to work and to be assigned to his new companion. We will assign him tomorrow afternoon to his trainer, a special dedicated missionary called to that important position. But rather than wait until then to let you know he arrived safely, we thought you might be anxious to know that he didn’t get lost in transit and that he did arrive and that all is well. Earlier today, I had a wonderful interview with him, we got him registered with the American Embassy. We just had dinner, and he and his companions are off to get some rest. We will send you another short note tomorrow with all of his addresses, the name of his companion and any other information that will hopefully make you comfortable about his status.

We have had the wonderful opportunity of spending more time with your son and getting to know him a little better. Your son is still functioning in another time zone, but jet lag will pass quickly for him. Elder Seevers is doing well with the language and is talking to people in the street already. This morning, we took our new missionaries to the Mother Albania Statue and Park, a memorial to the heroes of Albania during the second world war, overlooking the city of Tirana. This is where Albania was dedicated for the preaching of the Gospel in April of 1993 by Elder Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve. We had a short service there where we read together the dedicatory prayer, which is beautiful and becoming fulfilled in amazing ways. After prayer and thoughtful consideration, we have assigned him to work with Scadden, in Tirana. Your son’s companion is a great missionary who has earned the opportunity to be a trainer by his dedicated service here in Albania. I am sure that your son will be able to learn much from him. He will also learn to rely on the Spirit to guide him daily. He will grow in ways that you can’t imagine.

There is no mail delivery in Albania other than post office boxes, so our Office Secretary goes to the post office twice a week to pick up the mail and packages. We have found that US Priority mail is the least expensive and fairly rapid option (2 weeks), and US Express mail is the quickest (4-5 days) and the packages are actually delivered to our doorstep. The following address covers post office delivery, as well as delivery to the doorstep for US Express mail and other courier services:


Elder Seevers

Fondacioni Liahona

PO BOX 2984

Rr Qemal Stafa Vila 1

Përballë Postës 22

Tirana, Albania


We find that many items are sent that can also be purchased here and the costs are very high to ship, so discuss with your missionary what they really need to receive.