ARRIVED

I'm safe even though I look awful after twenty hours of flying.     
(From Sister Ivory's email.)

WEEK 5

Flight Plans

So we fly out of SLC on Monday morning to JFK in New York, and then to Amsterdam, and then to Bucharest. YAYYYYY

On Sunday Sora Anderson and I picked some peppers on our walk to the temple and decided to eat them. It was the hottest thing I've ever tasted in my life but it was fun. I'll send pictures later. At choir on Sunday I gave the closing prayer and when you do that you have to say your name where you're from and where you're going so I did. Then on Wednesday at lunch someone was like Sister Gleason! and I was like hi????? And he was like do you recognize my name???? And it was Christian Rider! from forever ago! He's going to Hawaii speaking Marshallese and he said he figured there weren't many Gleasons in Stockton so I had to be the one he knew. Crazy!
The Nashville Tribute Band came and did the devotional.

On Monday we found out that we had to move because apparently there was something in our ceiling that needed to be fixed that couldn't wait five days until we moved out permanently... so packing up our entire room on Monday night was quite the experience.

Elder Ucedo of the Seventy spoke at the  devotional on Tuesday and it was really good.


Wednesday we got to host again! Way fun. And I finally met some people going to the Modesto mission! I made them write down Weston Ward and my last name so if they ever serve there, they'll say hi. On Wednesday we also finally got our new Italians! Ce bine!!!!! And we didn't even lose anyone at orientation. What a miracle!

This morning we went to the temple and then ate breakfast there. IT WAS HEAVENLY. Definitely worth the $5.80 to avoid eating the MTC food. 

I don't know what else to say. 'Twas a good week. Next time y'all hear from me I'll be in ROMANIA!
On Monday I'll have a new mailing address! If you love me enough to send me stuff all the way to Romania, here it is.

Letters:
Bdul. Primaveril Nr. 19-21 Et. 1, #13
Sector 1
011972 Bucharest
Romania

Packages:  (Have to be addressed to someone else--contact my parents for more information.)
Bdul. Primaveril Nr. 19-21 Et. 1, #13
Sector 1
011972 Bucharest
Romania

Sora Lucy Gleason
România/Moldova Mission
July 2016-January 2018

WEEK 4

There was a Bat and I lost Two Humans

WELL WELL WELL this week was another giant adventure.  I'll start with the first day I can remember which is Saturday.   Really Saturday night though. It was a great day, we got back to our residence hall, I was on my way to the showers, and a police officer starts yelling at me to get back in my room and then a girl asks me if I heard the screams. WHAT? I went back in my room and then a voice comes over the loud speaker telling everyone on the fourth floor to evacuate to the third floor because there was a bat in our hallway. WHAT EVEN? HOW DOES A BAT GET INSIDE OUR BUILDING? 

So we went downstairs and had a fiesta with the Sorellas (Italian speaking sisters) because it was their last Saturday and we love them and also they have like 2348203 bags of tortilla chips and cheese and salsa, so that was an adventure. We all already miss the Italians SO MUCH. 

Then it was Sunday. We had a great relaxing day and then devotional was okay, not the best I've ever been to, but it was okay. I was made a sister training leader on Sunday and they gave me the binder of doom with all of my responsibilities in it and I am not super excited about it but if that where I'm wanted then that's where I'll be.

I have no idea what happened on Monday, other than half of our Italians left and we cried. 

Tuesday was another great day. There was a rumor going around that Elder Holland was speaking at devo and I tried to tell everyone that no, he wasn't, the schedule they saw it on was just for BYU, but they didn't listen, and then were disappointed when Bonnie Oscarson (gen YW pres) came instead. But she was straight up, SUCH  a good speaker. It was really cool. 

On Wednesday we got to host new missionaries! It was crazy fun because 1) We got out of class and 2) We got to walk around without a companion for a while. But, honestly I missed Sora Anderson so much while we were apart, so we hosted together for our last new missionary :) On Wednesday, our Sister Training Leaders and Zone Leaders (Sora Idiart, Varstnicul Perrett, Varstnicul Trottier, and I) had to do new missionary orientation for the new German Zone because they didn't have any old people in their zone who could do it. So our branch presidents coordinated and asked us. It went pretty well....... until Sora Idiart and I LOST TWO OF THE NEW GERMAN SISTERS AND SPENT AN HOUR WANDERING AROUND CAMPUS LOOKING FOR THEM. We felt so bad. We finally found them in their room which they had miraculously found their way back to and apologized for twenty years. It was horrible, haha.

Today is Thursday and I took a nap. We did laundry and then we just slept until it was time to go to the temple.  It was MUCH NEEDED. Tomorrow we get our flight plans! Just 11 days until Romania and I am so excited.

My leg is better now and I'm happy.

Cu drag!

Sora Lucy Gleason

România/Moldova Mission

July 2016-January 2018

WEEK 3

Anderson, Uchtdorf, and Chick Fil A

Well, now that my subject line has piqued your interest, I'm not gonna explain any of it until I get there chronologically. So ya best keep reading!

This week was great. I have some highlights I want to talk about and I'll probably forget a million things but that's okay.

First: Matthew Holland (son of Jeffrey R.) came and did our devotional on Sunday! It was all about the life of Joseph Smith and it was so cool. The choir (btw, I'm in the choir) sang Praise to the Man and it was super duper cool. Then after, we got to watch Ephraim's Rescue which is a pioneer movie. It was a good Sunday. Also, sacrament meeting was fast and testimony meeting and hearing all of the missionaries' testimonies was super great. We're in a branch with all of the Italy missionaries and they're all awesome. 

Sorella Holiday, if you're reading this, Sorella Waltch and Sorella Taylor are heading for Rome next week and they're SUCH great people!

Okay, moving on. On Monday we had just a normal day, nothing special happened. Until dinner. For dinner, we had CHICK FIL A. IT WAS A MIRACLE AND I MIGHT HAVE CRIED A LITTLE BIT. Seriously if you know me at all, you know how obsessed I am with CFA. We had two of our varstnicii sneak some sandwiches out of the cafeteria for us to eat later........ don't tell anyone hahahah. 

Tuesday was another FANTASTIC day. Our favorite teacher Fratele Simmons was there (so it just started on a good note) and then he gave us THE MOST AMAZING NEWS EVER. So our mission is having a mission conference a week after we get there, and guess who's coming? PRESIDENT DIETER F UCHTDORF. I'M GOING TO MEET PRESIDENT UCHTDORF. And there's also a possibility that we'll get to go to Dracula's castle during that first week so that's incredible too. Our whole district is still kind of in shock over the whole thing. It's so cool. Apostles verrryyyyyyy very very rarely ever visit Romania. We're so happy.

Our speaker at the Tuesday night devotional was wonderful too. The devo was broadcast to every MTC in the world because Elder Neil L Anderson came and spoke to us! He talked a lot about miracles and how if we look for them, we'll find them. The message I got from it was really to never put a lid on how God can work through you. Set high expectations and then figure out how to reach them. It was a good day.

On Wednesday (yesterday) during exercise time I met with on of the ATs because my knee has really been bothering me and surprise surprise.... it's hurt again. So does anyone remember how my senior year during softball conditioning I hurt my hamstring and had to quit? Because that's back again. I am not allowed to exercise until Monday and have been given strict orders to stretch it out three times a day, wrap it if it gives me issues, and apply heat/ice during gym time. Yay. But the good news is, I'll be fine. I also got super good at all the sports here, but it doesn't matter 'cause now I can't play them.

My Romanian is getting better and better every day. We're finally learning about grammar so we don't sound like toddlers anymore. That's good. We currently have two investigators, Cristian and Cosmin, as well as two TRC (teaching resource center--basically just talking to Rom/Mld RMs in Romanian) lessons per week. Next week we'll start Skype TRCs with members in Romania. HOW COOL/SCARY IS THAT?

I'm grateful for all of the emails that I got and I'm sorry if I didn't get a chance to reply to you! Send me your mailing addresses if you super wanna hear from me because I get way more time for letters than emails.

Some other highlights from this week: Sora Idiart's mom sent us a ping pong net and paddles and ball so we had a ping pong tournament this morning.

The mom of a girl serving in Romania right now reads my blog and sent my whole district cookies--I'm excited to meet her daughter!

The food is still bad but it's getting better. I had cheese/broccoli soup and a sandwich yesterday and it was good. I got a haircut today

The MTC store doesn't work as well as online shopping for stress relief, but today I bought myself beef jerky and a Romanian hymn book and I feel better.  If anyone would like to send me microwave popcorn, my companion will love you forever. She's been craving it for weeks.

I have to prepare a talk in Romanian this week--should be fun.

My mom sent me 20 pairs of socks and it was honestly the best package ever--thanks mom.

We've accidentally said six Romanian swearwords just because we don't know how to say anything, so that's cool, I guess.  Three of us wrote home about the marker situation last week so we all got markers sent to us.... we have at least fifteen markers now. It's great. the Italians are jealous.

OH YEAH, the Nashville Tribute Band is coming back on our last Sunday here (they were also here on our first Sunday) and we get to sing with them! Look them up; they're great.

For my Stockton friends: do any of you remember Madison Nelson? she lived here awhile ago and went to girls camp with us for a couple years... I saw her last week! She left on Monday for Pennsylvania I think. It was cool to talk to her.

Honestly, I love my district and teachers and everything so much. It's so much fun to be here. I can't think of anything else but y'all are great. Much love!

Sora Lucy Gleason

România/Moldova Mission

July 2016-January 2018

WEEK 2

HOW ON EARTH IS IT ONLY WEEK TWO???

Pictures this week are from a wonderful sister in my district because she
figured out how to make her camera work lol.

This week was fantastic! I have basically zero time so if I don't reply to your personal emails I'm sorry, I'll try to make time for it soon!

I love y'all and this keyboard is jenky so my email wil be full of typos, sorry.

So many things happened this weeek and I don't know how to say all of  them but I'll try. First, there's a lot of marker thievery going on. We started with four markers and then the Italianos stole them all so we had zero. It's really a fun game to go marker hunting so we can actually use our whiteboard. Our markers are all hidden in a tissue box. Speaking of tissue boxes, WE FOUND A KNIFE STASHED IN A TISSUE BOX. We disposed of it and basically saved someones life probably.

I got lots of love this week! Thanks Jessica and Sister Phipps for your packages! They're super appreciated and I love you both.

Notice my lack of packages on this particular day!

Also, Canadian Oreos are 10x better than American ones and that's a fact. Some Canadian Frenchie brought us some and they're DELICIOUS.

What else? Hm. Go look up Will Perrett on Youtube. He was on Australian X Factor and he's in my district! He's the nicest guy. All of our elders are great.

The food here is nasty.

I'm honestly astounded at how good my Romanian is. We're all almost fluent if you count talking like a 3 year old as fluent, which our teachers say counts. So that's cool.

adică, vreau Chick Fil A. eu sunt o misionară pentru la biserica lui Isus Hristos a sfinților din zilele din urmă. sțiu că la biserica este la biserica lui Dumnezeu, și Joseph Smith a fost un profet lui Tatăl Ceresc. Sțiu că tempul este central pentru planul salvurii. familile poate fi totdeauna. 

(Which Google translates says means this:)

ie, I want Chick Fil A. I am a missionary for the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I know the church is the church of God, and Joseph Smith was a prophet of our Heavenly Father. It knows that Temple salvurii central plan. families can be forever.

I love you all and I'm still wanting dearelders! They're FREE! also shoutout to Jill Fritchen and Adam Johnson for your dearelders. y'all rock. 

I think thats it! Stay safe and be happy :)

Sora Lucy Gleason

România/Moldova Mission

July 2016-January 2018