WEEK 27

Up. Sandwich. Down.

MARTI 17 IANUARIE (Tuesday)
Okay so first thing Tuesday morning we had interviews with President Ivory via the internet! My interview went really well. Lots of good takeaways and he also said to prep myself to have younger companions... yikes. That sounds terrifying. But after interviews we were visiting a member who lives way out in the middle of nowhere. Thankfully there was a Mcdonalds on the way to the middle of nowhere so we stopped and grabbed lunch. When we got to the middle of nowhere (we took a bus) we found a bunch of pigs digging through the dumpster and they were so cute, but also kinda smelly! 

Then our lesson with a member named Sora Kiss. She's Romanian, but her name isn't. In Romanian it would be spelled Chiș and it's pronounced keesh. But she is super great. Then we had to rush to the church to prepare for English class. Then we taught English. Then Sora Vann and I were both feeling kinda mehhh so we laid on the floor in the church for a good ten minutes. Then we went home and I laid on the floor there and took a nap before dinner. Sora Vann took a picture of me.

MIERCURI 18 IANUARIE (Wednesday)
We did language study at a cute bookstore and then had lunch at KFC (I ate so much fast food this week it's ridiculous. Nu mai pot. (which means:  I can't anymore.) Then we went to go see the book binding man! He leather-binds any book you want, so most missionaries get books bound by him. I put in my copy of Jesus the Christ and my Romanian triple (Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, Pearl of Great Price), so in a few weeks I'll send pictures. They're gonna be GORGEOUS. 

This is Sora Vann's

We also block knocked on Wednesday. A lady was coming out of her apartment building as we were trying to get in and she was asking us "Who are you here to see what number what's their name blah blah blah" and like... we were just there to knock on doors, so we kinda pretended we didn't speak Romanian and didn't understand her questions. She just walked away rolling her eyes and let us in haha. Then we went home and packed because we were flying to Bucuresti for exchanges! We took the bus to the airport around 5:30. Our plane left at 7. 

It's only a 45 minute flight AND YOU GET A FREE SANDWICH. Basically it's just take off, get your sandwich, and then land. Such a short flight.

 Then we caught a cab to the STL's apartment in Buc. They're so great :) Sora Falkenberg and Sora Stanley. 

JOI 19 IANUARIE (Thursday)
I did my exchange with Sora Stanley. So we got on the tram to go visit someone and Sora Stanley wasn't paying attention soooo we missed our stop and rode the whole route back to the station we started at. But she thought maybe we just took the wrong tram so we took a different one... nope. First tram was right. So after forever we finally got to the member's house over an hour late. But it was a ton of fun. Sora Stanley is great. Also, it's FREEZING in Buc right now. The snow is knee deep. I thought I was going to die. After the member visit, we went to a restaurant in Centru called Car' Cu Bere. It's traditional Romanian food and it's so good! You can get a traditional 4 course meal for only 23 lei (that's like 5 dollars). Super good. We language-studied in a bookstore and then our other lesson cancelled on us so we went block knocking! I really love block knocking. Even though we had zero success that day, it's always a good time. THEN WE ALMOST MISSED OUR FLIGHT HOME. It took us almost 40 minutes to get a cab. Normally it should take about 5. We got to our gate and 30 seconds later, it started boarding. Then it was just up, sandwich, down, and we took a bus home.

VINERI 20 IANUARIE (Friday)
We had soooo much stuff set up for Frida,y but everyone fell through. So in the morning we had district meeting. Elder Wagner asked us to bring three medium oranges and our blender. So we did and he made us smoothies. Props to Elder Wagner. But it was the most chaotic district meeting ever.  We ended up having to have a talking stick that we passed around so the elders wouldn't yell at each other. Elder Wagner compared it to the conch shell in Lord of the Flies, but they all killed each other in Lord of the Flies.... and we were pretty close to that too. So the ZLs are getting followed around this week by a journalism student. She's making a documentary about Mormon missionaries and she's coming to district meeting on Friday, so this coming week we're literally going to have a meeting on how to have a good meeting before we get filmed. Ha. Should be great. The District: Europe is coming at y'all... be prepared. Anyway, so after that disaster we did some stuff I don't really remember what but then we had GAMES NIGHT! We ended up playing spoons and Elder Cochran CHEATED AND IT WAS AWFUL.  No, but I should have won but he saw my cards and then grabbed MY SPOON AND THEN WE FOUGHT OVER IT AND MY FINGER BLED INTERNALLY.  Then we visited a member who is just super great. She was lecturing us on how important it is to always have a temple recommend even if you can't afford to go to the temple and that's awesome, especially in Romania. then we went home.

SAMBATA 21 IANUARIE (Saturday)
We taught English and after English the ZLs had a lesson with Rares--the guy we found at the mall. He's AWESOME. He is going to go far. Elder Cochran and I dueted on the piano and Sora Vann learned how to play chess. Then we had a lesson with Teo! It went really well. She's not reading the Book of Mormon right now and she said she's frustrated because she's not getting an answer when she prays about the church... and we were just like well Teo you have to read the book! It was just a good lesson. 

DUMINICA 22 IANUARIE (Sunday)
Church was good. I played the piano in relief society again. scaryyy. I almost had to play in sacrament meeting because our pianist wasn't there and Elder Wagner was late...but thankfully he showed up! Then after church we weekly planned and took an afternoon off because Sora Vann is sick right now and when she gets sick it triggers her asthma so she needed to take it easy. 

LUNI 23 IANUARIE (Monday)
WE GOT OUR NAILS DONE! The manicurist made both of our cuticles bleed. She was awful. But the color is pretty! Then grocery shopping, and now emailing. It's been a good day. We only had to run to catch a bus twice. 


Also this week I learned PROSTI! It is basically a Romanian mood/tense that's most commonly used for swearing.... however it's just a different arrangement of the grammar so you can turn any sentence into prosti. I promise I'm not swearing, but now I understand when people swear at me. It's great fun. I found frozen pate last week and it made me think of my mom. Pate is a big thing here. I've never eaten it though.

I started the Book of Mormon on January first and right now I'm on page 350. It was a new copy of just the soft bound English ones and I've been marking every time it talks about people being highly favored or blessed or strengthened by the Lord etc. and it's super cool. I'm reading about the sons of Helaman right now.

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!

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