Hello everyone! Thanks for the email mom, wow give a big thanks to the Poppa's and Nana and Poppa Graham! I still have to buy some gloves, scarf and a hat. It is soooo cold here!!!! It's been -6 or -8 C wich I think is somewhere in like the 20's F. So the plane ride was super long, and I've been getting over the jet lag the last few days, but it's not too bad. So as the the money question - where I'm serving? I'm in Cluj right now, and my companion is Elder Clonts. He's a cool guy, he's from Thatcher Arizona, and he's been out for about a year and a half. He's been a lot of help to me and a great trainer. Oh and yes my pday is on monday. although today we have to do our email's in the morning because we have a zone christmas party at the church all day today, so we don't really get a pday today haha. So far I love it here! Its kinda hard to understand people - when I was at church yesterday I was trying to talk to this investigator after sacrament. He was asking about how many missionaries are in Cluj and what parts of the city we preach in and I was having a hard time following what he was saying so he points to his son and says something like just speak english to him and then he'll translate for you haha. oh man I felt so dumb but it was funny! Most of the younger people here know a fair amount of English.
My first day in Bucarest was crazy! We went to the Church office, got our pictures taken, met the elders who were going to go out contacting that night, and had a quick little medical exame, basically the doctor just asked if we were healthy and stuff like that. so then that night Elder Tefft and I went out with Elder James and Elder Ransom who were actually in the group ahead of us in the MTC, so it was fun to see them again. We didn't end up doing much contacting because we only had a couple hours and we couldn't find an ATM with cash so we could buy dinner haha. Our plain got in late so their whole schedule got kinda messed up. The next day we went to the mission home, had breakfast and interviews with President Lundberg, then went to this park on top of this hill made out of a bunch of rocks where the dedicatory prayer was given, and we read the prayer out loud. Then we went back to the mission home where Pres told us who our companions are and where we were going, and we were off! I had a 10 hour train ride from like 6 to 4:30 from Bucarest to Cluj. First time on a train with beds and everything, that was pretty cool!
So about Cluj: It's in Transylvania (of course), it's actually a pretty good sized city, although not nearly as big as Bucarest. I don't really know any numbers for like population and stuff like that...but anyway, there are four Elders, and then a senior couple serving here. Elder Clonts and my area is basically half the city, and the public transportation isn't very good so we walk pretty much everywhere. The city is kind of in the foothills of I guess the Transylvanian Mts (I don't really know that's a total guess.) so the terrain is a kinda hilly. There's a good amount of snow here which is awesome! I love snow haha! As far as lessons and stuff goes, we've had 8 lessons so far, which have all been pretty cool! Some of them were with some new potential investigators we found block nocking. One is this old man named Ioan who seemed pretty interested in the BoM and restoration, he asked us why God lets bad things happen to good people so we (meaning Elder Clonts. I'm mostly there for moral support haha.) talked to him about agency, and stuff like that. We've also had a couple lessons with some recent converts, they're both 15/16 year old girls from different families, and weve been giving them the new member lessons. So as for the language, some of the members who have heard me speak said that I speak very well for being a boboc. (baby duck. that's what they call greenies) and my companion says that I speak pretty well too, so that's encouraging! As for understanding whats going on, most the time I can kinda figure out what people are talking about but it takes a lot of focus and energy to follow along. By the end of the day my brain is totally fried!
Yeah, so things are going pretty well, I'm loving it here in Romania! things are really different from America, but I think its so cool that I have this opportunity to learn about a culture that's different from my own. So far I haven't really been hit by too much culture shock, I'm just kinda taking things as they come, but everything's super different for sure! Oh one thing - the juice here is amazing!!! So I hope I will get that christmas package at the party today, and a big Merry Christmas to everyone back in good ol' Cali! One quick thing, I got an email from Heather (which I absolutely loved) but she was asking if I can email back, which sadly i cannot. :( So if someone could let her know that I will be writing her a letter asap. actually I think she usually reads these on the blog, so yeah ok. Hi Heather! lol. and also if you could forward this to my MTC teachers, their addresses are: Christina.Petrisor@gmail.com, alex.jepson@gmail.com, ctrben@gmail.com, robbieirion@gmail.com, steveyboy408@gmail.com
Ok thanks so much!! Oh yeah and about Christmas- so i found out that we are allowed to skype so if you want to try to set that up, then that would be cool. other wise a phone call will be awesome! I figure I could call at like 7pm for me, which is....10am for you guys allright well I gotta go, I'm already over my time limit! I love you all, Merry Christmas!
Elder Myers
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