Hey All!

Shane at Brother Iancu's farm just outside Bacau, Romania

Hey everyone, so first off I want to throw this out there, I realize that Dad will be working and there's a good chance that no one will even read this in time, but Elder Schanck told me it would be ok if I tried Skyping today, and made sure I used a computer with a working microphone. He said he felt really bad that none of you were able to hear me, especially since he was on a computer that had a working microphone. He said if I had gone over and asked him he would have gotten off sooner. I had just assumed that he would get off when he was done. Anyway, it was all just a miscommunication, so I will be calling you again at 8:00/8:30pm my time, which should be 10:00/10:30am your time back in California. Again, I realize that you will probably read this too late, but I figure it's worth a try. If not, I'm still really gratefull that I could at least see and hear you, even if you coudn't hear me, and I really enjoyed todays emails! That conference sounds like it was really awesome mom!! I'm really glad you were able to go to that. I've never heard of advanced readers copies or whatever that was, sounds interesting.


So yeah, Bacau is way different than Cluj haha. The branch has over 60 members and has been open since the early '90's but today there are 5 or 6 active members. There definitely is a much different spirit in a small branch like this. It's unlike anything else I've ever experienced. It's interesting because there's a certain closeness between the members, yet at the same time they all keep there distance and have their own seperate lives outside of church. But there is definitely a lot of love to be felt from the members. 

LDS  Church building, Bacau, Romania
This is where Shane attends church!

One of them, Brother Ishtok (I figured from now on whenever there is a 's' or 't' sydilla I will just write it phoenetically) who is in his late 30's or early 40's is spending this week at the Kiev Ukraine temple, and it's his first time going to the temple!! He left Sunday afternoon and traveled with a lot of other Romanian members going to the temple. He was soo excited to go, and he's such a good guy! Definitely a prospective branch president sometime in the future. The branch's priesthood is made up of him, Alin who is 32 or 33, Brother Iancu who is I think in his 50's? It's hard for me to tell Romanians' ages. He's married and has a 16 or 17 year old daughter named Alecsandra. Other than that, there are the missionaries.


 Then there are two sisters, Sister Dragomir who is about Fratele Iancu's age, and Sora Profira who's in her 40's I think. And that's the Bacau branch! Right now the zone leaders are working with an investigator who actually has a baptismal date, although it's somewhat tentative. His name is Daniel, he's 17, loves sports, and has been investigating the church for a couple years now. He's actually going to Utah either this month or next month, and will be staying with several different missionaries that had served in Bacau. He's also going to this huge EFY week in July that will be in Germany. He's really excited for that too. Ironically, he's the only youth in this city that's going, and he's not even a member! It will be a really good experience for him though. 


Mom, you asked about C-------, and right now nothing has come out of it -- yet. Actually, I just saw him on the computer when I walked into this internet cafe haha! I didn't talk to him or anything, it looked like he was with a bunch of friends. Technically we do have one investigator right now, his name is Alexu. I don't know if I told you about him, he's the kid that came up to us about a week ago and said we had given him a Book of Mormon. I had never seen him before, and Elder Schanck didn't recognize him either. But, we had a lesson with him, and we're trying to set up a second one. He told us that in the past he used to play basketball and ping pong with missionaries, so to be honest we're not really too sure how interested he is in the church. At least he's getting some good exposure, and hopefully the church holds a good reputation in his mind. One more person who at least knows that we're normal people wooot!! 


Oh yeah, random cool little note, for zone conference this transfer, we will be having a combined conference with the Chishinau (key-she-know) zone, which is in Moldova. Chishinau is the capital of Moldova, and that's where we're going for zone conference onthe 23 and 24! So that's going to be super cool. I'm going to try to get some Russian nesting dolls there for you mom in case I never get a chance to serve in Moldova. Moldova has a lot of Russian influence there, so half the people speak Russian, and half speak Romanian. 


Other than that, not too much new to speak of. Hopefully I'll be able to talk to one of you later today! If not, than it's all good. All right, well, I'm going to try attaching some pictures to this email, I hope they go through!! The first two are Elder Schanck then me when we made a visit with the Marcov's out to Brother Iancu's house. He lives out in the countryside and has a nice little peice of land where he has chickens, cats, a goat, and a couple gardens. The next one is the Vila where we have church, and the last one is of the Easter eggs one of the members made for us. Enjoy! I love you all, and I'll send more pictures next week!

Love, Elder Myers