Ciao!



Fortress at Lipova, Romania

Hey all, I'm writing a little later than usual because we just got back into Arad from a zone p-day trip to this place called Lipova that has a 500 year old fortress! It was awesome! The fortress ruins are situated on top of a huge hill in the mountains overlooking a valley with a large river running through it. It was absolutely gorgeous. Everyone from our zone except for the missionaries in Oradea came, and the two elders in Deva also came, it was super fun.



A--- came along with us too and I had a chance to get to know him better. He's got a pretty interesting life! He went to school and was best friends with Nicolas Cage's son, and has done a lot of traveling. He said he's recorded a couple albums, written a novel, and he said that before he came out to Romania he had tried putting together an orchestra! He's also a really open guy and easy to talk to. He asked a lot of questions about the Book of Mormon, and I explained to him the history of the Book of Mormon and the Joseph Smith's story. He found it all really fascinating and said that he has a friend from LA who is mormon. It was pretty cool and he didn't seem weirded out or awkward at all by the fact that he was spending his day with a bunch of missionaries. On our train ride home back to Arad I thought about talking to Brother Moldovan to see if he's ever offered A--- a Book of Mormon. If not, I'm planning to get one in English, write my testimony in it and give it to him before he leaves. He said He'll probably be in Romania until some time in June.



My exchange in Oradea was really fun. Elder Nilsson actually stayed in Oradea with Elder Newton -- his former companion -- and I brought Elder Newton's companion Elder Sneed back to Arad. Elder Sneed is in his second transfer, and it was really fun working with him for a couple days! He's got an upbeat, positive attitude and loves everything about Romania! At the end of the exchange, I always give the other missionary a commitment - something to work on improving - and I also ask them to give me a commitment for something I can work on. He told me to just smile more and be as positive as I can about every situation! I learned a lot from his example about keeping a positive attitude and always looking for the silver lining in things. Funny enough, that was actually a personal goal I had set the week before - to not get stressed out when things don't work out right, and to keep a more over all positive attitude.

This week we found a new investigator! We haven't been able to meet up with M--- yet, but on Saturday we had a lesson with a man from the English courses! His name is C--- and his 12 year old daughter has been coming to the classes for  a couple years. C--- said that he had wanted to come too, but was always too busy with work until now. He also said that the past few years he's been searching for a church to join. He's born Orthodox but isn't necessarily practicing and knows a lot of people who have joined protestant churches. When his daughter started coming to our English courses she told him that it was held at a church and then he heard what church it was and he was really interested to learn more. Our lesson with him went soooo well and the Holy Ghost was present and strong the whole time. He seems like a really humble man, and he said that he wants to find a church for his family, and that family is the most important thing to him. He took the Book of Mormon, said he would make time to read it and pray about it and come to our church services, and he also said he wants to meet with us as often as possible. He had a lot of really good questions and with each question he posed Elder Nilsson and I were both able to see the ways that he has been prepared by Heavenly Father to receive the gospel. Naturally, we're really excited to meet with him again.

Thank  you for looking up more college info!!!! I looked over the info you sent me about CSU, LA, and I also found some helpful information on the BYU website. I'm still leaning towards BYU at this point, partially because of the financial advantage it has, as well as me having a TON of connections there from my mission, and their music program. I think the only advantage of going to LA or some other southern california school would be living in one of the capitols of the world for music industry and it would give me a lot of networking opportunities. But it would also be a lot more expensive. I looked up cost average for BYU for two semesters that includes averages for housing, books, transportation, meal plans, etc and it was a little over $17,000 for one academic year. Tuition itself was like $4,000-ish for two semesters. Also, Even though the application deadline isn't for a while, I think I'll want to start the application process soon so that I'll never be stressed over deadlines. I also saw that housing for 2013 semesters has already opened up. Some things to think about. Let me know what you think!

Thanks for the pictures, and that's soooo exciting to hear about Carissa and Justin! Wish them luck for me. I'm glad Dad had the oppoturnity to speak at Carissa's farewell, wish I could have been there! I love you all and can't wait to hear back next week! Oh yeah, next week is transfers, so within the next several days we'll find out who's going where. Crazy right? I feel like I just got here! This transfer has flown by!

Love,
Elder Myers



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