Hristos a inviat. Adevarat a inviat

From April 13, 2015

So. Romanian Easter. 

This week, my comp was SICK. Woke up Tuesday with fever, chills, and basically was couch ridden with bathroom trips every 10 minutes. It was epic. 

I got a lot of reading in and thinking time. We made it a decent time. I had fun at least. I just kept Elder Reed laughing as much as possible, he fired it back. So it was solid. He wasn't, if you pick up what I'm putting down there.

We live on the top floor of our building and the windows in our apartment are like on the slanty ceiling/wall that goes right out to the roof. So I went out on the roof on a little flat part and chilled in the sun a bunch, The weather here is sooo nice. 

Winter was loooooong and cold. I forgot what it was like to go out without a jacket and hearing people running around/laughing. Seeing colors on the trees etc. The city is alive now and it is incredible. 

The mountains still have little frosty tips and we can see them from our place. It is nice. I miss hiking though! Hope we can get out there somehow someday.

I also taught myself how to make ciorba too. It is gooooooood stuff.

So we had a cool Easter Activity on Saturday. 

Mowed the grass at the church and set it up. Then we played some games and fired up the grill. Charcoal here is so hard to get going, haha. But this awesome member Marius moved back from Germany/France and is the coolest dude ever. He straight up found some wood and just built a fire on top of the charcoal and then let it get going. We went hard bbq'ing some mici and made a huge pot of Ciorba. Then we feasted. It was the bomb. Everyone was stoked, the weather was perfect and the food was good and Romanian. 

The church has a sick new video out for Easter too, so we had a cool spiritual section watching that and talking about the Life, Atonement, and Ressurection of the Savior.

The plan of happiness man, how can you not get STOKED about it? 

We went to the Orthodox Celebration for Easter at the big cathedral in Centru. Everyone was gathered around the church, everybody brings a candle. The Priest dudes in their robes all go in the church where there is a flame going, they bring out some lit candles and everyone lights it and passes their flame to everyone so the crowd slowly lights up from the center of the crowd by the front of the church. It is really pretty cool. 

Sunday was awesome too. Just had sacrament meeting so people could go spend time with their families for Easter. Then spent some time hanging out with Eugen, he just talked about pokemon and stuff forever. It was pretty cool though. He was happy, so we were happy.

Here in Romania, we harvest in a lot of different ways. So many people think that missionary work is all investigators and contacting and baptisms. It's a big part, and we always work towards it. But especially here I have a bigger focus on members and how the branch is operating. Now there is a new found spirit and excitement in the branch. It always starts with the missionaries and how their attitude works. PLUS there has to be something solid for people to come into, or else the foundation will wash away again and they will just be another name on the list that nobody knows anything about. So, it's not always just all about how many baptisms, the work goes forward in a lot of other ways.  

Today is incredible, weather is 10/10. I missed the sunshine. Centru here is so beautiful and everyone is just running around havin a blast. It is the bomb. 

My new comp is Elder Kennedy. He's just a little younger than me in the mission. I hear the kid is hilarious so I am stoked for it. We are going to do solid work. Sibiu is the bomb right now.

Life is gooooood! The weather is awesome. We go down to Bucuresti tomorrow morning and will be back Wednesday.  Elder Reed is going home. I will miss him but it's always fun when they are going home.  They are wise and productive and that usually makes it a good time.  

Spring is incredible. Nothing like it in Romania. The city is back to life and everyone is out in the city. Families all over etc. 

- Elder Boydstun