How are you? I'm doing great. As the title of the email says, SPRING IS COMING! and I am so excited to be done with the cold and the winter. Sometimes the Siberian wind still hits us pretty good, but the sun is out, and pretty soon everything will be in bloom and it will be gorgeous.
This week was a good one, We had zone conference this week which was good, and though we didn't have any baptisms in Galati, there were 4 in the mission which means that we are well on our way to see the miracle take place. We currently have been blessed with 23 baptisms, or ceremonies that signify people coming closer to Christ and changing their lives in a way that will bring them everlasting joy. Yes, the miracle is happening.
This is Sora Hardy (my companion) and me at zone conference, with some Elders acting crazy in the background.
Here is the makeshift piano I played on at zone conference. Our investigator Lili is doing well, and is already inviting others to know. She rents one of her rooms out to a man named Dumitru, and she invited him to our lesson with her, and then brought him to church. She was really happy that he came. When I asked him how he liked church, he said "it was acceptable. It was a beginning, and I'm still a beginner." It made me laugh, but I think it went well. He participated a lot during the Sunday school classes, which is always a good thing. He has been reading the Book of Mormon with her and then they discuss it together - and they are almost finished after 2 weeks of having it at their home. Hopefully he will accept to be baptized on the same date as Lili, on April 10th. I am confident that the Spirit of the Lord is working in their hearts, and that all will be well as they continue to come closer to their Savior. It's exciting to see.
So now it's time to smile at Romanian traditions, and yes, it's smile. It's not polite to laugh at them, and since it's a tradition and therefore not a living thing, we can't really laugh with it, so instead we just smile no matter how weird it is. I found this one out last night when Sora Hardy was talking on the phone to an investigator named Angela that she worked with in Bucuresti (she's from Galati and was here visiting family). So it is really bad luck here to die without seeing the sun, so if someone dies suddenly with out the sun being a part of the death process, they have this tradition to make up for that. Every 7 years, they dig up the coffin and put the corpse/bones in a bag, and put that bag up in a tree from sunrise to sunset for one day so that they can "see" the sun, and then put it back in the coffin, rebury it, and wait for the next 7 years to do this. Angela's dad died when she was young, and it was unexpected, so they do this for him. Apparently one year the grave-diggers were all drunk and reburied the coffin without the bones in it. A few days later they realized that the bones were still in the tree, so they had to re-dig up the coffin, and rebury it again. Now you can laugh. (A story can be laughed at ;) I was laughing pretty hard.
Anyways, I don't really have much else to write about - sorry it's shorter than usual. But I am doing great, I hope that you are all doing well, and more fun stories will be shared last week.
Grandma, it was great to hear from you, thanks! I love being out here among the Romanian people, teaching them about how God loves them personally and how He has a plan for them - for all of us, and how He made a way possible for us to succeed. He did not send us to this life to fail, but instead gave us the choice to be able to follow the way He laid out for us or not. I know that that way is through the Gospel. or through the teachings and love/example, of Jesus Christ. Only by following Him and applying His infinite atonement in our lives can we find the joy that is available to us. I have been able to witness a portion of this joy being out here among the service of the Romanian people, children of God. It truly is amazing to know that there is a way, and that He, the author of that way, is there helping us with every step as we turn to Him. I know that that is true, and that there is a way for all of us.
I love you all so so very much, and I hope that you know that I pray for all of you every day. And I feel your prayers - thank you for your love. Have a fun week, keep smiling, for there is always much to smile about!
Love you! Always, --Sora Karina
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