July 1st, 2013

Salut!

It's been another busy and beautiful week here in Arad. This week we've worked a lot with the branch, planning activities and firesides and things. I have to just say that I love the branch here so much. They are absolutely some of the strongest and most powerful people I've met in my life. Especially the Relief Society leaders here. I am always impressed by them. They do so much with so little. So little resources, and so little support.  I love them so much. One of the sisters here actually just got a mission call to Lyon, France. She is about 30 years old, and she is so excited to go. She asked to meet with Sora DeRuvo and me so we could help her prepare. We're excited to meet with her! We're trying to plan a time when we can take her with us to teach a lesson to one of our investigators.

This week we didn't have many opportunities to teach our investigators. They were all busy this week, or weren't home when we came over to teach them. daaaang. But hopefully this week we'll have a better chance of meeting with them.

We taught our English classes this week, and they went so well! We only have about 8 students so the class is pretty small. It is so much fun though.  It's funny because they try to talk to me in broken English, and I try to talk to them in broken Romanian. Luckily, and I have great companion to fill in gaps on both sides:)
We had an exchange with the coordinating sisters this week, and I exchanged with Sora Gerhartz. She's from New Jersey. We did Book of Mormon contacting. So we went to a park and talked with soooo many people. It was actually surprising how many people were willing to talk with us. We probably talked to over 50 people. Most conversations didn't last long, but we were able to talk with them a little bit about the Book of Mormon and just a bit about the restoration. We handed out a lot of pamphlets. At the end of the day we came back with 5 phone numbers. It doesn't sound like much, but for us that was SO COOL. It's not very easy to get numbers here, so we were more than pleased! 

On Friday, we had zone conference. It was so much fun! I loved it. President Hill announced that he put in a request to get 9 new SISTER companionships . That's 18 new sisters! There really are not many sisters here right now. There are like... I think 80 Elders and 20 something sisters. We're going to double!  How exciting.

On Saturday we had a Preach My Gospel fireside for the members. We talked about how members can use it to teach their family and friends about the gospel. They really seemed to enjoy it. branch activities here are so different than in Utah. If 10 people come to our firesides, or to a branch activity, we are thrilled. They are just like a family here. If someone is speaking at the meeting or activity, any of the members can interject at anytime and put in their 2 cents. I love it so much. It's so funny:) I love these people.

Oh my goodness, I love the food too. Okay, they have this place called Petru's. They sell chocolate covered pretzels for practically nothing. I don't know what I'll do with out them...

I really love being here so much. Every single day I love it more. Every missionary I've met here has been incredible. My district is hilarious, and my companion/trainer is one of the best people I've ever met! I literally see miracles everyday.

Thank you so much for every prayer, and all your support! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!

xoxoxoxxoxoxox

Love,
Sora Ralls