Many Slightly Gross Adventures

Salut Friends and Fam!!

This week was awesome; we have met many cool people and have started teaching more which is great! Also all the investigators that leave for the summer and coming back! So we are excited for these next couple of weeks!

I have definitely grown a tougher skin dealing with gross situations this week lol. First of all our friend who is a member invited us to her apartment to help with repairs. We went over and it was the most chaotic scene I've ever seen (lol poetic). She didn't have a fridge, so all this food that should be kept cold was just left open on the table everywhere, with flies all over it. She fed us watermelon, and poor Sora Dusenberry tasted it and it definitely was rotten. We also politely refused the tea served in suspicious really dirty mugs. And all at the same time we had these two cats who looks like they definitely had some sickly disease were running all around us. We did as much "repairing" as we could and go out of there quick.

Secondly, we were so sad this week, because our kitchen got some kind of bug infestation. We spent 3 hours this morning going through all of our cupboards, throwing almost everything away and spraying everything with like bleach or something. Anyways, I guess now we can go on a spice rack shopping spree. It was pretty gross and I really hope I haven't been eating bugs for the past month.

Haha I'm sorry for this gross update, this week had been super fun other wise. Yesterday was Moldova Day!!! They basically have a huge concert in the center of the city with traditional music during the day and normal (?) music at night. And fireworks! It's super fun, they have all these markets selling traditional Moldovan things, and all these families are out in the parks all day celebrating with icecream and picnics, etc.

Quote of the week: "The greater your faith, the stronger your character; increased character enhances your ability to exercise even greater faith." -Richard G Scott

I love you all! We are having so much fun here in Chisinau and working super hard! 

Sora Ebert

PS I forgot: one highlight of the week was someone gave us Kraft Mac and cheese and it was so American and tasted heavenly. :) Don't take American food for granted haha

Moldovan Emergency Room

Hello Friends and Family!

Well for the first half of this week I spent many hours reading Jesus the Christ, listening to the MoTab and cleaning the apartment because poor Sora Dusenberry was sick! We aren't really sure what it was, but she's better now. However, on Tuesday she wasn't doing so great so we got to go to the hospital! Let me just say I am really grateful that they send us missionaries to the private hospitals here, because it's super similar to America and the doctors are great as far as I know. Sora D told me a bunch about the healthcare system here. It's honestly so sad, and the whole system is so corrupt. Basically a patient may come in with a headaches or something and they will be told that they are going to die if they don't have surgery or something. For example, there's this cute 17 year old girl who comes to the Russian branch and she recently had her ovaries removed and is currently undergoing chemo and radiation, though there really doesn't seem to be anything wrong with her, and we are all pretty sure the doctors have been lying to her in order to get more money. It's so so so sad and happens all the time here. But don't worry!! That doesn't happen at the hospital we go to luckily!

On a happier note, we've had a great time contacting less actives this week! There is a long list of members here in Chisinau, and only a percentage of them are coming to church, so this week we made some cookies and bought some flowers for some of them! Basically here in Chisinau, everyone lives in these huge apartment blocks, and almost all of them are super old, super creepy, and super dark, all left over from communism 30 years ago. Plus they smell super weird.Yesterday we went up this old creaky elevator for 17 floors with it sounding like it was going to break any second. But we had fun and it's definitely an adventure.

Also I wanted to say that the people here are so nice and I love them all, and some of them are hilarious. We are friends with Ecaterina, this old member in the ward who every morning and night she calls us to pray with her. Plus every time we see her she asks to pray with us. Some days we end up praying with her 3 or 4 times, and it's awesome she's the sweetest. Plus you can never have too many prayers!

I love you all! I hope all is well!

Sora Ebert

Pics:

1) poor Sora Dusie, glad she's doing alright

2) Cathedral Park, literally we spent countless hours here each week

3) this is our branch building and I forgot if I've already sent it to you guys! But the church rents out this cute villa and it's my favorite

Life is Good

Buna Dimineata Friends and Fam!!!

Life is good here in Chisinau. Lots happened this week, haha but every time I email I forget it all. 

Our investigator Virginia was baptized!!! She is this cute mom of two little girls and I love her and am so happy for her! Her husband Ghenadie was able to perform the baptism which was awesome and they are they cutest little family! Love them. :)

We had zone conference this past week which was fun. It was fun to see Elder Cloward from the MTC and all the other elders in the two other moldovian cities. Also it was very fun to see President and Sister Hettinger again, they are the best. I learned a lot. 

It's so fun, the sister missionaries have started a young women's program here! We had an activity last week where we watched Mormon messages and learned how to make brownie balls (so good) and I think we are having another activity this week decorating journals. The girls are so sweet and it is so fun to have enough youth to have young womens! Probably more than half of the girls are actually investigators who come every week and are super solid. Super fun :)

It's kind of weird to think I'm one of four sister missionaries in this entire country. All of us are here in Chisinau and we are able to go contacting or go to lunch with them all the time.

This week was pretty good! Sora Dusenberry have a goal to "forget English." We try to SYL (speak in Romanian as much as possible) any time we are out of the apartment. It actually makes everything so much easier cause then you are already in the habit of speaking and thinking in Romanian. 

Life is good here! I love you all and I hope you are all great!!

Cu drag,

Sora Ebert

Pics

1) Bonus Points if you can find my name in Russian

2) Me with cute Vica (Virginia's daughter)

3) Virginia's baptism :)

Hello From Mini-Russia

Buna Ziua friends and family!!!

I have made it safe and sound to the mission and am serving in Chisinau, Moldova (pronounced keesh-i-now) with my amazing trainer Sora Dusenberry! Love her!! I was not expecting to be sent to Moldova first I'll be honest but I'm so happy to be here. Moldova is kind of like one part western Europe, one part third world country (cause it is one) and one part Russia. 

So far I have tried quail eggs, sarmale (soooo good), Russian Snickers bars, and many other Ukrainian or Russian foods. Also they have the best sandwiches on the best best best bread for less than one dollar here. Awesome. Also my personal groceries here cost less that 10 dollars per week, which is great. :)

The language is coming along, we have sticky notes all over the apartment with vocab right now and I am starting a big notebook for new words. The problem is though, people here speak with a huge Moldovan accent and then throw in a bunch of random Russian words. To be honest, half the time I can't even tell what language they are speaking haha. But I'm definitely grateful for the Gift of Tongues! Maybe I'll be able to speak a little Russian by Christmas! 

Church is kind of funny. The electricity goes off every ten minutes or so, so that in the middle of sacrament meeting the lights go off and a loud beeping noise starts. But you get used to it. Also we are assigned to the Russian speaking branch (we actually attend both Romanian and Russian services) and all of Russian sunday school is spent by these old Russian ladies standing up and yelling at each other over something about the devil. Idk I don't speak Russian.

Guys the work is on fire here in Moldova! Everyone is talking about how  something is happening, the church is growing, and we are seeing miracles! We have set some pretty high goals for this next transfer but with hard work, faith and God's help I know that He will help us achieve them!!

I love you all! I wish I could explain everything about Moldova, but it wouldn't do it justice. This kind of feels like it's the most insane thing I've ever done but it's also the most fun I've every had. Every day is a blast. I love Moldova, I love the cute old ladies, I love our investigators, I love love love my awesome trainer and I love everything I am doing here!

Cu drag,

Sora Ebert