Week of Miracles.

Wow, this week, "Dumnezeu was 'catching us' ".  Basically, Heavenly Father was with us a lot this week.  In many ways, some easier to describe than others.  

TUESDAY:  Sora Trebas prayed that we would be able to have several quality gospel conversations today and boy, did Heavenly Father deliver.  Everyone that sat next to us on the metro was super interested in who we were, what we believed, and what we are doing here.  It was amazing.  We even met this man who lived in America for several years, while he worked there.  He knew almost immediately that we were Mormons and he turned to my companion and said in English,

"So are you going to convert me?" 

And she looked right back him and said, "Well, only if you want to"

I freaking love her.  

Miracle.

So we ended up changing metros so we said our goodbye and had another good conversation with some students who were eyeballing our name tags.  

(((((((((SIDE STORY:  So about 2 months ago I went into an interview with President Ivory and I presented to him the idea to create "name tag" pass along cards, with our information on the backside and a brief description about who we are and why we are here.  

People always stare at our tags and I wanted to use that opportunity to teach them about who we are so badda bing badda boom, the name tag card was created!

President loved the idea and he assigned an amazing senior couple to get to work on them immediately.  And about a month ago I was asked to test drive these special cards and they have been a HUGE success!  So much so, President has decided to create these special business cards for ALL of our missionaries and the headquarters in Germany are currently discussing about making these business cards for ALL of the missionaries IN EUROPE!

GAHHHHHHH.  

Miracle.

So back to the story. ))))))))

We got into a great conversation with this cute college student.  She wasn't too interested in church but she thought what we did was very admirable so hey, I'll take it.  

So anyways, we had a lesson that night at Luana's house and we were hustling to get there on time.  We had missed the metros that we needed to take so we were already behind schedule. We pop out of the metro and I'm like, "I have 3 lei in my wallet.  I have no money to buy trips for my bus pass".  So I was freaking out.  Anyways, head over to the ticket booth to buy one trip (which was only enough to get one of us there) and I asked the lady if I had any tickets on my card.  She smiled and said, "Oh yes, you have 14 trips on your card" 

WHAT.

Miracle.  

Sora Trebas and I were just so happy.  We said a little prayer and headed over to the trolley bus station which----wasn't there.  It had all been ripped up for construction.  

Crap.

Then, this nice lady comes up to us and she is like, "Follow me, they have a temporary stop over here".  SO NICE.

Miracle.  

As we are walking we head over to the temporary station I see our bus coming.  CRUD.  We start booking it but by the time we get there it is filled with people and pulling away.  CRUD.  The next one doesn't come for 20 minutes, we were going to be late.  

While waiting this lady looks at us and says, "Sunteţi Mormonii" (You guys are Mormon) and I was just like "Da" (Yes) Haha.  So then she starts asking us all of these questions about our church in English.  She was flabberghasted when we told her that we WEREN'T from Utah.  I asked her if she knew why Utah has so many "Mormons".  She said she didn't know and I got to bear a little short powerful testimony to her about the pioneers and how after years of suffering persecution, they found religious freedom in Utah.  She was surprised.  She was a little rough speaking to us but I gave her my card and told her about our website and invited her to learn more.  She hopped on her bus and left.  It was a little 2 minute spiritual moment and we got to talk to another amazing person.

Miracle.

Then our bus came around the corner, 15 minutes early.

Miracle.  

We got to her house on time and shared a powerful lesson with her and her son about prophets.  Her husband asked if he could sit in, which has never happened before. 

Miracle.  

Heavenly Father had prepared so many people for us that day.  He made it possible for his work to roll forth, despite difficult circumstances.

THURSDAY: Amazing Zone Conference were we got to hear Elder Kearon give a powerfully inspiring presentation.  He is one of my favorite General Authorities.  We were all "spiritually fed" this week and it was amazing.  I also got to reunite with 7 of my 9 MTC girlies.  We had a great day together. For more info on Elder Kearon click the link below.....

https://www.lds.org/church/leader/patrick-kearon

LOVING Buchaest.  My companion is basically training me.  She is incredible and we manage to have a great time no matter what we are doing.  She is such a blessing in my life.  

Loving the work, Loving the people and Loving the Lord,

:) Sora Lee

Photo 1: Nametag pass a long cards!!!!

Photo 2: Me and my double name tags!

Photo 3: I'm a little proud of these things.  

Photo 4: The fab nine (7 of us were at this conference)

Photo 5: The fab nine (7) plus President Ivory

Photo 6: The comfiest bench in all the city

Photo 7: Sis Mis problems

Photo 8: Gettin' Hunger Games hungry in Bucharest!

Photo 9: Casa Poporului

Extra Photos for Y'all!

Photo 1: Our pretty little fall forest outside of our block.
Photo 2: Sora T and I like to take macaroon snack breaks.
Photo 3: We bought matching dog slippers in honor of our favorite form of contacting : dog contacting.

FEASTING Not Just Snacking

I don't have oodles of time today to email you all but I just wanted to tell you that I HAD A GREAT WEEK!  I am loving my companion and we are best of friends.  I am so honored to be serving with her.

So this week I wanted to share a little thought with you all.

Okay what is feasting?

Well I can tell you that my 9 year old self was a fan of this.  She was a foodie.  I was and I still am.  Anyways, let's talk about feasting.  When you think about feasting, what other words pop into your head?  For me, and my nine year old self, I think about buffets (my parents are losing it right now).  Channeling my inner nine year old, here are some phrases that pop into my mind about "feasting".


Large amounts

Super size me

Yes, I'd like that doubled

Round 2

Can I get an extra plate?

Round 5

Oh for sure dessert

Extra topping

Stretchy pants

No regrets

Feasting.  It is getting all you want and more.  And why do you want more?  Because you love it.  It's delicious.  It makes you happy, it fills the need for hunger.  It quenches your thirst.

"Wherefore, I said unto you, FEAST upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do. "
- 2 Nephi 32:3 

In the same way that we feast when we eat, we should also FEAST upon the word of God.  Let's open up our scriptures and go to work.  Let's keep reading, keep going,keep marking, keep underlining, keep highlighting, keep learning and then come back for Round 2 and then Round 3. . The more we involve ourselves in studying our scriptures our need for "spiritual food" will be better taken care of.

Why?  Because we will be feasting on the scriptures and not just "snacking" on it.

So for this week, I challenge you all to "feast" during your scripture study.

So what will you choose . .  a feast or a snack?

Feast up.

Loving the work, loving the people and loving the Lord,
:) Sora Lee

Photo 1: Me and my "Do you have a question for God?" poster
Photo 2: Me and Sora Trebas at the end of our creative contacting session
Photo 3: How to hold flowers in Romania.  If the petals are facing up, THAT IS BAD.  Flower petals must always face down.

The Orange County, California Companionship. A Match Made in Bucharest.

Let me start off by introducing my trainee, Sora Trebas (Tree and a bus) to you all.

She is 19 years old and is from Irvine, California.  She loves mushrooms, wedge salads, chunky sweaters, Laguna Beach and Chipotle.  She talks with her hands and uses the same weird filler words as me.  We both love taking jumping photos and we love bread. She went to BYU Idaho and she loves dogs. It is a bomb companionship. 

I literally love this girl and I am so honored to be her trainer.  

This week was a pretty exciting week.   

We did a lot of contacting this week, giving us the opportunity to have several gospel conversations with some pretty...interesting people.  Some good, some not so good, but all together we were able to go home with a smile on our face and a knowledge that we did all we could do to invite people to learn more about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  

We set a goal as a district to talk to 6 people every day about the Romanian language, believing that gospel conversations would come from it.  So challenge accepted and we met this amazing woman on the metro.  Silvia was one of the nicest Romanian women that I have ever met.  She was helpful and happy and smiling all the way.  She gives us her phone number and says, 'I want to meet up with you girls again".  

So we will see how this goes. . . . . .  We are pretty stoked.  

PSYCHED.

We also got to work with our less active members and learn more about them and some of the things they are struggling with.  We are excited and looking forward to easing their burdens and helping them have a stranger relationship with their savior.  

RANDOM STORY: MY LIFE IN ROMANIA:

So Friday morning at 8:30am I get this knock at our door.  I check the peep hole and it is one of our little old lady baba friends who help run the block.  So I open the door and she is like, "Why are you having dance parties at 4am?" and I'm just like, "Whut"

Hahaha so then I'm like, "Wait, maybe I mistranslated that in my mind".  And then she says it again.  

And I'm like, "Wait what?  Haha we don't get out of bed until 6:30.  We only exercise in the morning but no dance parties here". 

She just looks unenthused and she's like, "Your neighbor beneath you says you cracked her ceiling" .  

And I was just like "No way" haha. And she tells me to come downstairs to look at the damage.  

So I grab Sora Trebas and we head downstairs and I have our crazy neighbor lady yelling at us, her neighbor yelling at us, and our baba lady yelling at us.  3 ladies yelling at me in Romanian. 

"You are dancing"

"You are throwing your furniture"

"You are kicking the walls"

"You are beating on the floor"

"I am a 76 years old, without a husband, on pension, living here alone"

"You two are probably thieves"

"The noise wakes us all up!"

And I'm just thinking, "No freaking way do we have enough energy in the morning to do all that, much less do pushups haha"

So anyways, I tell her that she is mistaken, and I apologize and ask her to talk to our proprietar to work it all out.  

So I call our proprietar, who is a member in our branch, and I explain the whole thing.  Turns out, she's been complaining about that crack in her ceiling for over  years now.  

Hm.  Interesting.  

And I also discovered that we have a crack in our ceiling in the same place that she has hers...Hmm... #normalblockproblems

And that is the story of how I almost got kicked out of our apartment.  

Shoot.  Better stop those dance parties now. 

Dangit.  

LOVING the work, LOVING the people and LOVING the Lord.  

:) Sora Lee

Photo 1: First day of church with my new missionary!

Photo 2:  Halloween service party with our best friends!

Photo 3: Expanding our cultural horizons with Indian food . . . and then having to go "find the nearest bathroom" contacting haha.