Any last words?

You are what you eat

Gigi pretzel

This past week was wonderful... we got to go to Galati for a couple days, and to go on exchanges with Sora Polatis and Sora Parker. Our first night there, Sora and I were sleeping on this pull out couch. In the middle of the night I turned over and there was this HUGE CRASHing sound and being tired, I just whispered "sorry" to Sora. Then a short time later I rolled over again and there was another HUGE CRASH. Again I just whispered, "sorry" and we kept on sleeping. I then found that I couldn't turn over for the rest of the night. My body was some how stuck. It wasn't until the alarm went off at 6.30 that I woke up and realised I'd broken the bed.... lol (See picture) I guess all the cake is getting to me ;) lol JK  - the wooden boards actually weren't broken they'd just come out of the little plastic thing holding them, so we fixed the bed.

Oops I broke the pull out bed in Galati in the middle of the night!

Exchange

The exchange went great. Sora went with Sora Polatis and I went with Sora Parker. S.Parker is in her first transfer so it was really fun to take her contacting and help her to become more confident in talking to people and to try to pump her up even when people were being super rude. The benefit of being a boboaca is that she didn't understand the rude people :)

Craziness in Galati

Sora was a little sick and the trains left at crazy times so we stayed another day in Galati. So on Friday Sora Polatis and Sora Parker had a lesson with their new 13 year old investigator. In the meantime Sora and I got gigi pretzels and walked and contacted to the church. The Soras had left the door open so we walked in and went upstairs to wait for them to finish their lesson. Then Sora Polatis, during their lesson saw a man walking out of the church holding one of the paintings! She yelled, "Hey that guy is stealing a picture!" Their 13 year old little girl investigator jumped up and chased the man up the street and demanded he give her the picture back. Thankfully he gave it back without any problems and she walked back triumphantly holding the painting, "You girls need to be careful, there are dangerous people here!" she told us... haha :)

Me and Sora Parker on our exchange outside Chip and Dales - in Galati ....lol (it's a bakery)

The work in Iasi

This weekend we met with Anca from our English class. She's sooooo cool! Everything she says is so perfect and as though it came straight from the distirct! We also met with another couple of people from English who seem promising. Alsio, Sora and I have set the goal to talk to 1000 new people before I go home. We set it on Saturday night, so with about 10 days to go. We're very excited :) We're only at 83 so far but it's Monday morning and we have a nice long week of contacting ahead :D

People from the Iasi Branch 

1 week left

Well, this is my last full email. I want to thank all those who've supported me on my mission. It's been amazing! But thankfully I know that this is just the beginning. Everything I've learnt and experienced out here will continue to help me and teach me for the rest of my life and beyond. I know my Saviour lives. I know that He is Jesus Christ and He knows and loves each of us.  I know the Book of Mormon is true. It was translated by Joseph Smith, who was a prophet of God. I know that we have a prophet on earth today. And if anyone reads this and does know for themselves that each of these things are true I encourage you to pray with your whole heart to your Father in Heaven and to read from the Book of Mormon and I promise you that you will receive an answer.

Keep the Faith!

Sora Rivera

Tree on a Train

Hello family & friends!

Wow, just a few weeks left! Time is flying by! I can hardly believe it. I still feel like I've only been here for a few months. Sora's Mom asked her if I was dying or getting trunkie, and she was like uuhhhhh, even if she wanted to, we don't have time! This week, for example, we've only been in Iasi for 3 days! The rest of the time we were either in Bacau or Chisinau. 

me trying to catch a pigeon

So Monday, we head to Bacau. For various reasons we very nearly missed our train, but we were running to the Gara with a few minutes to spare. Then.... we jumped on the train, and headed to the first class area, only to find that it was completely full! Half of the second class people were all chillin' in first class. The entire second class cabin looked and smelled like they'd been drinking most of the afternoon, so we stood awkwardly in the hallway between the first and second class areas. Then, just before the train left, these guys got on.... drunk out of their minds!! They were covered in Mud and one bright spark was carrying an entire tree! That’s right a huge massive tree that took up half of the train! Thankfully about 20 minutes after the train left, the controller guy made some people get out of first class who weren't supposed to be there, and we were able to sit down. 

a ton of us to dinner in Chisinau, Sora and I are at the other end of the table in the dark lol!

Wednesday, we were crazy busy as it was one of our only days in Iasi. So as we were running around trying to teach our lessons, we got a phone call from Sora Hill, "Oh, I forgot to tell you that we have a sisters meeting tomorrow and that you two are in charge!" gaaah!! So then we had to fit in planning a meeting, and then hosting all the sisters from Galati and Bacau. Then Sora and I left at 2am to take the train to Chisinau, so after not getting any sleep we finally got to Moldova and had the sisters meeting and Zone conference.... rough! 

Random... but cool, I gave a prayer in Russian...

I gave my dying (leaving) testimony! It was soooo weird. Oh and we stayed in a hotel in Chisinau. That was fun. 

us in our hotel room

So yeah, things are going great! We're sooo busy! I've never had a busier transfer! It's seriously crazy! We have our last exchange this week, in Galati! Galati is far away though, so it'll be a 3 day affair. Then we still have a ton of potentials, and English classes, and finances and just yeah.... basically we're crazy busy!

Oh, and as we were on the Maxi taxi coming back to Iasi on Friday, I was sooo car sick, but as we got close to the border, our phone received service again and we got a text from the 1st Counsellor in the branch presidency asking me to speak on Sunday! So I wrote my talk in between lessons and English and contacting on Saturday. It was cool though. I was glad to speak, especially since I'm so close to the end of my mission. 

us at the sisters meeting

Alrighty, well, I love you all! Life is good. Keep the Faith

Love 

Sora

Let them eat cake

English classes are going fantastic! We already have a bunch of lessons set up from them. We're really excited about it. For our first class with our advanced students we had them build towers out of gummy bears and toothpicks whilst only speaking English. Then right after our first class we had FHE and only one member showed up but 14 of our students from English stayed. We did bowling, using bottles and a football. It was hilarious :D (see pictures)

bowling for FHE

a few of our english studetns and their gummy bear/toothpick tower! :D

We then went to Moldova for 3 days for our exchanges up there. It was the craziest couple days! It all started at 2.30am in Iasi, on Wednesday morning. Since both Sora and I get carsick, instead of taking the maxitaxi we decided to get the train from Iasi to Chisinau. Sadly, the only train that goes to Moldova leaves at 3am, so we went to sleep for a couple hours then got into our cabin. We lay on the train for another 30 minutes when we arrived at the border. The border took about 3 hours, then we slept for about 2 hours before for some unknown reason they cranked the heat up on the train and we were suffocating and super nauseous upon arriving in Chisinau. Since we were so sick, we sat on a bench at the Chisinau gara for an hour eating a cake we'd brought with us. 

us in Orhei!

Once we were feeling better we went to call the Orhei sisters to see how to get to Orhei, but it turned out our phone doesn't work internationally, even though we'd asked the office to fix it for us. 

A string of pretzels! Romanian tradition :D

So there we were, stranded, with nothing but cake and spare clothes. Thankfully, I remembered the Chisinau sister's address and ho to get there, so went to their apartment. They weren't expecting us though, since we weren't supposed to be with them until Thursday night, so we terrified them by banging on their door at 9 in the morning during their studies. We used their phone to call the office and we managed to sort out a means of communication by using one of the senior couples' phones. 

Next we headed to do our studies and to eat lunch. We also sat on a bench in the mall and ate more of the cake we'd brought. We headed up to Orhei in the evening, but upon arriving at the tiny Orhei gara, there were no missionaries there to meet us. Now, 8 pm at night, we sat and waited for an hour and finished off our cake. The elders and sisters finally found us and took us home and we had the exchange the next day. 

It was womens day, every girl  wears broaches with red and white string. We got given 2 sets of flowers and 2 different broaches each and a bunch of chocolates :D

The exchange was great! I got to go with Sora Caruso! We also had district meeting and Elder Danielson gave us another Russian lesson (I've got a few sentences down!). Then for lunch we went to this pizza place. It's in a hotel room that's been converted into a mini restaurant. It was amaaazing pizza! Sora Caruso and I went villa knocking and block knocking in the afternoon. Thursday evening we went back to Chisinau for our exchange there. Friday, we had our exchange with Sora Sayre and Sora Case. We all went street contacting and for lunch we went to this awesome American restaurant called Okey Dokey. The guy that owns it is from New York but his wife is from Moldova. They were an awesome couple and they even want to come to church this Sunday.

us in Chisinau at Okey Dokey!

So apparently this whole trip was all about the food.... but what can I say? :D

I can hardly believe I only have 3 weeks left! We're going to Bacau today for an exchange and then we're going to Chisinau again for zone conference on Thursday. I have to give my dying testimony. It'll be very interesting. I love it here. I love the people, I love being a missionary, It's going to be hard to leave. 

Keep the Faith!

love, Sora Rivera

Cum am devenit stupid?

Cum am devenit stupid? (how I becamse stupid)

Sora and I were assigned to do a presentation in our zone training meeting. The material we were asked to present on was a basic definition of accountability. How on earth were we supposed to do an entire presentation on that?! After 4 hours, Sunday night, we couldn't think of anything to do with missionary work and something that people would actually find interesting. Our problem was that some people are very self motivated, therefore do not really require accountability in goals. But we suddenly realised that the goals for which you require accountability are the one's in which you are the least motivated to accomplish. It was a great realization and for an object lesson to demonstrate this to the zone, we decided that we'd get one of the missionaries to eat crap paste.  There is this fish paste made of carp and other questionable ingredients and in Romanian the word for carp is "Crap". the disgusting little tubs of the paste have big old labels reading "CRAP". 

Miruna - Monica's little sister. just turned 7 :)

It turned out to be a great presentation. In exchange for eating the CRAP, which represented a difficult goal, we offered a greater reward and thereby increased their accountability. So we had one of our zone leaders come up and eat the crap in front of everyone in exchange for a loaf of zucchini bread. He just about threw up and struggled to eat for the rest of the day, but on the bright side our presentation really made people think and was definitely memorable! :) 

Miruna and Bello the dog

This week we had a lesson with our only investigator. She gave us the Book of Mormon back. yep. Her preot had told her it was a sin to read from it. But the lesson actually still turned out surprisingly well. We testified to her of the power of prayer and used Galatians and Moroni 7 to explain the fruits of the spirit and how she could truly know whether or not it was of the devil or of God. We also pointed out that she hadn't actually asked God, so she agreed to pray about it. 

We also went to visit Monica and her little sister Miruna this week. It was really fun! I love being back in Iasi! It's the best :D We also got to visit a lovely old lady from the branch who had a stroke last year. She's so sweet! it was a great week. We've also been English contacting like mad and having the best time! Sora and I have also made a last transfer bucket list for me, to make sure there are no regrets!

Keep the Faith!

Love the Sora