From Mrs. Hann Brown



(Dear truly of God)

I am divinely touched to offer my fortune to less privilege through you for charity work.
I am a widow and childless, as a result of my present situation, I have nothing else in mind other than to help the poor according to God's direction and wishes. By special grace of God I reached you by email because I can not speak to your understanding on telephone due to my sickness.

I am suffering from oesophageal cancer for years now and have undergone series of cancer treatments but no avail. Recently my doctor declared that I will not last forth coming month. Therefore I will offer you $8,500,000.00 US to take care of less privilege with heartfelt love of God and humanity. I decided to hand you over this money so that you will conduct vastly a charity work and dispense the money to the glory of God. I
have shorter days to live, therefore I have portioned 30% of the total money for your personal use while 70% of the money will go to the charity work.

As soon as I receive your reply I shall give you the address of my bank Banco Santander Bank in London and will also instruct them for the release of the money to you for the charity work. But I only wished to have assurance that you will utilize the money as I have instructed herein.

This is my last wish, I grew up as an Orphan and I don't have anybody as my family member therefore I would not like any thing to jeopardise the charity project as my last wish. Please remember my situation in your daily prayers.

Hoping to receive your reply soon.
Mrs. Hann Brown.

oi

Querida família,

Today we had Zone P-day and we played a game of soccer that was Brazilian versus Americans. The final score was 20 to 17. We were in the lead, and we almost won, but we lost it in the end. Now we just have to play a game of basketball and we will kick their butts.

The ward here is getting ready to divide, but they need to have more adults that are active. On Sunday there were 40 young-men at church. The problem is that their parents aren't members, but Elder Wright and I are going to work to change that. Lots of missioaries don´t even try to teach adults because it is more difficult, but if we want the church to grow we have to bring families and adults.

I feel like I am opening an area again because Elder Wright is only a month old on the mission and he doesn´t know the area or the members, and his old companion didn´t work so they didn´t have any investigators. I think the best idea is to visit all the recent-converts and young people whose families aren´t members and teach them, but I need to know where they live first.

Last week we taught the mom of a recent-convert, we took her to church we came to her house Sunday after church she told us that she had prayed to know if it was true and when she went to go to sleep the word "evangelho" (gospel) was passing through her head over and over and she felt good, relieved. I asked her if she thought this was an answer from God and she responded that she didn´t think so... She was certain that it was an answer. Then she said that if we were having a baptism the next Sunday she felt like she was ready. I didn´t disagree, so we marked her baptism for Sunday. The people just have to hear what we have to say, understand it, act on it, and they will know that it is all true.

Gotta go, but Happy birthday to Julia and Maegan, and send me a picture of Julia´s baptism.

Tchau,
Elder Jay



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Romania 27 June 2011

Hey everybody,

Sounds like things are going well.  And I hear that Julia is going to get baptized soon.

This week has been kind of slow, we had only a few lessons, but we have been having some good success.  We had a Relief Society activity on Saturday before English and we invited all the older women in our English class to come to it because then they could just stay for English and it would be convenient.  About five or six of them came and the activity was really good.  (Each person brought an object that brought them good memories and told about it.)  The missionaries here have been really frustrated that so many old people come to the English classes and they were trying to figure out some way of getting them to stop coming by making an age limit on the class or something.  I saw them all when they came to signups and they are all in our class, beginners, and they have been in that class for like six years is what the other missionaries say.  I figure the best way to make them stop coming is to bug them a lot about coming to church and meeting with us, then either they will stop coming because they get annoyed by our persistence or they will get converted and the missionaries will like it when they come to English class.  It was cool that we got so many of them to come to the Relief Society activity, now we just need to get them to come to church.

We did invite our English class to come to church during class on Saturday, and to make sure that they would come we made invitations for them really quickly before class started, we handed out the invitations and told them all to come.  I was really bold with our class during both of the spiritual thoughts we had this week.  I told them all that they need to pray, read the scriptures, and go to church.  I asked if any of them did those things and the room was silent.  One of the older ladies said, "nobody does."  Then I told them they would only be happy if they started doing those things and then we taught them how to pray and told them to start today.  The next time after English during the spiritual thought I asked if any of them had prayed and a few of them said they had (they had mostly just said The Lord's Prayer though) so that's a step.  It turned out that three of our students came to church the next day.  They  were all older people, but that works.  There are some really young kids that come, that are like 12 and 10 years old and they said they are interested in the church.  We probably should talk to their parents before trying to teach them though.

Last Sunday I was talking to the Relief Society Presidend, Sora Miron, on the phone about the activity and she sounded super stressed out so I asked her if there was anything we could do to help her.  She said that the elders were planning on going over to her house during the week to help her fix it up because it was leaky and had all sorts of problems, and I said that we would come too.  She called again during the week to change her mind, but then we talked to one of her daughters and came to her house anyway.  She was really happy to see us.  It turns out the back part of her house had collapsed because of the recent rain, luckily there wasn't really anything in there that got crushed or destroyed because it was the leaky part.  So we showed up and helped her put all the broken boards in a pile and gathered up all the shattered roof tiles and used shovels and rakes to clean up all the garbage and put it in a pile.  It was a good workout and we stayed there for a few hours and got really dirty.  That is one of the few opportunities that I've had to do some real good service out here and it was really refreshing.  The day we went out was also her birthday so we made some brownies that morning and brought them out with us.  We took a short break to eat brownies while we were there and then we kept on working.  We were all at least a little sore the next day from shoveling and carrying things for so long.

We had one day this week where we had seven lessons set up, and only two of them went through, and they were lessons with Recent Converts.  Our one progressing investigator, ifrim, is still working on deciding whether or not to get married so that he can be baptized.  He is fitting in well with the ward now though, so hopefully he will continue working towards baptism.

We found a former investigator in the area book and went out to visit her (and got lost and it took forever but we eventually found her house) and we met with her and her mom.  Her mom seemed more into it so we got her info and set up to meet with her at her house.  When we went out to meet her, her youngest son came and picked us up from the bus stop and we talked with them at their house, and then the dad came in and started talking to us to.  They are a super religious family and you could feel the spirit really strong in their house as we were speaking.  The only question they had was whether or not we thought that Joseph Smith was comparable with Jesus Christ.  And they believed everything else we had to say.  They had read the Book of Mormon back when the daughter had been an investigator like ten years ago.  They seemed really prepared.  The son was really flirty though, he is 21 and was really impressed to meet some girls that have high standards like him.  He remembered the missionaries from back when they taught his sister and expected us to be older women like they were to him when he was little, and so he was nervous and uncomfortable when he realized that we were so young.  We told him that there are some boy missionaries in this city and he asked, "are they you're boyfriends?" all shocked and worried.  We'll introduce him to some nice member girls.

We also went to the immigration office and the police station this week to find out what we have to do to declare ourselves in this city.  The lady we talked to at the immigration office told us that we only have to declare ourselves at the police station.  We asked her our questions and then had to wait a while for the person she needed to ask to be available, and I talked to her a little bit, but when I spoke to her I was informal and I think she was surprised.  At the police station they asked us if we speak Romanian and we said "da" but then a few minutes later a cop came out talking in English to help us.  We spoke in English for a while and then we switched to Romanian for some reason and he said he was really embarassed that we made him speak to us in English when we spoke Romanian so well.  We had told the police officers that we knew how to speak though.  I realized that I only speak to people informally in English because when I switched back to Romanian I was speaking informally and it seemed to throw off the police officer a little just like the immigration lady.  I'm just not used to speaking up to anyone, and I only use the informal for speaking to old people and people that you want to keep a distant relationship with.

This week we didn't go to the zoo, but we went up into the mountains and ate some bear meat at a restaurant up there.  Next week we are planning on going out to Dracula's Castle.

Love,
Sora Jay



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Transfers again

Querida familia,

We had transfers and now I am in a city called Mossoró, it is close to the border of Tim´s old mission. I caught a bus from João pessoa at 9:30 a.m. and arrived in Mossoró at 6:00 p.m.. I went the whole way with another Elder that lives in the same house with me now. During the second half of the bus ride there was a couple sitting in the front of us that was making out the whole time, we accidently made Elder Kitchen´s water bottle fall on top of them and then I read in my triple combinatio and tried to sleep.

My new companio is Elder Wright. He is from West Jordan and this is his second transfer in Brazil. I am going to "re-train" him because his trainer didn´t do anything with him and then got sent home because he did some bad things, so Elder Wright will be considered my second son on the mission.

Mossoró is super hot and I think I am going to start to use sun screen because if I don´t I will burn to death. The good thing is that it won´t rain everyday like it did in João Pessoa.

My last P-day in Mandacarú we went to a zoo and I took some pictures and made some videos of the animals. I will try to send them next week.

I also have another story that I think I never told you. One day in Guarabira there were a bunch of insects called Tanajuras that were flying around and falling on the ground and everyone was running around and putting them in bottles so they could fry them later and eat them. I started to help some members catch some, and then I saw and old I that grabbed tore off the head, the wings, and the legs and ate it raw. So then I ate one raw as well. It didn´t taste very good, in fact it tasted really bad. I caught two more and took them to Rayssa´s and tried to get her to eat one so she stuck it in an egg sandwich but still couldn´t do it. The second one that I ate wasn´t too bad.

Happy Father´s day dad! I always tell people about my family and everyone gets really impressed that you have 13 childern, 9 of whom already served or are serving missions, and 7 who married in the temple. You really do have the best family in the world.

And Thankyou for the communist birhtday card comrade Ariel.

Elder Jay Brazil



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Romania 20 June 2011

Hey everybody,

How is it going?  Happy father's day,  dad, and to all the other dads that get this email.  I don't really know how far this thing goes.

This week has been good.  We have been doing a little more park contacting since it has been a little warmer, it still isn't that warm though because I'm up here in Brasov in the mountains.  Last summer was super hot, but this summer isn't too bad.  It's more humid here though.  Jerm said he looked at Brasov on google street maps.  That's crazy to think that you can see all the places that I go.  I'll be able to show you stuff from all my cities when I get back thanks to google.  After being deprived of it for a year and a half I may never take technology for granted again.

I have learned really well since I got here to call people and reschedule everything several times a day.  People stand us up a lot so if somebody isn't coming anymore to a lesson we call all our other investigators and tell them we are free right then, and people have actually told us to come over a lot.  This is probably one of the first transfers that I have had that work out really well for me.  We have been park contacting but not a whole lot because we have been able to meet with people a lot, and we have taken some time to call a lot of people from the potentials list.  Two people came to church yesterday and I was thinking about how it seemed from their perspective.  I am really used to it so to me it seemed like a regular Sunday, but I did go with some questions and get the answers.  After sacrament meeting one of our investigators, Ion Furtuna, had to leave and he looked at us a smiled and said, "that was really good.  I'm going to keep coming."  And he said that he liked how everything the said was true (the Holy Ghost must have been testifying to him).  It's interesting how for us it has become so normal, but for other people it is way different and really nice.  I remember back in college I loved going to the stake singles branch because it was a break from the rest of the week and it just always felt really peaceful there.  I always know that people will like church, they just have to make the time to come once and they will want to always come back.  Especially this ward is really good at being warm and friendly, and peaceful.  It will probably grow really fast.

I heard that one of the branches that I was in, Ploiesti, has to open up the thing in the back now to make the room bigger because they have so many people coming.  I was there with them at the beginning of the year when we made a goal to have more people coming to church every week.  It looks like they're succeeding.  It's cool.

We have one investigator, ifrim, that really wants to be baptized right now (and a few others that are getting there) but he can't decide whether or not to marry his girlfriend so that he can keep the law of chastity.  He said that if he had known about the law of chastity he might not have kept coming to church because it is too difficult to fix.  I guess it was a good thing that they didn't have any lessons or talks about the law of chastity before he decided he wants to get baptized.  He said he might get married in August and then he can get baptized.  We told him he needs to keep the law of chastity anyway.  And maybe we can help him get baptized sooner.

Brasov is the closest city to one of dracula's castles (the brauns castle) and we might go out to see it on a P-day.  I found instructions in the Area Book for how to get there.  There is also stuff in there about a Zoo and an obstacle course park, so maybe we can do some fun things.  It's really really sad that Ed lost his Area Book.  Those things are priceless because of the investigator information.  I think it merits a miracle for you to find it again.

Love,
Sora Jay



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Your Urgent Respond Needed



Your Urgent Respond Needed

Dear Friend,

Good Day Please Read,

I am (Mr.Kasimy Ricky) The Director incharge of Auditing section of Africa Development Bank (ADB)in Ouagadougou,Burkina Faso.I know that this message will come as a surprise to you, since we don't know each other, but pay attention and understand my reason of contacting you through this via email,for the purpose of introduction,

I need your urgent assistance in transferring an abandoned sum of ($5.5 Million)dollars left by a deceased customer of my bank immediately to your account. we shall share in ratio of 40% for you and 60% for me.Finally, should you be interested to operate this project with me,reply urgently and i will give you the full details for us to move forward and The secret is bound between me and you.

Your earliest response to this letter will be appreciated and also Your Full Name And Phone Number is needed for Easy communication.+226-740 33 615.

Yours faithfully,

Mr.Kasimy Ricky

Urgent Respond



Dear Friend,

Greeting to you

I am ( Mr Compaore Michel ) and I know that this message will come as a surprise to you, since we don't know each other, but pay attention and understand my reason of contacting you through this via email,for the purpose of introduction, I have a business proposal in the tune of ($5.3m)


This fund 5.3 million dollars belongs to a deceased costumer who died along with his family in a plan crash and since then no body has applied for the release of this fund, now am contacting for you to stand as the business partner to this deceased costumer for the bank to release this fund to you, after which you get the total 40% while 60% will be for me.


Should you be interested to operate this project with me, reply me urgently and I will give you the full details for us to move forward.

Your earliest response to this letter will be appreciated and also Your Full Name And Phone Number is needed for Easy communication. +226-74-30-25-51.

Yours faithfully,

Mr Compaore Michel
Bill and Exchange manager
Bank Of Africa Burkina Faso West- Africa.
Tel: +226-74-30-25-51.
Email: compaoremichel@one.co.il.

Oi

Querida Familia,

Hi everybody, Remember the story I told you about the lady who lost two children 2 months ago. Her name is Claudia and yesterday was her baptism, finally. We bought a photo of the temple and gave it to her after her baptism so she could put it in her house and remember that she needs to go there and do the baptisms of her children. We taught her son before he was killed and he wanted to be baptized. Now his family will be able to do it for him.

We have a couple of other really good investigators right now, one of them we have been teaching for a little over a month and she just finished 2 Nefi, and is reading Gospel Principles. She has already gone to church 4 times, goes to all of the activities and everything. Só falta o batismo.

Today we are going to  go to a zoo, so next week I will have some cool pictures for you. This week I have a couple.




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Romania 13 June 2011

Hey everybody,

You guys are kind of freaking me out by talking about me coming home all the time.  Everybody in Brasov (bra-showv)keeps asking if I'm a new missionary because they've never seen me before.  One of the members told me that I have a iasi accent.  Now I'll be able to get back the pure accent.  Brasov is up in the mountains in the middle of the country.  It is way cooler here that it was in iasi.  It's nice.  I'm glad I didn't leave my winter stuff behind because it has been really cold and rainy here the past few days.  The members said it will get hot eventually.  You can see mountains all around like Utah, but they aren't as big as the Utah mountains are, I'm pretty sure.

My new companion is really chill.  Her name is Sora Bedebone and she is Samoan.  Her family is from Nevada.  She is in her fourth transfer, and she doesn't talk a whole lot during the lessons we teach.  She said she has been talking more with me than she ever did with Sora Wilson though.  It's funny because when Sora Wilson was my companion she never talked.  So, she got her comeuppance.  It's nice being with a companion that has already been taught by one of my former companions about how things go.  Sora Wilson seems to have done things pretty similarly to me so I can just step right into her place really easily.

We found out that there are some members that live in a little city right next to Brasov, Sacele, that haven't been visited for a while and we found a teaching record for one members wife.  The missionaries haven't tried to go out there forever because they hesitated to ask permission from President to leave the city.  I called him and asked him and he pretty much said he always lets missionaries go there.  So we went and had a lesson with a cool family that has three little kids, one baptized and another just about to turn eight, and the other is five.  The one who is baptized (recently) is at his grandma's house where she is trying to indoctrinate him against our church.  Their parents said something about going through the police to get him back.  Maybe she kidnapped him? or at least took him without his parents permission.  Poor little kid.  His siblings really miss him.  They said they're not a whole family when he's not there.

There are some progressing investigators here.  I think it's the first time I've ever come into a city and there were progressing investigators, even a person with a baptismal date.  In Brasov there is also a chapel.  I think it is one of the biggest ones in Romania.  The branch is pretty small though.  There are tons of inactive people and people that have left the country.  We met with the Relief Society president on Sunday to ask her who we should try working with.  She gave us a list of people but they are mostly guys.  She has kept pretty good track of the women in the ward.  There are young women here too.  This ward has one missionary out and one of the girls is going on her mission at the end of August, and she is going to the Provo MTC and then Spain.

There is a member here that I taught a couple of times back when I was in Bucharest.  Her brother was supposed to meet with us back when I was there, and the first day that we were out contacting in front of the church he was there waiting for his brother-in-law, so we talked to him and he came to church yesterday.  When we went to teach the member he was at her house too so he sat in on a lesson about the priesthood.  Probably not the best first lesson.

Our apartment here is really humid, my hair curls differently because of it.  It's hard to sleep when you feel all wet all night long.  I guess maybe that's what Tom's and Ed's whole missions have been like.

Love,
Sora Jay



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Urgent response !!!From: Mr Fahad Adongo

Dear friend,

I am Mr.Fahad Adongo, the director of the accounts & auditing dept .at the African Development Bank Ouagadougou-west Africa . (A D B).With due respect, I have decided to contact you on a business transaction that will be beneficial to both of us.

At the bank's last accounts/auditing evaluations, my staffs came across an old account which was being maintained by a foreign client who we learnt was among the deceased passengers deid on November. 2003. Since his demise, even the members of his family haven't applied for claims over this fund and it has been in the safe deposit account until I discovered that it cannot be claimed since our client is a foreign national and we are sure that he has no next of kin here to file claims over the money.

As the director of the department, this discovery was brought to my office so as to
decide what is to be done. I decided to seek ways through which to transfer this
money out of the bank.

The total amount in the account is Ten million five hundred thousand dollars (USD 10,500,000.00).with my positions as staffs of the bank, I am handicapped because I cannot operate foreign accounts and cannot lay bonafide claim over this money. The client was a foreign national and you will only be asked to act as his next of kin and I will supply you with all the necessary information needed this fund.

The total sum will be shared as follows: 50% for me, 50% for you and expenses incidental occur during the transfer will be incur by both of us. The transfer is risk free on both sides hence you are going to follow my instruction till the fund transfer to your account.

I will wish you to keep this transaction secret and confidential, please for further information and enquires feel free to contact for more explanation and better
understanding

Thanks and remain blessed.
Mr Fahad Adongo

     Forgive my indignation if this message comes to you as a surprise and may offend your personality for contacting you without your prior consent and writing through this channel.I got your contact from the proffesional data base found in the internet Yahoo tourist search.When i was searching for a foreign reliable partner.I assured of your capability and reliability to champion this business opportunity.
 
     After series of prayers/fasting.i was divinely directed to contact you among other names found in the data base Yahoo tourist search.I believe that God has a way of helping who is in need.
 
   I am Toure Ibrahim ,the Head of file Department in African development bank (ADB).

In my department we discovered an abandoned sum of $15 million U.S.A dollars ( fifteen million U.S.A dollars) . In an account that belongs to one of our foreign customer who died along with all his family in the Asia Earth Quake Disaster (TSUNAMI DISASTER IN INDONESIA/INDIA http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2004/tsunami.disaster/ .All of his Family lost there lives in the Disaster. Since then I have made several inquiries to his Country embassy to locate any of his client's extended Relatives, this has proved unsuccessful. After these several unsuccessful attempts, unfortunately we learnt that all his supposed next of kin or relation died along side with him at the TSUNAMI DISASTER IN INDONESIA/INDIA leaving nobody behind for the claim. It is therefore upon this discovery that I and one official in my department now decided to make this business proposal to you and release the money to you as the next of kin or relation to the deceased for safety and subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for it and we don't want this money to go into the bank treasury as unclaimed bill.

The Banking law and guideline here stipulates that if such money remained unclaimed after five (5) years, the money will be transferred into the Bank treasury as unclaimed fund. The request of foreigner as next of kin in this business is occasioned by the fact that the customer was a foreigner, and a Burkinabe cannot stand as next of kin to a foreigner. We agree that 40% of this money will be for you as foreign partner, in respect to the provision of a foreign account,and 60% would be for me and my woman colleague. That means ($6 million)  six million dollarsfor you,and ($9 million) nine million dollars for me and my partner.There after i will visit your country for disbursement according to the percentages indicated. 

All I require is your honest cooperation to enable us seeing this deal through. I guarantee that this will be executed under a legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law. Please consider my official positions, reputation and integrity, especially, the opportunities in the business itself, it is very necessary that all due care be taken so that we do not miss the opportunity due to carelessness.
 
               You are therefore expected and advised to display high degree of maturity, responsibility and understanding in handling this information. I will give you all the details in my next mail when you have indicated your interest and commitment to work with me. Always remember that this is the highest confidence and trust any person can repose on the other, especially when it is considered that we did not know ourselves 
 
                                   I hope you will honor me too.
 
                I will come over to join you in your Country for disbursement when the funds hit your account. More so for an effective and easy communication I will advice that you furnish me with your telephone and fax number.Upon receipt of your reply, I will send to you by fax or email the text of the application I will not fail to bring to your notice that this transaction is hitch free and that you should not entertain any atom of fear as all required arrangements have been made for the transfer. 

You should send me E-mail , and call me immediately  +226  78530001 as soon as you receive this letter. Trusting to hear from you immediately.
 

Your's faithfully, 

TOURE IBRAHIM.
FROM (ADB) OUAGADOUGOU BURKINA-FASO.
GOD BLESSINGS,PROTECTIONS AND GUIDIANCE TO YOUR ENTIRE FAMILY. 
 
                 (FILL THIS FORM BELLOW PLEASE AND RESEND IT TO ME).
 
1) Your Full Name..............................
2) Your Age........................................
3) Marital Status.................................
4) Your Cell Phone Number…………..
5) Your Fax Number……………….....
6) Your Country………………..............
7) Your Occupation.............................
8) Sex.................................................
9) Your Religion..................................
10) Your Private E-mail Adress...........
 
POST SCRITUM:You have to keep everything secret as to enable the transfer to move very smoothly in to the account you will prove to the bank.As you finished reading this reply me immediately so that we discuss very well over this 
 

Oi

Querida familia,

Sorry that I did't write the last two weeks, I ran out of time.

For my birthday we had a family home evening in a member's house and ate hotdogs and cake, it was pretty good and I took advantage of the opportunity to bring some investigators. I also used my birthday as leverage to bring some people to church because I told them it would be the best present they could give me.

Right now is probably the hardest part of my mission. I was called to be senior companion, train a new elder, and be District Leader all at once, and I'm not having very much success, so I don't have any good stories to write.

Maybe one, last night I ate Cabeça do Galo, which being translated is Rooster Head. It doesn't really have rooster head though and it tastes pretty good. All of the members here love missionaries that eat a lot, so I always eat a lot and am famous in all of the areas that i have passed because I eat so much, but I haven't gotten fat. I'll send you my one year picture.

love elder Jay



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Romania 6 June 2011

Hey everybody,

It has gotten really hot here now, and I have a few mosquito bites on my legs from teaching people in the park.  We persuaded our landlord to come over and put some screens on our windows so we can open them and not roast to death at night.  It's too hot to even have sheets on me at night anymore.  But I found out today that I'm getting transferred to Brasov this week.  I'll probably be there until the end of my mission since I only have two transfers left.  I wanted to stay here, because it's dumb to move missionaries around so much because then you lose all of the knowledge about the branch and the city.  People get forgotten and lost.

We are now required to constantly have our passports and 100 dollars cash on us at all times in little pouches that you wear under your clothes.  We have to always have the number for the American Embassy too.  It might make us even more likely to be robbed or lose our passports if all the missionaries are going to be taking them around everywhere all the time.  Oh well.

On Tuesday night the elders called us and said that on Wednesday we would be moving the location of the church.  The branch president from Ploiesti (whose job it is to take care of all the church buildings here and in the surrounding countries) called them and said that we were moving in.  So, on Wednesday morning we went and packed up everything in the church.  The BYU students showed up eventually and helped and there was one other member and one investigator.  I don't know where all the other members were.  They all knew we were moving though.  They showed up for the unpacking in the new church so that they could explore and see how nice it is.  President Ene, the one from Ploiesti, drove one of the mission vans up here to iasi and that's what we used to get all the stuff over to the new chapel on strada ipsilanti.  It wasn't that far.  The new building is really nice and has three floors for the church and on the fourth floor the missionaries will live.  I think they are going to have the sisters live there.  I wouldn't really want to live there.  The members would bug you all the time.  But, I don't have to live there anyway because I'm going to Brasov.  So, it took us about two days to move everything, but we were still able to meet with some of our investigators and show them where it was while we were in the moving process.

On Sunday on of our investigators invited us to go to her church.  I probably would have said no, but Sora Mullen said yes.  I've never agreed to go to any other churches except for Orthodox churches on P-days and Easter, because there's just no point.  Investigators only try to get you to come because they think they can convert you.  But, we said yes, so we went to her church.  I figured I would still be able to learn something because it is a place where they talk about God, but it actually just sucked.  If I wasn't a member of this church I wouldn't be a member of any church.  I felt the spirit more at the orthodox church than at that one, and the preacher said some pretty outrageous/blasphemous things.  We talked to him afterward and he said he had read the Book of Mormon, and he said he wanted to teach us something from the Bible.  Sora Mullen pulled out her Bible and he saw that it was marked and read, and then he said the only problem with our church is that we don't believe that Christ is our Savior.  I laughed and said, "Yeah we do."  I was going to tell him that he obviously didn't read the Book of Mormon but I think he didn't like the way that I laughed when he said we didn't believe in Christ because he cut the conversation short and left to talk to somebody else.  Our investigator asked us afterward how we liked it and Sora Mullen said she liked it and that it was fun (there was a lot of singing and clapping).  I just didn't answer.  She asked us what we learned and the only thing that I could say was that he put a few interesting questions for our consideration and that the answers to all of those questions are found in the Book of Mormon.  I don't think I learned anything else because they didn't really teach any doctrines.  He just asked some questions like "Why didn't God stop Adam and Eve from eating the fruit," and "Where did Satan come from," and then told us all over and over that we need to find Jesus.  He didn't even tell the congregation how to do it though.  I don't understand how our investigator managed to come to our church and not be converted because you feel the spirit so strong there every time and the things they teach all make sense.  Anyway, I used to be curious about other churches and want to go see what they are like, but after that I don't think so.  The closest thing I can compare it to is a boyscout pow-wow, where it's really boring and you don't learn anything, but you begin and end with a prayer (no offense to boy scouts).

The investigator who came to help us move the church is from our English class.  His name is Col.  He has a baptismal date now for the 25 of June.  We told him that transfers were coming up and that we might be leaving, and he said he would be sad if we left because we (the sisters) were his first teachers.  Just in the English class though, we invited him to come to church and the elders started teaching him.  I'm sad that I'll miss his baptism, I always get transferred out just before people get baptized.

I think moving into a new chapel has got the members all pumped to do missionary work.  None of our investigators came this week but there were a few nonmembers there that members had brought.  There has been a big push recently from the Eastern European Presidency to try to get members to bring people to church too.  For the month of June every week the members are supposed to be inviting people, nonmembers or less-actives, to come to church.  The branch president read the letter from them that had a cool story about one of them going to a district conference and the building was only half full.  He told them that if they would all just invite someone to the next district conference the room would be full.  when the next district conference came around, the room was full.  We do actually have a lot of Romanian members, it's just that about half of them left the country when Romania joined the European Union, so that they could find jobs in other countries.  Mostly to places with latin-based languages like Italy and Spain.  Lots of people say you don't even have to study Italian to be able to get by there if you speak Romanian.

I'm getting kind of tired of being a missionary, because for the past six months I haven't had companions that I can really work well with.  Ever since I was made senior companion I have had to drag my companions around, and now I am really tired of it.  None of them speak Romanian, they are all really irresponsible, hardly any of them keep the simple rules like getting up on time and exercising, and if I am not watching the clock, or saying we need to call people, or pulling my companion out the door to go contact people, no one is.  So I've been getting really, really tired and sick of it.  Especially the last six months while I have had companions that I haven't gotten along as well with.  I have to work so hard at keeping things peaceful and letting things go that I no longer have the energy to make sure we are doing everything else.
That's probably what missionary work will always be like though, I guess.  It will never be perfect.  I just wish it could be a little bit better.

Love,
Sora Jay



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