Happy Fathers' Day! I can now do a Rubik's Cube! and several other items of business. One of them might make you cry

Happy Fathers' Day!! I hope you had a great day, dad!

And as the title suggests, I can indeed solve a Rubik's cube now. Elder D is one of those guys who can just sit there and flick his fingers around a few times and solve it in a few seconds. So he taught me and after like an hour of training, my fastest time so far is 1:38!! So now I can actually use that Rubik's cube I've had for however many years.

Anyway, some weird things have happened this week... This is a long email.

First of all, as of last wednesday, I have been in Romania for a year. O_o

Second of all, on that day we had our last zone conference with President H... He leaves in just over two weeks. That thought was really weird and on my mind for the meetings but it was just a normal meeting basically. But then the dying testimonies! They were all by people that were not old when I got in! And one was Elder L, who was in my first few districts and with whom I have become really good friends out here.

And then there were a few other ones all of the same age and it's just so weird that they're all going home. So many people who I've known for so long out here are going home and it's the weirdest thing because with all these people going home it's making me think of all the things that I will need/want to do when I get home and so it almost feels like I'm going home too even though I still have ten months left.

It's weird because I can officially say that I've reached the point in my mission where it doesn't have that "wow this is all so new and crazy" feeling. I've in large part gotten used to it. I'm feeling old and I need some more of that spark, haha. But we'll see what happens with that.

Then the day after zone conference, me and Elder D stayed in Bucuresti for an extra day to go on exchanges with the zone leaders. I went with Elder L! It was a really good exchange. I spent the one year anniversary of my first real day on an exchange with my first DL. We talked a lot about his plans, he gave me some advice and talked about his experiences, and we walked all around Bucuresti for like 4 hours straight. It was great. I'm going to miss that guy. He was one of the most influential people to me out here and it's going to be so weird when he's gone in two weeks.

Now for the bad part.

When I was on my exchange, I went to go visit Iancu! Remember how a little while ago I said I felt like things were going to get worse soon, before they got better? Brace yourselves.

I had heard some things about Iancu, and I wanted to go see him and his family again anyway. There are two main points to hit on: he's now married, and he's going to be excommunicated.

That's right.

The 12 year old gypsy boy with so much light in his eyes that was my investigator in my first transfer that got baptized, the only baptism of one of my investigators on my mission, is now 13 years old and married, and is going to be excommunicated.

I walked in to their house with him and saw his father and his little sisters and it was so great to see them all! It was seriously like seeing family that I haven't seen in a long time. His youngest sister, when I was serving in Bucuresti, was 5 years old and missing her two front teeth, and basically the most adorable little gypsy girl you'll ever see. Now she's just barely 7, has her grown up teeth, and is the same amount of adorable, but in a more grown up way.

And his father is still alive, a fact for which I am so grateful, as his health is VERY poor; he's confined to his bed and is hooked up to a respirator machine. I discussed with Iancu and his father the situation. His dad has been worried about Iancu recently. He says that Iancu has been skipping school, and not reading his scriptures or praying as much. He's also recently started going to church a little less frequently. He says that Iancu hasn't been listening to him much recently, and has been hitting his siblings and his wife (keep in mind that he's 13 so he's not too violent, but it's the principle of the fact).

I talked with Iancu about this and you could see in his eyes that same childlike, christlike light shining there, and he had a look of shame and seemed to me to know that he's not been doing too well with some things lately. I told him how much I love him and care about him. I told him how important it is to keep our priorities in the right places, and that if he stays in school and works hard, he can get somewhere in life. I asked him what he wanted to get out of life, where he wanted to go, and all he said was "vreau sa fiu un om bun," which means just "I want to be a good person." We discussed it and talked about what that means: treating others kindly, following the lord and the prophets, etc.

I told him also how much potential I see in him, and how I consider him my brother. I don't know how much stuck, but I know now that he at least knows that I know the situation and that I still care about him. He said that he's talked with the branch president and that he's already had the priesthood taken away from him, and that the BP (who really likes Iancu and from what I've heard is so sad about the situation) said that he still wants him to come to church and participate in as much as he can, and that he can be rebaptized when he's 18 and can have a legal marriage.

So it's not just that he's renounced the church and done a whole bunch of horrible things and therefore is getting excommunicated, it's that that is simply what has to happen because of various reasons. He still knows the church is true, and does want to get rebaptized, but it's a weird situation.

It's so weird; when I was in Buc, he was a super cool little kid with the light of Christ so bright in his eyes. He still has that light, but now he no longer seems like a child; he seems like a teenager. And I think that that's part of the main problem: he wants to grow up too fast. I still have faith and hope in him. But I am so sad about what's happening. Please keep him in your prayers.

So that's about it!

Transfers are next week, so I'll let you know what happens there!

Love you all!

Here's a picture: In Utah they do this with coke. Here they do it with beer. Yeah Romania!

-Elder DeGraw

Singing in the park/ I actually live in africa

So this week was pretty cool!

Where to start...

Okay so remember those Africans? Well we went over again with Alin to teach them and it went pretty well! We watched the restoration movie and discussed it. We even got two soft baptism commitments. Which isn't really anything but it means that we brought up baptism and they know where we ideally want it to go.

 

Then church yesterday was really good. There were some really well done talks. The BP kind of layed down the hammer about home teaching and it was kind of awesome. He got this super cool looking face, kind of like a face of righteous indignation, and told people how important home teaching was and that if they weren't home teaching, they need to repent and do home teaching.

Then  there were two talks that were really well prepared by some YSA members, one of whom is a recent convert of about 7 months. The other one was  23 year old member who is, in his own words, cel mai smecher, which means like the biggest punk ever. But he got kind of emotional in his talk, talking about family. He mentioned how he would do anything for his younger brother who is on a mission right now in Germany, although they fought a lot when they were younger. He got really choked up when he said, "It doesn't matter if you have a brother who, for 20 years or more speaks nothing but bad things about  you. Because when he needs you, you'll be there to help him. Because he's your brother."

He went on to say how much he loved him. This clearly made me think of my brothers and family in general, and I know that if my brothers ever need my help I will be there if I can. Family is the strongest bond in the world and beyond. I'm so grateful that I have my amazing family. An older brother and two younger brothers who are both great examples to me. I look up to each of you in different ways. And to have such amazing parents, grandparents, and extended family members is a priceless blessing for which I am so thankful.

This week I also listened to one of the best talks in the world: "His Grace Is Sufficient." If anybody hasn't listened to it, go listen to it.

 

speeches.byu.edu/?act=viewitem&id=1966

 

Even if you have, listen to it again. I know I always get the thought that I'm too imperfect to ever reach perfection. The thought crosses my mind frequently, "If I can't do these little things, how can I do the big things that I'll need to do to gain exaltation?" That talk explains grace so well, and has helped me on multiple occasions to understand how things actually work, and that although we will ALL fall short in the short run, in the long run we can make it. I especially want my brothers to hear it :) All this talk about brothers makes me think of them and I know that this talk can and will help each of them.

 

Anyway, more about me.  Yesterday we went out chalk contacting in the park, and I brought my guitar to bring in some atmosphere and attention. It was such a great night! We got quite a few people to come up and talk to us and it was so much fun. Something about it just made me feel so much more normal and comfortable with talking to everyone. It just like made me feel like I was in my right zone, playing the guitar and singing and talking with people. Someone even tried to tip me though I obviously refused.

We didn't get anything solid from it but there was a really cool young 13 year old boy who talked with us for quite a while and I'm sure we made an impression on him. He's actually apparently studying to be an orthodox priest, but he was still super open minded and wanted to talk, so it was super cool. It's been a long time since I've done either of those, chalk contacting or music contacting, and both just made me feel so much better at talking with people. We plan on doing it again next week.

 

So yeah that's about it!

 

Hope everybody's doing great!

 

Love you!

-Elder DeGraw

This week had some great things and a crappy thing, but mostly good

First off happy birthday to Robyn, Katie, and Sophie!! As we say in Romanian, To Many Years! La Mulți Ani! Hope you all had a great birthday.

 

So this last week had some ups and downs but overall it was pretty good. So I have noted down in my planner the following points to hit on:

 

"Joe's Crab Shirt

free pets

Africans/translating

Alin

Castelu

the awful day"

 

Allow me to elaborate.

 

The first one's pretty simple, I saw a guy wearing a Joe's Crab Shack T- Shirt. I thought that was pretty cool.

 

Next, if I was a permanent resident of Constanța, I would now be the proud owner of an adorable kitten and several awesome puppies. As in, in the same day, Friday if I remember correctly, we passed a pile of stray puppies. As in, a pile of puppies lying in a ditch on the side of the road. They were probably a few months old. Just chilling there. I wanted to just scoop them up and take them home. Then, only a few minutes later, we passed a stray Kitten. It was so adorable and friendly and I honestly probably would have just taken it if I lived here permanently. There are so many stray animals around Romania and when I see baby ones it just makes me want to steal them up and give them a good life even though I know I can't.

 

Next. This one involves 2 of the points. There are a lot of Nigerian students who live in Constanța who go to the Maritime University. One of them happens to be a member of the church! He's really cool. He has a very thick accent and so sometimes it's hard to understand him (he only speaks English) but he understands us perfectly. Anyway we went over to him with Alin, the BP of the branch (also one of the coolest guys in Romania), as part of a branch activity to get members involved in missionary work. The Nigerian member, Shedrack, as part of his school contract, lives in a Hotel in Mamaia (fun fact: the most popular tourist destination in all of Romania), so we went out to visit him. His roommate and a few of his friends were there. So it turned into a member present with 4 African students! They were all so cool and open to discussion and faithful/spiritual in their own regards. Alin and I agree that we saw a lot of possibility with Shedrack's friends. So we're going to make a habit of going out there regularly and meeting with them. I'm excited. It's kind of sad that some of the only people here who are open to talking about this kind of stuff are from another country, but souls saved are souls saved! 

[Sidenote, I've seen so much that basically anyone who is not part of the Orthodox church here will be open to discussion. Not necessarily everyone, but "pocaiți" (anyone who's not Orthodox but who is Christian) just are much more open minded from what I've seen.]

Moving on to Sunday. I was busy haha! I had to teach Elders' quorum for the first time ever and I feel like I did pretty well. Then, because we had 2 young girls from texas visiting here because they are volunteering with an orphanage, and Shedrack came with a friend that he's brought to church before, we had Sunday school in English on our own and it was really weird. I understood every single word without trying. It was weird to think that that's what church will be like when I go home. Weird. Then during Sacrament I sat behind the visitors and translated for them. I did pretty well except for with the people who talked really quiet or mumbly. But it went pretty well.

 

And I just want to say Alin is so cool. He's an RM, speaks perfect english and is a translator for the church, and is just really motivated with missionary work. It's just really nice to have a BP who knows what he's doing, because I had a BP who did nothing and it just really made things a lot harder. Anyway, even outside of the BP calling Alin is just a super cool guy.

 

Castelu. That's the name of a little commune outside of Constanta where we've been going and teaching English every week! It's in this little room in a little-ish village with a bunch of kids. It makes me feel like I'm on some service expedition haha. I actually feel like I'm helping people out there if that makes any sense. It's just pretty cool is all.

 

The awful day. Okay so a few days ago I had a pretty rough day. It's passed and I'm happy again but it got me thinking. So what happened is just basically a lot of little things piled up and I was just ticked off hard core. We had to ride the bus back and forth a few times for various reasons, and Romania just started to anger me haha. I'm normally a very optimistic and happy person. I've never had a moment personally out here where I've been like "I can't stand this place, or these people," but it finally happened. For a moment. After being pushed around multiple times and yelled at for literally doing nothing but standing minding my own business, or getting honked at for crossing the street in a crosswalk, not fast enough, I just felt really pissed off. I just felt like doing nothing because I had no desire at that moment to help anybody. I decided to get a McFlurry. Those always help. So I felt a little better after that but still not great. And then later we had a lesson set up at the church. So that came around and we waited around for a while, nothing. Called the guy twice, nothing. We got bunged. Yet again. So after that I was just thinking how done I was. That night after we came home I just sat out on the balcony overlooking the Black Sea and played my guitar for like an hour and a half. It felt amazing and really helped me feel okay again. I thankfully was able to go to bed really relaxed.

 

What I got from that day was a) the first time in my mission when I think I could actually say that I was discouraged and a little bitter towards the people. I just was so ticked at everybody and people were so rude and I didn't feel like helping them at all. And then our lesson fell through just to top it all off. So I really didn't like that at all. But b) I got the thought right before I went to bed that it's going to get worse. But then it will get so much better. It's always darkest just before dawn, as we learn from Batman. I don't know. I just feel like that although even harder times are probably coming for me, I know and have faith that it will get better.

 

Haha I feel like I give off a vibe now and probably will when I get home that I am bitter about things or discouraged or whatever it may be. And I really am not either at all! It's just that it's kind of hard to talk about what my mission is like without sounding bitter haha! I absolutely love my mission, hardships and all. I would not choose to serve anywhere else if I could. This is where I'm meant to serve and I'm so freaking happy I get to serve here :) I don't want anybody to get the wrong idea from my letters. It's certainly hard but it's so fun at the same time. I always find ways to enjoy the little things so my mission is a blast.

 

Anyway sorry long letter!

Love all of you and hope you all have a great week!!

 

-Elder DeGraw