Craiova is cool!

So hey! Craiova is cool! Haha I'm still liking it more than Bucharest. We've had quite a few lessons, and we've been getting tons of phone calls for our english classes, so I'm expecting a lot of people to come tomorrow. The church is quite a bit smaller here even than in Buc, but the people here are so prepared and they just don't know it! This week we had a few lessons, and had some people coming to our activities, and I can easily count at least 5 people who I could see baptized this transfer, which would almost triple the active branch membership haha. It's crazy. But the problem is that none of them will/can come to church! I don't know if a single one of them has been to church. But I firmly believe if we can just get them to come to church, then I can see them all getting baptized. They just need to see the importance of it.
 

Other than those lessons/people, the week has been contacting. What we usually do every transfer is that in the first two weeks we contact almost solely for our English classes. So that's what we've been doing. It's probably the easiest form of contacting, and it's a good way to start the contacting juices flowing with a new companion. Then, in the third week, when we actually start teaching English classes, we switch over to normal gospel contacting. So this week will be a lot of that. We've been pushing to have 20 hours of contacting each week. In a mission like ours, especially in an area like this with like 3 members, you contact a lot haha. So we're trying to work harder to have our contacting time be a bell curve this transfer; we'll work up the hours and eventually we'll have too many lessons so our contacting hours will decrease! We've been working a lot harder than I got to last week, so that's good.

So as you know, there are like 2 active members in this branch. And the church in general in Romania has a pretty high inactivity rate right now. It's such a weird thing because the language/culture is so abrasive to many Americans (for example you don't ask for things you just say "give it to me" and it's not rude at all, things like that are very common; you can say pretty much whatever you like as long as you use the right tense) and they'll say all the time that we get offended over little things, but most of the time when people go inactive here it's because of some small offense done to them that they can't get over.

 

It's hard for them to find forgiveness in their hearts. I have found this in myself that I'm trying to work on, and seeing how it all works out it this environment I just have such a strong testimony about forgiveness. We need to forgive others. I've found so far on my mission that there will be things my companion will do that I will, for whatever reason, take offense at. And I've found that it does nothing good at all to harbor feelings of bitterness or to hold a grudge. It just burns in the back of your mind like a cancer and stops the spirit from taking place in your heart. I've had a lot of opportunities to forgive so far on my mission. I haven't always taken them and used those times to forgive as I should have in that moment. But I've learned that when I let things go, I find peace! It sounds so corny but it's true! It does no good to hold grudges. We need to let things go. Even those things that seem too big or too much to forgive, we need to forgive. Looking back, there were lots of times that I've been upset or angry or holding a grudge, and didn't even know it. We need to pray to God to give us the ability to forgive and let things go. Life just goes so much better when we are free from the burden of anger or bitterness of a grudge.

So yeah. My testimony has grown so much since I've been on a mission. I just realized that this week will mark 6 months as a missionary for me. Yeah it still feels like I left the MTC a week ago. This is my companion's last transfer and I already know he's handling it much better than I will when I'm in that position haha. I'll be freaking out the whole time. But we're working hard to make his last transfer his best one yet.

And holy crap these pictures of Zack and Jacob are freaking me out! They look so old!! In the one of both of them after the track meet Zack looks just like Nick! Zack's looking so tall! It's going to be so weird when I get home...

Anyway I love you all and I wish you all happy days and love and sunshine and rainbow puppies and unicorns and to also happy halloween I hope you're all dressing like Dracula because he's the coolest ok bye.

Elder DeGraw

Train station out in the middle of nowhere where we went for a lesson.

The pumpkin I carved for the halloween activity.

I may or may not have been kissed by a man this week.

Hey so I'm in Craiova! It's really pretty here. Especially compared to Bucharest.

So on Wednesday afternoon we took a 3 hour train from Bucharest. Haha I was officially the last one out of my MTC group to ride a train out here. It was everything I've ever imagined. We got in kind of late, took a taxi to my new apartment, and then we got ready. We've been walking a lot. There's really no reasonable form of public transportation out here in Craiova, especially compared to Buc, wherein you couldn't get anywhere without it. Yesterday we walked like 3-5 miles out to a lesson, only to find out that the person we were going to meet with lived in a completely different town. But we ended up having a lesson with a different family anyway! It was cool.

Oh. And Craiova has some... interesting... people. Haha on my first day I met like four crazy people. So yeah, about that title. So they do the whole, double cheek kiss thing over here. Women do it a lot, and men and women will do it as well. Men will do it to other men if they are like the best friends in the world. Well anyway, yeah! We were trying to contact but this one semi-crazy guy was following us trying to talk to us. We finally got rid of him, but not before he "pooped" both of us (a pupa means to kiss, they'll say te pup a lot, which basically means "kisses!"). Blagghsshsashglakhglkaalgdjgla. I can still feel the stubble on my cheek... I keep blocking this encounter out of my brain, but it keeps coming back. But yeah. That's as bad as I've got out here, so far!

Probably the weirdest thing (for me, anyway) that I've noticed about Craiova, is the branch... So, the branch president is an American who works for Ford out here. So there's him and his wife there. And yesterday at church, want to take a guess how many Romanian members there were there?

...

...

...

...

1.

...

...

...

Yeah. There was one native member there. Mind you, there was also one "eternal investigator," as well as a great potential, but that was it! Haha the church is really small here in Craiova. We meet in a little villa which shares space with another organization. Haha. It was... interesting. But the Spooners (the branch president and his wife) are really cool. They made lunch for after church, and that included chocolate chip cookies!!

I had way too many. They were so good.

But yeah, not too much else to report! Pretty city, we're going to baptize someone, I can feel it! Elder H is one away from his mission goal of 10, and this is his last transfer! We're going to make it happen. This is the calm before the storm. Missionary work is going to explode soon. We'll make it so.

Love you all, and Oh! Family! I have put all of the pictures that I've taken on a google drive, I'll send dad the information so you can see them all. So dad just the pictures that I send in this email will be the ones for the blog, unless you find others you like too which is fine.

Yeah. So that's all for now!

Much iubire! Now for some pictures!

Yeah! Love you!

-Elder DeGraw

View from my new apartment in Craiova

Train ride to Craiova - Just like in the movies

I thought this looked cool

We call him "Uncle Rico"

Some flash mob type thing in centru. "I don't want to be a merchandise/property."

I'm going to Craiova!

So hey we just got transfer boards and I found out I'm going to Craiova, as implied in the title of this email! It's a bit smaller than Bucharest, physically as well as missionary-wise. It'll be a 4 man district. So this will be the first time in my mission where I don't serve in literally the biggest district possible haha, including the MTC. 

 

My new companion will be Elder H.  He's a very hard-working missionary, a very nice guy, and I'm super excited to serve with him. We're going to get some work done! Haha my district is going to be super fun. It'll be us two, as well as Elder M, who was in my MTC group, who will be senior companion to Elder H, who is one group younger than us, and both of them are hilarious and good workers. We're going to be a great district. I'm super excited. 

 

This past transfer my companion has had a lot of stuff he's had to do, so we haven't gotten to work as much as I would have wanted to. But Elder H is known as one of the more diligent missionaries out here. It'll be really good for me and I'm excited to get back to work haha.

This will be the first time since getting here that I'll be in a district with all new people! And probably the weirdest news this transfer, is that Elder L, who has been my district leader since I got here, and who is one of those who I know I'll still be friends with/keep in touch with long after the mission, just got called to be a branch president in the city of Bacau! He's both excited and really nervous, as could be expected. But I totally saw it coming haha. He'll be a great branch president.

So many people from my MTC group have changed cities, and like half of us are senior companions with the group under us, which is weird to me haha. We're movin up! Pretty soon it'll be our group that'll be all the zone leaders, BPs, and APs! It's ridiculous to me how fast this mission is going. I'm already 1/4 done with it... That's both weird and scary.

 

Other than transfers, I'm doing great! And just a heads up, so dad knows, I plan on getting a coat and boots in the coming weeks so you'll see some money come out of my account. I don't plan on spending more than around 300 & something Lei for the coat, or more than like 150 Lei for boots. But in case my tastes/desires change, the max that I've seen a coat was like 500 Lei, and shoes the max I've seen that I'd even consider buying were like 300 Lei. So those are the prices you could expect to see come out of my account. A missionary did leave a nice trenchcoat-like coat & scarf in our apartment, so I do have that already. But I need one that will also work out of missionary clothes and in missionary clothes. So that's what I'm going to get soon. 

I got everything you said you sent, so don't worry! 

I'm super sad to hear about John Kimball. He was a great guy. Give his family my condolences. He will be greatly missed.

Also, one last thing in case anybody is having ideas about sending me stuff for Christmas... Tell them to just not. Haha well I mean if they really want to, I won't stop them, but the money is not being put to as good of a use as it could be. For how much it takes to buy something, and send it all out here, I could get a nice suit, nice clothes, and more. Seriously with what the last package cost to get out here I could have. So if they REALLY feel like spending money on me, tell them to just put it in my account and I can get three times as much with it haha. I love getting letters and packages from you guys, they make my whole transfer, I just don't want you wasting all your money on me! So unless it's something that I can only get at home, just have them put the money in my account and tell me what to get haha. I know you guys love me:) 

 

Just my recommendation. I say this also because President told us to tell our families that if they wanted to send us Christmas packages they need to be here before thanksgiving anyway. So I thought I'd just tell you that instead so you don't have to worry about it! So yeah!
 

Love you all! Talk to you soon!

-Elder DeGraw

That's weird

So this week was good! Conference was fantastic, and all that. Just some little stuff, I now have a better way to send/share pictures with you all back home! I have permission to use a google drive, wherein I can upload all my pictures/videos and stuff and so they are both backed up, as well as shared with you at home because I'll give you the password info and stuff! So I'll get that all set up this week and send you the info soon.

 

Also mom just to let you know I did get the package! I got it on the 2nd, I believe. I have been getting fat ever since;) Little weird info, Oreos exist out here, but they're not even kind of as big of a deal as they are in the states. And they for sure don't have double stuf! It's a similar situation with peanut butter; they have it but it's not the best, and it's not as big of a deal. And those peanut butter cookies were just fantastimagical, and I am so excited to make my peanut butter chip brownies! :)

-SPECIAL BIRTHDAY PARAGRAPH BEGINS-

Happy birthday J! Hope you're doing great and loving life! Just remember that just because you're a teenager doesn't mean you're too cool for Mom and Dad;) stay sick  bro!<editors note: "sick" must be Romanian for "awesome">

Also happy birthday to all of my family members who've had birthdays that I've missed! Sorry I didn't say anything before but happy birthday!

-SPECIAL BIRTHDAY PARAGRAPH ENDS-

Yeah so we just realized that on the eleventh of this month I only have a year and a half left. O_o So that's weird. Also I realized that now my youngest brother is a teenager and my next younger brother will be driving in like two months. And I've been a missionary for like 5 months now. That's weird... I've found that I think that's my catchphrase haha. I don't think I'll ever be used to the fact that time is a thing, so every time something happens and I realize that time has passed I'm just in awe like, "that's weird..." Every transfer has felt about half as long as the one before. The MTC was actually so short, but while I was there it felt like forever, but now everything has just been shooting by! Pretty soon I'll be home and that'll be really, REALLY weird. But yeah.

So we watched both morning sessions live, and here that meant going to church on Saturday at 7 in the afternoon to watch it, and then we watched some other ones all day on Sunday. I love Conference:) It's such a good, uplifting, spiritual experience. It was fantastic. My companion said that this was his favorite conference he's seen since being a member, because he got so many questions answered. I did as well, answers both about things here and at home. I'm excited to read all of the talks again in the liahona when it comes out!

This past week, we had a lesson with Nick, and I think it's a definite that we're going to give him to the North Elders. He lives like 10 minutes away from their apartment, he would be in their North Group, and they all speak English, the language he wants to have the lessons in, so I won't have to be teaching the lessons all by myself. Plus Elder E was with me when we started teaching him, so it still makes sense that way.

I'm doing great, I'm excited for what next transfer will bring, and I'll do my best to end this one with a bang!

I love and miss all of you and command you to have a fantastical week!

Love,

Elder DeGraw

It's getting cold!

So it's getting really cold here, as hinted by the title. It's also raining really badly today. And has been since yesterday afternoon. It's also windy. Very windy.  So that's fun.

Anyway, this week has been an interesting week. We met with Nick a few times, and the meetings went well, but he sent us a text the other day telling us that he still would like to meet up, but that he doesn't want to talk about religion anymore. So we're going to follow up with that.

 

Other than that, we met with a friend of Elder G, whereat we were served some really good food and invited them to come back to church after several years of inactivity, which he did, by having us pick him up in the morning. So we were at his house two hours before church to bring him there.

 

By the way, Elder G was really sick while we did this. He was apparently up all night vomiting, and he said he woke me up to help him or something, and I replied (in Romanian) "Leave me alone, I want to dream, let me sleep." But here's the kicker -- I didn't do that! I never woke up that night at all. That means I was sleep talking! And it's actually not the first time he's told me I sleep talk! Although the last few times it was in English, but this time I answered in Romanian, in my sleep! So that was weird. 

 

And other than that, this week has been kind of bland. I've been refamiliarizing myself with my guitar, and I actually feel like I play better now than I did before! Haha something about absence makes the heart grow fonder maybe?

And now some sad news, we just found out that someone from our MTC group has gone home! We're all really sad about that. Our group was really close and we all miss him. No one saw it coming either. Nor does anyone know why! He was always one of the most upbeat out of all of us. It's weird that he's not out here anymore.

 

It's been making me think about why I'm here, what I'm doing, and why I'm staying out here. And I realized that ever since I entered the MTC, I haven't had the thought to go home. Sure, homesickness has been there, I miss all of my family very much, and my friends and possessions and all that jazz, but I realized that since I've had the title of "Elder," my perspectives and focuses have changed.

 

I was worried before the MTC that it would be really hard for me to be away from the lifestyle that I was used to; going to school, working, goofing around on technology, wasting time one the internet and tv, but from day one, I haven't had a single problem with that. The first few days of nonstop study and work were a change, for sure, but I was never hindered by a desire to be anywhere else. It's hard for me to even think back to my life before the MTC. My mind is out here, and that's where it needs to be. I've been learning so much about being proactive and making things happen instead of just wasting my time. I still have a ridiculously long way to go to get where I want to be, but progress has been and is still being made.

The Gospel changes people. I've seen that happen out here. Even though a lot of people out here aren't interested at all, there are those who are, and when they apply the gospel principles in their lives, they change so much for the better. But here's the important part: for those who don't want to change, who don't want to be better, they never will. I've had companions, seen members, and even seen myself in this position of being too comfortable in the position I was in. But when I say "I want to be better," find a way to do so, and act on it, I better myself.

 

I've learned that you need to never, EVER, be satisfied with the kind of person you currently are. Even the greatest people on the planet still have room for improvement. And I've been learning that if I want to touch the hearts of the people in this country, I need to be the best me that I can. It's hard.

 

Right now I'm with a companion who, whether he knows it or not, is helping me in a few ways. I'm learning with him that if I want to see change, I need to address my problems head on, rather than being content with the way things are, and letting people walk over me. I'm still trying to apply these principles, but I'm progressing.

 

I guess that's the thing I've recognized most since being out here, is that although the main and really single purpose of missionary work is to bring souls unto Christ, I can't do that if I'm not the best that I can be, because I need to be a representative of the perfect person. So every day I try to improve myself a little more. It's hard. I'm only starting to come to this realization and it's hard to push past my comfort zone. But it needs to be done if I want to be the best missionary, and by extension the best person I can be. And it's not just something having to do with missionary work.The principles I'm trying to apply to myself are such that I always want to keep in my mind and work on, because we are always representatives of Christ, so we should always try to push ourselves to be better.

 

Haha I guess this letter has turned more into a self help seminar, but I've just been thinking on this subject a lot lately. But I just feel so strongly about this, that we need to keep pushing ourselves past what we feel is comfortable, to better ourselves.

Okay well now that my incoherent ramblings are over, here's a weird factoid about where I'm serving: Adult rollerblading is a huge thing out here. Every time we go to a park, we see dozens of them. There are some who take it really, really seriously and go really fast and do tricks and stuff and I feel like I'm living in the 90s.

Okay well that's about it for me!

Now here's some proof that I'm not starving myself:



I made nutella cookies with homemade frosting to make homemade nutella oreosand they were so good that I ate them all at once...

 

 

Also, poorly lit picture of my new guitar and me

Okay bafta!

-Elder DeGraw

(p.s. I printed off all of your letters and I'll try to respond to them all next week! Love you all!)

Reunited and it feels so BUN!

I got a guitar! I've been brushing back up on all of my songs that I've forgotten, and soon, actually tonight I think, we're getting together with another companionship to go in the park and I'll guitar contact again! Haha I didn't know I'd miss playing the guitar so much, but man did I miss it haha. It was so much cheaper than mine back in the states, but it plays as well or better as that one does. I just need to grab a capo, and my arsenal will be complete!

Okay so this last week was a pretty slow week, nothing that huge happened, with the exception that we finally met with Nick again! His phone had broken and he got a job, so he had been too busy to meet up with us, but we finally got back in contact and had a lesson with him and his friend! 

 

And because he likes/wants to learn English and we've done all of our lessons in English, we taught in English, and because my companion doesn't know any English, I taught the lesson all by myself! The spirit was so strong, I could feel how I was being guided as to what to say. I had been praying hard earlier that day to be able to answer all of his questions and to guide him to take the right path. 

 

He had a lot more questions this time than he did in our previous lessons, probably having to do with him asking his mom how she felt about him getting baptized (to which she was against, although I'm not sure of the extent), as well as he had some questions brought to his mind when he came to church a few weeks ago. 

 

But I went in as his friend, answered all of his questions based on the scriptures, and was able to reassure him of the truth while not simply stating my opinions. Haha he actually had some tough questions, but with the help of the Holy Ghost, I knew exactly what to say! 

 

In the end his last question was such to where the answer was that the only way he could know for himself was to read the scriptures and pray about them, which I instructed him to do. It was one of the better lessons I've had. I was able to bear testimony on the truth of the Gospel, about prayer, faith in Jesus Christ, as well as other things. The lord truly allowed me to be an instrument in his hands.

 

We also had district conference (basically stake conference) yesterday! The church was absolutely PACKED. It was like nothing I'd seen in quite a while. It looked like our ward back home! I swear I was the future of the church in Romania this past Sunday. I want the church to look like that every Sunday! It was beautiful.

 

Also I've been getting into cooking a lot! Last week I made all of my meals! Including some pastas, rice, I made two different kinds of pancakes completely from scratch, and I made some really tasty hot chocolate from a packet of cocoa that had been lying in our apartment since I got there. 

 

Oh and I also made saltine crackers. Yeah. They're not bad at all! Haha we have some recipe books in our apartment and I've been starting to use them and make my meals nice and tasty. It's so cool to turn some dust, liquids, and seasonings into something tasty and beautiful haha. I'm enjoying myself:)

 

Well that's about it! Same old same old! Long hours, hard work, but loving it all the time!

 

Laters!

-Elder DeGraw

Words go here...

More words are going here.

HEY. So guess what I did yesterday?! 

 

Yeah I went guitar contacting nbd. Haha a guitar was in transit to a member and the ZL had it and he was like "Hey DeGraw want to play" and I was like "I so want to play" and so I played/sung in a park while the other missionaries around talked to people who stopped or walked near us and it was super cool and effective too! 

 

Haha this last week we all tried different ways of contacting. I did that, Elder G did ping-pong contacting, Elder E did Chess contacting, and the whole district is trying to get people in for the sisters to teach a children's English class. And yesterday we all did all of that and it was super fantastarific haha. 

 

So I decided I'm going to get myself a guitar like some other missionaries have out here and do more of that. I'll put an advertisement for the English classes on my guitar so that whenever I play it people will know that I'm not asking for anything, quite the contrary I'm offering a service! 

 

One of the elders from my MTC group, Elder C, and his companion, are both super into music, so they contact like that all the time and apparently it's usually a pretty darn effective form of English contacting I mean think about it: a guy singing songs in English, advertising free english classes, if anything else that's going to make an impression.

 

So yeah other than that, this week we had a lesson with Elder G's cousin, to whom we showed the restoration film, as well as another lesson with Iancu, who is still nice and active just in case anyone had forgotten about him;) And yeah that was pretty much my week, that and contacting!
 

I've found myself trying to push myself harder every day to do more work. Lots of missionaries out here are really discouraged because we usually have low numbers. But I've seen that just turn into a vicious cycle of no work, no lessons, no baptisms, discouraged, so no work. 

 

But I've been trying to push myself and my companion to both work a lot harder than we have, and I've found myself enjoying the work much more. Not necessarily the actual contacting, which let's be honest, sucks. But with feeling like I'm actually doing my full part in bringing the Gospel to these people. I feel more satisfied with my output at the end of the day; I feel more like I'm doing what God wants me to do. I still have a LONG way to go, for sure, but I'm moving there.

I'm so happy to hear about all these happy things happening at home! You are all in my prayers every day and I'm so glad to see that so many are being answered. I miss you all, and I hope you all have a fantastic week!