Missionary Work Takes a Lot of Energy!

Bună Ziua!!

One more week in Romania. I have settled in a little more to the lifestyle now, but there is still a lot of mental adjustment going on. To be honest, it is really different from my expectations from the MTC. Investigators are hard to get, unless you happen to be the sisters, who now have 4 investigators with baptismal dates. I have high hopes for English classes though.

I will be buying my winter clothes soon. I hope to find a sweater today, but I don't plan on buying anything else yet. You can get anything at the malls here, so I'm not worried about finding anything. There are 4 malls just here in Constanta, which are pretty much like the ones in Canada, just with European stores.

Elder B and I have our own apartment, for just the two of us. The other elders are just a few minutes north of us, on the 5th floor, looking over the sea. I hear the sisters have a similar view. This is a great place to start my mission. Even for learning the language, this is probably the best. The accent is purer here than compared to western Romania or near Moldova, but people don't speak quite as fast as in Bucharest. It still seems incredibly fast to me though. 3 hours of church is quite the mental workout, as understanding anything more than the topic takes all my brain power and I usually still don't get it. One day, it will be easier, but it will take a lot of patience on my part. Learning the language is tough, but I am getting pretty good at understanding the way people either refuse us or accept a  "Cursuri de Limba Engleza" card. I have that vocabulary down.

We do walk quite a bit, and we also use the buses. But mostly, proselyting means walking for us. On Thursday, we walked to the opposite side of town by foot, contacting on the way, and kept going for three hours until our lesson with a member. It was way down in the industrial side of town, in probably the sketchiest hood in town. We met with the Branch President and taught a fantastic lesson to one of the members. It didn't count for any of our key indicator goals, but the spirit was strong, I talked as much as anyone else, and the point got across. It was great, and the member said he would prepare to go to the temple. I felt like I had accomplished my missionary dream. I fell asleep in my clothes at 9:30 that night, and didn't wake up to change until 2:20 in the morning. Missionary work takes a lot of energy.

We do have exercise time each morning. We usually just work out in the apartment, but we will go on a run sometimes.

You asked about Constanta last week and I didn't answer all your questions, so I will try to explain a little more.

I haven't seen any ruins or anything like that, but there is a pretty cool mosque in the old area of town. Most of the city seems very influenced by the communist era, but not quite as much as Bucharest. There are lots of apartment blocks here, but also a fair amount of really fancy neighbourhoods, in a European sort of way. There is also a very large casino down by the sea in the older area. I have heard Constanta described as the Las Vegas of Romania. It is the most touristy place, and we are already starting to see the city die a little as summer closes. It is a lot different in the winter, and since no one is on the streets, the only thing to do is bloc-knock. (The trick is to start from the top floor, and go down. It's easier to keep going that way.)

We also made a little trip about 15 minutes outside the city on Sunday to Valul lui Traian, to find information about a less active member who once lived there. The trip by foot, bus, and Maxi-Taxi took all afternoon, but we were successful in obtaining a phone number. A maxi-taxi is like a big 24-seat van, and they are very common around here. That is the way to get to the towns where the buses won't go.

If you want to send me a Christmas package, it should be here before Nov 28, since the Christmas zone conference will be a little early this year. Thanks.

Love you so much! Vă iubesc!

Elder Lybbert