Day 19: Moldova

So today started at 5:10 am with a skype chat with the lovely Brad Sturgill. What a great start to my day! We then got ready in our church clothes and headed to the Culture Palace where we met the rest of the branch. Because there is no stake here, we have district conference rather than stake conference. District Conference was held in Chisinau, Moldova. We took a little charter bus and had to cross the border. New stamps in mah passport baby! The drive was about 4 hours but it went by quickly. The church building was so nice but it was crazy how few people there were. Including the missionaries there were, I'd say 50 people from Moldova and Romania. The talks were in Romanian or Russian and translated into english through headsets for us americans. The mission president's wife spoke in english.. so she would speak a sentence or two at a time, after which Sister Holden would translate into Romanian from the front, and Elder Stapleton would translate into Russian from the front also. As you can imagine, the mission president's wife had to consolodate her talk a bit. When we sang the hymns it was interesting because people just sang in 3 different languages so it was easy to get thrown off. It was cool though because it just goes to show how world-wide of a church it is and the sacrifices that the church members make to drive (even to a different country) to attend this conference. After the district conference, we went to a park and had pizza (pizza here is SO different than it is in the states) and were able to walk around the city for an hour or so. There was a big "protest" going on concerning the border control into Romania.. but it was more of a festival than anything. There were lots of stands, bikes, a bmx/ skateboard park, break dancers, music and more. It was so cool to look around! The drive home was so much fun.. I have not laughed that hard since I got here and it was so refreshing to just sit back and have a good time. I feel like I am starting to make friends here with the branch members and girls and it is nice to feel like I can open up and be myself.. even if the american and romanian senses of humor dont line up all the time! haha. Well that is it for now.. Sorry for the delay of writing and the brevity.. it's been a crazy week. Take care and best wishes!