It's not even funny. I already had transfers! I thought you knew that! And I got a great coat don't worry. Dad the other $62 was for just random stuff that I can't remember anymore sorry. I said something about in a previous e-mail. I got mail and that awesome package!!! Thank you so much :) I wasn't expecting anything but I'm spoiled and I appreciate it. I totally thought I told you about Dylan ( I love that kid) He's in Florida for good and he's having a great time. So we really like this band named Mayday Parade, we've seen them live a few times, met them several times, etc. And I always said we were going to baptize them or at least contact them. And the music scene in Florida is awesome and Mayday Parade is based out of Florida. Well Dylan, who always manages to get in these kinds of situations, meets them at a CD signing and of course tells him why he's in a white shirt and tie. He's a lucky fruitcake. Anyways.
Speaking of musical artists, one of my favorites, Brandon Flowers, is on mormon.org now. He's the frontman for the Killers (band) and has a wonderful solo album. I love that man.... Other random stuff: A missionary here told me The Guess Who is from Romania, is that true? what else. Oh my watch band fell apart but the timepiece still works. Does my pocket watch in my room still work? Does my room still exist? whatever. What else.... oh yes mufasa. So I told you about that homeless guy who scares you and then is really nice to you. He's become our great friend and we call him mufasa and he likes that. We were coming back from shopping one day and gave him a little bag of chocolate cereal because he's cool. The next day we saw him and I expected him to want more food or something but once he saw his he approached us and pulled out an unopened back of Haribo candy and tried to give it to us.... made my day. Next we were inside a tramvai and he was on the outside miming to us to make a paper airplane with some money and throw it out the window, so naturally we gave him a pass along card. He smiled and made an offensive gesture... But then later that week we're on a tramvai and he recognizes the backs of our heads and knocks on the window. He points to himself and says, "un leu" and we were sure he was just trying to tell us he's a lion. Then he poked his head in and said what's up, asked for money, we said we can't and so he stood outside our window, gave us the warmest smile and just waved. We waved and then turned around again thinking the tramvai was leaving. It didn't and he knocked on the window and made us wave back at him until the tramvai left. That guy is the coolest.
There is an excess of crows here. Some days you'll see blocks of buildings with hundreds of crows just sitting on top. The Birds.
So I've been let down a little bit by missionary work here. That sounds pretty horrible but what I mean is that there are a lot of missionaries out here who are missing the picture and are wondering why they aren't having lessons and investigators and baptisms etc. And then they say, oh Romania's hard. I'm sick of that mindset. There's no reason for progress here to be the way it is. Thankfully we had this conference in Bucharest on Wednesday and Elder Teixeira of the Seventy lit us up. At first glance he appears to be a Portuguese teddy bear when in fact he is more like a Portuguese Kodiak (if such a thing exists). He told us all the things we need to change and improve. We had taken an online survey several weeks ago and he reviewed some of the results with us and they pretty much explain why this mission is the way it is. I hope things change. Elder Barney and I have a vision for this mission and this week is gonna be the week we implement all we learned and see how it works. We set some crazy goals, pray for us to succeed. I think we're gonna blow this week out of the water. We should have five investigators with baptismal dates this week and should get callings for two or three less-actives. And other stuff. Oh and I got my visa so I'm legal. Not sure I really ever need this thing but it's definitely a good souvenir. Except I look like a criminal in the picture.
Yesterday we had a district conference in Arad and we got Mary Anne and her daughter Monica to come. We've also got Mary Anne to accept the fact that we're going to help her quit smoking starting this week. At first I was so nervous... I was worried how the branch would treat her and how grumpy she'd be without all her smokes and what she would think (because it wasn't a normal meeting) etc. After the first meeting Elder Barney went upstairs with Monica to an investigator meeting and I had to face Mary Anne who was not happy.... There had been loud, loud children (understandable). But she was also annoyed by some comments made and really annoyed that we had missionaries translating (because our language skills are so limited) and she was a professor of Romanian so she's really picky about the language. Even in the Book of Mormon she gets annoyed with the mistakes. I told her to translate it then. No not really but maybe she should.... Whatever but I talked to her for like an hour and my Romanian was crazy good, it blew my mind and she calmed down and admitted she had felt good for parts of it. Then her and Monica went upstairs to a meeting for all the women and we just hoped the women in our branch would take care of them. Sora Carolina, the sister that just barely reactivated herself, connected with them soooooooo well and put Mary Anne in a great mood. Sora Carolina is the greatest, she is helping us with so much and she just barely came back. So then as we were walking back in Oradea, Mary Anne admitted she'd had a great time and Monica had already said many times how much she enjoyed it. She considers herself an investigator and is just wonderful. She had been really sick that morning and wasn't going to come and by the time we were in Oradea she was wonderful. So that was awesome.
That night we went to a nearby block to spread some good news of the Gospel and the first door yielded no response. The second door I said two greetings and then tried to say we're missionaries but the guy just invited us in. He had a gorgeously clean apartment and he served us some snacks. He listened to the message of the Restoration and accepted everything we said. He interrupted us to tell us he'd be at church sunday -- we hadn't even mentioned church. His wife came home and was super nice. She went into another room so we finished teaching him and he asked for more visits and longer visits and wow. Pray for that continue please. It was wonderful. And he doesn't smoke or drink....... And although he's Christian he's not really tied to any religion currently and acts like he wants to be. Crazy.
How is everyone? How is the McManus family? I was thinking about them the other day. Those boys would make fantastic missionaries. Um I'm pretty sure anyone can e-mail me but I can only e-mail back family and then write everyone else. I got the ward newsletter from Bishop Mckell, tell him thank you thank you, I loved it.
I think that's everything! I love you guys, I'll be sending a tiny Christmas Package home soon.... Don't open it til Christmas. I will know.
Love,
Elder Taylor
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