Week 40 - Durres

loving serving w/ Sister Davis, she is amazing 

findinggggg the elect! (not checking my pulse)

ARIU!!!!!!!  Ah check this out!! we got the pic for free, usually the owner charges 500lek

cool moon right?? remind you of my Moscow pic? haha  

and we tried making our own qep e domate byrek! to celebrate motra davis' YEAR MARK 

music stand.. all we ever wanna do these days is make music aka her on violin, me tryna harmonize

Hej! Siii gjithmone.. so much to say, so little time.. how can I describe the crazy and exhausting and testimony-building experiences of the past week in one little p-day email?

okay so I guess this past wk I've been workin on developing new talents haha aka music w/ Motra Davis.. she got a good bridge for her violin (#Eliza #MrsKatahara) and I love singing alto/harmonizing and we love hymns and I didn't consider myself much of a singer before the mish but these days I love it and I hope the people we teach love it as much as we do because we've been incorporating/ performing hymns in our lessons, to invite the spirit (if all goes well ha) etc. and it's been really cool actually, plus the lyrics alone have such a powerful effect. <3 So, my new favorite hymn is "Redeemer of Israel" (I guess Elder Bednar likes that one too?) and I have an arrangement I loove with harp/ bassoon, just instrumental, and I could listen to it all dayy. We used a cool arrangement of Lutja e pare e Jozef Smithit for some investigators we needed to emphasize restoration of the priesthood with. On Wednesday we have zone conference- which I'm singing a duet w my comp at btw ha wish me luck.

Also the other day in lang. study I tried writing a poem in Albanian and it was so fun so I wrote more hahaha they'd probably be so cheesy ne Anglisht but I like the language excuse, so new fave pastime? (Haha what can I say, gettin in touch w my childhood self, remember when I was published in the Friend? ;) )

I loved reading through Jacob 4. Awesome chapter. 

 

Oh my goodness, the funniest things have happened while tracting! (It helps that my comp and I think everything's funny). Btw, we've been doing tonsa tracting the past few days, b/c all our awesome, amazing, not-technically-progressing-but-progressing-in-our-eyes investigators dropped off the grid on Tuesday! Either on vacation or moved or stopped answering their doors or taking our calls, I swear our phone was cursed b/c noone answered that day lol. But yeah knocking doors....these people have the worst excuses! I.e. the heat or a family member is home ("sweet they can join us for a lesson!") and I am so sick of the lame excuse of "I just believe in one God but nope no time bye".. faith without works is DEAD and yeah I ranted about that in my journal the other day but I'll save you the commentary. One lady said, "I'm orthodox- I mean, Muslim... I mean, idk, I'm busy ok?" and another said "No, bye" but came out with cold water, soo nice, and one lady, in perfect Albanian told us she only spoke Italian, and then her daughter started to say otherwise but her mom shushed her. We tried a new approach, "can we at least sing to you?" and we started singing "femi i per'ndis jam" and our audience (super rude lady) cut us off and said, "no need to finish" and slammed the door, and looots of other doors SLAMMED not just the usual rejection hah but it was cool because one lady, as soon as she saw us went off about how much she can't stand us and our propaganda etc. and no she didn't have even one minute.. for us.. but we ended up chatting for a solid 15min in her doorway, testifying about the Plan of Salvation and she was crying by the end and told us we are sweet girls but if we were her daughters she'd never dream of letting us travel so far but we explained that just goes to show the importance of our message because it's true, we do leave lots behind. I know for me, I can't help but want to tell everyone about the gospel and so I do, because reflecting back on the role it's played in my own life, I shudder to think where I'd be without it!

The other day was probably one of the highlights of my mission (and that is saying something!) because we were at the Canis and they taught us some popullore dancing, yesss, that's been my dream to learn the cool steps hah and now it's my dream to go to an Albanian dosem (wedding) and wear traditional clothes etc. but yeah sis. davis was fiddling Albanian folk songs on her violin and we were with awesome members at their little house overlooking this city, and we'd been visiting/ talking about missions and testimonies and life etc. and yeah it was awesome. Then we ran to make it to a lesson on time, and I think I was the sweatiest I've ever been in my life when we finally arrived. And our investigator was late haha! 

Ooh yesterday in church there was a crazy, outspoken older man (just kinda showed up #visitorswelcome!) with strong garlic breath in 2nd hour and his mannerisms were hilarious and he got really worked up about symbolism in a scripture and started shouting and waving his fists... passion for the word of God! jk. 

And yesterday, fasting, I was just thinking about how powerful God is and how needy we, his children, are.. it's so silly for me to ever think I may know better than him or his servants and I'm just grateful to have such a wise and loving Father in Heaven who's prepared such a perfect plan for each of us, his children. It still blows my mind that there are so many people in the world yet he knows us all personally and cares about our concerns. Something I appreciate, but can't fully wrap my head around. 

Oh and we had interviews with President, I love President Weidmann, he is so in-tune with the spirit (and Swiss! haha) and as he reminded me on Tuesday, "living the Gospel is always a win-win situation." Very true, even when we're tempted to think otherwise in the short-run. 

I love you guys!!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD! Check the mailbox in a week or two :) #betterlatethannever 

<3 Madi/ Motra Rajlli 

Ana showed us how to make byrek! qep e domate :) well, more like she made it all while motra davis took detailed videos, and I played ping-pong with henri. man I love p-day.  

Henri reminds me of Josh!  

best p-day with the Canis! (ignore my dirty feet)

<3  

thisss little cutie! who just moved aka we lost an investigator, his mom 

just for fun, English/Deutsch/Shqip/Russki at a glance

Elder Anderson had a birthday.. perfect timing because sister davis and I had just started our month of super strict clean eating but we went to eat w the district ha so we only lasted a solid 24hrs.. and then byrek today ;) moderation in all things!?