Adriatic South Mission : 3 COUNTRIES IN 1 WEEK!!!

Okayy so this has been a whack week. I have been in Albania, Kosovo, and Macedonia woot woot! This week has been really busy opening Prishtina so we've had to do a lot of work finding records, people to teach, and making plans to have the work EXPLODE in Kosovo! Oh also I think I forgot to mention that they LITERALLY SPEAK A DIFFERENT DIALOGUE OF ALBANIAN IN KOSOVO HAHA IT'S SO HARD BUT AWESOME. We also had zone conference in Macedonia (about a 2ish hour drive away) and that was such a blast. Macedonia is beautiful wowww. They are also quite developed there I had no idea. It was kinda funny too because my companion and I gave a training and we're the only sisters with like 7 elders lol and I have only been here a month lol. Our zone is so small HAHA. Kosovo is basically the same as Albania besides that they have Burger King and KFC.

KOSOVO CULTURE SHOCKS:

1. Okay this is hilarious but Kosovars LOVEEE BILL CLINTON. Oh my word. There are huge posters of him everywhere and they just love that guy so much for helping liberate them from Serbia. Also, the American flag can be found here almost more than the Kosovo or Albanian flag lol they love America. Plus everyone always wants to know if me and Bill Clinton are friends HAAH.

2. Speaking of Serbia, Kosovars hate Serbia with all their might. In fact, a lot of road signs are in Serbian but they have blocked out any words that are in Serbian and HATE anything that has to do with Serbia. So there's tons of blacked out road signs with no directions.

3. There is a rule here which is that you NEVER walk into someone's house without taking your shoes off outside. It's super disrespectful to walk inside when wearing shoes.

Funnies:

1. There is this cute senior couple from Austria and their bank accounts were having some major issues here in Kosovo. The bank wouldn't give them their money but then it was kinda funny because the bank kept saying that they needed to get a signature from President Russell M. Nelson which is a little difficult hehe. But then they changed their minds and said that they wanted a signature from the owner of the church hahahah ummm yeah I would love to have a signature from the owner of our church too hehehe.

2. It's a mission rule that you have to sleep in separate beds from your companion (makes sense right?) well our landlord couldn't figure out how to get two beds into the small room so he turned our entire bedroom into a huge bed hahaha. There are two beds however, because it's so small our entire bedroom is just one huge bed how awesome.

3. Oh also this week our washer exploded and there was just water everywhere lol. There was so much water and all of Motra Adams clothes were just sopping wet hahah also we don't have dryers idk if I mentioned that.

Food for the spirit:

1. The gospel is very new in Kosovo. We are in a branch with about 15 members all of which live 30+ min away. Yet they come every week. They all love each other so much and are the most christlike people I have ever met. They are taking ministering to a whole other level. They are always welcoming anyone new, loving each other, and serving wherever they can even though they are completely different from one another. I think we can all follow their example and remember what it truly means to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

2. We met the most amazing people this week. There are these twins (Elda and Elsa) that are our best friends. Within our first hour in Kosovo we had a lesson with them and they immediately fell in love with us. They have never seen the sister missionaries before so they were so excited to meet us! They said that we were the answer to their prayers awww I love them so much. They pray every day, read the scriptures every day, come to church, and are literally always at the church for activities because they want to be by the spirit. They know this is true. This was a hard week for all of us though. They asked their parents if they could be baptized (because they are minors) and their parents said no. Ohhh how that breaks my heart. We will be praying hard for these two beautiful souls. In this culture the people often times have to choose between family and Christ because they will be either killed or disowned. They are already under heavy persecution from their schoolmates for even attending a christian church which is so hard. I am so proud of them and look up to them so much. We are soooo lucky in America. Please don't take that freedom for granted.

3. This week we went music contacting with the elders. Basically what happens is that some of us sing and play instruments while the rest talk to people in the road (lol I bet you can guess which part I played in this). First of all, the spirit was so strong with their singing and it brought so many people over. It was so amazing to see music really touch their hearts. Also- I had a cool experience! I saw this woman and just had the strongest impression to talk to her! She said that she had seen the missionaries around before but they have never talked to her and she knew that if it was from God that they would talk to her. She was so excited that I stopped her that she just started kissing me all over hahah and said that we can meet this week! AHHH I can't wait!!!

Pics: Macedonia, cute family we taught, trees, me with a goat (and the worst allergies)