Good Bye Uzhorod

WOW! What a week!?! I think that my emotions have been around the block a few times! We got to celebrate my 6 months on the mission. That is scary! I can't believe that it has been that long, I feel like it is all going waaaaaay faster than I want it too! I love these people to much, no way another year is long enough to be here. 

Also, random! So, Sister Garrett and I got volunteered by our lovely Elders here to go to this doctor open house thing. I guess that the two most random cities in the world that I can think of, Corvallis OR and Uzhhorod Ukraine are "Sister Cities." So Brother and Sister Rampton, who live in Corvallis, came into Uzh this week. They have been coming here for 20 years to help establish family mediciene here in Ukraine. They called the Elders to find out where the church and had lunch with them. I guess that they were working with the doctor that helped me when I had my allergic reaction to juice to set up a family clinic here and it was opening this week, the church had donated a lot to the cause as well, and they were hoping to get some missionaries as representatives; so of course, send the Sisters!

It was like the most random thing ever, but we had so much fun! Half english, half Ukrainian, translating for people, all kinds of stuff. They were so nice, and we basically just took a tour of the clinic, that ironically I had already received medical care in, and were introduced as representatives of the Church. It was super simple, we took a bunch of pictures and even met the mayor of Uzhhorod.

We still are running pretty low on investigators here in Uzhhorod, so we spent most of this week hitting the streets, which are getting colder. Mel, our one investigator wasn't able to meet this week at all because of work, which was unfortunate. We had a few good conversations with people and have just been walking EVERYWHERE! It has been so fun though, me and Sister Garrett just make it fun!

Our members, Sasha, Anna, and Yeva have been gone since Thursday. They were able to go on a temple trip and do baptisms for the dead in Kyiv. I was SO excited for them! Sister Garrett and I met with Anna and Yeva on Tuesday and talk about the temple with Anna. She had never been before, obviously, she has only been a member 2 months, and Yeva has been to the temple a few times. It was SO helpful to have Yeva on the lesson. She explained pretty much everything, about how it works, what will happen, where to go, it was so great! I really hoped that Anna would have a great experience with the temple.

Also, on Saturday we got transfer information. Pretty much, if my email isn't that exciting that would be why, my brain is a little bit on overload. Elder Terry, Elder Tribett and I are being transferred out of Uzhhorod. It made Sunday quite the bitter sweet Sunday. Elder Terry had us leaving missionaries bear our testimonies. I cried. Pretty much I cried during the whole sacrement meeting. It was terrible. I love these people so much! Yeva wasn't at church because she had decided to stay in L'viv and see Sister Echols one last time before she leaves on Wednesday, back to the States. Sasha and Anna had just returned to Uzhhorod about an hour before sacrement and came. It was so great, Elder Terry asked them to tell about their experience at the temple. They both had the best time! It was so wonderful to hear all about it from them.

We also had Brother and Sister Rampton at church, Elder Tribett was translating for them. That was weird, having my words translated from Ukrainian to English as I shared my testimony. It will definately throw you off when you are speaking.

OH, and Sasha was ordained an Elder!! He is the first melche.... yup, don't know how to spell that, holder in our little Uzhhorod group! It is so amazing! Sasha is just the best and that will be such a blessing for him and his family! His little brother, Ivan got the priesthood, he passed the sacrement for the first time last Sunday. Uzzhorod is just the best!

So, I am sure that you all want to know.... I am being transferred into Luds'k. It is a city more northern, close to Poland. They have some of the cleanest Ukrainian, which will be super helpful! It is going to be so weird! I get a new companion, Sister Rudolphie. There are 3 sets of Elders there, the zone leaders are in my district. I don't know anyone that I will be serving with other than Elder Peterson is being transferred to Luds'k as well, he is from my MTC district. So that will be nice. Sister Rudolphie came in with Sister Garrett, so I will be finishing training her in my new area, she has been in Luds'k one transfer already. It will for sure be an adventure.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to have served here in Uzhhorod though! It has been truely amazing, and part of my heart will always be with these people. Who knows, maybe I will be back?