Bulgaria

This has been one of the fastest weeks of my mission! Probably because I wasn't in my mission for almost three days on my visa renewal trip to Bulgaria.
We made all our trains and planes and buses on time with no big problems. I was delighted to meet so many people from all over the world at the airports. It was interesting to hear the Bulgarian language that sounds like Russian, but is still not understandable. We traveled with two missionaries from a different mission in Ukraine and I felt almost guilty that I would be apart of the Temple opening and they wouldn't. Even in the Bulgarian mission office, they have a big picture of the Kiev Temple and updates underneath. I am so blessed to be in the best mission on Earth! I was afraid that the trip might make me "trunky", but it turned out just the opposite, being away from my area, my mission, my Ukraine, and knowing that I still have some months left, made me super eager to jump right back in and get to work!

Yesterday all the missionaries in Khmelnitsky set up a table of books for about an hour. Sister Murphy and I talked to a very nice babushka who we almost got a referral from. Then a woman from another faith came up to us and started telling us what she believes and didn't want to listen to us. We tried to offer her some brochures, but she wouldn't accept them, then Sister Murphy testified of Jesus Christ and she agreed with everything, then she got so wound up that when a young man came up to us, the lady started preaching repentance to him! It was hilarious! I'm grateful that he still stuck around long enough for us to get his number, he seems really cool. After they both left a man came up and started telling us the history of Ukraine and his views on religion. It didn't seem like he would ever go away, so we got helped out by some rain that allowed us to pack up our stuff and run out of there! I haven't done book stands very often on my mission, and I'm not sure they are the most effective, but you sure do meet some very interesting people.
I love missionary work. I'm so happy that I will never ever have to stop being a missionary.

5-24-10
-Sister Howell