When we don't have water, we pretty much just go about our day normal leaving out everything that has anything to do with water. So we can't really shower or anything. We found a big jug of water under the sink the other day, so for those days when we don't have water, we just use that to like wash our hands and whatnot. I don't think we've had a problem with it this past week which has been pretty nice. When we do have water we always seem to have enough warm water. It's nice. Elder Flack says that our bathroom is probably one of the nicer ones he's had in his mission.
Lately, I've been reading Libri i Mormonit for part of my language study, and I think I'm starting to get my reading speed and everything up pretty good. I realized how helpful that is when we are teaching somebody.
The branch in Lushnje is really small. I think it used to have like 30ish people coming or something, but I hear that when a senior couple stopped being in the branch presidency that many people left. I think the most people we've ever had at church since I've been here has been 10. We only have 1 hour of church each Sunday, and nobody really has any callings. There are a couple pretty strong members here so that's nice. There aren't any children coming to church since I've been here either.
In my personal scripture study, I think I'm more than halfway through Alma now. I haven't tried using my debit card yet, but I might try that pretty soon. I saw this pretty cool looking scarf here that said Lushnje on it. I've wanted to get something from my first area on my mission, so I figure that scarf probably shows it well enough.
The other day, I studied a little more about hope, and I learned a lot about it. I remember in the MTC one time we were learning about how important faith hope and charity were, but I remember wondering why hope was so important. I always just thought of hope as "I hope this happens" which always seemed to me to be a lesser form of faith. I'm not exactly sure how to explain it, but I learned that hope has some other meaning that makes it important. From how I understood it, it still sounds like it is closely tied to faith.
That's awesome how dad is starting to get paid more. It's good to know that you guys are being blessed and everything. I could try getting some pictures to you all sometime. We're headed to Berat today for a district trip, so maybe I'll be able to get some cool pictures for you all.
So work here in Lushnje seems like it's really slow all the time. Last time we met with the former investigator that we found, we learned that he was only interested in the church for money. We've gotten many contacts while we've been here, but they usually just fall through. We meet with this inactive guy named Lorenc, and I have some hope that he could start coming back to church. There is also this less active lady that doesn't come to church because she has to work on Sunday. She seems to have a testimony though. We try to meet with her, but she works a lot throughout the week, so it is really hard to get ahold of her.
Last Saturday, for an activity with the young men, we went to this Italian circus that was in town. One guy couldn't come because his brother has been sick, but we had a good showing of 2 people out of 3. One of them just kind of ditched us when we got there, but the other one seemed to have fun. The one person we sat with that went with us has some mental challenges, so he's almost like a little kid. It was really fun to see him laugh at some of the clowns and stuff.
On Friday, we got another contact while street contacting, and I'm hoping we'll be able to get ahold of him this next week. We'll see how that goes. Sometimes it's hard because it doesn't seem like we're having any success at all. One good thing that could come from this, is that if I get transferred somewhere else, it could just seem that much more successful.
I have found that on preparation days that it is kind of fun to shine my shoes. They have started looking really shiny each time I shine them. However, we go outside, and by the end of the day, we've flicked up tons of mud and dirt all over them. Luckily, we have like this brush thing that we can dust off all the dry mud from our shoes each time we get home. So our shoes are able to look pretty good most of the time.
It's kind of hard to believe that I've been in Albania for a month. It does feel like it's been forever since I was in the MTC though. I can't decide how long it seems like I've been here in Lushnje. Time just goes all crazy it seems. It really just stops making any sense when you go back and try to think about it.
Anyways, I love reading letters from all of you. Keep me updated on happenings and everything! I appreciate all your prayers!
Love,
Elder Wallentine
Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you about the stores here. I think it may just be because of how small Lushnje is, but there aren't really any big supermarkets. The stores we go to are just built into these apartment things and most of them are really small. They have those kinder egg things here, and there's a lot of similar cereals and some similar products here as in Belgium. Anyways, one thing that is kind of confusing about the money here is they speak in old leke and new leke. The actual numbers on the money is in new leke so the 1000 leke bill is like ten bucks. So in new leke talk, they say "Nje mije leke" which is one thousand leke, but in old leke talk, they say "Dhjete mije leke" which is ten thousand leke. I think they usually talk in old leke from what I've seen so far, but sometimes it is confusing. Anyways, that's about it for that.
Love,
Elder Wallentine
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