When in Romania!

BUNA ZIUA!!!!

Where do I even start?? It has been the longest/shortest week of my life. Hold on... it hasn't even been a week... weird. Definitely feels like it has been a month since I got off of the plane. Can I just tell you, that getting on that plane in Washington DC to Vienna Austria was the scariest thing I have ever done. As I walked back to my seat, I looked around and no one spoke english (flight attendents included) and no one was American and that's when it hit me that I was leaving my home land and it took all of my strength not to turn around and run off the plane. I sat down in my chair and prayed for strength as I embarked on this new adventure. My prayers were definitely answered and by the time we got to Austria, our plane for Romania could not come soon enough. I wish I would have had time to call everyone, but our layovers were way too short. I'm so sorry. But please know that I love you with all my heart and I wish I could have had time to talk to everyone!! If we didn't have such a dang big family, this wouldn't be an issue:)

So getting to Romania was definitely a culture shock. Bucaresti is so busy and so much fun. Everywhere I go I just see Sora Petrisor's face (my teacher in the MTC) and I feel so honored to be here serving her people and it makes me want to work so much harder. Our second day was an amazing experience as we went out to Cismigu park where the mission was dedicated by Elder Nelson. What a cool experience. If you get a chance, you should look up the didicatory prayer to the Romanian mission. Did you know it was dedicated the day after I was born?? February 9, 1990. How neat. They were just waiting for me to be born to dedicate the mission:) kidding

So that day in the park, Sora Ewell and I got to teach our first lesson. IT WAS SO COOL!!! They sent us off on our own to go contacting and we ran into a girl who was sitting and reading and starting talking to her and as we did, we asked if we could meet with her to teach her more and she said she had time right now so we taught her her first lesson and gave her a commitment to read and pray about the plan of salvation pamphlet and set up a second meeting. I wanted so badly to stay in Bucaresti just so I could keep teaching her. It was a cool experience. Anyway, we got 2 other numbers that day and it was amazing. I love being here.

Arad is beautiful. I wish I had time to explain how much I love the people here and how laid back they are. They are so kind and so considerate. As we hand out cards to them, they are so grateful whereas americans would just keep walking and completely igore anyone trying to hand them anything.

We visited a ton of less active families last week. We visited a mom and her two kids and I am in love with her kids. Her name is Mihaela and her kids are Alexandra and Mihai... They are SO adorable. Seriously, Romanian children are probably the most adorable kids I've ever seen. (besides my nieces and nephews, of course). But really, they are so beautiful. I love them:)

We have mainly been focusing all our contacting on english classes that start next week, but have also contacted 3 people and gotten their information and hopefully we get to meet with them this week. English classes start next week and we use that as our biggest form of finding investigators. So hopefully a lot of people show up and we baptize them all!:) ha.

I love my companion, Sora Remsberg. She is from San Diego, 22, been out for 8 months, already trained once, lots of fun, very kind and sweet. Honestly, she reminds me a lot of Amy.. She is very bubbly and I love it. She is a great trainer. Super patient and teaches me lots. I love her.

The branch here is little. Like really little. We meet in a quaint little building and it's awesome. There are a lot of less actives that aren't coming to church so our goal this transfer is to reactivate a lot of them and get them coming more frequently. Hopefully we get to focus on some investigators too, but I know that Sora Remsberg is very driven to reactivate a lot of the less actives, which is awesome! It was so hard to say goodbye to Sora Ewell, we may or may not have sat and cried for a good 10 minutes while hugging at the train station. It probably looked pretty pathetic to anyone else who was watching... haha. But really, it was so hard. I love her so much. She is basically like my sister. I have gotten so close with her in the 9 weeks. I hope and pray we get to serve together. I know that our companionship would rock and we would get so much done. At least that's when I'm telling president hill so that he puts us together:) We'll see what happens. Keep her in your prayers. I'm sure she is doing amazing, but it's not easy being in a country where you can't communicate... very well.



I'm excited to be here. It's hard and tough but it's so rewarding. I love listening to the members and feeling of their spirit (I can't understand them very well right now) but I love listening. The language is already getting easier so I know that it will come!! Thank goodness for the gift of tongues

I love you ALLLLLL!!! So much. Miss you like crazy and as always, you're all in my prayers. Be good:)



Va pup,

Sora Cook



by the way, there are really cute stray dogs EVERYWHERE!!!! And I mean REALLY cute. I want to take them all home. So cute. And they don't speak English... It's weird. I don't know how to talk to dogs in Romanian.






Sora Remsberg and Sora Cook in front of the Theatre in Arad.



The Arad District! Elder Harrison, Elder Myers, Sora Remsberg and Sora Cook















Bon Voyage MTC!

Hey Family,

I'm going to make this quick because I have so much to do before my departure date on MONDAY!! Look out. I'm so excited. Well, actually I am a whole slew of different emotions. Excited to get to Romania and meet President and Sister Hill, nervous to talk to the people and so sad the leave the friends I've made here at the MTC. It will be hard but I'm very excited for the adventure ahead.

This week has been an exciting week. A lot of "lasts"... last prep day, last time going to the temple for 16 months, last service day, last classes, last fireside, last devotional, last lessons with investigators... it's all very weird. I kind of feel like it's the last week of school and I don't really want to go to class. Our teachers have been awesome and take the first hour of class to talk to us about Romania... which is nice. And makes me even more excited to go.

I really don't know what to say. It has been an emotional but amazing week. Sister Ewell and I had a much needed heart to heart on Sunday night and she helped me learn so much about myself and ways to improve and because of that, it has made this week go by so much better.

So I found out on Sunday that the day after we leave, the entire first presidency and twelve apostles will be here at the MTC for mission president's meeting and to set apart the new MTC mission president. I'M SO MAD!! hahaha. okay, not really. Just a little though. How cool would that be? Ugh, so jealous of the missionaries that get to be here for that.

We taught our last lessons with Nelly and Daniel the other day... it was so sad. I definitely shed a few tears at the end. It has been such a neat experience.

I cannot tell you how much I love our Romanian Elders. They are amazing. My heart is full of gratitude both for these elders and for our teachers and all the missionaries I have come to be such great friends with. Goodbyes never have been my strong point... you would think I would be used to this by now. I'm not.

Can I share a poem that has been coming to my mind this week that I memorized a few years ago?? It's beautiful and puts into words exactly how I feel as I am preparing to leave for Romania...

If I Can Stop

By: Emily Dickinson

If I can stop one heart from breaking

I shall not live in vain

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one fainting robin

Unto his nest again

I shall not live in vain.

Beautiful, yes? This is truly my goal; to help just one person return home to their Heavenly Father. I cannot wait to meet the people I already love. It's a strange feeling and I'm not really sure how to describe it... but I feel like I already know these people I am about to go serve and that I already have a tremendous amount of love for them that I'm sure will only increase. I am so glad that Heavenly Father has called me to serve the Romanian people. President Monson said "There are feet to steady, hands to grasp, minds to encourage, hearts to inspire and souls to save. Are you doing your part?" I love that.

Okay, I'm sorry this is so short and not very detailed, but I plan and giving more details when I get to talk to you on Monday:)

I love you all so much. I hope you are all doing well and that you are growing closer and closer to our Heavenly Father as much as I am! Although, let's be honest, you're all way ahead of me... I'm just catching up:)

Miss you so much,

Sister Cook

Happy birthday wassa!!! A card is coming your way:)

And to all the dad's in my family, but especially MY daddy, Happy Father's Day on sunday!!! I love you all and am so grateful for you... you truly have no idea. I wish I could give you a Father's Day hug...

Sora Ewell, Sora Cook, Fratele Sandberg

Sora Ewell, Sora Petrisor, Sora Cook

ROMANIAN MISSIONARIES!! plus Fratele Sandberg and Fratele Boynton

happy p-day to me!

Ce-i sus câine?!
I literally woke up this morning singing "happy p-day to me" to the tune of "happy birthday". Prep days are great. Especially when I get to go to the temple first thing. Amazing way to start off my day!

Well... only 11 more days until I am on the plane to România!! How crazy is that? Pretty sure I was giving up  hope on whether or not I would actually ever leave here or not! We should get our flight plans today, which is exciting. After watching district after district of english missionaries come in and leave, we finally get to be the ones to leave! Speaking of, I had to say goodbye to some of the Elders and Sisters in my zone on Tuesday.... So hard. They will all be such amazing missionaries. Hopefully I will get to keep in contact with them after the mish. We will see.

It has been a pretty amazing week. The more I am here the more good days I have with hard moments rather than hard days with good moments. Does that make sense? This week Heavenly Father has shown me so many tender mercies. I am so blessed. Still not sure how ready I feel to leave for Romania.. I have had a few breakdowns at the thought of it this week.

The new Romanian Elders are fantastic. Seriously, we could not have even asked for better elders. They are so sweet and I am so impressed with them. For sure feel like we are way more blessed by them than they are by Sister Ewell and I. Their names are Elder Rodenberg, Elder Heyrend and Elder Travino. Elder Rodenberg is my age and was actually in my ward in Orlando at the same time, but neither of us remembered each other. It was pretty funny though when we figured out we were there at the same time. Small world.

Soooo... there have been two fire alarm evacuations since Sora Ewell and I came into the MTC. She caused one a few weeks ago with her burnt popcorn, and.... the other was caused by me on Tuesday. Wups. I was doing my service assigment and dusting in the hallways and apparently I was doing a really good job and a lot of dust gathered around the smoke detector and it set off the fire alarm. haha. So the two evacuations have been caused by the two Romanian sisters. So embarrassing.

Things are going really well with our investigators, Nelly, Daniel and Bogdan. I love teaching them and seeing their progress and feeling their spirit. I cannot wait until we get to teach real investigators and see the growth for real. I dont know how I will handle not having Sora Ewell as my companion though. She and I have gotten so used to the way we teach and I am SO lucky to have her as a companion. She has set a high bar for all my companions in the mission field. I am praying we get to be companions at some point in Romania!!

Marlin K. Jensen spoke to us on Tuesday... It was amazing. He gets released from the seventy next month so this was his last visit to the MTC and he just gave us advice. It was actually really cool. We talked about how the church isnt the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Status... haha. And talked all about how it doesnt matter what your calling is and how we are all important in the gospel whether we are a bishop or a librarian. I am not explaining it very well, but it was a really powerful talk. It reminded me of the movie Hugo and how there are not extra parts.. every single part has a purpose, even the smallest ones. I got to take Emma to see that movie last December and when we walked out we were talking about the moral and how everyone has a purpose and she said, "Aunt Aly, even I have a purpose, huh?" and I told her that ESPECIALLY she has a purpose. So tender.

On sunday at mission conference President Brown (the MTC pres) spoke on the importance of our name and how our actions today effect our legacy tomorrow and wherever we go, we will always carry our name with us and the way we conduct ourselves now will follow with us into the next phase of our life. He told a story about president hinkley and how President Hinkley vowed to not be the weak link in the chain of generations in his family. I vowed the same thing and have since made a conscious and prayerful effor to make a good name for myself, one that my children would be proud of. After his talk, it made me really want to study our family history more and do some geneology work. Dad, I know you can help me with that when I get home. I am really excited!!

I know I have lots more to say but it isn't coming to my mind right now, so I will have to send it in my letter home. It's so frustrating because all week I will think of things I want to tell you about and then prep day comes and I can't remember ANY of them. Oh well. Must not have been that important.

Well, ya'll have one more week to send me letters... Make it happen:) Kidding... but seriously.

I love you all so much and you are in my prayers.

Miss you,

Sister Cook

Brother Hodges and his wife