November 10, 2014

Hey Mom,

 

So, usually every week we do service by picking up trash in Skopje. Did you know it's the most polluted city in Europe? Disgusting. 3rd most polluted city in the world. Zoki our language teacher told us that. This week we had all of our language classes by his work and then afterwards decided to do our contacting down there instead of at our few usual places. It was such a nice change. A lot more people talked to us there. 

The only truly Macedonian materials we have are the Gospel Fundamentals book and some Joseph Smith pamphlets, which aren't very helpful when contacting. Everything else we use is in Serbian. For the past several months we've been using some self-made passalong cards. President Ford had it approved for a one-time printing of I think 5,000 denar worth. But we're running out and thus designing new ones in the hope that President Weidmann will be sympathetic to our cause and approve more to be printed. Anyway, since I still wanted to pass out things in Macedonian and we were short on cards, I had the idea to write out parts of my testimony on these card-sized pictures of Jesus that the Yarns gave me right before I came out on my mission (about a year ago!) I also wrote out the information for where to come for church and our phone number on them. So far they've gotten a great response because people are more willing to hold onto a picture of Christ than our card, which does have a picture of the first vision on it, but people don't always recognize that. I gave one of them to a couple that was intermittently staring at us and making out one night while contacting. They were from Czech Republic and said they were followers of Christ and in turn gave me a couple booklets about their beliefs. I thought that was really nice of them. 

Did I tell you that in Macedonia you can buy actual chestnuts roasted over an open fire? Well, more like open grill, but still. I haven't tried any yet. They were here when I first arrived in Skopje, which is a reminder of just how much time has passed. 

http://www.mormonchannel.org/music-videos?v=2098657586001&cid=HPMO110314451

Love you,

Sister Riddle