loveli: Where is Todd?

Yesterday when we went to the hospital, Todd (my favorite kids) was gone! I’m terrified that he’s ended up at one of the other orphanages. A lot of the other orphanages are horrible, like the stereotypical ones they show in movies in the states. (Ours is pretty great, though.) We have never been allowed in any of the other orphanages. But when kids from them end up in the hospital, we are able to see their behavior, and therefore surmise how they are treated where they live. Some go crazy with attention and climb all over you and some of them won’t let you touch them at all and smack your hand away or retract from your touch. They have RAD, and you can tell that they sit in their cribs all day everyday. Todd cannot go to one of these places, but I don’t know where he went. And there's nothing I can do about it. Bah! Hopefully he shows up in our orphanage. Sometimes the kids will disappear from the hospital for a while and then appear again later. We never really know where they go or anything.

Continuation:

The second day of the midsemester trip, we went to church in Bucharest. We got there early because we didn’t know how long it would take for us to get there. We were taking pictures in front of the sign when we first got there. A pair of elders walked by and looked really confused, but didn’t say anything to us. We went inside. Kelsey had burnt her arm on her hair dryer that morning (she was leaning over comically because she had to plug it into an outlet in a different room in the hostel since ours didn’t work) so we went in the kitchen for her to run it under cold water. I decided to look for some ice in the freezer. An elder walked in the room and looked extremely confused about who we were. Then Kelsey said “hello” in English. Then he was extra confused and said “hi.” Then I explained that I was leaning into the freezer in a random church building because I was looking for ice for Kelsey’s burn. “We don’t have any.” “I realize that now.” It was a great conversation.

Before and after sacrament meeting everyone came to ask us who we were and to kiss us on the cheeks and to practice their English. I've never felt more popular in my life. A nice English speaking Romanian translated for us into translators instead of just whispering behind us like the missionaries do in Iasi.

Kelsey had an awesome experience meeting a woman in the ward who her sister taught about the church 8 years ago when she was on her mission here. You’ll have to read Kelsey’s blog for that.

A kindly old lady in the ward who considers herself the mother of the missionaries in Bucharest invited us over for lunch. The four of us squished into her tiny apartment with 12 missionaries and her. The food was great and very traditional. It might be one of my favorite experiences in Romania not including the kids. It was just such traditional Romanian, and she was so kind to us! I loved it.

Kelsey and me after our lunch at Sora Grozo's

We met up with Jen in the park to watch a kids movie. Unfortunately that movie turned out to be Alvin and the Chipmunks, so we went to a different part of the park until it was over. We talked for a while and watched some really weird mimes that appeared to be trying to be anamatrons. I don’t know if this is usual for mimes or not since I’ve never seen one before. It was pretty cool, though.