Feb 13, Only a couple of pictures this time, The first is Deb in Cathedral park with Sister Nancy Cooley. We were giving our free cookies and also some hot Chocolate to people who would stop and talk. Getting something free was a new concept here, and many people would just grasp their chest, bow forward and keep walking. A few would talk and smile. Winter, even mild , is a somber time in Eastern Europe and many have little to smile about. The second pic is of the Piata, and I am sure is it one of many to come as Deb loved this place. It is an open market that has everything one could want. We went down there with the Cooleys from Logan to get some keys cut. We found a guy with an old booth who spoke no English, but I was able to communicate sufficiently to get keys to the Church and our Learning center cut. Elder Cooley was sure they would not work, but they all did fine. It cost from 15- 30 lei per key; the guy had old equipment but knew what he was doing. Meanwhile Deb was wandering about in heaven as she thrives on that stuff. What a place- look it up on You tube. We had a family home evening last night as the Church and it gave a good indication of what language is like here. The  lesson was taught by Ben Giles, an American who is doing an internship here in a business, who also served a mission here and speaks fluent Russian and understands Romanian. The only other member of our Church was Nina, who speaks fluent Romanian, Russian and English and who should be an auctioneer as she speaks so fast in any language and flits between them with ease. The other youth were all nonmembers; Mihael- fluent in all 3 languages, Toric-native Bulgarian, also speaks Russian, English and mostly Romanian [only 15 and a concert singer] , his 2 friends, cute girls who spoke in order Russian, Romanian and some English, a Vietnamese guy who is going to university here[schol is  in Romanian], speaks a bit of English and of course Vietnamese, Deb and I and the elders, one from North Carolina and one from Puerto Rico. Whoa. The languages flying around the card table were unbelievable. We monolingual Canucks are just lacking. A funny thing happened. One of the elders had a cramp and wanted to know the word in Romanian. Mihael thought he said crap, said that word in Romanian, but would not say it in Russian. After much laughter, all figured out the misunderstanding and the elder got the word-carcel with a funny a-hat. What an interesting group we were. It was a lot of fun- however very hard to pick up Romanian when one is really not sure if it really is Romanian. To make it all more interesting, half way through, Nina left to go to the airport to pick up a friend flying in from Hungary for an activity tonight. Might as well add one more language to the mix. Oh yeah, the song at FHE  was sung in all 3 languages. What fun.