A winter wonderland?

April 23 2017  When I wrote earlier in the week, I had just found out I was carless for 3 weeks or so. Deb had gone to Bucharest for a sisters conference and I had a few things to do. Well, let me tell you of winter, and later to show pictures. Wednesday I was trying to rent a car, and could not find one until Thursday. So I borrowed a car and drove to Bălți, with Evgenii Bekker, a wonderful man who was a missionary here. Bălți was great, we gave an afghan of Aunt Yvonnes away to a young girl, Olga, and had a great visit. Thursday I woke to snow. Snow? The law here is to remove snow tires from all cars by the end of March, or a fine can be had.  That tells you how often it snows in April. So I went to check on my rental car, not quite ready yet. Come out of the office and, a tree has fallen right beside my borrowed car. Go get Elder Cooley to return his car, trees are falling over roads, one crashed down right behind us, blocking a road. Close. I foolishly get my rental car, take it home, and there it stays for 2.5 days, because of snow. Deb and the sisters barely make it home Thursday night, because of the snow. Friday morning, the city is a disaster- 50 cm of snow or so. Trees down everywhere, no buses, a few roads open, a mess. We had to keep the missionaries inside as going out is not safe.Some had no food, they had been  advised otherwise, one set lost their keys  while going out to find food and could not get back in. We could not get to help them for a day- they got to stay with a member reasonably close by. What a mess, and it will be bad for agriculture here, many crops were up, flowering. The country will be hard hit. Deb and I shovelled a driveway with buckets and a short shovel, I watched a man shovel a car on the street out with a sand shovel. We got to use our rental car by Saturday night, a nice Prius, which does not like snow, by the way. Today snow is melting like crazy. It is also the day they call Easter for the dead, where people go to the cemetery for lunch with their dead family members. The cemeteries are wet, cold, snowy and with fallen trees. Sounds like a great day to me. At least one will have enough to eat. Speaking of food, our other pleasant task this week, was helping 4 elders in a senior members apartment which needed cleaning. 20 bags of cockroaches, molding food, maggots, an uncleaned pile of paper etc in a bathroom. It was an eyeopener. We need this poor man to be in a lodge- no such thing here without a lot of money. Count your blessings again at home. He has no family in the country,

Let the pics of winter begin. First from our deck, as you can see there is a lot of snow. 2 days later, almost gone.

The next few are around our building. 50 cm of snow or so

No one got to work today

4th on the left is my rental car, nice and easy to drive.

These guys looked hard and never did shovel the driveway out.

Post snow damage, the next few pictures are from the public park-Stefan cel Mare

If trees could cry. I thought of Lord of the Rings

There were some big ones fall, this is on the mainstreet

Picture of Elder Welling on the L, Igor Ivanova, Elder Housington on the R

A white day, both snow and baptism. The suit is a little short, but the testimony is deep and full . We think the legs melted with the snow.

It is a difficult situation that kept me awake one night. The week ended with a baptism, a very nice man, Igor, who came for dinner today. Like many, his story would fill a book. He has a deep voice that just booms when he talks, he talked at his baptism first in Russian, then repeated it all in English. By the way, today we are like the wicked witch- we are melting!
    So, never boring here. In two days, the Cooleys are going home. We will miss them as we work together, especially in FHE and YSA activities. They have served well, She is a gem and Elder Cooley, well, he has an odd sense of humor. Still a great couple who gave their all here, and more.