Ahoy Rodina!
Welp...I had my last transfer call last night...and here are the results:
.....I....am...STAYING! Don Valley will be my last area. In missionary terms, "I'll be dying in DV!". Sister Melander is leaving though :( So sad. But she's going on to do amazing things. She's whitewash training a new missionary. So she's opening up a new area and getting a greenie!! How exciting! She's going to be and do amazing things. I'm so happy for her! However...with the death of my companion...that means that my languist is going as well. I'm taking over the area...and the language. Yikes. Not gunna lie, I'm pretty nervous. But I am greatful for the challenge ;) Since Sister Melander is leaving that means I'm getting.....drum roll please....
The nicest, sweetest, kindest, Sister McReynolds!! :) Oh she is such a dear! She actually served here in Don Valley with Sister Melander for 3 weeks, but left cause she got called to train like Sister MacKay got called a few weeks ago. So now she is back and we're going to rock the Slovakian world together! :)
So as I'm sure you are all aware, (I think even more aware than I am ha) these are my last 6 weeks as a missionary. So weird. I remember when Joey had 6 weeks left and we were all FREAKING OUT!! I remember them being the slowest 6 weeks of my life. It's really strange being on the other side. I mean I've been in Don Valley for 3 months now and a transfer goes by so so so so so so so fast!! I've had a lot of moments on my mission where I've thought, "This must have been what Joey was feeling..." I'm totally living that right now. I honestly don't really know how to feel about this chapter of my life closing. Ha I think I'm in denile hahahaha! One thing I do know is that I want to finish my mission like my 2 brothers did. I wanna sprint to the end like Ray and Joe did. I want to be another "Brown Rodina Missionarky". I want to get to the last day of my mission and think, "Yes, I worked every minute I could, talked to every person I could, invited all I could to come unto Christ." So far so good :) I've done 17 months of hard work, but now is where the endurence kicks in. This is the most imortant part of the race. So lets kick it into hyperdrive and RUN!! :D!
We had a really great week here in DV. Sometimes I wish I had a pensive or a Beauty and the Beast magic mirror and let you see what it is we're doing here. It is a ton of hard work, but the most rewarding. It's like we're saving a lost tribe here ha. It's called the gypsy tribe. I don't know how much Raymond knows about gypsys but if he knows anything sit him down and make him tell you the peopel I'm teaching haha. I love them SOOOO much!! Let me try to give you a little taste of gyspy history here. So Gypsys for hundreds of years, centuries, have been a wandering people. (they really are a lost tribe I tell you!!) They never stay any place very long. The gypsy culture is pretty prominent in Czech, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. So the people we mostly run into are prominently Slovakian and some Hungarian and Czechy gypsies. So these gypsys have come to England..becuase thats what they do...they move. They have come to England for a better life. Most of the gypsys are either here in Sheffield or in Leeds. The town that we work in mostly is Darnall. Darnall is gypsy heaven, they're everywhere! About a year ago some missionaries baptized some pretty epic Slovakian gypsy families and they were attending Sheffiled 1. In the last year the membership of Slovakians has boomed so what they have done is taken the Slovakians "out" of the ward and has made a unit for the Slovakians (so they can go and have a service in their own language and not be so English confused) So what we're doing now is trying to transition the unit into a branch. The unit has no branch presidency, no RS leaders, no preisthood leaders, no YM or YWs. So ha...we run the show haha. We have 2 group leaders named Fero Dunka and Vlad Kandrac. Fero teaches sunday school and Vlad is in charge of Sacrament Meeting. We run RS and the Elders run Preisthood. We have this EPIC Senior couple who runs Primary and they the ward helps out with Youth class. I wish I had time to even tell you everything that we do here!!! (When I get home I'm gunna need a good week where you just sit and listen to me talk about my mission...I might need a good week to just talk about Don Valley!!) On top of all of this...these people speak a different language...BUT I LOVE IT SO MUCH!!!!!!!!! It's a really tough area...but its tough in the good kind of way. Alnwick was tought because...well Sister Berakdar was crazy. But here I have wonderful companions, wonderful leadership, wonderful ward, a ton of support.
Im running out of time and I want to send some pictures off! So just know that I love you all so much! To the moon and back (I mean geez you should know that by now ;) ) Have a wonderful week all ok!
PS Jillie and Joey thank you so much for your emails!!! Gaaa I love you both! I'll email next week ok?! ok!
Laska, Sestre Brownova