Scatter Sunshine: Adriatic South

Monday, July 17, 2017

From Tirana.....to MACEDONIA?!

Cfarë?!!!! SI JENI JU? Jam mirë! Thjeshtë do shkoj në Macedoni?!! How are you all doing? I'm just going to go right into the culture shocks.....

Culture Shocks of the Week:

1. I'm 9 months into my mission meaning I'm halfway :(

2. I'M GETTING TRANSFERRED TO MACEDONIA! No I don't speak Macedonian. No I can't read Serbian (the Book of Mormon is in Serbian). This will be so much fun!

3. Before I go to Macedonia, I'm serving in KOSOVO for 10 days while they do my paperwork and wait for another sister to fill my place in Kosovo.

In conclusion: I get to serve in all 3 countries on my mission! WHAT?! I'll be learning a little Macedonian, Serbian, and Gheg (Kosovo's Albanian). I'm so excited! It's a special assignment for one transfer (6 weeks) but honestly I am just so ready to go out and serve the Lord serving the people in Albania, Kosovo, and Macedonia!

So me being transferred means that I sadly had to say goodbye to my family here in Tirana. It was definitely a big family! haha I love all these people here and honestly am just so grateful I had the opportunity to serve them for this last 4 and a half months. Some special moments from this last week was that Liliana is getting baptized!! I am just so excited for all of the people that we are teaching right now and their preparation to make this covenant and receive the blessings of baptism! Hopefully I can hear about it somehow in Macedonia haha

Some other moments from this last week: We have become regulars at a milkshake place we discovered by our home....they've now been giving us free cookies. I don't know how that's helping our health haha but hey, I had a lesson with an older lady who told us ice cream is good for you so I'm going to go with her wisdom :) Also I got to go on an exchange in Shkodër again and honestly I just love that city! Any city that's not Tirana is a quiet city haha and lastly, for my last Sunday, I gave another talk in the other ward and probably said about every prayer in every class possible because of me leaving.....also I have to mention that as I was the organist in the Tirana 1st ward, I may have been playing the wrong song for half of the song in church as everyone was singing a different song. They thought the chorister was confused hahaha luckily it was just one of the Elders directing the song.

As I am now halfway through my mission, I just wanted to share something I have learned. This past 9 months I have learned about how real the love of God is. It is powerful! I have found that if we are feeling down or we feel that God has forgotten about us, it is not that God has forgotten us, we have forgotten Him!

1 Nephi 21:14 But, behold, Zion hath said: The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me—but he will show that he hath not.

15 For can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee, O house of Israel.

16 Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.

I truly can testify of that as occasionally when I'm feeling down or a little lost, I then think, "Have I turned to the Lord?" It is then when I turn to the Lord in prayer, I feel of that comfort, peace, and love that only comes from Him. We met with a lady this week that approached us saying that she liked my companion's skirt :) We then ended up meeting with her at her home and she shared this message: God has not forgotten me! It is me that does the forgetting. She has such a desire to follow Christ, the Son of God. I just want to testify of the joy that come from following Christ and coming unto Him! That is literally why I am happy! His love becomes so REAL in our lives when we REALLY follow Him! It does require work, action, but it is doing something we've not done before that helps us feel something we've not felt before. That is why we keep learning, keep changing, and keep coming unto Christ. I testify of that in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Have a wonderful week! Until next week when I'll be writing from Kosovo! :)

Oh Albania, I can't handle its beauty!!

KOS!! (Greek Yogurt)

A home covered entirely by grape vines!

One of my bishops and his family :) (He is in the February 2017 Liahona page 57)

The members from the Relief Society in the 1st ward.

Love this girl! I was in contact with her BEFORE my mission :)

Oh MegiBear. :) She is the Relief Society president here and she is incredible!

Tefta! :)

A beatuiful park here in Tirana! We went on a little xhiro (walk in the park)

My sweet companion: Motra Haggard. I'm gonna miss her!

Oh Tirana!

My last Albanian food in Albania for 6 weeks! Suflace!!

Mirupafshim! Të dua!

Motra Olsen

Letters:

Adriatic South Mission
Sister Natalie Olsen
POB 2984
Bulevardi "Gjergj Fishta"
Qendra "Alpas", Shkalla #5, Apt #14
Tirana
Albania

(If you can't send it with the POB box number, you can just send it without it. I'll still get it)

Email: natalie.olsen@myldsmail.net

mormon.org

Monday, July 10, 2017

Gëzuar 4 Korrik!

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!! My district and I tried to bring America here to Albania celebrating the 4th of July! There's a restaurant here called the Steven's Center with Burgers, fries, milkshakes, waffles, and pretty much American food you can't find anywhere else so we had ourselves a little American feast :) Other than that, no fireworks but hey-we had one old man call out to us "Gëzuar!" so that made our day :)

Culture Shocks of the Week:

1. I finally got to kinda see an Albanian Dasma (Wedding)!! We were at a ward activity at a park out in this little town and there was a wedding there at the park. I didn't get to see the bride but I got to see how decked out it was! There are literally cameras used for filming movies and tables all over the field with everyone in tuxes and full out gowns. I felt a little bit like I was at prom haha also only in Albania will you be playing soccer at a field and have a flock of sheep run out right next to you during the game.

2. People along the side of the streets have these little grills and they grill and sell corn! There is also corn juice here called Bozë. No it doesn't taste good but it was fun to try it! :)

3.We experienced a literal game of telephone this week trying to find a lady's home. First, it doesn't help that we are 2 American girls in a giant city clueless to the Albanian names of schools and streets here. Second, the speaker was very muffled so we ended up adventuring across the city asking people and trying to find these names of the schools and streets passing around the telephone to people on the streets asking them to talk to the lady haha it was an adventure. Best part: the home was found.

We had some incredible blessings this week! I wanted to focus on the power of music and oh my goodness: it is so powerful! So we met a couple times with our new president this week for a leadership meeting and to get to know him. Something that he shared with us that he learned from his training to be a mission president (he learned this from the Apostles at the Missionary Training Center) was to use music in our lessons! I was super pumped when I heard this because I have loved singing and using music in lessons! So my companion and I have made a goal to sing in every lesson and I cannot even express how many peaceful and powerful experiences we have had just singing in our lessons! One lady shared of a peace that she hasn't felt in a long time when we sang. We had another lady just tear up as we sang as peace was brought to her heart. Music is so powerful! I love the scripture in Doctrine and Covenants 25:12 "For my soul delighteth in the song of the heart; yea, the song of the righteous is a prayer unto me, and it shall be answered with a blessing upon their heads."

Music truly is a way that we can feel of the love of our Savior!

I wanted to share of another powerful experience we had this week. So we met this mother with her 3 little girls in the street on Monday. We went to visit her in Wednesday and shared with her our message and gave her a Book of Mormon. We then visited her on Friday and she had read 16 chapters in the Book of Mormon. As we sat down for the lesson, she immediately shared that she had read and she had learned 2 things. One being that the book is a book of God because when she had read the book, it touched her as all of the trials she had faced in life were mentioned in the book. It was as if it spoke to her. The next thing was that she now knows who we are and why we are here. We shared later that we are called from a prophet of God and she immediately said, "I know". I just wanted to share this powerful experience because as I am this 19 year old girl walking in the streets of Albania doing my best to speak the language and to help these people. What do I know about their struggles? What do I know about their trials in life? As I was with this lady and she was just pouring out her heart, I was able to testify to her that while I will never understand what she is going through, there is someone that does completely and perfectly! And that is Jesus Christ! I was able to share with her that we are called of God and sent here for her!

I truly cannot express the joy I feel being able to be a representative of Jesus Christ to these people in Albania. As I rely on the Lord, He truly does direct me and guide me to know what to say and how to comfort these people! Just through experiencing this, I am just filled with a love and a joy as I always look to follow Him and to serve His children. This truly is His work and I am called to invite these beautiful children of God here in Albania to come unto Christ and partake of His joy, His peace, and His salvation. I truly know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and I grow closer and closer to my Savior every time I read it. I invite you to do the same because it is truly through coming unto Christ that we find joy; we find peace. I say that in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

I love you all! Have just a fantastic week and a wonderful summer!

The Elder taking the picture is from England so he did not want to take part in the picture haha

'MERICA!!

We found milkshakes!!

We went to a beautiful lake for a Relief Society

Soccer game on the left, the flock of sheep on the right :)

Tirana 3rd Ward!!!

We hiked out to the bat caves again!!!

Hanging out at the bat caves!!

Your typical Albanian dessert: something drenched in sugar water :)

Mirupafshim! Të dua!

Motra Olsen

Letters:

Adriatic South Mission
Sister Natalie Olsen
POB 2984
Bulevardi "Gjergj Fishta"
Qendra "Alpas", Shkalla #5, Apt #14
Tirana
Albania

(If you can't send it with the POB box number, you can just send it without it. I'll still get it)

Email: natalie.olsen@myldsmail.net

mormon.org

Tuesday, July 4, 2017

MREKULLIT

Oh hello you wonderful beautiful people!! This week was a good one! Oh how much happiness this gospel brings-truly! I saw SO MANY MIRACLES this week so just you wait :) Also this week I got a new mission president. Because I am here in Tirana, us Tirana missionaries went to the airport to welcome the new president, President Andersen, and sing to him and his wife as they came in. It definitely was an emotional day as well as our previous mission president left that day and we said our goodbyes. I am just so thankful for his service! I have learned so much from him and I know that he truly was called of God to serve the people here in the Adriatic South.

Culture Shocks of the Week:

1. So apparently there's a culture belief or saying here that if your eyebrows are far apart, you're going to marry someone that lives far away. If they're close, then you'll marry someone from your own town haha I thought it was funny because this lady at the end of the lesson was like, "your eyebrows are far apart so you'll probably marry someone far away, like an Albanian! haha they are always trying to marry us off to Albanians here....

2. Because it is so hot here, I've seen too many old men without shirts in the streets and in speedos haha I don't know. I think it's a European thing.

3. I love how open the people are here. We've had so many funny stories of older ladies just going on a walk and calling out to us, "What time is it?" We also were giving a card to a lady and a man across the street on top of his roof called out to the lady-"TAKE IT!" No they did not know each other haha Also one more story: My companion and I go running every morning and we pass by the same people everyday so they are our running buddies. One morning, we just see this older lady sprinting at us and we were so confused. The lady then runs up to me and gives me a rose saying, "YOU WIN!"

So this last was filled with a ton of finding people in the nice heat :) Just day after day we were out talking with people, meeting people to find people to teach and share this message. After a week of this, yesterday, we saw so many miracles! I have to say how much the Lord truly is in every little thing in this work. This is HIS work! To start off the day yesterday, we went out to meet a little at the park to walk with her to church. The lady didn't show up (it's okay, it's a usual thing) but INSTEAD because we were out there, we ran into another lady we've talked to and invited her to come to church with us right then. She came and shared how much she loved it and felt like it was a place to truly take away all of her worries and relieve her from the stress of the world! She then said, "I want to bring my family here!"

So then we had another lady we've met with once show up to church and she absolutely loved it and set up to meet with us again! Then as we went out to meet another lady at the park who didn't show up, we needed to be there to have a different lady who I've met 2 months before approach us and say, "Hey come on over to my house right now!" Then as we did that, that lady that came to church wanting to bring her family was free so we went over to her home afterwards. Her entire family was there and we were able to share our message! Oh my goodness it was a day of miracles and truly having the Lord place people in our path so that we can serve them, and share this message of the restored gospel with them!!

I just wanted to share my gratitude for the little things. The Lord truly places people in our paths, in our lives so that we can serve them and they can impact us! I truly have seen that so much! It is through the littlest things that we find the greatest miracles! I am so thankful for all of the people here that have impacted my life. I LOVE THESE PEOPLE! And it's a love I can't express with words! I truly can testify that the love of Christ is SO REAL! It is when we serve with love to those around us that we can find this love and feel of His love.

Romans 8:38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,

39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

His love is REAL! I can testify that if we truly look around, when maybe things seem to have not gone as we planned or things go wrong, the Lord always has a plan for us. He knows us and loves us and even when we find ourselves lost or stood up at a park ;) He has a greater plan and purpose for us. I can testify of that in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Wow that was a long one. Just know you are in my prayers-and I mean that literally!! Love you and have a FANTASTIC 4th of July! I will be celebrating that here :)