My Missionary Birthday

Hey guys,

Took the picture in the morning.

      Thanks so much for all the Birthday wishes! It means a lot! Got sung the "La multi ani" song from my companion. I ate at a pizza place and opened some of the members presents to me and played game of bowling! (I think they let me win haha) I'm planning on making a blue cake that my parents sent me, today. And now that I'm 19, does that make me officially a real missionary? haha

The sister's present to me. A birthday tie that Sora Ralls got for her birthday.
And it just keeps passing from one persons birthday to another.
Some cherries, chocolate and a caramel filled croissant haha.

     This past week we had an interesting encounter with a man while we were eating in the park. He roller bladed over to us while we were eating sharma and asked if we were Mormons. We said yes and then he said, "Well I'm a pirate!" (He had an open button up shirt exposing his hairy chest, haha, had a fake earring on and two plastic swords) He had a good American accent, so for a second I thought he might have been a past Elder that was here or something, it turned out that he wasn't. He said, "What do you do when you see a pirate? You run like h***!, trying to scare us in the process with his swords. haha We both just looked at him plainly and replied, "Nope, we just keep eating." He then expressed his feelings on how he dislikes religion wars and that no religion was above the law and then before we could say anything else he skated away. We both looked at each other and shrugged and kept eating. haha. We're used to these kind of things happening way too often now.

This week I had to give my first talk in Romanian about Baptism at a Baptism on Saturday. It was pretty nerve racking, but I got through it. Later that same day we actually had someone threaten to burn the church down. Sorry that was random, but he didn't so it's all okay, haha.

It's also fun when people compliment you to their friends and they think you don't understand and then you speak Romanian to them. haha Those times are always great.

Well, that just about raps up this week. I'm still here and trying to love it everyday. I miss you guys, but I'll see you soon. Have a great week!

-Elder Houk

Marius, The mission branch leader, made this for me from his name tag!

A gift from Emma, a member in Brasov.

On the journey to the bowling alley.