Sestra Madison Ratcliffe: What the week?

So I am really praying that time starts to slow down sometime soon because if time flies like this the entire transfer I am going to be really sad really fast!

But Sister Easton and I are really busy. We have been trying to fill every little bit of our time this week with things that keep us busy, but effective!

except for P-days. we like to relax on those days! :)

Wednesday we took a trip to Blava and got to spend a couple hours with the senior couple there. They are just the sweetest we arrived and they had sandwiches ready for us and drove us around and BONUS we got to see the sestry while we were there and then on the way to the tram we ran into a recently baptized member and saw the Zone leaders. Bratislava is HUGE, so nič nie je nahoda (nothing is a coincidence!)

Oh but I totally forgot that we got super shammed by this lady on the train. We were buying our tickets and this lady told Sister Easton that she didn't need to buy a ticket, because she could go with her for free as an escort (of sorts) and so we thought "sweet!" and as we are pulling into the Bratislava train station she says, now that will be three euros.

Which obviously was the same price, but it was just 3 euros to her pocket and not to the train. the feeling was just a little different.

LESSON LEARNED. just buy your own train ticket. haha

but a wonderful perk to this trip (besides the fact that the lady who shammed us gave us fruit from her garden) is, we were on the train and the lady sitting next to the lady that shammed us started asking us how we knew slovak so well. (oh PLEASE (on the outside but on the inside we are like...KEEP THE COMPLIMENTS COMING)). hahah and it turns out that she is a Slovak teacher and that she knows one of the members in Bratislava! and I showed her my word book and she corrected every single mistake and helped me on pronunciation.

#freeslovaklessons #lovelysoul

But wait when we came home that night the elders texted us and told us that the man we serve invited us over for some guláš. How can you reject guláš?

Turns out the guláš was made with one of the goats that lived with all the sheep and donkeys on the mountain.

I felt a little weird to be eating one of my friends, but hey who knew goats taste like any normal form of meat.

hahah sorry to all the vegans reading this. you just don't experience things like this NOT on a mission, so it must be documented.

OH boy, now this story is just the best of them all.

We were coming home from a lesson in a village when we see this small little ball of fur on the street, and Sister Easton makes a sad noise, so I looked and it looked like a dead kitten, and for those of you who know me (I am a weak one for little kittens in the summer, Just ask Sister Russell) So we stopped to see if it was dead and it wasn't but it was super lethargic and one of its eyes were shut (probably from crying) hahah. so we tried to feed it aloe water and it wouldn't drink. Super frustrating. Then we called a ton of people to see if we could find an animal shelter and people told us to just get on a bus and take it to a village. So sister Easton and I determined that we had two options

1. give it away to some random person on the street

2. take it to a place close to our house that is currently filled with little kittens and pray that a momma cat will adopt it

3. leave it (that was not an option)

So we start walking with it. and we are on the bridge when our vegan friend comes to my companions mind. Maybe she will know what to do with our kitty. So we call and she asks us where we were and says "Stay there, I am coming"

So we waited..

and she came with some real water and with a little patient persistence she drank. At the time we thought she was a boy... (its like the opposite of louis' story.. haha ) but she drank and our friend called her mom and before you knew it we were nightly planning and getting a phone call that our friend is keeping the kitty and naming her lizzy.

WE SAVED A KITTY.

and there are so many other things that we did this week, but I cannot really remember them all, so I am going to leave it at that.

Something I learned this week :

What is bold today,

will not be bold tomorrow.

Whether that be standing for beliefs, calling someone that you have been thinking of lately or whatever else the spirit is prompting you to do. Do it now, because tomorrow will be too late!

Don't waste a day of this precious time we are given here on earth.

32 For behold, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet God; yea, behold the day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors.

33 And now, as I said unto you before, as ye have had so many witnesses, therefore, I beseech of you that ye do not procrastinate the day of your repentance until the end; for after this day of life, which is given us to prepare for eternity, behold, if we do not improve our time while in this life, then cometh the night of darkness wherein there can be no labor performed.

Alma 34:32-33

Have a miraculous week.

S Laskou,
sestra ratcliffe

Trying to take a pic a day and failing