Дорогие семьи и друзья,
Elder Wilding
Tell Grandpa Jo I say happy birthday.
What
a week. Since I basically shaved my head about a month and 1/2 ago I
finally had another hair cut last Monday. They took off the sides
only.
It looks much better but I still have to be patient until it grows back
to where it was. Also last Monday we have legit smores and roasted
marshmallows! One of the missionaries who served here and ended his
mission about the time I was about 4 months in, came back and we had a
campfire with him and some of the members! He is Russian so I don't
know how he got the marshmallows and chocolate and graham crackers or
the starbursts but I didn't care it was so delicious. I think I was
actually the one who enjoyed it most out of everyone haha, Actually
most
of the members didn't like it and said that it was too sweet. I just
felt like I was back home in the backyard roasting mellows. Speaking of
good food, watermelon season has hit Russia! That reminds me of when I
first got in country and me and Elder Lyman would buy at least one
every
week and absolutely love the watermelon. They are dirt cheap at the
store just across from our house. Oh yeah, I don't think I ever said,
at
our new house a grocery store is right across the street an makes
shopping fast.
Vl from Angarsk called
me this week haha. He wanted me to send him pictures and was telling me
how Angarsk was and everything. Haha it was awesome! We met with this
guy this week who called at us in English when we were in Burger King.
He took us to his home and played some songs he wrote by himself. They
weren't that bad, he is pretty talented but I have been thinking of
remixes to his songs this whole week.
With the
new law, we cannot talk about the gospel or anything of that sort
outside of the church. The only exception is that we are allowed to
teach members in their homes. Until last week, even if we were in the
church with a non-member we couldn't talk about the gospel until the
person signed a paper noting that they agreed to this and that they
were a follower of the church. But that has been thrown out now and as
long as we are in the church we can talk with anyone about gospel
topics. We still can't directly invite non-members to activities in the
church but we can let them know what time the activity will be as long as
there is no invitation extended. Lately Elder Staiger and I have been
inviting people to a store near the church and then walk with them to
the church to play ping pong or some other activity. I hope that makes
sense. If I forgot to add something or if there are still questions
please let me know.
After Institute we played
"Book of Mormon bingo". On the bingo card is Book of Mormon characters
names. I put the names in google translate trying to be more efficient
becasue it takes me a long time to type in Russian because I haven't
memorized where the letters on the keyboard are. I thought google would
have translated them over exactly how they were in the Book of Mormon
for some reason but I was so wrong. Hagoth the viking ship builder in
the Book of Mormon got translated over as Xagoth. All it changed was
the h
to an x. "G" isn't even a Russian letter. Wherever they pulled out
his name they just said viking haha.
The spin
trimmer was taken by President Zag and that which was broken is
now fixed! The blade on the end that was no where near the center is
now centered which stops the problem that we had where it shakes until
your hands bleed. We cut for a couple of hours at the "green island"
and got a good chunk of the field cut down to size. It only died once
on us and it was somewhat of a miracle. If I haven't said it before I
will say it now, at least one person gets married in Ussuriysk or at
least that is what it seems like. They put flowers and ribbons on their
cars and drive around the city honking as they drive past you. Anyways
we had brought a soccer ball with us and we see a woman in a wedding
dress and a small group of people with her. They come over and ask if
they can use our ball for their wedding pictures (he was in the goal
and the bride pretended to kick the ball). We happily told them yes. If
only I would have brought my camera with me I would have had some great
pictures. Their friend afterwards said that he plays basketball more
than soccer and Elder Staiger told him I was from America and play
basketball too and the guy freaked out when he heard we spoke English
and
that I was from America - he loved it. He started talking to us in
English that he learned in school and invited us over to his house as
guests! And throughout the rest of the night he kept on calling us
haha.
Well, I hope that feels you in on what
happened. Looking forward to another good week! Hopefully we can find
some more service. If anyone has any suggestions on what we could do I
would love to hear them. Zone Conference is next week and Elder Martino
of the 70 comes. He replaced Kl as the 1st counselor for our
region.
Much Love
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