Workin in Churkin

Morning good everyone! (You can say it such in Russian)

It is now time for my mind to pull up all of its hatches so that my memory of this last weeks events can come back so that I can give at least a decent report of what has been learned and what has happened these last few days. It has been said that you never learn something until it is taught to you 7 times in 7 different ways, that appears to be true. 

This week was great! Everything is good in Vladivostok. We still are experiencing a drought of new investigators but we have a good likely candidate in a 26 year old college student from Zambia. He is a 7th day Adventist, speaks great English and Russian and hopefully with fill the truth of the gospel message. We were going to meet on Sunday but he said it was too cold for him to wait until we make it to center (40 min. bus ride) so we are meeting this Wednesday after Russian practice.

Also we have been working with some promising less actives. One, Hope, who is a mother of 3 children, was so happy to hear us when we called. We talked about repentance on our lesson and it went great. Another less active we are working with is named K and he is a way tall and pretty funny member who said himself that he wants to come back but doesn't see it as a huge priority yet. We are going to keep on working with them and keeping on going through our area.  We don't have a ton of actives in Churkin and therefore we have a lot that we can work with.

I gave a talk on Sunday. It went good, Sister Jossie who goes home at the end our this transfer and Sister Thomas both bore their testimonies because they are new to the branch. It is still fun having church in a 5 star hotel. The staff always brings in like 50-60 water bottles and 4 microphones and has everything set up like we were having a huge conference. I think sometimes the workers are surprised at the little kids running out in the halls haha. 

The gospel is true, the doctrine of Christ is the means by which we can make it back into God's presence. The weather has been warm lately with a few cold days.

Love,

Elder Wilding

Churikinhood Living

At the start of this week I said all of my goodbyes and wrote in a few members transfer journals.  We went over to a sweet families house on Monday for FHE and gave them one of my name-tags.  The mother has a tree that she made out of name-tags with probably already around 20-30 names.  I was honored to leave it there.  That leaves me down to my last and final name-tag that is magnetic.  I don't know what happened to my others, but maybe they will turn up one day.  Then the next day we taught R the Plan of Salvation (which went good) and ended up going to another family's house for dinner.  I played one of the kids in chess that almost feels like a little brother to me and he beat me, it wasn't even close.  I beat him last time and was planning on leaving with that winning streak but he insisted we played.  Serving with Elder Lawrence these last 2 transfers I consider some of the funnest of my whole mission.  It never really hit me that I was leaving until I was already gone.  I really miss Sakhalin.  

We flew in to Artyom on Wednesday day and traveled to Vlad to try and meet with a man that Elder Lawrence met on his plane to Russia.  He wasn't there unfortunately but we had Sharma so I was happy.  Then we flew to Korea the next morning and were able to get into two sessions and perform baptisms and confirmations. Actually, that was the first time I have ever baptized anyone. It was excellent being in the temple. It always gets me ready for what is coming next.  It is a great feeling.  The next morning the Nielsons (senior missionaries there who are from Brigham City) took us up to a little outside work out area.  It was a great trip!

We made it back the next day to the motherland safe and sound.  We finally made it to our apartment Thursday night.  We are in the area of Churkin also now as Churkinhood.  It is a good place.  Kinda away from the center of town.  It takes 40 min. by bus to drive to the church. The city is HUGE.  We take a lot of buses and a lot of our money goes to those bus drivers.  The city is super hilly and extremely windy.  I get sore just from walking around and it is much colder than Sakhalin.  The branch is amazing!  So many cool and nice people live here.  Apparently the activities we have get huge attendance.  I have heard a lot about his city and whether or not they are true only time will tell.  I'm happy to be here.  Being whitewashed is a little bit of a struggle.  We don't know any of the members or investigators and sometimes when we call they are a little confused.  Getting to know the city is a fun adventure.  We haven't got lost yet! Elder Bacon is great!  He is from Arizona and has been on the mission a little over a year.  He is a wiz with directions and only needs to be somewhere once in order to know how to get there again.  It is 100% thanks to him that we haven't got lost yet.

I love you guys!  

Elder Wilding

***The photos below are from McKay's Mission President's wife along with this note:

Here is our new Vladivostok District: Chapman, Gee, Barr, Carlson, Jameson, Wilding, DeSandre, Williams, Burningham and Bacon. 

We want to thank you for your part in preparing Elder Wilding to serve the Lord here with us! 

He is a good Elder and is now serving as the District Leader here. 

We thank you for your many prayers in our behalf! 

*(2nd photo)-Saturday we discovered a little secret! Several Vladivostok Priesthood Brethren were gathered at the church doing 

some secret crafts! We are not sure what they are for, but we have a hunch because in Russia "Women's Day" is soon!

Sincerely,
President and Sister Perkinson
Vladivostok Russia

These are from McKay: 

*I had to crop out the Russian