We have been studying Russian, since the end of January, meeting with our tutor twice a week for an hour and half each day. About 2 months ago we decided we needed more concentrated time in the language so we enrolled in the Immersion Program offered by the MTC. It requires a minimum 4 hour commitment each day, for as many days of the week as desired. We decided that 2 days a week would be what we could do and ended up actually spending upwards to 6 hours on each of those two days. It was really beneficial especially because, along with our hour and a half with our tutor, we were assigned a study buddy for an hour each day of our immersion. These study buddies were often returned missionaries but sometimes they were native Russians living in the Provo area. That was especially fun to get a feel for the culture and people of Russia. One study buddy was an older gentleman who has studied Russian since high school just because he liked it. Go figure....it's a hard language ranking right up there with Finnish.
Our language classes started out being held at the MTC but with the call of so many new young missionaries it became impossible to find a room in which to meet with our tutor. The senior couples were soon asked to move to this church on 8th North in Provo for our language classes.
By the end of our language experience, we were meeting in the Amanda Knight building - again because even the church became over crowded with couple missionaries learning languages. (How many of you BYU alumni remember this old building down on 8th North? It was the original Missionary Training Center many years ago.)
This is our tutor, Daniel Harris. He served his mission in the Ukraine Mission and is majoring in Russian at BYU. He wants to be a pilot in the Air Force so is in the ROTC program at school. We learned a lot from him and we appreciate his efforts in teaching us. We, for sure, weren't his best students as he had two couples who committed to 8 hours of study each day. One of those couples left Idaho, came to Provo and did immersion 5 days a week, 8 hours a day for 4 months. Even though we weren't his most learned students, we were probably his most fun students to teach. He and Paul developed a real special relationship and we laughed a lot together.
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| Our last day of language training, outside of the Amanda Knight Building |
We decided that June 20, Paul's birthday, would be our last day of training. We needed the remaining time to get everything ready to enter the MTC on July 8. We did commit that we would continue to study and even take our Russian books with us to Russia. We never figured we would become fluent when we left and maybe not ever but we did meet our original goals. We can say a prayer, bear a testimony, ask directions, shop in a grocery store, greet our students in our Institute class and even sing a hymn or two.
We decided we wanted to have Daniel and his wife up to our home for dinner on Monday night,
so I spent the day preparing a French dinner of cordon bleu and all the trimmings.
A Russian menu probably would have been more appropriate but
I don't know any Russian recipes.
Maybe when I return home I'll be able to cook Russian style.....or not.
Their specialty is Borsh, a beet and cabbage soup...yummy?
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| Daniel and his darling wife, Katie |
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| Daniel and his two favorite students |
