Our Mission to Russia: THE BUSIER THE BETTER

Wow! What a busy week we've just experienced. When we have something to do every night of the week, that is busy. Our nights were filled with 2 dinners at senior couples' homes, a family home evening, a visit with an investigator, our weekly institute and gathering, game night and a movie night. That doesn't include our schedule during the day - weekly shopping, a fireside, lunch for our district meeting, apartment checks, and lesson preparation.

This was taken before 4 more people showed up.

Very crowded conditions but very fun.

The highlight of this busy week was the fireside held at our apartment on Monday night. When Paul announced to our elders and sisters we would open our home each Monday night, they didn't want to wait another week. Immediately, they started inviting ward members and investigators to come. We ended up with 19 in our little living room. It was crowded but lots of fun. We had 5 young single adult ward members, 6 investigators, 6 of our missionaries, and of course, Paul and me. After a hymn and opening prayer, one of the missionaries gave a spiritual thought. We then played a couple of games which got everyone involved. They all seemed to enjoy the evening. It ended with everyone crowded in our kitchen eating fudge dream bars and drinking juice. That was our contribution to the evening. FUN! FUN! We are so grateful Elder Beals told us about what had been done in his last district. I think that was why he was transferred into our district. Funny thing is that he is leaving our district, after only 1 transfer. The Lord knew we needed him to get this wonderful program underway in our district.

Monday also included another afternoon fireside given by Sister Lawrence, our area president's wife. She is an amazing scriptorian. This time she talked about the ministry of angels and assured us that as missionaries, we are entitled to ministering of angels to help us in the work.

Tuesday's highlight was the visit we had with Daniel, an investigator of Elders Beals and Melchor. They brought him over around 7 in the evening just so he could get to know us. They wanted him to feel the spirit in an LDS home and to see a happily married couple. The three of them stayed for about 2 hours and the visit was wonderful. Daniel said that he was a little nervous about what the evening would be like when the elders told him what they wanted to do. (Can you blame him....going to an old couple's home doesn't sound like something a 19 year old would find exciting.) At the end of the evening his comment to us was that it had been 'a beautiful evening.' We felt that way, too. He usually attends English group which starts up again this next week, so maybe we can continue this relationship, as both Melchor and Beals are being transferred.

Tuesday afternoon was district meeting. We had a little tender mercy from the Lord in the morning. I had planned to make an applesauce cake for dessert. I went to get the ingredients out and realized I didn't have enough soda. Wondering what I could make for dessert without going to the store, I remembered a bag of home grown apples that someone had given us the night before at family home evening. It was a random act of kindness....but to us is was a tender mercy because there were just enough apples to make an apple crisp for our district of 12. I have to also record a comment Paul made during the morning as he was doing the dishes from all my cooking. He said he thought his job was harder than mine.....doing the dishes or cooking the meal? At the time I just laughed, but later that day when he was doing all the dishes from the lunch, I wondered if maybe his job was harder. At least mine is enjoyable, if you like to cook....and I do.

This was just the clean up from my cooking. Later

he did all the dishes from the lunch for 12.

Wednesday brought another apartment check and a meeting to learn about the new curriculum for our English group that is to start next week. It is totally different from what we were doing this last 8 weeks, but it should be good. We are still assigned to the conversational group but Paul and I won't be the only ones deciding the discussion activities. We have been assigned 4 companionships to be with us. We will have a discussion on a selected subject for 20 minutes, an activity for 30 minutes, and then a story, spiritual thought and prayer. Each evening will be followed with a time for all three English groups to gather and have refreshments. The primary reason for having English group is to introduce people to the gospel. Helping them learn English is secondary. This format should allow the elders and sisters to get to know the attendees a little more and lend itself to more teaching contacts. In other missions, the English group discussions are responsible for many contacts that have resulted in baptisms. That has become the goal of the English groups in our mission.

Wednesday night, for our senior council, we were all invited to the home of a couple who lives here. They are Steve and Sue Murray and are from the United States. Steve works in the area controller's office and they live in the same development as President and Sister Borders. Sally is a dynamite lady and shared her experience of helping build 2 schools in Ghana, Africa. They were living there at the time and while Steve did his job, Sally got involved with the school children in a neighboring village. Eventually she was instrumental in raising money to build and outfit two schools. We were all really touched by her service.

Thursday night, of course, was our Institute lesson and Pathway gathering. We were granted another tender mercy as we were preparing for this lesson. Our lesson was on 'The Quorum of the 12 Apostles,' We felt like we needed a way to conclude our lesson more emphatically. I just happened to be on the Ipad one evening checking out the Mormon channel and came across a video entitled 'The Apostles Testify of Christ.' We watched it and knew right away it would be a perfect way to end our lesson. How better to know of the mission of the Apostles and feel of their spirit than to hear them testify of our Savior. It was a beautiful video and did exactly what we needed that evening in our class.

A side note: I have been wanting to make taco soup but the recipe we love calls for canned tomato soup and canned vegetable soup. We can't find either of those items here, unless we want to pay over five dollars for a can of tomato soup from Stockman's department store. I had been thinking of a way to make a similar tasting soup and finally decided to try it for an early dinner before institute. Using potatoes, vegetables from the freezer, tomato sauce, salsa, red beans, and hamburger, I was able to simulate the taste we loved from home. Cooking takes a little experimenting and lots of ingenuity here in Moscow.

Friday is always a study day, reading our lesson for the next week. After doing that, we had the afternoon available and decided to take a walk. Our goal was to find the new Krispy Kreme we heard had recently opened up near Red Square. We walked the 15 minutes it takes to get there and decided to visit the grocery store inside the fancy Goom's department store. Everything was displayed beautifully.....even this pig. There was a roasted one, too, head and all.

We wondered if anyone actually bought a whole pig like that.

A friend told us she has seen a rabbit in their store's meat display,

complete with its furry head and ears.

We did find Krispy Kreme and, of course, had to buy a few of them to take home,

Lots of American businesses are beginning to recognize the

great marketing possibilities here in Moscow.

Our walk home took longer than we expected. We decided to go down a different street as I wanted to see a church I had noticed on our walk to Red Square. We found the church but then, to get to a bridge to cross the river, it took us on a really long walk. A good thing resulted, though. We got to see one of the 'seven sister' buildings up close. There are seven buildings, built in a similar style, around Moscow. I am collecting pictures of all that we see in our travels. This one is close enough to our church that we can see the top of it from a distance. It was fun to see how immense the building actually is up close.

Same building up close

From a distance

Our walk took us in a huge circle, ending up at one of the grocery stores we frequent. As soon as we saw it we knew where we were....thank goodness. All in all we were gone for 3 hours, walking the whole time except for the thirty minutes we took to grab a bite to eat for lunch. Good exercise.....sore feet

At game night, we finished the puzzle we had been working on for about a month. It was a really hard one but satisfying when we finally completed it.

Our week ended with another BYU win. Saturday morning, Paul watched the replay of the BYU/Boise State game being very excited they had put together such a convincing win. I wasn't feeling real well so I didn't do much more than fix a pair of pants for one of our elders. They needed to be hemmed. He had been using them with duct tape holding the hem in place. Not real smart as now there is gum residue on the pant leg that comes through to the outside if a hot iron touches it.

Saturday night we met two other couples for dinner and a movie. Dinner was at a local restaurant that featured beef. Paul had a Mexican burger, and I had a steak sandwich. My sandwich was the first sliced beef we've had since we've been here and it tasted wonderful. The movie was at Elder and Sister Jensen's home. We watched a Spencer Tracy-Katherine Hepburn old movie. It was black and white but really entertaining. The popcorn and the company were good, too. A relaxing end of a busy, but great, week.

LIFE IN RUSSIA SPOTLIGHT

We were walking home Friday night from the Central Building and ran into, almost literally, this horse.....in the middle of downtown Moscow. It was almost 10 o'clock and the horse and it's owner were standing on the sidewalk where we turn to go home. It looked like she was soliciting riders. Interesting.

The picture is a little blurry but we had to post it anyway.

Friday night when we got home, Paul immediately became alarmed when he went to unlock the door. He was sure the lock looked different. Fearing someone had tried to break in, we slept pretty restless that night. The next day, we called our landlady to have her come to look at the lock. She said it was the same as it has always been since she changed the locks three years ago. Needless to say, we were a little embarrassed but relieved at the same time. The apartment next door has a lock that was broken into a couple of weeks ago and so we are a little paranoid. It was all a good thing, though, as now we have taken some precautions against it actually happening. We had become a little lax is our security efforts but now we leave a light on when we are gone at night and lock both locks, instead of one. All a good thing, especially living in the downtown area as we do.

Halloween in Moscow is not a big thing. We understand they have parties in the clubs but it is not a family holiday. Of course, there is nothing to suggest it is a holiday in the stores except we did see this one pumpkin the other day on a walk. Pretty clever wouldn't you say?

This week, the area around our metro was finally completed. New lights were hung, benches put in place and clean up begun. It really looks nice. We went out walking Saturday and took these pictures to send to the couple who we replaced. We thought they would like to see the changes. It makes for a much nicer walk to and
from the metro.