PHANTOM OF THE OPERA AND SLAMMING ALL IN ONE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT COULD BE BETTER?

The Cookie used to SLAM

For the first time since we arrived in Moscow, we slammed. It is a Russian missionary thing and we were just introduced to it. Our sisters asked us last week if we had ever slammed. We said, 'what is slamming?' They were appalled that none of our other missionaries over the last 16 months had introduced us to slamming. We quickly set a date to slam together. It happened on Tuesday morning when the sisters came over to take a Russian language test required of our missionaries every quarter. Once they completed their tests, I heated up water for hot chocolate and when it was ready, we slammed. You ask, 'what is slamming?' There is a special cookie in Russia which, if you bite a little section out of opposites sides of these round cookies, they act as a straw through which you can sip hot chocolate, milk, or tea. With hot chocolate the cookie gets warm and the chocolate begins to melt as you sip. At that point you eat the cookie and boy, is it yummy! Of course, we had to try it with two cookies each. We were so excited about slamming that we went out this week and purchased cookies to bring home so we can slam with our grandchildren.  A fun Russian missionary tradition.

Sister Shepherd

Sister Downing

     The sisters showing us how 

        to slam.

Paul doing the SLAM

Paul getting ready

So Yummy!!..... and So Messy!!

Can you believe that says

Phantom of the Opera?

That evening we were privileged to enjoy the stage production of Phantom of the Opera at a beautiful theater here. Of course, it was sung in Russian but that didn't even matter. The music is so incredible, no matter the language.  We have seen Phantom enough times to know the story line so we just sat back and enjoyed the music, the scenery, and the wonderful talents displayed in the singers. We went with three other senior couples and enjoyed their company at dinner before hand at TGI Friday's, close to the theater. A most enjoyable evening.

The beautiful theater

Other happenings of the week included baking gluten free cookies with Elders Shepherd and Jeppsen. Monday evening, the elders called and asked if I could help them bake gluten free cookies. They wanted to take some to a family in their ward but one of the children is gluten intolerant. I told them I would do some research and try to find a recipe. I couldn't believe how many different kinds of flour there are in gluten free recipes - coconut, almond, sorgham, millet, buckwheat, and tapioca starch flour, to name a few.  There were other ingredients I had never heard of....so out of my comfort zone. After checking to make sure chocolate chips, M&M's, oatmeal, and peanut butter were gluten free, we determined we could make monster cookies which calls for no flour at all. The cookies turned out great and the elders were thrilled to take two plates to the family and the third plate home for their district.  

Elder Jeppsen

Elder Shepherd

Wednesday was zone training at the Central building. At these meetings there is usually a chance for the elders and sisters to role play. This time we were involved. Elder St. Clair wanted his companion, Elder Kirdyapkin, to practice his English so he volunteered to role play with us. We roleplayed a couple who had stopped coming to church. The elders' job was to try to find out what our concerns where and why we were not attending church. They were to help us make commitments to overcome our problems so we would come back to church.  We wondered how much Elder Kirdyapkin really understood, but at least he tried to enter into the conversation. Good practice for him and fun for us. During the rest of the meeting, Elder Kirdyapkin was busy making folded swans. At our home it was swans out of candy wrappers.  This time he brought notebook paper for the job. It's got to be a bit boring to be in a meeting and not understand much of what is being said.  Oh wait a minute....we do that every Sunday when someone isn't available to translate for us.

The notebook paper swan.

(Notebook paper here has squares instead of lines)

Thursday, as always, was Institute/Gathering. Our lesson focused on the call to the early saints to 'gather' to Ohio. We discussed the reasons they were to gather and the instructions the Lord gave them as to how they should do this successfully. We talked about 'girding up our loins,' esteeming our brother as ourselves, being united, and taking care of the poor and the needy....all things we need to do today even though we are not called to gather into one place. It is our halfway mark of the semester so we took banana cookies as a treat for the students. They love it when we bring something for them to eat.

Friday night was a fun evening. Several of the senior couples gathered at the Roper's apartment for a chili feed and a couple of activities. It was our way of celebrating Halloween together.  The food was great and the company even better.  

The women in the kitchen,

of course.

The men visiting while

waiting for dinner

One of the activities was the donut on a string thing....

only this time blindfolded.

It was so funny to watch.

This has been a week of being 'figged.' We have had missionaries call and set up appointments for discussions at our home nine times during the week. Seven of them have not happened for one reason or another. We feel so bad for these elders and sisters who work so hard to set up teaching appointments with investigators, only to have the investigator cancel or just not show. It has to be discouraging. Maybe next week will be better.  

Elder Christensen, Baseel, and

Elder Denkers (left to right)

The two discussion that did happen were on Saturday afternoon and were fantastic discussions. Elders Holland and Grover, of the Rechnoy ward, brought two new contacts to our home. Ollig and Denise have been friends since college and are two really sharp young men. They are interested in speaking better English and learning about our religion. We had a wonderful time getting to know each other. We think the elders brought them over just so they could meet us. They are of young single adult age and were interested in our YSA activities, being surprised that they were free. We asked them to come to English group on Wednesday as well as our activity on Friday. Hopefully we will see them there. They each left with a Book of Mormon and a promise made to read it. We sure hope they become serious investigators as they would add so much to our YSA group.

The second discussion was with Baseel. He did not attend church last week as he had promised. He again promised he would go next week, when he returns from Ryazan. We stressed to him the importance of attending church.  We told him that once he came, he would want to be there every week because of the feeling he would have while there.  We will anxiously await Sunday, next week.




Earlier, Saturday afternoon, we finally took time to ride the Metro's brown line all the way around.  It runs in a circle crossing, thus connecting, all the other lines. They say this line has some of the most beautiful stations, and we have to agree after getting off at each stop to take pictures. This was our favorite station of the day.  Can you see why the metro is considered the 'palace for the people.' (We will do a blog entry on Moscow's metro system soon.)

LIVING IN RUSSIA SPOTLIGHT

For two weeks we had been watching the garbage pile up at the garbage drop off across the street from our apartment.  We don't know what the problem was but they weren't picking up the garbage. The pile kept growing larger and larger until it was actually out into the street.  One afternoon this week it was finally picked up.  We were beginning to worry.

This was taken several days before the garbage was actually picked up

so you can imagine how much garbage was there by the time it was picked up....

literally to the top of the shed and out in the street even farther.

Several times since we have been here, we have had people knocking at our door or ringing the doorbell, usually because of water leakage somewhere down below us. Once again, this week, our doorbell rang late at night. We had just returned from Phantom of the Opera, about 11:00 pm.  We have been instructed to never open our door to anyone we don't know so I looked out our peep hole to see who it was. I saw two pretty scruffy looking men and a lady. After several rings, and at Paul's insistence, (I wanted them to think no one was home) we asked, through the locked door, if anyone spoke English. Luckily, the lady did and told us there was a problem with water leaking in the apartment down below us. We tried to tell her, through the door, that we had no water leakage in our apartment but she insisted that the two men needed to check the pipes in our apartment. We let them in and they found no leaks.  We told them the water problems of the past have always originated in the apartment above us. The next day we heard someone working upstairs on the pipes so hopefully the problem will be solved once and for all. That would be a good thing for our replacements.

STILL LOVING OUR MISSION WITH

ANOTHER FUN AND PRODUCTIVE WEEK BEHIND US