Time is flying by

Two weeks ago we went to the baptism of three African men who are here in Russia studying the language and going to school. It is so interesting to us to see these wonderful guys who have the same spirit that we saw when we were in Nigeria, take up the Gospel with such enthusiasm. Since we have been here we have witnessed close to a dozen of these guys enter into the Church. We feel we have been a small part of each of them coming in as we can talk to them about their homes in Africa and relate to what they are missing there. The elders always make sure we are introduced to them and it is so fun to meet and visit with them. We instantly become "papa" and "mama" to them. Several of them attend our home evening each week and the English language Book of Mormon class that I teach.

Spring is here now. It actually got into the fifties several times this past week and even though it is raining today, it is fifty-two right now. This is hailed by many with great excitement and changes. The grass is beginning to get green, the buds are out on the trees, and the dirt of winter is being swept up. Since tourist season is upon us now, buildings are being painted, wrought iron fences and gates are being painted, and the boats are now plying the canals. Yesterday in a half hour as I passed the windows of our institute I saw five different boats loaded with tourists going by and saw four more in a convoy, empty, but headed for their loading points. And a sure sign of spring and the upcoming season is the change in the fashions. It seems like the Russian women get their fashion ideas from watching MTV and the short skirts are flourishing.

We had one quite exciting by product of our trip to Turkey. On the last evening there we got to sit at the table with President Paul, our area president. In the converstation with him and his wife, we talked about our experiences and his. In the conversation we mentioned that we had written and produced the Nigerian cultural event for the temple dedication there. We also talked of how fun it was to be on the committee for the same event at the Rexburg temple dedication. He asked us if he could send us a copy of the Kiev cultural event script to read and make suggestions. What a fun honor for us. We read it and made some suggestions to that committee. Who would have ever thought that we might have a part in three temple cultural events, small as this one might have been. We are looking forward to seeing it performed, video, of course, or the written account to see what might have been altered from our suggestions. This may happen in August, at least that is the time being planned for now.

We went to the May Day Parade on Saturday, which wasn't up to much. Not even as good as Rexburg's parades. But here is one colorful group. Most were just civilians marching with banners of their organization, which we couldn't read.

We are looking to the future being quite hectic. In June, the plans are right now, to close the institute for major remodeling. They are going to put in new windows and paint the whole place. We will move our efforts to the mission office complex and have home evening and summer classes there. But instead of going there from 4-9 each day, we will only go at about 7 till the class is over. The rest of the time we will have to be creative in what we do. This, of course, depends on the Russian construction schedule. It seems like here the quality of work and the time schedules are sort of based on a whim. They work when they want to and in summer often take time off for holidays and visiting their dacha's out in the country. But we love the work and love being with the young people.

When the president told us to get all the young people married, we laughed and wondered how we could even be a part of this. But maybe getting the institute open has contributed. Last year we had 22 marriages and so far this year we have had students get married. In the plans, right now, for the next few months there are 7 more students in the planning stage. People getting married here have to have a civil or 'registered' marriage before going to the temple. They have this civil wedding at a registry building of which there are many all over the city. Then they travel all over town and have pictures taken of the couple and the wedding party at different historical sites and cathederals. Then they have a dinner and program at the branch building. Then three days or so later they travel to Finland and go to the temple to be sealed. Quite the process. We have gone to two of these weddings and they are grand affairs. Any weekend there are many limo's passing us with wedding parties on there way here and there.

We are looking forward to visiting a few of the historical places, museums, and cathedrals we have not been to yet and to revisiting some of the ones we have been too. This town is so full of history and our understanding of the past and particularly World War II has grown a lot. May is a celebration month with Victory Day (or sometimes it is called Patriot Day or my favorite, "The day we won the War") at the beginning and other celebrations during the month.

Here's our new friend, Sister Hazelwood, and her grandkids. (Just kidding. These monkeys were on the street with a guy and we snapped a picture.)

Life Goes On

I haven't written here for a long time because it seems that missionary life goes on here with nothing happening that I think will be of interest to folks at home. Yet for us every day still brings new people and experiences. Of course, as at home, the biggest change in our lives is that it's spring, albeit with forward and backward spurts in temperature. Nothing can make you appreciate spring like a hard winter!

The Iceland volcano has affected us only indirectly. We are still waiting for the ash to hit us but so far the skies are blue. There is a new humanitarian couple who were to arrive last Saturday, but they are stuck at the MTC until they can get a flight in - hopefully on Wednesday. It will be fun to have new friends join us in this venture.

One of the highlights of our days is meeting the investigators that the elders and sisters bring to the Institute building to teach. Those who speak English really love to visit with us because they are always looking for English-speakers to practice their English on. This week there was a good-looking Indian guy (from India). He is going to be coming each week for a piano lesson. He speaks good English so that will be fun, but I have been teaching another investigator who is quite talented on piano but speaks very little English. That's a challenge! But he told the elders last week that he didn't want them to come back so he will not be coming to piano, either. I've had a steady stream of young people (members) come and ask to take piano lessons but after 3 or 4 lessons, when they find out that it requires more than just coming to lessons, they have all dropped out. This is frustrating because the whole point of it is to train pianists who can play in our branches. I've not had much success there.

The elders continue to find West Africans who are interested in the gospel. They speak English, of course (if you listen VERY carefully), and we love to get acquainted with them. We were told that one of things our mission president was going to bring up in his interview with the area president last weekend in Moscow was the possibility of creating an English speaking church unit here, mostly because of the group of Africans who have been baptized. There are 7 or 8 of them who come regularly to one branch and the elders teach a Sunday School class in English for them. Then there are also a few Chinese members and investigators and the American kids who come for the Inernational Language Program who all speak English. It would be interesting to see such a unit created, but I don't expect it to happen while we are here. The picture below is us with Kobe on his baptism day. Looks just like our pictures from Nigeria.

It's really fun to get the emails from our missionary grandson Curtis who is in Los Angeles working with Spanish speaking people. He and his companion have so many baptismal candidates to work with right now that he said they have no time to do other prosleyting. How our elders would love to have that problem! But Curtis is having some very unique experiences working in the 'hood. It just makes me realize how different every mission is. It's nice to know we were each placed where we are for a reason known only to the Lord. It is an awesome responsibility to try to live up to what He expects of us and hope that we are making a difference in someone's life.