Not only was Andrew's email not late this week, he even sent us some photos. So fun!
Hi everyone!
I've had a good week! You may have noticed that I sent some pictures.I collected a few onto my SD card from other people's cameras, so someof these are pretty old pictures. But there you go.
This picture is the album cover for the boy band that Elders Morris, Langston, Hughes and I will be starting later in life. We still haven't for SURE decided on a name, but we're thinking "XPAM Boyz." It has a nice ring to it.
Our branch did a service project a couple of weeks ago at a horse place. I decided to pop a Russian squat. Lots of young cool dudes in Russia do this on street corners. Pictured next to me is a big old pot of plov, simmering over some coals. Plov is the best food you have ever experienced. Not only that, but this was the best plov that has ever graced my mouth. LUCKILY, Elder Morris and I found a new investigator this week named A* who is from Uzebekistan, which is where plov originated. And we're planning on picking out a P-day sometime in the next few weeks where we head out and make a big ol' batch of plov together, and A* promised us that he would tell us "a very small but important secret" to making the best plov in the universe. So be excited for me having THAT skill when I get home.
This is a shot from an activity the branch put on for YSA [Young Single Adult] people. President Sartori spoke on mission preparation and moral cleanliness, so Elder Morris and I got to go to translate. There was a costume theme to the party where everyone was supposed to dress up like a decade. I guess Russia had similar fashion. From left to right,you have S*, who is an awesome member from New City, Tol'yatti; Elder Morris, Y*, an awesome member from Bezimianski; me, and V*, another awesome member from Bezimianski who is getting ready to go on a mission. Yeah baby!
This is a picture taken at sunset at Revolution Square in Samara. It turned out pretty sweet, but I want to come back and re-take it with a DSLR, a tripod, and a really nice sharp prime lenslike the 50mm f/1.4. Then it would be print-worthy. The statue is Lenin.
There is a family of Armenians we're teaching that live really close to our place. They are SO awesome. The dad is A*, the mom is M*, and the little baby is M*. That baby is the cutest thing that ever happened. She is the quietest, un-cry-y-est, smiliest baby in the universe. Gosh I love this family; they are SO rad. A* kept interrupting us in the lesson yesterday (about repentance) to basically testify about how repentance has changed his life, and how he used to be the town terror and everyone was afraid of him in his hometown of Armenia, but then he found Jesus and stuff. Man, he's such a boss. And M* sits at home with M* all day, and reads the Book of Mormon in Armenian whenever the baby is asleep. They are going to get baptized for sure.
So this last week, we had a pretty busy week. First off, we had Zone Leader Council on Monday. Then on Tuesday, we had our first ever Special Leadership Training, which is for all ZLs, DLs, and trainers.It was awesome; it went super well and we came to some really satisfying conclusions that were definitely inspired. Among those conclusions were that we need to raise the requirements for church attendance before baptism from two weeks, to three weeks within a six-week period, to help these new members already be in the habit of coming consistently every week.
Then Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday were visa trips for the othergroup (there are two "tracks" in the mission because we get new missionaries every 6 weeks, but need new visas only once every 3 months). They were kind of a nightmare actually because we had all sorts of problems at passport control. It doesn't seem to matter to the people at the passport control station flying into Samara that we are 100% legal, and do this every 6 weeks (sending 30 missionaries in three groups through the airport). They just like giving us all sorts of problems anyway. One of them went out and sent the minibus we ordered home one of the nights, then came back in and told all the missionaries, "No, I didn't see a minibus out there." Anyway, we ended up getting called a bunch of times in the middle of the night by missionaries who were having problems with officials. BUT it's over now, so I'm going to put it behind me and stop complaining.
Tomorrow we meet with President again to talk about the next transfer. Man, it seems like they just keep getting faster and faster. After this transfer ends, Elder Morris only has 3 months left. What the heck? I remember when he hit his year mark, and now I'm already past mine. No good.
I hope everything is well down there as I haven't read your emails yet. Have a wonderful day and a wonderful week everyone, I love you all!
Love,
Elder Broekhuijsen
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