Wow! Elder Broekhuijsen turns 21 today! His mother must have birthed him when she was very young! :-) Anyway, it sounds like he's doing just fine as a legal adult. See for yourself…
Elder Broekhuijsen here. Who is now a legal adult in all meanings of the word!
It's been a fun day. I got to wake up at 6:30, take a 7 degree bath (not that bad, actually; and it's a better simulation than a shower), do regular study, and clean the apartment! The Bezimianski Sisters kindly faxed me a card with a wonderful poem on it that they wrote. That was really nice of them. A few friends here and there from the branch, investigators, missionaries, etc. have called and sang to me and wished me a happy birthday. Then we went and bought all of the things we needed to eat food this week, including the ingredients for a GRECHKA CAKE! What is a grechka cake, you may ask? Words do not do one justice. You'll have to wait until I either a) write in a post office so that I can send pictures, or b) come home and make you one.
For the record, being 21 feels about the same as being 20.
Yesterday, T* came to our branch after 3rd hour to discuss details and planning of the baptism on the 19th. They're having a hard time finding a place where we won't have to cut through like 2 feet of ice, but President Blinkov is on the case, and if anyone can find a place, he can. She also gave me a really nice picture dictionary that has 12,000 some-odd words in it for all sorts of objects and parts of objects. I now know how to explain in detail how to build a guitar from scratch in the woodshop. That will come in handy, I think. Probably what I'll teach my MTC district on their first day.
Also: I am going to look at suits today at the market. I'm also going to buy a fresh pail of buttermilk and have the cobbler mend my galashes (sp?) while I peruse Madame Rosemary's apothecary. GOSH! Reenok. I hate that there is no English word for that.
Point being. Probably won't buy anything today. I'd like your opinions on buying one. But my suits are pretty hashed up after 2 years (I DID take good care of them though - most missionaries here replace their suits long before they go home), and it's not going to be any cheaper to fix them than it is to buy a new one. Also, it's going to be a lot cheaper to buy one here than in America. So I figure that can be my birthday present.
Other news. A few days ago I had a dream that I came home, and right when I stepped into our house, before Dad even said anything else to me, he just handed me a box that had a 5D Mk II in it. [Yeah, dream big, Andrew!] I was, of course, quite excited to play with that and immediately started. I was excited to see everyone. All the good things that I'm looking forward to after my mission were there, basically. And yet... the whole dream was just overcast in sad. The closer I get to the end here, the less I want to leave. I know it's time, but man. I didn't really believe them in the MTC when they said it would be way harder to leave my mission than it was to leave my life before. But it's like 392x harder to leave here. I'm going to miss these people and this place so dang bad. I can talk to many of them on Skype and stuff. But I can't go walking on Leningradskaya Street or Kirov Square on Skype. I can't talk to any of the missionaries that are basically brothers and sisters to me on Skype. I can't put on a nametag and go preach on Skype. I'll stop whining now. I'm going to enjoy everything to the end here. But I can really honestly say that if I could go home for a month or so and hang out with all of you, and then just come back and do another 2 years, I would do it. Even though that would make me a 23-year-old freshman.
We had a good week. Actually, in terms of investigators moving or "measurable" missionary work getting done, we had one of the worst weeks of my mission. But that's beside the point. We had interviews and "exchanges" (basically we work in a group of 4 all day) with the Bezimianski Sisters. They were the best interviews I've ever had. It was weird, because Elder Christensen and I were conducting the interviews, and I feel pretty safe in saying that we were able to help the sisters find answers to some of their questions and feel better about some of their stresses, but the Spirit was so strong on the interviews that I was like receiving personal revelation in real time, live streaming. It was mostly quite unrelated to the things we were discussing on interviews. I think I probably learned way more for myself than the Bezimianski Sisters did that evening. I don't know how to describe the experience very well, but before we knew it, we had spent about 5 hours doing 2 interviews. And I knew without a shadow of a doubt that THAT was exactly what the Lord had in mind for each one of us that day. I also had the opportunity to give one of the sisters a blessing. Probably more than any other blessing I've ever given, that one was really obviously not from me. The Bezimianski Sisters weren't like "struggling" in any sense of that word, and we didn't have any specific reason to be worried about them, so I'm not sure why the interviews turned out so awesome. I dunno. This paragraph isn't doing very good justice to the whole experience. The Spirit lingered over us the rest of the day, and through personal study the next morning it was like a continuation of the personal revelation flood. It was awesome.
Anyway, things are great. Thanks for the birthday card! It looks awesome. I know several missionaries here who would approve. Don't worry about not sending one, I don't mind at all. [Editor's note: We had to scan and send the card via email, since SOMEone didn't get it in the mail in time!]
My mission is the best thing that's ever happened to me. I'm not pumped that it's almost over. But I still have 3 full weeks to tear it up here, and the Lord can teach me a LOT of things in 3 weeks if I let Him.
Happy Birthday Dad, BTW. I didn't say anything about that in my last email even though I celebrated a little bit here and didn't forget. So I felt kinda bad about keeping quiet. So hope it was a great day!
Love you all!
Love,Elder Broekhuijsen
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