A Visit From Elder Nelson

This week was good!  It is hard to measure success sometimes here. We had less lessons than normal, and not as many new investigators but we were able to set a baptismal date with a man named V____. He is about 50 and lives alone here in Angarsk. He is way cool. So far we have only had one lesson with him but he seems very ready to accept the Gospel. 

 

The weather has been good, but we just found out this weekend that we should be wearing suit coats all the time unless the temperature exceeds 27 Celsius. (About 80 degrees F) 25 degrees Celsius is pretty warm so I think we will be getting a lot hotter here in the future. Thats okay though, just a tiny thing. Nothing to worry about.

 

We are moving into the last week of May! Wow... Then it will be June and Elder Brown's and my birthdays are soon :) His is June 3rd just like Jared. We are planning on having Sushi and Coke and watching some videos from "The District" as a special birthday treat :)

 

The sun is up all the time nowadays. I haven't seen the moon in a few weeks haha :) Right now the sun sets around 9:30 at night.  That's good though, because there are a bunch of hooligans running around.  Hopefully the sunlight will keep the hooligans from being silly.

 

Yesterday was the 24th here and was the 23rd for you guys. We had a pretty special day... I mean I don't want to brag but we spent the whole day with a pretty cool guy. He was with us for our Sacrament meeting and we had a missionary meeting afterwards.  At the end of our meetings, he said "Please tell your parents that I love them"... You may be wondering who it is... Oh, it was just my close and personal friend Russell M. Nelson.  He came down to say hi :) Haha yeah I am not too sure why he came down but it was way cool. I shook his hand 2 times!  It is pretty weird to see him from the side or from the back. Normally we only see his face when he speaks at General Conference. His wife is actually really cool, I never knew! She spoke to us for about 15 minutes before Elder Nelson spoke and she had great ideas. Really cool. For both of their talks during sacrament meeting there was a translator and that was cool being able to understand both in English and in Russian. Some of the sentences I would have translated a different way, but it was a cool experience nonetheless. It was a very sad weekend though, Since they leave in July, this weekend was probably the last time many of us will see President Brinton and Sister Brinton. I am sad to see them go but I am excited to have a new Mission President coming in. 

 

I am excited to hear about the new Lakewood Presidency (*He means Bishopric, but he has been dealing with Branch Presidencies)! I thought they just recently did some reorganizing.. maybe I am mistaken but I thought changes recently were made. 

Last week was a good week, but this week was pretty good too:) We go to feed homeless people every Tuesday, I don't know if I have told you. There is a church here called "Harry Krishna" or something like that, I don't know how it would be spelled in English. They are way nice people but they are a mix between Bhuddist and Christian and Hindu and its a bit weird. Super nice people though. They make good food too. Each week they feed us some soup, oatmeal, and tea and then we feed homeless people for an hour. Normally the homeless people are nice but sometimes they are SUPER impatient. They often bring jars with them and we can fill them up so they will have extra food for later in the week. Normally we will grab two jars from a person and go to fill them up but on the way we will get at least 5 more people shouting and holding jars up "Fill mine up!" We have to say "Hold your horses and we will be back in 2 minutes after we fill these jars". Some are very kind and thankful and that is such a blessing. It is always wonderful to work with nice people.  Those are the best kinds of people in all aspects of life :)

Serving the Hare Krishna

Oh and by the way, the jacket that I am wearing in the picture of me palming a basketball is new. I bought a cool track suit with Russia written on it. All the cool kids and hooligans here wear track suits so I got one!

By the way. I got my birthday package!! Super cool:) Thank you so much! I opened it up early I hope you're all right with that. We have a member here who was asking us the difference between a burrito and a taco. They don't have those here. He has never seen either one and we told him that we would make some. Now I've got that sweet taco shell gadget and some El Pato and we are making tacos this week:)

Elder Cluff saw the El Pato and asked "Why did your parents send you a random can of sauce?" And I was trying to explain to him that it was super good and we ate it often at home. Then Elder Brown came into the room, saw the can and got very excited "Elder Gardner! Do you know how much I love this stuff?! This is home for me! I ate this ALL THE TIME!" Hahah Elder Brown was very excited to see it again but Elder Cluff just didn't get it...  Thank you for the sauce:)   

This desk has a lot going on!

Korea will not be this week. We should have Kristina's Baptism later this week. She is doing good even though the Sisters are now teaching her. She still loves Elder Brown though... haha.  And I am not going to Korea the week after that. That is our birthdays. I think I have to go the next week:) That is my guess. 

Making Dinner in a bag! Chicken legs with vegetables and seasonings and cook it for an hour:) 

Real quick to end this letter, I heard a great joke from a Russian this week. What is similiar about a divorce in the Southern States of America and a tornado in the Southern States?  Both will take your trailer away from you:) Hahaha.  Those Russians think they are funny.  :)

 

I miss you all and hope you are doing good! You're in my prayers, and I hope youre all staying frosty.

Elder Gardner