Thanks for writing Mom and Dad. Well, I sent you my flight plans, looks
like I'm flying on one big long airplane ride....all the way from Moscow. I'm
flying into LAX, they had to change the schedule. Ok, enough about that! This
week was great. I'll start off with the good news....we have someone on date for
baptism!! and whats cooler slash crazier, is that he will be baptized on
Saturday! He is a miracle. We found him street contacting over a month ago, at
7 ish in the morning. We called and called to try and get something set up with
this guy and nothing ever worked out. Eventually, we stopped trying b/c after 3
weeks of nothing, it was time to focus on others. Then one day we decide to
call him and he finally meets with us. He came to church with us, and continued
to meet with us. Almost 2 week later, he agreed to be baptized. so we set the
date for the 26th, and well...its totally happening. Our Branch Pres. had
already been on 2 lessons with him and they really like each other. Toleek ( by
the way, his name is Toleek...) actually likes coming to church and likes the
people who are there, which NEVER happens. It was scary b/c we set the date and
he had only been taught 2 lessons....so we were a little nervous to see his
reactions for the other lessons, but he willingly accepted everything! He is in
his mid 20's and is perfect for what the church here needs. So this week will be
really busy for us as we try and get everything going for the baptism.
The weather here has been unusually warm so everything is melting and
it actually rained here. The night it rained, the temp dropped a little so
everything was literally a big ice skating rink. So morning contacting was
interesting. But we had a really cool thing happen. Almost everyday we see a man
named Vladimer. He is a doctor at a nearby hospital and is the happiest man I
have ever met. He speaks English slowly but has a huge vocabulary. The other
day during morning contacting, when is was super slippery, we saw him happy as
always. about 20 min after we saw him, we found this little old Babushka who
looked lost and in pain. She was holding her wrist as though she hurt it. Well,
she did, and is was actually a compound fracture. She fell earlier in the
morning and was still in shock form the pain. She was super old and she told us
is was really hard to speak b/c her pain, so we called a taxi and took her to a
hospital b/c her wrist was WRECKED and she needed to see a doctor bad. Well the
taxi came and we took her to the nearest hospital and went everywhere to try and
find the emergency room and guess who we walked into....yup, Vladimer. It was a
miracle, he took her off of out hands and helped her out and thanked us for our
help. As a result of this, we ended calling him and going over to his place for
dinner! Now, the next part of the story, Vladimer is a former boxer and is
stoked on being healthy and fit. He is 58 years old and is ripped! the guy
gets up at 4:30 everyday and does his workouts then goes to the hospital. He
showed us a diploma that he received 4 days ago for being on a swim team for the
hospital...he was the oldest member of the team and I don't doubt that he was
the best swimmer. He fed us dinner and for the first time, I couldn't even get
my self to eat some of the food. Usually I try my best to try all the food if not
eat it. and this time I couldn't even get myself to try some of it. He feeds us
sausage, cheese, and bread...not bad at all. The bad stuff was the sour crout
with a rotten onion and the fish. When I say fish, I mean cat food. Why? B/c
they were little individual fish about the size of my pinkie finger, and there
were probably 10 or so on my plate. They had their heads cut off and that was
it. scales, fins, everything. I saw the can the was opened...where the fish
came from and they were doused in this nasty sauce and....pretty much I almost
threw up like 3 times...it was terrible. I couldn't do it. And Vladimer was
DOWNING them, it was crazy! Anyways, after that we had to tell him that we
don't drink black tea and I felt terrible b/c he was pumped about giving us tea.
So after that, we had a wonderful lesson about the Restoration and he willingly
took a BOM. He actually only reads. He doesn't watch TV and his place is a
library, literally. And He has read the majority of those books. He is such a
wonderful man to be around and I see big things in the future with him.
This week was so packed and is so much more to talk about but, it will
have to wait. Thanks for everything! I love you guys! have a great week!
- Sean
Best District ever!!
(Typical native enthusiasm)
(Typical native enthusiasm)
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