Great week

hey hey hey hey hey

thanks for the many of letters. a good load this week, if i do say so. it was a good week for me. our zone leaders challenged every companionship to get 15 quality lessons this week, with a pizza party as incentive. so we worked hard, cuz in this area, it is actually quite a challenge. did i tell you that two transfers ago, this area was getting like an average of 6 lessons? this transfer the best we have done is 12... until now. apparently when this area first opened, the elders wanted to get 20 qualities, but they cheated. they taught lessons on the street to random babooshky. like 8 of them. and we got it legitimately. take that, cheaters.

Monday night was really fun, we had a lesson with a really fun family. we taught them how to make tacos, which is what we have been eating a lot this transfer. homemade tortillas, homemade everything else actually. so dang tasty, it blew their minds. i don't think they had ever tasted something that delicious. one of the kids asked, can we make this tomorrow? and the dad said probably not. the kid was then like, can we make them tonight? so tasty.

hey so i got my new passport, it came in the mail. so that is all taken care of. it came really fast, thankfully. that reminds me, this crazy member brat doberday decided to be a detective and find my passport for me ('I've found harder things than a passport before, he he he'). he narrowed it down to elder clarkstone, who he hates. elder clarkstone calls him his arch nemesis as well. well on Tuesday i get a call from clarkstone, who found my passport in his apartment! they had dropped it behind something and couldn't find it. so doberday was right! clarkstone said not to tell him though, because he would probably call the police on him. but now i have two passports, which is great, as passports make a lot of money in this country. so my money worries are over. haha

we had a split on Wednesday, i went to the other elders area with elder Johnson. it was good, Johnson is a cool guy, we had a good time. we also made the best borscht I've ever had. seriously i don't understand how it turned out so well. it was divine. and the thing with borscht is, is that it gets better on the second and third days, so it just got better. gosh it was good!

Thursday night we got back with our comps, and it wasn't looking good. both our companionship's had like 7 or 8 quality lessons, and everything was going to have to go perfect for us to get 14, and then a miracle was going to have to get us to 15. well everything worked out perfectly, and we gave this man with schizophrenia a blessing of comfort on Sunday, so we got it. so we is getting some pizza.

yeah, we haven't even had time to plan our next week, which we were supposed to do on Friday morning. we have been really busy. though i think this no planning thing works OK, we have like 10 quality lessons already set up for next week.

here's something that happened on Thursday night. we were on our way to our landlady's house for a lesson. ahead of us is a man and his son. the man was very drunk, and his son was like 8 or something. the man walked past me, but when Elder Thomas passed by, the man tried to hit him with his forearm. Thomas turned around as the man fell to the ground, as he was very drunk. we kind of stuck around a bit, kind of to make sure he wasn't going to hurt his son or something. he kept like grabbing his son and then falling over, on top of the kid. the kid was crying, telling his dad to call mom. it was awful, we didn't feel like we could do anything, or should do anything. so we just watched. all i wanted to do was beat the tar out of the guy. eventually he passed out in the snow, so we waited there until a couple of other guys came out and helped the kid. it was probably the saddest thing I've ever seen.

Sunday was cool. we had a lesson at the tixamerovs, the district presidents family, and the bontsovs came (the family we made tacos with). so like two of my favorite families ever, a big dinner, it was awesome. the kids are all just awesome, and the parents are all just as cool. they were talking about crazy stuff though, like this war in Egypt, then about guns, then about like the cocaine business in Ukraine. suffice it to say, i didn't understand very much. Thomas said there was a lot he didn't understand. but it was still really fun. way cool families.

to answer your questions: I'm feeling good. pretty cold most of the time, but my apartment is nice and warm, most of the time. in a couple months it will be good. my Russian is fine. did i tell you about the district meeting we had like a month ago? we played a Russian word game, where if you know words, you get points. and i beat my zone leader, and my companion. that was an ego boost. I've been working on listening recently, and it is really hard. there is still so much that i don't understand. my clothes are OK. the pair of shoes I've been wearing are getting beaten. but they should last a good while. I'm good in that area. hmmm... bday suggestions... there is this awesome book called 10,000. it is a Russian dictionary, but the words are in order of frequency. so it is really useful. that would be cool to have. my daily schedule is get up, study, go have lessons or contact, then come in, plan, and sleep. p-days are awesome. we found a bowling alley that, on Monday mornings, charge 14 grivn an hour. like a buck fifty. so we play for like two and a half hours. for like less than five bucks. its great. an hour of internet, some shopping, then hanging out with other elders. it is a great day.

well that's about it for my week, thanks again for everything. love you all. church is true, kak abweechna.

love, elder brimley