Hello dear readers!
happy p-day! i hope you all had a good week. mine was. thanks for all the letters, you guys are great. can you believe I'm turning twenty? its a pretty big deal. that's two decades. I'm done with childhood things, I'm a man. well i will be on Wednesday. I'm excited to become a mature, wise adult.
i haven't gotten the package yet, though I'm going to the office today, so, who knows. I'm really excited for it and THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!
on to the week: it was an interesting one, though not in a good way. none of our investigators had time to meet, we got dogged a few times, and i swear most of our time was spent waiting in the cold for unreliable buses. and it is really cold. so not the best week work-wise, but we had some successes. did i spell that right? and we had a good time, if that counts for anything.
Tuesday was OK. we had to do some shopping, buy a heater and a vacuum for the apartment. the bus that takes us to the store comes very rarely, so we waited in the cold for probably about an hour, collectively. but now we have a warm apartment, so that was well worth it. that night we went over to the bontsovs, had a fun lesson. they are the coolest people. they told me that my Russian had improved a lot since i had come into the branch. which is good to hear, as I've only been in the branch for one transfer. I've definitely been speaking in lessons more, mostly because i start talking, and i realize that i can speak! its weird, I'm used to like getting stuck on something i want to say, but that rarely happens anymore. so that's cool.
Wednesday was MAN DAY. yeah, its a tight holiday here to celebrate MEN. i think I'm taking this one back to America when i come home (in less than a year and a half, by the way). the sisters brought a tasty cake for the men, and gave us each a gift (toilet paper). it was good. other than that, we didn't have any lessons that day. but it was MENS DAY. womens day is like march 8th or something, we will celebrate somehow.
Thursday was pretty boring. but FRIDAY wasn't. i went on a split with antomonov, who is a greenie straight from Siberia. and he is actually really cool, which is surprising. we had a good time. we went to the bontsovs again, because they had invited him over. so twice in one week! yeah. we made a cake and he ate his first EVER oreo. don't worry i got it on film. one funny thing about him is this: he is from Siberia, which as far as i know is known as the coldest place on earth. well every time i see him he complains about the cold. sometimes i feel like a complainer when i say stuff about the weather, because i know it is colder other places, but now i don't. even the dude from Siberia thinks its cold here. its the wind, man.
the next day we were like planning what to do, and it looked like a full day of tracting until six, because a lesson fell through for like 1. so we tracted from eleven to fourish. tracting stinks, excuse me, but i really don't think there is another word to describe it. it stinks so bad. most people didn't answer the door, just yelled go away. the ones who opened the door weren't interested at all. that day more than most seemed very unproductive. THEN: a miracle. this lady was walking up the stairs, and she was like "well, tell me." we were like, uh, we are missionaries talking to people about Jesus. she was like, "OH MY GOSH I LOVE JESUS! I LOVE READING ABOUT JESUS!" and we were like, well, we have a book that is all about Jesus! she was like GIVE ME! and she was like, i have watched every movie about jesus ever made! and we were like, we have several movies about Jesus! she was like YEAH!!!! we were like, and here are some brochures about Jesus! and she was like YEAH! she said she was doing some errands so she had to go, but she also said, you don't even need to knock on the rest of these doors, I'm going to tell everybody about the xoroshee malchickie (good boys). well we start knocking on a door, and an old lady opens it, sees us, and says no, i don't need this. the other lady from like two stories down yells: 'listen to them! don't close the door, they are good boys!' she closed the door. then the lady comes up and she has 10 grivin in her hands and she is like, take this! for the book! i cant take it for free! go buy yourself some goodies! and we say no, we have sufficient for our needs. the lady probably sounds crazy from the story, but she actually wasn't, she was just really excited. and Russians are never excited. they don't even have a word for it. so we will see where that goes.
we decided to take a lunch break, and antomonov taught me some sweet slang. i now can say, hey guy, what are you looking at? want to fight? get out of my face, snotface. yeah, i'm cool.
later tracting, we knock on a door, and a member answers it, she is a member who we have been trying to have lessons with but she always says no because she is doing a remont and is embarrassed. so on accident we knock on her door, and she is like, come on in. she probably didn't believe that it was an accident, now that i think about it. but she was awesome, she is the cook for the office elders. and now we can meet with her every week. she invited us over and she was like, and be prepared to eat bleencheeky! which are crepes, because this week is CREPE WEEK! which is exciting.
those were the highlights of the week. this next week looks even better: bleen week, my birthday, already have several lessons set up. hopefully it works out better than this one. today we are celebrating my birthday, we are going to go to either this restaurant called Liverpool, which is like an English buffet, or this Mexican restaurant. we shall see.
my comp is from salt lake, we get along great. I'm good with money. sasha, i was afraid that he had lost interest, but i called him yesterday and asked if he still wanted to meet with us, and he was like, of course! so that's good.
its funny. the more i understand people, it doesn't really change my impression of them. it is pretty obvious the good people from the mean ones. like alexander, the guy who recently got baptized, i still don't really understand him that well. he uses really smart words. but you can just tell that he is awesome. thats one thing i really like about the mission. there are all these awesome people, and i can just call them, and say, hey can we come over and talk? and it is totally normal. i really like being able to just talk with these people, especially the members. some are crazy and weird, i won't lie. but then there are the bontsovs, who are just the kindest, happiest people. its so crazy that i ended up meeting them. like what are the odds, honestly? i lived in Utah. they live all the way in Donetsk Ukraine. its just interesting. it is a fun way of life.
well i can't really send pictures. the one place in Donetsk that lets you do that, i just found out, closed. so if i go to Kharkov, I'll send some pictures. shame.
i wish you a merry bleen week. and yes, please have stuffed waffles or french toast or whatever on Wednesday. i love you all!
love, elder Brimley
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