training is pretty fun. and funny sometimes. before i ruthlessly make fun of him, i'll say that we really get along, so it's ok. he's a cool kid. i'm glad i get to serve with him. we were walking home the first night, and there was this huge puddle of water. i told him that we should probably walk around, but i guess it didn't look too deep to him, so he starts making his way through. it got really deep and he just started running, yelling "its ochen deep! ochen deep!" haha, it was like above his ankles. i tried to warn him.
it just reminds me of being a greenie myself. that was a really long time ago, but i remember it pretty well. not understanding most anything, no one understanding anything i say, just being completely overwhelmed with it all. allow me to introduce him: his name is elder hales, no relation to the other elder hales. he is straight out of high school, which is really funny hearing all his high school stories. i feel like i grew up a lot while i was at byu, even if i wasn't mature at all. its just funny, hearing about high school drama again. i'm sooooo happy i'm not in high school anymore. its been like...almost 3 years since senior year. geez. he's from roosevelt, utah, which makes him my fourth utahn out of 12. i'm doing pretty good. he's cool, chill, and fun. i'm happy.
we had a couple of good brother lessons this week. one with this guy named stanley and his roomate, yesse (sounds like a guy in the army saying, yessir). he turned out to be a jehovah's witness! who'da thunk? well, they are cool, but aren't too... reliable. but oh well. yesse was new, so we preached the book of mormon. he seemed interested and said he would start reading and praying. legit! the other new brother we found is named micheal. he is...interesting. really funny. he was saying stuff like, "God gave me so many talents! i can sing. i can act. i can play football. in my country, i was a great player. people would watch me play football, and they would say, wow. micheal, you are a great player. so i must use these talents to increase my popularity. but this is not to feed my VANITY! i will use my popularity to preach the GOSPEL! think about it. if out there on the streets, lil' wayne began to preach the gospel, what would you do? you would go and listen. everyone would go and listen. and probably 1000 people would have a baptism." he started talking about how some people were "destined for hellfire", and that if we could see with our spiritual eyes, we would see "thousands of demons flying around" outside. he was cool, a bit crazy, but cool. just crazy enough.
that reminds me of the lesson we had with brat gorskee. he is one of the strongest members of the church here in ukraine. he used to be our branch president, and we met with him the first time on tuesday or something. he told us this story of the day after a surgery, he was laying down in the recovery. this was the first day in his 17 years in the church that he hadn't read the book of mormon. yeah, he's legit. but he said that he felt an evil spirit of darkness around him because he hadn't read. he said he could feel hundreds of demons flying around the room. then he put his arm to the square and cast them out, and they all left. he has a lot of stories like that, he is a spiritual giant. awesome guy.
a couple of nights ago we were having a lesson with a member, and hales told her that he wrote the book of mormon. i did my best not to laugh, but that was a good one.
wait did i tell you that i got my scriptures back? oh my gosh it was a miracle. so if you remember, i lost my scriptures when i came into country. i left them in some airplane and figured they were gone for good. well when the new greenies came to donetsk, some guy in the airport asked them if they knew elder brimley. they said no, but took the number. i called it, and they have kept them for the past year and 4 months. and now i have them back! and they are so much better. i'm so happy.
we've been really busy, which is good. but busy with stuff other than straight up missionary work, so not as good. but i like not having too much free time.
here is my favorite quote of the week. it is from a brother named bede. i asked him to give me some information about another brother, and he went off: 'i don't know! i don't know. i cannot give an account of what i do not know!" that’s just how they talk. it's so funny. i love the brothers.
well, i love you guys. have great weeks, respectively.
cordially yours,
elder brimley
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