Zone Culture Night

The Yekaterinburg Zone all braved -22 degree temperatures to attend this vibrant performance of Russian culture, organized by Zone Leaders, Elders Taylor and Kurbatov. Russians can be so proud! Thanks to Elder Wilson for the photography. (Click to enlarge on-stage photos in post above.)

What Child Is This?

Elders Smith (WA), Cutler (Draper), Isenbarger (IN), and Pearson(Park City), practice for Zone Conference, accompanied by Elder Holden (WA).

Holidays

The Soviet regime wiped out any hint of Christ in Christmas, so the New Year became the central holiday, complete with New Year's tree and all the presents.


The celebration includes costumes for children, a vist from Father Frost, abundant food, and big fireworks displays. Originally a two or three day holiday, it became a 10-day event in recent years.











Instead of the birth of the Savior, the theme follows the Asian calendar. The Year of the Tiger, 2010, means tiger toys, tiger candy, tiger figurines abound. Russian Christmas, January 7th, is kept by attending Orthodox mass.

How cold IS it?

In the last few days, Russians have been warning that a -35 day was coming--and here it is! Elders Taylor and Kurbatov arrive at the Office after their walk from the bus. (The bus stopped because the fuel froze?) They're at the entrance, showing the ice that has formed inside the door in the ante-room. Meanwhile, Elder Wilson makes them hot chocolate back in the kitchen.
This site shows averages; this one shows comfort level, which we presume takes into account windchill.

HO-HO-HO

In Finland, St. Nicholas and his Lady Elf offered
holiday cheer to travelers at the airport.
(Cute details on their costumes.)

Slippers

It's bad manners to wear your outside shoes indoors--except at stores. You're expected to take off your boots or shoes in the entry and go in stocking feet or top'ach-key--any sort of light-weight slip-on shoes.

Sometimes the hostess has an array for you to choose from. Some people carry slippers in their bag.

The Birkenstocks aren't common here. One of the Assistants had them in the Office and passed them to his successor. Now they go from Assistant to Assistant. Who was the original owner? Someone says Elder Johnson. Anyone know?

Elders - Random Pictures

From the top (click to enlarge), Elder Holden with his cake made by his companions, Elders Smith and Cutler; Zone at the Cathedral on the Blood yesterday; Elders Tate, Thompson and McEvoy after a meeting with Marina; Zone meeting;


Dinner at the Nuzmans (CES); In the fall, Elders Brown and Sare wait for a tram.

COLD

Quite a week of weather we have ahead of us!  Actually, it's not a whole lot different than Cache Valley. No doubt all our CV neighbors are being prepared to come and serve in Russia! : )

Finland

Our visa trip to Finland was brief, which is ideal for missionaries. We and the Palmers went to the Temple(and once again saw Elder Tim Groberg). Because our flight was delayed, we had an extra day in Helsinki and saw a few sights. Besides downtown, we went to a wooded island where historic Finnish homes and barns have been moved from throughout the country.

(Now we're back in the office and catching up on work, so we don't have time to post much.)

Notes

• We were sorry to hear about the Russian train.  It happened a thousand miles from here on a route none of our missionaries would ever need to take, but it's a tragedy none-the-less.
• We were grateful to talk to family members this Thanksgiving weekend.  We are full of thanks and gratitude.
• Another visa trip coming up.  We go to Helsinki again.
  

Giving Thanks

The Yekaterinburg Zone took half a day to celebrate with dinner at the Mission Home. The other Zones had their own gatherings. (Pictures from them later). Russians don't have a holiday like it, but our one Russian in the Zone, Elder Yazvinsky, was a good sport about it all.

Sister Nuzman, Pie Baker Extraordinaire, helps President and Sister Allcott while President carves one of their two five-pound turkeys imported from Germany. Jello and canned pumpkin were brought from America; dressing made from scratch.

Since this counts as P-Day, Elders relax and play Settlers of Catan, and "Pounce" with Rook cards. After dinner, Elder Isenbarger tells a story about his former companion, Elder Campbell.

After Dark

Winter nights are surprisingly friendly here. Our little camera doesn't do it justice.

First of all, it's never really dark. Of course, the snow reflects, but the lights of the city shine against the overcast sky, so everything has a pink glow. One Elder called it "warm." We carried a flashlight at first until we realized we never used it.

Lots of people are out and about, often even walking babies in carriages or strollers.



(Elder McEvoy with Lydia and Elders Smith, Cutler and Holden a the Botanika Church door after a meeting; the roads we walk near the Office; holiday lights on the tram stop near our apartment building.)

Fast Food

After a baptism, missionaries stopped at Subway before heading back to work.

FYI, the other familiar franchises are McD's, KFC (called Ros-teeks') and Cbarro, that pizza place in all the mall foodcourts in the US.

When we eat out, we like trying something Russian, but once in a while the American missionaries like good ol' fast food.

Holidays in the Air

It used to be when Thanksgiving was over, Christmas got the green light. Now it's more like Halloween. They tell us that here, the first snow gives everyone permission to think about the holidays--the 10 day New Year celebration which has Christmas rolled in with it--so the lights and decorations are going up in stores.

If you're mailing to your missionary, we're having consistent success with USPS Priority. Packages arrived today that were mailed from the USA October 30-November 4. As for normal letters, a Pouch with letters arrived today that left SLC via DHL on Nov 17. It's not always that fast, but it's not uncommon.

South of the Border

Stani workers come from the south, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, etc., to do a lot of the menial labor. Cheerful, friendly people, they send their earnings to family back home.

Crews work non-stop in the malls mopping floors during winter and the muddy seasons.

(Pictures last month just before the snow fell.)

Tram Window - 5:00 pm

This is what we saw out of the frosted window panes as we rode the tram-vye to the Mission Home one evening last week.

New Elders

Five new Elders came last week. We were holding out for better pictures, but we're going with what we've got:

Elder Fife (AK) eats dessert; Elder Hanson (Draper UT), at dinner with his trainer, Elder Shreeve (AZ), and sisters; Elder Lunt (VT)meets his trainer, Elder Krogue (Alpine, UT) while Elder Cordon (LA) looks on; Elder Pearson (Park City, UT) at a baptism on his third day here, and heading out with his trainer, Elder Isenbarger (IN).