news from russia

I told Austin to post, but he didn't have enough time, so I thought I would take one of his recent letters and post it for him. He is doing well--got transfered back to Moscow and says that one of his investigators in Voronezh will be getting baptized soon.

Dear family,

Things are going good. This week has been pretty normal. One thing interesting is that our open house is coming up and they are making us sing in the choir. And I really don't want to and my companion doesn't want to and the other elders.. well one of them actually can sing so he doesn't care but the other one doesn't want to and we all really suck at singing and there trying to do parts and all this jazz and like everyone can hear how bad we suck. And its funny to them and id really rather not sing but the lady is like crying about how there aren't enough men in the choir and all this sad story and how if we don't sing in the choir then there wont be a choir and then the open house wont be successful and it will be this huge waste and it will all be all our faults just because we didn't sing in the choir....

Then we when to his members house and taped up her windows so the cold air wont come in during the winter. And that was fun, not really but what can you do? We also went to a members garden thing out side the city and cut down this big apple tree and that was fun. Then the lady feed us some weird past, like just pasta with out any sauce or anything and this sausage thing that was really rubbery on the outside and like much inside, so yeah it was pretty normal. Other then that, we did our English contacting. Which is when we go stand on the street and hold a sign that says "English club, with Americans for free" except the "with Americans for free" part is in Russian. So yeah , we hold the sign and try to talk to people in English while they are walking past. Most just ignore us but some are like what the..? and come ask what were doing and it works pretty well. Usually all the pretty girls go talk to my companion. Probably cause he doesn't speak Russian yet. Or because he is usually holding the sign. Haha. And someone told us that the "with Americans for free" part kind of sounds weird, like innuendo, or something but we figure, flirt to convert right, that's a church program some where, I think.