Elder Andrew Gwilliam: California show your teeth

Hello! It was a good week. Here's a quick update. We left on Monday night for Novgorod to do exchanges. On Tuesday morning I went with the infamous Elder Dibble to help the branch president move a fridge to his new apartment. It was fun, I really like the branch president in Novgorod. He's a really cool, laid back guy. After that we had district meeting at the Glauser's apartment. It was fantastic to actually hear what they were saying and to participate. It was good. We decided that since my companion was there we could ask him a few questions about Russian. He decided that he didn't want to help so Elder Dibble and I answered the questions. After that we had some dinner, some tasty french toast, then ran to the bus station to make a bus out to one of the member families that Elder Dibble wanted to say goodbye to (he's going home on Thursday). The bus was pulling out as we got there, so we had to jump in a taxi instead. It was a good visit with them, I had been to their house before but they didn't remember me. We missed the bus back haha so we helped them move some wood around and he drove us back into town. Wednesday morning at 8 we got on a bus back to Pskov. We got home, did our studies, then went to some less-active addresses. The zone leaders were supposed to come on Thursday in the afternoon to do exchanges but cancelled at the last second. We met with the new branch president at the branch building and kinda did the official pass over of all the documents, passwords, keys, stuff like that. We met with a kinda investigator at the statue of Lenin and had a philosophical chat... well I didn't because I don't have the vocabulary or the desire for that. Friday we had the TRANSFER NEWS that I've been waiting for. My companion is leaving, my new one is Elder Mullen from Alaska. He's a new missionary, maybe 3 or 4 months here. I've met him a few times. It'll be great. That initiated the packing of the bags of my companion and the calling everyone to say I'M LEAVING AND WANT TO MEET WITH YOU AND SAY GOODBYE AND OTHER GOOD STUFF. That night we went to our investigator (the father of the former branch president.. I'll call him FFBP from now on) because he hasn't been answering the phone, and that usually means that he's drunk and in a slump. So we went there but he didn't open up or he wasn't home. Bummer. Saturday was really fun. We met with a nonmember mother of a member at the branch with a few other members and she taught us how to make these things called Манты (man-TEA). It's kinda like a dumpling but with only meat and a little more bland. But they were tasty. I wrote down the recipe and everything, so that'll be fun. The thing we didn't know was that they take 40 minutes to cook, and we made enough for 4 batches... yikes. So we ate them up, and in turn they ate up the day. Yesterday was good. We had church, Elder Zaharov said goodbye to everyone, then we had a request to help the sister of one recently activated member (she is also a member, not active and not friendly) move a fridge to her new apartment. So we did that after church, she literally did not say one word to us. But, we helped her out and I hope she'll remember that. So my fridge count for the week was two. I'll have a hard time topping that. I'll end with a funny quote from the former branch president of Pskov who recently got back from a conference in Moscow for those 18-30 unmarried members of the church. He called me to see how things were, and this was the best thing he said. He knows english ok, but he translated literally this phrase and it just sounded funny to me. I asked if he found any potential wives and this was his response: "Yeah, there was one. I don't know though. I don't know how her insides are, but she's really pretty." That was funny. I got a good laugh out of that. Also, one of the missionaries in his ward right now taught him the word "turd" and he loves that one now. Good one, Elder.

It was a good week. I've learned a lot in the last lots of months here in Pskov, I'm sad to see this time of testing come to and end but I'm ready to move on. I'm excited for Elder Mullen and what we'll do together. Have a good week!

Elder G

PiCtUrE tImE