Goodbye, Sisters

This past week was a pretty interesting one. It was our sisters' last week before they went home (we put them on a train to L'viv at 6 am this morning) so we were trying to make it a good one. We wanted to do some kind of big activity on the street, so what we came up with was making one of those fishing booths where you put a fishing line over a bed sheet or something and someone on the other side of the bed sheet attaches candy to it and then you catch some candy. The idea is that we would attach candy, a pass-along card, and then a little fish that kids could color-in and then attach to the board. While the kids were doing that we would be talking with the parents and giving them Family: Proclamations and stuff like that. 

Translated: "Come follow men and I will make you fishers of men."

So we spent all of Saturday pretty much making these boards. It took a heck of a long time, honestly. We used the boards that we made for our Easter activity a couple months ago, so all we had to do was cover them with blue paper and decorate them. It didn't seem like it would take a long time, but it sure did. But they actually looked decent so it was worth the time, at least in my opinion. 

Unfortunately, the weather was not quite cooperating. It's been raining pretty consistently and it's been pretty chilly. Rain would totally ruin the boards we made and the success of the activity was very much dependent on people actually being in the park. It looked like there might have been a patch of clear weather, so Sunday afternoon we got all the stuff ready and left the church, But just as we were walking out it started to rain. So, obviously, we weren't meant to do it this weekend, so we had to move it back to another time. Unforunately, now my companionship is the only one here, so it'll be much more difficult to do it with only two people. Oh well, it'll work out some how, we're not gonna let all that preparation go to waste.

On Tuesday for our activity night we did a "surprise talent show." Basically people showed up and we gave them a random talent (say the alphabet backwards, juggle, play the piano) and they had to pretend that they could do this thing. It was pretty fun. I had to walk across the room with 5 books on my head, super easy. 

Also on Wednesday (and Thursday, cause we didn't finish on Wednesday) we went out to visit a member who needed help picking the cherries off of her cherry tree. So we spent a few hours up in the tree picking cherries. they weren't even all that good, I'm not sure what one person can do with so many cherries.

We also went to the castle (again) last week for the sisters' last P-day in Ukraine. It was just as cool as it was last the three times, but this time a thunderstorm started right as we got on top of the tower, so that was exciting.

But yeah now there's only gonna be one companionship here in Lutsk. Kinda a bummer, cause everything is always more fun with more people, but it's only a month or so, so I'm not too worried about it. 

That's about it from this past week, I'll try to attach some more pics from this past week later if they ever upload, the internet is super slow here. 

Hope everything is going ok there, Y'all are all in my prayers.

Alec​

Back To The Beginning

The biggest thing from this past week was probably the exchanges we had in Rivne on Wednesday. I've been back there plenty of times, but it's always super weird going back to that city cause I just feel like I'm all the way back at the beginning of my mission cause that's where I started out. It's always fun to see some people that remember me though. Honestly though, I'm not sure why they remember me, it's not like I could even talk to them back when I was there.

Of course while I was in Rivne, I made sure to hit up McDonald's (twice). Mostly cause of the convenience of it, but also cause it's the best burger you'll ever find in Ukraine. 

We also did a sports day this past Saturday, which was luckily a bit more successful than the last one. We had enough people to get a somewhat decent game of volleyball going, and that's all that really matters. None of the members were able to come cause almost the entire branch was in Kiev visiting the temple (a decent excuse, I guess). They rented out a bus, left Lutsk at 3 am Saturday morning, drove through Rivne to pick up some members from there, and then got to Kiev by like 10 o clock. They went to the temple for a few hours, then made it back to Lutsk by 11pm the same day. Pretty cool that they were able to organize that for people who can't afford to miss work or can't afford their own tickets to Kiev. If they had planned it for just two weeks later we might have been able to go with them because we'll be part of the Kiev mission at that point. Oh well, I'll be there in like a month and a half anyway. 

Since everyone was just at the temple, everyone wanted to share their experiences during sacrament meeting, so for once we had plenty of people speak. Probably the first time I've ever actually been supposed to give a talk but didn't get to cause there wasn't enough time (not a bad thing at all). 

This is the last week for our sisters here in Lutsk, and then all three of them are going home next Tuesday. So for the last five or so weeks it'll just be me and elder Abraham here in Lutsk all alone. Kinda unfortunate, but the good news is we get to move into their apartment which is closer and nicer than ours. Bad news is that means we have to close our apartment and deal with our landlady complaining about all the damages that missionaries have done over the past 6 years. Super bad news is that I have to pack up all my stuff, again. I thought for sure I was never gonna have to do that again. Oh well, at least the other apartment has real beds.

An interesting meeting we had last week: we met with this guy named Dima. He was pretty drunk and he started telling us about how he was at Maidan in Kiev (the big protest that started the Ukrainian revolution in like 2013 and basically led to all the stuff that's going on now). He says he got shot 39 times (I don't believe that) and that he prayed to God to protect him the whole time and he survived (obviously) but God didn't do anything to help him so he doesn't believe in God. Not super sure how to argue with that logic, so we probably won't try to meet with him again. 

I've got some pics of a cool hot air balloon festival that was going on right in the middle of town. That's not the kind of thing you see very often in Ukraine, so it was pretty neat to see. 

I remember that the weeks of graduation parties were definitely a ton of fun, but super exhausting. It's definitely an exciting time. The computers at the library we're writing at don't have any sound, so we might just have to wait to watch all those videos til I get home. I'll make sure to keep Aunt Gail in my prayers, too.

Anyway, hope y'all have a great week!

Alec​

New Companion & Old Forts

We had our mid-transfer transfers, so my old companion Elder Frehner went down to Uzhhorod and was replaced by Elder Abraham from St George. So far things are going pretty well, we've known each other for the past two years so it should be pretty fun.

 Before my old companion got transferred, we hit up a couple museums. There was a little science museum we went to, and it was actually pretty cool. It reminded me a lot of the kind of things you'd find at Morehead or some other little hands on science museum, so I was pretty impressed. Even though half of the exhibits weren't working. That's where the pictures of me in the gas masks come from, those were pretty sketch.

And then we went to an old military museum too. It's basically just a whole bunch of tanks and other military vehicles parked out in a big lot that you can go out and climb on and look at. I guess we went during field trip time, so there were tons and tons of kids running around, so we didn't quite get to climb on as many tanks as we would have liked, but it was still pretty cool. There must just be a huge excess of leftover military hardware from WWII in estern Europe cause tanks seem to be in much higher supply for memorials and museums and stuff like that then you would ever see in America.

And then today for p-day we took a lil trip out to a town called Dubno. They have a castle there (it was pretty ok) but then about 5 kilometers out of the city there is an old fort, from I think WWI or maybe even earlier than that. It's completely abandoned and just out in the middle of the forest, so a super cool place to explore. There may have been no trespassing signs . . . but we figured if anyone asks we would just say that we don't know Ukrainian and pretend to be dumb Americans. anyway, though it was honestly pretty sweet. You could tell which parts were original and which parts had been added on for like WWII and stuff like that and it was just crazy how many tunnels and sketchy rooms there were. Here's a quick lil youtube video I found about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88zqBbpKqI8. The tunnels were pretty sketch (there were absolutely no lights and I feel like it would be pretty easy to get lost in them, but climbing up to the roof of the old center structure was pretty sweet. To get to the very top we had to basically shimmy up an old chimney. anyway it was pretty sweet, my pictures don't really do it justice, but you get the idea. It really looked like something straight out of a horror movie. it was kinda hard to find, but definitely a place worth visiting if you ever find yourself in western Ukraine. 

Other than that, the grind is just still going on. We have probably the most experienced district in the whole mission, all five of us (3 sisters and 2 elders) are going home in the next 2 and a half months (the sisters are leaving in like 2 weeks), so we should be able to get some good work done.  I got a ton of pics, most of them are from the museums and the castle and the fortress, so have fun sorting those out! 

Have a great week! Alec

The Last L'viv Mission Conference

 This past week here was pretty eventful. Tuesday afternoon we headed out for L'viv for what would be the last ever Mission Conference of the Ukraine L'viv Mission. There was an event Tuesday night, so we made sure to get to L'viv with enough time to get some dinner at the famous ribs place before 7 o clock. Brother Tad R. Calister, the General Sunday School President was here in Ukraine and he was doing an instruction segment about how to teach and ask good questions and stuff like that. They invited all of the members, but there were about 4 times as many missionaries as members that showed up. And there are only like 30 missionaries in the mission. So it wasn't a huge turnout, but it was still good. 

And then Wednesday was the Missionary Conference. Bro. Calister and Elder Martino, the Area President, spoke in the morning time, but then they left after lunch to go catch a plane. Bro Calister is apparently a pretty big deal, he's written lots of books and was in the presidency of the seventy, so it was cool being able to hear from him and Elder Martino. So between them and the patriarch last week, there was a lot going on here recently. 

And then in the afternoon, President Rizley and his wife took some time to talk to us, since it'll be their last conference before they go home at the end of the month. They talked about some good lifelong advice stuff and then gave everyone some cool Ukraine Lviv Mission commemorative coins that are pretty neat. 

Since we don't really know what exactly is going to happen after the missions merge, I wasn't sure if I was going to see most of the people again before I go home, so I had to say bye to lots of people. It's pretty weird, mostly cause the mission really has barely changed at all since we got here, in terms of people going home and stuff. So there haven't been a lot of goodbyes and we've all pretty much known the same people and spent the last two years with all the same people. So it was pretty weird to think that this might be the last time I'll see a lot of them. Crazy stuff, two years is a long time.

So yeah, fun time in L'viv. We also tried to do a big activity in a park in L'viv promoting our English practice. about an hour and a half in a guy gets super mad at us and starts standing up on a little statue thing and yelling (super super loud) about how Americans are the worst and about glory to Ukraine and about how we need to go back to America. It was quite the scene. We were getting ready to leave anyway, so all 20+ missionaries that were there just grabbed all of our stuff and dipped out. Crazy stuff.

And then we got back to Lutsk and just did normal stuff. We tried doing a sports day activity on Saturday. It took us forever to figure out how to get a volleyball net set up here at the church but we finally got it and then only two people showed up, lol.

though. 

On saturday we were also invited to a little block party that our apartment building was throwing. It was pretty neat, I've enver really seen anything like that in Ukraine. Everyone that lives there knows who we are of course, so we were just there to try to show them that we're normal people. I joined a little chess tournament, but then I found out I had to play 5 different games and so I had to dip out early to make it to our sports day. It was still fun though.

I also found out this week that my companion is getting transferred, even though it's right in the middle of the transfer. Something to do with getting ready for when people start going home after the merge and stuff like that. My new companion will be Elder Abraham from St. George who was in the MTC with me, so that'll be fun.

I attached a few pics from L'viv and then a ton with people from conference that I had to say bye to cause I don't know if I'll see them again (but I'm thinking I most likely will at some zone conference or something before I go home.)

Have a good week!

Alec