fun fun russia

Family, my love!

Hello again! another week come and gone! crazy crazy. This week has been quite an eventful one, and i will tell you about that all a little later. So, thank you thank you for those pictures!! i loved them! I was actually thinking the other day that i wanted to see some pictures of y'all, cause i felt like i hadn't seen you in forever! crazy that even in those picutres the kids look so grown up! and ange looks so old! i guess it is cause she turned 16. wow time flies. I can't believe that y'all do fun stuff without me!! little stinkers! haha jk. You all look great and look like you are having fun and doing well. And man! aren't terence and rhen just big studs getting their pictures taken with all sorts of people! man i love those boys and wish i could be there for that fun stuff. Oh well, i am having a lot of excitement out here too!! Looks like ange had a crowd at her party. it was really weird to see that picture in the front room and see the carpet. no one here has carpet. They all just have cement floors that are painted, or that have some type of linoleum on them. Our home is probably 6 times the size of the apts here. kinda crazy.

So as of now i am with a temporary companion, and president is in the works of trying to figure out what to do. My old companions mother has been suffering from cancer for the past few years, and in the last months it has gotten pretty bad. they thought she might need to come home, and then tues. morning she got the call from her father that she needed to come home. So tues. we scrambled and got everything packed up for her, and then she was on a flight back to canada in just a few short hours. Sadly, she will probably not be coming back. She only had a few months left on her mission, and so I think they set her apart and were just going to give her an honorable release from her mission. My heart aches for her and her family and what they are going through. So now we have an odd number of sisters in the mission and i don't have a companion. So thank goodness the Lowry's just live down stairs, and i stayed with them for the rest of tues. then we grabbed a young single adult girl from the branch who is now my temporary companion for yesterday and today. Tomorrow there are sisters coming down from lipsitcks for zone conference, so they will be my companions i think for tomorrow and sat until president figures something out. I don't know what he will figure out, but we will see! We thought maybe he might stick me with a 3-some somewhere, but then that would take the sisters away from investigators here who are working towards baptism. So we will see. I'll keep you updated. I heard they might give me a mini missionary that i could help train. Which is extremely scary for me because i don't know any russian and need someone to train me!!! i don't know what i am doing! but we will see. As long as i know where i live and how to get back home then i should be good right? haha. So they turned off the hot water yesterday for 2 weeks! yahoo!!! so now we get to do it the old fashioned way and boil water and take a nice sponge bath for the next two weeks. Should be fun!! I don't know why the government just turns stuff off randomly. It's weird. but, oh well, you just deal with it.

Dad, you had asked about english lessons. We teach some private lessons throughout the week and also have an english club at the church on fridays. Honestly, english is a good way to get people to come to the church building and get them interacting with church members. It is often hard to introduce them to the gospel right off the bat, cause many times they are very against any of that kind of stuff. But if you can get them to do english with you, then sometimes you can work in gospel topics and try to get them interested in having gospel discussions. We usually just advertise by making little fliers and then we go street contacting and just talk to people and ask them if they learn english and if they would like to come to a free english club. Usually the younger kids like it the best. and yes, i had said something about teaching piano lessons. And we all thought that would be a good idea. But we haven't gotten anything started yet since all the confusion with the companions, but once stuff settles down a little bit (if it ever does haha) then with my new companion hopefully we can get that started. the hard thing with piano and english is some times you can just have eternal lesson takers who don't want to know anything about the gospel but still want to learn piano. So you just don't want to end up with a bunch of lessons that aren't going anywhere as far as teaching the gospel. So we will see. And dad, i love your OWL(obedient, work, love people). I think about it often, and try my best to do that.

So, onto our investigators. Kacenya wants to get ready to be baptized on the 12th of june!! I am excited. Her husband doesn't understand though why she needs to be baptized if she is already a good person. So We are trying to work with her and get her ready. Hopefully i get a companion soon so we can really get to workin. And we have another young investigator, Nastia, who is the sister of a young man in the ward who just got baptized in oct. their uncle is a younger man who just got married in the temple to a young girl, and they are in our ward too. So between them and their brother they have been talking to her about the gospel. We had family home evening with them monday night, and Nastia asked if she could get baptized!! it was crazy! we just met her the sunday before, and we haven't taught her any of the lessons. But she wants to be baptized on the 12th, and so we are going to do the best we can to teach her all the lessons and get her ready by then. I am very excited, and she is the sweetest girl ever. See what can happen when you get the ward members to help find people and get their family and friends interested in the gospel?!!! miracles happen. It has been tough to find referrals through the ward members, but when it happens it is wonderful. i am very excited for nastia. These people are so strong. Nastia and her brother anton both go to a university and live together here in voronezh. their mother died 5 years ago from cancer, and their father lives in some other city. Anton's face lite up when his sister asked about baptism, I am very happy for them. And their uncle was able to do the temple work for their mother in the finland temple. It is amazing the humbling circumstances that the people here live in, and how strong some of them are. It is amazing. It is exciting to see the hope that the gospel brings to people's lives when the world can be so depressing.

The other day we were contacting, and we stopped a young girl. An old man heard what we were talking about and started yelling at us and saying don't you talk to our young people about stuff like that! We get that alot. You will be talkin to someone and then someone walking by will hear and then think it is part of their business to come save the other person from what you are saying. So he was telling us that we can talk to old people about our church all we want, but please don't corrupt our young people with your american church. They are the only hope we have from russia, we don't want them to all be Americanized. Well, we lost a contact because of that, but it gave me a little look into the minds of the people here. Russian people love their country, just like we love america. And they see the church as a threat to their country, because if the young people join, they will many times move to america and leave their russian culture behind. It is true, and i can understand how that is hard. A lot of times the strong young members here move to america, or find an american spouse and eventually end up leaving russia for america also. So i can see why the older people think this american church is destroying their country, but at the same time they just don't understand that that is exactly the opposite of what we are trying to do. We are trying to build a strong base of the church here in russia, so that when people join the church they have support here, and they can find a spouse here, and grow up and build the church here in russia. But now that is kind of difficult. there just aren't many good members here to marry, so many times people will go out to america and find a spouse there. I continue to pray that the young people here will be able to find themselves a good spouse here and be able to build the gospel in their own homeland.

Well family, i love you and have rambled on too long. thank you for all of your emails and pictures!! oh, happy late b-day gma!!!!!!!!! i thought about you on tues. and i hope you know that i love you! oh and mom, i need to get you the correct address for the mission office. Yes, you should be able to send stuff there and it should be ok. Usually people are in and out of the office every couple weeks or so and pick up the mail for their cities. So it may take a while to get here, but it would get here. I have heard that sometimes people will put a picture of Christ on there too, and it makes them a little more nervous about taking something. But as long and you don't ever send anything really valuable you should be ok. Well love you all!! have a great week! dallin, where is my email?!!! haha. love you!

RUSSIA MOSCOW WEST MISSION

Muravskaya Street, Bldg. 1 Floor 3

Moscow 125310

Russia

Until next week! Loves!

Sister Brown

exciting to hear from you as always

Hello my family!!

Well, first off, before i forget...because it has really been bugging me and i just wanted to apologize and forget about it. I don't know why, but i find myself thinking a lot, and just after being here and interacting with different types of people, I realized how much it bothers me when people don't want you to help them do anything because they are too independent and can do it all on their own, and they think that their way is always the right way. Well, ok, to the point....I realized that it bothers me when people do this because i am the same way!!!!! and for some reason i thought back and all the dumb and rude things i said or did to you all (my lovely family) were brought to my mind and it just bothered me really bad so i just had to say sorry. I just remember that before i left on my mission i probably wasn't the nicest person ever. I remember one night that you mom, dad, and dallin, were trying to console me and help me with some thing i was frustrated and complaining about, and I got upset and wouldn't let you console me. Im sorry. And i remembered that i told noelle i would paint her fingernails before i left on my mission and then i was "too busy" and so i never did. sorry noelle. And I remember i was being judgemental and stupid and i said something to ange about her skirt being somewhat short, and i know that it hurt your feelings ange but i never apologized for it because i believed i was right. Im sorry ange. and i remember that i was making some cookies, and joe wanted to help me but i didn't let him because i wanted to do them all by myself and i thought that the way i made them was better. im sorry joe. And i know that this is silly, but it was just weighing on my mind and so i wanted to apologize. Sometimes i think that i am an awesome daughter and sister, but now i realize that when i think that i am being way way prideful and need to do a little self check. I just hope that despite my weaknesses and my controlling and prideful nature, that you all know that i really do love you. I was reading the talk elder bednar gave in oct. conference and i realized i don't think i ever really told you all that, cause i just assumed you knew. Sorry and i hope that you can forgive me for all the stupid things that i do and say. And i think that you know that i love you, but I just wanted to tell you so know. I love you all!!!!

I'm glad that everyone is doing pretty well. As always, good to hear from ya. I hope you gave lacee my love, and also alvin and the rest of the fam. Wow ange, sounds like quite the party!!!!! oh man fun fun. That is awesome dallin that you did that all! Way to go d bro!! And ange, haha, that is funny about the story of your friends you told me. And as always, it is fun to hear those cute stories about joe and noelle. man i love them. That's cool about work dad, glad it is keeping you on your toes!! keep up the good work, im sure your doing just great!

Ok, so....back to missionary work. welp, to be honest, there is not a ton. We have heard that people keep saying (and i don't know who "people" are) but they keep saying that Voronezh is a "dead city". Which is really sad. I don't believe it one bit, but at times it is hard to not wonder if it is heading in that direction. I really do pray that we can keep our heads high and have the spirit with us and be able to find those people that are looking. Cause i do know that they are here somewhere. We just haven't found them yet. And i know that the Lord and pres. Wolley would not send missionaries into this city of 2 million if they did not have faith that there are people here waiting to hear the good news of the gospel.

We have a few investigators that are progressing a little bit. Our investigator Kacenya is just the sweetest person ever, and has the sweetest little son. I just wish i understood what she was saying. But i can feel hear sweet spirit. And she wants to change. She said that she wants to get baptized!! So that is very exciting! and hopefully we can progress to that point. She just needs to talk to her husband about it first. We would love for him to come in on our lessons too and desire to be baptized, but we learned today that he might really need some help. To be honest, sometimes i just get so frustrated with the men out here, and how ridiculous and controlling they can be over their wives and children. If they only knew what they had and what they are giving up by doing stupid stupid things. At times you just want to go up to all of the men and just shake them around and be like "What are you doing!!!!!!!". I pray that her husband is touched by the spirit though, so that their little family of three can eventually be blessed by the blessings of the temple. Seeing this makes me very grateful for the wonderful men i have in my life and for their examples to me and for them staying worthy of their priesthood. So, my little spill from the soapbox...Men, stay worthy of the priesthood. Look at your beautiful families and realize what you have. Stay true to the good man your family believes you to be.

My russian is getting a little better. It definitely takes a lot of time though. Mostly i can just understand other people a little better. I don't know how much better i can speak. haha. I hear people and be like oh, i want to say this to you...but then you try to open you mouth and say it and realize you don't know how. fun stuff, fun stuff. I am still tryin to say what i can on lessons and things, even though it is only like 5 short really bad grammar and broken sentences. who knew a language would be so hard? i didn't. maybe my mouth was not made to form russian sounds and words. but it's all good. things will come with time and patience. In the mean time, i keep somewhat quiet cause i can't say much else.

We met with a young girl from our english club the other day, so we would love to keep meeting with her. Ill let you know how it goes! And we are working right now a lot with our area book, and also with the less actives in our branch. There are so many it is crazy. I would say that like 3/4 of the people on the ward list are inactive and just don't find the importance of coming to church. well, hopefully they will let us meet with them and see otherwise.

The weather has weirdly cooled down a little bit and has actually rained a lot. It is funny because it leaves these huge puddles in all the unlevel sidewalks here and we find ourselves dodging and hopping over puddles very often. its fun.

Well, as always i love you very very much. Keep up the good work and keep doing right. I like the thing that elder bednar said in the oct. 2009 conference. Something to the effect that..every family home evening, every family prayer, every family scripture study is a brushstroke on the canvas of our souls. Love it!!!!!

Sending lots of hugs and kisses from half a world away!

Sister Brown

happy belated bday ANGE!!!

Dear Family,

How is everyone today? As always it was great to get your emails and talk to you on sunday!!! wahoooo!!! thank you, thank you. your awesome. I don't know what all of this "you are a great example to us" is...honestly. YOU ALL are the great examples!!!! I wouldn't be here today if it were not for you and your loving support, and I definitely would not even be who I am without all of you amazing people who I honestly look up to in EVERYWAY. Thank you, thank you, thank you and keep hanging in there with all you do. I love you all and never forget it even though we are many many miles away right now.

Angela, i am soo soo happy to hear that you had such a fun fun birthday! i can't believe you are 16. Everyone grows up so fast, and i don't like it, it's weird. I myself wish I were a kid again and just oblivious to everything and so innocent and just get to run around and have fun and not worry about anything. And im glad dad's talk went well, doesn't surprise me though cause dad always does good. and im glad mother's day was fun!

Let's see...news for the week. Well i talked to you sunday so not much has happened since then. I was in липецк for monday and we left tuesday morning on the bus. It was about a 2 hour drive. I liked it cause you got to see some pretty country side views and the road was surrounded by trees on both sides and it reminded me a lot of the highways in SC. so that was kinda fun. Then when we got to воронеж we had district meeting. Sis corbett was not back yet so i spent the rest of that day and wed. with the senior couple the Lowry's. They are great. I got some good studying done but it is always weird because im not out with my companion meeting or tracting on days like that. But i did get to help sis. Lowry clean, cook, and make cookies. So that was lots of fun!!! Sis. corbett got back and now it is pday again and we have just been up to the usual activities and will get out tonight and do some work!! wohooo!

oh while i am thinking of it, dallin....today on the bus we heard that kesha girl sing her don't stop song. it totally reminded me of you and was way weird to hear it. When i hear stuff like that i don't feel like a missionary and it reminds me of home and it is weird. I have to remind myself that i am in Russia and not in a little bubble anymore. haha.

i was very sad to hear that uncle alvin is not feeling well again. It makes me worry. But please tell them that they are in my thoughts and prayers. And how is lacee doing? when you go to see her sunday please tell her i love her and that i am very proud of her for choosing to serve. Im excited that we both will be out at the same time!

well, this week i guess is just pretty much the same old same old. I was thinking how i think one of the hard things about being here is the fact that just in the few short weeks i have been here, my eyes have really been opened up to the pain and suffering of the people here. I don't like it. It makes me want to crawl into a little hole. It always just makes me want to cry and makes me soo sick to my stomach. The unhappy lives that these people lead here, whether it be because of their own choices or because of others choices, just really breaks my heart. And as missionaries we want so badly to somehow take that pain away from them, but a lot of the time they don't want to hear it. You walk down the street and ride on the buses and you see so many sad and lonely people, and if you look in their eyes you just know that they are searching for something. Searching for happiness. But like it has been said, they don't know where to find it, or if they do, they are too depressed and lead such lives that they feel they can't achieve that happiness. I feel so so blessed, and it is not fair to them. Especially since now my eyes have been more opened and i witness so many depressive lives. I want to help them, but it is hard to conceive how one quiet little girl from utah who at times finds it hard to do things for herself...can do anything for them. How can i convince them of what can make them happy? I guess it is just little by little. But you do wish that you could just take away all their sadness in just one big swipe. I continue to pray that somehow as missionaries we can make a difference, i guess even though we may not see it.

Well, i think i have run out of things to say. Oh, i was reading the january 2010 liahona the other day. I love the liahona!! and the ensign! they are both great. But read the jan. 2010 liahona. It is an amazing one for both young and old. I love the talk by elder holland "the best is yet to be". and I also like the talk called "in the Lord's way". they are both great. well, like I said the whole thing is great. read the whole thing, but those two were my favorites for now.

Again family, i love you, love you. You are in my prayers always. I'm glad everyone sounds to be doing pretty good. I hope this is the case. Keep doin what's right. Keep reading your scriptures and saying your prayers. And having family night and family prayer and scripture study. Keep going to church. Keep bein nice and following the commandments. Attend the temple regularly. Keep loving others. And just keep on keeping on. Live your life so that the Holy Ghost can be your constant guide. It is always hard in this every changing world and with all the distractions we have around to hear the constant guidance of the spirit. But just keep doing what's right and keep doing those regular things that invite the spirit, and I know you will be blessed by it. All my love to you!! Until next week!

Sister Brown

Sister Brown with President & Sister Woolley

Sister Brown in front of Red Square

Church in Moscow

Whole view of Church in Moscow

Another Church in Moscow

Beautiful Acacia!

hello again from across the world!!!

Привет семья!! (hello family),

thanks first off for all of your sweet emails. And it sounds like everyone is just up to the normal and having lots and lots of fun so i am glad about that! That is so fun joe!! good job at baseball! i love you! that is funny about this being an alien city. i wouldn't be surprised. don't have too much fun without me though, k?

well lets see what all happened in this yet another week. First off, this week has honestly felt like the longest week in my entire life. I can't believe it has only been a week, it feels like an eternity!! And i do assume there will be many many more months of those to come. So yes, my companion sis corbett is in kazakstan right now getting a new visa. and no, it takes her that long because she is a canadian, for americans it only takes like a day or two to get your new visa. So she will be there till monday i think. The sisters from lipistcks came down yesterday and we had district meeting and then they are here with me until friday night i think, and then i go to lipistcks with them until monday. So will be there on sunday for the holiday. Sunday is not mother's day here, but it is actually another huge holiday out here. It is victory day, where they celebrate WWII or something. So everyone around here is getting ready for that, and it should be pretty crazy i guess with lots of fireworks and beer, so we shall see.

and yes, i am planning on calling on sunday, but since i will be in lipistcks i guess i need to call you from the cell phone we have. But i can't use minutes. So i think what i can do is call you on the calling card from the cell phone, and then you just call me right back at the same number using the calling card so that it doesn't use the minutes on our cell phone. so yes, and i am not sure when i am going to call exactly. I have not talked to the sisters and it is hard to communicate, and I don't know if they are calling home or not because it is not mothers day for them. But we talked about it a little with the senior couple and if all works out like i would hope, i want to call about dinner time or 6 pm our time, which would be like 8 am in the morning for you on sunday. sound good? i forgot when you had church. oh well, just expect a call from me on sunday. and dad, good luck on that talk!! fun!! hey, at least it is in english and not russian. Now tryin to speak this hard language, i would give an english speech to anyone at anytime!!! haha

ok, so the week. oh yes our hot water is back. um lets see. So im still trying to get the hang of stuff here. I understand nothing and just follow my companion around like a little doggy on a leash. We have a few investigators right now. I don't know them all yet and actually don't know much about them either because i can never understand what they are saying. It is sad and quite annoying to me cause i would really love to talk to people and get to know them and help them in any way i can, but the language is a great barrier. It will slowly get better with time though. Two of our investigators came to church on sunday, Kacenya and Erina. So i was excited about that. It is very hard to get people to come to church here. they just don't see the importance. and if they don't come to church then we don't get baptisms. So we have taught a few times to investigators. and a big thing about the missionary work here is just trying to keep the members active, and then trying to reactivate the already inactive members. It is quite a feat!! So we meet with members and talk to them a lot about missionary work and try our hardest to get referrals from them because tracting and contacting are hard to get referrals with. And then we meet with inactive families and also with investigators. We obviously go tracting a lot too. It is scary because most of the time once the people find out who you are they get this disgusted look and like run away. its kinda funny. The russian orthodox church out here that mostly everyone is a member of (but they usually only go on like easter and christmas) tells the people that the mormons are a crazy sect and that we like brainwash people and stuff. So a lot of the time they want nothing to do with us, but every once in a while we get a contact number or something. Monday was the first day we got a contact since i had been here, and i was so very excited!! she actually seemed happy about it and gave us here number before we even asked. so yes, i get excited about very small things around here. haha. I wish that i could do more though when contacting and doing lessons. All i can really do is say hello and that we are missionaries, and when i ask a question i have to let my companion take it from there because i don't understand much. so many times i feel useless, but it will get better. the branch here is pretty large, i think they said about 50 usually come and are active. And sunday they had me and the other new elder bear our testimonies. Im sure they got a kick out of that!

The food here is yummy!! well, at least the kind i buy at the store. I love the milk, butter, BREAD (oh, they have the best bread ever, and so many kinds), yogurt and cottage cheese are divine too, the cheese, ice cream, chocolate, fruit and veggies, cereal, granola, juice,...it is all delicious and i could go on. So don't you be surprised when i come home 100 pounds heavier k?! haha. It has been soooooooo hot here lately!! i didn't think it would be this hot, and stupid me for thinkin i only needed 2 short sleeve shirts. But yes, it has been very hot. and then you always ride on these buses or mini van type things, unless you want to walk for an hour. And when it is hot these buses are like soooo hot. but its all good. it is funny though because people just cram on them like sardines. If people need to get on they don't care how many people are in it, they just cram until, well, basically they just keep cramin and never stop. So you get pretty hot and your personal space is invaded often. It's fun though. oh haha the other day i saw one of the buses go by that had so many people and was so hot that the windows all fogged up and condensation was dripping down the window like no other. i had to laugh and get myself excited to be riding one of those very often. I like voronezh a lot, it is just a lot different from home. The minute you walk out the door in always smells like smoke and dirt. and it never goes away. Bus drivers and people drive like crazy and always honk all over the place. And people know i am american just by looking at me. it is kinda funny. And as missionaries we look like so different in our style of clothing because we are always covered. Girls her are usually always walking around in mini skirts or mini shorts and high heels and tights. i don't understand how they don't kill themselves or break an ankle for walking so far in high heels all the time. but they do it, and they like it. so i guess thats cool. And the fashion for men is to cut their hair in a nasty mullet style...it is very humorous. But all the same it is what makes voronezh voronezh, and i like it. the members here are very sweet and humble. They don't have much and usually all live in these huge tall apt buildings. And then there apt. are extremely small, sometimes with just one front room and a tiny kitchen that really only one person can fit into at a time. I am excited for the time when my russian gets somewhat better, so that i can really love these people. because it is very hard to love people when you can't even talk to them. So i am tryin hard, and come home very tired at the end of the day.

Well family, as you know i love you very much and am so grateful for you. I am excited to be here and excited to get to work here. It is far from home, but all these people, no matter how crazy we may think they are, are children of our Heavenly Father and need the gospel. As much as i wish they were all just lining up to be baptized, they are not. But we just have to do it one step at a time. One conversation at a time, one hello at a time. The more people we talk to and invite, the better. Yes, we will get rejected most of the time, but the more we talk, the more people we will be able to find, even if is just that lone one person out of 200 or so. It is scary for me, especially when almost everywhere you turn you don't understand a single word and people don't want anything to do with you, but it is the best service we can give to our Heavenly Father. And as members of the church, whether serving a full time mission somewhere away from home, whether you are a dad or mom, a young child, or just an average kid going to school or working, we all need to spread the gospel to those we know. We need to set an example, and we need not be afraid to speak up. The more people we talk to, the more people we love...the more people we will be able to bring into the fold of God. So, i guess my challenge and thought for this week is to just smile and be happy and don't be afraid to be the person that you know you need to be so that when others see you and listen to you, they will want to come closer to Christ.

I love you all! have a great week! and ill talk to you Sunday!

ps...sorry for the extremely long email and what may be seemingly boring topics of discussion. We have been so busy with planning at night that I don't write in my journal anymore as often as i would like...so after reading through this it seems like this has become somewhat of a long journal entry. sorry!! i will try to write in my journal more often so that you don't get such long winded emails from me.

я люблю вас!!

Сестра Браун

(pss...when young adults here see and read my nametag they just laugh and giggle, and walk around saying sister brown hehe sis brown hehe, look, sister brown hehe. they don't have short simple last names like that at all here, so they like to laugh about it, haha.