An Anamolly (Week 7)

So, thanks to leap year, this transfer is 7 week long! Woo! So that's cool.

On monday night we went and met an investigator at the branch, but the timing worked out that we had to end P-Day early and we didn't get to eat dinner. So, after our meeting, we went to McDonald's, because we were hungry.

Tuesday... What happened on Tuesday. On Tuesday we got on a bus from the 1950's and rode out to a village near Kherson to meet a member that lives out there. We got there and went into his home. He's basically just remodeling this shell of a house out in the middle of nowhere, so that's cool. He took us into his room, because that's the only part of the house that's really a house at this point. We stepped in and saw that the concrete walls had Bible verses, mathematical equations, and train routes scratched into them. We thought we had walked into the room of some villain from a Batman comic. Turns out, when he doesn't have paper on hand to make a note, he just gets a screwdriver and scratches it onto the wall. He plans on redoing the walls, so he doesn't really care how much writing is on the concrete.

He also fed us some 3 day old greasy meat-pies and weird cola that we were almost certain were going to destroy us. We ended up being fine, but Elder Ditty had a bit of an upset stomach that night.

Wednesday, I went back to Nikolaev! I really don't like it there. I really just don't.

Thursday, a member came by and picked us up for a lesson... in his CAR. It's super rare to even meet somebody here who has a car, let alone ride in one. It was pretty funny though, because he was listening to some Bob Marely song about marijuana. Ukrainians really don't care that they don't understand some of the songs they listen to, it's pretty interesting.

That night, before English practice, a couple of drunk soldiers showed up and wanted to play ping-pong. We let them, because what else can you say? They were telling some pretty offensive stories and jokes, but they left after a little bit. That was totally stress free for me, you know, just being the senior companion with 2 elders who don't speak Russian... and also not being able to speak Russian.

Friday, we returned to Kherson, but Elder Ditty had gotten sick in Dnepropetrovsk.

Saturday, we were ordered to stay home so Elder Ditty could recover. We didn't, because we had a branch activity planned. We went to that, it was pretty fun. Then we went home. Elder Ditty died, so I went and studied Russian and did a bunch of paperwork. I found some records that ended up being pretty useful, so that's good.

Sunday, we were again told to stay home, but Elder Ditty is branch president, so if he doesn't show up, nobody's there to conduct. So, obviously, we did the rebellious thing and went to church. There were 23 people there! It was amazing! I can't even believe it! We also met a new investigator.

We tried to do finances, but Elder Ditty had left the money at home. So we took the hour-long round trip to get it. When we got back, we discovered that we couldn't do finances anyway, because my membership records got removed from Ukraine, meaning that I'm no longer the branch seceratary, meaning I have no authority, meaning the sytem won't let me give the mandatory second authorization of any inputs. At this point, Elder Ditty and I curled up into little balls on the floor and died.

So, that was my week. Yay!

 This is the drink called Chambo

It's strangely good.

This may look like my bed, but really, this is Elder White's bed! I was annoyed that I had to be in Nikolaev, so I shortsheeted him. I know you can't see it, but just imagine it. 100% worth it.