The Missionary Table

When Vitya and Svyeta were over the other night, Vitya asked, "Have you ever been to the Chinese Restaurant?" We were confused and said, "Yeah, we've been to a Chinese restaurant", but he said, "No, I mean the Chinese Restaurant for missionaries.". After seeing our blank faces, he said, "Come on!" He made Leif hide in our bedroom and he asked me to get plates, chopsticks, a tablecloth that could be cleaned easily, a candle, napkins, and glasses. Then he charred the bottom of one plate from the candle and made it black-black-black. He dimmed the lights and called Leif into the room. Then he said that Leif had come to the missionary table and needed to do everything exactly as he did them. He proceeded to lift plates and use chopsticks and make funny movements with his glass. Leif followed suit quite nicely. Then Vitya rubbed his hand along the bottom of the plate and put his hands on his cheeks. Leif caught on and always kept his hands a centimeter away from touching his skin. Vitya tried and tried but it didn't work. Leif turned out to be a good missionary! Vitya said that someone did it to him once and at the end, his face was covered in black. So funny.

It's been very cold this week, several days under the -40 mark. We looked at the weather history and it actually got up to freezing (32F) on the 8th. That's 72 degree difference in the period of a week and a half!!

February is the LONGEST month here. It's cold and dark and our bodies are deprived of all of the sunshine vitamins. The whole month is called "White Month" and a lot of spiritual stuff goes on (Buddhist and Shamanist). I feel so much more tired at this time of year, too. But the days are getting a little longer each day. And soon February will be over!

Quadruple Date

Happy Valentine's Day! On Thursday, Leif and I celebrated together. He took Anneka for most of the day and I had a lovely time with Jesus at the nicest coffee shop in town. When I got home, Leif had made a wonderful pasta dinner with heart-shaped red peppers on top and chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese icing (also with hearts on top). On Valentine's Day morning, he made me heart-shaped pancakes with strawberries. Mmmmm! I have the best husband in the world!! Last night we went on a quadruple date with three other couples from our team. The restaurant was really nice and the food was delicious. We played a couples game where we answered questions about our spouse. Leif and I won! After dinner everyone came back here and we played the game Cranium (the guys barely won with two super-easy questions at the end).

We awoke this morning to Anneka barking like a seal. She sounded so awful and was breathing rapidly. I called my sweet aunt (a nurse), read about croup online, and got some steam going in the bathroom. I was contemplating taking her outside (cold air is supposed to help), but when I looked at our thermometer, it was below the -40 mark! (-40 is where Fahrenheit and Centigrade meet, by the way). So we opted to stay indoors. She's been her normal active self today and seems happy. It's so sad when she gets sick! I just want to do everything to make it better- and fast! Nighttime is supposed to be the worst time for croup so we'll keep our eyes (and ears) out for her tonight. We're praying and anticipate that she'll be well soon.

Blunders

We had Katia and Sasha over for dinner tonight. Afterwards, we played Settlers of Catan. If you don't know this game, you build settlements, cities, and roads by trading resources such as wheat, coal, brick, wood, and sheep. At one point, Sasha asked to trade his broom for bricks and we're like, "What?" and then we realized that the picture on the wheat card DOES look like a Russian broom. And then later I asked to trade sheep for coal. Well, that's what I wanted to say, but I actually asked for breasts instead. Ah, the blunders we can make!

Last week, I was telling someone about us being foreigners. I meant to just say that we were foreigners (making the noun plural), but instead I said we were little foreign people. haha.

Lately I've felt like such an airhead with my Russian. Today I even forgot that I had class. Thankfully my teacher comes to me, so it worked out just fine. I ordered three new language books online today in an inspiration to try new strategies of study. Hopefully they'll work!

Getting Out

Most days we do leave our apartment, but it is usually to briskly walk somewhere (or wait at the bus stop) heading somewhere else. There's not too much incentive to just "hang out" in the cold and wind. But this weekend we went cross country skiing with our Romanian friends and some of their Russian friends. It was so nice to be in nature and enjoy the sunshine.



All of the kids went sledding while Marios, Adriana, Leif,and I went skiing. The kids were so cute. (Anneka is on the sled in the middle of the above picture). There was another baby Anneka's age who went sledding, but Anneka was strapped to Leif's back.



I enjoyed talking with Adriana as we skied. This was her first time, and she did really well.



Anneka was so relaxed that she fell asleep almost immediately. There was one point where Leif came down a hill behind Adriana. He knew that he could either miss Adriana and fall backwards on Anneka, or he could plow into Adriana and keep Anneka safe. So he ran right over Adriana! Thankfully she was okay. They both fell in a heap, but Anneka didn't even wake up.

That evening we enjoyed a nice dinner at Marios and Adriana's house and played Settlers of Catan. It was a time that reminded me of God's many rich blessings.

And Another Birthday Celebration

We celebrated Leif's birthday again at church yesterday. In Russia, it's traditional to plan your own party (if you have one), prepare food for everyone, and make/buy your own cake. Often people will bring a cake to church on the Sunday near their birthday to share with everyone after the service. It was Vera's birthday, too, so along with Leif's cake we had a feast that she brought (three other cakes, bread, sausage, cheese, and tea).



Anneka like playing on the piano with her little friend, Vanya, and Katia. Katia babysat for us on Friday and Anneka awoke from her nap to her. Katia said that Anneka just looked at her with really wide eyes, like "Who are you?" but then she happily played with her toys. I'm so thankful it went so well. It's nice to expand the number of people that we can leave Anneka with. And it's nice if she can get a Russian language lesson, too.

Heidi and her family (the Wickers) had to go to Mongolia. They were told that they DID receive their temporary residency. But a day too late. The good news is that it'll be waiting for them when they return and they won't have to travel back and forth any more. The bad news is that they'll be gone for a few weeks. Anneka already misses Heidi! She talks into her little toy phone and says, "Heidi? Hi Heidi!"



Anneka konks out when riding on her sled. This is a picture after coming home from church.



Then later she likes to play on her sled. She just plain loves her sled.

Leif gave a talk last night at the youth club about man's love for God. He created a skit where Vasia (the guy) wanted to show his love for Natasha (the girl). He told her he could say he loved her 1,000 times or build a statue of her or make a temple in her name or go to war for her. Natasha kept trying to tell him that she just wanted to spend time with him- maybe go for a walk and talk... something simple and meaningful. But Vasia just talked right over her, not listening. The point, of course, is that to show our love for God, we need to just listen to him and do what He asks us. Leif created a powerpoint with different verses that went well with his talk. I think he did a good job.

It was a good birthday!

Yes, I had a good birthday this year. I'm not sure how many of you know this, in fact I know many assume the opposite, but I really don't like cold weather at all! In fact, I often think that I would prefer to sweat away in the tropics than feel a bitter cold wind cutting through my face! Well, God knows me well and decided to send me a little birthday present. Quite often in early February we will still get temperatures as low as -40, but yesterday on my birthday it got all the way up to -7C which is almost 20F. Now, I know that this is no tropical heat wave, but for Siberia I count that as a positive :). In addition to this, I had my first Buryat language class. In some ways this is kind of a tough thing to jump into studying a completely new language, but when I look at what I am hoping to do in understanding the people and culture here and being able to be a blessing for the Buryats, I count this as a great step, and it will be easy to remember when it was that I started my official studies. In addition to this, I got a number of emails, phone calls and facebook congratulations from family and friends and there is nothing better than realizing that there are people that you care about and that they care about you too. To celebrate we went bowling with some good friends of ours (Chingis, Ksusha, Vitya and Sveta), and I far and away beat my best bowling score ever with a 202 (check out the picture)!!!

I could hardly believe it myself, and as much as bowling is not a part of my life, it always feels good to do something really well :). After bowling Vitya and Sveta came back to our place and our temporary neighbors Sasha, short for Alexander, and Katya joined us for lasagna and German chocolate cake. Through all of this Anneka was a stellar baby enjoying our guests and doing amazing with a new babysitter (Katya) while we were bowling. The best part of all was Jami who put all of this together. She took the morning duty with Anneka who decided to get up at about 6am (I was allowed to sleep as long as I wanted) and made a wonderful breakfast of biscuits and gravy with eggs, nachos for lunch, and the aforementioned lasagna and cake. She also got me a couple of great presents, a wonderful card and just made me feel loved all day. As I said, it was a good birthday!

International

Something I love to think about is how Anneka will grow up with a much bigger picture of the world than I did. I love that our team is comprised of people from the United States, Canada, Germany, and Switzerland. I love that Anneka will be bilingual and will understand nuances of Russian culture that I never will.

Last week, Kandid and Daniella, invited us over for dinner. They are from Switzerland and moved here at the beginning of December. Their friend, Misha, is living with them for 2 months, too. They are all taking Russian language classes now (even though Daniella speaks really well already). They have an adorable little daughter who is 3 1/2. She and Anneka played together quite nicely (none of the pictures turned out), while we chatted over dessert.

We feel SO badly for this family because they've been living here for THREE MONTHS without their belongings!!! Their boxes were supposed to come on a plane within a couple of days of their arrival to Ulan Ude, but all of their stuff is trapped in Moscow. They've gone through a huge process trying to get their boxes, including giving a code number for every single item (after looking through a manual of 1,000+ pages. I am NOT exaggerating), phone calls, letters, etc, etc. They would love your prayers, as their patience is running thin. They don't want to buy a ton of stuff that they won't be needing, but at the same time, it's hard to live without it! We are so thankful that this family has joined us. They are really great people.

Sushi Night

The Wickers came one night this week to make sushi. Well, they're actually more like California rolls, but it sounds more fun to say "sushi". In the peak of winter, it's fun to do things like theme dinners.



Anneka is not pictured because she was crabby and we put her to bed. But she had a cute little Asian dress on with eye liner. Yes, we ALL wore eyeliner (even the guys).



I made a Japanese salad and then thought, what could I make for dessert? We had some cookie dough in the refrigerator, so I baked it into a pie plate, covered it in chocolate and then had Leif draw the Japanese symbol for "God" on top with white chocolate. It wasn't at all Japanese, but it looked festive anyways!

On Wednesday, Leif and I were cleaning the apartment before a bunch of people came over for a Bible study. We were laughing because when my parents clean their house before their Bible study, my Dad always jokes that he's cleaning the bathtub in case someone wants to take a bath. Of course, no one ever takes a bath at my parents' house when they come for Bible study. But Leif was cleaning our shower because people most likely WOULD shower at our place (and they did). Just a little difference in culture.

A Little Girl Version Of Her Papa

Leif's mom spent hours putting old slides into digital form and sent us a CD of a bunch of pictures from Leif's childhood. It's so fun to see shots of little Leif. Anneka looks so much like he did as a tiny tot!

Leif is a singer in a band.

Yes, that's right. Leif and his friends, Sasha, Dennis, and Vasia are creating and practicing a song in Buryat style. They're preparing to be able to sing it as at an outreach in February during the Buryat New Year, "Sagaalgan". The words of the song talk about how God can make us whiter than snow. This is especially appropriate as the whole month is known as "white month". People eat white foods and attempt to purify themselves. Of course God is the only One who can really purify us.

Leif is the throat singer of the group. It's so funny. And fun. And great. Hopefully I can get a little video snippet of them sometime.



Yesterday, Anneka and I spent the morning with friends and she catnapped on the bus ride back. I knew that a 24 minute nap was not enough for her for the day, so I put her in her crib after we'd been home for about an hour. She talked happily from her bed and after awhile it sounded like her voice was coming from a different place. I stood outside her door, listening, and she slid a book under the door. She'd escaped! Leif and I both went in there and our little monkey had pushed off of the wall with her feet, sliding her crib across the room next to the other bed. Then she climbed out of her crib, onto the other bed, and down. I suppose this is more comforting than her falling out onto the hard floor, but it makes me wonder if this will become a new problem we have to deal with. Funny girl. This picture was taken after the "incident". Leif was showing Anneka how to go to sleep, but she just wanted to play!

Time With Our Team

We spent more time with our team this week than normal. Thursday we participated in the SEND day of prayer, praying together for people and countries all over the world. We also had a special women's tea on Tuesday and the men spent an afternoon together on Friday. Things often get so busy that we can go long periods of time without seeing our team members. It was nice to connect with them this week.

In other team news, Inka and Elisabeth left for Germany yesterday (sniff, sniff) to await new visas for the next month and a half. Leif is out helping our friends Sasha and Katia to move into their apartment right now. The Wickers may have to go to Mongolia for 7+ weeks if they don't get their visas in the next few days. This would be really awful for them. We are praying for a miracle with this! Shannon just had her last really strong chemo treatment until her surgery in March. Our thoughts and prayers are ever with her.

This week, Leif spent some time at different universities and with administration, and he chose where he'll be studying the Buryat language- Buryat State University! His classes will begin the first week of February. We're really excited about this.

Something else exciting: we got a magicJack. This is a little box that plugs into our USB port and enables us to have a Spokane phone number. Woo-Hoo! We can call anywhere in the US or Canada for FREE. In December, I'd heard about the magicJack and prayed that we could have one up and running by February, but I really felt like this was a long-shot because we didn't even have unlimited internet (we were supposed to, but there was a mixup with the company), and to change plans, you have to have your landlord's signature and passport. And our landlords lived in a village a few hours away. Plus, we'd have to have the magicJack sent to us, which takes at least a month, etc, etc. But God answered this prayer! Another reminder that if He cares about little things like magicJacks, how much more He cares about the hearts and souls of people!

A Tot And A Pot

A tot in a pot:


























A tot on the pot:




Anneka has been using her little potty before she takes baths. We heap the praise on her! I am not motivated enough to start potty training now, though, while she has to wear 6 layers. To me, that's more work than changing her diaper. If she brings me her potty, then I assist her (which she's done a couple of times). But it's on her turf.

The poor little girl has been sick the last couple of days... kind of flu-ish. Last night she fell asleep on me as we were reading books, and she was so tired this morning that she climbed up on the chair in the living room and fell asleep. She's never done that before! I can tell people are praying for her. She's getting better by the hour and is now sleeping happily in her bed for the night.

Yesterday I went to our little local store and was kind of in a bad mood. I have this thing where I despise getting multiple items at the store when there are a lot of people there. You have to get all of your items from the lady behind the counter and I don't like to have people waiting behind me. Well, there were tons of people in there, most getting beer and cigarettes. And everyone in the store was dressed in black. As I waited in line, I counted all of the different types of mayonaise and- I'm not kidding- there were 17!! I'm not talking about 17 of the same type of mayonaise, but 17 different brands and sizes and types. And when I left, later, I remembered that they usually sell small packs of mayo with the butter and cheese and I didn't even count those. So there were probably more like 20 different types. Well, this shouldn't have annoyed me, but it did because often the store is out of things like sugar, flour, and milk. They never run out of mayo or wilted fish with squishy eyes. And I usually don't care about those things. As I was leaving, I overheard the lady behind me asking for the "fattiest milk" that they had. This is a pretty common request.

I walked outside and was annoyed again by a group of guys, smoking the cigarettes and drinking the beer they'd just bought, who were making fun of people and seemed to be up to no good. I just thought, "Yuck. It's cold, I forgot my gloves, I only got 60% if the items I wanted to buy, these guys are polluting the air even more, blah, blah, blah" and then I realized how judgemental I was being and it hit me really hard that God really really loves these guys who are dressed in black and seem to be up to no good. And then I thought about what these guys would be like if they knew Jesus personally and knew the plans God had for their lives and were filled with joy... how powerful that would be! And then I remembered that God tells us that if we pray anything in His name, He'll do it! And so I prayed for those guys, and for the other people I passed on my short walk home. I want to do that more- pray in faith that God will change people. And I want to see people as God sees them, not through my clouded glasses, but through His lenses of love. And I want to believe God for really big things and trust that He will do more than I can ask or imagine.

An Afternoon with Friends

We went over to our friends', Vitya and Sveta's, place yesterday for a few hours. They fed us a nice meal of potatoes and meat, complete with tea and sweets. We enjoyed the time with them.



Anneka loved playing with their kids! Sometimes she's been clingy with me lately, but not yesterday! She didn't seem to care at all where mama or papa were- she ran around and was SO happy. They have a little girl who is four months older than Anneka, a five year old girl, an 8 year old boy and then a 13 year old brother and grandma that live there. (In the above picture, Anneka is playing in the background with Alina)




Leif showed the guys "google maps" and they were interested in seeing where we're from and where they live. The kids hopped in and out of the crib.



Sveta is homeschooling her kids and they're all doing really well. She's the only Russian I've ever known to do this. It was fun talking with her. I understand most everything she says, which is a nice feeling.

Today on the way to church, Anneka's sled flipped completely over so that she was on her face. Poor girl. She was a good sport about it though. She cried a little and then fell asleep about 3 minutes later. When we got to church, she had little icicles on her eyelashes. Little "sparkles". Don't worry- the rest of her was warm.

In other Anneka news, she's been taking off with her vocabulary the last few days, repeating sounds and saying new words all the time- up, off, this, that, wallet, bowl, puffs, juice, love, etc. A girl at church slipped a bracelet on her wrist and Anneka said "Wow!", with expression and all. So fun. I know that all parents are amazed at their children, especially at this age when they learn so quickly. But it really is amazing to BE the parent and to watch Anneka learn.

A Fun Feature

Leif showed me this feature on our camera the other day, and I think it's so fun! You can capture movement within the span of a couple of seconds. It's great for busy babies.

This picture is of Anneka's little friend Vanya, when his family came over to take showers and wash clothes this week. They don't have running water where they live, which is especially hard in the winter, I think! Vanya will be having a little brother or sister in a few months, so their one-room home (the size of our livingroom) will be very full with his mom, dad, teenage sister, and the baby! I'm sure they would appreciate your prayers.

t.p.

Toilet paper in Russia is different than toilet paper in the states... it's not bright white or soft, it doesn't have perforated lines for tearing, and it's not very absorbant. Above is what a normal piece looks like. (kind of like material from a brown paper bag) Amazingly, as time goes on, I kind of like it better than American toilet paper. I can't really explain why, I just do. I like how you can buy one roll and it lasts forever. And somehow it works better. Most of the time.



Most rolls don't have a whole in the center for hanging on a rod. When you get to the end of the roll, it often comes in funny shapes like above. Some are really wild like the picture below:



And here's our curious George playing with t.p. (Those are pants on her head.)

The roll just kept going and going and going....

A Good Week

The English camp turned out really well. The teachers all did a really good job, and the students had a lot of fun. There wasn't a huge turnout, but it enabled us to really connect with those who did come.



Anneka did really well this week. Heidi watched her at our house one day and came to the camp to watch her another day. And then the other days, I pushed Anneka in her stroller to get her to sleep and parked her in the coat closet during the lesson time. She liked socializing with everyone during the other parts of the camp.



On Russian Christmas (Jan. 7th) we decorated cookies. Everyone had a lot of fun and we gifted (and re-gifted) cookies to others.



Several people were so proud of their cookies that they came up and asked me to take their picture with their creation.



There were a lot of great skits at the camp- some funny, some language-oriented, and some really powerful spiritual ones. Zhenya shared about Christ each day and the response was positive.

One day I prayed that God would show us a little glimpse of the fruit he was producing and one of the girls asked if she could start coming to the church's youth club. It's a small thing, but I know it was an answer to that prayer, and we can trust that God did far greater things in people's hearts.

Remember Muffy?

Muffy is our neighbor dog. Leif always said he was a girl and I always said he was a boy... but it turns out she had puppies, so I guess he's a girl. He seems like a boy, though.

Anyways, the surprise cat is Muffy's sister (not biological, of course). She hangs out in the hallway alot, though, like a stray cat. But she slipped into our apartment when Leif had the doors open (we have three doors) to look in the fuse box. We just didn't see her. It's funny because the last two days there's been a second cat out there that looks just like Muffy's sister. But I think she really is a stray cat. They hang out together and throw up and poop together on our stairs.

Ice Sculptures, Surprise Cats, and Grandfather Frost

Merry Christmas! Today is Christmas in Russia. We'll have a special program at the English Camp and our church is holding an outreach to the neighborhood today. Last night after the camp, we headed down to the city square. It was SO cold! The thermometer read -24C, but it seemed colder than that to me. Remember Anneka's layers of clothes from our November post? Now we add another two shirts, another pair of long underwear, and a fleece suit under her snowsuit. And she doesn't even get sweaty.

It was hard to get good pictures because it was dark, but there are loads of amazing ice sculptures in the square, ice slides, and an ice skating rink set up (all made of ice- even the walls around it). It's always fun to be down there with the people and lights and ice.



Here's a giant turtle made out of ice.



And some more ice in the background. It's the year of the cow, so there were lots of cow ice sculptures everywhere.



Some guys from our church were supposed to be doing Dyet Moroz pictures (Grandfather Frost, a.k.a. Santa), but they weren't there and it was so cold we didn't want to go back when they were there. So we found another Santa. This is supposed to be a "professional picture" but it turned out pretty poorly. Oh, well.

Last night when we got home, all of our electricity went out. Leif peered into the fuse box and it looked like it was totally broken, so we called our friend Igor. He dropped everything and made a special trip to our place to fix it for us. We were SO grateful. Leif said that while Igor worked in the fuse box, there was a fireworks show inside. Scary. We were SO thankful, too, for our wonderful neighbors. We cooked our dinner and ate at their apartment while we waited for Igor.

When it was time to put Anneka to bed, it was totally dark still and I put my hand down on her bed to move an object out of the way and it moved! It was a surprise cat! She was curled up, sleeping on the bed!! So funny. haha.

English Day Camp

Most workers have a 10-day vacation right now and university students have almost a month off. It's a good time of the year to plan outreaches and events to invite people to. This week, we're helping with an English Day Camp. The theme is centered around Chrismas and the meaning behind it. Leif and I are in charge of the icebreakers at the beginning. Yesterday was fun with games, songs, a lesson time, and a time for chatting over tea and cake. This picture was taken during a game of Christmas bingo with one of the language groups. We look forward to more fun this week! Pray that many students will come and their hearts will be pierced with the message of Christmas.



Anneka is getting more and more independent with her eating. She likes to be the one with the spoon. I found this bowl with a suction cup on the bottom, but as you can see, it's not fool-proof.

Yuck

While New Years is the biggest holiday of the year, the days following are some of ickiest (in my opinion). The buses stink of alcohol and are filled with either drunk or hung over people. The stairwells are filled with trash. And every year people die because they pass out in the cold and are frozen. Another reminder of the depravity of man and our need for a savior. This is a little picture of a cigarette box, empty bottle, firework packet and other debris in our stairwell.