new mission president

Hellllooo family. 

Interesting Fact #4130 : Irons heat up really really really fast here. Like within maybe 15 seconds or so. BAM! It's nice. Oh by the way, Mom, I have been ironing everday for the past 2 months or so. Guess who can iron now? Me.

Well again another interesting week here in Vyborg. Well to start, I got a new Mission President. President Podvodov's time was up here as a mission president (they serve for 3 years), so he went home. Well there have been some complications here in the St. Petersburg mission. Remember when I told you I met the new mission president in the MTC? Well he couldn't get a visa into Russian because he used to be a test airplane pilot in the U.S. Well, I suppose that's understandable. So they called President Clark, who was originally going to go to Alaska and serve as President there, but got transfered here to Russia. I guess Sarah Palin was right. Russia is pretty close to Alaska. The strange thing of it all is that, President Clark isn't here yet. He may come in a week, or maybe a month. So in that time, they called President Neuenshwander, who was in the area 70 here, to be the Mission President for the time being. He also is the Patriarch for this area. He also does the Church History in Moscow. He also is fluent in Russian. Oh, he served in Finland, so he knows Finnish. And by being the Mission President here, he acts as the Stake President for the whole entire mission as well. This man is a complete champ. So this last weekend we went back down to St. Petersburg and had a mission conference with him. He has changed a lot of the rules and got rid of most of them, but I have never heard more encouragement to work hard from anyone before. Our mission is up to us. We need to choose for ourselves. Be Responsible. It was an awesome conference, and I learned a lot. Yeah. This transfer is kind of strange for reasons that are obvious, but, my loyalty is first to the Lord, then the mission president, and then your companion. 

The Conference ended off way strongly as well. They fed us Papa John's. Oh yeah, Russian pizza is different, but so good. That was my first real taste of American Fast Food in Russia. Not bad, my friends. Not bad at all. I stayed the Assistants to the President's apartment in Malookhtinsky. One of the Elder's has a guitar. It felt so good to play. I haven't played on in so long. 

To be honest, this transfer is going by very fast, but the work has slowed down a lot. It's just been different. Nothing really exciting has been going on except President Neuenschwander and Pizza. We did have this lesson with an investigator and his wife who was a member. That in itself was just a weird experience. My companion really likes to argue, and it makes it really difficult to feel the Spirit. I'm still trucking through with this. I have really got to him calm down a little bit more, and to be more organized and clean. It hasn't been easy, but for once my apartment is almost spotless. I am cleaning the kitchen every night and picking up stuff. I feel like a mom sometimes. But he's starting to learn that the Spirit doesn't dwell in messy places. It's way true. 

He made this soup called Shee this week. It was absolutely amazing. It was like a sour cabbage soup with cream and carrots and stuff. It sounds gross, but it was absolutely amazing. He is really good at making soups. His borsh and shee have been grandiose. My meals consists mostly of chicken and meats and mashed potatoes. Although, i did make enchiladas a couple days ago. Those were pretty great. 

Last night, we had a lesson with on my favorite families, the Balkovs. This family wants us to meet with them every week. It's just a mom, an older son my age, and two younger kids at 10 and 12. The dad is in jail, so the family has been just having some rough times. We go there to help support them everyweek and have a little spiritual thought or fun lesson for them. They are seriously my absolute favorite families here. I prepared a spiritual thought using the big Nikon camera I got from Kellie's dad. I related every part of the camera to our purpose in life. They really had fun with it, and it made me happy. We made them these coconut pie things for them as well, which they seemed to like. Meeting with them is seriously the highlight of my week.

Service at the castle is the same old, same old. Moving books around and stuff. It's actually been absolutely unbearably hot here. It's like 40 degrees C or so, at 100 percent humidity. I don't think I have ever sweated as much as I have in my life, with the exception of that one time where Katie, Ryan, Josh, and I went into the steamroom at the Zumat ski resort this last Christmas. That was pretty dang hot. It's relaxed here a little bit, which is good. I am just afraid what -30 is gonna be like in this humidity.... We will see. I am going to be buying my winter stuff this fall. I can't find a thing here. They ain't gonna be selling huge jackets in this weather. haha

Anywho, Things are going by. I like my companion, but there are just things that I am trying to work out. I have definitely have been blessed with extreme patience, and I thank you, dear reader, for praying for me for that purpose. I definitely needed it. 

Anyway, I love you all. Like really. and to quote Albert, "Really?" "yes" "really, really?" "yes" "Like... really really really?" yes" "Really times infinite". That's how much I love you, family. Really times infinite.

Love,
Elder Tekulve