Week 58- JUNE- Thunder Thighs

Now this could go into two directions. I could comment on the monsoon weather, daily overcast skies and lighting and thunder storms. Or i can go onn about the amount of running around and flights of stairs ive climed and conquered. Im beginning to think that the being covered in a constant sweat glaze and legs burning with every stair i step up is going to be a normal thing...

What a week! For just having moved into a new apartment i haven't even really had a chance to unpack and move in and have been living out of a suitcase the past week moving to and fro from Kiev to...Brovary! 

Just love being a missionary, fun using mom's inspiration, using ideas for games and lessons, scripture inserts, reading a Liahona while trying to keep balance on a metro to finish preparing for lesson. Im beginning to be a little worried that home is gonna be boring! Good thing i got a line of boys to date when i get home. Oh....*realize reality face*

Speaking of the dating life im pretty sure posters are going to start going up on all forms of public transportation banning a particular sister missionary as she bellows out laughter reading about her parents romantic "stallion date" by means of golf carts and discount sandwhiches, or your best friend booty rolling during Zumba on her mission in Argentina, or your sister confessing to not wanting a fruitcake of a son by letting him play with girl dolls.

Today is the first solid day i have been with good ol' Sister Roberston for the past week as she just got back from Latvia from her visa trip. Is it strange to say i feel "home?" Spending time back in Brovary was great, seeing how the once cold, icy, white barren park is now a green fluffy swamp paradise, and seeing all the faces of those i have come to love, the awkward squeals with open arms, screeches, and a quick revolving into handshake (goodness i really am going to have some great dating stories in my future. Can't wait to tell you about those.)

Well of course i went to go and visit the Clarks! Even after a month it was the best to see all those dirt covered children coming running down the road to slam the breath right out of me. We had a great afternoon of swing pushing, baseball bat swinging...and missing, raking, and flower smelling.

It was really great to be able to have those last few days in Brovary to close some ends up. To craddle your dear loved ones once more (figurativly here people, im no white hand book rule breaker) and then to oh so carefully transfer them over to the next caretakers. If you can  end your day drinking ice water from a pickle jar, wearing soft as butter floral aladin pants, scratching mosquito bites as big as your face...you know it's been a good day.

These next mass of pictures is what you get when you give a 6 year old a camera and complete freedom...

You know what i don't understand? When people who are of another faith have the same faith and believes and desires as you but don't see that it is THIS gospel that can fill those deepest desires! I feel the goblin king from the Labyrinth swirling a crystal ball around my hand while sporting sparkling eye shadow, tights, and a mullet saying, "Follow me, love me, just do as i say and all of your dreams will come true." It breaks my poor heart when one of my most dearest potentials believes that the ordinances of baptism should not be performed on an infant, that ordinances should exist, and that "someday" there will be one faith and one church. Where is that veil and how can i get my hands on it to yank it up? Ok, the Spirit just whispered to me.....Patience. Blast.

Oh and here's a good quote for you, "You are what you do everyday." Amen to that.

Now how about another one on not so much a serious scale? I was walking down the sidewalk with Sister Larcabal and we were walking past a theater when we caught sight of the poster for How To Train Your Dragon 2 and she says, "You know you've been on your mission a long time when you see a cartoon character and think...dang he got good look'n." Yes world, sister missionaries are still human.

In the life of a missionary there is no such thing as "1". There will always be "2", and sometimes that creates a lot of complications. This past week has felt like one of those jigsaw mind puzzles of trying to make switches with scrammbled companionships and threesomes, but all at the staying as a pair. I guess those ridiculous math problems in math books really do help you in life..."You have three sister missionaries in Latvia, and one mixed companionship in Brovary on Monday. Friday only two sisters come back from Latvia leaving one sister missionary behind. Those two sisters arrive in Kiev only to find that they don't have a key to the apartment and the key is with one of the sisters in Brovary. How are you going to get that key to the other set of sisters, and plan accordinally to get 3 different sisters at three difference locations all at the same time on Sunday and still be at the mission office in time to pick up the sister from Latvia who will be arriving at 11:32 am at approximate speed of 786mph? Go.

One of our potentials found this little guy hanging out around a fish market, so she scooped it up and took it home!

It doesn't show but im in love

A classic birds eye view of Brovary

So during an unexpected evening in Kiev  we went out to contact to the church and we, thinking we would be adventerous, decided to take an unknown route which just so happend to be against the wind and directly towards the black clouds. What started as a light sprinking soon became one of the hardest downpoors this sisters missionary has yet to experience...without an umbrella. The hair and clothing was a lost cause, my shoes began to become musical with a rythmic "squish sqaush squish squirt squash", and i did everything in my power to keep my Book of Mormon dry but tucking it under my cardigan. So hunched over, drunken with water, waterproof mascara SO not being waterproof, and with my hand grasping something underneath my cardigan i guess i can't blame others for really not wanting anything to do with us.

These clouds showed no mercy

Post rain storm

We got a great view of a bike race right from our apartment window

Happy Mountain? What happened to you?

Trying to avoid the swamp we had to scale this wall on the way to church

One of the craziest moments is when you run into one of your good friends in the metro who you went backpacking with across Europe from when you were in ILP together.Small world!

Oh here's another good quote. When finally going down to bed my companion said, "Sometimes when i go to bed i like to imagine President called me and told me to have the day off and to go take a nap, then sleeping feels even better." Yes world, sister missionaries are, in fact, human. Not only that but when a sister missionary get's a suprise wedding announcment in the mail it's actually quite possible for the sister missionary the next minute to be sitting alone in the kitchen slumped over a tupperward container eating spoonfulls of cold leftover alfredo sauce...it happens, ive seen it.

So after one hectic week im back in Perchersky. Pretty excited to get my missionary feet firmly planted on the ground and get out there and really just do the best i can do. 

My family and friends have been on my mind a lot lately, things can change in an instant and so i just want to thank you all, this instant, how much i love and appreciate everything you have done for me. For all of your positive encouragment and influences, your testimonies and emails that my abs to this day don't think they will ever recover from, and they are eternally grateful.

XOXOXOXO

-Cестра Ро