july 23-24

July 22 – 24

Tuesday we walked around the town and went to the national art gallery with Anya and Ksysha. The gallery was really cool because there was art from all over the world and a lot from Russia and specifically the Komi Republic, which is where Syktyvkar is located. We went by a small souvenir shop before heading home to change to go work at the church again. We had a lunch of homemade borche and rice and meat made by Olga at the church. More firewood was to be cut and stacked so most everyone worked on that and Brandon and Vova started building the new fence. We worked until about 8:30 or 9 and then Michael went to the pastor’s house and Brandon, Ksysha, and I went to Vova’s house (Nastya’s dad). We hung out there for a while and got to talk with Nastya and see pictures and hear stories of them when they were younger and use the internet as well. It was good to get to talk more with her and share stories.

Wednesday, our last day in Syktyvkar, was spent packing up most of the morning after sleeping in and having a brunch of scrambled eggs with meat, cheese, and tomatoes. We went to the church around 3 for lunch and tea with the pastors and Anya. We spent the next bit of time preparing for everyone else to come for the picnic in the evening. There was a lot of cutting cucumbers and tomatoes, washing potatoes, and skewering shasliki (this time chicken that had been marinating since the day before). The boys also took on the quite manly task of ensuring flames to cook over. When everyone arrived, we had a small time of worship and took communion together. The pastors had gotten us each a small gift to remember Syktyvkar and them by so they gave it to us then. The people of this church are just so loving and the whole church family is really just that, a big family. We sat around the makeshift table outside (flat wood on crates with tablecloths) and sat on blankets on the grass and shared a wonderful meal together of shasliki and sausage and loads of other things. It was a great time talking and laughing and just being present with other believers. After dinner we played a couple of games before having tea and making sure everyone had put their pictures on Ksysha’s computer and all email addresses had been exchanged. We said some sad goodbyes before making our way back to the flat. The people here have such a good heart and will be missed a lot. We had our farewell tea with Ksysha before bed since we had to leave so early for our train, which was quite sad since we’d spent so much time with her and she had done such an amazing job translating for us.

Thursday was an early start, leaving the flat by 7am to make it to our train. The pastors and Vova picked us up and then Nadya met us at the train station for one last goodbye. Michael, Brandon and I had tickets for the four person compartment, and ended up having the compartment to ourselves so we used the forth bed for our luggage which was really nice to create some more room. Not much to say for a 26 hour train ride…we read, talked, snacked, slept, and repeated. Thankfully it was pretty cool on the train and we had a breeze because our window couldn’t close all the way (we couldn’t open it more however).

All in all we are safe in Moscow and looking forward to the youth camp that starts on Monday!