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!

july 20-21

July 20

This morning church began at 12 and the service was great. The building and the people just made it feel like family. We sang some songs from the hymnal, Michael, Brandon and I each spoke briefly before Olga, the pastor’s wife, spoke on community and what the church should look like. Ksysha translated the whole service, which was such a blessing. She has really done such a wonderful job of making sure we understand what is going on and including us. We sang some more songs and talked with people after the service and made some plans for later to meet up again. There was still some leftover soup and kasha from working the day before so some of us had lunch and tea there at the church before heading home. We had about 2 hours before we were meeting up with people again so we had a short Russian lesson, started some laundry and had a quick nap to be rested. Around 5:30 we met up with Anya, Nastya, Sasha, Vika, Misha, Nadya, Dima and his sister and her boyfriend at a Christian cafe for a pizza dinner and some more fellowship. It had finally cooled off a bit so we decided to take advantage of the weather and walk home. We stayed up chatting and putting out clothes to dry (which for some reason all turned blue) for a bit since we had no early morning plans. We were pretty tired though, so everyone went to bed pretty soon in our cozy ninth floor flat (which makes for great exercise when the elevator is slightly more than sketchy).

July 21

We slept in this morning and hung out around the flat before Anya and Nadya came over and we all went to lunch at the bellini cafe. Pavel and Olga (the pastors) came to pick us up around 3:30 to head about an hour outside of Syktyvkar to a Komi church. While there we shared a little about ourselves, prayed, sang songs and just had a wonderful time with the women of the church. The pastor there spoke a little English and since Ksysha wasn’t there to translate, she and Michael translated and it worked just fine. We sang some songs in Russian, some in English and some in Komi. The pastor of the church’s uncle had translated the Bible into the Komi language not too long ago (about 1981) and that was a really cool story to hear since the Komi people have their own language and culture and now they have the Gospel. The women of the church were a lot of fun and really encouraging to see new believers despite their age. They were encouraged by our youth, and we were by their wisdom. We walked down to the river (a journey all too similar to our last trip to the river in Syktyvkar, which I will not recount, only this time with mostly little old women) to wet our feet and watch the sun. When we returned, we had cake, bread and jam, and cucumber sandwiches with our tea and learned a little of the Komi language while practicing our Russian as well. It was a great experience being able to fellowship with the women in the Komi church and we ar so thankful that the pastors presented this opportunity to us!

july 19

July 19

Today we met up walked over to the church and met up with several members and the pastors to do some work on the church grounds. Their church is not a typical church building, but rather a house where the upstairs is the sanctuary and the downstairs is the kitchen and fellowship area to have tea. It is pretty awesome. There is a pretty big backyard as well for more fellowship events. There were a lot of us there so we were able to do a good bit of work. We took down the fence in the backyard to put up a new one (which hopefully we will be able to do on Monday or Tuesday). Brandon used the weed eater and cleared most all of the backyard (this time with no stork following around behind him) for most of the time we worked. There was a lot of wood left over from the fence and from a house that had been torn down behind their property, so the girls mainly worked on making the firewood and stacking it. The pastor sawed the logs and planks, Sasha used the axe on the stumps, and we carried and stacked the wood to stock up for the long winter ahead. They have been able to use the wood from the house though for about seven years now so it has been a huge blessing for the cold and snowy winters for the church. We took a break for lunch and then finished working around 5 and had some tea and more fellowship time.

After saying goodbyes until the morning, we went back to the flat to grab our bathing suits and meet up with Anya, Nastya, Sasha, and Vika to go to the river for a little swim. We took two taxis out a ways and were let out and then the adventure began. We walked down a street, which turned into a path, which turned into a field, under some pipes, through another field, which turned into a dried up river, up a hill, through some gushy mud like substance that they claimed was sand (I am still skeptical of this), which led to a small river that we crossed to our final destination of a small island of sand in the middle of a deceptively powerful current. We swam for a while and played something akin to badminton but with a small ball. It was a really fun and relaxing time to hang out with new friends and fellow believers. After the sun began to set, we followed our footsteps back we parted for the evening and went back to the flat for some pasta and veggies (and much needed showers!) around 10pm. Today has been a great day and we are really excited about the service tomorrow!

june 26

June 26

After a full of day of traveling, we relaxed for most of the rest of the day.  We put our stuff in the church in Riga and walked to a little restaurant near all of the fishing boats for dinner before Gatis picked up us to go back to camp.  Little did we know we were in for another adventure.  Gatis had a small car, and a full trunk.  Since there were four of us and all of our luggage, we had to pack strategically.    By that of course, I mean that we had bags between our legs, behind our heads, and in our laps.  Saying it was a full car would be an understatement.  So as though we had plenty of space, we stopped at the store on the way back to camp for some stuff.  All three of the guys went in and then packed even more stuff on top of us and in any open space we could find in the car.  Pair this with pumping euro trance music and you have one interesting ride.    We watched the last semi-final game of the Euro Cup (Spain vs. Russia – Spain won) before heading to bed.  It seems that travel days just seem to leave us whipped out.  Tomorrow begins the leadership retreat so we are excited for more people to show up!