May 23, 2011

Hi Mom,

 

So correction, I have had one week in the office, but things are going great.  Elder Schmutz (we were in Ivano together) was with me all week to help in the office and then to teach me the area in the evening and it was a lot of fun with him. Elder Kashiwagi and I are finally going to be together this week.  I feel like I have gotten a hold of the office and that there won't be too many more questions, and as far as the area, we will see how the work comes as Elder Kashiwagi and I continue to learn it.  We have a massive area here, the largest in the mission I believe, and it is only one section of the city.  Right now, there are eight missionaries all working in this area, so I am excited for the work. 

 

Here in the office, I have a lot of paperwork, but it is all electronic which is nice.  I sit on the computer from 10 to 5 everyday and I fill out ticket requests, scan and send off visas and contracts, send out anything that needs to be sent through a mail service, and I also have some other small projects.  I put together the mission newsletter every Monday morning which has a lot of numbers, a letter from President Steinagel, some quotes and pictures of baptisms, and then we go out and do our p-day after that.  So we are in the office from 8:30 to 11:30 on Monday.  I do train tickets for everyone by the way, except for President Steinagel.  The assistants do a lot of travel so I have to stay up with that, and I also get tickets for all the senior couples and they travel a lot.  Other things include, transfer letters to the branch presidents, a phone report each month (that was the big project last week; I look at all the phone calls of missionaries to make sure they use their phones correctly).    I also pick up mail each week.  So yeah, that is about it.

 

So Elder Kashiwagi is from Arizona and is in his fifth transfer now.  Oh and the temple desk just calls the missionaries here in the office if a non-member ever walks in. Some of the temple desk workers are Americans that don't know the language so we help them out.  And yeah, we just ask if they want to find out more about the church and how they can enter the temple. 

I hope that Jacob's farewell was a lot of fun.  I am sure that he did great and that he will be an awesome missionary.  Send me his address when you get it please.  I am glad to hear that Jake is planning on turning in his papers soon and I think that I might be home for that which would be great.  I hope that everyone is doing well.  Oh and Sean is now in a city called Cherkassy, south of Kyiv.  And by the way, I am probably coming home with Sean because I need to come home earlier for school so if he stays the late transfer, we will go home together which will be neat.  There will be lots of us heading back to Salt Lake I think.

 

So the weather here is incredibly hot - it is summer time and I am suffering.  It has just been hot, but I will be fine.  I just need to get used to it.  Tell Chelsea good luck by the way on her lesson.  That will be a great experience to get to learn a lot more about President Kimball.  I really like him a lot and hope that I can study more of his life when I get home.  We will go back to the Teachings of the Presidents so I will definitely have a chance.

Anyway, I love you mom.  Thanks for all that you do and for your support.  I love you so much.  Thanks for always putting up with me when I was a pain back home and for teaching me all that you did.  I love you.

 

Elder Jones

May 16, 2011 - Photos

Hey Mom,

So here are pictures of the temple, the office, a sunset, Elder Schmutz and me with a hedgehog, and then Elder Kashiwagi, my new companion. 

Enjoy!

May 16, 2011

Hi Mom,

So this last week was a crazy one, but I am finally getting settled in to my new home, the mission office, right next door to the temple.  So yeah, I am now in Kyiv, in the Borshahivskiy ward which is the biggest ward in Eastern Europe, at least until it gets split which may happen soon.  As far as p-day, I think that it should stay the same.  I have to come to the office every Monday to do work, so I will probably write Monday morning.  Anyway, so I have a lot of things to explain I guess, now that I have a new assignment in the office.

First off, my companion is Elder Kashiwagi who is in his 5th transfer and just came from Rivne.  It is going to be a fun transfer as both of us are new and have never served in Kyiv.  Luckily we have Elder Schmutz and Fredrickson, the former office Elders who will basically be training us for the next few weeks so I will get to know the area and work just fine.  I have been on exchages with Elder Schmutz all weekend to get to know the area and then on the weekdays, he is training me on how to do the office work.  It is really neat, because there are 2 office Elders, and then the Parks who are the office couple, and then the Assistants to the Presidents, as well as the mission secretary, all in the office.  And President Steinagel as well, when he is around.  It is going to be a lot of fun I am sure.  By the way, I am in charge of travel and documents so I have to take care of visa and passport things and make sure that those are all copied and sent to the visa man, and I also get to buy all the train tickets for missionaries and make sure they get around.  Plus I have a couple of other things which I am privileged to handle.  It will be a lot of fun I hope. We are in the office every Monday morning where I put the mission newsletter together, and then Tuesday through Friday from 10 to 5.  So our opportunities to do missionary work are really cut down here, but we still talk to lots of people everyday and we have already had a couple of people show up to the temple site, wanting to go in and they were referred to us.  We got one new investigator, Igor, who came to church and two more people that may potentially become investigators.  Plus here we get to work with a lot of awesome members who are all so ready to do missionary work.  This is really a great area to serve in, even if the missionary opportunities are cut down.  Hmm, I am sure there is a lot more to say, but I don't know right now so if you have questions, please ask them.

Tell Luke congrats on his mission call.  I am so excited for him and I am sure that he will have an incredible experience.  And tell Dewey that I say congrats as well.

Wow, that ended up being a lot shorter than I thought it would be.  I just don't really know what else to say.  Please ask questions and I will answer them next week.  Thanks for all that you do Mom!

I love you and I can't wait to hear from you again.

Love,

Elder Jones

May 9, 2011 - Photos

Hey Mom,

So I did get the pictures.  I am also glad to hear that sacrament meeting went well.  I hope that everyone enjoyed it.  So I figured that instead of writing a lot, because we just talked yesterday, I will just send some pictures so here goes...thanks for calling yesterday by the way.  I hope that you had a wonderful Mother's Day.

Love,

Elder Jones

By the way, I tried to find some that I am in.  I don't know if I have sent some of these but I will send them anyway.  Enjoy!

 

 

May 8, 2011 - Mother's Day phone call!

Sunday morning we were able to talk with Ryan for Mother's Day.  It was so wonderful to hear his voice.  He is doing well and is loving his mission and the people of Ukraine.  We asked him some questions so I thought I would include a little of that information.

I asked him about Ivano-Frankivsk where he is currently serving.  He said the city is very green.  It is hilly countryside and there is agriculture everywhere.  He said most families have plots outside the city where they grow their food.  It is super humid and the temperature was 40 degrees that day, cold and very wet with a snow/hail mix.  He said there are usually around 35 people at church and the missionaries.  He spends pretty much every Sunday translating Sacrament meeting for those who don't speak Ukrainian and teaches an English lesson for the African members there.  He said the city is around 200,000 people and you could walk across it in an hour.  It is by the Carpathian mountains.

His current companion, Elder Belashov is a convert and the only member in his family.  He's been a member around four years.  His family is supportive, but not interested in the church and they are from a village with not much money.

When I asked him if he was sleeping well, he said the bed in Ivano is his favorite so far even though it is too short.  The walkway to the building has a sign low enough that he would hit his head if he didn't duck.  Okay, I guess my son is taller than most Ukrainians.  :)

I asked him how the food was there.  He says he loves the food in Ukraine.  They eat a lot of pasta, rice and meats and their monthly budget just went up so they should be able to get more fruit and vegetables.  They never have dinner appointments, but the older sisters will usually feed them when they go over to do service for them (such as mowing their lawns, carrying things for them.)  He usually eats two meals a day, breakfast and lunch, and then stop at a store at night for a snack.  They usually eat at home.  His favorite food so far are the Ukrainian cabbage rolls and the weirdest food are the holodets (jellied minced meat- don't google it, I'm warning you, it will make you nauseous.)

P-days they usually hang out as a district (his city where there are 4 missionaries) and they've been playing Risk.  Someone made a Risk board up and they play the game.

Overall he is doing great and really enjoying his time.  We invited his friend, Jacob, so they could say hi since Jacob leaves soon for his mission and they won't see each other for 3 1/2 years.  I just enjoyed being to hear his voice!

May 2, 2011 - Photos

Photos!

Elder Jackson and me (sorry, but I was making a weird face)

Sister Daniya and me - She is the best member missionary I have ever met

The fountain next to the hotel

The hotel near our house and the church

Train tracks

A Catholic church 

 District Lunch

 Elder Belashov, doing service

Sunset

"Happy Trails" in Ukrainian as we left a town

Tlumach, the name of the town

Ukrainian countryside

3 Horsepower ;)

 More country

The district, walking down a dusty road

I had to throw this in.  This is someone's seat in the stands.  It is probably a king that sits there.  It is just really funny that someone put that in the stands. 

Enjoy!

May 2, 2011

Mom,

You are so silly.  I am excited for next week too.  (I told him I was excited to talk with him on Mother's Day.)  And as far as details, I give them when I can, but I usually just don't know what to say.  (This is referring to details of what he does each day.)  For me, each and every day is about the same so there isn't usually a lot to tell.  Oh and I will try to send pictures when I find some that I want to send.  I don't have much new, and hardly have anything with me.

So I got the talk that you sent and I have been studying it.  Thanks a ton.  I think that is really cool that you are going to be able to speak next week in church.  Good luck.  I hope that I have sent you enough details to know what to say about my mission experience.  I can tell you now that it is without a doubt the best and most important thing I have ever done.  By the way, you have to let me know how Jacob's farewell goes.  I will probably write him a quick note next week.  And I haven't heard from Curtis, but I print off and read his blog updates and that is enough.

So this week was a pretty slow one here.  We had some great weather, but the work is still really slow.  We got to go out to a town that is about 30 minutes away as a district and spent the day there talking to people.  We met a really cool guy who is the neighbor of a member that lives there so hopefully we can start working with him.  The weather took a nasty turn yesterday and it has been raining very steadily for 18 hours now.  I am sure it will be a wet week.  Church was good yesterday and one of the families blessed their new baby daughter which was really cool.  The blessings of families and the priesthood really are so great.  What an awesome blessing to have the knowledge that we have as well.  I know that this church is true.  I have truly developed a deep love for our Savior on my mission and I know that He does love us as well.  Through Him we can become better people each day as we strive to do what God has commanded.  I know that the gospel is true and by living the principles that we are taught, we can become perfected.  This is our purpose here and the Church exists to help make that possible.  I love you and can't wait for Sunday.  Thanks as always for being an awesome example.

Love,

Elder Jones